Don Eduardo kept looking warily at Ricardo as if he expected some kind of trick.
Ricardo’s inn was small—one had to be a friend, or a friend of a friend, of the proprietor to stay here. Ricardo had known the man’s grandfather. There was a small common room and hearth for guests.
At the door, Eduardo hesitated, his thin smile more masklike than ever. “This is a tavern, you said? A public place?”
Ricardo had already opened the door and stood on the threshold. The other man held back, eyeing the space before him warily. He was so bold in every other way, why didn’t he stride forward?
“It’s small, not so crowded and noisy as others. I like it. Mostly, it is the innkeeper’s friends who gather.”
“So it is his home?” He sounded unhappy.
“It feels so sometimes, I suppose.”
Just then the proprietor’s daughter, Marie, saw him and waved. “Ricardo! Come in, come in, and bring your friend! You are both welcome!”
Eduardo relaxed and stepped forward as if a wall had vanished before him. His discomfort was gone, and Ricardo studied him.
“Pardon my forwardness,” Ricardo asked carefully. “But what was wrong just then? You seemed unsure of the place.”
Eduardo spoke softly as they made their way to a table in the corner. “Have you never tried to enter a home where you were not welcome?”
“No, I never have,” said Ricardo.
The other demon seemed amused. “Some places, we need an invitation to enter. Do you not know this?”
“No,” Ricardo said wonderingly.
“But how have you lived all this time? You know nothing!”
Apparently, Ricardo didn’t even know how little he knew. “And that is why we are talking, yes?”
The common room was brightly lit and merry this night. Not everyone had gone to Mass, but they still celebrated with food and drink, singing and spilling wine, throwing more fuel on the fire. Ricardo felt very much the outsider here. He could look on, he could smile and pretend to take part. He had been like this once, newly arrived to a Mexico that was wild and full of adventure.
Marie brought over cups of the mulled wine that everyone was drinking. She’d surely think it odd when it was clear the two men hadn’t touched the drinks. But for now, they were part of the disguise. They were just two men come out of the cold.
Eduardo gazed around him with an unmistakable hunger. Likely, he did not feel like an outsider. He looked like a hunter.
“I see why you like this place,” Eduardo said. Ricardo didn’t think so but didn’t argue.
“You are new to this country, yes?” Ricardo asked. “You sailed from Spain?”
“Yes. A few years ago now. We settled in Mexico City and now I’m having a bit of a look around the rest of our new country.” He looked Ricardo up and down. “I didn’t expect to find one such as you.”
“So you said.”
“When did you arrive here?”
“A hundred years ago.”
“But . . . no one was here a hundred years ago.”
In fact, there’d been a whole native civilization here, and a thousand villages besides. But that wasn’t what Eduardo was talking about. “I was one of Coronado’s men.”
Eduardo was perhaps the only man in the room who would believe this tale. He gave a short, brief laugh. “Really? Hm. Mistress Catalina must meet you. You . . . are extraordinary, sir. If I may say so.”
“Gracias—I think.”
Eduardo leaned back in his chair, gazing haughtily around the room, no more willing to look Ricardo in the eyes than Ricardo was to look in his. Oh yes, they would not be dueling with rapiers tonight. Not when steel wouldn’t kill either one of them.