by Lani Forbes
Mayana grimaced into the furs, not wanting to think about what Zorrah could possibly do to her.
A clatter came from the garden just beyond the vines draping her room’s opening to the outside. She lifted her head, straining her ears for a sound. Clack. Clack—clack—clack. Her eyes fell to the floor, where a pebble rolled to a stop against the stones.
Throwing off the furs, Mayana scrambled to her feet. She stooped over and picked up the small lopsided stone, turning it over in her fingers. It was probably the stupid monkeys in the garden. Another stone clattered in and landed inches from her foot.
Fuming at the memory of the monkey stealing her cacao beans, she tightened her hand around the stone and threw it as hard as she could through the vines. It sailed through the hanging plants. A male voice grunted in pain.
Mayana’s hands flew to her mouth in surprise. She threw the vines apart and found Prince Ahkin standing at the foot of the small flight of stairs leading into the botanical garden below her room. He was rubbing a spot just above his left eye and squinting up at her.
“Oh gods! I am so sorry.” She flew down the steps, but stopped a few paces from him, hands still covering her mouth.
“I wasn’t expecting you to throw the stone back.” He lowered his hand and studied it as if checking for signs of blood.
“I don’t think it’s bleeding.” Mayana reached out and fingered the small bulge above his eyebrow.
Ahkin winced at her touch and pulled away. “It’s alright, I’ve had worse.”
“What are you doing out here?” Mayana rubbed her arms up and down and looked around to make sure they were alone.
“I—” Ahkin rubbed the back of his neck uncertainly, frowning down at his feet. “I just wanted to see how you are doing.”
“How I’m doing?” The corner of Mayana’s mouth ticked up. She could tell he was nervous. It was endearing to watch his internal struggle.
“Yes—um—how is your room? Is it arranged to your liking? I made sure to ask Atanzah to—”
She giggled.
Ahkin’s face fell into a frown.
“My room is fine, my lord. Why don’t you tell me the real reason you are here throwing pebbles?” She wondered if she was being too forward, so she gave him a reassuring smile. Ahkin’s sheepish grin and flushing cheeks told her he did have different intentions.
“Would you—want to take a walk through the gardens with me?”
“At night? Alone?” The many flaming torches that reflected off the hundreds of gold surfaces kept Tollan as bright as day at all hours, but the gardens? They wouldn’t be as bright … and night was when spirits and demons roamed the jungles.
Ahkin lifted a small blade and waved it back and forth in front of her nose.
“You will be with one of the Chicome’s best-trained warriors, who also happens to have the power to bend light and raise the sun itself if necessary.”
Mayana pushed his hand back toward him. “Who also happens to be exceedingly modest?”
“I’ll do what I have to if you’ll agree to come with me.” His eyes turned pleading.
“If I get eaten by a star demon, I am holding you personally responsible.”
“Does that mean you’ll join me?” The hope and joy radiating from his face warmed her heart, almost as if he had truly feared she wouldn’t want to.
“Yes, I’ll join you.”
Ahkin held out a hand and she reached for it, lacing her fingers with his. It was entirely new and foreign to Mayana, holding the hand of someone who was not family. She would often hold Tenoch’s hand back home, though he would bounce up and down with excitement about wherever they were going. The prince’s hand was solid and steady, and Mayana suddenly worried that her palms would start sweating. Was she squeezing his hand too hard? Not hard enough? Why had her father taught her every important ritual and rule under the sun but not how to hold the hand of a prince? Surely that would have served as a helpful lesson given how the codex dictated the selection of the Chicome’s empress. Then again, Mayana tried to imagine her stoic father giving her such a lesson and she had to bite her lip to stop from laughing.
“I enjoyed watching you dance this evening.” Ahkin walked slightly ahead of her, leading the way through the small garden and then into labyrinthine halls toward the rear of the palace.
Blood rushed into her cheeks. “I enjoyed watching you dance as well.”
The prince let out a disgruntled snort. “I—don’t usually dance.”
“Why? I thought your dancing was … moving.”
Ahkin smirked. “Isn’t all dancing technically moving?”
“You know what I meant.” She gave him a playful smack on the arm.
“You dare to hit the prince of the sun and your future emperor?” He raised an eyebrow.
Shame and fear flooded Mayana’s veins. Had she gone too far?
“I’m sorry—I didn’t—”
But to her surprise, Ahkin roared with laughter and squeezed her hand tighter.
“You will need to learn not to take me so seriously,” he said. “You should see the way Metzi and I tease each other.”
She would need to learn? Was that a promise for the future? Mayana’s heart fluttered like the wings of a hummingbird. But she still couldn’t shake the feeling she had overstepped a boundary with her playfulness. She dropped her gaze to their pacing feet and refused to meet his eyes.
“Mayana.” Ahkin stopped and turned to face her. “Please don’t ever hide yourself from me.”
He pinched her chin between his thumb and forefinger, forcing her to look up at him. “So far, what I have seen of your spirit and courage and compassion has done nothing but recommend you to me. Your dedication to the gods reminds me of my mother’s own devotion. Your joy and appreciation for beauty, the way your face illuminated as you watched the rainbows we made together. The way you sensed my own”—he swallowed hard—“difficulty with losing my parents. You even gave me a present that showed you understand the worry I have found overwhelming me since they died.”
Mayana’s heart swelled at his words and yet she couldn’t help but feel a little sad at the same time. He was obviously lonely and hurting. It likely had to do with losing his parents and being afraid of the responsibilities thrust upon him, but she feared he was idealizing her. He was seeing what he wanted to see and trying to lose himself in the distraction of choosing a wife.
That, or he just wasn’t looking as hard as he should. He wasn’t seeing how her compassion could get her into trouble. How she hated sacrifices and even questioned why the gods demanded blood in the first place. She was starting to fear that what Yemania had accused her of was true. She was selfish. What if Mayana couldn’t stand to deal with pain or see it in others and that was what drove her to compassion? What if her empathy was a form of self-preservation just like Zorrah’s? She hated herself for even thinking it … but what if it was true?
“ …and more than that, the way you did not care about anything but making sure we pleased the gods by not sacrificing that jaguar. That was so brave. The way you gave yourself over to the worship of the gods through your dancing. Your devotion to them shames even my own and makes me want to strive to worship them with the same … reckless abandon.”
Ahkin’s words pierced her heart like a spear. He was definitely only seeing what he wanted to see. Mayana’s eyes roved over his face, taking in the curve of his lips and the shadow across his chin. She longed to reach up and see if his cheek was as rough as it appeared. Would it be so bad if he held her up to an idealized standard? As long as he chose her, her life would be spared. Did he have to choose her for the right reasons?
With his fingers still holding her chin, he leaned toward her. She should stop him—he was trying to kiss the Mayana he had made up in his own mind because of how he thought he felt toward her—but she didn’t. She wante
d to kiss him too, because she was beginning to feel the same way. This beautiful, glorious warrior prince whose dark, calculating eyes she alone could soften.
Their lips met for the briefest of moments, like the brush of a moth’s wing. He pulled back, searching her eyes for a response, and Mayana shuddered. She didn’t care anymore. She would be whatever he wanted her to be in that moment, as long as he kissed her again. He must have seen the desire in her eyes because he crushed his lips to hers.
He pulled her toward him, one hand pressed against the exposed skin of her lower back. His other hand moved from her chin to cup the back of her head. The warmth of his palm against her skin sent a shiver up her spine, and she leaned into him, spreading her hands on his chest, thankful he had removed his golden jewelry so that her fingers could trace his flesh and not the carved metal.
Mayana had never held hands with a boy before, let alone kissed one, and she immediately wondered why she had rejected the advances the boys of her city had offered her. This was wonderful. Ahkin smelled of xiuhamolli soap, a fresh herbal scent she loved. His lips were as soft and full as she had imagined the first moment she saw him, and they were firm but gentle as they moved against her own. He was pure, radiant sunlight, warming every inch of her skin …
A clatter of wood against stone echoed through the hallway, and they broke apart. Ahkin closed his eyes and bit his lower lip, breathing hard, before turning to glare at the servant who was sweeping up the wooden bowls she had dropped onto the floor.
“S-sorry,” the servant girl whispered. She quickly gathered the bowls and backed around the corner, her face aflame.
Mayana sucked in a shuddering breath, longing to pull Ahkin back into their embrace. Instead, when he turned back to face her, he gave her an amused grin and jerked his head down the hall.
“We were going to see the gardens, weren’t we?”
“If you say so,” Mayana breathed, lightheaded.
Ahkin brushed another quick kiss across her lips and pulled her down the hall toward the back of the palace.
Would it be so wrong to pretend to be the girl he wanted, to be overly dedicated to the gods? But as she looked down at his hand, which held so tightly onto her own, her mind imagined those same hands dripping with the blood of the toucan he had sacrificed. She heard the memory of the strangled screech before it went silent forever. An image flashed in her mind of the tiny black-and-yellow bird in her own hand back in the palace of Atl, the bird looking up at her with its glassy, bead-like eye as she lifted her knife toward its throat. She could still see the disappointment mixed with rage in her father’s eyes as he waited for her to prove she could do what was necessary.
Maybe she needed a worry doll of her own.
Chapter
24
“What’s at the end of the gardens?” Mayana pointed to where the trees and shrubbery dropped down into blackness. The red comet still flared against the night sky, but Mayana was too distracted to think much on it. Their footsteps on the stone tiles of the garden path were the only sounds aside from the waterfalls dashing against the rocks in the bathing pools. Mayana assumed most of the animals had sensed them coming and were hiding in more secluded parts of the pleasure gardens.
“That’s the end of the city’s plateau.” The muscles in his neck tensed, and Mayana sensed there was something he was not telling her.
A raised stone platform hugged the cliff’s edge. Intricate hieroglyphs were carved into its surface. What kind of ceremony was performed here? Curiosity got the better of her and she led them toward it, wanting to see the details for herself. A small set of stone stairs led up to the platform’s surface, and up close, she recognized the histories of the gods depicted in the stone. She pulled Ahkin up to the top, though his hand tightened slightly, as if he was fighting the urge to pull her back. His gaze focused over the side of the cliff, and she carefully leaned over to see what lay below.
It was a sinkhole larger than any she had seen before, scarring the landscape like a gaping open wound. It looked big enough to swallow the Temple of the Sun whole. Vines and plants dangled precariously over the sinkhole’s lip. The blackness within it seemed endless, pulsing with an energy bordering on sinister.
Ahkin draped an arm across her shoulder and drew her closer to him, as if to protect her from the drop.
His voice was tense. “That’s the sinkhole that leads to Xibalba.”
A sudden chill swept across her skin.
“Are you cold?”
“No, I just … didn’t know you had an entrance to the underworld here in Tollan.” She nestled in closer to him, wrapping an arm around his waist. The chill subsided. She was tempted to trace her finger along one of the defined muscles of his stomach, but she resisted. Good gods, he was beautiful. His constant battle training left his body fit and lean and absolutely breathtaking.
He turned away from the sinkhole and led her back down the stone steps toward the gardens. “Well, technically it isn’t in Tollan, more under it.”
“Directly under it?”
Ahkin shifted his shoulder uncomfortably. She wondered if he was thinking about his parents’ souls residing somewhere down there.
“Not literally. I haven’t studied the layers of creation too extensively, but Xibalba is a different plane of existence altogether. The sinkhole is more of a gateway that leads there than a physical place, if that makes any sense.”
Mayana had heard enough about the underworld. She tickled a finger against his side and he grabbed her hand to stop her. He lifted her fingers to his mouth and pressed a kiss against them. Mayana’s stomach fluttered.
Ahkin gave one last look over his shoulder. “Ours and the doorway in Miquitz are the only two I know of.”
“Miquitz has an entrance to the underworld too?”
“How else do you think the spirits of the dead mingle with the living?”
“I guess I never thought about it. Father doesn’t talk about the Miquitz Empire much, and I’m honestly too afraid to ask. They terrify me.”
“To be honest, they terrify me as well.”
Mayana dropped her voice to a whisper.
“Is it true they allow the spirits of the dead to possess them during their religious rites?”
Ahkin gave a slow nod, his brow furrowed.
“Yes. They celebrate the dead and welcome them during the few days a year the dead spirits can roam the earth. Not many know, but the Miquitz priests even have means to possess the spirits of the living and control their bodies.”
Mayana gasped. The thought raised goosebumps over her skin.
The rival empire was only about half the size of their own, but they had been enemies since the age of the Seventh Sun began. The Miquitz captured Chicome soldiers for their sacrifices, sometimes staging battles purely for that purpose. They were obsessed with the dead and the underworld. There were even rumors that their warrior costumes were not modeled after animals like those of the soldiers from Ocelotl, but skeletons.
“Have you ever battled with the death demons?”
“I have.” Ahkin turned and showed Mayana a pale scar that crossed the length of his upper left arm.
She reached out a finger and trailed it down the puckered skin.
“What happened?”
“I caught the edge of a spear during a battle where they were doing a sacrificial raid outside of Ocelotl. I was lucky though.” He ran a hand over his bicep. “Usually the Miquitz poison their blades with the secretions of poison dart frogs. Coatl thinks the blade had stabbed so many times that the poison had been mostly wiped off. Scared my mentor, Yaotl, half to death when he saw me take the blow.”
Mayana stared at the prince, her jaw slack.
“Isn’t that dangerous? For you to be on the battlefront? I mean, your blood is so important …”
“Well, when my father was still alive, it wasn
’t as crucial. Plus Metzi is still alive, and she can raise the sun as easily as I can. But it is essential for a leader to be a warrior. I’ve been training with Yaotl since I was a boy, and he is the greatest warrior in the Chicome Empire. Our soldiers will not respect me unless I earn that respect.”
“I can respect that.” A playful smile returned to her lips.
They reached the pool where she had been swimming yesterday morning, and Ahkin pulled her to a stop, his gaze wistful.
“I wanted so badly to go in the water with you yesterday, but I was too much of a coward.”
“You can face the Miquitz demons of death with their poisoned blades and you were too afraid to ask to swim with me?” Mayana brushed her long hair over her shoulder. She kind of liked this idea of him being nervous. It made her feel less so.
“Is this pool deep?” He ignored her playful jibe.
“No, you could stand. You don’t need to know how to swim.”
“Good.” The smile upon his face sparkled with mischief. And then Ahkin pushed her into the water.
With a shriek, she toppled in. The water that covered her head was much colder now that it was night, but she quickly regained her footing and stood, the water level just below her chest. What was he thinking?
She pushed her sopping hair out of her eyes as a large splash beside her told her that Ahkin had joined her in the pool. The wave of his entry buffeted her to the side before his head broke through the surface.
“There are much easier ways to get me into the bathing pool, you know.” She splashed water at his face. What fun it was to tease him.
“I know, but I’m the kind who likes to jump in once I’ve made up my mind.” He prowled toward her like a caiman in the river.
“I’ve noticed.” Mayana didn’t move, mimicking an unsuspecting deer in a caiman’s sights.
He lunged and caught her against the stone wall of the terrace, his hands and muscular arms on either side of her head. With his body, he pressed her back against the wall. She didn’t protest. His lips found hers. At first, they were cold and slick from the water, but they slowly warmed from the heat of their bodies.
