The King's Gold by Yxta Maya Murray

Author:Yxta Maya Murray [Murray, Yxta Maya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Italy, Mystery, Action & Adventure, Travel & Exploration
ISBN: 9780060891084
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2014-11-28T05:00:00+00:00

25

Antonio says there are three clues in here, Erik—’ having survived to take up the challenges of City Three, you have earned that many additional hints’— but I don’t see any.” He and I were closely inspecting this bizarre letter. “There’s something going on with these flowers, the illuminations. They form some kind of design.” We squinted down at them.

Erik’s eyes drooped slightly; he had begun to tire. As had I. “I don’t know what that is. But—look at this. It’s strange.”

He pointed to the letter’s closing lines:

“Sincerely yours

Il Noioso Lupo Retto,

otherwise known as

Antonio.”

“‘Il Noioso Lupo Retto.’ There’s something funny about it...”

I wrapped one of my legs around his. “It means, ‘The Righteous, Tiresome Wolf.’”

“Lupo means ‘Wolf.’ Retto—that’s ‘righteous.’”

“And then noioso means ‘boring’ or ‘tiresome.’ I think from the Latin nausea.”

“That’s weird.”

“That’s etymology for you.”

“No—I mean the phrasing of it. Calling himself that. It sounds weird. It doesn’t sound like the rest of the letter—even the line’s script is different.”

I looked closer. “You’re right.”

Erik deftly opened the side table’s drawer while remaining entangled with me. He extracted a pen and paper, and commenced scribbling.

“What are you doing?”

“I think it might be scrambled.”

“A word puzzle?”

“Yes. A palindrome—or an anagram. Because Antonio was an alchemist, his wife a spiritualist or witch. Right? Renaissance occultists were crazy as loons about acrostics. And Witches were supposed to compose these palindrome prayers—kind of early versions of the Beatles records—read from the front, they’d be homilies to Christ, but then, backward, they’d be invocations to the Devil. When I was younger, I went through a manic little anagram phase myself—I formed them out of my name all the time.

Erik Gomara turns nicely into Karma Ergo I—sounds vaguely like a yoga position—and I’m a Keg Roar, which reminds me of some parties I attended in my youth. But the best one I ever thought up was O magik rear, which I thought sounded like a Wiccan description of my posterior region.”

“O magik rear?”

He yawned. “It’s so bad it’s good. But—before I pass out—help me out with the literal translation, here.”

Erik scratched his pen over the paper, writing Antonio’s closing and its English conversion:

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