Page 108 of Blood from the Marrow
“I keep wondering if the universe is ironic or just cruel,” Marisol said without looking away from the window. “That I got to keep you at the cost of my mother. At the chance to get to know her outside of all of this. To ask her questions and be angry at her and tell her…” She sniffled. “That I forgive her.”
Elena resisted the urge to run toward her and embrace her. It felt wrong that she would comfort Marisol when it was her fault that her mother was dead.
“Were you going to spare her?” Marisol asked when she finally turned toward Elena. “Sayah, I mean. Were you going to spare her life?”
“I don’t know,” she confessed. “The fighting had been… not what I prepared for… and I… More death just seemed incomprehensible. But I don’t know what I would have done, Marisol. All I wanted was a moment to make a cool-headedchoice.” Elena steeled herself for what she needed to say. “I don’t know how the binding complicates things, but if you can’t stand to be with me?—”
“What?” Marisol swept toward her. “Why would you say that?”
“Because it’smy fault, Marisol.” The truth of it was an axe blade lodged in the middle of her chest. Her throat burned with how much she wished it weren’t true. “This is my fault,” she repeated when Marisol took her hands in hers. “If I hadn’t been so blind to Narine and Sayah… If I hadn’t been so arrogant.” She shook her head. “If Sayah hadn’t come for me, your mother would still be alive. You could have a chance?—”
“Or I never would have known her at all,” she shot back as Zuri walked into the room wearing pajamas and drying her hair.
“You don’t know that, but what you do know is that now you’ll never have a chance?—”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.” Zuri interrupted Elena and tossed the towel into the bathroom behind her. “I knew this shit was coming but I was hoping for at least twenty-four hours of rest first.”
Elena and Marisol turned to Zuri. She was already striding toward them like an irate mother that had been calling her children in for dinner to no avail.
Zuri glared at Elena, hands on her hips. “You want to take an insane amount of responsibility for several things that were not within your control what-so-fucking-over, great. Have a fucking party. But you’re not going to take Clara’s choice and turn it into your own personal tragedy. You’re not the only fucking person in the world who gets to decide what the hell they want for themselves. She was a grown woman who made a powerful, impossible decision. That was her prerogative, Elena. Not your failure.”
When Zuri turned to Marisol her expression softened but her tone kept its edge. “Your mother saw you. She saw this incredible, fierce, loving woman who had built a life and a family. She saw what you have with us. And she decided that protectingthat, andyou, was a legacy worth dying for.” Zuri’s eyes watered but she barreled forward. “What I saw in Clara’s memories, Bambi, I can never forget.” She took Marisol’s hand and interlaced their fingers. “I will walk you into my memory of how deeply I felt your mother’s love for you any time you want. I’ll take you there every day, if you want. I’m not a mind-reader, baby, but I am so sure that she did exactly what she wanted to do. And that she’d make the same choice again and again. All she ever wanted to do was protect you.” Zuri’s crying made her voice tremble and Elena’s knees weak. “And she did.”
Elena was crying when Zuri looked at her again. “You want to honor her sacrifice? You don’t do it by drowning in what-ifs. You do it by living the life she gave back to you. You protect her people and give them a chance at standing still.” She looked at Marisol again. “And you let us love the absolute hell out of you.”
Reality, unfair and raw, pushed Marisol over the edge. A choked sob escaped her lips and then she was collapsing forward, burying her face in Zuri’s shoulder, her body shaking with the force of her tears.
It was hours before they were back in bed together. Until Marisol’s weeping subsided.
Zuri had insisted on lying in the middle even though she was the one who complained about too much body heat the most. Elena was sure that after everything they’d been through, the heat of life, the weight of their bodies, was welcomed. At least Elena would never tire of holding them this close. Of spending the rest of her life loving them and honoring Clara’s sacrifice.
“We will get through this,” Elena promised with her head on Zuri’s chest.
“Together,” Marisol muttered like she might have been drifting to sleep with her head on Zuri’s shoulder after crying herself out.
Zuri’s arms were already wrapped around both of them, but she tried to pull them in ever closer. “To the very fucking end.”
Epilogue
One Year Later…
Rogue vampire nests only popped up in the first months of Bernice’s reign. There had been no appetite for rebellion, and it had gained little traction before Bernice acted quickly and decisively. Elena had never doubted that she was the only choice for the job, but being right was still so satisfying. All Elena had to do was wear something fancy and show up when Bernice needed her support on something. It wasn’t a daunting task, but after living in her oasis paradise, it was getting to be more of a chore than revelry. Tonight, she hadn’t bothered to change out of her suit before she’d gotten on the plane to take her home from New Orleans.
Home. Just the thought filled Elena with unbearable anticipation.
Buying the twenty acres on either side of Zuri’s farm had been easy when Elena’s offer had been insanely generous and all cash. Zuri called their new homestead the Island of Misfit Toys, but she couldn’t hide how she’d flourished as the head of a much larger coven. The enormous tree that guarded their relic remained near their home, but Zuri had built a huge coven house in a new space surrounded by gardens and two greenhouses.
Zuri hadn’t been sure whether non-Brujas could even join their coven. But when they’d done their rituals, the tattoos had blazed on the St. Augustine witches’ forearms just as they had on Zuri’s. Veil witches had joined them too, and before long, half her old coven was at the door. Instead of poaching them, Zuri had offered them all a place with her. All had accepted. Even the triumvirate.
The dozen cottages they built on the witches’ side of the property for anyone who wanted to stay close together were dwarfed by the commune the Aglion had built on the other side. Preferring to stay close together, they’d built a series of modest quadruplex buildings a foot apart from each other. Even though they didn’t have to, many families chose to share the small spaces.
Elena guessed that it might take a while for them to grow accustomed to living somewhat normally again. They’d built other buildings too. Places for communal cooking and eating and recreation. They’d built a pool, a park, a library, a movie house, and a schoolhouse with computers. Marisol spent most of her days teaching the younglings, and her nights poring over Sabina’s books, hand copied by Hel, looking for new ways to unlock the Aglion’s full potential.
There was no shortage of witches and vampires mingling with the Aglion. Even Elena showed up on Friday classic movie night. The beating heart of the Aglion community was a small grove of fig trees.Treeswas generous. The largest at the very center of the grove was the one Clara had given Marisol on their wedding day. At least once a week, Elena visited the glorified sapling and thanked Clara for what she’d done. She talked to the tree the way she wished she’d had time to speak with the woman herself. Her favorite news to recount was about the Aglion.
How they were the ones doing the hunting now. Not for their enemies, but for other Aglion. They searched for others in thesame desperate way they’d lived on the run. Hel, Librada, and Sofia never missed a chance to go with Judith and Dutch and the other tracker team when they got a tip. They pretended it was for want of any cartel work to do, but Elena knew it was to protect them.
Marisol rested easier when the Aglion weren’t on their own, and she breathed a shattering sigh of relief every time they returned with another stray lamb in tow. They’d grown their numbers to over a hundred this way, and as word of the sanctuary spread, some Aglion turned up on their own. There hadn’t been any more attacks, but Elena would never drop her guard. Not again. Now, her family held all of her attention. Keeping them safe was the only thing she wanted to do with her life.
