handful of sand from the ground. She began muttering something in what sounded like French. Suddenly, there were two of each of us: our real, flesh and blood selves and a more transparent version of ourselves that was like looking in a mirror: not quite right. It sent a shiver up my spine to look into my own slightly transparent, reversed eyes.
“Go!” said Cassandra. Our shadow selves darted out from behind the metal fortress, running in different directions, and casting no shadows. The Laredo Boys fired and fired, and soon the gunfire grew thinner and ceased altogether. Our shadow selves flickered out. A silence fell over the ravine. All I could hear were our ragged breaths and my own rabbit-fast heartbeat. Were they out of bullets?
Then a sound rang out over the ravine: the sound of someone clapping, loud and slow.
“Well done, girlies,” said a deep, cold voice. “Well done.” A man stepped out from behind a boulder, still clapping slowly, sarcastically. I recognized him immediately: the man from before, their leader. He started down from the cliffs, and we could see his bald head—shaved and painted with the black designs—and a tattoo of a cross on his chest. He was frighteningly muscled and his eyes were cold blue.
“Samson,” Olivia spat.
“Olivia.” He smiled. Two of his teeth were silver.
Just the sight of him made me shudder, and whatever he was coming down to do, it wasn’t good. I flexed my fingers next to my components pouch, thinking of all the spells I could throw if I had to.
“When we found that lode, we thought of you girls and how sorry we felt for taking so many of your supplies a little while back. We miss you, you know. So we thought we’d leave this lode where y’all could find it, throw some extra rations in there, and have us an excuse to meet again.”
“Forgive me for not being flattered,” said Olivia.
He smiled and shrugged elaborately, a terrifying gesture with his broad, shirtless frame.
“Well, you know us. We figured we’d get us some more wives while we were at it.” He winked at Olivia. “Though it may take a couple of us each to break you in and that ox of yours.”
The sound of many male voices snickering rose all around us. I could see Judith’s fist clench behind her car door.
“Shut your filthy mouth, hijo de puta!” Olivia shouted. “You’re not getting anything! Or anyone! And the only ones leaving here broken today are gonna be you and your boys!”
“Now, now, now, that’s no way for a lady to talk!” said Samson. He was much closer now, almost to Olivia, and he stopped about ten feet away from her. “Especially a lady with no bullets.”
Olivia’s fingers twitched near her gun. Somehow I knew it was true: Olivia was out of bullets.
“What, you’re gonna shoot us now?” Olivia said. “Fight us from a distance when we’re out of ammo? That’s cheap, even for you.”
“Who said anything about fighting from a distance?” Samson said. He whistled, and twelve men came slipping down out of the cliffs, their leathery pink skin painted over with those greasy black designs, their faces hidden behind dust masks, bandannas, and strange metal masks made from car parts and wire. Some of them carried old farm equipment—pitchforks and machetes and sickles. Others carried clubs made of twisted bumpers, wore armor made of rusty chrome rims, like junkyard Sentinels, rust monsters given life.
I steadied my breathing and reached into my pouches with shaking hands, checking my spell components. If we had to fight, I wanted to be ready. I wasn’t about to be or let anybody else become somebody’s wife or dinner if I could help it. But still, my breath came in gasps and starts.
“Don’t worry,” Cassandra said calmly, putting a purple-varnished hand on my arm. “There are thirteen of them. Thirteen is an unlucky number.” I saw her reach into the many pockets of her vest, gathering a handful of what looked like the teeth of a small animal. Getting ready to cast an illusion.
Samson was right in front of Olivia now. She looked up at him, her shoulders set with defiance.
“Now, we can do this the easy way, and you can give up and come with us voluntarily,” said Samson, reaching for the machete strapped to his back. “Or we can do it the bloody way.”
My heart caught in my chest.
But Olivia just sized him up, looked him in the eye, and spat on the ground.