Yara winced as she adjusted her posture. ‘That’s the story in brief. It sounds mad, I know, but . . .’ She shrugged.
It did sound mad, classically delusional, and Snow would have liked to pass it off as madness, but sufficient evidence existed to suggest that it was not and he believed to a certainty that he was in imminent danger. He had only half-listened to much of her account, consumed by worries about his future, but one sentence in particular had attracted his notice: ‘He’d spend all his time flying if I let him.’ From this he deduced that Yara was capable of influencing Jefe.
‘So your position here is . . . what?’ he asked. ‘Surrogate mother?’
‘In the beginning, yes, that would have been an accurate description of my function. But as he’s matured I’ve become more of a nurse, a servant. He turns to me for advice now and then, and he trusts me. I doubt that’ll change.’
‘Isn’t there anything you can tell me that’ll help with my situation? You must know some way of playing him. What buttons to push.’
‘Flattery,’ she said. ‘He responds to flattery, but he’s so mercurial, so volatile . . . it may prolong things, but sooner or later he’ll turn on you.’
‘Then I guess my best bet is to run.’
‘Don’t!’ She stretched out a hand as if to hold him back, and then seemed flustered by her show of concern. ‘When someone tries to escape him, he’s spectacularly cruel. They, the PVO . . . they set snipers in the hills to watch him. He found out and chased them down and tore them limb from limb.’
‘You saw this?’
‘I saw what he did to the man who gave the snipers their orders. Two other PVO officials witnessed the murder as well. And yet they still believe they can control him.’
‘Can he be? Controlled?’
‘You’re asking if I can control him? I don’t want to. He’s the only chance we’ve got.’
The old political argument again – any change is good, whatever the risk. It was proof against logic, but nonetheless Snow said, ‘What about the cost? He’s already slaughtered the men in the village and who knows how many more. Next he . . .’
‘What do you know about costs? I’ve got more than eight hundred souls on my conscience, and many of them friends. I’ve known for years that I’m damned. I want him to go through another transformation, even if thousands are killed in the process. He has no real depth of interest in us. Once he’s able to fly he’ll go his own way and leave us to sort things out. The PVO won’t survive his absence – they’re incompetent. I know this for a fact because I helped to recruit their leadership. The country will explode, the army will be in chaos, without direction, and we’ll have the opportunity for reform in Temalagua.’
‘If things are as you say . . .’
‘They are!’
‘It’s a shaky goddamn premise. What if you’re wrong? What if he doesn’t go his own way, or if this second transformation is a fantasy? You’ll be handing over your country to a fucking monster.’
‘We’ve had worse.’ Her voice became less strident and a note of tenderness crept in. ‘You don’t know him like I do. He doesn’t care about any human thing, about revenge or politics. They’re a means to an end, that’s all. Admittedly it’s an end he can’t yet see, because he’s in the dark about his past. He doesn’t remember the centuries he spent paralyzed on a plain, or much of anything before that morning when he woke in the jungle – but he’s obeying his instincts, acting out the behaviors he learned when he was a dragon. All he really wants to do is fly about and fuck female dragons. You of all people should understand that.’
Ignoring the dig, Snow said, ‘He’s going to be pretty pissed off when he discovers there aren’t any female dragons.’
‘You don’t know that there aren’t.’
‘You’re talking about those old wives tales? The ones that claim dragons are still living in Argentina?’ He made a derisive sound, expelling a jet of air between his lips. ‘Or maybe Oz.’
‘You see? This is what you always do. We can’t have a conversation without you ridiculing me. You’re right! I don’t have all the answers and I may be proved wrong in the end. But I’ve been right so far, haven’t I?’
The mechanical noise overhead rose in pitch and they sat for half a minute without speaking.
‘You could help me if you wanted,’ said Snow churlishly.
Yara sighed impatiently and said, ‘What did you do after you left me?’
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’
‘Humor me. Where did you go after you left Temalagua?’
‘Home.’
‘And what did you do there?’
‘I got a job. Wrote a little.’
‘I imagine there were quite a few women in your life. And drugs.’
‘Yeah, you know. But mainly I thought about you. I realized . . .’
‘So you had a job, probably something that just allowed you to get by. You wrote some things no one ever saw . . .’
‘I published some stuff!’
‘And you fucked around. You lived the same kind of life in Idaho you lived here. That’s the man you expect me to sacrifice everything for? If I could help you, which I can’t, that’s the man I should give up . . .’
‘That’s not fair!’
‘No? You just admitted it.’
‘Superficially, yeah. That’s how it was. I was accustomed to that kind of life. But there were other things going on with me.’
‘You’ve got hidden depths? Is that what you’re telling me? You’ve grown a soul? Who cares? You expect me to toss aside the one chance we have of getting rid of the real villains? And I should do this because of the way you once made me feel?’ She waved her hand about as if dispersing a swarm of gnats. ‘Fuck it! Enough! I have to wash your clothes!’
She levered herself up from the chair, biting her lip, and stood, wobbly, trying to stabilize herself. He took hold of her elbow and, obeying an old reflex, she leaned into his shoulder. He slipped an arm about her waist – despite her infirmity it was supple as ever. She tensed, her breath quickened, and he found himself wondering how long it had been since she’d had a lover.
That evening Yara ushered Snow into a narrow corridor off the dining area ranged by a series of small bedrooms – like cells, really – each with plain concrete walls, a bath, and no lock on the door. She installed him in one of these and told him she was down the hall if he needed anything. He started to say that what he needed was her honesty, her help, but if her help were forthcoming, a direct approach was not the way to achieve it. Subtle pressure such as he had been applying ever since their initial conversation, reminding her of their golden moments years before, touching her as often as possible and sowing doubts about Jefe whenever he saw an opening, yet doing so slyly, indirectly – that was his best hope of influencing her. He knew he had made some progress, but how much longer could he afford to be subtle?