Off an alley behind the cooper’s yard, hidden behind stacks of barrels and a string of ramshackle workshops, stood an ugly blockish stone house. I hurried across the shavings and sawdust of the yard, entering the alley just as my brother hurried in from its far end and my bedraggled swordmaster rapped on the plain door.
“Came soon as I got your message.” Neri blotted his forehead with a sodden sleeve, sweeping aside a mop of dark curls dripping with sweat. “Had to dodge three sniffers on my way. What’s going?”
Placidio, unshaven, unwashed, and his stained leather jerkin stinking of wine, cast a mournful gaze over his shoulder. “Dumond and Vashti haven’t run off and left us to tend their houseful of chittering sparrows, now have they? I was just settled into a most delectable mutton pie at the Limping Bull after a dastardly morning.”
“No, it’s—”
The gray door swung open with a rush of air that fluttered my limp hair.
“Romy-zha, what’s happened?” The web of creases that fanned out from the small woman’s dark eyes were tight with concern. Behind her Dumond’s bristle-brush eyebrows came together in a near solid line.
“Sorry! I didn’t mean my message to fret you all,” I said as Dumond and Vashti stepped aside and waved us in.
“Very little new blood on the swordmaster,” said Vashti, her sharp gaze taking in old stains on Placidio’s abdomen, limbs, and backside. “That’s reassuring.”
Indeed so, and it was a good reminder. Only a half a season had gone since Neri had hauled Placidio into this house awash in blood and very near death. Our joined magic had saved him, just as we’d saved one-and-twenty souls at the coliseum. We were not demons.
“Couldn’t trust this to a messenger.” I raised the sealed fold of fine parchment. “And I couldn’t—I thought we should be together when we opened it.”
“It’s his hand?” asked Placidio, staring at the missive.
“Unmistakably.”
Our first adventure had been forced on us by il Padroné’s young wife. The second had been a request from the Shadow Lord’s own mouth as he sat in my scriptorium. But he’d made clear on that night, and the one time I’d spoken to him since, that we dared not meet again. My partners and I used magic in his service. He knew it, intended it, and trusted us to keep that secret as he kept ours. But if he had recognized any of us at the coliseum and sniffers had picked up traces of magic there, he might have decided to end our association. The First Law of Creation allowed no ambiguity. Suborning sorcery, even to good purpose, reaped a death sentence as inexorably as working the magic … even if you were the Shadow Lord of Cantagna.
“Let’s hear it then,” said Neri, as we sat on threadbare cushions around Dumond and Vashti’s low table.
I waited for Vashti to reappear with her ever-available teapot and cups. Vashti would not allow us to count her as a partner of the Chimera, because she had no gift for magic and did not actively participate in our schemes. But we could not accomplish anything without her own gifts: a generous anticipation of others’ needs, her impeccable skill with needles and fabric, and a talent for seeing straight to the knot at the center of a logical tangle.
As she filled our cups, I broke the seal. The missive bore no greeting or signature, but as I read the words, I could hear Sandro’s pleasing baritone. The wry good humor. The intensity of belief that could push him into such a dangerous undertaking as employing sorcerers. Especially in the fraught aftermath of an earthquake.
An urgent matter has arisen of perhaps a less inflammatory nature than our last dealing, but I hope you find the circumstances worthy of your unique skills.
A virtuous young woman, my vicino-figlia, has just discovered that she is subject to a marriage contract that predates her birth. The young man in question is a stranger to her and familiar to me only by name and family—thus his state of personal virtue is unknown.
It has been made known to me that the young woman wishes to refuse the match for Most Serious Reasons, unrelated to the young man’s state of virtue.
Her parents wholly support this contract, which, on its face, seems a most excellent arrangement that will provide their daughter and themselves a comfortable living for the rest of their days. Yesterday, the young man’s family claimed the girl and took her to their formidable residence. The wedding is scheduled for the Feast of the Lone Praetorian.
My influence—personal or public—wields no merit in this case, and every conventional solution leaves the young woman’s parents in devastating forfeit of contract and our independency’s governance with dangerous instabilities. If the contract remains unbroken, the particular circumstances of the marriage will most certainly deprive the world of an extraordinary young woman’s work. If you choose to take up this cause, the necessary details will be conveyed in the same fashion as before.
There was no signature.
“A marriage contract!” Neri’s disappointment could have clouded the sun. Just turned seventeen, he’d only begun to realize how many charming young persons found his thick curls, onyx black eyes, and persistent good humor immensely desirable. He viewed permanent attachments as unpleasant, if not unfathomable, and dealing with one was evidently not near exciting enough for a magical adventure.
“To arrange children’s marriage before they are born is a vile custom,” said Vashti, flicking her spread fingers in the air in dismissal. “One thing I had no regret for leaving in Paolin. I’d no idea … is it widely practiced here?” Her glance at Dumond encompassed every emotion of one with four beloved daughters.
“Old families adhere to old ways like contracted marriage,” said Placidio, his brow so clouded in thought he might have been speaking to himself. “And the very rich, like the man who wrote this, often do so. Also those who work the land … tenants, say … who don’t have leave to go round courting partners willing to share such a life. And one more group that I know of; did you notice the day set for the event?”
“The Feast of the Lone Praetorian,” I read, trying to piece together a puzzle intended to intrigue us.
“The remembrance of the Lone Praetorian is the most solemn feast day of the Philosophic Confraternity,” said Dumond. “And the Confraternity is very particular as to marriage arrangements.”
“The Confraternity is involved.…” The ancient society of philosophists was dedicated to two objectives: providing rational education for the people of the Costa Drago and protecting humankind from the depredations of sorcery. The Feast of the Lone Praetorian celebrated their victory over a sorcerers’ rebellion two centuries past.
The words of Sandro’s message might have been standing atop the page, each holding secrets and portents, burdens of significance il Padroné did not want to commit to paper.
“Certain, there’s more here than a reluctant Confraternity bride,” I said, mulling each word for hidden meanings. “For one, Alessandro di Gallanos is the girl’s vicino-padre.”
Vashti and Neri both looked confused.
“Her near-father,” I said. “She is his vicino-figlia, his near-daughter. At some time her parents asked him to take a benevolent interest in her welfare throughout her life, and he agreed. Or perhaps they asked his family, and he inherited the responsibility when he became the Gallanos segnoré. I didn’t know he had that relationship with anyone, which makes the circumstance curious.”