All my doubt and fear was gone. I was on the right path.
I feasted as quickly as I could on some tough but flavorful cabra that Papá had seasoned and dried. I dumped out the goatskin bag and refilled it, then stuffed everything back into my pack. At the edge of the clearing, I gazed back once more on this paradise. The shadows sat delicately over the ground, the rocks cascaded gently downward to the west, and los árboles bent over the stream, yearning to touch it. If I went back home, I would tell Empalme that there was a source of water a half day’s walk from la aldea. They would appreciate that.
I glanced down and saw the outline of a boot print, the toe facing toward the water. It made me smile. This place had blessed someone else, too, and I sent another prayer up. Solís, please continue to allow this place to give la gente hope.
I made the sign. See the truth. Believe the truth.
I was much more careful getting out of the oasis. I stepped through the stream, soaking my feet one last time, then exited the other side, pushing past mesquites and other squat bushes I did not recognize. Once the shade faded, the heat pressed upon me, tearing the moisture from my skin, and within a quarter hour, only my breeches were still slightly wet. A spot of dryness appeared in my throat, and I thought back to that stream, and I turned to catch one last glimpse of it.
The trail behind me was flat and straight. There was no oasis behind me. Just the endless, stretching expanse of the desert.
The dirt trail, dry and wide, rose from the ground, up into the curled nooks of la montaña. I stood motionless at the edge of las bajadas, and I traced its path with my eyes. But then it tucked behind ridges and out of sight.
The summit seemed so very far away.
I couldn’t look upward. Papá taught me that, to keep my eyes a few paces ahead of myself so that I could maintain a solid footing, to spot holes and ridges so I didn’t trip, and to keep the illusion of distance at bay. I passed through las bajadas, greeted the silence and the ironwoods and the mesquites and the skyward-reaching saguaros. I was the only thing that moved, the only sound at all. My leather huaraches scraped against the dirt, my breath lightly huffed out of my mouth, and you could hear the sloshing of water in my pack.
Nothing else.
I was alone out here, and I had never felt so alive.
How did la poeta know that? How did they know me so well?
Las bajadas were short, and I passed through them swiftly. It amused me that I was climbing closer to You as You dropped in the sky.
I looked for the cacti that Marisol had told me to find. They stood on either side of the path, mirror images of each other. Each of the saguaros had the low arm facing the other, and the arm on the outside was stretched high.
Los Gemelos.
I was on the right path. I took a deep breath and passed my hand across my eyes—then stopped.
And then I started to climb
and climb
and climb.
It was a gentle ascent at first, and half an hour later, I hadn’t made as much progress up la montaña as I had wanted. My pace was steady, my pulse was not pounding in my head, and I had kept my breathing even and regular. But then the trail veered sharply to the left and I wished for the slower climb.
The trail was wider here, and it must have been so carts and horses and mules could pass one another. But I saw no one else on the horizon. I stuck to the side farthest from the edge, unnerved by just how far down I could fall if I didn’t watch where I was going.
Each step was a reminder of my choice; each step was a deliberate move away from home. I accepted it. And I paid the price, but I did not mind. My legs started to ache—a dull, constant pain—and I took a brief break to drink more water, which was still cool. I broke my own rule, too, and glanced up toward the summit. I had maybe conquered a third of the path. But I was still high enough that the tallest árboles en las bajadas were tufts below me. The trail was a direct line to the south before it snaked off in the distance.
Was that it?
Empalme?
Was it only a brown speck from up here, a tiny impossibility? Is that where I came from? I squinted and tried to focus on it, but I was too far. I could not make out any recognizable details. Would it have been easier to see at night? The desert stretched forever to the south, to the distant montañas in the west, to low hills in the east, and there was nothing. No other aldeas, no other granjas, nothing.
A panic gripped me, tightened around my heart.
I couldn’t go back now, at least not until the next morning. Empalme—if that was it in the distance—was so very far away, and I would need to make camp soon if I was going to stay safe from—
Everything.
I’d heard all the stories growing up, but they were just stories. I had never seen anything unusual at night. Conejos, lobos. Owls and lizards. Plenty of mice. But what of all the stories? What of los cuentos of two-headed bestias and creatures the size of
