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river’s mouth,
The City Under the Sea
. Surely his edginess was related to that. The arti st , Gabriel Espinoza, had taken into his mind to re-create the grand houses that lined the Street of Flowers. He’d anchored the fir st replica in the water a year ago, yet only recently had the Security Police—the regulars—begun to inve st igate those houses, suspe ct ing that something more sini st er than art might be driving the creation. They had immediately been ordered to close their inve st igation, although it was unclear from how high in the government that order had come. That had only served to pique Duilio’s intere st . As a private citizen, he could st ill ask all the que st ions he wanted.
    The latch of his bedroom door turned with a faint click.
    Reflex more than anything else got him onto his feet before the door opened halfway. He didn’t feel the twinge of warning that usually alerted him to danger, but he snatched up the revolver that lay on his night st and and held it ready as he turned to face the intruder. A shape st ood unmoving in the doorway, st artled by his sudden a ct ion. Someone else waited in the hallway with a lamp, ca st ing the intruder into silhouette.
    His visitor was female, even though she clearly wore trousers. That didn’t mean she was harmless; a woman could be as dangerous as any man. But Duilio felt sure there was no reason to fear this visitor. He let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. “What do you want?”
    “You’re him, aren’t you?” a feminine voice asked, confirming her gender. “Erdano’s brother.”
    Well, any woman who knew
that
wasn’t likely to be a threat. Duilio lowered the revolver and set it back on the night st and. His visitor had to be one of Erdano’s women—part of his brother’s harem.
    Duilio buttoned the top button of his nightshirt and st arted hunting for his felt slippers. “Give me a moment, please.”
    Very few humans had any inkling the Ferreira family possessed selkie blood, and those who did were polite enough not to let themselves into his bedroom in the middle of the night. It was, of course, an open secret among their employees that Duilio’s mother was a selkie. While mo st selkies spent their lives in seal form, every moment in the sea or on a beach, she’d been raised among humans. But for a time she
had
lived as a seal among the neare st harem, to the north of the mouth of the Douro River at Braga Bay. Erdano was her child by that harem’s ma st er. He often visited the Ferreira household, but tonight he’d sent one of his women in st ead.
    Duilio cursed under his breath. His valet had hidden his comfortable-but-worn slippers again, an unsubtle reminder that the man wanted Duilio to replace them. He gave up on finding them, crossed to the mantel, and lit the gaslight there. It wasn’t likely that bare feet would offend this woman anyway. He turned up the light enough to ca st a feeble circle of illumination about the armchair and table waiting before the hearth, then looked back at the unknown woman. “Do you have a message from Erdano?”
    “Yes.” She st epped into the light, revealing pointed features set in a heart-shaped face. Light brown hair fell sleekly over her shoulders. She was a lovely girl, but as soon as Duilio caught the scent of her, any thought of getting to know her better fled. Evidently before she walked barefoot into the city to find him, she’d simply borrowed some of Erdano’s garments. The clothes—a man’s trousers and shirt cinched tight by a wide belt at her wai st —reeked of musk. Duilio resi st ed the urge to pinch his nose closed. Even though he was only half selkie himself, he had never much liked the scent of other males.
    “Sir?” a voice asked from the hallway, dragging Duilio’s attention away from the girl. João, the young boatman who st ayed down on the quay with the family’s boats, st ood there, his sheepish expression evident in the light of the lamp he