The Seer's Choice: A Novella of the Golden City (11 page)

“What did he do to you?” Miguel Gaspar had taken a single look at his hand, but that was all Gaspar ever needed. He
saw
things. Not in the way that normal people did, but in a more complicated way. He could see the sum of a person’s gifts, of their actions.

“What’s wrong with my hand?” Rafael asked. After Miss Jardim had touched it, the sharp stinging had ceased, but it still felt
wrong
.

“It looks to me like he stole some of your hand from you.”

Stole?
“I had my hand on him, and he just disappeared. I assumed it’s some gift I’ve never heard of before.”

Gaspar’s head tilted. “Do you mean he made himself unseen?”

Gaspar’s wife could do that, simply make others not notice her. “It wasn’t that,” Rafael said. “I was holding him and suddenly he was gone. He didn’t pull away. He was just gone.”

Gaspar leaned against the wall. “Are you saying he moved himself somewhere else by magic?”

“I suppose that’s what he must have done.”

“Fairies can move themselves through the faery realm, but from what I understand, it’s a complicated procedure and requires that doorways be in place to do so.”

Rafael would point out that fairies didn’t exist, but Gaspar—and his wife—were very sure that they did. It was likely that Mrs. Gaspar’s father had been one of those mythical creatures. “I don’t think a doorway was used.”

Gaspar scratched his chin. “Perrault wrote of boots that could transport the wearer seven leagues with a step, but I doubt we’re speaking of boots here, either. It could, however, be a magical device with a similar effect.”

Rafael
had
thought of a magical device. The past fall, the Special Police had found dozens of unexplained devices when they’d raided a secret collection of magical oddities. Mrs. Gaspar recognized many of them as having belonged to her father before his disappearance, but the majority of them had unknown functions. The Jesuits had possession of most of those and were trying still to safely discern their uses. Despite his respect for that order’s brethren, Rafael suspected they’d taken on more than they could handle. “I didn’t see any device.”

“It could have been as small as a talisman,” Gaspar said. “And he disappeared when the other police officer drew his gun?”

“Yes.”

“At the sight of an imminent threat, he triggers the device and he’s gone, taking a layer of your skin with him. You’d better not lay hands on him again, or he might take more of you than just skin.”

“Why would he be after Miss Jardim? He was clearly trying to get past us to her.”

“The more pertinent question was how he knew which room was hers that first time. You said her room looks down on the street. He could have seen her through the curtains at some point, I suppose, but a man who’s yelling gibberish doesn’t sound clever enough to reason out the internal layout of the house.”

“I wondered that. I am concerned he might have a way to find her. Magically, I mean.”

“Early to leap to that conclusion,” Gaspar said.

Rafael frowned. Gaspar preferred evidence to supposition. “He looked familiar, too. Likely someone I’ve seen on the streets before. I couldn’t place his face, though.”

Gaspar tilted his head, considering. “That doesn’t narrow our field of suspects. Is he going to strike again?”

Rafael had asked his gift that, in a hundred different ways. “Yes, although not immediately.”

“That buys us time,” Gaspar said. “Did you send out an updated description?”

He hadn’t had many details to add to Miss Jardim’s description. He would place the man’s age to just over fifty, which made his white hair seem premature. Nose that had been broken before, pointed chin, teeth yellowed from smoking cigarettes, and eyes that bulged a bit. It was a better description than they’d had before. So his officers would, among other things, be looking for this man. That was about all they could do.

Even so, once he got his officers sorted out, each out working on their individual cases, Rafael had some time on his hands, so he went down to the Carvalho house to speak with the butler. The man would surely know if anyone had threatened Miss Jardim when she’d lived there.



Genoveva had spent a leisurely morning at the Ferreira house. It seemed strange and wrong to do so, to sit about when she’d become accustomed to
doing
. She didn’t have a place in this world any longer. Despite the cook’s insistence that she sleep as late as she wished, she awoke with the dawn.

The captain had left a message for her that she was probably safe for the day, but he preferred she not leave the house, not even for Mass. So she ate breakfast and read a newspaper, a strange luxury she’d forgotten. In the house’s library, she found an interesting selection of books and settled on the couch to read. Time seemed to crawl, though, rather than flying.

When the butler went to answer the door sometime after lunch, Genoveva went to the library door and peered out, hoping that Captain Pinheiro had arrived with some news. Instead, a familiar woman stepped inside.

Genoveva ran down the hallway to embrace her mother, whose eyes were red with tears. Lady Carvalho had a plump form and pale skin that tended to blotch when she cried, two traits that Genoveva hadn’t inherited. “How did you know I was here?”

Her mother kissed her cheeks and embraced her. “A police officer was questioning the butler, and sent me word that you were staying here in Lady Ferreira’s absence.”

Ah, Genoveva detected Captain Pinheiro’s hand in that. “Does
he
know you’re here?”

Her mother nodded, not questioning whom Genoveva meant. “He does allow me to visit a few of my friends. If he knew you were here, though, he would forbid me to come again.”

Her mother’s husband—who was
not
Genoveva’s father—kept his wife on a short leash following the scandals of one daughter running away with a commoner and another proving to be a bastard. If she could take her mother away from that situation, she would, but Genoveva had no idea
how
. Her mother had no money of her own since her dowry had unwisely been handed over to her husband’s control. “Then we’ll make certain he doesn’t find out,” Genoveva said firmly. “Now, come tell me everything that’s happened.”

And so she spent an afternoon pleasantly chatting with her mother, which was the kindest thing that Captain Pinheiro could have done for her.



Rafael hadn’t had much luck at the Carvalho household. He’d spoken with the butler, the cook, Lady Carvalho’s maid, and one of the footmen. None of them could imagine anyone having a grudge against Genoveva. No one had come to the house seeking her, not since her precipitous departure six months before.

They did, however, reassure him that Miss Constancia’s husband—the former footman, now farmer—was a clever and hard-working young man, which provoked him to send a telegram to the countryside. He hoped he might have an answer to his proposal in a few days.

He returned to the station and spent the end of his day meeting with officers to close out their current batch of cases. Medeiros had found the missing father, Forsythe had located the witch selling faulty love charms in the narrow streets of the Ribeira district, and the businessman harassing the sereia had been brought in to the station and reminded of the new law of the land, which should keep him from further misbehavior, although word had been left in the area to call in the Special Police should he try such extortion again. A dozen rumors had been followed to their ends, and a few of them had proven important. They’d had a productive week, all in all, even if they’d gotten nowhere with Miss Jardim’s assailant.

Rafael couldn’t walk directly from the station to the Ferreira house to check on her. There was always the chance he might be followed. So he took a cab to Massarelos Parish and then caught a tram headed toward the Street of Flowers. He stepped off the tram a few houses past the Ferreira house and cut behind the houses to walk down the alleyway that served as a mews for the houses on that street. He felt foolish the whole while because he had no warning from his gift that the man in question might be pursuing him. But at the end of his quest, he stood in the Ferreira kitchens, sure he hadn’t been followed.

He was rewarded for his caution by the sight of Genoveva Jardim coming down those kitchen steps, a broad smile on her usually solemn face. That told him her mother had received his message about her presence in the Ferreira house. “I wish I had answers for you, Miss Jardim, but we didn’t get very far on the case today.”

“I didn’t expect everything to be solved in one day,” she admitted. “Now, Mrs. Cardoza has insisted on preparing a full dinner for me, and I don’t want to sit and eat alone. Please say you’ll stay.”

“I’m not dressed for dinner,” he protested.

“It doesn’t matter. She didn’t mean it to be a formal meal. And I don’t have anything to change into in the first place.” She took his hand in her own, just as he’d done the night before. “Please.”

Apparently he was forgiven for his amusement at her expense. And she seemed to
want
him to stay, which made the idea most appealing. “Very well.”

“Come along upstairs then, and tell me everything you’ve found out.”

That would be a short discussion. But he gave in to the tugging of her hand and followed her upstairs anyway.

