“No.”
The defeat in his voice chilled me. Was it that that drew gooseflesh over my arms, or was the temperature of the room dropping? Were the shadows thickening, growing stronger as they fed on the taste of our fear, or was it my mind playing tricks on me?
“Then how—”
“I memorized everything,” he said sharply. “It is too dangerous to write. And I—” His voice caught. His eyes had taken on a glassy cast. He was on the verge of tears. “I can’t remember the words.”
I saw him being flung against the wall as if he were no more than a rag. The darkness had not killed him. But by smashing his head against the wall, by injuring him so, it had taken something almost as precious as his life: his ability to protect us all.
A sharp spike of fear dug into the back of my skull.
“Is there anything that doesn’t require words?” I asked, fighting to keep rising panic out of my voice. “Something where you act on instinct, or you could improvise, or use castellano . . .”
“Absolutely not,” he snapped. Anger crackled like lightning over his words, drawing his shoulders back sharply as he turned to me. He said, “This—what I did in this room last night—it must be controlled. It’s dangerous. You don’t understand what you’re talking about.”
A flush rose to my cheeks and smarted there. No, I did not understand his witchcraft. But I understood that it was dangerous to be without protection in this house. Without his power, we were bare and defenseless against the darkness. Yet here we still stood, unshielded and unarmed, surrounded by the house, by the malice that festered and spread in its walls like an infection.
We were its prey.
Beatriz. I stiffened. A voice called my name, rising in my mind though I heard nothing. The hairs on my arms stood on end. When is nightfall, Beatriz? When is day?
My fingers curled tight around Andrés’s arm; I cast a wild look around the room.
No one was there.
“Andrés,” I hissed. “I hear a voice. Do you hear it?”
In a fluid movement, he seized me tightly by the shoulders. My breath caught, startled by the harshness of his touch.
Aren’t you frightened?
“Andrés—” I cast my eyes around the room again.
Don’t you know what he is capable of?
“It’s here,” I breathed. “She’s here.”
That which we had set loose last night. Whoever had frightened Ana Luisa to death and smashed the crucifix. She was in the walls, in the rafters, around us—
“Look me in the eye,” Andrés said forcefully, shaking my shoulders when I did not immediately obey. His grip was so tight it would leave bruises. “Look at me.” His tears had evaporated; his eyes burned feral, and . . . yes, it frightened me. This passion made him a stranger, commanding, dangerous. “Do not listen to her. Cast her from your mind this instant.”
He has secrets, Beatriz . . .
“Do you hear it?” I asked, raspy and uneven. “Tell me. Please.”
“Cast it out.” His command had the brassy ring of the priest he was, one who cries for his congregation to repent of their sins, whose condemnation of the Devil fills cathedrals. “Cast it out.”
I shut my eyes.
Beatriz, Beatriz, Beatriz . . .
I curled my hands into fists and thrust it away with all my might. No, I told it. No. Out.
The voice stopped.
Footsteps rang in the corridor, announcing someone’s approach to the parlor.
My eyes flew open.
Andrés dropped my shoulders and turned to face the door.
Paloma stepped into view. “Ay, Cuervito,” she said, drawing the syllables out as she took in the half-tidied mess of the room, the melted-down candles, the censers, the broken glass. She made the sign of the cross. “You’ve outdone yourself this time,” she added dryly.
“Palomita, you should be resting,” Andrés said. In the blink of an eye, he had transformed. His face and voice were soft with concern, his posture once again full of gentle authority. Everything about his presence exuded calm.
But I was rattled to my core.
“I can’t sit still,” Paloma said. “Give me something to do.”
Andrés walked toward her and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You could rest in my rooms, if you’d prefer. I understand—”
She shoved him away, clearly frustrated. “You’re not listening. Give me something to do,” she said. “I can’t sit alone doing nothing.”
I was desperate to be out of this room. I needed to be away from Andrés. I wanted the safety of being outside, where there were no voices, or at least—
“Will you help me cook?” I said abruptly.
They looked at me in one motion, surprised—as I had been—at the strange pitch of my voice. I cleared my throat. “I . . . I need to make something.” As we no longer have a cook, I added silently. “I would appreciate some help.”
Paloma raised a brow. “You cook?” she asked dryly.
“I do,” I said. “And I will need to ensure that I have a plan for when my husband returns day after tomorrow.”
Paloma stiffened. “The patrón will be back? Santo cielo, Andrés. You need to clean up.”
My whole body trembled as I crossed the room to Paloma. As I stepped through the doorway, I cast a look at Andrés over my shoulder.
The wall behind him was perfectly blank.
No blood. No name.
It was gone.
* * *
*
THE COLD IN MY bones did not lift as Paloma and I entered the kitchen. While she lit the oven, I knelt in the doorway to light the censers that stood guard there. It took me longer than usual to get the resin to light; my hand shook violently. Finally, smoke twined upward like columns, filling the kitchen with the distinctive aroma of copal. I inhaled of its comfort. My heart slowed. This was safe. This I could rely on. This would not falter.
Andrés, on the other hand . . .
I bit my lip as I glanced down the hall. Before me, it was a cool dark, a neutral dark that did not watch me. Perhaps the house’s attention was on Andrés. He has secrets, Beatriz . . .
A shudder tripped over my shoulders.
How was I going to survive the night? How was I going to survive at all? How on earth was I to receive Rodolfo? Would he humor my many censers ringing our bed? Would he think me superstitious, or worse, mad?
Was I going mad?
The darkness smirked at me.
I jerked back from the doorway and turned to Paloma. The kitchen faced south, and she had thrown its wide door open to the garden. Sunlight streamed rich and warm into the room as she stoked the fire.
“What are we making?”
Her voice was taut. I knew that feeling. She itched to work with her hands, to forget.
“Something simple and filling,” I said. “Arroz con pollo,” I decided. “It will be easy to make a lot. Padre Andrés is exhausted, and I worry . . . I think he might be ill.”
“What happened?”
I did not know how to reply.