7

Teresa and the horse stayed awake, waiting, anticipating, while nothing happened, nothing at all. She fed the fire until it blazed high, yellow and orange flickering against the starry night. By the time the flames had died down again, her eyes were drooping. At last, they both slept, woke to the broad light of day, ate some food, and walked on. Teresa did not try to ride the horse, who was still weak and suspicious of her. Also she was a little scared. She had never ridden an animal before and wondered if she would fall off, the first time and every time.

They crossed a second stream, where yellow flowers bloomed along the bank. Big slow fish glided in a pool sheltered by the green leaves of cottonwoods, and Teresa thought of stopping to make a net of yucca rope—catching the trout, building another fire, roasting and eating the flaky white meat. Her appetite was returning, her fever completely gone, only sprinkles of rash on her thighs and stomach. Fish sounded good. A stew of rabbit meat and squash and beans sounded good. Wild duck sounded good.

The horse had already begun to graze. Teresa gave the gelding a few moments while she squatted by the water, one hand on her cheek, thinking of nets and traps. When she was small, she had seen the Indians of many different tribes make such things. It would take time and effort to learn to make them herself. But that’s what she would do, she decided. She would make a net.

I’d like some grain, the horse said mournfully.

Of course, Teresa said. But I think we should avoid the villages for now.

She didn’t say why. The horse already knew.

Someone might desire me, the gelding agreed, and not all masters are good ones. Most are not. I have seen great cruelty among those who follow their captains to war and conquest. I have seen men beat their mounts until the blood ran. I have seen men take their weapons and hack each other to death for the metal they carry in their pockets or the chance to become more powerful and wear clothes of a different color.

What else have you seen? Teresa asked, interested. She flicked a pebble into the water, watching to see if a fish would rise.

Horse raised his head instead of answering. Teresa’s skin prickled, too. They were still being followed. Something watched them from the bushes by that line of trees, something clever and patient. It would be gone by the time she ran to beat through the thorny branches. Even now, it was creeping away.

What could they do but walk on?

It’s a wolf, Teresa guessed.

No, Horse said. I don’t smell wolf.

Later in the day, to pass the time, he told her about his life in Spain—how he had been born in a stable in the city of Granada. His mother also had been a mercenary’s horse, and from the start, her colt was meant to be the same. His master had trained him with gentle firmness, and while they were both young, they had gone to fight in a place where the people spoke strangely and smelled bad.

The Italian wars, Teresa thought. Like the Italians with their feuds and labyrinthine strategies . . .

When they returned to Granada, the horse and his master had a few glorious months of resting and eating before all the money was spent on grain and apples, gambling and women. Then there was nothing to do but sign up for another war or expedition. This time, his master chose a ship bound for the New World.

The stories were familiar to Teresa, although told from a different view. The horse remembered stables, not churches, and silver bridles, not inlaid writing desks. He didn’t groan about fruit tarts and meat pastries but oats sweetened with honey and apricots from a tree in his master’s garden. Still, it was the same Spain that Teresa had heard so much about as a child: the fine clothes and dramatic processions in the cobbled streets, the smell of incense and baking bread, the burning of heretics and unbelievers.

After the horse and his master had crossed the ocean—and that was a miserable voyage, the horse said—they had to pass through Mexico City, the former capital of the proud and ferocious Aztecs. The horse’s master had chattered with excitement. Clearly this town had once rivaled the great cities of Spain, as grand as Granada or Seville, and both horse and master marveled at the winding streets and buildings rising into the sky. Of course, many temples and public houses had been destroyed when the famously lucky Hernán Cortés and his five hundred men had conquered the Aztecs with the help of many thousands of Indian allies, the help of sarampión and viruela. But new churches and mansions were being built every day using the labor of slaves. As the horse had neared the center of town, the marketplace could be heard a league off, a roar of people shouting and selling meat, vegetables, herbs, dyes, cloth, silver, gold, parrots, and the prized blue and green quetzal feather.

The horse knew some good gossip, too, for the New World was a small world for Spanish hidalgos, and everyone talked about each other’s affairs. He had heard, for example, what had happened to the Moor, the man Teresa’s father had called Esteban, who had been sold to the Governor to lead an expedition north. The expedition’s task was to discover the Seven Cities of Gold. As always, the Moor was the one who went on ahead, talking to the tribes and shaking his painted gourds. The story went that his claims became more and more extravagant until finally, in one village, he told the Indians that he was a god as well as a healer. Properly impressed, his hosts tested his divinity by cutting him up and eating the pieces. The Moor died bloodily, and the rest of the expedition scurried home with their tails between their legs. Even so, Horse said, the Governor still believed that the north was full of villages with streets paved of gold. Even so, the Spanish dreamed of extraordinary wealth, riches beyond imagination.

Teresa listened but felt nothing. Her hard heart protected her. Casually, she found herself asking: have you heard of a man called Andrés Dorantes?

Naturally, of course, Horse said. Dorantes and his famous companion Cabeza de Vaca had been lost in the most heathen wilds of the New World for eight years and then rescued by the Governor himself. Later the men had taken separate ships home to Spain, and Dorantes’s vessel had proved unseaworthy. Limping back to Vera Cruz, he had been sent off by the Viceroy of Mexico City to subdue the Indians in the province of Jalisco. There he married a rich Spanish widow with whom he had three sons.

And Alonso del Castillo? Teresa wondered idly.

Another companion of the famous and celebrated Cabeza de Vaca, Castillo also did not go to Spain but only accompanied his friends to Vera Cruz in order to see them finally gone. He, too, had married a rich Spanish widow and was given half the Indian rents in a small southern town. No one heard much news from him, for he led a dour and solitary life. People said he was very religious.

And Cabeza de Vaca? Teresa finally murmured. What news of her father?

Like everyone who was anyone, the horse’s master had discussed the conquistador who had written a famous book as a report to the King of Spain. Her father was a refined and ambitious gentleman with an influential wife. On her husband’s return from his adventures in the most heathen wild, this influential wife had convinced the King to name Cabeza de Vaca as Governor of the Río de la Plata from Peru to the Straits of Magellan. With that title, he had sailed again from Spain to the New World. At the capital of his province, he pacified the Indians, forbade their slavery, defended their rights, and angered the Spanish colonists. Rumors now hinted that these colonists, as well as his own men, were rebelling against him. The horse snorted at the thought. His master had taught him better than that.

But Teresa was only mildly interested. Her hard heart whispered: so her father had returned to the New World. And the sarampión? she asked. How far does the epidemic spread?

The horse did not know since this was more recent news, after his master had gone sorrowfully mad with grief. I can tell you about other epidemics, the animal offered. I have seen smallpox sweep through Mexico City, killing thousands and burning and disfiguring everyone it touched. Only the Spanish escaped, especially those already pocked.

Go on, Teresa agreed, happy to keep him talking as they walked along the trail.

They skirted two villages that day, and she felt more strongly that this was the right thing to do. She remembered the Moor although she did not grieve for him, and she felt disgust at the way they had once traveled, entering and leaving village after village with the large crowds streaming behind. So many people. So much noise, clapping and shouting. Her father had made speeches. He had made the sign of the Cross and the man or woman jumped up healed. She remembered how the Opata children would run toward the healers in anticipation. She remembered the sound the people had made when the Spanish slavers took their baskets of food and ringed them with horses. This was not the kind of journey she would ever make again.

Soon she would make a net, Teresa thought. She would learn again to gather berries and the roots of plants, how to trap small animals and hunt bigger game. For now, there were also the abandoned fields of maize, squash, and beans. There were orchards of hard green fruit—not yet good to eat. But soon.

At one of these orchards, they stopped so that the horse could graze. Let’s stay the night, he said lazily.

We have hours of daylight, Teresa protested.

But I like this grass, Horse insisted.

He nudged her shoulder as if begging, and Teresa was pleased. Already, the horse needed her approval. Very well, she replied. Privately, she thought: tomorrow I will ride you. Tomorrow we will travel far to the north.

While the horse rested, Teresa experimented with getting fresh meat for her own meal. She waited in a good spot until a young rabbit emerged from its burrow, and then she dropped it with a stone. Surprised at this easy success, and while the animal was still stunned, she slit its throat using a knife she had found in the last village. Triumphant, she did this again when a second young rabbit hopped from the burrow although she knew she could not eat two for supper.

She hung the second one from a tree near their campfire.

The attack came when they were both asleep. This was not supposed to happen, for they had agreed they would take turns on guard, something the horse had learned from his master and the master’s captain. To Teresa’s chagrin, she was the one who drifted off, closing her eyes just when dawn was close and the pull of dreams strongest.

The horse squealed, high-pitched, and Teresa woke, jumped up, and grabbed a stick from the fire they had kept alive all night. A blur of movement nearby! A low deep growl! And the horse lifting his front legs in defense, striking out with his hooves.

The blur of movement moved away from the horse, closer to Teresa. Instinctively, she waved her stick, which flared newly orange. In the light, she saw the rabbit dangling. She saw the shine of green and yellow eyes, the jaguar’s yellow-white fur also gleaming in the glow of the fire stick, which illumined a pattern of black spots. Teresa had seen the skin of a jaguar in the Governor’s hallway—and earlier, too, in the wise woman’s house—and she knew how the animal would look in the day: a beautiful gold fur covered with rings and circles of black. She stared entranced at the large rounded head, the small ears and powerful jaw.

The jaguar dropped the rabbit and grunted. Hunh! Hunh!

His back legs tensed. He would not attack the horse, who pawed at the air with hooves that could break ribs and crush a spine. But he was ready to spring at Teresa, launching himself against her chest and biting her neck.

He grunted again. Hunh! Hunh!

No, Teresa cried. Stop!

The jaguar froze.

Don’t hurt me, Teresa babbled. You can have the rabbit. Leave us alone.

No words, no image came from the animal. But Teresa could feel its shock. The green-yellow eyes blazed and seemed to get bigger, bigger, brighter, and then dimmer.

Dimmer. And then they were gone. The jaguar was gone.

Teresa waved her stick, which flared anew.

A small boy lay on the ground.