And Eduardo … well, he needed the money.
So he took the children, left them at the wall, and two became six, became ten, became twenty, became …
He didn’t truly give it too much thought. He would fix this, he told himself.
After he paid his debt.
They first came to him months ago, before Carlito disappeared, before Eduardo began to question what he was told. It was within a dream first: a large black gato, bigger than anything Eduardo had ever seen. He was somehow back in his home in Obregán; his parents were nowhere in sight, but he sensed they were just outside the door, whispering about him.
Eduardo, the guardian said. We have come to you for help.
He asked them to take him far away from this place, far from parents who did not seem to care about him.
Focus, joven. You have been taking people to Solado. We need you to stop.
He refused. He was so close. So close to being free.
They are taking us. They are stealing guardians and corrupting them.
He didn’t care. He had never seen a guardian before; they had never spoken to him.
The guardian stepped closer, and he could smell the blood on their breath.
You are sending them all to their death, Eduardo.
He tried to turn away, but could not. His body was stone. “That can’t be true,” said Eduardo. “They go to work there, to find a better life.”
Solado is not what you think it is, the guardian warned. Their bodies, their minds, their spirits … they all go there to die.
And then the guardian lifted their paw.
Placed it delicately on his chest.
And he suddenly knew.
He knew everything.
He saw the people he had delivered to Solado; saw how los sabuesos were used to torment them, to hold their lives in a delicate balance; watched los pálidos reap the benefits from the hard work of a people who were frightened, terrified, who did not realize what price they paid when they journeyed to paradise.
Los pálidos stole what was not theirs, the guardian explained. They could not survive in the world that Solís left behind, so they deceived. They manipulated. They demanded. And now, they thrive from the exploitation of others.
And they want more and more and more and more.
Guilt spread in Eduardo, like rainwater rushing over the dry creek beds. “But they chose to go,” he said, and even as the words left his mouth, he did not believe them.
You do not tell them the truth.
But did Eduardo even know the truth? This was un sueño, nothing more. What was really on the other side? Did anyone actually know?
And yet, you keep taking them there, lying to them and to yourself. If you do not stop, we will be unable to protect the children of La Reina Nueva.
“How is that possible?” Eduardo cried.
They have stolen Solado. They have corrupted what is sacred. And soon, los pálidos will unleash it upon the world. You have to stop them.
“But how?”
The guardian lunged.
And Eduardo awoke, awash in sweat, his mind and body racing with terror.
He did not do as he was asked. He discounted it all as nothing but a manifestation of his fears and his anxieties, and he set out from Obregán that day with a new group. Six people, four of them without children, and the fifth was a mother with a seventeen-year-old son, old enough to work. They made the difficult crossing to Solado in two and a half days without incident. At la frontera de Solado, they each paid their fee.
They held out their arm.
A vial flashed in the sunlight.
The masked men took their blood.
And then they took a step forward and disappeared into their new home.
The mother and son were all that was left. The boy offered up his arm for payment, and upon taking his blood, the man in the white cloak began to shake his head. “No, no, no,” he muttered, and he rounded on Eduardo, grabbed him by the camisa with a gloved hand. “I told you, they have to be older. He is too young.”
“He’s seventeen!” Eduardo shouted, trying to free himself. He’d never been this close to one of the men who ran Solado, and now, he could see this person’s eyes: bright green, surrounded by impossibly pale skin. Was this man sick? Cursed?
Something worse?
“No, he’s not!” the man sputtered. “Too young.”
He threw Eduardo to the ground, then shoved the boy aside. He grabbed the mother’s arm, withdrew her blood, and tried to yank her forward.
She realized what was happening immediately.
“No, no, he comes with me!” she screamed, and suddenly, her son had her other arm.
“He is still a child! He is not old enough to work here!”
Eduardo stared at her in alarm. “Did you lie to me?” he cried out.
“He has to come with me,” she begged, tugging her son closer. “He’s fourteen. But he is a good worker and—”
The second masked man ripped the two of them apart.
The son screeched loudly.
And plowed into the man who had separated them.
He began to pummel him with his balled fists, and the man struggled to get the boy off him, and Eduardo stood there, unsure what to do and—
The boy ripped off the mask.
Eduardo heard the gasping first, but then couldn’t believe what he watched unfold.
The man’s skin was pale, paler than any human he’d ever seen, but only for a moment, as it began to turn red, a deep, terrible color, and the stranger clawed at his face, and the boy rolled off him, horrified.
The man tried to find his mask.
He tried to put it on.
His skin blistered over his cheeks, and the most awful shriek erupted from his pink lips as the skin split and bled and then he
