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What could I say in my defence? Sabina was doomed the minute she ran to the square. She violated the precept, no one aswang had done since the conversion and the breaking. She had consorted, people had seen her bargaining with the mananangal in the square. Yes, she did it to save their lives, but it would not set a dangerous precedent, to allow something like this again? No one wanted to consider it.

My queen mother demanded my report. What charges had been laid against Sabina, what Dona Esperanza wanted us to do, what had I done, to ensure her safety? I thought I heard, unsaid, what had I done to endanger her?

“She has been charged with consorting with ungodly creatures,” I said. “The mananangal.” O Queen-mother, did you blame me for running out with Sabina into the streets? She would have done what she did, regardless, but without my help. The mananangal would have torn her apart then.

I said: I did what I could. I would have given more. But they saw her, once they did, nothing we could do would make them unsee her. She had the grace dew were given in a lifetime, and the Nosferatu had nothing.

My Queen mother replied through our emissary: There were still things you could have done, little one. She said. But nothing is lost until we have expended everything. We are keeping our bargain with the Good Dona. Tell her this. If there are things we can do to keep her safe, we will.

We sent my brothers to her cell in the Church tower. Not for enchantments, but to speak to
Sabina, comfort her, bring back news if they could. It was little enough.

I begged them to watch over her for me. I who had failed.

Sister, who said it was your failure? It was the priests. That is all.

Yes the priests. The Nosferatu, and the gentleman with cat’s eyes. Once they saw her, saw her for the first time, saw the grace she had been touched with, they could not leave her be.
I never saw Maryam again. She had abandoned the little room when Sabina had left it. I wondered if she came with her. I paced the room uselessly, back and forth, back and forth, looking for the person who had left. Who would not speak to me.

#

If I survived it, she will, said Dona Zamorra. Her face was ashen and her hands were worn from the marks she left on them. She was resolutely refusing to look at Anuncia and I, I who had failed her. “I was a widow and a monster when they put on trial for my husband’s murder: she’s a girl. She saved their lives. They can’t kill her.”

Oh would that it could be passed off as a family tradition that everyone survived.

Anuncia and I had done what we could, walking into the streets, whispering things in people’s ears when they were asleep or daydreaming or drunk: the outrage of it, the incarceration of a fifteen year old who had dared speak to the mananangal and save their lives. It was a counter-story that fled: at the moment, more people resented the frayle than they resented the aswang, and many of them had seen Sabina run up to her kin in the square, to stop the blood shed. It was more fashionable to despise the frayle, little as they were allowed to show it.

Only the Dona was allowed to see her daughter. The prisons were no place for a child and it was decided second cousins had no right of visitation either, though Sabina asked for me. She wasn’t allowed her muning, who wandered up and down the house, searching for its mistress. She was allowed spindles of spider thread and gossamer, baskets of spider weave from her mother.

She embroidered the edges with foreign vines, sampaguitas, butterflies with intricate patterns on their wings.

Sometimes she embroidered dwende.

“What is she doing?” I asked Dona Esperanza. “No one wants to see langgam on their hankerchiefs.”

“My daughter can embroider what she likes,” Dona Esperanza said flatly, and sold them together with the others. Commerce and business had to go on, even with what happened to Sabina. Oddly, Sabina’s troubles did not result in fewer customers. Foreign merchants entered the Zamorra household, were served tea and coffee, were given baskets of spider gossamer in exchange for gold. They commiserated with the Dona, as much as merchants were allowed to do so, and left more gold and little gifts than the Dona knew what to do with. Local folk left flowers on our doorstep, at the foot of the church where they knew Sabina was being kept. It was ambiguous enough that the frayle were unsure whether the flowers were for them or for the child they locked in their cell.

That had to be enough, wouldn’t it? Whatever the frayle did, it would be difficult for them to turn the public against Sabina. There would be no howling mob calling for her death. There might be a mob calling for theirs.

It did happen, sometimes.

I would have liked to murder the mananangal. Look what they left in their wake.
#

Father Martinez appeared at our doorstep, tapping his frayle’s hat, solicitously inquiring after the familia.

I refused to let Aling draw her own blood, yet again. I slaughtered a chicken and served its blood to the Padre warm, scented with human smell. He made a small face as he sipped the cup. He begged us to tell him: how were we faring? He knew how difficult this must be for the Dona, after her husband’s trial and her own brief imprisonment. But care was being taken, considering Sabina’s age, the long years of service Dona Zamorra gave the Church. He thought Sabina, troubled though she was, could still be saved by the sanctity of the Church and the hard work of the priests.

I said nothing. I thought I wanted him gone.

“Sabina is doing well, as can be expected,” he said. He made a face. “She eats, which is understandable, but considering what she is, she really should be having more bloodmeals. She is preoccupied with embroidery, and I think prayer would suit her better.”

“You’ve been visiting her,” I said. I was horrified.

I looked at the Dona. She had not told me this. Her face was ashen as my heart, and I looked back at the good Padre.

Frayle Zamorra looked at me with an odd sort of compassion. Silly little provincial cousin.

“As befits my responsibilities, Senorita,” he said, bowing a little from his seat

“You had better get back to them,” I said, trying to put as much persuasion and enchantment in my voice as I could. How much would it work? He was enkanta after all. But if he stayed, I would tear him limb from limb. Oh, Sabina. “I’m sure a priest such as you has many other things to attend to, aside from Sabina’s welfare.”

“It’s almost dawn,” Anuncia said. “And I’m sorry Padre. We do need to sleep for the commerce ahead. You know these foreign merchants, they don’t keep decent hours.”

Her words were more convincing than mine. Padre relaxed, nodded dully.

“Of course,” he said. “Have a good night, Familia Zamorra.”

“Good night,” I echoed, and shut the door behind him. I tried to think of all of the things that spoke of his guilt. His face had been warm, even before he’d arrived. Had he been drinking from her? Aswang blood which the nosferatu so disdained?

“Why didn’t you say anything,” I said softly, to Dona Zamorra. She knew. Oh I knew she knew, and suddenly, I realized why the grief and the guilt smelled so strong on her when she came from Sabina’s cell. Or rather, they took on something infinitely more sinister.

“What do you think I can do?” Dona Esperanza asked. I smelled metal and salt, looked down at her hands to see little crimson rivulets.

“Dona, Dona stop,” Anuncia said gently. She got up and went to get simple cotton cloth, gauze made from the cobwebs of Daddy-Long-Legs.

“We’re not helpless, Anuncia or I,” I said. “You should have told us,” my voice was raised.

“You should have said something.”

“And what would you do, Ambassador, that would not result in Sabina being accused of craft?”
Dona Esperanza said. “She’s already been accused of consorting with the mananangal. What do you think will happen to her if the priests and the guardia discover evidence she may have been meddling with craft?”

Human beings and their politics. There was nothing I could say to that. It was one thing to create enchantments in the Zamorra’s household. It was another thing entirely to do it in the heart of the Nosferatu’s nest, where their magics and their faith were strong.

My brothers lurked in Sabina’s cell. They came to reassure me: yes, the Padre does visit her, but he stays outside the bars, and she embroiders as if he does not hear us very much at all.
“Trust in the enchantments we made,” Anuncia whispered. Would that I could! We gambled, but we had no assurance that what we did would save Sabina or bring her home.

#