“Your defense of your brother is admirable.” Grayson’s deep voice was surprisingly quiet, with only the faintest gravelly snarl of anger. “Your defiance of me, less so.”
Alejandro pressed his face against the rug.
“Up,” Grayson said.
Surprised, he rose to kneeling, cautiously lifting his gaze to look at the Master.
“Did you notice how Williams reacted to your defiance?”
Alejandro stared at him in surprise for a moment, then flinched away from the Master’s hard stare and looked down. He said, glad to hear that his voice was steady, “No, sir.”
“You have courage, but that is not rare. You have good control when you fight; you are able to think and cooperate with others. That is less common, and highly desirable. But when you are frightened, you focus too tightly. You must learn to watch everything that happens around you, even when you are frightened.”
This was exactly the sort of reprimand Papá might have delivered when disappointed in his son. That tone, utterly unexpected, intensified Alejandro’s sense of shame. He lowered his head.
Grayson said, “Williams was pleased to see you defend your brother. He thinks now he might like you better than he expected. He thought I would punish you harshly – he still thinks I may do that. He will judge his safety here, and his son’s, by what I do with you. Then he will either be easier in his mind or more fearful. You have put me in a position where I cannot punish you as you deserve without frightening Williams, which I do not wish to do.”
Though he did not look up, Alejandro nodded to show he understood.
“Now, Keziah. Whether or not she approves of your defying me for your brother’s sake, she will think I am weak if I do not punish you. She, like you, is of an age where she wishes to press the limits of my authority, and she is naturally very dominant. You have put me in a position where, if I do not punish you as you deserve, Keziah will think that I will also tolerate her defiance. Which I do not wish to do.”
This was all immediately obvious, once the Master pointed it out. Alejandro nodded again.
“I suspect Keziah has never been accorded respect by any male black dog. I will give her the opportunity to earn mine. That may suffice. If it does not, I may eventually be required to kill her. I am not pleased that you have contributed to this difficult situation.” Grayson paused.
“I understand,” Alejandro whispered.
“You’re a fool – and unnecessarily. Do you think I would punish a human boy as though he were a defiant black pup?”
Alejandro swallowed. He shook his head.
“You had better learn to trust my restraint,” said Grayson. It was a warning, and an order. “Do you understand?”
“I understand, Master.”
Reaching down, Grayson closed a powerful hand around the back of Alejandro’s neck – a threat, but a gentle one. He shook him, still gently. “You could be an asset to Dimilioc. Learn to think of that.” Releasing him, he ordered curtly, “Go.”
Alejandro crept backward on his hands and knees, got cautiously to his feet, and, not looking up, made his escape into the deserted hallway. He was shaking – he was very grateful to have a chance to collect himself without an audience.
“You had better learn to trust my restraint… You could be an asset to Dimilioc.” It had never occurred to Alejandro that he might actually trust any black dog except Papá. Nor had he ever really thought of making himself into an asset for Dimilioc. From the first, they had all thought only of Dimilioc being an asset for them. Only… Grayson had been right. Right both times. “Pendejo,” he muttered out loud, meaning himself. He was an idiot.
Nothing about that difficult interview just past had gone the way he’d expected. Alejandro did not know what he felt, now. Except anger. But he was almost sure he was not angry with Grayson Lanning. No. He was angry with himself, because Papá had told him plainly, “If you ever meet them, Dimilioc wolves may think you are a callejero. You must remember who you are and show them otherwise.” He knew he had probably not yet shown Grayson otherwise, yet.
Alejandro hated it when he was angry with Miguel, and hated it worse on those rare occasions when Miguel was angry with him. He didn’t care about the disagreement. He just hated the way any argument made him want to hit his brother, force him to submit.
He didn’t do it. He never did. He wouldn’t. But he hated that he wanted to. He was proud that Miguel didn’t know he wanted to. At least, he was almost sure his brother didn’t know.
Miguel certainly showed no fear of Alejandro. At the moment, he did not even show any caution. He was angry, not with irrational black dog fury, but with the colder anger of a frustrated human. He was still arguing. An angry black dog could not argue like that: thought and language became too difficult when black dog temper rose.
“He doesn’t understand,” Miguel said furiously, pacing fast across the length of Natividad’s room and back again. His quick movements made Alejandro’s shadow want to lunge after him. Instead, Alejandro stayed exactly where he was, leaning his hip against the windowsill, his arms crossed over his chest, and Miguel kept pacing. The boy turned fast, glaring at Natividad but ending with an especially dark glower for his brother. “He doesn’t understand that Vonhausel isn’t an ordinary black dog. You don’t understand. None of you black dogs understands Vonhausel, and it’s going to get us all killed!”
Alejandro nodded – not in agreement, but in acknowledgement of his brother’s anger.
Miguel glared at him. “You think I’m wrong!”
“Sí,” Alejandro agreed. “Estás seguroque estas correcto?”
The glare intensified. Miguel snapped, “Yes, I’m sure! And if everyone else thinks I’m wrong, maybe it is because you’re all black dogs and don’t know how to think!” He whirled to his twin and demanded, “Y túy qué piensas?”
Natividad held up both hands palm out, shaking her head. “Oh, no, no. I don’t think anything. Don’t look at me!”
Miguel whirled on Alejandro again. “Think on everything Vonhausel’s done so far and tell me he’s a normal black dog!”
“He’s strong and clever and he may be using undead magic,” Alejandro conceded. “But he’s still a black dog. That’s what he is. Grayson’s right, Ezekiel’s right, Keziah’s right, and for once you’re wrong.”
Miguel shook his head. “Let’s entertain the idea, just for a moment, that you’ve got it backwards. That I’m right and all you black dogs are wrong. What would that mean?”
Alejandro snarled soundlessly. He was too tired and angry to argue. He was not human. When he tried to frame his brother’s question to himself as though it made sense, he couldn’t do it. “It doesn’t matter,” he said, trying not to sound as frustrated as he felt. “It doesn’t matter that we have no way to protect human towns from Vonhausel! Because you’re wrong. He will come here, and then we’ll kill him. We’ll use silver, and then it won’t matter whether he’s using undead magic or what he’s been doing with the shadows of dead black dogs, because he’ll be dead.”
Miguel gazed at Alejandro. He was not used to being so unable to sway his brother, and he looked like the recognition that he’d lost this argument might be choking in his throat. He said at last, his shoulders rounding with defeat, “Puede que tengas razón. I hope you are right. I think Vonhausel wants a war of all against all, I think he truly believes he can use his new kind of magic to win it, I think if we let him attack Brighton or wherever, we may have no hope of stopping him at all. But I hope I am wrong and you are right about everything.”
Despite his anger, Alejandro did not like to see his brother like that, so defeated. He said as gently as he could, “Lo siento. But if Vonhausel does what you say... entonces estamos fregados. We can’t guard every village and town in Vermont.”
From the doorway, Keziah said in a very dry tone, “I think we have seen quite clearly that we can’t guard any town in Vermont. This enemy of yours has too many black dogs and we don’t have e
nough.”
Alejandro snarled at her, furious because once again he had not heard her approach. He moved sharply toward her, his shadow rising fast – it was so tempting to let it up all the way, to let himself fall into the cambio de cuerpo. He could not fight Grayson Lanning, he didn’t even want to, but he could fight this arrogant too-beautiful Saudi girl, he could force her to recognize that he was stronger, he could make her respect his strength and dominance…
Keziah did not want to fight. She turned her head aside submissively, and Alejandro, found his shadow subsiding almost willingly. He snarled, “Well?”
The girl watched him warily through the lashes of her lowered eyes. “If your human brother is right, then Vonhausel will begin a war with all the many ordinary human people. Then either he or they will destroy Dimilioc. What if he is right? If I knew it was like that, I would go to your enemy and join him, except what if he uses that undead magic of his on me, on Amira? I could not stop him if he wished to do that. I would take Amira and run, except what place will be safe if Dimilioc falls?” She turned to Natividad, “So, I came to ask, what is this about your mother’s special magic? Have you found a way to counter your enemy?”
“I’ve thought and thought about it,” Natividad said earnestly. “But I don’t know what Mamá thought I could do, I don’t know what she could do that was special, Miguel doesn’t know either. We don’t know.” She bit her lip. “I want to help. But I don’t know how.”
Miguel said, his tone flatly certain, “But we have to go after Vonhausel tonight anyway.” He took a step toward Keziah, hoping for the support his brother hadn’t given him. “You know Vonhausel won’t expect an attack tonight.” He turned back toward Alejandro. “We can’t wait. No podemos esperar más tiempo. Not past tomorrow. After that, you’re right, nos fregamos, it’s too late.”
Saying nothing, Alejandro looked away, at the window, which the gathering darkness had turned into a mirror. It showed him his own reflection, and his brother’s. He thought he looked older than he had a week ago. Harder. More temper-ridden. But he also thought that, maybe just because of the contrast, Miguel looked somehow younger. More vulnerable. More like the child he’d been so few years ago. It was not an observation his brother would have wanted anybody to make. And anyway, it was just an illusion created by the glass.
But nevertheless, when Miguel stepped toward him, Alejandro found himself nearly overwhelmed by memories of his brother as a child, as a boy. He wanted to protect him, to guard him from harm. It was a kinder feeling than the black dog urge to force Miguel’s submission, but not, he thought, something his brother would welcome.
Miguel said urgently, “If Vonhausel’s planning to make a lot of undead zombie black dogs and start a war with ordinary humans, then we have to figure a way to stop him doing that, and we have to do it right away–”
“If, if!” snapped Alejandro. “We do not know what he is doing tonight, we do not know what he will do tomorrow!”
Miguel stared at him as though he would think, milagrosamente, of some way to crush Vonhausel and his shadow pack like so many poisonous bichos. This seemed an especially outrageous confidence because Alejandro was not the one who usually thought of dramatic things to do or try or say. He said reluctantly, “I will go out. I will go to Lewis and watch. Where’s that phone of yours? Does it have minutes left? I can call and tell the Master if Vonhausel comes toward us here or if he goes away to hunt somewhere else.”
“Yes,” Miguel said instantly. “Yes, please, that’s so much better than nothing.”
Natividad protested, “Wait, wait! Grayson said–”
“That doesn’t matter!” snapped Miguel.
Alejandro held up his hands, quieting them both. “I will go out, I say–”
“I will go,” said Keziah. She met his eyes, smiling faintly. “I can come and go so quietly no one will ever know I slipped away or back unless I choose to say I have. Can you say the same? They will not see me, there in that town; they will not catch my scent. Nor will anyone in this house. I will come and go as though I am nothing but a true shadow.”
Now, she did not look aside or down, and Alejandro understood suddenly what he should have realized at once: that she had never meant anything of the submission she had shown him. That had all been a show, a lie. How strictly she must be able to control her shadow, to lie like that! Doubtless she had learned that as a child in her father’s house. Doubtless that was also where she had learned to come and go so silently – because she had certainly shown him that she could do that. He wanted to hit her, force a real submission – but he also wanted to laugh. He said, “It’s true Grayson forbade it.”
Keziah shrugged. “Grayson Lanning will not know unless I have reason to use this phone you will give me, and if I call, he will have other things to think of. Besides, he did not punish you for your defiance. Why should he punish me?”
Alejandro did laugh at that. He did not want this girl close to Natividad or Miguel. She was still too beautiful and dangerous and much too sexy. But even if he knew he should avoid her, he almost thought he did like her. He said, “If it comes to that, I will support you.”
“Well, that relieves my mind,” Keziah said drily. She caught the phone Miguel tossed her and turned to go, but added over her shoulder, to Natividad, much more seriously, “You must guard Amira for me, if there is trouble and I am not here.”
“I will,” Natividad promised her instantly. “We all will.”
“That relieves my mind,” Keziah said, and strolled out, hips swaying, slanting a glance back over her shoulder, deliberately seductive.
“I hope she finds out you’re right,” Miguel said awkwardly once she was gone, half an apology.
Alejandro hoped so, too, but he also longed to go after Keziah, leap out into the frozen night, run under the black sky. He would not give way to his shadow, but he could manage only a curt nod and a swift retreat to his own room. He did not like leaving Miguel to think he was angry, but he was, still. If he stayed, he would show it. He was too tired; he needed a respite from innocent human gestures that grated along black dog nerves, that continually pricked him toward violence. He shut the door of his own room behind him and he stood for some time, his hands resting on the cold metal of the deadbolt and his head bowed against the painted wood, lacking the energy and will to even turn and cross the room and throw himself down on his bed.
A sense of peace gradually crept over him as he stood there, though. At last he recognized Natividad’s influence: she had been here, had stood where he was standing, had drawn her pentagrams on his door, on his windows.
The knowledge of his sister’s care was almost as warming as the subtle whisper of tranquilidad that emanated from her work, and eventually he did turn and cross the room. He barely remembered dropping down full length on top of the bedcovers, and after that, nothing.
He woke to a hard grip on his arm and Miguel’s voice, sharp and urgent, calling his name. If he hadn’t recognized his brother’s voice even before he was awake, he would certainly have taken Miguel’s head right off with a slashing blow – as it was, he only just managed to turn his first, violent reaction into a snarl of, “Suéltame! Estupido!” and a back-handed slap that only rocked his brother back on his heels rather than cutting him to pieces.
“Lo siento! Lo siento!” Miguel belatedly crouched down low to help Alejandro recapture his control. His breath was coming fast with shock – no, with terror.
“Que quieres?” Alejandro demanded. “There is an attack, there is battle? Vonhausel has come?” His brother’s fear and urgency swept over him like a fire kindling in the dark and he rolled to his feet, dimly glad he had not had the energy to undress before collapsing across the bed. How long had he been asleep? Not long enough, not nearly long enough... The glowing red numerals on the clock told him it was 12.05, the hinge of night where the dark swung around at last and headed back toward day.
He shook his head hard, fighting to flatten his shadow dow
n out of his way so he could think clearly. Lingering exhaustion made it difficult, but one urgent thought occurred to him, far later than it should have, and he asked sharply, “Natividad?” Abruptly certain that whatever the trouble was, his sister was the heart of it, he did not wait for Miguel to answer before striding across the room and through the connecting door to Natividad’s room.
It was empty. There was no sign Natividad had ever lain down in that bed. The room was filled with a sense of emptiness and abandonment – was that only in Alejandro’s head?
“She’s gone,” Miguel said, very quiet-voiced. He was hesitating, with vastly uncharacteristic diffidence, at the door Alejandro had left open behind him. “I woke up and I knew something was wrong and I came in here to see and she was gone. Es mí culpa– es mí culpa…”
Brutally, Alejandro did not disagree with this judgment. He demanded only, “What do you know? What do you guess?”
Miguel took a quick, hard breath, gripping his hands together. Whatever he saw in Alejandro’s face must have frightened him, for he also dropped down to kneel on the floor at the edge of Natividad’s pink rug. He said, “She believed everything I said about Vonhausel and she went to find him. I’m sure that’s what happened. She made something. Look at her table…”
The little dressing table had been cleared of all the little perfume bottles. The only thing that now occupied its lace-covered surface was their mother’s old wooden flute and a single silver bullet taken from one of the rifles they had brought upstairs.
“I heard her playing earlier,” Miguel whispered. He looked wretchedly into Alejandro’s face. “I thought… I didn’t think…”
“No,” Alejandro said furiously, and saw, with both guilt and savage satisfaction, that this single word hit his brother like a blow. He picked up the little flute and stood for a moment, holding it in his hand, trying to think.
Miguel, visibly gathering his nerve, said, “She made something, a weapon, I guess. I don’t know what someone Pure would make – maybe not exactly a weapon. But I think she thought she had to do something special. It’s my fault, I know it’s my fault. She made something, and then she slipped out. I think I heard her door close. I was dreaming and I heard a door close in my dream and the sound scared me and woke me up and I came to see if she was OK and she was gone…”
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