The law weighed both, as the law is meant to, and what followed for Soledad was neither the ruin Matías had promised her nor an escape she had not earned, but something in between and more honest than either — an accounting proportionate to a woman who had done real harm under real duress, and had, at the last, chosen the light over the fear.

Inmaculada visited her once, afterward, and did not offer forgiveness she did not yet feel, but offered something she thought might matter more.

“You told the truth when it cost you everything to tell it,” she said.

“That is not nothing.

Build the rest of your life on that.”

Chapter 21 — Sealing the Dark

The tunnels were the next thing.

Inmaculada would not have them merely bricked up again — bricked up was how they had lain forgotten for a century until a desperate man found them.