Black Dog(27)
“Hah,” said Alejandro, and grinned at last, leaning back against the edge of the cot in a deliberate echo of his brother. “I don’t have to like it. You’re far too sensible, Miguel.” Sometimes he wondered what that would be like, to be that way – to be calm and rational, the way an ordinary human could be. Not to be pulled always toward violence and anger by the black dog shadow. Miguel had so much more choice over what he did, or at least over what he felt; a kind of control a black dog achieved only through constant struggle.
Miguel’s mouth crooked. “No such thing as too sensible. Which we can hope Grayson thinks as well.”
Alejandro nodded. “You understand people. What will they do? Miguel, you did not tell them you argued us into coming here?”
“Estas bromeando? You’d kill me yourself if I told them.”
“I might.” Alejandro gave his younger brother a long look, trying to decide whether he was lying. But Miguel met his hard stare with evident sincerity.
“So,” Alejandro said at last. “What I think is, maybe they will send me away and keep you. I don’t think they will kill me. They want Natividad, and if they are wise they will want you. It must be useful for Dimilioc to have some ordinary humans and I don’t think they do right now. I think they will say to one another, ‘That young one, he is only a boy, he shows promise and he can be brought up to be Dimilioc in his heart, and anyway he is not a black dog so he is no threat.’ I think they will say, ‘That black pup, though, he does not have such good control of his shadow, and at his age he will challenge everyone and never rest from violence.’ If they say things like that, Miguel, then it is important that you let them blame me for our trespass. It will not matter to me, and maybe it will help you.”
Miguel nodded, but this was not exactly agreement.
Alejandro said, a little more forcefully, “Harás lo que yo te diga. If they keep Natividad, and they will, it is important she have a brother near her. You understand?”
“Yes. Yes! I understand. You don’t need to keep on about it!” Miguel got to his feet, taking an impatient step away.
“If you understand and agree, then I don’t,” Alejandro said grimly. “If you tell them and then they don’t kill us both, I really will kill you myself.”
“Papá suggested we come here,” Miguel said. “And you decided we would. Natividad and me, we never make decisions, we’re just along for the ride.”
“Good.”
“But if they send you away, they’re fools, and if they kill you, I won’t forgive it.”
Alejandro nodded. “So, what will they do? Do you think I worry for nothing?”
Miguel shrugged, glancing up to meet his brother’s eyes and then down again, uncomfortably. “Nothing about this is obvious. I don’t know the Dimilioc wolves well enough to guess. I don’t know.” He looked at Alejandro earnestly. “I really don’t. But Grayson’s smart and he doesn’t care a lot about tradition. I mean, once so many vampires got killed that there weren’t enough to keep their miasma going and people began to see vampires and blood kin and then black dogs? No one expected that, right? But Grayson figured out he could use that by just sending the right information to the right people so the humans themselves would attack the blood kin where Dimilioc couldn’t reach them. That was really clever, and usually a black dog wouldn’t think of things like that. So, I get that Dimilioc didn’t used to let anybody just walk up and join, but Grayson’s different – and Papá was a Toland.”
Alejandro thought that Miguel might be partly right, but that unpredictability was not the most reassuring quality the Dimilioc Master might possess. But he said only, “Maybe you are right. So. Rest, then. You rest, and I will also, and as Natividad said, we will let the morning take care of itself.”
But the morning came, and nothing happened.
The windowless basement room offered no sign of the brightening dawn and the soundproofing was too good to allow any sound from the house above to filter down to the cell, but Alejandro felt the sun anyway, a pressure against his shadow. No one brought more food. There was still some bread left, and some of the berry preserves. Alejandro left the food for the twins, who woke stiff and bleary. Miguel did not complain. Natividad complained about the lack of a toothbrush, and the lack of a hot shower, and the lack of clean clothing: their belongings, escaso – scant – as they were, had not come down to the cell with them. But she did not complain about the silence from the house above, or admit that she was afraid of what this silence might portend.