The Seat of Magic

by J. Kathleen Cheney

  It was as if he’d known meeting with her father would overset her. There was so much buzzing around in her mind, too many problems all at once. One had been bothering her since their morning discussion in the hallway. “Duilio, from what are you . . . backing off?”

  He rose, picked up a heavy woolen throw from the foot of the bed and laid it over her, and settled in the chair again. He touched her outstretched hand, wrapping his warm fingers around hers. “Right now, I am your friend, and that’s all.”

  And for the moment, she suspected a friend was what she needed most.

  * * *

  Oriana was asleep in only a few minutes, her hand slipping out of his grasp. Duilio rose and made his way out of the room, closing the door softly behind him. He had notes to dispatch and plans to make, so he made his way down to his desk in the library. But his mind kept drifting, far away from the tasks at hand.

  Now that Oriana seemed to be feeling better—temper not withstanding—she wouldn’t be satisfied waiting in the house and trying on new clothes all day. Duilio couldn’t see her remaining a hired companion. His mother was right about that. Oriana had to figure out what her new calling in life would be. She was resourceful and intelligent, both qualities he admired in her. She was, he suspected, the equal of a man in every way.

  From the first time he’d laid eyes on her, he’d sensed her importance. He’d felt Oriana would play some part in the rest of his life.

  He’d had women before. He had always chosen carefully, seeking lovers who would be interested in an affair but nothing more—women who didn’t need his money, who had no interest in marriage, and who were discreet. Unlike Alessio, he had never enjoyed the pursuit. He preferred a comfortable relationship, one that provided companionship and offered an outlet for his physical needs. Most of those relationships had lasted for some time—months, or even a year—before he had moved to another city. But when he returned home, he hadn’t wanted to risk his family’s safety by taking up with a woman who might not be a Sympathizer. So there hadn’t been a woman in his life—or his bed—for well over a year now.

  Oriana had asked what he was backing away from. He pinched his nose as he considered that. He’d been considering it for weeks, actually. There was only one acceptable answer. He wanted her to marry him.

  That wasn’t going to be easy. There were legal bars to marrying one of her people, although Monteiro had worked around that, hadn’t he?

  “I would like Oriana to marry me,” he said softly, trying out the words in the library’s silence. Yes, I like the sound of that.

  But he needed to give her time and space to make up her mind about her own life before he asked her for more. So for now, he decided, he would be good. He would strive for propriety in his interactions with her. I will wait.

  He didn’t like the sound of that, but he would survive.

  CHAPTER 16

  Joaquim Tavares made his way along Fábrica Street, pondering his most recent meeting with Inspector Gaspar. Much as the man unnerved him, he had to admit that Gaspar was a thorough investigator. He’d carefully studied the list of missing women, most of whom were prostitutes or beggars—the sort of women policemen didn’t usually worry over. They were often transient, moving from one place to another, so most officers felt their disappearances could be explained away. Others felt women like that weren’t worth their time, that their “sins” relegated them to a less-than-human status.

  Joaquim had never looked at them that way. His own mother had sold herself on the streets of Barcelona, forced into it by none other than her father, a man who should have taken care of her but used her instead to finance his careless life. She’d married anyway, to a man who was kind to her and brought her to Portugal, far away from her past—the elder Joaquim Tavares. No one knew that part of her history save her husband and the Ferreira family, and they never spoke of it. But Joaquim never forgot, so he was grateful that Gaspar seemed to be taking the women’s deaths as seriously as he did.

  And as much as Gaspar bothered him, he was beginning to suspect that the man was right. Gaspar had confronted him two weeks before when Duilio had been lost in the river after his rowboat had been hit broadside by a yacht. Gaspar had yelled at him to find Duilio, and he’d supplied the answer without thinking. Duilio and Miss Paredes had been located the next morning exactly where he’d predicted, on the beach near the southern breakwater at the mouth of the river. It probably wasn’t a coincidence.

  Gaspar, whose own gift was to recognize those of others, believed that Joaquim was a finder, a witch who could locate people, particularly if they knew the other well. He had been able to take Duilio directly to the island where Oriana was held. He never got lost. And his own mother had never lost track of him when he was a child. She had to be the one from whom he inherited the gift.

  It made sense, in a way, but he hated being forced to deal with the notion of being a witch. He’d spent most of his life denying it.

  He shoved his hands into his pockets, mind ticking away as he walked along.

  He had other problems to solve, ones larger than his personal issues. He hadn’t mentioned the dead selkie to Gaspar, or the otter girl. Those deaths were disturbing in a different way. What recourse did a selkie have if a crime was committed against her? If a selkie—or a sereia or whatever else—came to him to report a crime, he would never turn them over to the Special Police to be prosecuted for the mere act of living in the Golden City.

  Was he the only officer who felt that way? Were there others, each keeping their investigations secret from their superiors and other officers? There probably were. He couldn’t be the only one. Surely they could all find a way to work together.

  He stopped on the cobbles.

  Something is wrong.

  He couldn’t pinpoint what made him so sure of that, but it seemed he’d played out this day before, as if he knew he was going to . . .

  A cry caught his ear, a woman calling for help.

  Joaquim ran, bolting toward the voice. He ran past half a dozen houses and turned into a vacant lot created by the removal of a narrow building. A smartly dressed young woman struggled with a stocky man there, her hands in his grasp.

  “Let her go!” Joaquim yelled.

  The man spotted him and dropped her hands. He ran away from the street and was out of Joaquim’s sight almost instantly.

  Joaquim went to the frightened girl. She was tugging her gloves on with shaking hands, revealing that one had torn in her attacker’s grasp. The man had knocked off her hat in the struggle and her braid had come loose, trailing down over her shoulder now. Her head was bowed as she gazed at her hands. He couldn’t see her face from that angle.

  “Are you hurt, miss?” Joaquim asked as he retrieved her felt hat from near a pile of old cobbles. He dusted it off with one hand.

  She looked about as if she’d lost something else. “He threw my handbag away,” she mumbled. “Where is my handbag?”

  Joaquim peered down the narrow slot between the two buildings, no more than ten feet across. Vegetation ruled the center of the block, hedged about by old houses, and he couldn’t see any sign of her attacker now. Surely the man had taken her bag with him. But no, he spotted a small beaded handbag not far from where her hat had landed. He made his way around the pile of cobbles and retrieved it. She wiped her cheeks with the side of one gloved finger, valiantly trying to put the fright behind her. When he held out her bag, she reached out one small hand, her eyes lifting to meet his for the first time.

  Joaquim forgot to breathe.

  “Thank you, sir,” she said as he mechanically deposited the bag in her hand.

  He knew that face.

  Not from a photograph of her, not a drawing from a friend’s description. She wasn’t one of the missing women in his files. But he knew her face like the back of his own hands: the deep brown eyes, the curl that had come loose from her bra
id and curved against her cheek, that ivory-pale skin, the soft lips. How can she be here, this woman from my dreams?

  “I must thank you, Mr. . . . ?” she said in a voice that he recognized now. A narrow line formed between her smoothly arched brows.

  How long had he been gaping at her like an idiot? Joaquim mentally shook himself and rubbed a hand over his face. “Tavares,” he answered. “There’s no need, miss. I was walking this way anyway. Did he hurt you?”

  She shook her head quickly. “No, no. He ripped my glove, but . . .” She lifted her chin and favored him with a shy smile. “But he didn’t take anything, Mr. Tavares. Thanks to you.”

  Joaquim felt a flush warm his cheeks. “Can I escort you, then, to make certain you get home safely?”

  “Yes,” she said after a brief hesitation, those beautiful brown eyes lifting to his again. “I would like that.”

  * * *

  When Oriana appeared in the front sitting room before dinner, her hair had been neatly done up into a very proper bun. She once more wore the jet earrings and brooch set. Her brown skirt didn’t look rumpled, which made Duilio suspect Teresa—who was acting as Oriana’s maid—had insisted on pressing it again. Oriana seemed composed now and answered his mother’s queries about the visit to the Monteiro office with as little detail as possible. His mother quickly caught her unease and moved to another topic. She picked up the French book about the sereia. “I have been meaning to discuss this book with you, Miss Paredes. I suspect its validity.”

  Oriana took the offending text from her, squinted at the nearly unreadable lettering on the cloth-covered spine, and then glanced at the frontispiece. “I don’t have French, Lady Ferreira.”

  His mother waved away that objection. “I suspect the author drew the wrong conclusions about many things. As Duilinho has informed me he intends to let Filho chase murderers on his own tonight, he can read some of it for us.”

  Oriana shot a quizzical glance at Duilio and mouthed, “Murderers?”

  “Later,” he mouthed back at her. He had written to Joaquim, begging off for the evening. He wanted to be available should Oriana wish to talk about her visit to her father’s office. He was grateful, though, that his mother had hit on such an excellent distraction. Aloud, he explained, “I’ve mentioned this book to you before, but I couldn’t find it. It turns out that Erdano somehow managed to break one leg of his bed and filched a pile of books from the library to prop it up, this one among them. Probably the best use for the thing, as it is truly awful. Mother thinks someone should write a more accurate book about your people.”

  “And that would be you?” Oriana asked.

  “I lack the experience needed, Miss Paredes. I’ve never even seen the islands. You, however . . .”

  “Ah,” she said, “I’m to be the expert.”

  Cardenas appeared in the doorway to announce that dinner was ready. Duilio held out an arm for his mother, but inclined his head in Oriana’s direction. “Perhaps after dinner, I can read the first chapter to you, Miss Paredes.”

  “Of course, Mr. Ferreira,” she said, a hint of laughter in her voice.

  * * *

  “The writer says there are very few males,” Lady Ferreira commented once they’d retired to the front sitting room after dinner. “Does that disparity exist?”

  “Yes,” Oriana said. They had discussed Monsieur Matelot’s questionable book over dinner, a topic that seemed likely to last all night. “Among our people there are approximately two females born for every male. In the past it was closer to three to one but over the last several generations, that’s been changing.”

  Duilio made a note in the margin of the book itself. Apparently he didn’t share her father’s horror of writing in books. “I don’t think human numbers are exactly even, either,” he commented aloud, “although I’m not certain what the percentages are.”

  “Among selkies,” his mother offered, “it’s closer to ten to one.”

  The lady sat on the other end of the pale beige couch, so Oriana shifted about to face her more directly, tugging at her brown skirt to get it to cooperate. “Is that why the females live in harems? Because there aren’t enough males?”

  Lady Ferreira’s eyes slid to her gloved hands. “The harems are principally for protection. It’s safer to live in a group. The male is there for . . . breeding purposes. They’re honestly not that useful otherwise.”

  Oriana couldn’t hold in the peal of laughter that bubbled out. She could only image Erdano’s offense should anyone tell him that. Duilio had a studiously uninterested look on his face, but Oriana wasn’t fooled for a moment. His lips were pressed into a thin line, barely keeping his amusement inside. She turned back to Lady Ferreira. “So they don’t provide protection?”

  “Not much,” the lady said, the corners of her eyes crinkling. “They’re so often gone hunting new females that it’s usually up to the queen to prevent that sort of predation.”

  That sounded harsh, but Oriana had learned that many things about selkie life were. “It seems unfair to his queen.”

  Lady Ferreira smiled at her. “It is difficult. I was not well suited to that life.”

  Of course, she’d been queen of a harem at one point. “Because you were raised among humans?”

  “Yes,” Lady Ferreira said. “I have to admit, when a human man offered himself, I found the idea terribly attractive.”

  “And your mate didn’t fight to keep you in the harem?”

  “I don’t think mate is the correct word, Miss Paredes. Mate implies a one-to-one relationship, does it not? But no, Guidano feared that should another female want to be his queen, she would kill me to have my place. So when Duilio’s father took an interest in me, Guidano encouraged it.”

  And that explained why, despite having borne him a son, the selkie male had given her up to a human lover. Oriana had wondered. “Did you love him?”

  “Guidano?” She waved one hand vaguely. “I was fond of him. He was kind, but not terribly clever.”

  That told Oriana a great deal about that relationship. She caught Duilio’s eye. He didn’t seem upset, so she suspected he’d heard all of this before.

  “Forgive me for asking,” Lady Ferreira said, “but selkies deal with the numerical imbalance by having many females sharing one male. Do your people do the same? I had the impression monogamy was practiced among them.”

  What an awkward topic. Oriana sighed inwardly. She would have to take her ire out on the inconvenient Monsieur Matelot, should she ever run across him. “More or less. Our people are taught there’s a mate intended for them from the very moment they are born. Even before. If there is to be one.”

  Duilio regarded her with brows drawn together. He opened his mouth to ask a question, and then apparently thought better of it.

  “Then what becomes of the other females?” Lady Ferreira asked. “Are half the females meant not to have mates?”

  “Yes,” Oriana admitted. “Those are meant to serve their people.”

  “As spies, perhaps?” Duilio closed the book and set it aside.

  Oriana nodded again.

  “I find that terribly shortsighted,” Lady Ferreira said. “Why not choose a human male, as there are plenty of them running about.”

  Oriana tried not to look at Duilio. It was a terribly complicated subject. Choosing a human mate meant diluting the bloodlines, although none were all that pure anyway. At the same time, beauty in a male was often defined by how human he looked. “I suppose it’s convention,” she answered weakly. “Most selkie females don’t leave the harem, do they?”

  “No. They usually stick together. Most of the young males leave, though, and many end up living among humans if they aren’t successful at attracting a harem.” She rose regally. “Now, I’ve had a long day. Please don’t get up, Duilinho. I will see you both in the morning.”

  Duilio
had risen with her anyway. “Good night, Mother.”

  She shut the sitting room door on the way out, leaving them alone in the room—an improper thing to do. Oriana doubted anyone was going to raise eyebrows at that, not when Duilio had already spent an inordinate amount of time alone with her. He returned to the chair across from the sofa.

  “Murderers?” she asked, brows rising.

  Duilio didn’t argue with her effort to escape the previous discussion. His features went solemn like he was debating how much to tell her. “Joaquim and I have been searching for someone who murdered a selkie girl, one of Erdano’s harem.”

  Oriana caught her lower lip between her teeth. It had to happen in cities of this size. People died, and some small percentage of them probably weren’t human. “I didn’t think the police were interested in nonhumans.”

  Duilio shrugged. “His superiors believe she was human. Erdano had asked me to look for her, so when Joaquim came across her body, he had a good idea she was the one. Another girl was killed several days before that in a related manner. Possibly an otter girl, although we can’t be certain.”

  “The otter folk have tails,” she said. He was holding something back. “It would be hard to miss that.”

  He cast an apologetic look at her. “If she had a tail, it was removed.”

  “Removed?” Oriana sat back, horrified. What kind of person would do that? “And the selkie?”

  “They removed her skin. All of it.” He paused a moment, jaw working, and then asked, “Does that mean anything to you?”

  Her stomach churned. “No, nothing. Are they only after nonhumans?”

  “It seems likely that the two murders are related, given the manner of death. The killer would have known about the otter girl, if she was that. We can’t know if he was aware Gita was a selkie. We’re not sure what’s unfolding here.”

  Oriana looked down at hands, which clearly marked her as a nonhuman. Had Duilio been staying so close out of concern for her safety? “Please, tell me everything.”