But Silva had never forgotten his expulsion. He had disappeared for years, only to return to the Golden City just as Prince Fabricio ascended the throne. Silva quickly wormed his way into the young prince’s favor. He’d become the prince’s favorite seer, displacing Alexandre Ferreira as an adviser. While always polite in public, Silva had privately told Duilio’s father that it was his intent to ruin the whole Ferreira family for their treatment of him.

If only his grandfather had been a little kinder—or faithful to his wife—Duilio suspected he wouldn’t be hunting for his mother’s pelt in his spare moments.

In the slanting light of late afternoon, Oriana walked along Escura Street, clutching her notebook to her chest as she headed back to the boarding house. Her feet ached. Her shoes had been too small before, but the soaking they’d gotten in the river meant they were tighter now.

She had hoped that the sketch would tell her something definite, but Nela’s words had only left her with more questions. Her time searching the newspapers suggested that the creator of The City Under the Sea had fled the Golden City. How was she supposed to hunt him down if he was miles and miles away?

None of the newspaper articles had mentioned that Gabriel Espinoza was a necromancer, but that didn’t surprise her. The Portuguese Church forbade this type of magic, so if he studied necromancy he certainly wouldn’t tell anyone. But it was far more likely he wasn’t working alone. There had to be workers to build the houses, others to lower them into the river at night, and someone to dive down to affix the chains to the weights on the river’s floor. Surely she could find one person among those willing to talk. Surely one of them found this monstrous.

But she was nearing the end of her rope.

She couldn’t go to the police. She’d considered posting an anonymous letter to them, but no matter how she imagined that playing out, every possibility led back to them asking her why she had lived when Isabel had died. The truth would land her first in the Special Police’s holding cells and then on the gallows.

There were other possibilities. Her father lived in the Golden City . . . but she wouldn’t go to him. Not unless she became truly desperate. Not having made such a mull of her life. Not after Marina’s death. She didn’t know if she could ever face him, having failed to keep her sister safe. And he had a new life here, a fresh start, where he was allowed to pursue his own goals and dreams without the government’s disapproval of a male getting out of his place. Her father was a businessman now. Oriana was proud of him for his enterprise . . . and was equally furious that he had replaced her dead mother with a human lover, one of his employers, Lady Pereira de Santos. Oriana had heard it whispered in the Amaral house—one over from the home of the lady in question—and it stung.

It was a childish reaction, she knew, but when she occasionally saw him, she felt such a welter of conflicting emotions that she always kept her distance. She only hoped that no one else realized he was her father. Heriberto might use that information to force her hand if he learned of it—he could turn her father in to the Special Police—and she didn’t want to give her master that sort of advantage over her.

No, she must simply find some manner of work, a position that would allow her to stay in the city and pursue the person who had ended all of Isabel’s dreams. She could go to an agency, perhaps, or start checking with dressmakers to see if any needed a seamstress. She glanced down at her worn black skirt. She wouldn’t make a favorable impression wearing this.

A voice broke into her musings. “I’ve been looking for you.”

Oriana glanced back at the store she’d just passed. Tucked into the first level of the building beneath an overhanging balcony, the tiny shop sold lace and fabrics and ribbon. The man waiting for her there could not look less like one of their patrons. An older man with graying hair in untidy curls, he dressed like a fisherman in worn brown trousers and a stained white tunic. A red kerchief hid his throat from view.

Ah gods. He was the last person she wanted to see now. Oriana mentally steeled herself, squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin. “Heriberto. How did you find me?”

The sereia spymaster stepped out of the shadows into the lesser shadows. In this part of town, the cobbled streets were jumbled and narrow. With the buildings tightly packed on either side, reaching up four stories high, it was a wonder anyone here ever saw sunlight. Heriberto gave Oriana a false smile. “Your employer eloped, I hear.” He leaned closer, his voice lowering conspiratorially. “And you missed your scheduled report. Why?”

He hadn’t answered her question, Oriana noted. This wasn’t an ideal location to have a private discussion anyway. Escura Street was busy this time of day, with pedestrians wanting to get past them and on to their dinners. Laundry flapped in the murky breeze overhead, run between and along the balconies, snapping and spraying them with fine droplets of water. “I have something I need to take care of.”

He raised one scarred hand to touch a finger under his eye, the gesture for disbelief. “You have no business other than what I tell you to have. You had an appointment with Dr. Esteves Saturday afternoon. Remember? I set it up for you, yet you’re still dragging your feet about getting your hands cut. Gods, you’re useless.”

Oriana was as tall as he was, so she could look down her nose convincingly. “You forget, Heriberto, I’m the only one you’ve got with access to the aristocracy. Who warned you that the navy was moving out on exercises last April?” she whispered. “Who told you that the Marquis of Maraval has friends among the Absolutists?”

They had been important bits of information, whether Heriberto wanted to admit it or not. The first had come from a naval officer who’d wanted to impress Isabel at a ball, puffing on about how the exercises—which would have taken the navy far too close to the islands—couldn’t proceed without his navigational skills. The other tidbit had come from Isabel herself, simple chatter while Oriana had been repairing a rent in one of Isabel’s dresses. Of course, Isabel didn’t see the Absolutists as a threat—after all, her own father was one of them. But the Absolutists believed in the divine right of the royal family, and therefore that the prince’s ban on the sea folk was perfectly legitimate. The Marquis of Maraval, the powerful Minister of Culture, was supposed to be neutral. If he shifted his views in favor of the Absolutists, it might adversely affect her people. Northern Portugal had always leaned in that direction anyway.

Heriberto ignored her reminders. “Your access to the aristocracy just fled to Paris. The papers claim you went with her, but I hear her mother threw you out on your ear.”

Her blood pounded in her ears, and Oriana pushed down the sick feeling that welled up at his claim. How did he know? She glanced down the street at the door of the boarding house. Her expulsion would have been fodder for servants’ gossip up and down the Street of Flowers for the past few days. It wouldn’t have cost him more than a beer or two to hear that tale, but only Carlos had known she was coming to stay with his elderly kinswoman. He must have told Heriberto where to find her. Oriana lifted her chin, trying to appear confident, and lied through her teeth. “When she gets back, Isabel will give me a reference. I’ll find another position then. I just need a couple of weeks to get my feet under me.”

“Weeks?” Heriberto snorted and made an obscene gesture with his hands that, fortunately, no human would recognize. “To get your feet under you? I heard you’re going to be spending that time on your back to pay your rent. Are you stupid enough to trust a human with the color of your stripe?”