Grisham's patience when he has a gun in his hands is endless. She's ready to fire at the well if she has to. Bouchard hasn't advanced from the very edge of town. It's been hours—at least, the sun's moved millions of miles—and she can't figure it out.

"Stop. Fidgeting."

Amazing, how being a brat becomes default when the wolves are at the gate. She shifts around one more time, just enough to kick him in the shin. He moves his eyes from the sight for one moment, one glare, before resetting.

"Why hasn't he moved?"

He glances at her again, lifts his chin and sets the musket aside, gestures for her to do the same. He pulls her over to him and ignores her yelp, makes her look through his embrasure. All she sees is dust and dust and dust. "The drop off. He has to debate whether he needs the cannons to finish the town. It'll take as many men to get them up and over that shelf as to take us down."

She looks back towards their feet, sees Marta spooning up soup for someone—Marisa, maybe. So little Mateo in her arms. "Will he kill everyone?"

"Just combatants and gachupinos."

"So everyone."

He sighs. "Yep."

200 men are marching up towards Montoya's ruins. Grisham calls the number back, puts a powder twist between his teeth. "Wouldn't mind having your Brit around for this. Damn good shot."

200 men are marching up around Montoya's ruins. "Don't."

200 men are swirling around the fountain and stomping adobe brick into more ginger dust that will coat the inside of her throat and her lungs and the whole wide world— "Where'd he go, anyway?"

Focus. Focus. Focus. Pay attention, stay alive. "Home."

Grisham grunts. 200 men fall into a long box that stretches across the back of the church. 10 men ride up behind them. "No loss. Well. Except for the shot."

"Shut up and shoot, Grisham."

She can recognize Bouchard because he rides the white horse. And once she figures that out, it's all she can focus on. He reminds her of Napoleon. Maybe just because he's French.

Bouchard rides up close—close enough for someone with a steady aim and a good gun to kill him. He's flanked by two riders. No one takes the shot. "Coronel Luis Ramirez Montoya!" He's read the name off a piece of paper, she sees. It makes everything seem so… fruitless. Helpless. Less. "You are ordered by la Republica Argentina to stand down and hand over all europeo inhabitants of Santa Helena. If you refuse to comply with these orders, we will be forced to open fire."

Montoya is gachupin. So is Gaspar. And Vera and Marisa and technically Marta, too. Bouchard will make them kneel. Will he decapitate them? The Terror wasn't so very long ago. Maybe it will be a bullet to the brain. But bullets are precious commodities. Maybe he will hang them all.

Tio had told her, once, that Mama had planned to go back to Spain while pregnant, but the war with the British and all the ships sinking into the sea… She is criolla and she can't, for the life of her, understand why.

Grisham is suddenly scrambling backwards, sliding on his belly to the ladder. The goddamn coward. Coward. "Grisham! You bastard, what the hell—"

He jabs a finger forward. "Corney!" he hisses, and is down the ladder.

She looks out harder, the handkerchief pressing into her slightly open mouth. And there he is. Peter, sweet, handsome Peter who'd bought her dinner and danced like a gentleman soldier should.

She has a shot. Bouchard and Corney and whoever the third man is—and it would just make her day if she knew him, too—are waiting for a reply, for the gates to open and a flood of victims to come rushing gratefully out. She has a shot.

There's a tug on her foot. "Come down," Grisham whispers.

"I have a shot," she whispers back.

It tempts him, too, she can see it, but he shakes his head. "Orders. Let's go."

The corporal of whom she is inordinately fond is there, waiting next to Montoya. "Lima, tell her."

He faces her, nods somewhat deferentially. "They're positioned just out of our firing range. 70 meters. We can shoot but it'll be useless."

"So they can't hit us, either?"

Grisham shakes his head. "Last reports on him said he'd hired British mercenaries. Riflemen." She doesn't understand. "They have rifles and are well trained to use them. If you or I stand up right there," and he points to their banquette, "they can shoot us in the chest. If they're very good, in the face."

The sun is shining. How… wrong. "What do we do?"

Montoya looks up at the sun. He must be thinking the same thing she is. "Blow up the church."

Or he's waiting for the lightning bolt. "Right." Padre Quintero. "No."

"The padre will be your excuse, should you be caught."

God.

Lima doesn't raise his eyes when she asks the question and Grisham won't stop laughing. Montoya sneers at the expletives and she wishes she could just punch him the face.

They're settling now-sometimes she really can't deal with men-and Lima's whispering. "He was-the idea was for the anniversary. Of Morelos's execution. To… to attack. He started stockpiling powder for our guns. There are muskets in there, too. A few."

She isn't quite following because Lima is speaking blasphemy. "Padre Romero… was stocking weapons… in the church… to stage a revolution."

Lima nods. "He-he was trying to coordinate with Las Llomas."

She closes her eyes and thinks of the angels, wonders what this means for their existence. She knows better than to zero in on "our guns" or the glaring obviousness of why Lima knows these things. "All right. By the grace of God, there is enough powder in the church to blow it up." She throws a finger out towards the 200 hostiles. "How do we get there?"

It's almost dark enough for them to move; Bouchard's men have simply dug in where they are, rifles across their laps as they circle around small fires. Grisham cleans his gun for the 14th time and Montoya clears his throat. "Now, Senorita, you see why it is important that I have a cannon."

She can't believe he has the audacity to bring this up now. "So you can fire on Bouchard, and Bouchard can fire on you, and everyone can die? Yes, sounds crucial to me." Grisham snorts, then coughs to cover it up. Montoya sneers at him, and how bad is it? "Tell you what. We both live through this, and I'll get you one for your birthday."

Even Lima laughs, now, and she understands that they're all going to die.