Black Dog(23)

One of his earliest memories: he must have been about three, he knew that, because he had just begun to talk; like many black dogs he had been late to talk. The black dog did not understand language, and it had pulled at him all the time then, so that a lot of the time he had not really been separate from it. And the twins had been born that year.

At first Alejandro had not been allowed to come near the new babies. But one day – Alejandro remembered this vividly – one day when Mamá had gone out to the garden, Papá had taken him to see the two infants, tucked together in the little crib they shared. They had been sleeping, but woke when Alejandro leaned over the crib. Little Miguel had screwed up his face and cried, which had given Alejandro a pleasant little thrill of power and excitement as though he was hunting. His shadow had pushed at him, tipping his chubby baby fingers with claws and filling his mouth with the tastes of ash and blood. But Natividad had stretched out her hands to him and cooed and laughed, and he had liked that in a different way.

“Cut her,” Papá had suggested to him. He had lifted Miguel out of the crib and tucked him against his shoulder, but he left Natividad lying where she was. “Go ahead,” he said. “It’s alright. Rip her up. Spill her blood. Look how little she is! You could kill her so easily. Don’t you want to?”

Alejandro sort of did. He leaned forward eagerly, his mouth distorting toward the muzzle of the black dog, the bones of his shoulders and arms shifting. But his baby sister smiled and cooed, not at all afraid, and another part of him wanted her happy just like that, wanted to protect her and was horrified at the idea he might hurt her, that anybody might ever hurt her.

“Part of you wants to hurt her,” said Papá. “But a different part of you would destroy anybody who tried to hurt her. That part stops the other. Isn’t that so?”

Alejandro hadn’t been astonished that Papá understood so well. Papá understood everything; he knew that already. He had nodded and waited for Papá to explain things.

“The part of you that wants to hurt your sister, that isn’t you, Alejandro. That’s the black dog. That’s your shadow. The part of you that stops it, that is you. You always need to know which one wants something: your shadow or you. And sometimes you can let your shadow have what it wants, like when we go hunting in the forest, but mostly you have to stop it. You will always be able to stop it, though, if you want to. Understand?”

Alejandro couldn’t remember now how well he’d understood his father, then. How well could any little black dog pup really understand where his shadow stopped and he started? But he reached out now as he had reached out then and touched his sister’s cheek gently with fingers that were human right to the tips of the blunt nails. He had protected her from that moment, protected her all her life. Until he had brought her here, where he could not protect her from anything.

He couldn’t fight the verdugo, anyway. He told himself firmly that it didn’t matter: Dimilioc would not kill a Pure girl. He told himself that, and tried to believe it.

They had all thought themselves very brave, when they had decided to come to Grayson Lanning and ask Dimilioc to take them in. Papá might have said that Grayson was an honorable man and a good Master for Dimilioc, but he had also said, all their lives, Dimilioc does not tolerate strays, remember that. You never want to catch Dimilioc’s attention. They all knew it was a desperate thing to do.

Alejandro had wanted the twins to run east instead, to Japan maybe, or China. To some country where Natividad would not need to fear Vonhausel’s pursuit or the violence of perros negros. But she had refused. Because she did not want to go to so foreign a country, she had said. Really, he knew, she had refused for his sake. The Chinese dragons loathed black dogs almost as much as they had loathed vampires. Black dogs could not go into the Far East, and so Natividad would not go.

For himself, he was glad she had refused. He would have gone with them, guarded them along the way despite the danger. In the Far East, his brother and sister would have been safe from every demonic threat, certainly safe from Vonhausel. But Miguel had said no, who knew if the Chinese dragons would hate the Pure as they hated black dogs, the magic was all tied together after all, they should come to Dimilioc instead. Now Alejandro wondered how his human brother had made this sound like such a good idea. He thought of Ezekiel’s dispassionate contempt, of Grayson’s massive strength, and running north no longer seemed so clever. He wished very much for Papá, for his strength and his confidence – but even Papá’s strength had not been enough, and his confidence had been misplaced, and he was dead. No one but Alejandro was left to protect Natividad and Miguel, and how could he do that here?