Lotería

by Karla Arenas Valenti

  The woman’s eyes opened wide, overflowing with gratitude. “Gracias,” she said, and made to leave.

  “One moment,” Catrina said. She touched the edge of the marigolds she had embroidered onto her skirts. The flowers bloomed in her hand, and she gave the bouquet to the old woman. The woman’s face lit up as she slipped the coins into a small cloth bag tied around her wrist and clutched the flowers to her chest.

  As she walked away, the woman gradually transformed. Her gray, knotted hair smoothed and looped itself into a dark braid around her head. The weight of decades seemed to lift off her shoulders, and she straightened her back. Her weathered skin became silky and bright.

  But it was not youth that Catrina had given her—that was not hers to give. Catrina’s gift was of a different kind.

  “You are generous with beauty,” Life told her, and Catrina nodded.

  Although, to be precise, Catrina had not given the woman beauty, either. Rather, the woman’s heart brimmed with the joy of beauty, and it was her full heart that transformed her. The gift would last until the marigolds withered. But by then the old woman would have had a day of many happy fortunes.

  The merchant whom Life and Death had come to see began setting up his wares. He unfolded an old card table and draped a bright pink cloth over it. Carefully he laid out delicate chains of silver and gold, then shimmering pendants and elaborate charms. Even from a distance Catrina could admire the skillful designs.

  The merchant’s stand, slightly off balance and tented with a cheap plastic tarp, did not look like much. But that did not dull his reputation as a master jeweler, and his expertise was precisely why Life and Death were paying him a visit.

  The friends were well aware of the implications of the Lotería. And it was their custom to deliver a gift to the pawn they subjected to the game.

  The jeweler looked up as Life and Death approached his stand.

  “Buenas noches,” he said.

  “Good evening,” Life replied.

  Catrina studied the various pendants and charms on the table.

  “Can I help you find something in particular?” the merchant asked.

  “We’re looking for a gift,” Life explained. “A token of our deepest appreciation.”

  Catrina nodded. “The recipient has brought us together.”

  “But at a great cost to herself,” Life added.

  “I see,” the merchant said. “You need something truly special, then.” He reached into his workbag and pulled out a stone.

  It was an unassuming stone, blindingly white, smooth and polished to a gleam.

  “White marble,” the merchant said. “Black on the other side.”

  Catrina turned the pendant over. The smooth black disk caught the light from a nearby lantern, casting it onto one of the blossoms stitched on Catrina’s dress. The petals opened to receive the light.

  “How are the two sides held together?” Catrina asked.

  “They’re not. It’s a single stone,” the merchant replied.

  “Remarkable!” Catrina turned the pendant over once again. A small bale had been attached to the top of the stone through which a silver chain was threaded.

  The merchant’s eyes smiled as he went on. “This piece is not quite finished, señora.”

  “Oh?” Catrina looked up.

  “I may be skilled at making jewelry, but I am just a man. To complete this necklace requires the kind of magic that only nature can provide.”

  “I’m most intrigued,” Catrina said.

  The merchant leaned over. “Take this pendant to the big temple at Monte Albán. You must be there at the exact moment when the night meets the day. Hold the white side up to the moon and the black side to the rising sun.”

  “What will happen?”

  The man grinned. “Then the gift will be finished.”

  “How clever,” Life said.

  The man inclined his head. “The idea came to me quite unexpectedly,” he explained. “But I promise it works.”

  “It’s perfect.” Without waiting for the merchant to state a price, Life paid him the stone’s true value—a bounty that would feed the man and his family for a year.

  The merchant struggled to speak.

  “Thank you.” Catrina slipped the necklace into her purse.

  “Did you hear what he said?” Life asked as they returned to their table.

  “That the idea just came to him?”

  “Exactly. Imagination.”

  Catrina smiled. “The idea may have come to him unexpectedly, but broad though his imagination may be, it was still inspired by something. It wasn’t an arbitrary decision plucked out of thin air.”

  As she spoke, she plucked a petal off her crown and released it into the air. The petal folded into a rose-scented butterfly.

  “You see, a person can never know what they don’t know. Which is to say, there is a limit to what they can imagine—or reason, for that matter.”

  “And what they know is based on past experiences.” Life sighed. “My dear, you are making it very difficult for me to win this debate.”

  Catrina laughed.

  “But I’m not giving up just yet,” Life added.

  “I would hope not! After all, the game is not over.”

  “Not yet.” Life flipped over the top card of the deck. “SALTANDO VA BUSCANDO, PERO NO VE NADA,” he said.

  “JUMPING, IT GOES SEARCHING,” Catrina murmured as she searched for the pictograph of the deer, “BUT IT SEES NOTHING.”

  She placed her frijole back on the table while Life placed a black bean on the image of a deer. “Three in a row.” He pointed at his tabla. “It seems I’m finally making progress. At least in the game.”

  “And so it does,” Catrina replied.

  Clara tried in vain to push her way through the vines. Her hands were cut, raw and bloodied from the effort. But her determination numbed the pain. The thought of Esteban alone in this world made her relentless.

  She resisted the urge to cry, instead hurling angry words at the impassable green wall.

  “This place is absurd!” she yelled. “Grown-ups who kidnap children, and stupid birds that want unicorn horns, and nobody willing to help unless they get something in return, and—”

  A sudden rustling of leaves momentarily startled her into silence.

  “Who’s there?” She turned around. Her labored breath crowded out any other sounds, but still Clara sensed a shift in the air. She could feel it, if not see it—something was near.

  Slowly Clara lowered herself to the ground, keeping her eyes trained straight ahead. She groped around for something she could use to defend herself. Her hand clasped a jagged rock, and she clutched it tightly. She kept her head low and her body still.

  For a while, nothing happened. Perhaps it had been her imagination. But then a flash of white behind a mass of leaves caught her attention. She spotted a limb, an ear, a jet-black eye gazing at her unblinkingly.

  Clara sucked in her breath. Whatever the creature was, it had her directly in its sight.

  Breathe.

  And yet it hadn’t attacked. The creature had probably been staring at Clara the whole time she’d been searching for it, and it hadn’t made a move.

  It’s afraid.

  Clara rose from her crouch. The leaves rustled, and she saw the creature shift behind them.

  “It’s all right,” she whispered. “I won’t hurt you.”

  To prove her point, she dropped the rock. Startled, the creature shifted once more. But still it did not attack.

  “It went this way!” A voice preceded a group of people who raced out from the jungle to her right.

  The men wore pelts made of white fur and had leather belts around their waists. Daggers hung from their belts. They each carried a bow and a quive
r of arrows. Leather bands encircled their heads, with colorful feathers festooning down over their stark white hair. The oldest in the group had the most feathers; the youngest—a boy no older than Esteban—had one.

  “Oh, thank goodness,” Clara cried. “Finally, someone who can help!”

  The group froze. Each set of eyes turned toward her.

  “Who are you?” the elder called. “What are you doing here?”

  Clara walked toward them, but the elder put up one hand, and with the other he gripped his knife. “Stay there,” he said.

  Clara stopped. “I just need your help. It’s my cousin. He was taken by a bad man, and they’re on the other side of that hedge.”

  She pointed at the wall of vines behind her. “Please, I think he’s in danger.”

  The elder frowned.

  “Can you cut through some of these vines?” Clara asked, her words spilling out in a frenzied plea. “I only need a space big enough for me to get through.”

  “What can you give us?” the elder barked.

  Clara jumped at the harshness in his voice. The hunters closed ranks, gathering closer; a few placed their hands on their daggers. Clara took a step back.

  “I—I—” she stammered. “I have nothing to give. I’m not from here, and I didn’t know—”

  “We have no use for you,” the elder growled, and turned his back on her. The group began to move on.

  “Wait!” Clara called after them. A wave of heat rose from her neck and spread across her face. “Maybe I can…draw you something.”

  A pause of less than a second was followed by laughter.

  “What do you think we would do with a child’s drawing?” one of the hunters said. His eyes danced with ridicule.

  “Absurd!” another hunter scoffed. “Let’s get out of here,” he added.

  “Papa,” the youngest hunter spoke up. “She might know where the fawn went.”

  A fawn!

  All at once the laughter ceased, and the hunters turned back to her.

  “Do you?” The elder’s voice was as sharp and cutting as his gaze.

  Clara blinked at his intensity but forced herself to keep her eyes steady on him, to avoid giving away the fawn’s location with an inadvertent glance.

  His expression narrowed as he studied her. “If you tell us where the creature went, we’ll help you.”

  Except that she’d pay with the fawn’s life.

  We must honor all living creatures. It is not our right to restrict anyone’s freedom.

  It felt so long ago that Chita had spoken those words to Esteban. At the time, they had seemed small and unimportant when they only related to a tiny spider. But they now took on a deeper meaning.

  Whether she liked it or not, the fawn’s life was not hers to give.

  “Is there something else I can give you?” Clara asked. “Anything?”

  “Enough of this, Father,” a hunter said. “Let’s go.”

  The elder gave a whistle, and as suddenly as the hunters had arrived, they were gone.

  Clara didn’t bother calling them back. She knew they wouldn’t return. As she watched the group vanish through the trees, she felt doubly trapped: first by her insecurity with the bird, and now by her convictions.

  “Thank you for not telling them where I was.”

  Startled, Clara turned. The baby deer had left its hiding place and now stood behind her. It was completely white, a bright beacon against the greens and reds and yellows surrounding them. Its large black eyes gazed at her openly. The fawn nuzzled against her hand. Clara could feel its heart racing when she stroked its alabaster fur.

  “You’re an easy target with fur so white,” she said.

  “I know,” the fawn replied. Then it added, “I heard what you said about your cousin. The Kingdom of Las Pozas is a place you want to avoid.”

  “Why is that?” Clara asked.

  The fawn bowed its head. “It’s the home of El Diablo. He collects children.”

  Clara’s hand froze in midair.

  “What do you mean he ‘collects children’? Why?”

  “I don’t know,” the fawn said. “But he steals into your world, opening passageways wherever he sees heartbreak.”

  Clara’s throat tightened as questions piled up, one on top of another.

  The fawn went on. “The children he collects…They never return.”

  “What?” Clara turned back to the impassable wall of vines.

  “There is a way in,” the fawn said. “But it’s dangerous.”

  Clara didn’t even let the words sink in before she pleaded with the fawn. “You must show me!”

  “First, we need to figure out what to trade,” the fawn said.

  “Trade? But I saved your life! Isn’t that good enough?”

  “I didn’t ask for your help,” the fawn replied. “It was given freely.”

  “But they would have killed you!” Clara cried.

  The fawn nodded; a shiver rippled across its bright white fur. “And you would have contributed to my death. All acts have consequences.”

  Chita’s words echoed in Clara’s memory: We always pay a price.

  “Well, shouldn’t good deeds be rewarded, then?”

  “Good deeds have great value,” the fawn agreed. “And yours was no exception. Do you know the wall is enchanted?”

  Clara looked at the vines that had impeded her passage. Of course! That explained why she had struggled so much.

  “Even if you had traded my life with those hunters, they wouldn’t have been able to cut through the vines. I would have perished and you would have gained nothing. As it is, I happen to know a way in that the hunters do not. So it’s a good thing I’m alive.”

  Clara studied the fawn. It was impossible to know whether it was telling the truth.

  “Your good deed is what will help you find a way into Las Pozas,” the fawn continued. “If we can find something to trade.”

  Clara shook her head. “You heard me tell the hunters I don’t have anything to trade.”

  “Actually, you do have something that could be quite useful to me.”

  “Anything!” Clara cried. “What can I give you?”

  “Your help,” the fawn replied.

  “How?” Clara asked.

  “As you said, I am an easy target, and it is almost impossible for me to hide once the hunters have me in their sights. I was lucky this time because you distracted them. However, I may not be so lucky the next time.”

  “But—but how can I help?”

  “Give me your hair,” the fawn replied.

  “My hair?”

  “The color of your hair.”

  Clara looked down at her long dark braids.

  “I have no use for anything else,” the fawn said. “I’m sorry.”

  Somewhere in the distance a bell began to toll.

  “What is that?” Clara asked.

  “It happens every day at this hour,” the fawn explained. “It comes from Las Pozas. Five bells means the Mercado Rojo is open.”

  The bell tolled a second time.

  “The Mercado Rojo?”

  “The Red Market is a secret market, for people who want to trade goods and services that are not part of your world.”

  A third bell rang.

  “I don’t understand,” Clara said. “What kind of goods and services?”

  “Charms and curses, fortune-telling and fortune-making, the sale of long-dead creatures…and children.”

  Clara’s heart sped up as the fourth bell tolled.

  “El Diablo trades children?” she asked. “To whom? Why?”

  “There are many uses for children in our world—some more frightening than others.”

  “Like wh—”

  The
bell rang a fifth time, and it was followed by a terrific explosion, which Clara felt as a wave of pressure that crashed over her.

  “Esteban!” she cried. Then she turned to the fawn.

  This time she didn’t hesitate.

  “Fine,” she said. “Take it. Just get me to the other side!”

  The fawn nodded and began licking Clara’s arm. A blush of color tinged its fur: faint and pale at first, then warming to a milky brown. As the fawn’s pelt took on a darker hue, Clara’s hair began to fade, first to a dusty brown, then a washed-out tan, and finally a stark and chalky white.

  When it was all done, the fawn dipped its head. Clara gazed at the full spectrum of browns—chestnut, chocolate, coffee, cinnamon—swimming in its fur.

  “Thank you,” the fawn said.

  Clara’s braids fell limply over her shoulders. It was a small thing, she knew, but the loss made her feel cold, stripped of herself.

  “And now you must move quickly,” the fawn said.

  Clara nodded. There was no time to indulge her sorrow. “Okay. Show me the way.”

  The fawn led Clara to the right, following the wall of vines.

  “I’ve been this way already,” she said. “There’s no entrance.”

  “There is,” the fawn said, “if you know where to look.” They continued walking, eventually stopping at a segment of the vines that looked no different from any other. With its snout, the fawn indicated an almost imperceptible opening on the ground beneath the hedge.

  “It’s a tunnel,” the fawn said. “It’ll take you to the castle garden. The animals use it to forage for food.”

  “That’s perfect,” Clara replied. “Thank you!”

  “A word of warning, though. The tunnel runs deep below the wall of the vines, but the vines still have a way of knowing when someone is traveling through it.”

  “How?”

  “They sense fear.” The fawn paused. “If you are not careful to keep your fear in check, they will find you.”

  The fawn didn’t say what would happen if the vines found Clara. It simply added, “Good luck!” Then it sprinted off, leaving Clara alone, staring into the mouth of the tunnel.

  They sense fear.