A Magic of Twilight nc-1 Read online

  The healers had all said that her matarh would die, and Ana had watched her fail. When Ana was little, she had often put her hands on her matarh’s temples when she complained of headaches, and there were always words in her mind that she could say, words that would take away the pain. You always played at being a teni. . She had, and Ana knew now that it was the early manifestation of her Gift, an instinctive use of the Ilmodo.

  It was also wrong. The Divolonte, the laws and regulations of Concenzia, explicitly said so. ‘To heal with the Ilmodo is to thwart the will of Cenzi,’ the teni thundered in their Admonitions from the High Lectern in the temple. Ana, always devout, had stopped as soon as she realized what she was doing.

  But. .

  She couldn’t watch her matarh die. After the last healer Vatarh had hired left in defeat, Ana finally put her hands on her matarh again and spoke the words that came-carefully, tentatively, letting the Ilmodo ease the pain, letting Ana bring her back from the death spiral she was in, but not all the way back: because that would be too visible and too dangerous. Ana parceled out the relief, feeling guilty both for her misuse of the Ilmodo and because she didn’t use it as fully as she might.

  Then came the true shame. The worst of it all. Her vatarh. . First it was just words and hugs, then he came to her for the more intimate comforts that Abi had once given him. Too young and too immature and too trusting, Ana had endured his long, careful seduction, knowing that if she told anyone, the shame would destroy the family utterly, that it would be her matarh who would suffer most of all. .

  “O’Teni? Through here. .” Savi had led them to a set of gilded wooden doors. The panels were carved with a representation of Cenzi’s ascension to the Second World-the elongated figure of the god being lifted up toward the clouds while below an immense fissure yawned in the globe below, where Cenzi had fallen in his struggle with the Moitidi, His children. Ana stroked the polished wood as Savi pulled open the doors. Beyond was a small, simple chapel which might have held fifty people at the most, lit by candles set in silver candelabra swaying on chains from the high ceiling. Ana could smell incense burning in a brazier, then motion caught her eye near the altar covered with fine damask at the far end of the chapel. The Archigos stepped up onto the altar dais, supported by a young male o’teni who towered over him. The Archigos gestured to them as Savi closed the chapel door, remaining behind in the corridor. Ana glanced around; there was no one else in the chapel.

  “Are you disappointed, O’Teni?” the Archigos asked, his voice reverberating from the stone surfaces around them. “I know that the official ceremony was better attended with all the families and all the a’teni. . ”

  “No, Archigos,” Ana answered. She remembered A’Teni ca’Cellibrecca’s stern, unforgiving face staring at her, and the way the others had looked at her as if she were a puzzle they had to solve. She was pleased none of them were there now. “I’m sorry. I’m. . very happy tonight.”

  “Then please come forward and sit-there are chairs for all of you here in front. This is your vatarh and matarh?”

  “Yes, Archigos.” Ana introduced her parents, Tomas going forward to kneel before the Archigos with clasped hands, playing-as he always did-the devout follower. The Archigos came forward to put his own gnarled and small hands around her vatarh’s.

  “I thank you for sending us your daughter,” the Archigos said. “Vajiki cu’Seranta, I’ve arranged for the Concenzia treasury to transfer five thousand solas to your family’s account against Ana’s future services to the Faith. I assume that will be sufficient?” Ana could see Vatarh’s eyebrows lift and his mouth drop. She sucked in her own breath in surprise as well-the families of the acolytes in her class had been given a tenth of that sum.

  “Oh, yes, Archigos. That is quite. .” Tomas stopped. She wondered what he’d intended to say. His mouth closed and he swallowed.

  “. .adequate for the moment,” he finished. Ana could see him toting up accounts in his head.

  The Archigos had noticed the internal greed as well, Ana realized.

  He favored her vatarh with a dismissive smile. “One of my clerks will be outside when you leave, Vajiki,” the Archigos said. “She will have papers for you to sign that will complete the transfer. You’ll note that you will also be giving up the family’s right to either select or approve a husband for Ana: she now belongs to Concenzia and can make her own choice freely. You will have no voice in that, nor will you receive any further dowry for her.”

  Her vatarh frowned at that. “Archigos, we had expected to advance the family through Ana’s marriage.”

  “Then perhaps a thousand solas will suffice, if you prefer to retain those rights. It doesn’t matter to me. My secretary, O’Teni Kenne ci’Fionta, is right here.” The Archigos nodded to the teni who was standing next to him. “Kenne, would you be so kind as to tell the clerks to make that change in the contract. . ”

  Vatarh’s eyes widened again and he hurried to answer as the o’teni bowed and started down the aisle of the chapel. “No, Archigos,” he answered. “I think the agreement will be sufficient as is.”

  “Ah,” the Archigos said. Kenne, with a slight smile, returned to the Archigos’ side. To Ana, the Archigos seemed to be smothering laughter.

  “Then let us begin. .”

  The ceremony was brief. Afterward, O’Teni ci’Fionta handed the Archigos the green robes that would be Ana’s attire from this time forward. The Archigos uttered a blessing over the robes, then handed one set to Ana. “If you would put this on,” he said. “You may go behind the screens there at the side of the altar.”

  The robes felt strange against her skin; softer than she’d expected from the times U’Teni cu’Dosteau’s robes had brushed against her. She touched the slashes at the shoulders of the robe: yes, they were those of an o’teni, and on the left shoulder was sewn the broken-globe crest of the Archigos. Taking off her tashta and putting on the robes, she realized that she was also severing herself from her old life and putting on a new one. She would not be returning to her family’s home this evening, but retiring to a new apartment here in the temple complex.

  I’m finally gone, Vatarh, and you can’t touch me anymore. .

  She came out from behind the screen, holding her yellow tashta folded in her arms. Sala, beaming, hurried forward to take it from her.

  Her vatarh nodded his approval, tears glistening unashamedly in his eyes-she wondered whether he was truly proud of her, or only sad-dened by what was being taken from him. Her matarh stared blankly ahead, as if transfixed by candle glints from the gold-threaded robes of the Archigos.

  “Ah. .” the Archigos breathed. “Now you look the proper teni.

  Vajiki cu’Seranta, I wonder if you would allow me a few minutes alone with your daughter. My clerk, as I said, is waiting outside to take care of the fund transfer while you wait. Your servants should go with you, but I would like Vajica cu’Seranta to remain.”

  Anna’s vatarh looked startled, but he brought his hands to his forehead and motioned to Sala and the other servants. The Archigos waited, silent, until the chapel doors had closed again behind them.

  Then he turned to Ana.

  “I deliberately brought you here, to this chapel and without any of the a’teni about. Your matarh, her illness is grave. The Southern Fever, isn’t it? She was incredibly fortunate to survive at all. I’ve only rarely heard of anyone recovering who has been affected that badly. I remember all the funerals years ago when the Fever was at its height here in the city.”

  He was staring at her, as was O’Teni ci’Fionta. “It was Cenzi’s Will that Matarh lived, Archigos,” she said, and the lie felt like pins stabbing her throat.

  “No doubt,” the Archigos said. “And your will, also.”

  “Archigos?” Ana started.

  Faintly, the dwarf smiled. “There’s no one here but the four of us, Ana. No a’teni listening, no ears here that shouldn’t hear what you might say, no prying eyes watching.” Ana couldn’t stop
her gaze from going to the young o’teni. The Archigos’ smiled widened slightly.

  “Kenne ci’Fionta is someone I trust implicitly, so you must also.” He paused. “You no doubt prayed for your matarh’s life.”

  “Of course, Archigos. Every day.”

  “And Cenzi answered your prayers? Or was it something else?” the Archigos prompted, and Ana’s face colored helplessly. “You lie badly, O’Teni,” the Archigos said. He stepped from the dais and put his hand on her matarh’s arm. At the touch, the woman stirred, turning her head slightly but still staring off vacantly. “Your innocence and naivete is very fetching, Ana, but we’ll need to work on that. Tell me the rest, and tell me the truth now. Did you use the Gift of Cenzi to thwart Cenizi’s Will for your matarh? Did you do what you knew was forbidden for the teni by the Divolonte? Tell me the truth, here where you can.”

  Ana saw the joyous evening and her triumph beginning to collapse around her. She wondered how she would be able to tell Vatarh how it had gone so badly so quickly. She could imagine his face going slack, his shoulders slumping and his will shattering inside him.. and the foul anger and abuse that would follow. “Matarh was dying.

  Archigos,” Ana said, looking down at her matarh unmoving in her carry-chair. “That would have killed Vatarh, too, after all that had happened to us. So I. . I. . Just the smallest help. . Just enough that. .” She couldn’t finish, her voice choking. Her hands lifted. Fell back to her sides.

  “You know the punishment for this sin? You know the Divolonte?”

  Ana clasped her hands behind her back. She could barely speak.

  “Yes, Archigos.” Cenzi has given me His own punishment to bear for what I did. If I’d let her die, then Vatarh might have married someone else, and he might have left me alone.

  “Look at me. Quote the Divolonte for me; you’ve certainly heard it often enough in your studies.”

  She forced herself to look down into his face: stern now, the wrinkles holding his ancient eyes drawn harshly in his skin. Her voice was little more than a whisper. “ ‘The sinner has abused Cenzi’s Gift and shown that she no longer trusts in Cenzi’s judgment; therefore-’ ” She stopped.

  “Finish it,” the Archigos told her.

  “ ‘Therefore, strike her hands from her body and her tongue from her mouth so that she may never use the Gift again.”’ Ana took a long breath.

  “You put yourself above Cenzi?” the Archigos asked.

  “No, Archigos,” Ana protested. “I truly don’t. But I watched her suffering, watched my vatarh suffer with her. . ”

  “Does your vatarh know what you did? Does anyone?”

  “No, Archigos. At least, I don’t think so. I was always alone with her when I tried. I made certain of that.”

  The Archigos nodded. His hand was still on her matarh’s arm. “You didn’t do all you could for her, did you?”

  Ana shook her head. “I was afraid. I knew Cenzi would be angry,and I was also afraid that everyone would notice-”

  “Do it now,” the Archigos said, interrupting her. At her look of shock, his stern face relaxed. “The gift of healing is the rarest tendency, the most easily abused, and the most dangerous to the person using it, which is why it’s proscribed. It’s also why I made certain that the only other person here tonight was someone I could trust. Your hands and tongue are safe for now, Ana. Show me. Show me Cenzi’s Gift. Use it as you wanted to use it. Go on,” he said as she hesitated.

  Ana took a long breath. She could feel the Archigos staring at her as she closed her eyes and brought her hands together. As she been taught, she reached deep into her inner self as she prayed to Cenzi to show her the way, and again the path to the Ilmodo opened up before her, sparking purple and red in her mind. Her hands were moving, not in the patterns that U’Teni cu’Dosteau had laboriously taught the acolytes but in her own unconscious manner, the way she knew they must go to shape this particular Gift. She could feel it now, a warmth between her still-moving hands, a glow that penetrated her eyelids and sent blood-tinted, pulsing streaks chasing themselves before her.

  Before, she’d stopped at this point, just as the energy began to be felt, and applied it to her matarh. This time she allowed it to continue to flow around her, gathering it. She chanted: words she didn’t know, in a language that wasn’t hers. A calmness filled Ana as her hands stopped moving, as she cupped Cenzi’s Gift in her hands.

  She opened her eyes. Her matarh was staring at the brilliance she held between them. “This is for you, Matarh,” Ana whispered. “Cenzi has sent it to you.” With that, she bent forward and placed her hands on her matarh’s shoulder. The brilliance darted out, striking her matarh and seeming to sink into her.

  As Ana touched her matarh, she felt again the wild, black heat in the older woman: patches of it in her head, around her heart, in her lungs. It paled where the Ilmodo touched it, and this time, this time Ana let the power flow freely, let it cover the illness. She could feel it through her hands: as if Ana herself had the Fever, as if it could crawl out from her matarh into herself. She pushed it back, back into the maelstrom of the Ilmodo, and the heat rose so intensely that she thought her hands would be burned.

  She lifted her hands away from her matarh, unable to hold the power any longer.

  Abini jerked in her seat, a shuddering intake of breath as if she were a drowning person gasping for air. Her eyes went wide, and she gave a long, low wail that held no words at all. She sank back, her eyes closing. . and when they opened again, her pupils were clear, and she looked at the Archigos and O’Teni Kenne alongside him, then at Ana in her green robes.

  “Ana? I feel as if I’ve been away for a long time. . I’m so tired, and I don’t remember. . Why are you dressed that way, child, like a teni?

  And so much older. .”

  Ana’s breath caught in a sob. She felt too weary to stand, and sank down alongside the carry-chair, gathering the woman in her arms. She looked at her own hands, marveling that they weren’t burned to the bone. “Matarh. .” The doors to the chapel pushed opened suddenly and her vatarh strode in, looking concerned. The servants peered around the opening. Ana glanced at him; her matarh turned in her carry-chair and laughed.

  “Tomas!”

  “Abi?” he said. He gaped, almost comically, caught in a half-stride.

  “Abi, is that you I heard?”

  “Indeed it was,” the Archigos answered him, moving between Tomas and Ana as Kenne lifted Ana to her feet, his hands supporting her as she swayed, exhausted. “Cenzi has moved here tonight, Vajiki, in honor of your daughter’s anointment. We have witnessed a special blessing.”

  Ana heard the Archigos’ last words as if they were coming from a great distance. She thought she saw her vatarh rushing to them, but the shadows in the chapel were growing darker and the candlelight could not hold them back. The darkness whirled around her, a night-storm.

  She pushed at it with her hands, but the blackness filled her mouth and her eyes and bore her away.

  Movements

  Marguerite ca’Ludovici

  “Kraljica?”

  “When I’m eighteen, I’ll be Kraljiki just like you became Kraljica,” Justi said, smiling at her as she held him. She laughed.

  “Is that what you want, Justi? That means I only have twelve more years to live.” She pouted dramatically, and Justi’s eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. The courtiers gathered around them laughed.

  “Oh, no, Matarh,” Justi said, the words tumbling out all in a rush. “I want you to live forever and ever!”

  “Kraljica?”

  The Throne Room smelled of oils. When Renard’s voice came,Marguerite found herself startled-she’d nearly fallen into a trance as the painter ci’Recroix first sketched her likeness on the canvas and began applying the underpainting. She was startled to see darkness outside the windows of the West Reception Chamber, and to find the room lit by a dozen candelabra and the eternal glow of the Sun Throne.

  Several of the courtiers
were standing well to the back of the room-banished there because ci’Recroix had said that he could not work with gawkers looking over his shoulder-and talking softly among themselves while servants bustled about. How long had she been sitting there? Had she ordered the candles lit? It seemed bare minutes ago that Third Call had sounded.

  “Yes?” she asked Renard, blinking at him standing before her with hands on forehead-here, in public, always the correct image of an aide. Renard glanced over at the painter. Ci’Recroix straightened by the canvas set at the foot of Marguerite’s dais, stirring his brush in a jar of turpentine. Pale colors swirled around the fine sable hairs. The strange, dark box of a mechanism he’d used to sketch her initial likeness, the device he’d called a “miroire a’scene,” was draped in black cloth on the floor nearby.

  “Kraljica, the Commandant ca’Rudka is here with his report.”

  “Ah!” Marguerite blinked. She felt somnolent and lethargic, and shook her head to clear it. She wondered whether she’d been sleeping, and if anyone had noticed. “Send him up. Vajiki ci’Recroix, I’m afraid that our session is over for today.”

  The painter bowed and pressed his paint-stained hands to his forehead, leaving behind a smudge of vermilion. “As you wish, Kraljica.

  When should I return? Tomorrow afternoon, perhaps? The lighting I want to capture on your face is that of the late day-the light looks so dramatic on your face, coupled with the Sun Throne behind you. …”

  “That will be fine-Renard, make certain there are a few turns of the glass in my schedule for Vajiki ci’Recroix before Third Call. And please clear the room so that the commandant and I have some privacy; I will meet with the court afterward in the Red Hall for supper.” As Renard bowed and went to the courtiers, as the painter began to gather up his oils and brushes, Marguerite rose from the crystalline seat. The light in the Sun Throne dimmed and faded, making the room seem dark as the courtiers noisily filed out of the room. “I would like to see what you’ve done,” she told the artist.