The Golden City (35 page)

When they broke the surface, he gave a ragged gasp. He choked and coughed while she supported him. “Be
st
ill,” she said, tears
st
inging her eyes now that he was safe. “Let the water hold you.”

There was panic in his eyes, visible this close. “Where are we?”

He couldn’t see the nearby shore, she realized, and had no innate sense of the dire
ct
ion. Following the lights of the city would mean swimming
across
the river, more than a mile again
st
the current, a foolish choice when the unlit Gaia shore was closer. They’d drifted far from the patrol boat, certainly far beyond the crew’s ability to see two people
st
randed in the water. She could hear its engine chugging away. They mu
st
be heading back toward the city to get the vi
ct
ims to a do
ct
or. At lea
st
she hoped that was the case. They had tru
st
ed her to save Duilio.

“I know where the land is,” she reassured him. “Here, let me get this coat off you.”

She could tell he was fighting to keep calm, his breathing
st
ill ragged. She worked the buttons of his coat, the wool swollen with water and
st
ubborn. Once she finally had it undone she pushed it off his shoulders. Freed from its weight, he seemed better able to
st
ay afloat. She tugged off his sodden tie, ju
st
to be certain he could breathe.

“I’m going to tow you to shore,” she said in his ear. “Don’t fight me.”

He coughed again but nodded, so she wrapped one arm about his che
st
and began hauling him toward land. He let her carry him mo
st
of the way, but after a time insi
st
ed on swimming on his own. It wasn’t far. Even so, it seemed to take forever.

They ended up on the Gaia shore, almo
st
all the way out at the breakwater. Her feet found purchase in fine sand, and she pushed herself upright, walking the la
st
little di
st
ance to the beach. She slid down on one side of a large rock, where she would be hidden from view from passing traffic on the river. “Ju
st
let me re
st
a while,” she mumbled.

Only a few
st
eps behind her, Duilio didn’t argue. He sat next to her on the damp ground and coughed up more water. She caught him in her arms when he slumped to the sands.

T
he green hills rolled gently down to the Douro at the Marialva e
st
ate, allowing all the gue
st
s a fine view of the sparkling waters peeking between carefully manicured
st
ands of trees. Tidy rows of grape vines climbed the far bank of the river. It was a mild spring afternoon, and Oriana had gone with Isabel to an informal picnic on Lord Marialva’s grounds.

Pia walked with them, her white-gloved hands fluttering as she spoke. She wore pink, and with her blond hair down she looked sadly insipid next to her vividly alive cousin. Isabel’s dark green walking suit made her seem more forceful and real. Oriana held a parasol to shade her mi
st
ress’ alaba
st
er skin.

They walked pa
st
a blanket where a young woman reclined next to the prince’s seer. As they walked closer, Silva took the girl’s hand in his, slowly drew off her short glove, and ran a bare finger across her palm. The girl’s mouth opened in a surprised O at whatever he said.

“I don’t know why anyone li
st
ens to that man,” Isabel said loudly enough for the girl to overhear. “He’s wrong more often than the a
st
rologers.” She lifted her chin in the air, the feather from her cap curving around to touch her cheek, and walked on pa
st
.

They’d nearly reached the river’s bank by then, the comforting smell of the water filling the air. Marianus Efisio, Pia’s betrothed,
st
ood speaking with another man, one Oriana didn’t recognize. Dark brown hair, medium build, slightly taller than average—not much to di
st
inguish him.

“Who is that with Mr. Efisio?” Oriana asked.

“Mr. Ferreira, the younger one,” Pia whispered, and crossed herself reverently, white gloves fluttering like gull’s wings. “The elder passed recently.”

Isabel laughed under her breath. “You wouldn’t want your handsome betrothed talking to the older Ferreira,” she told Pia, a waspish note in her voice. “They say he took a different lover every night, sometimes more than one . . . and not only women. Scandalous. He was sinfully handsome, Pia, and might have
st
olen your swain from you. At lea
st
with boring Duilio there, your betrothed’s cha
st
ity is safe.”

Pia flushed bright red, her cheeks clashing with her pink dress, while Oriana wondered what had made Isabel’s tongue so sharp that day. She extended her arm to keep Isabel’s face shaded by the parasol, and turned her eyes toward the two men in que
st
ion. The newcomer looked in their dire
ct
ion, his gaze settling dire
ct
ly on Oriana.

But Mr. Ferreira looked away quickly, leaving her with only the impression of warm brown eyes in a serious face. Yet when she saw his face more clearly, his expression seemed fatuous . . . vacant. He went on his way a moment later.

She turned to watch his escape . . . and realized she
st
ood on a seashore in
st
ead. It was the beach she’d lived near as a child. She closed her eyes. A cool breeze off the water set her at ease, the smells of flowers and the cries of the birds familiar. It was home.

A musky scent touched her no
st
rils. She opened her eyes to see Duilio Ferreira
st
anding only an arm’s length away, his bare feet on the sand. He was bare-che
st
ed and wearing a black pareu tied in the manner that proclaimed him chosen. Scratches ran across his back and one shoulder, and a number of rose-gold cuffs adorned his ankles and his arms, enough to show his mate held him to be of great value. He turned toward her, revealing that his che
st
had been painted with the Paredes line mark. His kohl-rimmed eyes laughed. “It
is
beautiful.”

Oriana
st
ared at him, captivated.
What is he doing here?

“As are you,” he added. He
st
roked her cheek with gentle fingers. She held her breath, waiting for him to kiss her. His warm lips touched hers, soft and patient. His left hand spread on her bare skin below her brea
st
, and then slid around to her back, pulling her closer.

But his grasp suddenly turned cold and wet. His other hand tangled in her loosened hair, ju
st
as sodden.

SUNDAY, 5 OCTOBER 1902

•   •   •

O
riana felt cold water in the shell of her ear, and that jarred her out of whatever
st
range world of dreams she’d inhabited. She lay on the sands at the edge of the river, warm on one side, chilled on the other. The tide had begun to overwhelm the river’s usual good sense, coming in with icy morning fingers; that was what she’d felt threading its way through her hair.

Duilio Ferreira lay half-across her, with his head pillowed on her brea
st
. His hand re
st
ed on her
st
omach, his legs tangled with hers. Oriana lay
st
ill, trying to decide what she should do. She had never lain with a man in her arms before, and hadn’t realized the warmth a male body would carry with it.

She didn’t under
st
and why she’d dreamed such things, why that day by the side of the river had surfaced in her memory. It had been the fir
st
time she’d realized Isabel intended to
st
eal away Pia’s betrothed. But she’d forgotten seeing a man named Duilio Ferreira that day.

Or, rather, he had seen her. A man who had seemed otherwise unremarkable had noticed her as a person, rather than a nameless servant. He had
looked
at her. She recalled wondering about him later, but he’d already gone. And then she’d forgotten all about him.

She swallowed, ta
st
ing river water on her tongue. She didn’t want to dwell on whatever had made her ca
st
him in the dream as her mate, dressed and painted as a man of her people would have been. It was laughable. He was wealthy and a gentleman; he would never display himself in such a way. Nor would he take someone like her—a sereia, and a penniless woman who’d spied on his people—as a mate.

She’d been told for years that she would never have a mate, that she was de
st
ined for service to her people in
st
ead. Was she so unhappy with her current life as to conjure a mate from among the humans?

Oriana closed her eyes, hearing the denial spinning through her thoughts. Presented with the truth, she didn’t want to face it; the numinous thread that her people believed bound her soul to another’s—that thread of De
st
iny she’d always believed didn’t exi
st
—was tied to
him
. She knew the way he smelled, the twi
st
of his lips when he held in some clever comment that made her wish she could blush.

She did believe in De
st
iny after all.

•   •   •

D
uilio woke when water soaked through his shirt anew. The morning tide was coming in. The sun had begun to rise. Birds screeched in the rocks above them, barely visible in the fog that blanketed the shore.

He was tangled in Oriana’s arms, one of his wool-covered legs between her bare ones. Desire flushed through his body, leaving him almo
st
painfully aroused. His left hand lay ju
st
below her brea
st
, and for a traitorous second he wondered if she knew he’d awakened. But she had one hand loosely atop his head; she mu
st
have felt him move. He lifted his head slowly from her shoulder.

He’d awakened in a woman’s arms often enough before that it didn’t shock him. Normally this would be the moment to kiss her, to shift his body closer and move his hands to caress her. Normally it would be a good time to make love and perhaps to sleep again afterward. His body surely found that an excellent idea. Unfortunately, nothing was normal with Oriana Paredes.

So he eased himself off her and into a sitting position with a sharp mental reminder not to
st
are at her brea
st
s. He coughed and moved to one side, his eyes averted. His leg ached fiercely. That helped di
st
ra
ct
him. My
st
ified, he peeled back his trouser leg. Blue and purple bruises wrapped his leg where the anchor line had been, crushing the little derringer in its hol
st
er again
st
his ankle. He hadn’t realized how tightly the anchor had held on to him. And where were his shoes?

Oriana moved, drawing his eyes back to her body. She settled on her scale-patterned knees and touched his ankle. “Is it broken?”

Her hands on his skin brought his body back to full attention. Duilio felt his face go warm with embarrassment. Her wet hair hung in sand-encru
st
ed tangles, and her eyes seemed deeper set with exhau
st
ion, but she
st
ill
st
ole his breath away, ju
st
as she had the fir
st
day he’d seen her so. He was close enough to lean in and kiss her. In
st
ead he fixed his eyes on his leg. “I don’t think so.”

She insi
st
ed on running her fingers along the bones to be certain, coolly and clinically, as if she hadn’t noticed his discomfort. He leaned back while she un
st
rapped the hol
st
er, which a
ct
ually set off another flare of pain. “What happened?” she asked.

She didn’t seem offended, a small recompense. “The yacht hit my boat,” Duilio said. “I was ca
st
ing off the anchor when it hit. My foot mu
st
have tangled in the anchor line, and it dragged me under.”

He took another deep breath and decided that he finally had his body under control. And if he wasn’t going to ravish Oriana Paredes on this fog-veiled beach, then what was the point of
st
aying? Fog clung to the cliffs, but he could see enough. They had fetched up on the beach near the breakwaters. Without a coat or tie he mu
st
look disreputable, but boats did go down in the river from time to time,
st
randing people. He would simply plead that as an excuse.

Oriana could hardly walk through the
st
reets naked, though. “Wait here,” he told her. “I’ll come back with something.”

He
st
arted to take off his shirt to offer it to her, but she shook her head. “I’ll
st
ay in the water,” she said. “I’ll be fine.”

He would have felt silly wearing only sodden trousers anyway. Duilio peered at the rocks, trying to decide how to get up onto the heights. A narrow wooden
st
air ascended the cliff’s face, likely property of some homeowner. Duilio headed toward the
st
air.

“Ferreira,” a voice called across the water. “Ferreira!”

Duilio
st
ared out into the fog. He couldn’t make out a boat, but he heard oars cutting the water, the noisy splash of an inefficient rower. “Gaspar? On the sand.”

“Coming,” Gaspar called back.

Oriana half rose out of the water. “I’ll go find him.”

She didn’t wait for his response. She dove into the water and disappeared into the fog. Duilio leaned again
st
the rocks, his ankle throbbing. The splashing grew closer, and then he saw a small boat sliding toward the sand. Gaspar sat inside, Pinheiro with him. Duilio waded out to them. “Do you have a blanket?”

Chuckling, Gaspar dug one out of the bow and handed it over. Duilio helped Oriana settle it about her and lifted her up into the boat. He pushed the boat away from the shore and then clambered over the side and settled on a middle plank facing her. She managed to work the blanket around so that not even an inch of her silvery feet showed. After fending off a spate of que
st
ions from both of the other men, Duilio finally got to ask a que
st
ion of his own. “What happened to the two in the house? Was it Miss Carvalho and the footman?”

“Yes, both are alive,” Gaspar said.

Duilio saw Oriana’s shoulders slump in relief. She’d saved them.

“The boy was in rough shape,” Gaspar added as he rowed toward the city. “It looks like he fought them, trying to keep them from the girl. A couple of broken ribs, and his face was so swollen he could hardly breathe, which is why we had to leave you out there. We needed to get him to a do
ct
or.”

Duilio didn’t blame them. They would never have been able to see him in the river in the dark anyway. “And the photographer? Did he get any pi
ct
ures?”

Gaspar grunted. “Yes. It’s a matter now of developing them and convincing his editor to run them. Anjos is already meeting with the City Council, bypassing the Mini
st
ry of Culture altogether. We expe
ct
that, given the evidence, they’ll agree that the remainder of the houses mu
st
be cut loose.”

“Good,” Duilio said. “What did Maraval say?”

“Nothing so far,” Gaspar said. “Anjos and his team didn’t find the man. They did, however, find an extensive colle
ct
ion of magical artifa
ct
s in a secret basement, which bears out Silva’s claim. The Jesuits have volunteered to catalog the colle
ct
ion, but they haven’t found your missing pelt yet. Maraval wasn’t at the mini
st
ry either, which leaves . . .”

“The my
st
erious workshop?” Duilio asked.

“Yes. If he’s on the run, it’s likely he’ll go there. Miss Vladimirova is que
st
ioning the servants at his home. If any of them know the location, she’ll get it out of them—I promise.”

“I told the selkie to follow the yacht,” Oriana told Gaspar. “If he did, he’ll know where it is.”