by Lani Forbes
“Excellent idea, my prince.” The priest led the way toward the dark mountains in the distance.
The moment everyone’s backs were turned, Ochix lifted her bound hands and pressed a fleeting kiss across her fingers. “Let me know if the gag is bothering you at all. I’ll adjust it.”
Yemania nodded. Though it wasn’t her bound wrists that bothered her most now. It was the nervous fluttering in her stomach.
She was going to Miquitz.
Chapter
43
Mayana couldn’t tell Ahkin her plan in case the lords of Xibalba were listening. She couldn’t give away her one advantage.
She patted her leg for Ona to follow her. The dog perked its ears, eager to help.
She began to slowly walk between the hundreds of statues, Ona at her heels, passing horrific figure after horrific figure. They were so lifelike. She couldn’t even stand to look at Ahaltocob. He had been one of her greatest fears, a clawed demon that lurked in unclean areas of a house. As a child, Mayana frantically cleaned her room in the stone palace of Atl, convinced that any little pile of dirt would summon the Stabbing Demon, who loved filth.
There were dozens of statues of Cizin, each indistinguishable in appearance. The details were grotesquely exquisite, from the identical spots of decay scattered across his mottled skin to the protruding ribcage. Each headpiece of dark-gray feathers had two large wooden eyes like an owl. Visually, they were all identical.
But Mayana wasn’t studying them for their appearances. She carefully approached each one, inspecting as if she was, but in reality, she was getting close enough to smell them. Ona had a much better nose than she did, and she watched him carefully for signs. Four, five. Eventually ten, eleven, twelve. She pretended to inspect each Cizin statue, waiting for Ona to detect the one difference that would mark the true Cizin—his stench. He was known as the Fetid One for a reason, and she doubted it was something he would be able to hide completely.
Finally, after at least thirty different statues, she and Ona approached one along the edge of the group that made Ona take a step back. The dog’s nose scrunched in discomfort, and as they got closer, even Mayana could smell it—an unpleasant odor of sulfur and rotting meat. She inspected the statue as she had all the others, and this time she had no doubt. The stench was subtle, as though the Lord of Death was attempting to mask it but could not eliminate it entirely. Plus, something about this one felt right. She couldn’t exactly put it into words, but she knew all the way down to her toes that this was him.
She turned to find Ahkin, a smile spreading across her face. “I found him.”
Ahkin came to stand beside her. “You’re sure?” His eyes raked up and down the statue. “It looks exactly like all the others to me.”
“I’m positive.”
Ahkin took a deep breath. “All right. Xic, we have made our choice.”
The Winged One flapped down beside them, his wings beating the air like drums. He turned his wolfish face toward them. “You are confident in your choice?”
“Yes,” Mayana breathed.
“Should I remind you what will happen if you choose wrong?”
Ahkin widened his eyes in fear, as though to ask, Are you absolutely sure?
“He’s trying to make you doubt my decision,” Mayana hissed at him. “I know my choice. I am literally betting my life on it. Can you?”
Ahkin chewed his lower lip, gaze darting from the statue, to Xic, back to her. Mayana kept her face straight and confident. Together. This decision to trust her had to come from him.
He fixed his hardened gaze upon Xic. “That is our choice.”
“Very well,” Xic wheezed.
There was a crashing sound as one of the statues beside them collapsed into rubble. Mayana jumped and screamed. Then another crash, and another, and another. Ahkin flinched with each crash, his arms protectively encircling her. The deafening sound of collapsing statues filled the council chamber, until Mayana, Ahkin, and Ona were covered in dust. Xic flapped his wings harder and a great wind swept through the hall, surrounding them in swirling cyclones of dust and shards of clay. Mayana clutched Ahkin’s arms, digging her face into his chest and squeezing her eyes shut. Finally, it was silent. The winds died completely.
When Mayana lifted her head and looked around, they were no longer standing in a sea of statues, but in the center of a circle of twelve thrones. Each throne was comprised of the same materials some of the statues had been sitting in: mud, excrement, bones, teeth, and even one that looked to be covered in human flesh. Seated upon them were the living, breathing forms of the eleven lords of Xibalba. They were even more terrifying to behold alive and moving than they were frozen as statues. The largest of the twelve thrones, a massive chair of jade bones and skulls, remained empty. The statue beside them, the last one standing, the statue they had declared was the real Cizin, suddenly dropped its jaw. Life flickered within the lidless sockets as bloodshot eyeballs rolled forward to face them.
The skull-like face of Cizin, Lord of Death, smiled at them.
“You have chosen well, humans. Unfortunately for me, we will not devour you today. You will be allowed to safely venture back to the land of the living.” His voice was not what Mayana expected from a figure so skeletal and thin. His voice boomed deep with power and authority, how Mayana imagined a mountain itself might sound if it had a voice.
Mayana’s legs wobbled and she almost collapsed to her knees in gratitude. Beside her, Ahkin released a long breath he had apparently been holding. He squeezed her tighter.
“Just like that? We are allowed to go?” Mayana wanted to elbow him in the ribs for questioning their permission to leave.
Cizin slowly paced toward his jade-bone throne, settling onto it while a gray owl three times larger than any she had seen in the jungles settled on his backrest. “You have proved your worth. You can choose to stay if you wish, or you may take the tunnel passageway through the mountain of fire back into the overworld. But if were you, I would not linger. You have very little time before the passageway closes.”
“Thank you, Lord of Death.” Ahkin bowed his head.
“You are welcome, prince of light. I am curious to see if you have the strength to face what lies ahead of you, should you choose to return home.”
Ahkin stiffened. “What do you mean?”
The Lord of Death ignored him. “Daughter of water, I can see there is something you still wish to ask me? I can sense the question hovering on your tongue like an arrow waiting to be loosed. You better ask quickly, as your window to escape my realm quickly closes.”
Mayana swallowed and took a step forward. “Lord of Death, we do not come only to pass through to the overworld. We have a very specific request to ask on behalf of the great creator Ometeotl.”
Cizin’s bloodshot eyes seemed to go redder, and every eyeball hanging around his neck swiveled to look at her. His skeletal fingers tightened on the armrests of his jade throne. “You ask for more than your freedom?” His voice remained even, but Mayana could sense the ire hiding just below the surface. They had insulted him by daring to ask for more beyond their lives.
“Ometeotl has sent us to request the bones of her son, the god Quetzalcoatl. He sacrificed himself to bring about the Age of the Seventh—”
“I know who he is!” Cizin boomed, rising to his bony feet.
Mayana flinched back, praying to the Mother to protect them from his fury.
He cocked his skull head to the side, considering them. “The jade bones of Quetzalcoatl are my most prized possession, daughter of water. They represent my conquest over the favored son of our mother, the foolish wind god who sought to humiliate me by stealing the bones of humanity after I claimed them. The sixth sun had been destroyed by great storms, and the souls that perished belonged to me.”
Mayana tried to explain. “I’m sorry. We don’t want to ins
ult your generosity. We are merely doing as the Mother—”
“I will give you the bones of Quetzalcoatl, daughter of water,” he interrupted.
“Y—you will?” Mayana blinked in wonder at the putrid Lord of Death. Hope blossomed within her. Perhaps he was more benevolent than the legends claimed.
“In exchange.” He rapped his fingers against his throne, seeming satisfied with his idea. Several of the lords hooted with glee, their excitement rising.
Mayana’s hope withered like a fragile flower. “In exchange for what?”
“You are asking me to make a great sacrifice. In order to grant your request, I must lose my greatest treasure.”
Mayana waited, her pulse pounding in her ears and fear tingling in her stomach.
He leaned forward. “I will give you the bones you seek in exchange for the bones you carry in that little bag of yours. The bones of your mother.”
The other lords around them cackled and howled.
A rushing sound filled Mayana’s ears as sour bile coated her tongue. Their laughter felt like a weight pressing down on her chest. She wanted to collapse underneath it.
“No.” She lifted the bag and hugged it to her chest. The bones of her mother. The last hope she had to ever see her again. “No. Anything but that.”
Cizin sat back in his throne, laughing cruelly along with his deadly companions. “You have my price, daughter of water. Now the decision is yours. And I advise you choose carefully and quickly. More than you realize hangs in the balance. The foolish daughter of light brings the next apocalypse upon us, and I look forward to flooding my lands with the souls of your people.”
Mayana’s head snapped up. The hollow feeling inside of her deepened. Her choice?
Before your journey ends, you will have to make a choice that will destroy your world or mine.
The Mother goddess had spoken those words to her on the beach a lifetime ago. Had it really been only five days?
This was that choice. Mayana knew it as certainly as she knew which statue had been the true Cizin. If she didn’t give up her mother’s bones, Ometeotl would never get the bones of her son, destroying whatever plans she had for them. But if Mayana did give up her mother’s bones, then it was Mayana’s world that was destroyed. She’d have to give up the chance to ever see her mother again. It was an impossible choice.
And she raged against it.
“Mayana?” Ahkin’s voice said, but it sounded distant and far away as she spiraled into herself.
An anger unlike any she had ever felt before burned inside her chest until she thought the flames might consume her entirely. She had known. The Mother goddess had known that Mayana would have to make this choice. Which also meant, she gave her that doll on purpose. She made sure Mayana had what she needed to retrieve the bones of her mother. Not as a reward, not as a gift, but as the payment to get what the goddess really wanted. How could the Mother goddess have done this to her? Had she even considered what something like this would do to Mayana’s heart? Did Ometeotl even care?
Mayana’s anger consumed her until her eyes themselves burned, burned with tears that now traced their way down her blazing cheeks. Mayana wanted to turn her face to the heavens above and scream her rage at the sky.
She had a chance to bring her mother back—the mother that never should have been taken away in the first place. Ometeotl hadn’t protected her. It was her fault she had even died! This gift was supposed to right that grave wrong. And now, Mayana couldn’t believe she had been foolish enough to think the Mother goddess had given her such a miraculous gift. Of course not. Her mother’s bones were to be used to serve the greater purpose, just as Mayana herself was being used as a servant running errands for Ometeotl.
Did the goddess even love her at all? Were her own dreams and desires pointless compared to whatever greater plan the creator was orchestrating?
Mayana hugged the bag against her chest even tighter, sobbing harder than she’d ever sobbed in her life. She sank down to her knees and cradled the bag, not unlike her mother had cradled her as a child. She rocked back and forth, releasing her agony at having to say goodbye to her mother again.
The lords of Xibalba laughed and relished her pain, which seemed to drive the obsidian knife even deeper into her back. Curse all of these gods. These beings that sought to torture humans for their own pleasure. Or worse, pretend they love them, only to use them to serve their own selfish purposes.
Selfish. Selfish. Selfish. Wasn’t that what the voices had whispered in her ears in the freezing waters of the final river? That she herself was selfish? Unwilling to submit and trust the will of the gods? It was the same whisper she’d heard in her ears from her family. Selfish for not wanting to follow the rituals. Selfish for caring more about her own heart than the lives of the people in their empire.
She turned her gaze to Ahkin. The prince of light had collapsed onto his knees beside her, palms open and pleading and exposed to her. An invitation to let him help.
“What do I do, Ahkin?” she sobbed.
“I can’t make that decision for you. It’s your choice to make, not mine. I know that I trust the Mother goddess. Whatever reason she has for bringing us here, it is for our own good. Even if I can’t see what that good is yet.”
She took in his handsome face, his beautiful dark eyes turned down in concern. He always trusted the gods so blindly, so devoutly. To the point of doing nothing while his mother stabbed herself in the chest. He had faith. A faith that she obviously lacked. His faith had been misguided, placed in the rituals instead of the gods themselves, but he had a conviction that was admirable. A dedication that she had never been able to muster herself.
Could there be a greater purpose Mayana could not see yet? Even if she didn’t entirely believe that, could she believe it enough?
Mayana thought back to all the times she had questioned the Mother’s will over the course of their journey through Xibalba. How everything had come together for a purpose. The doll, the worm, even Ona. Everything the Mother had given them served an important role in getting them here, even when Mayana could not see their purpose beforehand. She and Ahkin were dualities, gifts to each other, teaching and challenging the other’s deepest weaknesses. Ahkin needed to let go of his twisted sense of responsibility. But what did she need to learn? What had he been meant to teach her? Faith? Trust?
Ona slinked up to her and ran his tongue along the side of her face, licking up her tears as he did so. He curled up against her, looking up at her with doleful eyes. The Mother could have sent any dog to help them, but she had sent Ona. Mayana’s dearest friend. She knew it would be an encouragement, a gift. She had to trust that the Mother goddess loved her, even if half of her heart raged against that choice. There was no time left. They needed to leave now.
Before your journey ends, you will have to make a choice that will destroy your world or mine.
“I’ve made my choice,” Mayana said, rising to her feet once more.
Chapter
44
Ahkin watched as Mayana forced herself back to her feet. He could not imagine the magnitude of the choice she was about to make. To give up the bones of her mother to save the bones of Quetzalcoatl. It was brutal. Cruel. But he did believe the Mother had a reason. He couldn’t explain how he knew, but he did.
He also knew that Mayana would make the right choice, whatever that was. The Mother goddess had faith in her. And so did he.
She tilted her chin in the air, a small act of defiance and pride that Ahkin couldn’t help but admire her for. Stubborn and passionate until the end. How he loved that about her. “I will make the trade.”
The wolf-headed Xic howled from his throne made of teeth, while the other lords of pain and suffering guffawed and stomped their grotesque feet or claws against the tiled floor of the council room.
“Very well,” boomed Cizin. The ske
letal demon was truly a monster for doing this to her. Ahkin wished there was some way to rip that mottled flesh right off his bones. “Keep your thoughts respectful, prince of light, or perhaps I will not let you leave so easily.”
Ahkin bit his lip to keep from responding.
Mayana marched forward and held out her bag to the Lord of Death. He took it in his pincerlike grip and opened the flap. With a snap of his fingers, the bones within the bag rose, floating and hovering like white birds. The bones then flew, whirling around Mayana in a taunt that made her slam her eyes shut to stop from seeing them.
More howling laughter from the lords of Xibalba.
Finally, Cizin snapped again, and her mother’s bones flew to join those that comprised his throne—the bones that were his most cherished possessions. The white bones melded with the jade, making the throne now look as mottled in color as his rotting skin.
“The Lord of Death keeps his promises,” he said. He snapped a third time and several of the jade bones ripped themselves off his throne with a sickly crunch, hovering in the air like jade birds instead of white. He pointed to her bag, where the jade bones settled into their new home. “You now have the jade bones you asked for, daughter of water. Are there any other deals to be struck, or are we finished?”
Mayana made a sobbing sound, but kept her chin held high. “We are finished.”
He dismissed them with a wave of his hand. “Very well. My wife, Ixtab, will show you to the passageway home. I advise you to hurry.” But something about his grotesque smile unsettled Ahkin’s stomach. It shouldn’t be this simple. Not that Mayana sacrificing the bones of her mother had been simple . . .
From beside Cizin rose a terrifying figure that Ahkin had not focused his attention on before. The woman was incredibly beautiful. Her long, flowing white skirt fell to the floor, exposing her thighs along the sides. Her ebony-black hair was plaited down her back with golden ribbons. Ahkin averted his gaze from her uncovered chest to the white paint that covered her beautiful face, with black lines of paint arcing out from her mouth and surrounding her eyes. But what was most disturbing of all was the length of black rope that looped around her neck and dangled into her hands, wrapping around her arms like snakes. A noose, he realized. Ixtab was the deadly Lady of Suicide and Sacrifice.