Rain

By Abigayle Ellen

The book follows a girl called Rain, and this is from the time she was ten in Colombia 1927—two years after her parents died in a fire.

She is forced to flee her village after telling a dangerous secret. Her best friend, Cabello, takes her into the jungle in the hope of finding a place where she won’t only hide but live. She grows up solitary but happy in a place she calls her oasis, accompanied by the finger monkeys that take up residence in her great tree by the water, but that’s only where it begins.

From beginning to end, this book is interspersed with Muisca traditions—an indigenous tribe of Colombia. Filled to the brim with symbolism, it clearly expresses the strength and power of women. The underlying theme is that good and evil are both needed to create balance and balance with nature will create peace.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 29, 2019
• ISBN: 9781984569691

Abigayle Ellen

My name is Abigayle Ellen. I’m twenty eight and am currently a single mom of a seven year old boy who is second to nothing in my life. I’m engaged to be married to one of the few good ones left. I’ve had four brain surgeries and was crippled by the last one. I can no longer walk outside by myself and other things but I use that as a good example. I also no long qualify for life insurance, so I want to sell these books so that I’ll be able to leave my family with something.

Book preview

Part I

GROWING UP FOR THE FIRST TIME

Chapter 1

RAIN

I am the wind that howls. I am the white caps on waves. I am my mother and my father, my friend and my enemy. I am everything and nothing. In my most vital years, I learned the jungle. The wild was my teacher and the trees, my peers. Now I walk on glassy moss as a water spirit glides along the earth. I call the dew from the leaves and set the flowers to sleep, for I am the sinking sun and the dark clouds that thunder. I am Rain.

*     *     *

In Colombia, on the far side of the Andes from the Pacific Ocean, in 1927, an hombre joven (young man) of eleven tore through his village, moving swift and single-minded. He knew he could break from his course and find somewhere to hide but he had to warn her, hide her, protect her. She was the only thing that could make him forget his most primitive instinct; survival, though he didn’t yet know why. He had a notion but from what he knew, love was still just a word.

He reached the top of the hill and saw candles flicker behind the hides shading those windows that hadn’t glass. All of the houses were plainly made. They were all of cinder blocks and cleverly utilized wooden crates. The houses were built along either side of three roads, straight as sunbeams and each shining from the market place that dusted the top of a huge hill. The roads were spaced evenly down the hill’s one side, reaching the bottom and stopping where the tents lay between the houses and the coca field.

The house the boy came to was of better quality than the rest, with bigger windows and nicely kept by those who volunteered a spare minute to touch it up here and there. This was the house of Nora who was royalty to some or as royal as one could be in such a place. For those who didn’t put their faith in the old stories, they believed her to be very kind if nothing else with a hand for healing. Though, whatever her status was to anyone, she was well respected. To those who gave her praise, she would say, I simply am. To the children, she’d cup their cheek, look into their face, adding, and so are you. Then smiling warmly down at them, she’d wink in a way that made you wonder if she had actually closed her eye or if she could make her eye sparkle at will.

The people of the village valued her kindness and position enough that when she decided to live among them they built a house for her at the very top of the center road. A corner of the house was gridded in blocks of glass to handsomely display the crimson, emerald, gold, and royal blue in the medicines that she made. To the people, the medicine looked like potions and they fascinated the people. She used to live in one of the few houses that had glass windows. Eventually, it became the only house that had them.

At the moment, her house was peaceable, the inhabitance calm in the ignorance of what danger was coming. His hand lingered beneath the latch, reluctant to stir them. Then he shook off the ludicrous thought one occasionally forms in surreal circumstances and burst inside.

*     *     *

I sat in my usual place on the floor where I put tiny stitches into a rosebud. My skirt plumed around me and the white flowers embroidered along the hem of my red skirt pooled in the extra length of material. I knew the other girls and women in the village only had a few ragged pieces of clothing and saw them as tools to cover and use as rags or baskets but I was born to privilege. I viewed clothing as a covering to make oneself more decorative. Until I was nearly eight, I lived in a tall house made of wood that stood a little way into the meadow past the market place, before Jorge’s wheat field. My momma was what towns might call the mayor but her position was given her by birth, not election.

My family comes from a complicated line of Muisca chieftains. When the tribes were the leading form of government in South America before the Spanish invaded hundreds of years ago, the future leader of the tribe was the current chieftain’s nephew. I don’t know who made up that law but there you have it. After the Muisca were demolished by the Spanish, those who survived tried to keep the beliefs and traditions alive. Of course, time passed which means things changed. More people turned to Catholicism and traditions became scarcer. The responsibilities of a leader went to the next generation in the same immediate family instead of nephews and the gap between upper and lower classes wasn’t so noticeable anymore.

Tἱa (aunt) Nora was supposed to be next to lead, at the age of twenty after my abuelos (grandparents) died but she felt compelled to live where she could care for the people physically and spiritually and passed the responsibility of caring for them civically and economically to her sister, Mariana, who was sixteen at that time. Momma had a mind for that sort of thing though and accepted the position gladly.

My momma was beautiful. That’s easy for a girl to imagine about her mother though. She had long, straight, black hair. Not like mine, which is only straight in some places but wavy in others. I even find loose curls when my hair dries in the sun. My hair is thick, wild, and entirely unmanageable. Momma was taller than Tἱa but not by much. In other words, she was of average height as to Colombian tribe standards. She was thin but I think only because she moved so much. She loved food and to cook.

Her favorite part of her job was to visit all of the homes throughout the week. She had a great memory for what people needed. After two years, she managed to establish many strong relationships. I never saw her write anything down but I never heard anyone complain about a forgotten necessity when she came home from town either. She knew that job was what she was born to do. How reassuring, I thought sometimes. I was sure I had been born for the same purpose once but I didn’t know anymore…

Momma had the bones and solidity of an ancient one. One that was a little curvy but still ancient and beautiful. I spent hours sometimes looking in the mirror to find glimpses of her in my reflection. She could break a heart with a look. When she was angry, her dark brown eyes would water as if she might cry. She’d go outside and face the wind, listening for… something. A time I remember well is one of which the wind billowed through her hair. With closed eyes, her chest rose and fell heavily as she took in a few deep breath of air that swept down from the mountains and warmed as it passed through the jungle.

She met Poppa when she was eighteen and they were married four months later. Two weeks into their marriage, they learned that Momma was pregnant. I was born a week late that following January. When I became six, she began to take me with her wherever she went, partly to learn what would one day be my responsibility but, at that age, I mostly went because she liked to show off her beautiful niῆita. I got to know everyone very well that way. We visited Tἱa frequently but I didn’t know of Cabello (now my best friend) until I came to live with her when I was eight. He always went there at night after work and me and Momma visited during the day. I was six when I first remember calling Tἱa Nora just Tἱa for short. She was the only aunt I had, so it was fitting.

I was deep in my dreams of those days when Cabello flew through the door and slammed it shut behind him. Tἱa was in the kitchen to his left shucking maize at the table.

Cabello? What’s happening? She asked in a way that sounded in demand of any situation but I knew she was worried.

He seemed to have no time to answer and I didn’t think he could if he had. He pressed a few fingers to a stitch in his lungs. He strode straight ahead and passed the kitchen, limping in the biggest strides he could manage. He reached me before I had time to comprehend that anything was seriously wrong. Before I could set down my sewing to give him my full attention, he grabbed my wrist and pulled me to my feet. I dropped the needle and thread and followed him to the wall of loosened planks, then gave Tἱa a startled glance when I realized what he meant to do. Her look didn’t ease me at all. I had been told before that I may need to hide from Edgardo or his guards someday. For the two years I had lived with Tἱa until that hour, he thought me dead along with my parents. Someone must have tipped him off that it wasn’t so and, possibly, that I also knew his secret (one of them anyhow) and I thought I knew who told.

Edgardo’s plan had been to take over everything from the far end of the wheat field to the far end of the coca field, which was put into action, coincidentally, the day after my parents died. His secret was that he fell out with my poppa (his business partner) the day before he and Momma died. Their deaths were already speculated by the people as murderous but if they knew my poppa’s intention to break ties with Edgardo just before the fire, they would no longer speculate but know what had really happened and the people would rebel. For the death of my momma was the death of our culture and with the death of my poppa came the death of our freedom.

Without divine intervention, however, we would be all but destroyed in the end. Tἱa and I both knew the problem was out of their hands and could only be fixed by something greater than themselves so his secret became mine as well. Hope still flowed stronger than our desolation though and someday peace among us would be reborn.

Just then, I was very reluctant to hide in the wall. I had seen inside once for less than a minute before turning away. I told myself it would never need use so long as I held my tongue. Small, dark places made my heart race until all I could do was stifle my urge to scream and try to see beyond the dark spots that were darker than the small place I was in.

After prying a few boards loose and making a hole big enough for me to fit through, Cabello picked me up and set me inside. He boarded the hole up again but not before seeing my terrified eyes lost behind the last plank. I could tell he had seen the fear in them because the last thing I saw was the blood that left his face and his eyes turn from determined to soft and remorseful. He threw down the tapestry that hung on that wall, covering a few slits of light and air that I needed to keep me sane, a state in which I began to flutter.

A loud BOOM came on the door that brought me back to myself and made my heart plunder over an unseen step in the dark. I saw a flash between the boards and heard a louder BOOM that crackled at the end. Sheets of rain came down on the metal roof above me. Cabello’s old, grey military jacket wooshed as it whirled about him when he spun on his heel. He walked into the only bedroom and closed the door behind him. The less anyone knew of his involvement, the more he could help me in the long run.

Tía went to the front door, threw back the latch, and jumped away. They came in at the same instant and slammed the door into the wall it adjoined. The door bounced back and hit a thug in the arm. He wasn’t fazed. Tía rushed back to her seat and two of them advanced into the room, muscles flexed to intimidate and swallowing half of the space. Both were blackened by the sun, burnt nearly to the color of charcoal. One thug had a high forehead, a box-shaped face, and one thick brow above both eyes, squinting hard into the room as though he could see through walls. The other had two brows but looked no better for them. His forehead sloped over a round face and he sported patches of beard. All this and his flat, speckled nose made him resemble a gorilla. His eyes bulged as he stared with bloodshot eyes while he scanned the room. Then he rested them on Tía.

Where is she? The latter barked in his deep voice. He towered over her. Luckily, they weren’t told to hurt her for harboring me because they could break her before breaking a sweat. She was small and somewhat wrinkled. When she was younger she had dark brown hair but now it was lighter with a red hue, dried and bleached by the sun. She kept her brittle hair in a long braid over her shoulder at home after dark. She wasn’t ugly by any means but few people noticed her appearance. She emitted a glow filled with kindness and understanding.

These attributes went unseen or unappreciated by the thugs. She looked down at the half-shucked corn in her hand, seeming unsure of how it came to be there and dropped it before she moved back in her chair. She tried to get far away but couldn’t escape his glare as his face came close to hers. He was a rabid dog, about to take off her head without the hindrance of a single blood vessel. Her eyes darted around the room in search of something that would inspire a lie but found nothing. She wasn’t good at lying on the spot. I felt the blush rise in my cheeks for her as I watched her floundering fearfully in the glossy gleam of his eyes. Without looking away from her, the ape-man growled an order.

Matἱas! Check the house.

The thug with the square face past in front of me without a sideways glance. I tried to see if he would find Cabello or if he had managed to escape through the window. I couldn’t see from my angle. I only heard Matἱas smash pottery, turn over the armoire, and strip the sheets from the neatly made bed. He suspected me to hide in the pillowcase no doubt. The same treatment was given to my loft. The head of my teddy bear flew over the banister and rolled over to the baseboard by my feet. That teddy bear was the last thing my poppa had given me before he died. I was mad enough to spit on the floor if the space in which I stood had been of a size that I wouldn’t have simply spit on my shoe. Thunder shook the house.

I heard Matἱas say There’s no one here Nikelas. He probably has a frog lodged in his throat, I thought bitterly when I heard him croak out the words. I relaxed a bit, however, and saw Tἱa’s shoulders relax too, though her and Nikelas were still eye to eye. Cabello wasn’t anywhere in the house. He had been wise enough to escape completely. I should have known he would be.

Fine. Count on seeing us again. Nikelas gave the house one last narrowed scan from where he stood, then they were gone.

I didn’t call to Tἱa. Heaven knew I wanted to say, Hurry! or Get me out! Except that either of those would have been pointless since she was in a hurry to get me out. I worried too that my own desperate voice would invoke panic beyond what I could bear. I closed my eyes, took some deep breaths, and told myself to be calm.

She had only gotten so far as to roll up the tapestry before Cabello came from the bedroom soaked through, squishing to my rescue, a crowbar in hand. He must have been waiting outside, watching the front door for the thugs to leave. He walked to the false wall, hooked a board, and pried it off in one swift movement.

There wasn’t time to chat but Tía took that time anyway to tell him that she was impressed by how nimble he had been, climbing out of that window the way you did without leaving any sign of a step stool. She brought him up from the time he was born and was always proud of his achievements, however small. He didn’t show his gratitude but I saw a quick and crooked grin flash over his features after removing the first two planks. He undoubtedly felt guilty for putting me in there. Of course, I didn’t blame him. He saved my life. I was grateful but he wouldn’t see it that way. He always thought the worst of himself and the best of me.

I was terrified but relieved too. I felt the emotions well up from my toes and come out as tears. My friend lifted me with care out of the wall. Tἱa could have comforted me just as well but he needed me to need him so I held on to him tightly and cried into his shirt. He held me until I got a hold on myself. Even then, I rested my head on his shoulder and sniffled while I stared at the black velvet nose of Teddy and realized that my life was about to take a drastic turn… again.

Chapter 2

THE JUNGLE IS MY REFUGE

Minutes later, Tἱa gave Cabello the pre-packed suitcase of my things. He took it, alert in all he did. I was still dazed. I tried to listen but hadn’t taken much in. Time seemed unbearably slow and languid. I focused on the details of the suitcase as her words blurred together. Badly worn, its fabric cover was thinner in some places than in others. Stitches along the seams were loose or broken. An ugly faded brown, it was almost grey after three generations of harsh travel. Once-colorful passport stamps from Ireland, North America, and South America could still faintly be seen and the initials AR for Aodhan ό Raghailligh (my grandpa) were scrawled in gold in the top right-hand corner. I wondered what AR would have thought when he bought it if he had known it would someday be taken to three separate continents to end up in the hands of his Colombian granddaughter. This wasn’t the time to think of such things though. We had to go and be gone before we were missed. We didn’t know who would talk or when Edgardo would discover my permanent absence.

A ridge higher than our heads had been built around the entire village to set a boundary between us and the rest of the world. We ran to a place we knew of, where we would be well enough away from watchful eyes. The ridge was slippery with mud and rain that fell over the side in rivulets and made the wall of mud hard to see, also making roots hard to find that might be useful. Cabello handed me the suitcase, sopped in weather. We took off our shoes that threatened to be sucked from our feet by the muck. I followed his lead and tied them together by the laces.

He jumped through the thin streams and caught a root on his first try. Aside from being thick and strong, it was the only root he could reach. He drew an arch in the air along his side and over his head as he threw his shoes high over the ridge’s shelf. We didn’t see them slide back down so he went on to dig his bare feet into the wall.

Toss me the suitcase! he yelled down to me over the racket of the downpour. I couldn’t quite see his hand but threw it anyway in the direction of his voice. He caught it and threw it the same way he had thrown his shoes, and again, nothing slid back down. Okay! he said after a brief hesitation. I assumed he wasn’t sure that the next part of his plan would work due to the question in his following words. Throw your shoes over the shelf! I did my best and put all of my strength into it. The shoes didn’t go far. Instead of sailing over the top, they came down on his head and slid back to the bottom. There was a short silence of irritation. I made an apologetic face, though, he couldn’t see it. Alright! He said finally. Try again! Can you throw them to me? I did and when they came to him, he hooked a finger around the laces and put more force into my throw. The shoes flew high over the shelf in one continuous arch. He’s rather graceful that way. Now you’re going to jump to me!

I’m going to do what? No! You won’t be able to hold us both!

I will!

But your hand! He knew what I meant before I said it by the tone I held. I’d seen red in the mud when I had brief glimpses of him. He hadn’t been able to get a foothold for long before the earth slid away under his feet and the hand that gripped the root was skinned. However, a skinned hand wouldn’t account for the amount of blood that I saw running into his sleeve but we weren’t about to pause in our endeavor to discuss it.

I have to! he said more quietly but still loud enough that I caught the quiver in his voice.

I looked quickly from side to side to be sure there was no other way. I couldn’t see one. The longer I waited, the worse his hand would get and worse would be my weight on him. I wanted to cry again as I considered what I was about to do but crying wouldn’t help either. I saw a boulder to my right that seemed solidly placed, half buried. How many storms had it been through like this one? I climbed onto the rock, toes curled and my arms outstretched for balance, then jumped. The side of one foot tried to find something that it might push off of to lift me those few inches higher but it found nothing. Rather, I was pushed down by the sludge. I swiped for his jacket but missed completely. I saw myself fall away from him in slow motion and panic set in me. I caught his foot but began to lose my grip right away.

Run up the wall, fast as you can, lean back a little, and reach! He yelled down to me.

I didn’t hesitate to do what he said but leaning back into the open air and knowing that there was nothing to hold onto was unnerving, to say the least. I kept my eyes closed in a reflex of terror and reached in his direction until I thought my arm would come out of the socket. I raised my feet out of the mud to trudge through it, then leaned back just enough that the mud didn’t push its way down the front of my blouse. He reached behind him where he could use his whole arm unhindered by the wall and grab my hand.

He caught my arm in a death grip. I’d have a bruise there later. Thankfully, I was small for ten and I didn’t weigh a lot. Still, I opened my eyes in time to see him turn his head away from me and make a pitiful sound into his sleeve. A flash of a skinned hand, stretched muscles, and dislocated bones came into my dramatic mind but the images gave me a desperate need to reach the top where I could help him get up the rest of the way. I put one arm around his waist (grateful to whoever invented suspenders) and was able to reach the root as well. I dug my fingers into the ridge wall, using any rock and lump of earth under the mud scramble closer to the top.

I finally got a hand over the edge. I dug my fingers into the horizontal surface above and made myself into a human grappling hook. My feet dangled as I pulled myself up. Climbing over the shelf would have been the hardest obstacle if I hadn’t been so desperate. From the top, I could see part of another thick root raised above the ground in an arch. I hooked my feet behind it, balanced my torso over the edge, and reached for him. Take hold of my arms!

I can’t! I’ll pull you down!

I could see him thinking of how he could get back if he let go in which case he’d have to leave me alone in the jungle overnight with any number of dangerous creatures. I was determined for this not to happen. All I could say to convince him to hang on was, Trust me! At that, his face wiped all thought from it and he decided to trust me more than the plans he had so recently imagined. He switched hands on the root before he clasped my elbow. I saw a dark red gash that bled freely in the center of his palm. The muscles there must have been weakened or numbed or even severed when torn into by whatever mangled it. His grip wasn’t so tight as I knew it might have been. What in Naturaleza’s (nature’s) name happened to it?

My arm was soaked in his blood but I paid little attention. I used both hands to hold on to his arm, determined to keep him. I felt blood rush to my head with the strain of pulling him to me, though, I hadn’t made any progress. When he saw I was fixed in one spot, he grabbed my other elbow with his uninjured hand. Our arms now fastened together firmly, he was able to pull himself up, letting go of me just long enough to collapse over his stabilizing hand like a bike falling over its kickstand.

We found our things in a bush. One of a few that grew thickly around many thin trees. We untangled our laces and put our shoes on so not to step on something that might have stung or bitten us. We ran for cover under the canopy and once out of the rain, I fell in obvious anguish and clutched my knee.

What? What is it? Cabello asked, frantic. He dropped down beside me and looked from where I was clutching down to my toes for an injury, holding his hand under his arm. Lluvia! What happened to your foot? He used my real name, it must look as bad as it feels. I kicked off my shoe when I fell and the air was cold above my big toe along the bone. A thick strip of flesh was torn away and scrunched up like a paper fan where it still clung to my foot. The gash filled with blood, no longer irrigated by the rain. I could see traces of white in the crimson puddle and sucked air in through my clenched teeth, moaning on the tail of every exhale. I wasn’t surprised when tears started streaming down my cheeks without my permission.

The root that I fastened my feet behind in order to fix myself to one spot while I helped Cabello reach the top had something like a sharp thorn on it. I could feel something was there and thought it probably wouldn’t feel pleasant when pressure was applied but the root was short and I didn’t have a choice. I hadn’t wanted him to let go so I made my face as mild as I could when it tore through my muscles, occasionally resting my forehead on the ground to hide my face as I silently screamed and whimpered beneath the sound of the rain.

Is this from helping me? Why didn’t you say something or let go? Anything?

I was propped on my elbows, tears still in my eyes and brows furrowed. I couldn’t believe he was scolding me now. Then I saw that he scolded my shoulder, not my face. He wasn’t mad at me, he was mad at himself.

Would you rather I be bitten by something because I spent the night here alone with no idea how to protect myself? You’d find a dead amiga with a snake bite, oozing with puss. The pain made me snap and I wasn’t in the mood to be understanding of his feelings. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath through his nose, and consider the situation. I watched his eyelids strain then rest. He nodded once, then opened them and was calm again.

I’m sorry, he said patiently. I acted mad because I was afraid.

His insight surprised me. I knew that people aren’t often so honest with other people let alone with themselves. To show that he had no hard feelings, he gave me one of those smiles. I didn’t know what attracted me to him or what I would do if I had him or even how to have someone but I knew he could chill my flames with the twitch of an eyebrow. I needed to think about this new revelation of expressing fear through anger but most of my focus at the time was for my foot in any case, not philosophy.

Here’s the plan, Oh good, he has a plan. "Tomorrow I’ll go back to the village. They’re not looking for me. I’ll get a few things and instructions from Nora so I can mend your foot." He paused to swallow hard and stared at my wound with immense sympathy. He began to go on, shaking off that instant and pretending that he hadn’t paused.

What? I asked, cutting him off. Then I decerned his hesitation. He would need to clean and disinfect my foot thoroughly and with something strong to kill any chance of infection; he would have to use alcohol before he put the numbing cream on. The cream acted as a lighter form of disinfectant but applied occasionally after the initial sanitation to keep it clean. A wound down to the bone was going to sear a lot of nerves. Cleansing with alcohol was outrageously painful as it was. He looked back to my face where he found restrained terror. I tried to be stoic about it but I’d heard grown men cry from having their blisters washed at the field, even when high on cocaine or drunk. Pure alcohol killed germs and bravery. Thamkfully, Tἱa watered hers down a bit.

I’ll get food and a few tools we need, he went on to distract me.

I wasn’t distracted though. The forethought of what pain was to come made me tense and shake no matter how brief the experience would be. Cabello moved to sit next to me. He gathered me up and rocked me gently. He fixed my thin, red hair band with a smack instead of a snap which told me how much mud was in my hair. Then he tugged my shirt a little further up my arm to its proper place across my shoulders.

We’ll be okay, he told me. We’re covered in mud so for now the beasts won’t bother us and tomorrow… tomorrow we’ll see. We’ve been through a lot today. I think we’re allowed to stop caring for the sake of sleep.

Won’t the smell of blood attract… things?

He took off his coat. Only his silhouette could be seen now. His coat was caked with mud on the outside but not completely on the inside. He rested his bloody palm over my bloody foot and laid his coat over them. He peeled the hair from my face then combed it back. Once I was no longer afraid and let my guard down I melted into the nook of his shoulder, knowing he’d be by me all night.

Rain?

Mhm, I answered, half asleep already.

I love you.

I knew that and was happy to hear it but had to ask, Why? I was his best friend after all but something in the way he told me that time was different and made me want to know more.

He rested back on a tree and closed his eyes. Because you’re beautiful, he answered, breathless and with longing as though I wasn’t there. He might have been describing the stars. I was flattered but let down too. I sort of hoped for something more than… that. I didn’t know what else I hoped for but a space above friendship and appearances was left where something bigger should be. Not knowing exactly what I was missing but knowing that whatever it was he could give it to me and wasn’t made me irrationally angry and more awake than I had been.

So you risked your life for me because you think I’m pretty? I asked in a dangerously matter-of-fact tone.

Beautiful, he corrected, and yes. Inside and out.

His words hadn’t fully sunk in yet so I was still flustered when he opened his eyes again and gave me a soft, short kiss on the lips. The stars seemed to shine brighter. He looked down on my shocked face in awe of what it was he saw in me. So that’s what I’d do if I had him, or rather if he were mine. Little did I know, he already was.

Chapter 3

GOOD NORA VS EVIL

I woke up in the morning wondering where I was, then remembered when I felt the pain in my foot shoot out from under my ankle and up my calf. The gash was puffy, red, and the skin around it was the color and consistency of seaweed. Cabello was putting his muddy coat back on. He was very pale with a tinge of green to his face. He kept his hand under his arm. I thought it must look pretty horrible if he was so determined to hide it from me.

I discovered why we were both hurt last night, he said mildly while looking at the ground and kicking around a rock.

Why?

The trees, he said as if this explained everything.

What about them?

He looked at one not far behind him and there I looked also. The thin trees had roots half the width of the trunk and both the roots and the trunks had wide, sharp thorns on them and thick from top to bottom. When Cabello grabbed the root in the cliff wall, it was one from a tree of this kind. The same was so for the root I hooked my foot behind.

He looked back at me, seeing now that I understood what he meant by the trees. However, to prove that my question had an obvious answer had I paid more attention he pointed out that they’re covered in thorns, then blinked at me with his long, black lashes.

I gave him a hard squint. He raised his brows at me with an heir of blamelessness. After some seconds he quit kicking the rock around, slumped his shoulders, and gave up the careless façade. He walked over to me and kissed my forehead, then set off as he had planned. He jumped to the ground but not before he told me that I shouldn’t be afraid because you’re caked in mud and your stench will be well hidden from creatures. Something might mistake you for a tree or log, he admitted, in which case, just be still and they’ll pass. Then as an afterthought, he added, Unless you think they might crawl into your nose or ears. Then you might be wiser to move slowly and flick them away. Giving me a weak smile after his dashing reassurances, he jumped off the cliff and was gone. I did feel better about the beasts but not about things that could make a home in my head or that I was still indeed, caked in mud.

Thank you, I said wryly after him but he was already gone. At least he covered my foot in leaves, which he then put a thick layer of mud over top of. He couldn’t have left his jacket with me. I’m sure he needs it for something important in this heat, I thought sarcastically. The rain usually wouldn’t stop for weeks or months but the sun was out that morning and the rain wasn’t an issue. I’d been hoping it wouldn’t be. Overall, I had to admit that he had been impressive and it didn’t appear as though he meant to stop being so. I knew he wouldn’t leave me there in the wild until I was safe and content… assuming that one could truly be either of those in the wild.

*     *     *

Cabello landed on the balls of his feet and launched himself into a summersault over a shoulder. He rolled onto his feet again and ran, pausing only when he came to corners so he could peer around them cautiously. Edgardo might not have been looking for him but his padre, Cecilio, most assuredly would be. He’d be mad because he had to do real work and by himself that morning. The boy would be beaten for it later but Cabello felt the beating would be worth it, assuming that Rain got safe away.

He ducked under windows and avoided the three main roads until it was absolutely necessary to cross one. He didn’t want to be seen at market in case someone forestalled him or he was seen by his padre. When he came to the first road, on the west side of the village, he crossed it by first laying in the tall grass on one side where he waited, then rolled under a buckboard at the best opportunity and held tight to the undercarriage as it rolled downhill. When he saw another wagon going in the other direction, he estimated the correct moment he would need to let go of the wagon he was under,