We Set the Dark on Fire Read online

  “So, señor,” Dani began, the sight of the newspaper spurring her into action. “I’d love to dig right in and understand what you do. Your work, the causes you champion, your interests politically. No detail is too small.” She smiled, trying to seem interested rather than scolding. But she hadn’t come here to make sure his sangria was the right temperature, and she wanted him to know it.

  At first, Mateo seemed amused, but when she didn’t break eye contact the shadow was back, the lines in his face deepening. “Why don’t you make sure you can handle the correspondence and the staff schedules first,” he said, his voice cold again. He’d dropped the script, and Dani’s heart sank. This was the true Mateo after all. “I don’t want someone representing me socially who can’t accomplish a list of simple tasks. I’m sure you understand.”

  Dani felt the flash of heat in her cheeks that would become a flush if she let it. She had been trained at an institute for elite wives; how could he possibly think so little of her skills?

  His eyebrows were still raised, like he was waiting for her response.

  “I thought I’d finished the last of my tests in school,” she said, her voice even and mild. “But of course, your wish is my command.”

  “I’ll thank you to watch your tone,” he said, his own face flushing now though his tone had gone colder still. “No one likes a mouthy woman.”

  Dani was stunned into silence. He was a high-society husband. A representative of his community, his government, and his family. And here he was insulting her during their first real meeting as husband and wife.

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me,” he said, standing and pushing back his chair. “I’ve lost my appetite. See you at dinner, Primera.”

  Dani stood as well, reflexively, but he didn’t offer her a hand to shake, and when he’d left the room she realized: he’d called her Primera. Apparently, her mouth had cost her her name.

  Back in her office, she found comfort in the stack of applications Roberta had delivered while she was at breakfast. Gardeners, cooks, servers, maids. A house this size required a large staff, and if Mateo wouldn’t allow her to be his partner or his equal, here was something she knew she could do well. Hopefully something that would keep her clear of him and Carmen for as much time as possible.

  By sundown, she’d paused only to pick at lunch, and she had a full list of interviews scheduled that would carry her through at least three days. She placed the requests in her outgoing correspondence box and went to bed without dinner, daring Mateo to reprimand her.

  As she’d hoped, the interviews kept her busy for the better part of the week. Housekeepers on day one, gardeners on day two, cooks on day three. She conducted them in various rooms of the house, both to familiarize herself with the layout and to make herself more difficult for Carmen and Mateo to find. At breakfasts and dinners, he was courteous but cold, and Dani found herself almost relieved that he’d dropped the act from the first morning.

  At least when he acted like himself she knew what she was up against.

  Next week there would be parties, dinners, fund-raisers, the beginning of her life as a high-society Primera. Next week there would be opportunities to show him what he was missing by relegating her to the sidelines.

  By the end of the week, the house was fully staffed, the schedules written up for the month, and the correspondence basket was empty. Dani tried to find some joy in her menial tasks, tried not to think of her schoolgirl fantasies of touring the government offices and impressing the politicos with her knowledge and intellect.

  Above all, she tried not to chafe under the weight of her new upper-class mantle, to forget Sota’s note, smudged with the dirt and dust of her homeland, and to let the weight of gold pens and silver forks against her fingers and silk pillowcases against her cheek at night be only what they were, and nothing more.

  Everything would have been peaceful but for Carmen, who seemed to have changed her strategy. She no longer lashed out with petty insults when she passed Dani in the house’s halls, which at first had been welcome. But then Dani had realized: Carmen had replaced mocking and scorn with appraisal. Eyes that picked Dani apart and reassembled her, searching for all the shadows lurking between her bones.

  She was subtle about it. Almost frighteningly so. Even Dani took a few days to notice. Segundas weren’t trained in the art of reading a situation, only in anticipating emotional responses, so this skill of Carmen’s was both unexpected and unsettling. Dani felt as if she were being constantly evaluated, but had no idea why, or what for.

  The logical reason was that Carmen was looking for a gap in Dani’s armor. At school, it had been enough to insult her low upbringing and her poverty. The other girls had been all too eager to join in. But here, her upbringing hardly mattered. She was a Garcia now, no matter who she had been before.

  If Carmen hated her enough, she’d need some new material, and if she was determined enough, there was no telling what she’d find. With Mateo already underestimating her, Dani couldn’t run the risk of Carmen undermining her. It looked like she was going to have to do some appraising of her own.

  At first, she took to avoiding Carmen during the day, seeing her only at dinner, when Mateo’s presence forced her to orbit around him instead. Dani figured she’d bide her time, let Carmen think she had the upper hand. Figure out what to do with a rival she trusted even less than her condescending husband with his cold, still eyes.

  When Dani had been in the house a full week, Señora Garcia appeared at breakfast, changing places with the departing Mateo. Dani was almost glad of the distraction. At least she wouldn’t be forced to endure Carmen’s strange vigilance with Mateo’s mother at her side.

  “How are you holding up?” she asked when they were alone, her face unsmiling but not unkind.

  “Just fine, señora,” said Dani, her expression neutral, her dutiful daughter-in-law manners on full display. “The house is beautiful, Mateo is more than generous, and I feel well-prepared for my duties here.”

  The older woman nodded approvingly, stirring her café with a tiny silver spoon. Her skin was a deep brown, slightly darker than Dani’s own, her hair close-cropped and curly. It was the only thing the señora had in common with her mama, that hair, not that Dani ever could have said as much. It was far too nostalgic a sentiment for a Primera.

  Something of it must have shown on her face, however, because when she looked back up, Señora Garcia’s hawklike eyes were on her.

  “We stick together in this family,” she said, rather abruptly. “If there’s ever anything troubling you . . .”

  Dani nodded, not sure whether the words were an offer or a warning.

  “Within reason, of course,” she finished, pursing her lips.

  “Of course, señora,” said Dani. “Thank you.” But inwardly, she laughed as the woman across from her sipped without loosening her lips.

  Tell Señora Garcia what was troubling her? Had anything ever been so ludicrous?

  Well, since you asked, she imagined saying. There’s this awful secret I have . . .

  “So,” she said, cutting into Dani’s imagination just in time. “Are you looking forward to the dinner party tonight?”

  Dani seized on this appropriate conversation topic eagerly. “Yes, very much,” she said. “I’ve enjoyed the quiet to get used to the house and the job, but I’m thrilled to meet Mateo’s colleagues and friends, and begin actually applying what I learned in school . . .” She hoped the dig was subtle enough, but Señora Garcia quirked an eyebrow.

  “You’ll need to make them your friends, too,” said Señora Garcia. “Well, as much as anyone is anyone’s friend up here. It’s a viper’s nest, child, I’ll not deny it. See that you have the strongest venom. Society has no use for a weak woman who clings to her husband’s coattails.”

  For a moment, Dani wanted to break down, confide in the señora about Mateo’s strange reticence to allow her a foothold in his life. But this was not Dani’s sweet, mild mama, and something
told her this woman wouldn’t appreciate the confidence, no matter what she had said.

  “Sound advice, señora,” she said instead, sipping at her own iced water with mint and lemon as the morning grew more humid around them. “But I assure you, I’ve never been accused of clinging to anyone’s anything.”

  The other woman offered a wry smile. “Why do you think I chose you?”

  Dani sat up a little straighter at the compliment. The sun warmed her face, the glass was cool in her hand, and Dani closed her eyes for a brief moment, enjoying the feeling that nothing was in immediate danger of falling apart.

  But then she opened them.

  At first, she saw only a gardener, probably one of the many she’d hired herself just a few days before. He had climbed a ladder and was trimming a flowering vine that had wound around the ornate railing of the breakfast patio. It struck Dani as strange that he would choose to trim it right then, while she was entertaining, and she was halfway out of her chair to tell him so when he turned his face toward the light.

  The angular features, the thick, arching brows, the fox’s narrow smile. Eyes like obsidian, reflecting the sun. There was no mistaking him. But there was also no mistaking the emotion that welled up in her chest at the sight of him. The loosening of the bonds she’d tied up all her revolutionary sentiments with.

  Suddenly, her fork felt too heavy in her hand again, her dress too impossibly soft against the back of her neck.

  “Something wrong, Daniela?” asked Señora Garcia, who had her back to the railing.

  “Nothing!” Dani said, just a little too hastily. “I’m . . . dizzy . . . from the sun, is all.”

  Over her shoulder, the gardener-who-was-not-a-gardener had the audacity to smirk.

  “I think I’ll head inside,” Dani continued, standing and edging toward the door. “Big night tonight, as you know.”

  Señora Garcia pursed her lips again. Not a good sign. “If you’re going to make it in this family, Daniela,” she said, “you’re going to have to develop a hardier constitution.”

  “Of course,” said Dani, still backing away apologetically. Every twelve-hour day she’d spent racing up and down the dirt roads of Polvo played behind her eyes, mocking her choice of lies. A Vargas? Dizzy from the sun? The sand itself would get dizzy first. “Let me see you to the door, please.”

  “I’m more than capable of seeing myself out,” said her mother-in-law with another searching look. “And you really don’t look well. See that you get some rest before the party tonight; it’s your first chance to show him who you can be.”

  “The most venomous viper in the pit.” Dani flashed a weak smile, torn between terror at Sota’s appearance and curiosity at the señora’s words. How much did she know about the way Mateo was treating his new Primera? But there was no time. “You can count on me,” she said, moving them both toward the door.

  Señora Garcia gave her a once-over. “It’s not me who needs to count on you,” she said, then disappeared into the house.

  Alone on the patio, Dani whirled around to face the intruder, but there was no one there. Just a neatly trimmed vine where chaos had been impending moments before.

  She tried to look with only her eyes, to make sure she was truly alone. With Carmen watching her every move, she couldn’t afford to be chasing shadows on the second-floor terrace. When she was satisfied that no one could see her, she crept closer to the balcony rail, scanning the lawn below, taking in the waxy leaves crowding the edges as they threatened to encroach on the civil gardens.

  Dani had hired a dozen gardeners this week, but the only person in blue coveralls was sitting casually on the east gazebo stairs as if he had an appointment, and Dani was sure his application hadn’t been in her stack.

  I could go inside, Dani thought. Just hide in my room and hope he goes away.

  At the thought, her heart sank in unmistakable disappointment. She could almost hear Sota’s letter and all her previously contained thoughts rattling in the still morning.

  His posture hadn’t shifted an inch. This was a boy who was willing to wait.

  Telling herself it was only to prevent what he might say if she left him alone, Dani took a deep, calming breath and descended the stairs to the lower lawn to meet him.

  7

  Though family is the center of a happy life, a Primera’s friendships can take her far. Choose your social circle wisely, and maintain mutual usefulness for optimal social opportunity.

  —Medio School for Girls Handbook, 14th edition

  “FOLLOW ME,” DANI HISSED AS she passed the gazebo. She didn’t stop. “At a distance.”

  Her eyes scanned the grounds, the windows of the house open to the morning sun. There were a hundred places someone could be hiding. A hundred vantage points. Curious kitchen girls, downtrodden maids with a grudge against their employers.

  Carmen . . .

  Dani kept walking, focusing on her feet. She tried to act as though she were just out for an after-breakfast walk, no clear destination, just some exercise to aid in digestion. But it was hard to tune out the dangers: talking to a gardener in private would raise enough eyebrows, but talking to a card-carrying member of La Voz inside the government complex was good for a pair of handcuffs and a list of questions Dani could never answer. Not with the truth.

  Not if she wanted to live.

  Since the riots began, just before Dani was born, subterfuge had been the most powerful weapon of groups like La Voz, who no longer had anything to lose. They had been devastating in the early years, planning targeted attacks, delivering lists of demands, showing up two steps ahead of the military wherever they turned.

  It had been war, until Medio got wise. Under the leadership of Mateo’s father, who had risen quickly to the rank of military strategist, they’d stopped focusing so much energy on the border itself and started rooting out sympathizers to the cause. The hint of a whisper that you were working with the rebels was good for a one-way trip to a solitary cell. Families were dragged in and questioned. Even the innocent were forever tainted with suspicion. Soon enough, the informants all but dried up. No one wanted to take the risk.

  The government had effectively removed La Voz’s eyes and ears—the main source of their power. They never quite recovered, though they never stopped recruiting, either. In the border towns, they were almost as feared as the military themselves.

  Now they had come to Dani’s door. To collect on a favor she never should have accepted in the first place. And the worst part was, she wasn’t entirely sure she was unhappy about it.

  Behind her, she felt rather than saw Sota trailing her, like the darkness just outside a candle’s protective circle. But whose darkness was it? His or her own?

  Finally, on the south side of the house, she saw a small, sandy path leading into the trees. It was all the privacy she was going to get for now. Sinking into the part of the curious new Primera out for a walk, Dani peered into the leaves. The key to being in control of yourself, her maestras had taught her, wasn’t in ridding oneself of emotion but in concealing emotion. To conceal a particularly strong emotion, you sometimes needed to layer another on top of it. Intentional expression was always preferable to unintentional.

  She stepped onto the path, moving into the shadows, listening for any footstep heavier than a spider or a swallow.

  None came. Not until Sota, his gardener’s boots impossibly light on the path behind her, made his presence known.

  The sound of a babbling creek was near enough; Dani could only hope it would mask their conversation. It was here, in the safest place she could find on short notice, that she turned to face him at last, determined not to let him know she was anything but furious.

  Her anger was an intentional one, layered over her curiosity until nothing showed but fire. She prayed to the gods in the leaves around her that it would be enough.

  “What in the salt and sea are you doing here?” she asked, resisting the urge to pinch his arm like her mama had done to her wh
en she’d been naughty as a child. “Do you even know how much danger we’re both in right now?”

  “Relax,” said Sota, yawning. “They won’t see us. Nice digs, by the way.”

  “What are you doing here?” Dani repeated, refusing to let him placate her with his easy demeanor. “And I swear to every god I know it better be good.”

  “Feisty today, are we?” he asked, mischief dancing around his narrow mouth. “I have to admit I was hoping for a warmer welcome.”

  This time, Dani didn’t have a clever retort. She just stood there, her mouth opening and closing without sound.

  “Tough room . . . ,” Sota muttered. “Look, you seem to be a straight-to-business girl, so I guess I’ll come right out with it. I need a favor.”

  “No,” Dani said. “Is there anything else?”

  He actually laughed. “Hold on there,” he said. “I wasn’t finished yet. And if you’ll notice, it wasn’t technically a question.”

  “It didn’t have to be,” said Dani, adrenaline making her bold. “I never agreed to do anything for you.”

  “Ah, but you took my gift,” he replied. “Some might say that you owe me one.”

  “Some might,” Dani bit back. “But I don’t.”

  Sota’s eyes weren’t smiling now. “I’m sorry, but it’s not exactly up to you. Not if you don’t want to give up all this.” He encompassed Dani’s entire life in one sweeping gesture.

  She said nothing.

  “Good, quiet. That’ll make this easier. You’re going to a dinner party tonight. It’s very exclusive, as I’m sure you know, and I have reason to believe one of the little birds we’ve been speaking to is going to sing a very interesting song there. One we’d rather she didn’t sing.”

  Dani stayed silent. He seemed determined to say his piece, but she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of admitting that she was curious about what he had to say.

  “She’s a new Primera, like yourself. Been married just a year. Her parents are hosting the party. It’ll be the first time she’s been in the same room as her parents since we got in contact, and we believe she’ll attempt to come clean about our . . . relationship, to either her señora or her mama. Our intel says she’s close with both.”