Before the Birds Return

Santiago de Compostela · January 12, 2026

The woman in the red coat was crying when Valeria de Armenta crossed the square.

She stood beside a backpack with a broken strap, looking up at the cathedral as though someone had arrived at a window. Rain silvered her face. Around her the other pilgrims were taking photographs, embracing, discovering that the last few steps of a very long journey required somewhere to put one's hands. A man knelt to retie a boot. Two women shared an orange beneath a black umbrella, passing the pieces without looking at each other.

Valeria slowed. The woman in red pressed both palms against her eyes, then laughed at something her companion said.

It was nine in the morning. The stone beneath Valeria's shoes held the color of wet ash. Above her, the towers climbed out of their own reflected outlines, successive ledges and figures losing definition in the low cloud. She had grown up with this building at the edge of ordinary errands. Her father had bought shoe polish nearby. She had once come through the square with blood on her sleeve after falling off a bicycle. Knowing a place that way did not protect her from the sight of someone meeting it for the first time.

Her phone vibrated.

Leandro: You are late.

She checked the time.

You are early, she wrote.

An achievement you should encourage.

He was waiting inside the appointed entrance, holding two paper cups. His dark hair was damp at the temples. He wore the expression that had persuaded three customs officials, a furious widow, and once Valeria herself that circumstances had become inconvenient through no fault of his own.

“No sugar,” he said, offering a cup. “And I watched him make it, so you can stop looking inside.”

She had been looking inside.

“I was checking the temperature.”

“Of course.”

He had bought the coffee from the place she liked, farther from the square than the place he liked. She noticed. It was one of the difficulties of working with Leandro Salvatierra: his consideration was usually real. It could survive alongside things she would be wiser to remember.

“Have you spoken to Aurelio?”

“Only to assure him that your alarming punctuality has not become a medical condition.”

“Then you haven't discussed the limits of the authorization.”