Isabel hadn’t slept much. She’d spent the weekend at the Department of Justice immersed in getting all the documents collated, bound, and ready for trial. She’d thrived on what her mind could uncouple and understand. The hours of due diligence and her expertise in criminal law had brought her to what she thought she’d wanted. Recognition.

In the midst of her career’s rise she’d isolated herself from her past, her sister’s singular zeal, and from forging any meaningful relationships of her own. But something Arama said pushed its way forward in Isabel’s mind: “The uses of the heart are wiser than the most successful uses of the mind.” These were slogans that belonged on bumper stickers, but like everything Arama believed, had enough truth to disturb the stubborn mind. Like now. Isabel saw the reciprocal affection among Arama, Vincente. and his daughter, and Isabel’s first thought was how she could use Vincente to keep Arama’s childlike zeal contained. That’s when she saw Jhana-Merise enter the room.

A finger of light from the blinds illuminated Jhana-Merise’s eyes. They reminded Isabel of her mother, the brightness she’d had before succumbing to depression and suicide in their town in the shadow of the sacred ruins of Machu Picchu. After her mother’s death Isabel saw nothing hallowed in that land. As far as she was concerned the devil rode on those mountain winds, not God. So, she left before the devil found her.

“I know we’ve put you in a difficult position,” Jhana-Merise said, with the composure of one much older than her young years.

“What do you hope will happen here?” Isabel asked. “Arama has spent much of her life living on dreams. I don’t imagine you do.”

“We’re not here on a dream,” Jhana-Merise said. “We’re here because we’re connected.”

As a young girl Arama had introduced Isabel to the phenomenon of Ley Lines. These were hypothetical alignments of a number of places of geographical interest, such as ancient monuments and megaliths. It was said a powerful energy traveled through those lines. And like the chakras of the body, each point was connected and affected by what happened along those paths. Arama had told Isabel if you were to draw a line from their town of Cuzco up through a map of the world, one of the cities you’d go through would be Washington, D.C. “In this way we will always be connected,” Arama had said. “And you’ll always be below me,” Isabel had shot back, poking her sister for her misguided uses of enchantment. Isabel had concrete plans. And plans were never accomplished through magic.

Isabel had been picking at a piece of skin on her thumb and now the cuticle was bleeding. She tucked her thumb under her fingers and folded her arms across her chest, as she and Jhana-Merise stood there in the growing sunlight.