“We’re leaving this place and heading back to the keep.”
I blink. Not what I want to hear. At all. He starts throwing things into his pack, the bowls and spoon, leftover food. He puts on his hat and tightens the laces of his worn boots.
Through it all I can only stare.
“Be ready to leave in fifteen minutes,” he says. “Your back has healed enough to travel, I think. But we’ll move slow.” He hesitates. “As slow as we can, anyway. I’ve been searching for a way out of this damned jungle and it’s possible your tracks leading from the outside are still visible.”
I shake my head. “I have to stay here.”
He brushes off my comment. “How long were you traveling before you arrived at the jungle?”
“A week,” I say. “But it doesn’t matter because I’m not leaving.”
“Can you scoot over? I want that bedroll.”
“Manuel.”
“Is the keep still standing?”
“Manuel,” I say. “I’m not going with you.”
His gaze narrows. He props a hand on one bent knee, the other leg tucked under him. “Haven’t you been listening? It’s pointless. The Illari can’t stand having me in their jungle, let alone having a conversation. Every day is a test to stay alive. Their perimeter isn’t just guarded with warriors capable of doom and death. They use the very jungle to fortify their borders—with Pacha magic. We can’t get to them.”
“We have to,” I say angrily. “There’re no other moves left. You want to head to the keep? Be my guest. You’ll find no one there. It’s empty. And I can’t go back with nothing, without an army. I can’t.”
“Where is everyone?” he asks. “Damn it, Catalina. What aren’t you telling me?”
“I’ve told you—”
His hand slashes the air. “No, no. Not everything. You haven’t said a word about my family,” he snaps. “You haven’t mentioned what happened to our people.”
I let out a sigh that could have been a sob. “They’ve accepted Princesa Tamaya as their queen.”
“Why?” he asks. “There has to be a reason. Not one Illustrian would give up everything we’ve worked for this past decade for nothing.”
“Their reina said she wanted peace,” I snap. “That we’d be treated equal, that we’d have rights and a new life in La Ciudad Blanca. They believed her. The fools. As if we could ever agree with the Llacsans after what they’ve done to us. That girl is dreaming if she thinks she’ll achieve peace.”
He’s quiet for a long moment. “When I lived among the various tribes in the Tierra Baja, I learned quite a bit about Llacsans. No, stop,” he says, holding up his hand. “Maybe some of them are different than Atoc? Aren’t you curious to know why our people would accept her as queen? Observe with your own eyes what others have seen?”
Something in me dies. Whatever I felt, whatever I yearned for in this moment—his smiles, to be seen by him as a girl and not just his queen—all of that vanishes like yesterday’s sunrise.
It’s another betrayal. I can’t look at him. Can’t speak to him anymore. Why am I the only one who still cares about what happened to us during the revolt? We lost family. We lost our homes. Our way of life. The throne. My parents were murdered.
“I’m going to find the Illari. With or without you.”
“Don’t do this to me,” Manuel whispers. “It’s been three years. I need to go home.”
“I know you do.” I look away. “So go.”
“You’re still not listening to me.” His hands reach toward me as if he wants to shake me. “It will mean your death.”
I’m supposed to die here anyway. But I don’t say the words out loud. “I have nothing and no one left, Manuel.”
“Let me take you—”
“Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” I say, my voice cold and frozen over as if I were made of solid ice. “Do not.”
“My mother isn’t one to suffer fools,” he says gently. “She may have seen this as the best way forward—”
I slap my palms on the ground. “Your mother is dead!”
My words ricochet off the walls, clamoring in my head, ringing in my ears.
His face goes deadly white. “No.”
“Ana and Sofía both died at the hands of Atoc,” I say. “Do you still want to accept Atoc’s sister as your queen? If you do, then I guess I never knew you at all. Your mother would be ashamed, Manuel. Ashamed. Do you want to know how she died? She was executed while Ximena stood by and watched.” I pause. “Don’t tell me you’re ready to quit.”
He flinches at my words, at my tone.
There are tears running down my face. I’ve hurt him. I’ve hurt us both. He stands, head ducked to keep from bumping into the cave ceiling, and marches farther into the dark until he’s out of sight.
I don’t know how long I sit without him. The rain hasn’t stopped; neither has the roaring thunder. In the distance I catch sight of the flock of vultures, feasting on death. My back is sore and tired from not having anything to lean on, but the idea of pressing my wounds against the cool rock is not appealing.
I turn my head and gaze into the darkness where Manuel went. I never should have told him about his family that way. Impatient and frustrated beyond belief. Back at the Illustrian keep, when I was just the personal maid to Ximena’s condesa act, I helped soothe tempers, and tried my best to care for each family under my supervision. I was everyone’s friend, the person they came to when approaching Ximena was unthinkable.
I should have spoken to him gently, but he was starting to sound like her.
I’m tired of being the only one holding on to the Illustrian dream of reclaiming La Ciudad Blanca for ourselves. I want him to feel the same hurt I felt. I want him to remember what we’ve been fighting for. But more than anything I want to remember who I am: the condesa. Ruler of Inkasisa. I am the best answer to who will protect the Illustrians who survived the revolt.
Footsteps sound in the dark and draw closer. I stiffen, bracing myself. If he insists on leaving the jungle, I won’t fight him. But I’m going to stay and try to reach the Illari. I will not go home empty and without a plan.
I will not.
There’s iron in my blood, after all.
Manuel reappears, eyes bloodshot and red-rimmed. My heart pinches, sharp and painful. He’s been crying and he didn’t want me to see. He drops to his knees in front of me and lifts his chin, daring me to say something. But I don’t. Instinct tells me to keep my hands close, no matter how much I want to offer some comfort.
I need him angry.
“I’ll take you as far as I’ve gone, Condesa,” he says quietly. I stiffen at his use of my title. “I’ll help you and protect you with my body. Whatever I can do to give you access to the Illari, I’ll do it. I’ll do it for them—my family.” His voice nearly breaks, and he takes a deep breath. “But I’m in control. Whatever I say, you do. That’s the only way we’ll survive. If I say to stop, hide, or run, you obey me. Do you agree with my terms?”
“Yes.”
Manuel nods, and gone is his harrowed look. Now he lets me see his fury. The expression on his face steals my breath. The scant lines around his eyes are tight and his mouth is a white slash against olive skin. Gone is my friend. He won’t call me by my name anymore. I’m looking at a soldier, born and raised by a warrior mother.
I’m almost sorry to have pushed him.
Almost.
CAPÍTULO
Siete
Once again, I hold on to Manuel’s back as we climb down the impossible granite wall, this time using the coiled vine from within the cave. His shoulders are tight beneath my arms, probably from the exertion, but maybe also because of my decision to find the Illari. I try to forget about the disappointment in his eyes, the apparent despair in their depths. He’s homesick, missing his family, and terrified we won’t survive the jungle.
I ought to cut him loose. Force him to go home and mourn his family. But I need him with me. I can’t
survive this place without him. He’s been living in this nightmare for eight months—living and somehow surviving.
Manuel’s faster on the way down, even while carrying me and the canvas bag, filled with his meager possessions and my dented telescope. The second his booted feet touch the jungle carpet, I drop my legs to the floor and back away from him as if he were a feral jaguar. He glances up to the cave, an unreadable expression on his face.
“What is it?”
Grudgingly, he turns away from the rock wall and pulls out his machete. “For three years I’ve kept moving, never staying longer than a few weeks in each village. That cave was my home for two months.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. Three years is a long time to be away from home. I want to hug him, offer some encouragement. The words bubble to the surface, but his walls are up. He’s suffering. I know he is, and now I’m the burden he has to carry. “Tell me how to find the Illari, and after you do, go back to La Ciudad, Manuel. You don’t need to be here.”
He hacks at thick liana vines, and then glances at me from over his shoulder. “Did you come here with supplies?”
I nod, my heart sinking. This is it: He’s changed his mind. “I lost them though.”
“¿Dónde?”
“Over the cliff. Near that pit you found me in,” I say. “The way out is about a day’s walk from there. Maybe less.”
He looks away and hacks at several broad palms. “Anything worth saving?”
I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be following him, so I stay put. “Hammock and mosquito net. Dagger. Some food.”
He pauses, his hand held high over his head. “Supplies are hard to come by in the jungle, especially a weapon.” Then his arm swoops down and slices away at the dense foliage. “We’ll search the area for your things before crossing the river.”
I barely hear his words, except for the one that matters most: we. He’s made his choice; I gave him a way out. I even told him how far of a journey it was to the border.
Manuel turns around and I have to blink at the sight of him. Sweat drips from his brow, and his arms are corded with muscle. He towers over me, grim and silent, appraising me not as his sovereign, but as a weakness he’ll have to compensate for.
“I can defend myself,” I say.
His gaze drops to my slim hands, the blisters gone, the skin soft once more. I drag them behind my back. Embarrassment sweeps across my cheeks.
He swears under his breath.
“I’ll keep up.” I lift my chin, pride demanding it of me, even as the blood rushes to my face. “Try not to worry.”
“This is the height of stupidity,” he says. “You know that, right?”
“It’s not that bad of an idea.”
“You’re right. It’s the worst.”
“Then how else will I help my people, Manuel? Hmm? How else will I take back the throne? I don’t have an army. Do you want to help me, or don’t you? Don’t you want to avenge your mother and sister?”
He flinches. “Try to understand something for me, por favor: Above all else, my mother would have wanted you to survive. Aside from securing allies, I had one other job. And that was to watch over you. Make sure no harm came to you inside the Illustrian keep.”
“Who would have hurt me?”
“Hundreds of Illustrian refugees, hungry and near starving? Desperate and bored? Without your title, you were just a girl among hundreds. Anything could have happened to you.”
Memories of the few moments we were alone together resurface. I thought he just enjoyed my company. Thought of me as a friend. “All those years … I was just a job to you?”
His brow rises. “What else would you be?”
I shrug, my cheeks flaming. Again, the memory of our kiss sweeps all other thoughts from my mind. He’s completely forgotten. “It doesn’t matter. We should keep going.”
A muscle in his jaw ticks. “Follow close behind me. We must always stay together. Don’t touch or lean on anything. Don’t wander away, even if you have to relieve yourself. Not every predator can be seen or anticipated. Do not talk until I say it’s safe. I need to listen to the jungle. Understand?”
I nod and try to keep my face neutral, because his tone isn’t one I’m used to, especially coming from him. He’s always been respectful, but now he’s erected a careful barrier between us, reminding me that I’m his sovereign and the only thing I should be thinking about is acquiring an army.
He whips around and plunges into the mat of trees and hanging vines as thick as his arm. I stumble forward and through the tiny path forged, my gaze trained on the strong lines of his back. He’s uneasy; I can see it in every one of his movements, the hard press of his feet on the tangled mess of leaves, the downward motion of his hand as he cuts into the face of the jungle, thick with heat and the scent of mildew and rotting mushrooms. We are enveloped by the various shades of greens and browns under our feet and over our heads. There’s no sunlight under the canopy, only the chronic gloom cast by the broad palms and tangled branches. More vines unspool at my feet. I carefully step around or over each one, minding for a snake—or worse.
This is the same way we’d gone two days earlier, but the path has already been swallowed by the ravenous jungle. By now, the trail leading out of this place is long gone as well. He must know that. But I guess it doesn’t matter anymore. The trickling sound of water comes softly at first, but with every step closer, the noise transforms into a gentle roar.
Manuel stops at the tree line, looking from one end to the other and back again. His machete is an extension of his arm. Every few minutes he looks back to see if I’m still trudging along in his footsteps, or to check if I’m hurt. I scramble down the bank and for once we walk alongside each other, toward the cliff I thought I’d left behind.
My expression sours. More climbing.
“That won’t be the worst of it,” he says, and then he quickens his step until we are at the base of the cliff. It’s nothing like the wall we climbed, with me on his back and the howling wind tousling my hair. But it’s still steep. The boulders are jagged and large, emitting a sweet smell. “Step where I step.”
I’m not used to following orders. Not used to being looked at as if I were a burden, an annoying nuisance. Back home, I’d been a favorite. Everyone’s friend, the person they turned to for a listening ear or encouragement. While in public, I was free to be myself, but even then I knew that no one could order me around.
Manuel lifts his foot high, hooking it between the rocks, and hauls himself up. I follow, surveying his technique, where he places his hands and feet. We’re halfway up when the distinct sound of thunder rumbles overhead. Seconds later raindrops plop onto the rocks, splattering and dripping down the craggy surface. The rain is relentless, a steady pattering that infiltrates every line and curve of my body. If I ever make it out of here, I’m going to stand in the sun for an eternity, I swear it.
Manuel reaches the top first and then bends to help me up the rest of the way. I consider ignoring his offered hand, but my legs and arms are shaking too much. I reach up, and he clasps my palm, his callouses rubbing against my skin. As soon as I’m upright, he lets me go, then he yanks out his machete and slices a way through. I follow close behind, his dutiful shadow, until we arrive at the pit he found me in.
The jaguar has been picked clean; all that remains are chewed-up bones half hidden by thick twigs and branches. Manuel studies the area and places a light hand on the log I’d climbed over. “You came from the direction of the cliff.”
My breath comes out in pants. “But I was moving toward it at first. Trying to get away. I didn’t run far.”
He takes this in and then heads away from the pit. Once again I follow him. He stops every so often to examine crushed leaves still attached to their stems, overturned twigs, and any tracks on the ground. We’re at it for what feels like hours, without a word spoken between us. It finally stops raining, but then the heat is stifling. I sip hot gulps of air while birds chatter clos
e by, only stopping to listen for the sounds of an approaching predator.
I can’t take the silence or my growing thirst. All I can picture is a frosty glass of water, something I’ll never have in here.
“Manuel,” I whisper. “I need water.”
He glances at me from where he’s crouching, examining a nondescript patch of jungle floor that looks exactly the same as all the rest. In fact, I think it is the same as all the rest. “Yo también.”
“Don’t you carry any?”
“There’s plenty if you know where to look.” He stands and surveys the area for a long moment. He points with his machete. “This way.”
I trail behind him, the familiar thwacking noise of his machete ever present, like my own heartbeat. Manuel leads us into a swampy grove where bamboo shoots up from the ground, towering above us, over double his height. The bamboo shoots are perfectly segmented and parallel to one another. He hacks off a piece exactly at the joint, two segments high, and then grabs a leaf, proceeding to wipe down the bamboo from top to bottom and all the way around.
He hands the heavy column to me. “Some bamboo can irritate skin. Safer to wipe it down with something.”
The bamboo weighs more than I thought it would. Its shade is a bruised yellow, and when I tilt the bamboo, liquid sloshes from within. He lops off one more stalk at the joint, wipes it down, and then holds the plant at arm’s length, chopping the top with one fluid motion. Silently, he hands it to me in exchange for the other. The bamboo is now a sort of wooden cup, and inside laps astonishingly clear water. I bring the stalk to my lips and drink the whole thing down, and while it’s this side of warm, it tastes refreshing, like diluted herbal tea. Manuel finishes his drink and turns the stalk around to chop off the top of the other end. Again, he hands it over to me and I eagerly polish off every drop. As soon as I’m done, my stomach rumbles.
Manuel rummages in his pack and pulls out a handful of walnuts and a banana. I scarf both down in a matter of seconds. I’m still hungry, but now the feeling is bearable. What I wouldn’t give for a bowl of hot quinoa piled high with fried eggs and diced red onion and locoto. I want to ask for more food, but he’s already turned away, examining the landscape. He doesn’t eat anything, and guilt settles onto my shoulders, weighing them down further. I must have eaten his meager supply.
Written in Starlight Page 5
