The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina (93)

“Not the gift Orquídea gave you. Mine. You are still my child. You have your own power, Marimar.”

“How?” she asked.

The third and final bone from Isabela Buenasuerte’s finger erupted in flames. The room went still. Rhiannon clung to her cousins as the sharp click of boots on stone rang, the rhythmic thump of a cane approached. Bolívar Londo?o III was alive and he wanted them to know he was coming.

“Show yourself,” Marimar demanded.

An old man dressed in a midnight velvet suit stepped out of the wall in front of Marimar. The skin at his jaw gave the effect of a melted candle, but Bolívar flashed a wicked grin. The blue of his eyes too bright, something about the Devil in them.

“So eager, my dear, for our family reunion,” said a deep, disembodied voice. “I thought for so long that this trap would be for my Orquídea, but the three of you will do for now.”

He lashed his hand out like a viper. Marimar was aware of the screaming around her, the people she loved trying to come to her aid, her father, failing yet again to save her.

Bolívar’s fist closed around the flower bud at her throat and he pulled it out by the root.





32

THE MAN MADE OF BRITTLE THINGS




There was one memory of her mother that Marimar always thought back to. It wasn’t particularly special or magical, just another cold October day in the valley filled with tall tales, which was a different type of magic she supposed. Pena Montoya loved the fall because the fruit born from the orchards tasted sweeter. Marimar thought it tasted the same as always, but perhaps her mother knew differently somehow. In that memory, Pena was more beautiful each time, more ethereal as she continued Orquídea’s tradition of stories. The dragonflies were their protectors. The trees were their guardians. Even Jameson, neé Gabo, watched over the house and the Montoyas, and that is why he could never die. All of that Marimar had taken at face value, the legend of her family.

But when her mother told her the story of a secret door at the bottom of the lake that led to other lands, Marimar shook her head. Still, her mother stood by it.

“It’s there,” Pena had said. “Beneath the mucky ground, the clusters of silver fish, past the cave of eels, there’s a door that leads to other lands, even deep into the reaches of space.”

Marimar had tried to write down her mother and grandmother’s stories, but the words never made sense when she put them to paper. Was it because she had stopped believing in them? Had she given up on them or her own potential? After all, belief was like glass—once broken it could be pieced back together but the fissures would always be there.

Now, in the hidden room within the chapel of Santa Ana, Marimar was a broken thing in body and soul. She knew she was bleeding. She was aware that her throat was raw from screaming. She couldn’t feel anything, not her own limbs, or the floor beneath her, or the connection that had sparked when she dug her fingers into the worm-filled earth. Orquídea’s gift was gone. Rey and Rhiannon would be next. Her cousins were the only thing that forced her mind to cut through the pain, and she focused on a bright, white light behind her eyelids.

Marimar opened her eyes. The skin of her chest was sticky, and her insides felt like she’d swallowed a fist-full of nails. A gutting, ripping sensation, followed by a scream that left her hollowed out.

Rey and Rhiannon came into view. The Living Star stood between them and Bolívar Londo?o III. The decrepit old man held the long stem covered in dozens of thorns dripping blood. He caught a droplet with his fingertip and brought it to his lips.

“You’re stronger than you look,” Bolívar told her. “I suppose it’s your father’s blood, too. You’ll do, once he’s spent.”

“Go back to the circus hell you came from,” Marimar spit.

Bolívar chuckled, then held up the green flower bud to his lips and ate it, thorns and all. The green chlorophyl pulsed with the light of the magic within. It made him younger, sagging skin tightening, silver hair peppered with black, giving him back at least twenty years.

“There,” he said, turning his eyes to Rey and Rhiannon, who hadn’t moved. “Now for the others.”

She blinked through the spell of dizziness that slammed into her, and realized they were frozen in place. In Rhiannon’s fist was Orquídea’s fishing knife, and Rey held the fishing net. They were ready to defend her, but vulnerable. Always too vulnerable.

“I’m going to kill you,” Marimar promised. “Why couldn’t you just leave my grandmother alone?”

That seemed to catch his attention. He walked through the shaft of light from the skylight, casting his features in hideous shadows.

“Please,” Lázaro begged. “You have what you’ve always wanted. Finish it. Finish it and let this all end.”

Marimar looked at her father, the Living Star. She’d seen his name printed on that poster in magnificent letters like he was the ultimate marvel to behold. But it was a lie. There was no marvel, nothing spectacular. He was just a man who had fallen, and in doing so, he’d become as weak as anyone else. Hadn’t she wanted to know him? She knew in that moment—it hadn’t been a father that she’d wanted, but the truth. Lies carve out holes until they make one big enough to escape through.