Lost City of Gold

by Rai Aren

  CHAPTER

  13

  Rick screamed, struggling to get away, but his captors held him firm.

  The huge green anaconda lunged at Rick. Just as it did, his captors let him go. As the anaconda struck him full force, he fell hard to the ground, his hands and feet still bound. He felt a sharp pain in his hip and heard a snap. The anaconda tried to sink its teeth into his neck, but he jerked his head to protect it. The creature’s teeth sank deeply into his shoulder instead, holding him firmly as its powerful body wrapped around his, all the way down to his ankles.

  He screamed as he felt the mighty squeeze of the anaconda’s muscles overpower him. The pain in his hip was excruciating, but he tried to ignore it, or he knew he’d be dead within minutes. He tried rolling around as he struggled to breathe against the crushing embrace of the giant snake, trying to dislodge it, noticing in horror how those around him simply watched in grotesque fascination.

  The anaconda lifted its head. Rick screamed in pain as the rows of teeth dislodged from his shoulder, and it moved to wrap itself around his neck, all the while trying to crush his body. The creature moved fluidly with deadly purpose.

  Just before the large predator went in for the kill, it hissed again, and then locked eyes with him, holding his gaze. Rick, wide-eyed with terror, found he could utter no response. Tears spilled down his cheeks. Then, he felt the snake’s body quiver for a moment. It squeezed him once more, not quite as forcefully this time, then let go.

  Rick gasped for breath and shook violently as his body was flooded with adrenaline from the life and death fight. His mind raced to make sense of things, to process what damage had been done to his body. His shoulder throbbed in pain, bleeding badly. His lungs felt as though they were going to explode. Every nerve ending in his body screamed in hot fire. He looked to the side and saw the giant green snake slither away, glistening in the torchlight, heading out of the main temple entrance. The chanting started up again as the creature made its way down the temple steps. Rick tried to move, but passed out.

  * * *

  Sometime later, Rick started to wake. He had been taken to a small building set aside for medical purposes, not far from the main temple. He had been placed on a soft cot, with a pillow under his head and thick brown and orange woven blanket covering him. His body felt like it was on fire. The pain was shooting everywhere. He was drenched in sweat and was breathing heavily. He groaned. Then, he felt the welcoming touch of a cool cloth on his forehead and a gentle hand on his chest.

  “Rest,” the woman said. “Breathe.”

  He nodded. He did what she said, trying to calm the panic he felt inside. The images of the anaconda attack came rushing back to him. He couldn’t help it, tears streamed down his face.

  Then, he heard a familiar voice.

  “You live, gringo,” Sergio said, standing at Rick’s bedside. “It is a miracle.”

  The woman took her leave.

  Rick opened his eyes, embarrassed to be caught in such a vulnerable moment. He nodded, then closed his eyes again. His lips quivered as he tried to quell his emotions. “So, was that the test, to see if that thing would kill me or not?”

  Sergio looked him over, sizing up Rick’s condition. He was not the same man he had met in the bar that fateful day, that was apparent. The barest hint of a smile traced Sergio’s lips. The jungle had a way of putting a man in his place, especially this jungle. “Yes, that was the test.”

  “You expected it to kill me,” Rick said.

  Sergio didn’t answer.

  He didn’t have to. Rick knew.

  Sergio waited.

  Rick sighed heavily, trying to fight the tears that fell. He was confused and deeply traumatized by the experience. “I don’t even understand what happened in there. Is...is the boy dead?” he asked, glancing up at Sergio.

  Sergio regarded him for a moment, not sure of what he wanted to tell him.

  “He is then,” Rick said, looking away.

  “Not exactly.”

  Rick looked back up. “Not exactly?” He frowned. “What does that mean?”

  Sergio had a slight smile on his face. He took a seat in a chair next to the bed and leaned forward, placing his elbows on his knees. “I told you this was a place of enlightenment...and transformation. To be selected for the transformation ritual is our greatest honor.”

  Rick inhaled sharply. He thought for a moment, going over what had happened in his head. The whole experience was all so horrifying to him. “Transformation? That’s what I witnessed? How is that even possible?” He shook his head, unable to accept it. “No...no way...”

  Sergio held up his hand. “I know you people in the so-called first world think you know everything, but you don’t. Not even close.” His expression was hard.

  Rick bit his lip, searching Sergio’s face for hints of deception. He found none, only traces of anger. He shifted uncomfortably, trying to process what he was hearing. Pain shot up through his legs and back. He winced. He wished more than anything that he had never set out on this nightmarish quest.

  Sergio got up to leave. “I should let you rest.”

  “Wait,” Rick said, trying to sit up a bit. He gasped, suffering another bolt of pain, this time in his hip. “Don’t go please.”

  Sergio stood for a moment, then sat back down. “I know this is all difficult to understand, but there is much more to the world than you have ever realized.”

  Rick nodded. “I guess so...” He felt very shaky.

  Sergio leaned back in his chair.

  Rick recalled the events in the temple, trying to piece all the bizarre and macabre ritual elements together. There was something he needed to know. “When it attacked me, why didn’t it...” Rick started to ask, but his voice cracked.

  “I don’t know why he spared your life,” Sergio stated, trying to mask his disappointment out of a sliver of compassion for the man that lay before him.

  Rick swallowed hard. He knew he should just be happy to be alive, but he couldn’t shake the sense of unease, of fear, that lingered. He would never forget how close he came to death. How it felt. He squeezed his eyes closed, fighting back tears.

  Sergio saw his struggle and decided to continue. “It has happened on occasion. We think that something in their animal form responds to the person in a different way than they did before their transformation.” He paused, thinking of how to explain it.

  Rick opened his eyes, wiping away the wetness with the back of his hand.

  Sergio held his hands out. “It’s as though something primal in them first attacks, but then maybe the human part, or the hybrid soul, senses something in the person. It appears they make the choice to let the person live. It is a mystery to us.”

  Rick reflected on that for a few moments. “And the jaguar I saw tonight...?” he started to ask, trembling with emotion and pain.

  “Yes,” Sergio answered. “And the black one who briefly trailed us on the journey here.” He cocked his head. “Three times you have escaped death. I wonder how many chances you have left?”

  Rick cast his eyes down. He didn’t know what to say to that, to any of it. It was all too much for him to comprehend. Everything he had seen and learned about this place shook him to his very core. The world was no longer the same place to him. It never would be again. Then, he thought of something else he wanted to know.

  “Do those selected for the ritual hunt and kill their own animal?” Rick asked.

  Sergio laughed bitterly. His face filled with scorn. “You think so little of us? You think we are so primitive, still? After all you have witnessed?”

  “I-I don’t understand,” Rick said, as he tried to lift his head. The pain sparked everywhere as he did and he felt weak. His head spun, and dropped back down on his pillow. He took a few deep breaths. “I meant no disrespect. I just wanted to know...”

  “Savages kill animals for ritual purposes. We only take animals that have already lived their lives in full here, and whose bodies and spirit tr
aces are left behind.”

  “You find dead animals to use?” Rick asked.

  Sergio scoffed at him. “You put it so crudely, so indelicately, with so little understanding of the world around you,” he said. He stomped his foot on the floor. “Your ignorance shows itself, once again.”

  “Sorry,” Rick said, his voice hushed. His head was pounding and the pain was gripping him. He was in no shape to argue or debate anything. “Please tell me then...in your own words. I want to know, to understand.”

  Sergio glared at him for a moment longer, then huffed. “As I was saying, the animals we bring into our rituals have died naturally and left their remains behind for one of us to find before the jungle claims them. We interpret this as the animal giving its life over to us once it has completed its own journey.”

  Rick listened quietly, captivated by what he was hearing.

  Sergio’s face softened slightly as he shared this deep philosophical belief. “We believe that when we find the animal this way, and only this way, when it has died naturally and not through any kind of violence, that a trace of its eternal spirit remains, that it chose to gift itself to us for this purpose, that it stayed behind for us to find it.”

  Rick waited for him to continue, trying to absorb what Sergio was saying.

  Sergio bowed his head and closed his eyes, clasping his hands together. “We connect to that trace spirit through the ritual. Through it, the animal and the person both become more than they were before, through this unifying process. Each lives on, entwined with the other.”

  “Incredible...” Rick whispered. “I have never heard of anything so...beautiful.” He was mystified.

  Sergio opened his eyes, nodding.

  “What do you call this place?” Rick asked.

  Sergio hesitated for a moment, deciding whether to answer. “Templo del Renacimiento,” he admitted finally, “in the Ciudad de las Almas.”

  ‘Temple of Rebirth,’ Rick translated in his head, ‘in the City of Souls.’ He looked over at Sergio. “This is all so...overwhelming.”

  Sergio abruptly stood up. “You will remain here until you are healed and well enough to continue your duties. I understand that you have sustained quite serious injuries. Your duties will be thusly reduced once you are released.” He made to leave.

  “Don’t go...I still have so many questions, about how the ritual works, how the actual transformation happens...” Rick started to say.

  Sergio turned back to him. “There are secrets we will keep,” he said, his voice laced with warning. “Some things we will not share. Be warned.”

  CHAPTER

  14

  Six months later, as Rick had finished up his work for the day he walked over to the edge of a small creek that ran through one side of the city, a slight limp one of the permanent souvenirs of his encounter with the transformed anaconda.

  His dislocated hip and injured shoulder where he had been bitten had never healed properly, and he had suffered some nerve damage in his left leg.

  Sergio and his people had tried to treat his wounds, and had let him convalesce for a while in the rough, scantily equipped medical building, but in the jungle, there was only so much that could be done.

  And they had refused to let him leave the city. They were steadfast in their position that he remain imprisoned and continue to work for them, albeit at a reduced pace due to his injuries.

  He was given some small privileges, a bit more freedom of movement and participation in their life around mealtimes and other ceremonial functions, but nothing more. No pity was given for his ordeal. None was expected any longer.

  Rick had frequent nightmares about his near-death experience. He often awoke in a cold sweat, gripped by a sense of sheer panic. The horrifying memory of a powerful weight pressing down on him, trying to smother him that haunted his sleep was so real. It had taken a bad toll on him. He was constantly nervous and on edge, due to lack of sleep and what he figured was PTSD. While he worked his shifts, he was often startled by small sounds, thinking the snake had returned to finish what it started.

  Matters had been made worse when he was taken to witness a second transformation ritual that had been performed under another full moon. This time, it had been an older man, tall and with a thick build. Rick had been taken up to the temple against his will to witness this transformation. Being back in the temple was overwhelming and nearly too much for him to cope with, but they insisted that while he was with them, he would bear witness to their ‘miraculous transformation events’. They said that since his life had been spared during such an event, the jungle spirits had ordained it that he be a part of the rituals going forward.

  Rick suspected they just hoped one of the future hybrid creatures would finish him off; that one of the animals would sense him as a threat and an intruder and do away with him once and for all.

  To his great horror, this night the man took the form of a giant black caiman. The ritual was still incredibly frightening for him, in spite of how Sergio had explained it.

  The massive supernatural beast had marched purposefully out of the temple, stopping to take note of Rick with its beady eyes, completely unnerving him. But it carried on down the temple steps, its powerful body to be swallowed by the night and embraced by the jungle to begin its life anew.

  Rick was haunted by these experiences, first with the jaguars, then nearly losing his life to the preternatural anaconda, and then gazing into the eyes of the transformed black caiman. All borne of some kind of jungle witchcraft. All with a deep-seated intelligence firing their wild being, sent out to have an unknown impact on the world around them. It made his skin crawl. Nothing felt safe or certain any longer.

  He had no idea how many of these creatures were out there or what they may do in the future. He wanted to know how any of this was possible, how it had started, how long it had been going on, but they wouldn’t tell him anything more.

  They only said that it was a privilege to be given the chance to change and to live a new and entirely different life, to see through different eyes and interact with the world in a new way. To them it meant experiencing true freedom and pureness of being. Rick had also learned it was a one-way ticket. Once a person made the choice to be transformed, there was no going back.

  Though a tiny bit intrigued by the possibility, he had trouble fathoming how one could leave their natural, human life behind so completely and take on what amounted to an alien existence, knowing they could never come back. He had dwelled on these thoughts for hours on end.

  Rick sat down stiffly on a rock, feeling dejected. His hands were rough from his toil and he had lost weight. At least twenty-five pounds he figured, maybe more. There was never enough rest from his labors or the things that haunted his mind. He knew it wouldn’t change. They would just wear him down until there was nothing left, or until some disease or other jungle encounter got him.

  He thought back to what Sergio had said about how many more times he could cheat death. He didn’t feel lucky.

  He sighed. His shoulders slumped. The situation seemed hopeless to him. He felt like he had aged about fifteen years. His hair and beard were long and scraggly and he didn’t remember what a decent shower or bath was like. He had grown used to his unkempt state. No one else cared either.

  He shifted uncomfortably. Overhead, he was startled by a flock of macaws taking flight. He looked up, shielding his eyes from the sun, watching the colorful forms of the birds soar across the sky. Free. Not like him. He wished he could be like one of those birds, spread his wings and fly away to freedom. But he couldn’t. And even if they ever let him partake of a transformation ritual, which he knew they wouldn’t since they all but despised him still, he would never agree to it. He liked his human form and his former human life and he wanted it back. At least, as much of it as he could find.

  He thought for a moment. His mind had the spark of an idea. Could it work? Was he delusional? He thought harder. Maybe it could work. But he’d have to be pati
ent. He’d have to be careful. With what he had witnessed in the temple, he couldn’t be sure of what was real any longer. He’d never see the world the same way again, that was certain.

  Over the next few days, he had begun working on his plan. Each workday was the same, performing maintenance and cleaning on both the ancient and newer structures. He kept a careful eye on his captors, memorizing their movements, their daily routines of smoke and bathroom breaks. He could tell they had relaxed around him since they had given him a bit more freedom of movement as a result of his injuries. That was good for him. The more relaxed they got, and the more docile and weak he seemed, meant their guard would be lowered a little bit more every day.

  Rick made a point of seeming defeated and beaten, which wasn’t too hard since it was damn close to the truth. However, he still had the tiniest fire of defiance left in him, in spite of the constant pressing anxiety he felt. The only semblance of his former brash self. ‘Maybe that was their intended punishment after all,’ he thought. ‘To break you if you tried to peer into places where you didn’t belong.’

  * * *

  Over the course of a few weeks, with his slightly extended freedoms, he had managed to steal a set of clothes, boots, a small shoulder pack, a jacket, a hat, and an extra canteen - items that had belonged to a few of the guards. He tried to spread out his thefts, so they wouldn’t be noticed. He had also cobbled together some food, rationed from his own meals. If only he could get his hands on a weapon, but those weren’t left lying around.

  Rick bided his time, waiting for the right opportunity. Then it came. He was once again assigned to start clearing an area out back, to prepare it for waste disposal. He knew it would take him several days to complete, and they knew he couldn’t work fast with his injuries. He smuggled out the stolen supplies one by one, and hid them in the jungle underbrush, just beyond the edge of the clearing.

  He was always skittish, fearful. Wondering if something else out there in the jungle watched him and what it was, if it were natural or unnatural. In spite of some of the beautiful aspects of what Sergio had told him about the transformations, he resented feeling this way, so uncertain of everything, so afraid. He hated what they had done to him.