Page 32 of The Familiar

“You’ve been enjoying your lessons?”

“Yes, señor.”

“You are fond of your teacher?”

“I am grateful to him and to you, señor.”

“I see Catalina’s polish has at least put some shine on you. Do you think you’re ready to impress Pérez? Do you think your entertainments are fit for a king?”

“I can only pray that is the case, señor.”

Don Víctor grabbed her by the chin, forcing her to meet his gaze. “I have no interest in the prayers of a shitty little scullion.”

“Víctor.” Santángel’s voice was cold, an echo heard from deep within a cave. “That’s enough.”

“You do not use that word with me. Enough is forbidden to you.”

“Leave the girl alone. Vent your anger elsewhere.”

“I’m not angry with her.” Víctor gave her head a shake, his gloved fingers pinching. “I’m simply weary of her mediocrity.” He turned to Santángel. “It is you who deserves my ire.”

“Then beat me. Strike me if you are so sure I cannot find a way to return the blow.”

Luzia didn’t understand this battle, but she didn’t want to be hit and she didn’t want to see Santángel beaten.

“He has tried to teach me,” Luzia said, hoping to appease Don Víctor. “I am a poor student.”

But he didn’t care what she had to say.

“How kind of you to volunteer, Santángel. As always, I am grateful for your service.” He turned to the bodyguard. “Álvaro, break his fingers. If our student is making such wonderful progress, she will be able to repair them.”

“Please,” Luzia began. But Álvaro didn’t wait. He seized Santángel’s hand and wrenched his first finger to the right. The snap was like kindling being split. “Don’t!” Luzia cried.

“Go on,” said Don Víctor. “Fix him as you did the sapling. If you can.”

Santángel said nothing. He didn’t fight or resist or cry out. His gaze was locked on Víctor, but there was no light in his eyes, only a long cold night.

“Again,” commanded Don Víctor.

“Wait!” Luzia pleaded. “Give me a moment to think!”

“She thinks now. Who told you to teach her that?”

Crack. Álvaro bent back another of Santángel’s fingers, a branch breaking in winter, an animal’s jaws snapping shut. El Peñaco was grinning now. Was he mad? Did this please him?

Luzia’s mind scrambled for the words that had come so easily only moments before. Aboltar kazal, aboltar mazal. She couldn’t find the tune. The sound of Santángel’s breaking bones was all she could hear.

“Álvaro will continue until you show me what you are capable of.”

Who knows what you might do?

Luzia shut her eyes, shut out the room, shut out the anticipation in Álvaro’s eyes, the grim resignation in Santángel’s face. There, the melody, the letters forming one after another, but again she felt that pull, that sense of sliding, the song seeking another form.

“Again, Álvaro,” Don Víctor commanded.

She had been lulled by this room, by Santángel’s patience, by velvet dresses and lessons in comportment. She hated this house and everyone in it. She hated this city too. Anywhere but here, she thought. I would be anywhere but here. She fought to find the melody and then there, the song, she followed it, humming, the sound blooming from her chest with the strength of a hive, a swarm of bees singing with her, the words taking shape, traveling across the sea, across time, the words of exile, of new beginnings, of survival.

Aboltar kazal, aboltar mazal.