"I'm not a little boy," he replied sharply as he removed his shirt.

"That's what you're here to prove. I haven't seen much evidence yet." She said it in a tough voice, deliberately insulting. But he was man enough even at fourteen to hear that her anger and bitterness had nothing to do with him, and so was not insulted.

Plain gray skirt and white underskirt puddled at her feet. She kicked the garments after the blouse and bodice, stretched out on the bed, and leaned back on her elbows. She had a fine body: high-breasted, slim-waisted, hips richly curved. But most Grijalva women were her equal or better, and she was nothing out of the ordinary. Head tilted to one side on a long neck that was her best feature, she asked, "Are you really that sure about yourself?"

"I've known all my life."

"If you say so." With a shrug, she lay back. "Come on, then. They inspect the sheets each morning. At your age, you'll be expected to perform at least twice a night. That's supposed to be the best thing about this for us girls."

As the varied noises of passion began to escape high windows and echo in the hall outside, he set about the task of proving himself in absolute and efficient silence.

After, she rose and went to the washstand, soaking a towel in the basin. As she wiped sweat from her body, she admitted, "You're no amateur. But you don't enjoy it much either. I'm not that ugly, you know."

"I think you're very pretty." He turned on his side to watch her, head propped against one hand.

She tossed him a wry grin over her shoulder. "A bit of advice, amico. A Limner paints the foul as well as the fair, so learn how to flatter-especially women. Start with whatever she's proud of-with a little practice, you can always tell. Move on to what she thinks is an imperfection- you'll know what it is if you're clever-and then lie like a Tza'ab rug."

He grinned at the challenge. "You have a lovely neck."

She gave a start. "How did you-" "It's in the way you hold your head, and that little gold necklace is just the right length to emphasize it." He laughed. "As for 'imperfection' "-I don't have to lie. Your breasts are perfect."

Rallying, she retorted, "Had vast experience of breasts, have you?"

"The first girl's were like overripe melons. The last had none at all."

"Not bad," she conceded. "But remember that comparisons are risky unless you know the ins and outs of private rivalries." After rinsing the towel, she brought it over to him. "Here-feels good in this heat." A voice cried out down the hall, manly baritone cracking to boyish soprano.

"Not as good as that, though. Cansalvio's enjoying himself. I recognize the squeak."

He scrubbed chest and underarms. "What a tragedy if he turns up Limner! I've more talent in one thumb than he has in his whole body."

"Matra Dolcha! So sure of that, too? How do you know so much?"

"You don't live at the Palasso."

With a frown: "No, with my mother and stepfather in his caza outside the city. What's that to do with-"

"If you lived here, you'd hear me spoken of."

Dark eyes widened mockingly. "What a strain such genius must be!"

He blushed, but in annoyance and not for shame at his arrogance. She'd find out-they'd all find out-once this stupid Confirmattio was over and he joined the ranks of the real Limners, the only true Grijalvas.

She tossed the towel to the floor beside the discarded topsheet for the servants to take for washing tomorrow morning. Perching at the foot of the bed, knees hugged to her breasts, she said, "Another piece of advice. Think as highly of yourself as you like-who knows, you may be right to do so-but hide it from the Fratos. They're a jealous lot. When they find a true talent, they're both thrilled and furious."

"I've learned that," he acknowledged. "But how do you know it?"

"My brother. Half-brother, really. We're both Menninos do'Confirmattio. Mother was only sixteen when she had Cabral, twenty when I was born. Then she married Master Jonino-he owns copper mines in Elleon-and took us with her. I've lived all my life outside the Palasso and I suppose they forgot about me. But my brother returned for his education. He's not a Limner-I have a niece around here somewhere-but he's a great artist all the same."

"I'm sure," he said politely.

She wasn't fooled. "You think talent is reserved exclusively for the steriles? Anyway, I thought his contribution to the family would be enough. But there was a shortage this year, and somebody remembered me, so here I am-worse luck."

He nodded, knowing that again she meant no personal insult to him. "Four girls needed, but only three suitables. Trinia's mother, grandmother, and aunt died in birthing, so she'll never even be bred. Filipia's line hasn't produced a Gifted in three generations. As for Pollia . . . eiha, let's just say she's painting with an imaginary brush." "See how delicate and tactful you can be?" she teased.

"Grazzo millio," he thanked her in kind, suddenly liking her quite a bit. "So you're here to do your Grijalva duty."

"Their idea of it, not mine." She shook her head, black hair swirling in a thick cloak around her shoulders. "If you're as sure about yourself as you say, then I've escaped. I want babies only by the man I love and marry."

He arched his brows in exaggerated shock. "Fall in love, marry, then make babies? I've never heard of a Grijalva with merchant-class morals!"

"Sneer all you like," she snapped. "Four of you silly little arrtios I've had to bed, four months of my life wasted either in wallowing with one of you or waiting to be told to-while they hold their breath to see if I'm pregnant! And if I were, there'd go another year while I bore the child!"

He shrugged. "That's what Grijalva women do."

"Not this Grijalva!" she shot back grimly. "If you can't understand it from my side, consider yourself. You know who your mother is, but your father-the Fratos know, of course, but in real terms you might just as well be one of the original chi'patros. Which doesn't matter inside the Palasso, but wait until you're out in the larger world. Sanctas and sanctos watching you sideways as if you've got purple skin and five eyes."

"Who cares about them?" he scoffed.

"We don't, but the rest of the world does. They mimic those sideways looks so everyone knows they share the Ecclesial disapproval of our disgusting, immoral, unnatural existence."

"Eiha, I see what you mean. But it makes no difference to Limners. We're too valuable."

"Haven't you ever been outside the Palasso? Limners are in the world most of all! Talk to my brother Cabral about it one of these days-you could learn a lot from him, even if he isn't one of your exalted brethren," she added tartly.

"Do you feel sorry for me?" The concept amused him.

"Yes," she answered forthrightly. "For all of you. At least Cabral and I had a family. One mother, one father, without a thousand half-siblings and cousins and suffocating numbers of other relations-none of whom care merditto about you until and unless you turn up Gifted. What did you have but a cot in the crechetta while sharing one woman's breasts with another baby? And then there's your so-called education," she continued, angrier by the moment. "Art, art, art-and forget the rest. For instance, what do you know about the sciences?"

Straight-faced, he replied, "Enough to mix paint solvents without causing an explosion."

"It's not funny! They teach you just enough without worrying whether or not you understand it! Enough history not to insult foreigners with your ignorance. Enough literature to babble a few poems to entertain nobles while they sit for their portraits. Enough about horses so you won't fall out of the saddle-stop laughing! Don't you see how they keep you in prison?"

"Regretto," he apologized, because he did like her despite her silly ideas. "I was just remembering my riding lessons." "Ah, but you're one of the lucky ones, or so you think! You're Gifted- and may the Gentle Mother have mercy on those who aren't! A life spent as a drudge, making bad copies of other men's masterpieces-"

"Bassda," he said tolerantly. "Everything you say is true, and nothing you say makes me the least bit sorry to be what I am. En verro, I'll tell you why no one will look sideways at me and I'll never sit in the copyists' drudge room." He smiled, savoring the moment. "I'm Tazia's son."

"Tazia!" She blinked, and in a completely different voice said, "Arrigo's Mistress! Matra ei Filho!" His pride dissolved at her laughter: sharp, derisive, full-throated in its mockery. "You truly think your ambition will survive the Ghillasian marriage?"

Stung at the insult to Tazia, he said, "Arrigo adores my mother. He may send her from Court for a while to placate his bride while she has a few babies, but Tazia will return. And I'll be at her side."

"About twenty years old, fully trained, and ready for Lord Limner Mequel to hand over his brushes?" Eyeing him narrowly, her face anything but pretty now, she asked, "What if Arrigo starts adoring his wife instead?"

He shrugged. "Lissina is always at Court. She and the Grand Duchess are close friends."

"But who wouldn't love Lissina? She's a jewel, and everyone knows it."

"Which didn't prevent everyone from being shocked when Gizella named her daughter after her husband's former Mistress-and even made Lissina one of Lizia's Sponsors!"

"So you think there'll be a little Tazitia in Mechella's nursery one day, do you?" She didn't wait for an answer. "Eiha, everybody's terribly cozy at Court, I agree. But it's an unusual arrangement and Gizella's an unusual woman. I've met her. She's sweet and kind, and she genuinely likes Lissina. What if Princess Mechella doesn't like Tazia?"

He said nothing, having already said too much. What the Princess liked or didn't like mattered not at all. Frankly, having seen her portrait, he wondered if she even had a full paletto of brains with which to understand the situation. In her vapid blue eyes had been no hint of intelligence to match Tazia's. True, she was lovely-if you liked washed-out blondes-but no threat to Tazia's vivid dark Grijalva beauty.

"The future," his companion said at last, "should be fascinating. But for now, my Lord Limner, if it's all the same to you, I'd like to get some sleep."

" 'Cordo." He hid relief, not wanting to hurt her feelings. If she'd met Grand Duchess Gizella, she could have Court connections that might be useful one day. Besides, she was the very first person to call him "Lord Limner." He'd remember that-maybe paint it one day as a personal me- mento for her. The thought made him grin to himself.

"Sleep is just what I need," she was saying. "I was up late last night studying, and-" She broke off as another series of grunts, moans, and cries signaled duty done down the hall. "-and I doubt tonight will be very restful! Why must some people announce it so loudly?"

"Trumpeting like a Grand Ducal Herald," he agreed, and together they laughed, humor restored.

She lay beside him, not touching him. The breeze had died down and it was too warm to sleep skin-to-skin, especially with someone who'd been a stranger three hours ago.

"What do you study?" he asked all at once, wondering if she was one of those Grijalva girls who fancied themselves artistically gifted.

"Hmm? Oh-plants."

"For medicines?"

"Perfumes."

"En verro?" He decided to make much of her boring little hobby. She might be useful, she'd been fun in bed, and he liked her. And there was the brother, Cabral. One could never have too many Grijalva allies, even un-Gifted ones, if one desired to become Lord Limner. "It sounds difficult and complicated."

"I mix scents the way you mix colors. It's how I met the Grand Duchess. I created a special fragrance just for her."

"From roses, I'll wager. It's said she loves them."

"I used a base of rose, yes. Always white, she won't have any other. Then some grasses, valerian, a few other things."

His painter's mind instantly translated the items into their symbology: I Am Worthy of You, Submissiveness, Accommodating Disposition. From all he'd ever heard, that was Gizella to the life.

"You ought to make a perfume for the Princess," he said suddenly.

"As a wedding present? That's a wonderful idea! Perhaps one day your mother will want something special, too."

He ignored the hint, merely saying, "Mmm, she might enjoy that," thinking that Tazia would not be Tazia if she did not smell of the Elegance of yellow jasmine mixed with the Gladness of myrrh and the Sweet Temptation of apples. Turning onto his other side, he pretended to fall asleep. But it occurred to him, and he smiled to consider it, that the Princess's perfume ought to be blended mainly from almond oil, for her Stupidity in marrying a man who belonged to Tazia Grijalva: Nazha Coronna, mother of the next Lord Limner.

THIRTY-FIVE.

To Dioniso's everlasting astonishment, Princess Mechella ordered him to paint her in her wedding gown-leaving space enough beside her for Arrigo.

"You'll have to paint this picture anyway," she said, "and the sooner it's finished, the sooner we can all go home to Meya Suerta."

Amazing enough to be summarily commanded (he, a Grijalva Limner- one might even say the Grijalva Limner); but she had all the precise details in mind, too. She knew every symbolic flower she wished included, how she wanted to stand and hold her head and hands, the background, even the time of day. Obviously, she'd been planning this for years. Thus once more the girl showed steel beneath the roses-and-sunshine sweetness. Dioniso bowed graceful homage to it, hiding a grin for the shock awaiting Arrigo, and told himself that as Lord Limner in his next life he'd have a merry time of it with Mechella as Grand Duchess.

In her snowy bridal finery she was sheer splendor from diamond tiara to pearl-encrusted slippers. Miles of thin, airy white silk fell from her tiny waist like the petals of a rose, each edged in cobwebby lace. A starched underskirt supported the delicate material. The bodice mimicked a rosebud, tightly furled layers at the waist rising to cup surprisingly voluptuous breasts before lapping onto her shoulders in little sleeves sewn with pendant teardrop pearls. Just where the petals parted at her breastbone the initials A and M intertwined were embroidered in gold.

She'd planned the dress for years, too.

Accustomed to luxury, witness to three centuries of aristocratic display in six different countries, still he was stunned by this tall, golden-haired Princess in her wedding gown. When he bowed to her, it was with the genuine humility an artist must feel in the presence of beauty he is lucky enough to commit to canvas.

The long hours he spent sketching and then detailing her were infinitely preferable to the interminable days he spent with Princess Permilla.

She proved flighty over the posing of her person. Each of her suggestions was a disaster. In the robes of the Order of Ghillas, at an open window with gardens spreading to the horizon, she looked like a tour guide. In the robes of a Patron of the University, reclining in her salon surrounded by devotional books, sacred icons, and three hideous little yapping dogs, she looked equal parts scholarly sancta and kennel keeper. In her own interpretation of the colorful Ghillasian national costume (silk and satin substituting for linen and wool), seated by an ornate fountain, she looked like a parched plant in a painted pot set out by a worried gardener for watering.

At long last he called on every scrap and shred of diplomacy he possessed to persuade her that no background could do justice to her innate presence, no pose could convey her instinctive grace, no symbolic costume could encompass her wide-ranging intellect. He asked her to wear a plain white gown, stood her in front of a plain white plaster wall, and presented her with a small but respectable fortune in very old, very rare blue Tza'ab glass beads. Earrings, necklace, hairpins, and bracelets had been meant for Mechella; he told the old prune this quite bluntly, adding that no matter how much trouble he brought on himself, as an artist he could not bear to see the azure mystery of these small crystalline miracles worn by any woman lacking the rich depths of character he perceived in Permilla's eyes.

"The jewelry and the Princess mutually enhance each other," he concluded. "Nothing else can deserve to be in this painting."

She not only bit, she swallowed whole. The sketch took him half an hour. Permilla retired to her chambers positively stuffed with smugness.

Then it was time for the Crown Prince.

He had two choices: Crown Prince, with Horse or Horse, with Crown Prince. When young Enrei arrived in the stableyard with the biggest stallion Dioniso had ever seen, he knew which it must be. The youth was thrilled with the preliminary drawing, and even more impressed when Dioniso released him from his posing after only fifteen minutes so that he was free to take the monstrous horse for a gallop. Watching him ride off, Dioniso considered it not a matter of if he would break his royal neck, but when. This left only the King himself, and because there was as yet no formal portrait of Enrei II in all his regalia-there having been no limner at Aute-Ghillas in the year of his coronation-this picture proved easiest of all. King, Throne, Robes, Crown, Orb, Scepter: he'd done a score of them and could have mixed the cobalts and madders in his sleep. He was signing Dioniso Grijalva at the bottom by the end of the afternoon.

Wonder of wonders, Arrigo arrived the next day-only fifteen days late, and just in time to reap the warm and welcoming benefits of Dioniso's work. Mechella was, of course, not allowed to greet him with the rest of the family. Their first official meeting as betrothed husband and wife would take place in full view of the Court the next morning. But as Dioniso took a late-night stroll to clear the final brushstrokes of Princess Prune from his head, he witnessed an affecting moonlit scene in the private royal garden.

Mechella's shining head was unmistakable. So was the glitter of gold braid on Arrigo's Shagarra uniform. Running toward him, she stopped just short of flinging herself into his arms.

He stood his ground and bowed. They exchanged a few awkward phrases Dioniso could not hear.

There was a brief, nervous pause-and then Arrigo offered her his hand. They walked like shy young lovers to the seclusion of a hedged retreat, and were lost to his view.

So much for Tazia?

"Limner," came a trembling voice behind him, and he spun around. An elderly servant stood there, twisting work-roughened hands by the silver light of the waning moon. In common accents, and slowly-as if she didn't believe a Tira Virteian would understand the King's Ghillasian-she said, "Limner, I beg you-tell me he will be good to her!"

"Of course he will," he began.

She shook her head vigorously. "No! Speak to me not as a man who serves a prince, but as a man who knows another man-and a man who knows his own kinswoman. Will the Grijalva loosen her hold? Will my precious girl have a chance to make him love her?"

Dioniso was moved by the woman's devotion. "I think she will," he replied, honestly as far as he knew. "Don Arrigo is ready to marry and have sons. He knows his duty, and she is its delightful embodiment." With a smile for the old woman, he finished, "Only look at your Princess. She's a rare beauty, charming, young, a delight en tudo paletto-and the Grijalva is nearing forty, old enough to be Her Highness' mother!"

This did not seem to bring much comfort. "Look after her," she urged. "You have painted her with rare understanding, you must have seen into her soul and been moved. Advise her, caution her. She is young in the ways of women like the Grijalva."

"Surely you'll be there to do all that."

"No." Tears ran down her wrinkles like spring snowmelt through streambeds. "I have been forbidden."

"By Princess Pru-Permilla," he corrected himself, and when she nodded confirmation of his guess he went on, truly shocked, "Is the poor girl to take none of her own people with her?"

By long tradition, brides were wed in their own countries and escorted to the border by a regiment or so of their own military. At that point the new husband's officers and men took over guardianship. But the girl always was attended into her new country and home by her own maids, menservants, and the like.

"I haven't had the heart to tell her yet. It is declared that the instant she marries him, she is Tira Virteian and must surround herself with-with strangers who don't know her or love her, courtiers interested only in advancing themselves, barbarians-"