Effigy

by Theresa Danley

  “Teotihuacan?”

  “I believe so. When he entered the city it was long abandoned. Starving, and with no food to be found, the boy lay down in front of a temple and resigned to die there. What he didn’t realize was that he was being watched by the gods of the temple. One of them, Quetzalcoatl, saw that the boy’s heart was good and took pity on him.”

  They were nearing the open plaza where a loose crowd of tourists were gawking and snapping photographs of the pyramid. Derek and Peet had paused to take in its incredible height. John was already searching along its base.

  “What did Quetzalcoatl do?” Lori asked.

  Eva smiled. She could still hear her father’s voice telling the tale. “Quetzalcoatl materialized his power through a fire of butterflies and restored the boy’s strength. He then entrusted that power to the boy. Quetzalcoatl even lent him his name and proclaimed him as the keeper of his powers. In return the boy was commanded to build a new city, one where he could promote knowledge and peace.”

  “That’s quite a story,” Lori said.

  “Maybe. I’m beginning to think Father had that story in mind when he brought your artifact here.”

  “I suppose that might explain why he didn’t take it to Chichen Itza instead.”

  Lori shed her white, long-sleeved shirt and tied it about her waist, leaving her spring-kissed shoulders exposed to the hot Mexican sun. A silver Kokopelli pendant hung from a sterling silver chain, dancing to her pulse about the neckline of her sleeveless blouse. She squinted against the sun glaring off the Pyramid of the Sun as she tied a motley bandana around her head, allowing the length of her long blonde hair to spill out the back. With those brief alterations, Lori had transformed from a studious co-ed to a seasoned archaeologist. Eva admired the ease of such a transition.

  “Derek thought that Shaman Gaspar brought the effigy down here to be blessed for the New Age of Quetzalcoatl,” Lori said, glancing over the stone-cobbled face of the pyramid. “I guess the birthplace of Quetzalcoatl is as good a place as any.”

  Eva shook her head. “Father performed countless blessings over artifacts and junk trinkets. He’d bless a child’s drawing if it looked like Quetzalcoatl. But as far as I know he never brought any of those things to Mexico.”

  “Why else would he bring the effigy all this way?”

  “I think Father believed he’d found the power of Quetzalcoatl.”

  Lori tugged at the shirt sleeves knotted around her waist. “Wait a minute. You mean the effigy I found in Utah is supposed to be the power of Quetzalcoatl?” she asked incredulously. “The power entrusted to the Toltec boy?”

  Eva nodded. “Perhaps Father was offering his final gift to the New Age. He was returning Quetzalcoatl’s power to its birthplace.”

  Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl

  Lori searched the gravel at the base of the Pyramid of the Sun, though she didn’t have a clue what she was looking for. The ground looked undisturbed if she dismissed the hundreds of shoe prints left by earlier tourists and passers-by. The mid-morning sun had a bite to it, producing small flecks of sweat that dampened the handkerchief hugging her brow. It was hard to believe that only three days ago she was huddled within Dr. Peet’s coat and sweater, trying to keep warm in a cold RockyMountain rain.

  “There’s a man-made tunnel that enters the pyramid from the base of the main staircase,” Dr. Friedman said as he led the way around the massive structure.

  “That seems simple enough,” Eva said.

  “Yes,” Dr. Friedman said in a less than reassuring tone. “Except the entrance has been sealed since its discovery in 1970.”

  “Maybe Mr. Gaspar opened it,” Lori said optimistically, but when they arrived at the Pyramid of the Sun’s grand staircase, it was immediately obvious that no tunnel entrance was awaiting them. In fact, Lori didn’t notice any sign of an entrance until Dr. Friedman stepped up to a slab of stone cleverly disguised into the cobblework of the pyramid’s base. Dirt and gravel were drifted around it and the ground was well-packed from foot traffic.

  Clearly, the tunnel’s seal hadn’t been broken.

  “My father wouldn’t have had the strength to move that,” Eva said.

  “So now what?” Derek asked, carefully removing a lens cloth from its small plastic pouch and attending to his camera.

  “Are there any other caves around here?” Lori asked.

  Dr. Friedman shrugged. “Sure. Lots of them. The volcanic soils of the area account for a number of natural caves and lava tubes. And there are burial chambers within the Temple of Quetzalcoatl at the other end of the ruins.”

  “Father’s body was found near that temple,” Eva said.

  “That’s too easy,” Dr. Friedman said. “If he took the trouble to leave you a coded message, I doubt he would deposit an effigy of Quetzalcoatl in such an obvious location.”

  “Especially if he thought it was the power of Quetzalcoatl,” Lori added.

  “And his message seems to indicate he’d already hidden the effigy before he called you,” Dr. Peet added. “If he parked near the Pyramid of the Moon, then he must have intended to hide the effigy somewhere on this end of the ruins. My guess is, he accomplished his goal only to find himself being hunted, so he tried to escape through the other end of the park. Unfortunately, it appears that the killer caught up to him near the Temple of Quetzalcoatl.”

  “It’s quite clear Mr. Gaspar was using every precaution to keep the effigy from whoever killed him,” Dr. Friedman added with a nod.

  “Are there any other tunnels leading into the Pyramid of the Sun?” Lori pressed.

  “There’s one other that we know of, but it’s several hundred meters east of here, and not so readily accessible to the public. Physicists have been using it off and on over the past decade to test their muon detectors, searching for evidence of possible burial chambers in the vicinity. Unfortunately, equipment problems have hindered much of their work.”

  “That sounds like the entrance an eighty-four year old man would use,” Eva said.

  “Perhaps,” Dr. Friedman agreed. “But it’s quite a detour through uneven ground for an elderly gentleman to be navigating in the dark.”

  Eva was shaking her head. “None of this is making any sense.”

  Dr. Peet glanced up the slope of the pyramid, following the lumbering flow of tourists as they scaled the main staircase. “Maybe a bird’s-eye view will give us better insight.”

  With that, he began the long climb up the pyramid with Derek quickly tucking his lens cloth away and following close behind. Lori took note of the odd pair—one a tall, full-fledged archaeologist adorned in the weathered raiments of dirt work; the other a strapping, athletic jock posing as a weekend tourist complete with shorts, a pair of Oakleys and a camera slung around his neck.

  She scaled a step or two as if to follow them, but then stopped, her mind working. She turned back around to find Dr. Friedman and Eva curiously watching her.

  “There’s something I don’t understand,” she said, taking a tentative step back down. “If the effigy is really the power of Quetzalcoatl, how did it wind up in Utah?”

  “I might know the answer to that,” Eva said, fingering a crack in the pyramid’s crumbling adobe. “According to my father, the Toltec boy entrusted with the effigy’s power built a capital city where he enlightened his people with the peaceful teachings of Quetzalcoatl. But an ancient cult overthrew his leadership and banished him from the city.”

  “I believe you’re speaking of Ce Acatl Topiltzin,” Dr. Friedman interrupted.

  Lori hesitated. “You know this story?”

  “It’s a legend, rather,” he said. “Topiltzin founded the Toltec capital, Tula, where he assumed the namesake of his god and started a fellowship that promoted peace, art and science, not to mention putting a temporary end to human sacrifice. That was until followers of the Tezcatlipoca cult overthrew him.”

  “So Shaman Gaspar’s story isn’t just a story,” Lori said thoughtfully. She turned back
to Dr. Friedman. “You knew the effigy was the power of Quetzalcoatl?”

  He shook his head, his Panama hat casting a wavering shadow across his face. “I’ve not heard of the power of Quetzalcoatl,” he admitted. “But there are different variations of the legend out there. One version ends with Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl setting himself on fire and thereby ascending the sky as the morning star.”

  “That would explain Quetzalcoatl’s relationship with Venus,” Lori said.

  Dr. Friedman nodded. “Yes, but the version I’m more inclined to believe states that the fair-skinned Toltec king was sent adrift on a raft of snakes. As he drifted away into the Gulf of Mexico, he vowed to return from the east in the year One Reed, thus entwining his story with the fabled return of Quetzalcoatl.”

  His eyes were dancing now. He seemed almost giddy with the story but Eva apparently found no humor in it, and he corrected his enraptured smile. He couldn’t be blamed. Teotihuacan was clearly within his realm of expertise so it only seemed natural for his knowledge to gush forth like a PBS special.

  At the moment Lori wasn’t concerned about Dr. Friedman’s excitement, or the conflicting fates of Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl. Instead, she was pondering over the familiarity of his story. She recalled a similar legend and as she thought about it, she felt a flash of revelation—as though she’d lifted the last straw from her dissertation’s needle in the haystack.

  Her thoughts carried her back to a Hopi legend about a lost white brother they called, Pahana. Supposedly, Pahana was expected to one day return from the east, bringing peace and prosperity with him. Then she remembered Awanyu, the horned serpent that adorned Hopi pottery. The parallels were striking. Could the horn at the back of Awanyu’s head actually be a feather? Could it be that Pahana and Awanyu were the Hopi versions of Quetzalcoalt?

  “What happened to the effigy after Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl was thrown out of Tula?” she asked.

  Eva sighed. “That’s what I was going to tell you, until John took off on a tangent.”

  Dr. Friedman cleared his throat, straightening his composure. “Pardon my fervor,” he said humbly.

  Eva turned back to Lori. “But he’s right. The new cult banished the king from Tula and the power of Quetzalcoatl mysteriously disappeared amid the turmoil.”

  “Obviously, Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl didn’t take it with him,” Lori said, trying to read Eva’s face for an explanation.

  Eva shook her head. “The cult of Tezcatlipoca supposedly destroyed the power of Quetzalcoatl, but my father never believed that.”

  “So now that the power of Quetzalcoatl had been found, he was trying to return it to its birthplace in Teotihuacan,” Dr. Friedman observed.

  Lori’s mind was in high gear, shifting back and forth between the Hopi and Toltec legends. Perhaps more than trade goods had been swapped between the two cultures. It seemed Pahana could be traced back to Ce Acatl Topiltzin, Awanyu to Quetzalcoatl—evidence of an exchange in beliefs. But where did the belief begin—with the people of the southwest or with the Mesoamericans?

  No matter the origins, the similar, and presumed traded, stories were stunning to think about. Lori hadn’t really discovered a trade relationship through tracking pottery. Her dissertation was being suddenly swayed by something she couldn’t dig out of the ground, something she couldn’t study under a microscope. In an ironic twist she seemed to have found her answers through the exchange of intangible beliefs.

  “The Hopi are thought to be descended from the Anasazi,” she mused. “And the effigy suggests the Anasazi had ties to the Toltecs.”

  “What are you trying to say?” Dr. Friedman asked.

  “There was a reason the Anasazi would have traded for the effigy after all,” she said. “The Trader had found his Awanyu!”

  The revelation was fantastic, but Lori felt a vain level of disappointment when she considered Eva’s story. She’d been searching for the effigy’s story from the wrong angle. The question wasn’t why the Anasazi would want the effigy. The real question was why the Toltecs would give it away. That answer seemed to lie with Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl. It wasn’t the answer Lori had been looking for, and it surprisingly pained her to admit that she’d been wrong.

  “I think I owe you an apology, Dr. Friedman,” she said.

  The professor stopped, stunned. “Pardon me?”

  “I always thought your summary conclusion on the effigy was too hasty,” she admitted.

  He shrugged. “I can’t say that it wasn’t a bit presumptuous.”

  “But all this time I was trying to find the true story behind the effigy, when it appears you already found it. The effigy really was traded to the Anasazi.”

  Dr. Friedman looked flabbergasted. “Well, in all honesty, Lori, I may have to amend my conclusions. Given the story Eva just told us, I’m having difficulty believing Ce Acatl Topiltzin would trade away the power of Quetzalcoatl.”

  “But you were right in another sense,” Lori insisted. “I don’t think it was Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl who traded it.”

  “Who then?”

  Lori smiled wryly. She’d found her needle, even if it didn’t have the sharp point she’d expected.

  “It was traded by the cult of Tezcatlipoca.”

  * * * *

  John hadn’t considered a third party trade to explain how the effigy made its way to Utah, though he should have. Of course, that conclusion depended on the accuracy of Eva’s tale, but it certainly wasn’t out of the question. Ethnoarchaeologists often relied on a peoples’ traditional stories to help explain certain behaviors within the archaeological record. Why couldn’t a story reveal trade behaviors between two cultures?

  Archaeologists researching ancient civilizations all around the world commonly questioned direct acquisition theories with down-the-line trade possibilities. Even without Eva’s story, how could he have allowed a secondary explanation to slip his academic reasoning? It’s a sign of old age, he thought.

  But even as he considered the Tezcatlipoca cult trading off their spoils of war, it was Eva who’d immediately dismissed the idea.

  “I think you’re both wrong,” Eva said. “I don’t think the effigy was traded at all.”

  “What do you mean?” Lori asked.

  “It doesn’t make sense. Doesn’t it seem logical that someone taking possession of their rival’s power would either destroy that power or find a way to use it for their own advantage?”

  Lori’s face twisted in confusion. “So you think the Tezcatlipocans brought the effigy to Utah?”

  “To the contrary,” John said. “Perhaps the Tezcatlipocans never took possession of the effigy in the first place.”

  “You said it yourself, John,” Eva said. “Why would my father move north to Utah when he could find all he wanted about Quetzalcoatl in Mexico?”

  John knew exactly where Eva was going with this. “Mr. Gaspar was looking for the power of Quetzalcoatl,” he said.

  Eva nodded. “Something must have convinced him to search Utah. He must have found something that contradicted Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl’s fate in the legend.”

  “Like what?” Lori asked.

  “I don’t know, but I get the feeling Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl didn’t flee to the east. He went north instead—”

  A light flickered in Lori’s eyes. “Into the land of the Anasazi,” she said, finishing Eva’s thought.

  “So it may have been Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl himself who developed the legend of Awanyu among the Anasazi which was later passed on to the Hopi,” John added.

  Lori’s eyes were wide with a new revelation. She appeared excited and yet cautiously reserved at the same time. Something was brewing in that head of hers.

  “It couldn’t be,” she mumbled.

  John and Eva waited expectantly.

  “What?” he finally asked.

  “You don’t suppose…” Lori glanced up at him, but he could only stare back, unsure of what to expect.

  “The skeleton buried with the effigy,” Lori
continued. “He wasn’t an Anasazi trader at all.”

  John felt the dawn of his own surprise as he waited for her to finish stating what was only beginning to dawn within his own mind.

  Lori’s smile wasn’t about to be held back any longer.

  “The Trader is Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl himself!”

  Pyramids And Temples

  There was a reason the pyramid was named after the sun, Derek decided. Each stone step seemed to lead directly toward that glaring orb of heat, and he hadn’t even reached the midway point to the top yet. Derek was hot and growing more irritable, a disposition that had quickly deteriorated when he realized that Lori had chosen to stay behind with Eva and Friedman.

  Why in the world was he following Quickie Peet to the highest elevation in hell? Sure there were fantastic photo opportunities from their vantage point, but the late morning light was all wrong and it was highly unlikely they were going to find any clues leading to the effigy from way up there. He stopped for a breather.

  Peet, apparently realizing he was no longer being followed, paused to glance over his shoulder. “You’re not giving up on me already, are you sport?”

  “Keep going if you want to,” Derek said, removing the cap from his camera lens. “Everything’s just going to get smaller the higher we climb, and that includes Shaman Gaspar’s cave.”

  Peet hesitated, and then as if to acknowledge Derek’s logic, he stepped back down and stopped beside him.

  Aspiring journalist—one, dimwit professor—zero.

  Derek scanned the ruins below. The wide swath of bare ground marked the Avenue of the Dead, extending into the distance to his left, stretching past the Pyramid of the Sun and ending abruptly in a square plaza lying before the base of the Pyramid of the Moon just to his right. People were exploring the ruins like little ants attending their mound. Nowhere was there any sign of a cave or tunnel entrance.

  Derek stepped aside as a small group of tourists pushed past them on their way back down the pyramid. He watched them go, a bit put off by their lack of attention to his personal space. But as they continued down, his eye shifted to a woman making her way up. The plunging neckline of her blouse exposed all her secrets to his higher vantage point, allowing him an eyeful of flesh and a trickle of sweat gleaming down her cleavage.