The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina (79)

“You said, if I gave you your freedom, you’d give me a taste of your power.” Her mouth had gone dry with a hunger she’d never felt.

He stood slowly, watching her with his night-sky eyes. “And I meant it.”

“I don’t want a taste. I want a piece of it. I want a sliver of your power to keep for always. And I want you to teach me how to use it.” She should have thought about it more. Been more careful about the eagerness in her voice. But it was out there, and she couldn’t reel it back.

He thought about this as he silently prowled the cage. Two decades he’d spent imprisoned, bested by a monstrous boy of only ten. Now, he was haggling for his freedom with a girl who had so easily given away her heart. And yet, he knew that it would be Bolívar’s true love, the one he’d called forth on a wish, who would set the Living Star free. Agustina had decreed it, and though he doubted the capability and honesty of humankind, he did not doubt her gift.

“You have a deal, Orquídea.” He held out his hand and waited. She seized it. His touch was firm, cold, like the first time she held snow.

“Deal.”

A sound came from the end of the hall. Voices. The guard, or perhaps Bolívar himself.

“I have to go,” she said.

“Bring me the ring, and find the key. It is the same color as my chains.” He gripped the bars in front of his face.

“Wait,” she stalled, glancing back at the door. “What does his ring do?”

Lazáro held up his palm, and her eye went to his left hand. “It is how he controls me.”

Steal a key and a ring that her husband kept on his person at all times. It was impossible. But as she made her way back, she imagined the taste of that power, even the smallest bit. She was Bolívar Londo?o III’s wife. La Sirena del Ecuador. Orquídea Divina, Bastard Daughter of the Waves. She’d seen parts of the world she’d never imagined, and when she was done, she’d see it all. And why stop at the world, when she might have a chance to see the galaxy?





Part IV

HASTA LA RAíZ





26

INGREDIENTS TO CALL ON THE DEAD




The grasshoppers were hard to catch. When they thought they’d gathered them all, they appeared in cups of coffee, in Jefita’s purse as she rushed out to make arrangements. They hid in the underside of the car and in the engine. Ana Cruz’s approach was to step on them, crush them, but eventually she grew accustomed to the sight of their green faces in the kitchen cupboard and in the tins of cereal and rice.

Ana Cruz was not devout, not the way Jefita was. She’d been baptized, had her first communion. She went to church when her father was alive, but not since. She kept reliquaries of the Virgin Mary in her home, a cross in her bedroom. Sometimes she wondered if it was because she truly had faith or because she feared the alternative. But when she’d come down the stairs to find Tatinelly dead, she prayed harder than she ever had before. She prayed for the Montoyas, the living and the dead. Ana Cruz had been so stunned she simply stared at Tatinelly’s lifeless body. The slight girl looked like a princess out of a fairy tale resting on a bed of vines after her sacrifice.

The vines had been another problem. They’d grown out of the garden and out of her stomach. No one had wanted to take the bodies. Not to the hospital and not to the morgue. There were too many officials, too many gawkers standing outside the house. Reporters and helicopters. Vultures, all of them. Even priests made the pilgrimage, getting past the enclosed neighborhood’s guards because no one, not even the guards, would deny a priest.

The official story was this. Intruders attempted to kidnap Mike and Tatinelly Sullivan, tourists from the United States. The perpetrators were chased away by other members of the family and were in the wind. The police had no suspects.

That was the official story.

Others, those who had visited the Montoyas, those who had marveled at the God-given gifts growing out of their skin, knew different. They called it a miracle.

Rey had spent the day after consuming the entire bottle of bourbon Mike had intended to drink in celebration of Félix Montoya’s life. Rhiannon hid in the garden, crying and whispering to the grasshoppers who surrounded her like a rapt audience. Meanwhile Marimar went over every finding, every photo. She obsessed over the Living Star, but there was nothing about him. No real name. No museum obscurities. He was like Orquídea, a mystery they couldn’t solve.

No one slept, and they only ate because Jefita forced them to. Mostly, they waited for the bodies to be ready. Marimar called the family at Four Rivers, told them to stay put, stay together, and then she sat there listening to Reina, Tatinelly’s mother, wail. It haunted Marimar as she retraced the steps of that night. How had the Living Star found them? Why hadn’t he come back? She stood in the courtyard with her face to the night sky. She listened for a whisper, a threat. That strange bell-chime voice that threated at the fringes of her mind. But nothing and no one came.

There were no more miracles.

Miracle or not, there was work to be done. A funeral to prepare. Tatinelly had used her final words to say she wanted to stay here. Despite Reina’s plea to come home, they couldn’t go against Tatinelly’s wishes. Not when she’d saved them. As for the Sullivans, they left a message, but no one had returned their call.