I nod, but my gaze is pulled back to the salon. I try to steal one last glance back at Rosalita but she’s already lost to my sight.

Kiki

Dawn pushes at the edges of the horizon, smearing dusky purple light against the stars. The imposing bulk of the Sonza estate rises up against the moonlit sky, a bulwark against the chaos and the fire and the life of the city.

It is beautiful and imposing and impressive. Its luxury shrouds the truth of what it is.

A gilded prison.

There are worse ways to come into the world, I know. I have never wanted for anything in my life (almost anything). I have never known hunger or the cold cruelty of a winter’s night without warm bricks placed at the foot of my bed. But even so, the bars of that cage hold me in, like the stays of a whalebone corset digging into my sensitive flesh.

Down in the city, with a sword at my hip and Ana’s hand in mine, I feel like myself. My truest self.

I stop as we reach the crest of the hill that will lead down into the orange grove that surrounds the property. The land here isn’t really suited to oranges—they prefer much lower altitudes than Potosí—but that is one of the many things that gold can buy. Inappropriate extravagance.

See how rich our owners are, those orange trees seem to say. They have enough money and influence to grow fruit that can barely survive in this climate.

Ana’s presence in my life has made me see things that my privilege had prevented me from noticing. Before her, I had never questioned my place in this world. In this villa. In this city. In this land that belonged to others once, not to the crown. Seeing my world through her eyes has been illuminating. The orange grove is a prime example of this. I had never questioned its presence until the first time she saw it. Her eyes had widened, as if I’d opened a magical door into a world beyond her wildest imaginings.

It’s a silly thing to do. Growing oranges in the mountains. I know this. But I also know that I relished the sight of Ana taking her first sip of freshly squeezed juice. I would not have traded that sight for anything. Her eyes shone as if someone had lit a candle inside her skull. And then she’d wrinkled her nose as the tartness hit, screwing up her lips as she worked her way through the flavor. Sweet, and a little sour. Just like her.

As I am rather fond of having all my limbs attached to my body, I kept that thought to myself.

Ana draws up beside me. I squint at her in the half-light of the late hour.

“Something on your mind?”