A Magic of Twilight

Because it was the month of the Kraljica’s Jubilee, the fiftieth anniversary of her rule, the sky was a perfection of deepest azure, decorated tastefully with pillows of white clouds. Because it was the month of the Kraljica’s Jubilee, spring deigned to arrive a few weeks early: flowers bloomed in a determined barrage of unadulterated hues from the boxes below nearly every window and in the dozens of great and small public gardens of Nessantico. Because it was the month of the Kraljica’s Jubilee, the sun, which until the last week had been a pale apparition easily overcome by the cold winds and snow off the Strettosei, girded its celestial loins and beamed renewed warmth down on the city. Because it was the month of the Kraljica’s Jubilee, the days were full of ceremonies and rituals, all of which were occasions for those whose family names were prefaced with a ca’ or cu’ to attend and be seen, to mingle and gossip and at least pretend that they were universally joyous at this milestone in the current Kraljica’s long reign over the Holdings.

Because it was the month of the Kraljica’s Jubilee, nothing would be allowed to mar the perfection.

Ana cu’Seranta made certain that she wore yellow for her afternoon’s appointment at the temple, since the Kraljica had appointed the trumpet flower with its sun-tinted petals as the official flower of the celebration, and one never knew when the Kraljica might deign to take her carriage for a turn around the Avi a’Parete. Besides, yellow enhanced the golden-brown tones of her skin and contrasted nicely with the nightfall black of her hair. When the Kraljica had declared the trumpet flower as her symbol, there’d been an immediate rush on the last harvest’s stock of sapnuts, from which the richest golden dyes were derived. Sapnut-dyed cloth had become difficult to find and expensive to buy, but when the invitation had come from the Archigos’ own office requesting Ana to view the Archigos’ afternoon blessing, Ana’s vatarh had managed to find a small bolt at Oldtown Market.

“No, Vatarh, you don’t need to do that.”

“But it’s what I want, Ana,” he’d said to her. “You’re going to see the Archigos, and I want you to look beautiful.”

He’d reached out to her then, and she’d turned quickly away. She kept her face averted until he dropped his hand back to his side. When he returned that afternoon, he’d given the bolt to the upstairs servant Sala, not to Ana.

He’d left the house again without another word.

The hue of the cloth was perhaps more subdued than the optimum, the dye diluted or mixed with less expensive dyes, but the shade was acceptable. Ana had fashioned a robelike tashta from the cloth, the folds drawn tight just under her bosom and then falling free to the sandals on her feet, a Magyarian fashion that had been adopted for the last several years in Nessantico.

“They’re here, Vajica Ana. They’ve sent an open carriage for you.”

Tari, one of the two remaining lower-floor servants, was bowing at the door to Ana’s dressing room. “It’s being driven by a teni,” she added.

Ana glanced a final time at the mirror, waving off Sala, who was wield-ing a brush as she arranged Ana’s hair and tied it with ribbons.

“Tell them I’ll be down directly,” Ana told Tari, who inclined her head once more. They could hear her footsteps on the stairs.

“An open carriage,” Sala said quietly. Sala had been Ana’s wet nurse, and had stayed on in the family’s employ to become an upper-floor servant. She still seemed to consider Ana her special charge, and had stayed on even as the family’s fortunes had declined and the staff that had formerly kept the house was reduced. “The Archigos wants you to be seen. As you should be.”

“Or he wants the wind to tangle my hair,” Ana replied, and managed to laugh despite her nervousness. “In any case, it’s not the Archigos I’ll be meeting, just one of the lesser teni.”

“But they’re going to give you your Marque, then,” Sala said. “They wouldn’t be sending for you if you hadn’t passed. You’re to be a teni yourself.”

Ana didn’t dare to hope that was true; she wasn’t going to think it.

If anything, she feared that she’d be given worse than a Note. “We’ve learned how you’ve abused your gift. We know what you’ve done with your matarh. .” If that was why she’d been summoned, she would not be returning here, not as a whole person.

She shuddered. “Are you cold?” Sala asked. “I can get a shawl. .”

“No. I’m fine.” It can’t be that. Please, Cenzi, don’t let it be that. They wouldn’t have sent a carriage to take me to the Bastida, certainly. Maybe Sala’s right. .

She forced the image away. Ana desired her Marque more than she could admit-because of the work and tears; because of the expense to her family; because of the way the wealthier acolytes had treated her, or the way the teni who staffed the school had done nothing but criticize her. Three years ago, there had been over seventy students accepted in her class; only twenty remained in the final year. Three of the twenty of her class had received their Marques on Cenzidi last week, giving them the rank of e’teni and placing them in the service of the Concenzia Faith. The gossip among the acolytes was that the rest had received their Notes of Severance, though none of them admitted such-Ana feared the way her vatarh would respond if she were given a Note. It would be worse than anything he’d done yet.

“Don’t expect more than a bare few of you to receive the Marque,” U’Teni cu’Dosteau, in charge of the acolytes, had told them when they’d started their studies. “Of the seventy here, it will be five at most, and likely fewer. The majority of you will leave early and receive neither Marque nor Note. For those of you who manage to stay, nearly all of you will fail to go any further in your instruction with the Ilmodo.”

Ana had heard nothing from the temple or U’Teni cu’Dosteau.

Still, if impossibly Sala was right, Ana could leave this house and forge her own life.

That was what she wanted most of all. To be away from here.

To be away from Vatarh. No matter how guilty it might make her feel for abandoning Matarh.

“Thank you, Sala,” Ana said, moving her head away from Sala’s brush. “If you brush it any more, you’ll pull the hair right from my head.

I should be back to take evening supper to Matarh, and I’m still planning on attending the lighting ceremony tonight with her and Vatarh, so make certain her carry-chair is ready and the help hired for the evening.”

Ana walked slowly from her rooms to the main stairs, forcing herself to keep a leisurely pace even though she wanted nothing more than to hurry. Tari was at the front doors with an acolyte in pale green robes, the broken- world crest of the Archigos on the boy’s left shoulder. He lowered his head as Ana came down the steps, lifting his eyes up to her only after she stopped before him, but there was no subservience in his eyes, only a penetrating regard. She’d seen that attitude before, many times. His unconscious bearing told her that he was probably the younger son of one of the ca’-and-cu’ families placed into the temple’s service, too new to Concenzia to be someone she would know by sight.

She wondered whether he noticed how few servants there were in their house, or how the hall needed to be repainted and that there were cobwebs in the high corners, wondered whether he knew that she had once been like him. Whatever he might be thinking, it never reached his impassive face.

“If you’d follow me, Vajica. .” he said, gesturing to the carriage waiting on the street.

She followed behind him, into the air that still held a faint kiss of winter in its embrace despite the sun. She shivered and wished, briefly, that she’d brought the shawl Sala had offered with her, though that would have spoiled the effect of the tashta. She could see a few of their neighbors standing outside in their front gardens, pointedly not staring at the carriage adorned with an ornate gold-and-enamel fractured globe, the sign of Cenzi and the Concenzia Faith. She lifted her hand to them; they nodded back, as if happening to notice her and the carriage for the first time. “Why, good morning, Vajica Ana. How is your matarh today? When does Vajiki cu’Seranta return from Prajnoli. .?”

“Matarh is still very weak from the Fever and still can’t talk or move on her own, but she is beginning to recover, thank you for asking. We expect Vatarh back later today or this evening,” she answered as the acolyte opened the door of the carriage for her and helped her inside, then closed the door and took his place standing on the step outside.

The driver was indeed one of the teni, and as he turned to nod to Ana, she glanced at the doubled white slashes on the shoulders of his green, cowled robes. “E’Teni,” she said, addressing him by the rank denoted by the slashes, the lowest of the teni positions. “I’m ready.”

He nodded again, turning. She heard him muttering softly-the sibilant chanting that she’d heard many times