“Carlos, how did we get here?”
Carlos let his hand fall as he smiled at Ramon, a look of caring and concern replacing the anger on his face. “You're all right, Ramie?”
“I think so, but everything still hurts,” Ramon said ruefully, and glanced at Kayla. “I remember that the bruja was doing a healing, and I thought something was wrong so I went to her, and then everything went black. I'm all right, Mama,” he said to the woman fussing over him in Spanish. “Manuel's the one who was hurt, not me.”
Mama? This lady is Ramon's mother?
Ramon turned to Kayla. “I heard what you said, Kayla. Will you heal my brother Manuel? Please? For me?” His face was still very pale; the whiteness made the small scar stand out on his cheek even more, contrasting with his dark eyes.
She nodded. “Sure,” she said.
Manuel took off his jacket and removed the wadded shirt from the wound. The wound wasn't bad, more bloody than anything else. The bullet had scraped through the upper muscle on his shoulder; Kayla didn't know the name of it, but she traced it with her magic beneath his skin, seeing how it connected to the other muscles . . . with a start, she pulled herself back to the matter at hand. This healing was easy, compared to what she had done before. Within half a minute it was done, Manuel gingerly touching the closed wound that had been open and bleeding a moment before.
“She obeys you, but not me,” Carlos observed from the side.
“Thank you, querida,” Ramon said. Their mother was alternately staring at Kayla and Manuel's healed shoulder, then muttered something in Spanish and left the room.
“She says you must be the Devil's daughter,” Carlos said with a laugh.
Kayla considered hitting Carlos, then decided it would be more trouble than it was worth. She walked past him to the bathroom that she could see down the hallway. In the bathroom, she scrubbed the blood from her hands and tried to wash the blood marks from her shirt, without much success. Everything she owned seemed to be bloodstained now, or would be soon, the way things were going.
“We'll stay here tonight,” Carlos said to her, standing in the open bathroom