Apocalyptic Pirates 6, page 9
“Gloria!” Eva called, and as she hurriedly led us forward, a young woman came out of the huts in the center of the village and beckoned for us to hurry.
Eva’s breath came in painful gasps, and she had a death grip on my hand as we entered the hut.
It was dark inside, with the only light coming from a hurricane lantern that was set up on a packing crate in one corner. There was only one room, but there was a curtain strung up as a divider to give some privacy, and it was half pulled back to reveal Marisol lying on a little bed.
“Marisol.” The name broke from Eva’s lips like a sob, and she let go of my hand and hobbled over to the bed.
For a second I thought we were too late, but then I heard the terrible rasping gasp of labored breathing and saw the rise and fall of Marisol’s chest as she struggled to draw breath. She was covered in blankets, but when I stepped to the edge of the bed, I could see that she was trembling all over. Her forehead was covered in a bright sheen of sweat, and the pillow was stained with perspiration.
The other woman, Gloria, was speaking rapidly to Eva and gesturing.
“Marisol’s got a fever, and it seems to be getting worse,” Dia translated. “She’s finding it difficult to breathe, and one second she’s freezing, and the next she’s too hot.”
Marisol’s eyes were closed, and her head turned restlessly on the pillow. She seemed to be muttering something.
“What is she saying?” Ally asked.
“Nothing.” Dia swallowed. “She’s just talking nonsense. She’s delirious.”
“Okay,” I said. “We’ve got to act quickly. Get the bottles out.”
“How do you think we should do this?” Letty asked as Dia took off her rucksack.
“We don’t have time to experiment with raw meat,” I said. “And with the state she’s in, she might not be able to keep solid food down anyway. So I think we’re going to have to get her to drink the blood.”
“Okay.” Shannon nodded and unscrewed the lid of one of the bottles. “I wish we had a straw, that would make this easier.”
“We’ll just have to do the best we can,” I said. “Dia, can you tell Eva that we’re going to need Marisol to sit up so we can get her to drink it?”
Dia translated quickly, and Eva hurried over. The other woman, Gloria, looked at us suspiciously, but she helped Eva bring Marisol up into a sitting position. Eva sat down on the bed, drew the little girl into her lap, and supported her head as she carefully opened her granddaughter’s mouth.
Eva said something quickly, and Gloria hurriedly grabbed a cloth that was hanging up to dry and tucked it under Marisol’s chin to catch any spills.
Shannon held the bottle to Marisol’s lips.
Marisol choked and gasped as the blood splashed against her mouth, and Gloria gasped in horror and recoiled.
“Que es esto?” she demanded.
“Esta bien, es solo medicina,” Dia reassured her, but the woman was staring open-mouthed with her eyes almost popping out of her head.
“Por favor,” Eva pleaded.
“No.” Gloria shook her head. “No. No esta bien.”
Eva looked pleadingly at Shannon.
Shannon nodded and carefully held the bottle again so Marisol could drink.
“Bebelo,” Eva whispered to her granddaughter. “Bebe, chiquitina.”
Marisol coughed. Blood dribbled down her chin, and scarlet flecks of it spattered over Shannon’s hand, but the Indian woman didn’t flinch.
“That’s it, Marisol,” she whispered. “You’re doing great, sweetheart.”
The little girl was deep in the fever that had hold of her, but the sound of Shannon’s voice seemed to reach through the haze. Her eyelashes fluttered, and her lips parted.
“That’s it, baby, good job,” Shannon whispered, and she tipped the bottle to help the blood trickle into Marisol’s mouth.
My heartbeat was pounding in my ears. I was barely aware of anything else. In my peripheral vision, I could see Gloria backing away from the bed with her hands moving in the shape of the cross over and over again. I was aware without even having to look that Ally, Letty, and Dia were by my side, and we were all focused on the frail little figure cradled in Eva’s arms.
Marisol swallowed with difficulty. She gasped. Her lips were cracked and bloodless, and her cheeks were empty hollows. Eva wasn’t a big woman, but she completely dwarfed the sick child, and Marisol looked more like an abandoned doll than a little girl. Her limbs were so thin, and there was a yellow tinge to her brown skin that made the dark stains of blood around her mouth look black, like some strange mold was growing out of her.
The crushing reality of her sickness was suddenly overwhelming, and I had to fight down the wave of hopelessness that rose up inside me.
This would work. I’d seen too many videos of dragon-fueled miracles for this not to be effective in some way. I knew with all the fibers of my being that this was going to work.
It had to work.
Shannon tried to get Marisol to take another mouthful, but the little girl’s face screwed up, and she turned her head away from the bottle.
“Bebes, Marisol,” Eva urged.
Dia leaned forward and brushed her fingers over the little girl’s thin cheek.
“Marisol,” she murmured. “Puedes hacerlo. Puedes hacerlo. Tienes que beberlo.”
Marisol sighed and opened her mouth. Her eyes were still closed, but she gulped and swallowed more of the blood.
“Si, si,” Eva whispered and tucked a strand of the child’s hair behind her ear.
“She’s had about half the bottle now.” Shannon looked at me questioningly. “Do you think that’s enough?”
“For now.” I nodded. “We don’t want her to throw it up before it has a chance to work.”
Gloria burst out into a torrent of outraged Spanish.
Dia answered with a torrent of her own, and the two of them began arguing furiously. Eva was too focused on Marisol to engage, and she just clasped her close to her chest and pressed her forehead against the little girl’s.
“Dia, what’s she saying?” I demanded.
“All kinds of shit,” Dia spat in frustration. “She thinks we’re poisoning her, or that we’re cursing her, or–”
“Marisol!” Eva cried.
My head snapped around.
Marisol was shaking. Her whole body was vibrating, and Eva snatched her hands away from the child’s forehead with a sharp cry.
“Ella esta ardiendo!” the old woman cried.
Dia touched Marisol’s forehead and then recoiled with a startled inhale.
“She’s burning up,” Dia exclaimed. “Her fever’s rising.”
“Drew, what do we do?” Ally’s voice was panicked.
“She could end up with brain damage if her fever gets too high,” Shannon said, and I could hear the edge in her voice as she tried to hold her emotions in check.
“Lay her back down,” I said.
Dia spoke quickly to Eva, and I helped her shift Marisol back down into a lying position on the little bed.
Marisol let out a faint moan, and her lips moved wordlessly. I held my hand close to her skin, and I was shocked by how hot she was– she was almost too hot to touch. But there was no way back now; the only possible way to get Marisol past this was to help her fight her way through it.
I took her little hand and held it in my own. I ignored the burning heat radiating from her skin and the scorching pain of it against my own hands.
“Marisol,” I whispered. “Come back to us, Marisol. We’re all here, your grandmother is waiting for you.”
Marisol’s head turned from side to side as she tossed feverishly in the bed. Her dark hair was dank with sweat, and she left wet, limp strands of it on the pillow that revealed the angry red skin of her scalp burning underneath.
“Marisol,” Eva sobbed.
“Madre de dios y de todos los santos ten piedad,” Gloria declared from her position by the door.
The heat radiating from Marisol’s body was unbearable. I gritted my teeth and held onto her hand even as my skin turned red with the scorching agony of it.
“Drew,” Ally almost sobbed. “You’re hurting yourself.”
“I have to see her through this,” I gritted out. “She needs to make it through to the other side.”
Eva had been standing on the opposite side of the bed, but now she bent over and took Marisol’s other hand and pressed it against her chest.
“Marisol,” she whispered in a voice that was broken and full of tears. “Marisol. Regresa a mi. Marisol.”
Marisol started to pant. Her chest rose and fell so violently it was like some other power was forcing the air into her lungs. Her rasping, tortured wheezes filled the tent. She was still shaking, but now she began to convulse. Her body arched backward on the bed as her heels and elbows dug into the thin mattress. Her head was craned at an unnatural angle on her neck.
She opened her mouth, and we could all see the dark stains of dragon blood that ringed her teeth and painted her pale, shrunken gums black.
And then Marisol screamed.
It was a terrible, short, sharp sound that rang in my ears and sent a terrible, lurching jolt into my stomach like I’d been kicked there. Her hand was juddering back and forth, but I held on tight, and so did Eva.
“Marisol, mi chiquitita!” the old woman cried.
“Mama!” Marisol cried. “Abuela!”
“Marisol,” Eva wept.
And, suddenly, like a puppet whose strings had been cut, Marisol collapsed back onto the bed. Her head lolled limply on her neck, and her hand in mine was abruptly cold and as brittle as a collection of dry twigs.
Eva gathered her into her arms as she sobbed helplessly.
I stared at the fragile little body encased in Eva’s embrace.
And then Marisol opened her eyes.
“Abuela?” she murmured.
“Marisol?” Eva drew back and stared down with wild, unbelieving eyes into her granddaughter’s face.
“Abuela,” the little girl murmured, and then she gave a huge yawn. “Que sucedio? Me quede dormido?”
“Oh dulce dios!” Eva covered her granddaughter’s face in a thousand kisses as tears streamed down her face. “Marisol, mi corazón.”
“Abuela,” Marisol murmured in complaint, and she struggled out of Eva’s embrace to sit up on the bed.
She stared around at all of us, and for a moment, her forehead was puckered in confusion. Then she blinked and seemed to remember who we were, and her face lit up in a smile.
“Letty!” she sang out. “Dia, Shannon, Ally, Drew!”
That more than anything else brought the knowledge home that we’d actually done it.
We’d fucking done it.
We’d saved her.
A crazy laugh of relief burst out of me. I’d been crouching by the bed for I didn’t know how long, and as the rest of the world suddenly came back into focus, my legs started to cramp, and I toppled over onto my back and stared up at the ceiling while another laugh of relief and pure exhaustion fell out of me.
“Drew?” Shannon asked anxiously.
The women hovered over me, and I grinned up at their concerned faces.
“We did it,” I gasped. “We did it.”
“We did.” Shannon grinned down at me.
Marisol was already chattering away, and I hauled myself back up into a sitting position to see what was happening.
The little girl was climbing out of bed and dancing around Eva, who held up a weary hand and sat down heavily on the bed with the biggest sigh I’d ever heard. She must have been completely exhausted with the toll of everything that had just happened.
I quickly got to my feet, and as I looked around the hut, I saw a water bottle next to the other bed in the room. I grabbed it and offered it to the old woman.
She took it from me and drank deeply. Then she took a deep breath, smiled at me, and patted my cheek.
“Buen chico,” she told me.
“That means good boy,” Dia said.
“Oh, okay.” I laughed. “Thank you. Gracias, Eva.”
“Gracias, Drew,” the old woman responded. “Gracias.”
“De nada,” I said with a smile, and then shot Dia a quick look to see if she was in a good enough mood to tease me for my pronunciation.
Apparently she was, and she shot me a smirk.
“I’m saying nothing,” she said. “You’re the hero of the hour, so I’ll let you off.”
“Well, gee, thank you,” I laughed.
I hadn’t noticed that Gloria had left the hut, but now she came rushing back in. And she’d brought company with her– two tall, young men, one of which had a drawn knife. The other had a heavy wooden club.
Behind the men were a couple of children who peered around them with wide eyes before being quickly pulled away by more of the villagers who were waiting outside.
“What is happening?” one of the young men asked in a heavy Spanish accent. “There is blood? What are you doing?”
“La curaron!” Eva cried. “Curaron a Marisol!”
For the first time, the young men noticed the little girl standing by her grandmother’s side. They stared at her with their mouths hanging open.
Marisol giggled and covered her mouth with her hands.
“She was dying,” the young man stammered. “She was too sick.”
“La curaron,” Eva insisted again.
“But how?” the young man demanded.
He took a step forward, and I stood up and held up my hands.
“We… had medicine,” I said.
I had no idea what announcing what we’d actually done would result in here. They might be positive toward the idea, but they also might denounce the whole thing as a hoax or a scam or worse.
Eva launched into a rapid explanation. I had no idea what she might be telling them, but I figured if she wanted to try to explain to them about the dragon blood, then she was the one who was going to have to live with the consequences of it.
“Dia,” I murmured. “What’s she saying?”
“She’s saying we had medicine, and we gave it to Marisol,” Dia said in a voice low enough so the young men wouldn’t be able to hear her. “She’s not saying exactly what the medicine is, though. She says it looked like blood, but she’s not saying that it was blood.”
“Tactful,” I observed. “I’m guessing that she wants to keep it on the down-low, then.”
“Yeah.” Dia nodded. “Maybe she wants to enjoy the miracle in peace for a little while longer.”
“That’s a sweet way of putting it,” I said.
“Well.” Dia shrugged. “I’m a sweet person, what can I say?”
“You are sweet,” I told her.
Dia glanced at me with an expression that was unexpectedly vulnerable. Then she grinned, rolled her eyes, and gave a shrug.
The rest of the villagers had started to crowd their way into the hut to get a good look at Marisol, and they were gawping at her in utter disbelief and amazement.
Marisol was giggling and enjoying the attention. It was astounding to see the difference in her. Her cheeks were glowing with a rosy hue, her eyes were bright and clear, and she breathed without a rattle or a wheeze.
But then she gave a huge yawn, and Eva started to shoo away the visitors. A few of them lingered behind and spoke to Eva in quiet tones, and then they stripped the soiled and sweaty bedding from Marisol’s cot.
Marisol yawned again, and Eva spoke to her in a firm voice and pointed to the other bed, which must have been her own.
Marisol didn’t argue, and she climbed into the other bed and yawned again as she lay down.
Eva leaned over her and whispered in her ear, smoothed back her hair, and kissed her forehead.
Marisol smiled up at her, turned over, and was asleep in seconds.
Eva gestured for us to follow her out of the hut, and we came out into the village with the rest of the neighbors who had stayed behind. The sun was blindingly bright, and I felt dazed with the rush of sensory overload that came from stepping outside of the dark, intense world of the hut. So much had happened in such a short amount of time, and I couldn’t hold back the smile that tugged at my mouth when I realized again what a momentous thing it was that we’d done.
Eva was speaking earnestly.
“She wants us to stay for dinner,” Dia said. “She’s very grateful. She wants us to share her meal.”
“Can she…” Ally hesitated. “I don’t mean to be rude, but can she afford to do that? Should we offer to donate some of the food from the yacht’s kitchen?”
“I don’t think she would offer it if it was too much,” Shannon said.
“I think she’s just so grateful to have gotten her granddaughter back,” Letty said in a soft voice. “I guess everything else just kind of pales in comparison to that.”
“Yeah.” Shannon smiled at me. “You did good, Drew. We all did.”
“Yeah, we did.” I nodded in triumph. “We fucking did.”
Eva was looking around at us expectantly, and I nodded at her with a huge grin spreading across my face. Her face lit up with an answering smile, and she called to one of the women who hurried into another hut and came out with two folding chairs tucked under her arm.
“Oh, let us help you,” I began, but Eva smacked my arm in anticipation of what I was saying.
“No,” she insisted and pointed firmly at one of the chairs.
I wanted to object, but Eva had the authority of all grandparents, and I found myself sitting down meekly in the chair without a murmur.
Eva nodded in satisfaction. The neighbors brought out more chairs for the rest of the women to sit down on, and one woman brought us each a glass of some kind of juice that I’d never tasted before but which was very tasty.
One of the young men from before came and pulled up another folding chair next to me.
“American, yes?” he queried.
“Yes,” I said with a nod. “My name is Drew.”
“Manuel.” He tapped his chest. “You are a doctor?”
I tried to think of the best way to answer that question and eventually just settled on plain honesty.
