The End of the World Club

by J; P Voelkel

  Max felt insulted on behalf of the long-dead Rodrigo. “If you thought he was so ugly, why did you marry him?” he asked.

  “Oh, Rodrigo, I do believe you are flirting with me!” She gave a girlish giggle. “You know I have loved you from the day we first met! I am so happy to see you again. Oh, this is such good news.”

  “Good news, indeed, dear lady,” said Lord 6-Dog. “May I have a private word with … er … with your beloved?”

  She nodded her consent, her movements slow and frail. Lord 6-Dog pulled Max to one side.

  “Did you see her throat, young lord?”

  “What about it?”

  “She is wearing the Yellow Jaguar.”

  “What? How?”

  “As a necklet.”

  Max snuck a glance at the old woman’s sinewy neck and saw that it was indeed encircled by dusty yellow beads.

  “Is that allowed?” he whispered. “A Jaguar Stone made into jewelry?”

  “Thou must persuade her to relinquish it.”

  “Why would she give me her bling?”

  “She thinks thou art Rodrigo de Pizarro. Play along!”

  “I’m not even Spanish.”

  “Wert thy ancestors not Pizarros?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Hast a Landa not sworn to kill thee?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Play along! But be careful. Remember, thou canst not tell a lie.…”

  Max turned back to the mad old woman.

  “Dear Rodrigo,” she crooned. “Now, at last, our story will have a happy ending.”

  “Will you tell me our story again?” he asked her.

  She patted the arm of her chair for him to sit next to her.

  “I have relived it a thousand, thousand times,” she said.

  She clapped her hands almost noiselessly.

  Lord 6-Dog’s torch sputtered and went out.

  For a few seconds they were plunged into total blackness, and Max’s only sensation was of her skeletal fingers entwining with his. Just when he thought he might scream, a pale yellow glow suffused the room.

  “Look, my love,” she said.

  She was staring straight ahead.

  Max followed her eyes and saw shadows moving in the mirrored walls. As she talked, the shadows became clearer, until the story was taking place in front of him, as if it were being acted out behind a thin curtain.…

  A pretty young Maya girl was laughing with her mother as she learned to knead tortillas by an open fire and weave on a backstrap loom.

  “Before I met you,” Inez began, “I had no thoughts of love. My father ruled the city of K’awiil, and my destiny was to marry a stranger, a prince from another city.

  “But my destiny changed when the Spanish arrived.

  “They came from the sunrise, in their floating houses. Their metal helmets shone in the sun. The old folk thought they were gods. The first time we saw a man on horseback, we thought it was all one beast. Where our warriors fought hand to hand, the invaders could kill a score of men with one shot from their fire sticks. For my city, it was over quickly.

  “They called our land New Spain. We took Spanish names and wore Spanish clothes, and a Spanish husband was sought for me. Lorenzo de Landa was first in line.…”

  An effete young dandy with a pointy black beard was seen admiring himself in a full-length mirror held by two terrified Maya boys.

  “Our wedding was to take place here in the Temple of Blood”—she gestured around her—“conducted by Lorenzo’s brother, Friar Diego de Landa.”

  A hooded figure in a monk’s robe greeted the dandy and they toasted each other with goblets of wine, served by another Maya boy. The boy spilled a drop of wine, and Rodrigo hit him so hard that he fell senseless to the floor.

  Max shivered as Inez resumed her tale.

  “I thought my fate was sealed … but then I saw you, Rodrigo. It was love at first sight for both of us.”

  She smiled dreamily at the reflections in the mirror.

  There she was, the young Inez, the image of Lola, holding hands with Don Rodrigo, the love of her life. He was dressed in the leather doublet and woolen hose of a conquistador, and—Max did a double take—and under his metal helmet was unmistakably Max’s face.…

  “I don’t understand …,” began Max.

  “What don’t you understand, my love?” asked Princess Inez. “Don’t you remember how my father blessed our union and helped us escape to Spain? How he had the Yellow Jaguar made into a necklet as my dowry, and sent Captain Mo to watch over us in our new life?”

  Max steeled himself not to flinch as Inez leaned over to stroke his face with her ancient fingers. “We were so happy in our castle in Spain … until the night Lorenzo de Landa handed me your bloodstained shirt.”

  The girl in the mirror screamed and fell weeping to the floor.

  “He said it was a fair fight,” whispered the old lady, “but I saw from your shirt that you’d been stabbed in the back. Lorenzo proposed that very night. I knew it would not be long before I, too, was sacrificed on the altar of his greed. But then his plan backfired.…”

  “Go on …,” said Max, now genuinely interested.

  “I was heir to the Jaguar Throne and the power of the Yellow Jaguar. But to share my fortune, Lorenzo would need to marry me in the Temple of Blood as he had originally planned. So he had the entire Yellow Pyramid of K’awiil shipped over to be rebuilt in Polvoredo. And that, my love, was his downfall.”

  The girl in the mirror stood at a castle window in her widow’s weeds and watched the rainforest growing in the castle grounds.

  “As the pyramid grew, so did my power. I used it to turn the flowers yellow, and I used it to drive away the Landa family. They called me a witch, but all they could do was withdraw and wait for me to die. They are still waiting! And now you have returned to me, Rodrigo, as I always knew you would.”

  The old lady clapped weakly. The pictures in the mirror began to mist over, and the last image Max saw was of the young princess turned toward him, her long hair wild and her face stained with tears, her sad eyes locked on his.

  She looked so much like Lola, it gave him goose bumps.

  “So where is the throne, dear lady?” asked Lord 6-Dog. “Surely it was shipped with the pyramid? For without it, the Yellow Jaguar has no power.”

  The old lady focused as if snapping out of a dream. “When Lorenzo de Landa understood that I would never marry him, he removed the throne to his palace in Galicia.”

  “Why didn’t he take the Yellow Jaguar, too?” asked Max.

  Then his mouth gaped open as the answer to his own question dawned on him. Suddenly he understood why the ancient Maya Lords of Death had come to find fourteen-year-old Max Murphy of Boston, Massachusetts. It was because he looked like his ancestor, the long-dead Rodrigo de Pizarro. The Yellow Jaguar could not be taken. And, in all the world, Rodrigo was the only person who could persuade the princess to give it up.

  But Max couldn’t go through with it.

  He took a deep breath.

  “Princess Inez?”

  “Yes?”

  “I am not Rodrigo.” He looked into her dark eyes and saw his own face reflected there, dull and hazy, like an image in an obsidian mirror. “I look like him, but I am not Rodrigo.”

  The old lady held his gaze for what seemed like an eternity.

  Max turned to Lord 6-Dog. “I’m done. The Death Lords can find someone else to do their dirty work. Let’s go.”

  “Wait,” said Princess Inez. “I, too, am done.” She reached behind her scrawny neck, untied the necklet and held it out to Max. “Take it,” she said. “I give it to you freely.”

  “But why? I told you, I am not Rodrigo.”

  “You are the one I have been waiting for. Why else would K’awiil have given you free passage? Rodrigo decreed that the people of this town must never lie. Now I, too, must face the truth. My Rodrigo is dead, and I must join him. A new cycle has begun. The Yellow Jagu
ar is yours. Do what you have to do.”

  Max took the necklet.

  As soon as it left the old lady’s fingers, she let out a deep sigh, as if a huge weight had been lifted off her.

  “Good-bye,” she said. “Until we meet again.”

  Cracks appeared in the flagstones under his feet.

  A shower of dust rained from the ceiling.

  Stones fell from the temple walls.

  The whole pyramid was shaking.

  “We have to get out of here!” shouted Max, pulling at the old lady’s arm.

  She sat back in the wooden chair and closed her eyes.

  Within seconds, her old body had breathed its last.

  Max watched, horrified, as her wasted flesh dissolved and the fabric of her dress clung pitifully to her bones, until it, too, decayed and fell away. Soon she was nothing but a skeleton, and then a pile of glowing yellow dust.

  A tear prickled Max’s eyes.

  “Come, young lord,” said Lord 6-Dog. “The pyramid is falling down around us.”

  Out of the dust of Inez burst a cloud of yellow butterflies. They danced around Max’s head and seemed to be shepherding him toward the doorway.

  “Follow the butterflies,” shouted Lord 6-Dog, as masonry crashed all around them. “It’s the princess! She’s leading us to safety!”

  Chapter Eleven

  DISASTER

  Ow! No! No! No! Oh! Ah! Ow! Ow! Ow! No! Ah! Ow! No! No! No! Oh! Ah! Ow! Ow! Ow! No! Ow! No! No! No! Oh! Ah! Ow! Ow! Ow! No! Ow! No! No! No! Oh! Ow! No! Ow! No! No! No! Oh! Ah! Ow! Ow! Ow!”

  Shouting in pain and terror, battered by falling stones and chunks of plaster, Max skidded and stumbled down the pyramid. He couldn’t see in front of him with all the dust, and only the boom of the howler monkey, rising above the crashing of stone slabs, guided him to safety at the edge of the courtyard.

  “Get down!” growled Lord 6-Dog. “Cover thy head!”

  Reacting on autopilot, Max obeyed.

  Lord 6-Dog crouched next to him. “Thou hast the necklet?” he asked.

  “In here.” Max patted his backpack.

  “Good … Now brace thyself!”

  “For what …?”

  Max’s question died on his lips as the ground in front of them opened up and—in eerie silence—the entire pyramid imploded, until all that was left was a rubble-filled crater.

  Lord 6-Dog wiped the plaster dust from his fur. “She sleeps at last,” he murmured.

  Max stared into the crater. “I wish her story had a happy ending.”

  “She is with Rodrigo. She is happy.”

  “Do you think she knew that I was planning to give her necklet to the Lords of Death? She said, ‘Do what you have to do.’ ”

  “She trusted thee, young lord, as much for thy heart as for thy face.”

  “Odd, wasn’t it,” mused Max, “how she looked like Lola and I look like Rodrigo? What was that about?”

  “Much as I would like to chitchat, young lord, time marches on, and we must march with it. Let us find Lady Lola and my mother, and plan our next move.”

  Through clouds of dust, they groped their way along the wall, looking for the Door of Truth to get back into the castle.

  They quickly found it. Or, at least, they found a door-sized hole in the wall. The door itself was gone, completely vaporized, not a chip remaining of the huge stone slab.

  Max and Lord 6-Dog ran back into the castle.

  Everything looked the same—the suits of armor, the tapestries, the battle flags—but even in the darkness, Max could see that everything had changed. Gone was the sense of watching and waiting, the crackle of energy, the aura of menace. It was like the difference between a sleeping body and a corpse. Now it was just a museum, another dry and dusty old castle.

  “Captain Mo, we’re back!” shouted Max, but no one answered.

  “He’s gone,” said Lord 6-Dog.

  “But where?”

  “I hope he sits under the shadiest tree in the highest heavens, for he has proved himself a great warrior in the service of his people.”

  “Do you think he knew I wasn’t Rodrigo?”

  “I think he knew thou wast the one who could release the princess. Besides, the Pizarro family are thine ancestors. Thou hast Rodrigo’s blood in thy veins. In a sense, thou art Rodrigo.”

  Max thought about this for a moment.

  “At ease, Captain Mo!” he called into the echoing, empty castle. “I will try to be worthy of your faith in me.”

  A night bird cried out in the guano-spattered rafters. A family of mice ran squeaking for cover as a picture fell off its nail in the wall and landed at his feet.

  It was an old map of Spain.

  He bent to pick it up and a moonbeam played on the glass, lighting up the northwest coast. Galicia, it flashed at him, Galicia.

  Galicia. He’d heard that name before.

  “Lord 6-Dog,” he said calmly, “I know what we have to do.” He drew himself up to his full height. “We’re going to Galicia.”

  A yellow plume fluttered to the ground.

  Max picked it up and put it in his pocket. “I won’t let you down, Captain Mo,” he whispered.

  They left through the front door of the castle and followed the old carriage drive by moonlight to the front gate. All around, the rainforest was dying. Tumbling yellow petals fell like autumn leaves.

  “We did this,” said Max sadly. “We broke the spell.”

  “Take heart,” Lord 6-Dog told him. “Look at the sky.”

  High above them, over the Spanish plains, the stars were clustered in twinkling constellations.

  “What am I looking at?” asked Max. And then he saw it: a shape made out of stars like a crocodile with a gaping jaw. “It’s the Cosmic Crocodile!” he exclaimed. “I saw it with Lola and Hermanjilio in the Star Chamber at Itzamna! But I can’t remember what it means.…”

  “It represents the Maya heavens. It marks the path between worlds.”

  Max stared at the twinkling stars. The crocodile stared back at him. “But what’s it doing here?”

  “I would guess that it lights the way home for Princess Inez.”

  Max shivered. “I need to cross between worlds. Maybe it’s lighting the way for me?”

  Lord 6-Dog gestured toward the gatehouse. “Thy road lies that way, young lord.”

  Max peered through the grating.

  As far as he could see, all was still.

  He opened the gate and looked out into the street. It was deserted.

  No Lola. No Lady Coco.

  He’d half hoped to find them waiting out there.

  “They must have gone back to the hotel,” he said. “Let’s go find them. Maybe get some hot chocolate.…”

  Lord 6-Dog made a noise of disgust at this suggestion, but soon he and Max were running down the hill, glad to be out of the castle and following the faint sounds of music and merrymaking that drifted up from the square.

  They passed a little fountain set into a street corner.

  “I need water!” called Max. “My mouth is full of plaster dust.”

  “A good soldier heeds only his thirst for battle,” Lord 6-Dog chided.

  “I’ll be quick.”

  He cupped his hands and took a drink. Then he held his head under the spout to wash away the dust.

  “That’s better,” he called to Lord 6-Dog, shaking the water from his hair.

  “Turn around slowly,” came a voice behind him. “And put up your hands.”

  When Max saw who it was, his stomach sank to his sneakers.

  “Good evening, Officer Gonzales,” he said politely.

  The police officer ignored him and jabbered urgently into his walkie-talkie. The only words Max could make out were his own name, plus agua, sangre, and fuente.

  Eventually, Officer Gonzales turned his attention to him. “So you have washed away her blood?” he said.

  Max stared at him blankly.

  “Where is the girl?” demanded the
officer.

  “Lola? Didn’t she come to the police station?”

  “Do not play the innocent with me, señor. You are under arrest for her murder.”

  “What? You think I murdered Lola? That’s crazy.”

  “We have a witness.”

  “Whoever they are, they’re lying.”

  “No one lies in Polvoredo.”

  Max blinked in confusion. “But Lola … did you”—he gulped—“did you find her?”

  “Not yet,” replied the officer. He slammed Max face-forward into the wall and deftly handcuffed him.

  A young couple, revelers from the square, walked past arm in arm.

  “Help!” called Max, breaking away and running after them. “I’m a tourist! Help me!”

  A door opened down the street, and the couple hurried inside without a backward glance.

  “There is no one to help you,” said Officer Gonzales.

  With a cry like an angry dinosaur, Lord 6-Dog came hurtling out of the darkness. He landed on Max’s shoulder, growling and baring his teeth.

  Without blinking, the officer shot him.

  Lord 6-Dog hit the ground with a dull thud and lay there motionless in a pool of blood.

  “You’ve killed him!” shouted Max, falling to his knees.

  The officer dragged him to his feet. “Walk!”

  “You can’t just leave him here!” cried Max.

  With the tip of his toe, the officer nudged the howler monkey’s body into the gutter. “The street cleaners will clear it away with the rest of the vermin.”

  “He’s not vermin! He’s a king, a warrior-king!”

  “In Polvoredo, he is vermin. Now move!”

  It was useless to argue.

  “I’ll come back for you,” Max called softly to the lifeless body of his friend, as the officer pulled him away.

  Lord 6-Dog was dead. Lola and Lady Coco were missing in action.

  He was alone.

  Still in shock, he allowed himself to be led to the police station, a low, modern building as bleak as his mood, all concrete blocks, fluorescent lights, and tiny frosted windows. It smelled of disinfectant.

  At the front desk, a crowd of people milled around. The air was tense. A fight seemed to be brewing. There was a lot of finger-pointing and shouting and then suddenly everyone piled in—men, women, and children—all punching and kicking and screaming.