Sky Knife

by Marella Sands

  “Death to you!” screeched the terrible figure. Its fleshless jaws flapped loosely and its teeth rattled against each other. Maggots crawled in the hole where its nose should have been.

  “Death death death!” whispered other voices. Sky Knife whirled, but the room behind him was empty.

  “Watch!” said Cizin.

  Sky Knife turned back to the god of death, but the voices around him did not stop. “Watch watch watch!” they cried, over and over. Sky Knife shivered. The temperature in the room had dropped since Cizin had appeared. Already, Sky Knife was colder than he could remember being in his life.

  Cizin hopped on his swollen, bruised feet. His lidless eyes rolled loosely in their sockets.

  “Come, Sky Knife, we must dispel this hideous creature,” said Stone Jaguar. The older man spread his hands and chanted in a language Sky Knife did not recognize. But the chant flowed into his soul like rain onto the dry milpas in spring. Sky Knife concentrated on the chant and put his hands, palms out, toward Cizin. He shivered again, anxious to clasp his arms to his chest to conserve warmth. But he had to help Stone Jaguar now.

  Cizin laughed. The high, screechy sound grated on Sky Knife’s ears. It sent shivers up and down his spine. Cizin hopped closer.

  “Bad luck!” shouted the god of death.

  The voices snickered. Sky Knife dropped his hands and clasped his arms together across his chest to control his shivering. Fear pushed his heartbeat faster and he panted in terror.

  A strange fog appeared before Sky Knife. He stared at it and realized it was formed by the breath coming out of his mouth. What magic was this? Sky Knife backed away from the fog, but couldn’t escape it.

  “Cold!” said Cizin.

  “Cold cold cold!” echoed the voices.

  Stone Jaguar stopped his chant. “Foul monster!” he shouted at the prancing figure.

  “Eat your bones!” screeched Cizin.

  “Bones bones bones!” said the voices.

  Cizin took a step toward Stone Jaguar and pointed a finger at the priest. Then, slowly, Cizin turned to Sky Knife and swung the blotched finger toward the younger man.

  Voices chittered and gibbered in Sky Knife’s ear. “Death death death!” they sang.

  Anger rushed over Sky Knife in a searing wave, forcing the cold from his bones and the fear from his mind. “No!” he shouted. He stepped forward and picked up the cigar. He reached outward with his mind and called fire to the cigar. The end of the cigar burst into flames. Sky Knife took the flaming cigar and shoved it into the maggoty dark hole in the center of Cizin’s face.

  Cizin screamed. The high, piercing sound hurt Sky Knife’s ears. He stepped back away from Cizin and clamped his hands over his ears.

  The god of death writhed in agony. He reached for the cigar but his hands smoked where he touched it. Cizin fell to his knees. Yellow fluid oozed out of his blotched skin and puddled around him. Cold winds swirled around the room and battered at Sky Knife, but he stood firm against them.

  Cizin melted away until only a puddle of yellow ooze and a cigar remained. The puddle drained toward the firepit. As the ooze touched the fire, the blue flame sprang up to consume it.

  Sky Knife watched until the last bit of slime had disappeared into the firepit. At that moment, the cold wind ceased and the room returned to its normal temperature. The shock of the much warmer air against his skin nauseated Sky Knife. He fell on his knees and heaved, but had nothing in his stomach to bring up.

  When Sky Knife’s guts stopped twisting and fighting to come up his throat, he sat back, trembling and exhausted.

  Stone Jaguar sat on the other side of the firepit, his hands in his face. Sobs wracked the other man.

  “Oh, Itzamna,” said Stone Jaguar. “Are we truly doomed?”

  “Doomed?” asked Sky Knife weakly. “How? Cizin is gone.”

  Stone Jaguar dropped his hands and looked up at Sky Knife. A terrible anger blazed on the older man’s face. “You understand nothing,” he said. “Nothing!”

  “Nothing nothing nothing!” echoed the voices. Sky Knife jerked and looked around the room.

  Stone Jaguar stood. “I will defeat you, Cizin!” he cried.

  Sky Knife stared at the sacrificial scene on the wall. The painted figures moved! He was sure of it. Sky Knife stood and walked toward the wall.

  “What are you doing?” barked Stone Jaguar.

  Sky Knife didn’t answer. He stared at the image on the wall.

  There! They did move! The priest in the scene plunged his knife into the chest of the sacrifice. Bright red blood ran down the wall.

  “What?” shouted Stone Jaguar. “What is this?”

  Sky Knife backed away toward the door. He didn’t want to be here any longer. He wanted back out in the sunshine. Back out in the fresh air under the blue sky.

  “Watch out!” shouted Stone Jaguar. Sky Knife ducked and whirled. A knife swung over his head. Sky Knife backed up and looked at his attacker.

  The man looked odd. Flat. Sky Knife stared, at first not understanding. But the blank spot on the wall behind the man made it obvious. The painting had not only come to life, it had leaped off the wall.

  The man approached in a strange, stilted gait. He raised his knife again.

  Sky Knife ducked under the knife and pushed the man from behind. His hands encountered a surface that gave readily but sprung back as soon as he pulled his hands back.

  The flat man advanced on Stone Jaguar next. Stone Jaguar circled the fire, keeping it between himself and the painting. Sky Knife glanced around. Other figures climbed down from the walls.

  “Run!” shouted Sky Knife. He hesitated a moment to see if Stone Jaguar had heard him. The older man nodded. Sky Knife dashed for the black hole of the doorway and darted through just as another flat man stabbed at him with a spear.

  Sky Knife ran outside, across the patio, and leaped down the steps. Bone Splinter reached out and grabbed him. “What happened?” he asked.

  Sky Knife turned to see if Stone Jaguar had escaped. The older priest emerged and stumbled across the patio. Blood flowed from a wound in his leg.

  Stone Jaguar sat down on the steps of the acropolis and tore his skirt to make a bandage for his leg.

  “This is no longer any of your concern,” he said to Sky Knife. “Whatever the king may say. This is sorcery, and no untrained priest wandering around asking questions is going to help us now. Go back to your quarters and stay there until morning. By then, perhaps, I will have been able to deal with Cizin and his ilk.”

  Sky Knife couldn’t believe his ears. “I was the one who fought Cizin,” he said. “Why send me away? I can help.”

  “You are braver than you are wise,” said Stone Jaguar without looking in Sky Knife’s direction. “Which is only to say you are young. Go. Without the chic-chac, you can’t help anymore. Take your bad luck name out of my sight.”

  Sky Knife backed away from Stone Jaguar slowly, then turned and walked toward the southern acropolis. He was confused. He could help—he knew he could! Why would Stone Jaguar turn him away?

  Bone Splinter put a hand on his shoulder when they reached the patio. “What are you going to do?” asked the warrior.

  Sky Knife sat on the steps. “I’m not going to my quarters tonight,” he said. “That much I know.”

  “Good.”

  Sky Knife glanced at the warrior. Bone Splinter smiled.

  “I’m going to disobey a direct order from Stone Jaguar and you say that’s good?”

  Bone Splinter laughed. “You don’t answer to him first. Or even to the king. You’re different from the rest of us, Sky Knife, even if you can’t see it yet. I believe you’ll know what to do.”

  Sky Knife sat on the steps, rubbed his hands over his snake tattoo absently, and thought. The coati curled up at his feet, laid the tip of its tail over its nose, and went to sleep.

  27

  The sun just touched the tops of the trees in the west before Sky Knife got up. The coati yawned
and stretched. Bone Splinter’s tapir had wandered over to some weeds growing on the far side of the plaza. It looked up as Sky Knife joined his coati in a stretch.

  “Where are we going?” asked Bone Splinter.

  “Stone Jaguar said Red Spider would be dead before sunset. If we want to ask Red Spider anything, we’re going to have to do it now.”

  Bone Splinter hesitated. “We should take some warriors with us, then,” he said. “Red Spider may be dying, but his attendants aren’t. Some of them may want revenge for Red Spider’s death.”

  Sky Knife watched as the sun began to dip behind the tree-tops. “If Stone Jaguar was right, we don’t have much time.”

  “Time enough to die if things go wrong.”

  Sky Knife weighed his decision. “All right,” he said. “I’ll go on ahead to the merchant’s quarter. But I won’t go in. You come as soon as you can with some others.”

  Bone Splinter nodded and jogged off in the direction of the House of the Warriors, the tapir ambling along after him. Sky Knife watched them until they disappeared around the ball courts. Then he turned his face toward the sun and walked to the merchant’s quarter.

  The quarter was a meandering system of permanent buildings and tents that sat outside the city proper. The tall trees of the jungle crowded close to the buildings. The colorful woven tents were often strung up between two trees. Many people slept in the open, in hammocks strung between trees.

  Several people noticed Sky Knife standing there, but no one approached him. Sky Knife leaned against a tree and waited impatiently. The sun dropped lower, and shadows covered the quarter. By the light of the fires in the quarter, Sky Knife saw merchants and their attendants moving around, but outside the firelight, the evening was dark under the trees.

  Eventually, Sky Knife saw Bone Splinter, carrying a torch, approaching. Several people followed him. Sky Knife was glad to see Kan Flower was one of them.

  “Do you know where Red Spider is?” asked Bone Splinter.

  “No,” said Sky Knife. “But a merchant from Teotihuacan shouldn’t be difficult to find.”

  Sky Knife straightened his shoulders, took a deep breath, and walked into the quarter. The warriors followed him.

  Red Spider’s camp was centered around one of the low stone buildings that dotted the quarter. Campfires and tents surrounded the structure and the jungle growth that plagued the other camps was completely absent. No doubt Red Spider made his people keep the area clear.

  Sky Knife approved. A clean, weedless area around the building made it look more liveable, more civilized, than the other buildings in the area.

  “What … you want?” asked a heavily accented voice. An attendant, short, dumpy, and clothed only in a white loincloth, stepped out of the tent to Sky Knife’s left.

  “I want to speak with Red Spider,” said Sky Knife.

  The man stared at him, apparently uncomprehending. “Me. Speak Red Spider,” said Sky Knife, hoping the man knew a few important words, even if he couldn’t understand entire sentences.

  “No speak,” said the man. He followed that with several sentences in his own harsh tongue and spat on the ground at Sky Knife’s feet.

  Bone Splinter stirred, but Sky Knife waved for him to be silent. “I am going to speak to Red Spider, like it or not,” he said.

  Another attendant, this one clad in a fine cotton skirt and shell bead jewelry, stepped out of the building.

  “You are Sky Knife?” he asked. His accent was thick, but not nearly as distracting as the first man’s.

  “Yes. I want to…”

  “I know, speak with my master. He wishes to speak with you, too.” The second man shouted something at the first. The short man disappeared back into the tent.

  Sky Knife walked up to the building. The other man bowed slightly. “Please enter our dwelling,” he said. Then he said something in his own language.

  Sky Knife hesitated.

  The other man stood up. “It is only a blessing we give to strangers entering our home,” he said without meeting Sky Knife’s eyes. “I know you do not have a similar custom.”

  Sky Knife walked into the building. Its single room, though decorated in a Teotihuacan fashion, was a familiar, comfortable Mayan shape. Red Spider lay on a bench against the southern wall, covered in blankets. A third attendant sat beside him and wiped sweat from his face.

  “Sky Knife.”

  Sky Knife was alarmed by how weak Red Spider sounded. He’d known Red Spider was dying, but somehow, hearing the pain and exhaustion in Red Spider’s voice was troubling.

  Red Spider waved his attendant away. The man bowed and left the building. Sky Knife walked over to Red Spider’s bed and sat down on the edge.

  Sky Knife hardly recognized the other man. Red Spider had been exotically beautiful before. Now his face was deeply lined and his skin damp and pale, almost yellowish, in the firelight.

  Red Spider moved his hand out from under a blanket and clutched Sky Knife’s wrist. “You must stop him,” he whispered.

  “Stop who—Cizin?”

  “No.” Red Spider closed his eyes and his breath hissed out of his throat. He squeezed Sky Knife’s arm and drew in another breath.

  Sky Knife cringed at the pain in the other man’s face. He waited without speaking.

  After two shallow breaths, Red Spider opened his eyes again. “Stop the priest,” he said.

  “Stone Jaguar? Why?”

  Red Spider licked his lips slowly. “She’ll die.”

  Sky Knife’s guts trembled. “I know,” he said. “But the king and Stone Jaguar have agreed on it. I can’t stop it.” Sky Knife clamped his mouth shut, embarrassed by the anguish in his voice.

  Red Spider smiled. “You want her,” he whispered.

  Sky Knife said nothing.

  “So did I,” said the merchant. “I asked Storm Cloud for her.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said he wouldn’t give any Mayan woman to a Teotihuacano.”

  “But his mother…”

  “I know,” the other man interrupted. Red Spider fell silent and closed his eyes. “But he felt his mother should have been married to a Mayan lord.” The last word faded away as Red Spider let out his breath.

  Sky Knife leaned forward, afraid the merchant had died. But after a moment, Red Spider caught his breath.

  “You mean the king doesn’t want to extend ties to his kin in your city?” asked Sky Knife.

  Red Spider nodded once, slowly. “His brothers made him leave,” he said. “He barely tolerates our merchants here—a marriage was out of the question.”

  “Yet you asked.”

  A hint of a smile crossed the other man’s features. “Wouldn’t you?”

  Sky Knife said nothing. He took Red Spider’s hand and held it.

  “Sky Knife…”

  “Yes.” Sky Knife leaned forward to catch the merchant’s words.

  “Stop him. You can do it.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  Red Spider smiled. “The owl told me.” The merchant’s breath hissed out of his throat again, but this time, he did not take in another. The lines in Red Spider’s face eased and his face grew slack.

  Sky Knife trembled. He hadn’t liked Red Spider, but he felt guilt at the other man’s death. Red Spider had died at Stone Jaguar’s hand, and Stone Jaguar and Sky Knife were priests to the same god, in the same temple. Sky Knife felt almost as if he were the one who had killed the other man.

  Sky Knife said a silent prayer to Itzamna for the soul of Red Spider. Slowly, he stood and walked to the entrance of the building. Red Spider’s attendants stood there, waiting.

  “He’s dead,” said Sky Knife. “I can perform death rites for him if you wish.”

  The attendant shook his head. “No, we will perform whatever rites are necessary. But I thank you for your offer.”

  Sky Knife nodded and went over to Bone Splinter.

  “What did he say?” asked the warrior.

&
nbsp; Sky Knife sighed. “He said Storm Cloud wouldn’t form an alliance with his kin in Teotihuacan because his brothers forced him to leave. And he said I could stop Jade Flute’s sacrifice. An owl told him that.”

  “An owl?” asked Kan Flower. He stepped forward, his manner intent and serious. “He said an owl spoke to him?”

  “Owl has spoken to Red Spider,” said the heavily accented voice of the attendant in the fine skirt and jewelry. Sky Knife turned to face the man.

  “The owl is the sacred guardian of their royal family,” said Kan Flower softly.

  “Owl has spoken,” repeated the attendant. “He told Red Spider that this man,” the attendant pointed toward Sky Knife, “was marked by the gods to strive against the evil that is here.”

  Sky Knife’s hands went to the rainbow serpent tattoo at his neck.

  “May the Feathered Serpent guide your hand, priest,” said the attendant. He stretched out both his hands toward Sky Knife and said something in his own language. Then he went back into the building.

  Sky Knife walked back toward Tikal. The others followed him, but he ignored them. If Storm Cloud and Red Spider hadn’t planned to bring bad luck to the city, he’d been running around the fields and the city for no purpose.

  Sky Knife’s steps came more quickly. Something was going to happen tonight, or Stone Jaguar would not have sent him away. But he wasn’t going to stay away. Whatever happened, Sky Knife was going to be there.

  By the time he reached the city, he was running, the coati bounding easily beside him. Overhead, the Knife of Stars pointed toward the last place Sky Knife wanted to go, but where he knew he needed to be.

  The northern acropolis.

  IV

  SOUTH

  WHERE WISDOM RISES ON THE WINGS OF THE WIND

  9.0.0.0.3

  11 AKBAL 16 CEH

  28

  Sky Knife slowed as he reached the Great Plaza. He turned to the warriors behind him.

  “Kan Flower, you and your warriors return to your house. I thank you for your service.”

  Kan Flower and the others bowed. Bone Splinter stared at him.