Ricardo longed for a sword in his hand, no matter that steel would do no good against these opponents. He would have to beat them with wood through the heart. Octavio held the torn branch, one end jagged like a dagger. The other three ranged around him, ready to cut
off his escape, and a wave of dizziness blurred Ricardo’s vision for a moment. Despair and hunger. If he’d taken blood, he would have more power—maybe enough to fight them all. As it was, he could not fight all four of them. Not if they meant to kill him.
He ran. They reached for him, but with flight his only concern, he drew on that devilish power. Make me like shadow, he thought.
The world became a blur, and he was smoke traveling across it. Nothing but air, moving faster than wind. He felt their hands brush his doublet as he passed. But they did not catch hold of him.
He found a cave. Villagers might have hidden here once. Ricardo found the burned remains of a campfire, some scraps of food, and an old blanket that had been abandoned. The back of the cave was narrow and ran deep within the hillside. It would always be dark, and he could stay there, safe from sunlight.
But would they come after him?
They could not tolerate rivals. Animal, demon, or men fallen beyond the point of redemption, they had claimed this territory as their own. He had rebuffed their brotherhood, so now he was an invader. They would come for him.
Ricardo put the blanket over a narrow crag in the rock, deep in the cave. The light of dawn approached. As he lay down in the darkness, he congratulated himself on surviving the night.
He fell asleep wondering how he would survive the next.
At dusk, he hurried over the hillside, gathering fallen sticks, stripping trees of the sturdiest branches he could find, and using chipped stones he had found in the cave to sharpen the ends into points. It was slow going, and he was weak. Lack of blood had sapped his strength. His skin was clammy, pale, more and more resembling a dead man’s. I am a walking corpse, he thought and laughed. He had thought that once before, while crossing the northern despoblado with Coronado.
Ricardo had to believe he was not dead, that he would not die. He was fighting for a much nobler cause than the one that had driven him north ten years ago. He’d made that journey for riches and glory. Now he was fighting to return to God. He was fighting for his soul. But without blood, he couldn’t fight at all.
“Señor?” a woman’s voice called, hesitating.
Ricardo turned, startled. It was a sign of his weakness that he had not heard her approach. Now that he saw her, the scent of her blood and the nearness of her pounding heart washed over him, filling him like a glass of strong wine. His mind swam in it, and the demon screeched for her blood. Ricardo gripped the branch in his hand, willing the monster to be silent.
The mestiza woman wore a poor dress and a ragged shawl over her head. Her hair wasn’t tossed and tangled in flight tonight, but he recognized her. She was the one he’d let go.
“You,” he breathed, and discovered that he loved her, wildly and passionately, with the instant devotion of a drunk man. He had saved her life, and so he loved her.
She kept her gaze lowered. “I hoped to find you. To thank you.” She spoke Spanish with a thick accent.
“You shouldn’t have come back,” he said. “My will isn’t strong tonight.”
She nodded at his roughly carved stake. “You fight the others? The wolves of the night?”
He chuckled, not liking the tone of despair in the sound. “I’ll try.”
“But you are one of them.”
“No. Like them, but not one of them.”
She knelt on the ground and drew a clay mug from her pouch. She also produced a knife. She moved quickly, as if she feared she might change her mind, and before Ricardo could stop her, she drew the knife across her forearm. She hissed a breath.
He reached for her. “No!”
Massaging her forearm, encouraging the flow of blood, she held the wound over the mug. The blood ran in a thin stream for several long minutes. Then, just as quickly, she took a clean piece of linen and wrapped her arm tightly.
The knife disappeared back in the pouch. She glanced at him. He could only stare back, dumbfounded.
She moved the cup of blood toward him. “A gift,” she said. “Stop them, then leave us alone. Please?”
“Yes. I will.”
“Thank you.”
She turned and ran.
The blood was still warm when it slipped down his throat. His mind expanded with the taste of it. He no longer felt drunk; on the contrary, he felt clear, powerful. He could count the stars wheeling above him. The heat of young life filled him, no matter if it was borrowed. And he could survive without killing. That gave him hope.