"I will be, Premio. I promise."

"Cabral!" Mechella called down from the landing. "Come see Tessa in her new gown!"

He excused himself to the farm manager and took the stairs three at a time. Halfway up he stopped, pretending to stagger back stunned at the sight of the four-year-old. Clasping one hand over his heart, he bowed several times with many flourishes. "Bela, bela! Muito bela!"

Mechella knelt to whisper in her daughter's ear. Giggling, Teressa stuck out her gloved fingers, mimicking a great lady of the Court. Cabral advanced the last steps and bowed once more over the little girl's wrist. Then he hoisted her in his arms to dance her around the upper hall, singing a Joharran ballad at the top of his lungs. Three-year-old Alessio trotted determinedly behind them until Mechella swept him up and they began dancing, too.

"Matra Dolcha, what an uproar!" Otonna exclaimed. "Cabral Liranzo Verro Grijalva, you close your mouth this instant before you deafen us all!"

Teressa wriggled in his arms. "Better do it," she advised. "I have lots of names, too. When she says them all, she means it!"

"Of a certainty I do!" said the maid. "Now, you come along and let's take that dress off you before it gets spoiled-" Otonna cast a disgusted glance at Cabral. "-the way he's spoiled your appreciation of music forever!"

"You call that music?" Mechella teased.

Cabral set the child lightly on the floor-then grabbed Otonna to gallop her around the hallway. She spluttered and flailed, but when he finally let her go, they were both laughing.

Teressa crowed with glee. "Mama, now you dance with Cabral!"

"Later tonight, at the festival," Mechella promised. "Do as Otonna says, ninita. You don't want to ruin your pretty clothes."

"But I don't like nap!"

Alessio's jaw set mulishly. "No nap," he announced.

"A Grand Ducal Edict," Cabral murmured. "He's starting early."

Otonna shooed the children to their rooms. Mechella and Cabral followed to spend a few minutes admiring their golden-haired, hazel-eyed son, then went outside to inspect preparations for tonight's celebration of Sancterria. She had planned everything so that the guests-all the inhabitants of the nearby villages, her own people, and a few noble guests from estates in the area-would be completely surprised. From the front drive, Corasson would look as it always did. But when everyone came around back, they would gasp in delight at seeing the gardens all ablaze with light.

"There'll be a procession around the fields with torches," she told Cabral, "before we climb Piatra Astrappa to light the bonfire. They've cleared a dancing ground-everyone who plays any instrument at all will be there to provide the music."

"I never would have guessed," he joked. "The tutor and his wife have only been rehearing the orchestra all week! Today I think most of them were even playing the same tune."

"This from a man with a voice like a calf with colic!"

He tucked her fingers into the crook of his elbow as they walked. "Tessa looked adorable. An exact copy of your gown, I'm told."

"Cabral! It was supposed to be a surprise!"

He slanted a look at her as they neared the great spreading oak south of the house. "You've developed quite a taste for surprises, haven't you? I tremble to think what you'll do next."

"Eiha, a woman ought to keep a man guessing. Prevents his getting bored."

"Not in a million years," he assured her. " 'Chella, a letter from Zevi came today."

"Have they found the right man yet? I wish they'd come home. I miss them."

"They'll be back soon. The quest goes badly." He smiled. "En verro, my sister is a demanding woman."

"What else does Zevi have to say?" She sat on a little stone bench beneath the oak and looked up at him. "There must be something, it's in your face-and you never would have brought me out here to be private unless it was something important."

Cabral cleared his throat. "Eiha . . . that picture of Corasson, the pencil drawing-Zevierin tells me to destroy it."

"What? But why?"

"Because Rafeyo drew it." Taking the letter from his pocket, he opened it and read aloud to her: It is a relief that the drawing is in our possession, not his. Still, you must dispose of it by the following means. Soak it in warm water until the paper disintegrates. Dilute the water by tripling its volume, then pour it down a drain.

Mechella gave a nervous little laugh. "I never heard anything so silly! Destroy that lovely picture?" "There's more."

I do not know if the drawing is Aguo, Seminno, or Sanguo. If it is, Rafeyo will feel a tingle of warmth from the water but probably not know its cause, and thus will not remark upon it. If it was not, he will sense nothing. But I beg you to take this precaution, amico ei frato, for talk here confirms his hatred of our dearest Lady and Leilias and I fear him capable of anything.

"Zevi's run mad," Mechella said.

Cabral took a matchbox from his pocket and set the page alight. It singed his fingertips before he dropped it to the dirt and ground the ashes with his heel. Facing her again, he spoke words both grim and bitter. "No, 'Chella, he has not. He is in deadly earnest." "But how could Rafeyo possibly-"

"I said that a letter came from Zevi. I did not say 'it was delivered.' "

She looked up at him blankly.

"It came," Cabral said, "into the atelierro upstairs. It's something Limners can do- accomplished ones, who know a place and can paint it with total accuracy, and into it paint a letter. We've communicated with our Grijalvas at foreign courts that way for years."

"Cabral," she breathed.

"The most spectacular example came when the Tza'ab were long ago massing for attack along the Joharran border. Duke Alejandro learned of it when a Grijalva spy sent just such a letter to Lord Limner Sario. Despite the warning, there was no possible way to get our troops there in time. So Sario consulted with all the Joharrans in Meya Suerta, and from their memories of the area painted a picture of the hills and dunes-with an army standing on them."

"No-stop-Lissina was right, this is not for my hearing-"

"This army," Cabral continued inexorably, "of two thousand men in battle armor, appeared at sunrise across the distant dunes, just as Sario had painted them on his canvas. The Tza'ab were terrified into retreat. They didn't even approach to do battle, or send scouts to judge our strength-they simply fled. And they have never come so close to our lands again. But the Grijalva spy, inspecting these guerrieros do'fantome later that day, discovered that they were hollow. The armor was empty, the helmets-"

"No! I don't want to hear any more!"

"Sario was thorough in his depiction of the soldiers at the front of the army. They had faces.

Hands. Fingers. He painted them precisely as the Tza'ab would see them from a distance, from the Tza'ab point of vantage. But they weren't real. And when the Tza'ab fled, and the spy reported this by another letter, Lord Limner Sario painted these thousands out of existence, leaving only the clean unspoiled sands in his painting-and on the Joharran border."

She was shivering in the shade of the huge oak, and he waited for a time until his own emotions were under control-the same horror, the same sick fear of power he'd felt when Zevierin had told him the tale. No one had ever painted such a picture again and it was utterly forbidden even to try, but it was possible to do such things, and maybe even worse. This was knowledge reserved only for Viehos Fratos and the Grand Dukes they served, and, as Lissina had cautioned, not for the likes of women or mere limners like himself.

At last he said softly, "I'm not a Limner-but Zevierin is, and he knows what Grijalvas can do.

Sario worked that terrible painting in his own blood. When a painting is Aguo, Seminno, or Sanguo, it means that it is powerful and can be used even at a great distance. You didn't see Zevierin mix the paints for Baroness Lissina's Will. I did. Why do you think he had a bandage on his wrist for a week afterward? Mechella, he mixed those paints with his own blood!"

"He-he said he cut his hand on a paletto knife-"

He knelt, taking both her hands. Her fingers were cold; she believed him, though she didn't yet know it. "Do you remember when Tessa's little songbird died this winter, and she was heartbroken for days?" All the soft rosy color drained from her cheeks. "Until Zevi . . . until he told her she might dream of her friend . . . and put a drawing of the bird under her pillow. ..."

"And she did dream, and Sancto Leo told her it meant her bird was singing now for the Mother and Son. That's the gentle magic, Mechella. The sweetness of what a Limner can do. But there are other kinds of power." He felt her tremble, and kissed her palms.

"Wh-what could Rafeyo do to us?" she breathed.

"I don't know." He did, of course, and writhed at his own impotence to prevent it. "My precious love, if I had the Grijalva Gift in me, I would paint protections onto every wall of Corasson in my own blood. But I can't. I'm not a Limner. I can't protect you. We must trust Zevierin-a thing you know, or you wouldn't have insisted that he and only he paint Renayo's Birth. Our son is protected as long as Zevierin lives, while the blood flows in his veins."

He laughed harshly. "I always wondered about that oath, the way it was worded. 'With true faith and in humble service I dedicate myself to my duty while the blood flows in my veins.' All of us swear it, but to a Limner it means more."

"And-Rafeyo?"

"Zevierin is worried, and with reason. Until Rafeyo paints his self-portrait, his Peintraddo Chieva, there will be no way of disciplining him. His blood will be in the paints he uses then, 'Chella. And Zevi says that a picture painted in a Limner's own blood-"

"Stop. No more," she whispered. "Don't tell me, Cabral, I don't want to know. Lissina was right. These are things for Grand Dukes and Grijalvas." With a shudder, she finished, "Do as he says with the drawing. I couldn't look at it now without being afraid. But don't tell me any more of this. Ever."

" 'Chella-"

"No!" She wrenched her hands free and leaped to her feet.

"Zevierin won't live past fifty," he said bluntly. "You'll need another Limner one day. I can never be what you truly need-"

"I need you as a husband, a father to my children-that's what you can never be, not openly, not before the world-ah, Matra, why is it we all want what we can never have?" She covered her face with her hands and fled into the house.

He stayed there on his knees for a long time, grappling with strange intensities of emotion: hate, despair, resentment, desperate longing for what he did not possess. Finally he pushed himself to his feet and trudged into the house. The drawing of Corasson was gone from its honored place in the dining room-torn off the wall, lying on the floor, the cords that had held it from the crown molding snapped. He cut a finger as he undid the frame hooks-glaring at the blood, hating it for not being Limner blood. For the rest of the afternoon he sat on a hay bale in the stable, watching in silent rage as the drawing dissolved in a huge tub of icy water. He left it cold on purpose, hoping the picture did have magic in it and that Rafeyo's teeth would chatter so hard he bit out his tongue and died of blood loss.

Does Sario gaze on me in my painted prison? Does he smile, does he laugh, knowing that he alone knows the truth? And . . . Alejandro? Does he weep, or curse, or cry out? Or does he stare in silence, hating me for leaving him?

Or does he never look on me at all?

I could look upon myself if I liked-there is a mirror, and I could see into my own eyes-but I'm so afraid of what I'll find in them. I am so afraid for myself, for Alejandro, for our baby-I fear Sario, what he has done, what he might yet do. . , .

He has left me a copy of the Folio-as a torment, I am sure. Did he know it would open? Did he know the pages are written on as clearly as if he had penned each word himself? Indeed, it is his writing in the margin glosses. It must be a painted replica of his own copy. Does he wish me to know precisely how he did this to me?

Or is it not torment but challenge to confirm his belief that I, too, am Gifted?

Could I use this book? Could I open one of my veins and find within it blood that would infuse mere paint with Limner magic?

Eiha, he gave me the book. But no paints. Not even a pencil to write with. If he had, I could have written on one of these pages and someone would see my words and- But they should have guessed by now. Anyone seeing me within this framed prison would surely see that I have moved within it, that I am alive within it- Only Sario gazes upon me. Only his eyes watch me while I go mad.

No. I will not go mad. I must be strong of mind and will and heart. For my child.

But I am so tired . . . two nights I have been here, two nights without sleep or surcease from this horror. No one has seen me. No one but Sario.

Matra Dolcha, when will he set me free?

The day of Sancterria, Tazia received Arrigo early in the afternoon at her old caza in town. He had a few hours free between his luncheon with the Silk Merchants Guild and the evening's festivities. They went out into the tiny garden behind the house to enjoy the sunshine. Tazia leaned back comfortably against Arrigo's chest, listening to the music of the bees. It was safe to relax here, shielded from prying eyes.

She had recently begun refurbishing her former home: taking back her own carpets and tapestries and furniture from Garlo's caza and castello, buying replacements for things discarded when she'd married. Soon she would resume her old life here and it would be just as it had been in the years before Mechella, when Arrigo had been entirely hers.

How often in those days had they done this: lazed away a soft sunny day on the square of lawn while bees dipped into new flowers and butterflies floated on a warm, languid breeze. Arrigo sat with his back to a tree trunk, Tazia reclining between his thighs, his arms enwrapping her and her head on his shoulder. She had never been so happy, and she smiled as she told him why.

"Rafeyo says the painting is ready."

"Mmm?"

"It only awaits your word. Whenever you please, Mechella will become as loyal and obedient as any man could wish." She laughed. "Just like a little trained puppy!"

A chuckle vibrated against her spine. "More boring than ever."

"But compliant. You must be careful not to order anything too contrary to her recent behavior for a while, Arrigo. Slide into it gradually. If there should be any sudden alteration-"

" 'Cordo, Tazia. We've talked about this before. You must admit, though, it would be amusing to command something really interesting. As punishment. She could host your next birthday ball," he suggested, then laughed aloud. "Better, maybe she ought to take to a Sanctia cell for a few years."

She winced; it reminded her of Garlo's wretched son, the cause of all her troubles with her husband. Garlo cared nothing for her renewed affair with Arrigo, but would never forgive her for the loss of Verradio to the Ecclesia. Perhaps Rafeyo could paint Garlo compliant, too. And Verradio silent forever. She wasn't sure exactly what could and could not be done. Rafeyo had been so busy with his painting and his classes and his special tutorials with Premio Dioniso that yesterday was the first time he'd come to see her in months.

Eiha, what she knew didn't matter. It only mattered what Rafeyo knew- and what he did with it.

Besides, she had plans of her own to pursue. Slowly, as if it had only just occurred to her, she said, "There is a way to punish her as she deserves. You could have another child."

"Not unless it was yours."

"It can be, in a way. I have a young cousin-"

He sat up, dislodging her from her comfortable nest in his arms. She turned to face him, putting all her yearning into her eyes.

"Arrigo, hear me out. Her name is Serenissa. She's my younger sister's child, born a year after Rafeyo and a Mennino do'Confirmattio, as he is. She's not quite eighteen, very bright and witty- and she even reminds me of myself in looks, the way I was at her age."

"You're still the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. But I won't do it, Tazia. Not if the woman isn't you. I promised you fidelity. That you didn't ask is all the more reason for me to give it. I couldn't make love to another woman, even one who looked like you."

"Not even for a child who would be ours?" she whispered. "Mechella's creature Leilias is wed to the Limner Zevierin-he's sterile, but they want children. She's at the Palasso even now, looking for a suitable father. Zevierin will treat her children as if he had sired them. He loves her that much. He wants her children that much."

"Tazia-carrida dolcha meya-" Arrigo drew her back into his arms, holding fiercely. "You are not only the most beautiful but the most generous and loving woman I've ever known! If you truly want this-"

"More than anything but your love, Arrigo. I swear to you I'll think of this child as ours, yours and mine. The cruelest thing I ever had to endure was that I could never bear you a child. But this way-don't you see-we could do what we've pretended so many times, make a baby of our own." He was quiet for a few minutes, the drowsy hum of the bees and the sound of his heart the only things she heard. Then: "If you adopted the baby, wouldn't it take Garlo's name?"

"Never! I'd never give him legal rights over a Grijalva! He-or she- would be a fosterling, and remain a Grijalva. Only you and I and the mother would know that the baby is also a do'Verrada."

"Well, naturally it must be kept absolutely secret."

"Naturally," she agreed. All proof and documentation would be most secret indeed-until the time was right to reveal it. Her own adherents among the family would approve this. Mechella's sons would never take a Grijalva Mistress, having grown up prejudiced against the tradition by their mother. Such a smear on the canvas of Grijalva power could not be tolerated. A bastard would ensure do'Verrada compliance no matter what the vagaries of Mechella's sons. Tazia was sure she could explain it attractively enough to the important Grijalvas on her side so they would look the other way and break faith with an agreement dating back to Lord Limner Sario and Duke Alejandro. Even if she couldn't convince them-and she would judge the telling most carefully before breathing a word-she would have the child in her possession.

"-the next Confirmattio," Arrigo was saying, and Tazia tore her mind from delectable possibilities to find him much less stunned than before. "The child would be attributed to the boy whose place I take."

Much less stunned. It was insulting, how quickly he'd taken to the idea.

"The perfect solution," she told him. "But could we be sure of trusting the boy?"

"Eiha, there is that. What of the girl? Can she be trusted?"

"I'm sure of it." Tazia created laughter out of nothing. "Serenissa has always regretted that she was born too late to be your Mistress and too early to be Alessio's."

But Serenissa's daughter-and Rafeyo would use every scrap of magic he possessed to ensure that it was a daughter-would be of an age to seduce Alessio in twenty or so years. She laughed more easily, contemplating Mechella's face when she found out that her darling elder boy was sleeping with his own half sister.

Arrigo made the correct remark about being glad Tazia had been the one chosen for him, then returned to the logistics of getting Serenissa pregnant. As if Tazia hadn't already thought of everything-though it must appear to him that he'd worked it out on his own.