The foot trail was narrow, the lush trees brimming with eloquent little bugs and reptiles that darted away at the disruption of their tranquility. In their proximity the back of Reina’s fingers brushed against Celeste’s as they walked, idly and without intent. And when it happened thrice, she had to fight a powerful urge to take Celeste’s hand.
Celeste spared her a glance, just as a passing sunray caught her eyes. “Can you imagine if we actually find the tomb? Do you think he’s there, Rahmagut?”
“If he is, I’m going to beg him to fix my heart,” Reina said with a straight face.
Celeste giggled.
“I’m serious. I’ll do anything. He can do it. He can fix me—”
“But you’re not broken.”
Reina watched Celeste as her belly wrung itself. If only she knew the truth.
“Besides, how can you sell your soul in exchange for your heart? Look at everything you have to do for Ursulina. Now imagine you’re indebted to a heartless god.”
Then, at least in this lifetime, they could be together. “I wouldn’t be enslaved to iridio. We could go anywhere.” The thought was exhilarating. She was so close. After this week, they would start afresh.
“But Reina,” Celeste cooed and raised her arms to the canopy, “we’re already going anywhere we want. Look at us, in Tierra’e Sol!”
Reina nodded, listening to the breathing of the jungle as they walked. The wind carried a gentle breeze smelling of humidity, of moist leaves and saline earth. The sound of water trickling over stones told them a creek was nearby. Again, there it was, the pang of familiarity. The unshakable feeling that she was doing exactly what she needed to.
From somewhere in the distance came the faint voices of Eva and Maior. They talked about Eva’s short antlers, about what it would be like at the dinner party. The voices died as they walked farther away. They sounded content with each other’s friendship, and safe. “They’re ahead,” Reina said.
“Yes,” Celeste said, nodding. Her valco senses were sharper than Reina’s.
“Maybe we should let them be,” Reina said, to divert Celeste from her bogus objective. It was Do?a Ursulina she needed to find.
“She likes you, you know,” Celeste said.
Reina’s eyes rounded in alarm. The butterflies in her belly returned, warm and right, like when Maior’s hand had pressed against her skin this morning. “Really?” The indulgent question escaped her before she could stop herself. She disliked thinking of Maior now, when Celeste was right here. When her true fate was days away from being realized.
Celeste chuckled. “Can you really be that blind to it? It’s almost like the woman’s desperate to have someone.”
Reina was nozariel, and poor, and dying, and Maior had witnessed it all. Maybe that was it: desperation.
“I find it funny that Maior likes women—she’s such a Virgin worshiper,” Celeste said with a smile. “Sometimes I wonder how much happier the world would be, if people allowed themselves to be who they truly are.”
Reina watched her cautiously. A spark of hope ignited in her chest. Was Celeste trying to imply that Reina should be her true self?
“Do you like her back?” Celeste asked.
Reina hated the question. She could come clean: About her feelings for Celeste. About her hopes for their future. How they were so perfect for each other. Then a monkey hooted loudly in the near distance, evaporating her courage. “That has nothing to do with why she’s here.”
Celeste laughed.
The path opened to a clearing along the banks of a creek. Feeding the creek was a shallow lagoon of the clearest green. And behind the lagoon was a great cavern, its shadow slicing the water in half. Its center gaped with a massive opening, rocky and jagged, like the ravenous mouth of a shark.
Celeste rushed to the glistening water, then stopped when she noticed the cavern.
A great sucking sensation imploded in Reina’s chest. Like she was falling—like her throat, heart, and belly plummeted to the deepest regions of el Vacío. She almost stumbled, but she grounded herself, realizing the sensation was her iridio heart reacting to the cavern. To its call.
“This is it,” she said without a droplet of doubt.
“Rahmagut’s tomb?” Celeste whispered.
Reina was half expecting a tiniebla or a jaguar to pounce from the darkness. Pulse tingling, she extended her hands to Celeste, and when Celeste took them, she reeled her back to the safety of her proximity.
“You don’t want to go in, right?” Celeste said. “We have no armor—and Don Samón is expecting us tonight.”
“We’ve actually found it,” Reina said again—a whisper of awe and apprehension. Do?a Ursulina could be awaiting her in those depths.
Her gaze locked with Celeste’s. The lagoon’s reflected light danced along the velvety smoothness of Celeste’s cheeks and lips, so full and perfect in Reina’s eyes.
It hit Reina at that moment, why she felt so comfortable seeking out the lagoon, which was an extension of the tomb. She had traveled this path time and time again in her dreams. The canopied path to the lagoon. She was an agent of Rahmagut, and he’d been beckoning her since the moment the iridio heart had saved her. Her new life was but moments away from being realized.
“We should get back,” Celeste said, a little panicky. “There will be that party tonight. All those people are protecting the tomb from Do?a Ursulina and my father.”
The truth almost burst out of Reina. But Celeste was right. She ought to bide her time.
Celeste’s brows bunched up at Reina’s expression. “Is something the matter?”
“I’ve seen this place in my dreams,” Reina said automatically. “Like I was always meant to come here.”
Celeste licked her lips.
Reina’s thumb found itself on the pinnacle of Celeste’s shoulder, lifting the silk of her hair to allow a view at the birthmark behind her ear. “I was meant to be there that night when we realized what you are, just like we’re meant to be here.”
She thought she felt Celeste shudder under her touch. Or maybe it was her own mad mind playing games on her.
“As if we already shared amapolas?” Celeste said.
“What do you mean?”
Their dress had pockets, Reina realized as Celeste pulled out the green-skinned fruit from the folds of hers. “Like, our fates are already bound together?”
Something turned in Reina’s stomach. It rendered her knees weak.
“I… I wanted to offer it to you. Not like… how my parents took them, but as a thank-you for our friendship.” Celeste tore the amapola open, its milky-white juices dribbling down her fingers. “I fled from Sadul Fuerte, and you’re the only one who cared about me. You proved it by coming all the way to the Plume—probably pissing off your grandmother and ruining what little you had built with Father.”
Celeste ripped out a small chunk and brought the glistening pulp to her lips.
The jungle rustled, a hundred little creatures witnessing their oath within the vines and the trees and the bushes.
Celeste asking for permission came as a nod, which Reina mimicked as her reply for consent. Celeste then plucked a meaty piece off the fruit and ferried it to Reina’s lips.