Mirari hesitated only a second before taking the mask and inspecting it as she turned it over in her hands. She nodded. “Brand new. A brand new face. A pretty face. I can wear a pretty face for the pretty boy. Then it will be all right.”
Lorenzo exchanged a look with Nina as the woman helped tie the mask over her sister’s face. She stepped back and said, “Are you all right?”
Mirari straightened up again and said, louder and clearer than ever before, “By all means, let’s be off. These good people have work to do and I have a day’s wage to earn. Thank you, Nina, I’ll see you later. Take care, dear sister.”
The sisters embraced and then Nina left, giving Lorenzo one last warning look as she passed. “Stay close to her.”
“She’ll be fine,” he said.
“I’m not worried about her.” Nina winked and set off down the trail.
The masked girl said, “Mirari Velasquez, at your service. And you, sir?”
“Don Lorenzo Quesada, at yours.”
“Don Lorenzo, please follow me.” Mirari turned and set out along the edge of the wall of the gully and pointed out a natural stair in the stone. “We’ll follow the old goat trail to the high paths. Where exactly did you wish to go today?”
Lorenzo looked at her masked face, still a bit stunned by her sudden transformation. “The north face of Pic Blanco. I’m looking for a certain cave or pit. We should know it by the heat in the rocks, as though from a hot spring, but not from a hot spring.”
“You wish to see the burning gold?”
He swallowed. “You’ve seen it?”
“Just once. Just for a moment.” Mirari turned and began to climb the stair. “But then the basajaun chased me away and I never went back.”
“The what?” Lorenzo started up the stair after her, not sure he had heard her correctly. “What chased you?”
Chapter 23. Taziri
The wind screamed against the western face of Pic Blanco. Taziri shuffled along the narrow trail behind Lorenzo with one hand on the rocks to her right and the other hand clutching the high collar of her coat around her face. At first the wind would slice through her clothes, penetrating her heavy leathers and wools in defiance of all reason and stinging her skin with the freezing air or worse, the freezing rain. And then the wind would batter her like a ram, shoving her off balance and slamming her into the rock wall.
She wore her aviator goggles over her eyes, which protected them from the stinging ice but required constant wiping and cleaning or else they would quickly fog up with steam and then crust over with frost.
Whenever she passed into the lee of some stone pillar or blasted tree, Taziri would glance back at Shahera and Dante, each time finding them as miserable but as dogged as herself.
Her mind ran over and over the last week, trying to sort out where everything had gone wrong.
What was the first wrong decision? What could I have done differently?
And every time she asked, she offered up a hundred new answers. It was Kenan’s fault, or the weather, or the Espani.
I could have flown farther, or landed closer. I could have tried to force the Halcyon into a near-stall banking maneuver to force it to turn south.
I could have gone south when Syfax first suggested it, or again later when he went that way with Kenan.
I could have gone to the authorities.
I could have gone back to the coast.
Could have.
Should have.
No.
She swallowed the guilt and doubt back down into her empty, growling stomach.
No, I need to focus on here and now. I’m not stupid or careless. Every decision I made was reasonable at the time. Every one of them.
But when she looked up at the masked figure leading them through the storm high into the Espani mountains, it was hard to see how any of this made sense.
How is this reasonable?
So she focused on Yuba and Menna. She called up their faces, their voices, their laughter. She remembered the last night they had all been together.
No, not that night.
Maybe another night from last month, a night when there had been no arguments about all her time away from home, no sullen looks, no hurt feelings, no loneliness or confusion. A good night. A quiet night at home with her family, safe and happy and warm.
Ahead of her, Lorenzo had stopped and was staring back through the howling sleet at the trail behind them. He leaned down close to her to speak into her ear. “We’re being followed.”
How is that possible?
She peered back but all she saw was a dark gray sky and a dark gray mountain and a veil of flying ice in between. “I don’t see anything.”
“I’ve seen him twice now. You go on with the others. I’ll bring up the rear.”
“All right.” She trudged on up the trail, following the dark flapping coats of their masked guide. Mirari seemed to be in her element here on the mountain, sure-footed and able-bodied. The strange girl climbed the treacherous, icy paths as easily as any goat and occasionally she turned to call out in a loud clear voice where there was a good handhold or a dangerous footing.
Another half hour of hiking brought them around to the north face of Pic Blanco. The stinging sleet softened into a heavy snow that fell in endless waves of perfect whiteness, obscuring the entire world. She felt as though they’d died and gone to some no-place between heaven and earth, a frozen wasteland that God forgot to fill with color and warmth. And still Mirari trekked on and Taziri followed her, angling down the rocky slope.
Taziri dragged her boots through the thickening snow, trying to ignore the thought that every step forward was another step they would have to take back again. She was also trying to ignore the thought that all of this effort was being spent to help a near stranger to collect a rock for his holy relic collection when her next step fell on hard, bare gravel. Looking down, she saw that all the ground ahead was bare. The snow was falling as thick and silent as ever, but the boulders and pebbles and dirt stood dark and hard against the soft white world around her.
She trudged through a few yards of soft mud and soon found the earth growing drier and firmer underfoot. Behind her, Shahera and Dante stumbled out of the snow drift and clawed their scarves away from their mouths.
“Did I miss something?” Dante asked. “Is it spring or did we just wander into an undiscovered circle of hell?”
“It’s a miracle.” Shahera pulled her hat and scarves off her head and shook her hair free. “It’s like another world, a secret garden where magical spirits dwell.”
The snow continued to fall but it vanished before it could kiss the warm earth. A sultry haze hung above the dry ground. Mirari stopped and pointed down the slope. “There. If you keep going that way, you’ll find the fire gold.”
Taziri glanced back for Lorenzo, but the hidalgo had not yet arrived. “How will I know it? What does it look like?”
“It’s gold. About the size of your head, I would say.” The Italian mask muffled her voice slightly, but Mirari’s wide eyes flashed behind the porcelain face. “You don’t have an axe.”
“You think we’ll need one to get the stone?”
Mirari’s eyes narrowed but her painted smile did not change. “I think you’ll need one to survive.”
“Why?” Taziri looked hastily around but there was no sign of anyone or anything dangerous. No trees or grass, no birds or mice. Just earth and stone. What was that word she used? “What is a basajaun?”
“Something that will not let you take the stone.”
Taziri pulled up her left sleeve and released the gun barrel in her brace. The weapon snapped up with a click and a hiss of compressed air. She set about loading a shell. “Well, if it’s human, this should scare him away.”
“And what if it’s not human?” Dante asked.
“As long as it’s not a snow bear, a gunshot or two will send it running.”
The Italian frowned. “I’ve heard stories about snow bears.” He knelt down and picked up a jagged rock. Shahera picked up one as well. Alonso picked up a handful of stones about half the size of his fist.