Fidel woke them up one last time.
Ordered them out of their small home on the southeast edge of la ciudad.
They packed what they could, which was not hard because they had learned never to own too many things, since they would inevitably leave them behind.
They ran.
They hid in an empty building, one managed by una vieja with flowing white hair, whose name Eduardo never learned, who allowed them space as long as they needed it.
They did not need it for long.
When they came for Fidel, it was the next night, and las estrellas shone brightly through the windows. The men burst into the building, yelling Fidel’s name, and the other inhabitants hid underneath the floor.
Sofía held her son back. “Let them get him,” she said. “He deserves it.”
When he told his mamá that they couldn’t let the men take Fidel, she merely said, “I’ll let them take you, too. You’re not any better than him.”
Fidel, who had spent the day getting drunk, was barely conscious as the men beat him. When his nose broke, his blood spilling to the floor, he merely moaned. When his arm was wrenched backwards, his elbow snapping loudly, there were only tears running down his face.
And when they pummeled his head, over and over again, he simply stopped breathing.
Eduardo watched his father die. Fidel didn’t defend himself. Sofía, however, spat on the bloodied body of her husband. She cast one last look at Eduardo. “You’re old enough now,” she said. “I don’t need to raise you anymore.”
She left him behind with these strange men, and one of them lifted him from the floor as he sobbed in grief and terror, and he put his hand under Eduardo’s chin, pitched his face upward.
“His debt is now yours,” he said. “You start working it off tomorrow.”
They left him there. Eduardo considered running away, but where would he go? He had no idea where his mamá had wandered off to, and they had only been in Obregán for a week. But la vieja came out from her hiding place beneath the floor and cleaned him up. She told him he could stay as long as he needed to. She guided him to a small bed in the rear of the building, ordered him to rest, and assured him that she would take care of the rest.
He dreamed of another life that night. Of being wanted, of being needed, of being useful. Of not always running.
He awoke the next morning and could not find his father’s body. La vieja said she took care of it. She told him again that he could stay as long as he wanted. And she offered him acceptance and peace.
But that is not what you gave him, Solís. Those men returned later that morning, dragged Eduardo out from under the filthy cobijas where he hid, ignoring la vieja’s screams, and they took him away. Away from Obregán, out into the endless desert and the saguaros and the heat, and it was there that they trained him, showed him how to find water and to memorize maps and routes, taught him how to get people to follow him out into the desert, to hand over their money and their belongings, all out of their desperation to find a place that valued them, that would give them hope, that would offer them a chance at a better life.
There were many coyotes in Obregán, but the collective Eduardo was forced into cared less about the people they guided and more about making money. Most were not like this, and coyotes were a much-needed force within your world, Solís. Eduardo wished that he had found work for the other collectives, but … well, the realization came too late. Eduardo was told that if he wanted to pay off his debt within a year, he needed to be one of the best coyotes Obregán had to offer, that the other groups would never pay as much as Danilo did. So he was trained, the lessons overflowing with cruelty and suffering, and it all made Eduardo stronger, more ferocious, more willing to do what he had to in order to survive.
And then they showed him the truth.
It took them three days to reach Solado on his first trip there. His coyote, his mentor, was Danilo. He was lanky, all toned muscle and spite. They walked during the day, rested at night, and it broke him. Danilo did not make it easy for Eduardo. No one did, but this man possessed a mean streak that never seemed to end. Eduardo had never felt that kind of exhaustion, that kind of thirst before. But Danilo let him experience it all, told him that it would build him into a better coyote if he knew how much the human body could suffer. Eduardo watched other people shrivel and shrink on their journeys. He watched them turn on one another, watched them imagine bestias in the daylight, watched La Reina torment them when they tried to pass. His own pesadilla formed out of the remains of that ciudad, two beings of bones and rotting flesh, and they tried to devour him, all while blaming him for the very act itself.
And when they had made it down Las Montañas de Solís, when they had crossed that final stretch to Solado, Eduardo saw them waiting in the expanse of ash. They were impossible to miss: their cloaks were white, and they were a horrible contrast to the blackness that surrounded them. They wore masks with long, protruding snouts, and every part of their body was covered. Nothing was exposed to the world outside.
The travelers were handed over to these men.
They paid their price.
And then, one by one, they took a step forward and,
