by Lani Forbes
She reached for Yemania’s hand and squeezed it. Her friend returned the gesture as they gathered in front of the platform. Sweat beaded along Mayana’s hairline in the humid air, and she found herself wishing for a breeze. The sun sat relatively high in the sky, blazing down upon them as though punishing them for not sacrificing the blood of the Miquitz captives. The mingling scents of noble perfumes and so many hot bodies gathered together made her wrinkle her nose.
Ahkin stood just ahead, elevated on the stone dais, close enough to hear her if she yelled. Mayana chewed her bottom lip, wondering if she should indeed call out to him, but he looked determinedly at his sandaled feet, his jaw still clenched tight.
“My lords and ladies, I thank you for your understanding in this rather sudden change of events.” Toani raised his arms to call for silence, the crimson sleeves of his ceremonial robes sliding down his withered wrists. Mayana resisted the urge to snort.
“As many of you heard in the arena just moments ago, there is evidence to suggest that the sun does not have enough energy to continue its journey across the sky.” Toani motioned toward the flaming disk raining heat down upon them all.
Mayana looked around for Metzi, curious how she was pretending to handle the supposed revelation. She stood beside Coatl, though still keeping a careful distance from him. Her hands were clasped in front of her, her head bowed in mock concern. Coatl looked exceedingly uncomfortable. His eyes darted from the floor to Ahkin and back as though he had some kind of tic, like he was regretting whatever was about to happen. Mayana guessed from his behavior that this plan, whatever it was they were hoping to accomplish, was Metzi’s idea.
“We have decided that the best course of action to prevent the death of the sun is to offer it a substantial sacrifice of godly blood, the substance that birthed the sun in the first place.”
The fear that had been slowly sneaking down her spine suddenly sank its teeth into her flesh. To her left, Yemania whimpered. They were going to sacrifice the princesses. Her heart threw itself against her ribcage as though it was determined to escape before it could be cut away and thrown into the pit of Xibalba.
“No, they can’t do this,” Mayana said quietly, fighting back at the traitorous tears that were now pricking at her eyes. On her right, Yoli straightened her spine in a regal manner to welcome her fate.
“You are so selfish that you would spare your own life to doom your empire to the next apocalypse?” Teniza said coldly from in front of them.
“Or she just hopes that the rest of us can die to save the sun and she can live happily with the prince like she originally planned.” Zorrah joined in the verbal assault.
Mayana clenched her hands into fists. “You are all fools,” she started to say.
Itza looked up from her whispered prayers to hiss at her as the prince stepped forward. “You don’t know what his plan is yet, so how about we wait to see what he has to say?”
Mayana stubbornly clamped her teeth together. These princesses were infuriating. How could she have always wished for sisters?
“Yemania,” she whispered quickly to her friend. “Listen to me, I don’t know what’s about to happen, but Metzi and Coatl are secretly together. I saw them in the garden. They killed the emperor and are secretly pulling the sun down each night. I need to tell Ahkin. He has no idea. This isn’t about me.”
Mayana didn’t think Yemania’s eyes could get any wider than they already were.
“How do you know? Are you sure?”
“I’m positive. Yemania, you know your brother has always had great ambition. Think about it. Ahkin has to know—”
Ahkin cleared his throat and drew an obsidian blade from his waistband. Itza was right. They didn’t know what ritual he was performing yet.
“My ancestor, Huitzilopochtli, gave his life to create the first sun. The blood of the gods has saved us each time our world was destroyed, and now, I am hoping that his divine blood can save us from another apocalypse.”
Mayana heard the words that Ahkin was saying, but they didn’t seem to make sense. Why was he talking about his own blood?
“I have made the decision to sacrifice myself. With my blood, the sun will be nourished enough to …”
“no!” The scream ripped through Mayana’s throat before she even considered holding it back.
Every head swiveled to face her. The high priest looked highly affronted, the other princesses looked embarrassed, and Ahkin … oh gods, Ahkin’s face was painted with grief and disappointment.
“Ahkin, you can’t—”
“You will hold your tongue, you insolent snake!” Toani cut across her before she could finish.
“But, it’s not—”
“Mayana …” Ahkin looked at her, the pain so evident upon his face that it broke her heart and stole the breath from her lungs. “You have shamed yourself enough already. Just leave this be.”
Mayana gasped as though she had been punched in the stomach. She let her gaze circle around the faces glaring at her and caught Metzi’s eye in that instant, blazing fury evident in her expression. Mayana realized that this was exactly what Metzi wanted. She wanted Ahkin to sacrifice himself. If he did, the only descendant of the sun god left to rule was …
“No, listen to me, Ahkin …” Mayana pushed forward, trying to get to the stone platform, but the bodies around her pushed her back, as unyielding as a thicket of trees.
“Listen to her!” Yemania found her voice and let it join Mayana’s in protest.
“No, Mayana, you listen to me. You dishonor the gods and spit upon the traditions of your own people. I, unlike you, care more about the lives of my people than my own comfort. I have the courage to do what is required of me.” Ahkin wasn’t looking at her now. He turned away to face the gaping hole in the earth.
Mayana was almost to the platform, her fingertips mere inches away as she writhed against the crowd.
“Please—” she screamed in frustration. “Just wait—”
She was helpless, powerless. She was running through water again, chasing after her brothers and never able to catch them. Tears slid down her cheeks and she growled at the nobles blocking her path. The bodies jostled aside just enough to let her through, but Ahkin turned his back to her and lifted his knife.
“Stop!” Mayana broke through the line of people and slammed against the platform. The stone edge jutted into her stomach and she gasped. Mayana dug her nails into the carved surface to haul herself up, but she was too late.
The blade flashed in the light of the Seventh Sun and Ahkin plunged the blade into his own stomach.
Mayana screamed as crimson blood, the blood of the sun god, the blood of the prince she loved, oozed from between his fingers and dropped like red rain onto the surface of the stone. She clawed her way up, stumbling to her feet just as Ahkin turned to look at her.
“I think I still would have chosen you,” he said quietly, his lips trembling.
And then, Ahkin spread his arms wide, his body soaked in the divine blood of the gods, and let himself fall back into the blackness of the sinkhole.
His body fell so slowly, tipping over the edge like a terrible nightmare. Mayana lunged toward him, but she wasn’t fast enough.
Toani closed his arms around her waist, hoisting her back away from the edge, but Mayana twisted against his restraint and shrieked like a feral cat. She ran her nails along the high priest’s face. Rage and fear and her own sense of powerlessness poisoned her blood like the scorpion sting, overwhelming her nerves and turning her into some kind of wild beast.
Suddenly, she was not the only one fighting. Yemania was there, her nails digging into the priest’s flesh as she pulled at his hands.
“Let her go!” Yemania shrieked. “She understands more than you ever will!”
The priest screamed and finally released his grip, his own common blood now glistening
on his cheeks and hands. Mayana’s body slammed onto the ground, but she pushed herself back up, simultaneously reaching for the blade stashed in the cuff around her ankle.
It was the blade her brother had given her, the blade he had said was for an empress. Everyone around her thought she was the worst possible candidate, too selfish and concerned with her own will above the will of the gods, but she knew in her heart that wasn’t true. In fact, she was about to do the least selfish thing she could possibly imagine.
She turned toward Yemania, and her friend’s eyes shone with a newfound courage. The daughter of Pahtia now stood with outstretched arms like a barrier between the crowd and Mayana, holding back whoever might interfere. Pride flooded through Mayana at the sight of Yemania standing up to so many.
“Do what you must,” was all Yemania said, and it was enough.
“Thank you, Yemania.”
Without hesitation, without grimacing at the pain or flinching at the sting, she drew the blade across her hand. The red comet in the sky seemed to flare a little brighter, as if it knew her plan and urged her on.
The moment the blood appeared, she sprinted for the edge. She didn’t slow or miss a step as she hurled herself into the open air and into the pit of the underworld.
Chapter
50
The cold air bit against Mayana’s skin as she fell. Tears streamed out of her eyes as she strained them for some sign of Ahkin’s falling body, but the daylight had already receded above her and the darkness around her felt unnatural. Otherworldly.
How far was she going to fall? The darkness pressed in like a mass, like dark water that would fill her lungs and drown her. The fall seemed to last an eternity. She gripped the dagger in her hand as tightly as she could, the only solid thing she could hold on to.
Mayana tried to scream Ahkin’s name, but blackness and air swirling around her prevented her from making a sound. Just when she thought she must be falling to the center of the earth itself, the darkness thinned. A dull gray light opened at her feet, and she plunged into what looked like swirling storm clouds.
Her stomach in her throat, she wrapped her arms around herself against the droplets of cold mist that pricked at her face like thousands of tiny cactus spines. The clouds rumbled angrily, as though she had disturbed them as they slumbered, and the overwhelming sound of it rattled her teeth.
The world around her flashed with light and she tried to scream again, sure that lightning would strike her as she fell and burn her into an ember. More rumbling of thunder through the mist shook her deep within her bones.
Without warning, she broke through the bank of clouds, and a massive gray ocean writhed beneath her. Its glittering surface, reflecting the flashes of lightning above, rushed toward her. With hardly any time to prepare herself, she plunged into the water feetfirst.
Icy water enveloped her as she dropped like a stone in a lake. Bubbles now mixed with a different kind of darkness as the pressure of her descent squeezed painfully against her ears.
Mayana kicked out with her legs, grateful to the depths of her soul that she knew how to swim. Salt water burned its way through her nose and throat, overwhelming her sense of smell and taste. Salt everywhere. She reached out her hands, kicking and pulling herself upward. Her lungs screamed in protest, but the stinging on her palm reminded her of the bleeding cut on her hand. She willed the water around her to obey and push her up. A geyser of water caught her within its current and forced her back toward the surface.
Cold wind finally swept across Mayana’s face and she gasped, gulping in as much air as she could. Before she could think too hard about where she was, she focused all her strength into feeling the water, reaching out with her divine sense to locate where Ahkin had fallen. As if she were a jungle bat using sound to judge her location, she sent out a small burst of water in every direction, feeling for where the current met an obstacle.
Behind her, several yards away, her current of water ran up against something, so she turned herself around. Blood coated the surface of the turbulent water, a further indication.
She pushed out her hands and swept the current of water around his body to pull it toward her. It wasn’t until the warmth of his body pressed against her own that she finally let out a choked sob.
“Ahkin? Ahkin!”
She turned his face away from her, wrapping her arms around his chest and tipping him back so that his head lolled against her shoulder. It was a technique her father had showed her when helping someone incapacitated in the water, to take advantage of the human body’s natural buoyancy. She wished she had thanked her father for all the things he had taught her, but she’d worry about that later.
She continued to will the currents to keep Ahkin afloat. She turned his face toward hers, trying not to look at the gaping wound in his abdomen.
“Ahkin,” she pleaded, slapping his rough cheek. “Please, please, wake up.”
His heart still beat faintly beneath her hands, but how long had he been in the water?
Mayana moved a hand to his throat and a coolness across her skin told her that water had gotten into his lungs.
Panicked, she willed the water to come out, the blood from her hand spreading on his chest. Water poured from his mouth. His muscles tensed, and she turned his head to the side as he retched, sending more of the blood from his stomach wound into the already red-stained current around them.
She held him tight, listening to him cough and gag up the last of the water.
He turned his head to look at her. Of all the emotions to flicker across his face once he realized who held him, anger was the last Mayana expected.
“What in the name of the Mother—?”
Mayana frowned.
“Before you lecture me on how disrespectful and selfish I am, let’s get to shore, shall we?” Her voice came off more sharply than she meant it to, but she was already exhausted from the effort of keeping them both above water. They had only the time until her skin healed, or else she would have to reopen the cut on her palm.
A small wave slapped against her face like a cold hand and she spat the salty water out of her mouth.
“Can you see anything?” she asked him. She didn’t like the blue color of his lips or how his usually sun-kissed skin was starting to pale.
“What are you doing here, Mayana? You were supposed to live.”
“Well, I’m here and I need to save us.”
“No, we need to save you. Then you can let me die in peace.” He winced as he twisted to look around them. “That way.” He lifted his arm and pointed to their right before groaning and letting it drop again. “I see a ridge of dark mountains in the distance. There must be land.” Ahkin gritted his teeth.
“Where are we, anyway?” Mayana panted as she turned to face the same direction. She looked up at the dark clouds obscuring the world above from view. It was hard to believe that falling through a simple sinkhole could throw you into an entirely different realm of creation.
Ahkin leaned his head back against her shoulder. He was starting to shiver.
“The Sea of the Dead.” His voice sounded weak, tired. “It’s the boundary that separates the layers of the underworld from the mortal world and heavens above. The in-between.”
“The Sea of the Dead,” Mayana repeated. That at least explained why the water tasted so strongly of salt. Nothing could live in the Sea of the Dead … nothing except …
“There is something else to that legend I’m forgetting,” she said.
Ahkin hissed in a breath as he tried to move, a hand shooting to his stomach wound.
“Cipactli. I’d like to avoid him if we can.”
It was one word, but it was enough to bring back nightmares from her childhood, nightmares she had after hearing the stories told around dinner fires about the beast that devoured the souls of the living who tried to enter the realms of the
dead.
Most of the legends agreed that he was a giant crocodile with a fish tail and the legs of a toad—who also happened to have an appetite so insatiable that he had an extra mouth at every one of his joints. That many more mouths to avoid if they had to escape him. Her pulse quickened at the thought.
She turned around, as though expecting to see him prowling toward them, but so far, all she could see were the whitecaps and gray waves of the turbulent sea.
“Where is he?”
“I don’t know,” Ahkin said sharply. “But we better get to shore as soon as we can, especially with how much blood I’m getting in the water. I’d rather die on shore where my soul won’t be devoured.”
“Too bad I’m from Atl and not Pahtia,” Mayana grumbled, eyeing his wound again.
“Thank the gods you are from Atl, or I would be dead already. Just focus on getting us to shore.” His voice was starting to sound feebler.
The cut on Mayana’s hand was hardly bleeding anymore thanks to the rushing salt water. Taking a deep breath, she deepened the cut and willed the currents to push them toward the black mountains on the horizon.
She kicked along with the current, which carried them like a river might carry debris down the side of a steep mountain after a heavy rain.
Out of precaution, she sent out continual surges of water in every direction, feeling for some kind of obstruction, a warning that Cipactli was approaching.
Ahkin wasn’t much help, mostly because he couldn’t swim, but also because when he moved the wound gushed even worse. Mayana didn’t know what they would do once they reached the shore. She couldn’t heal. They had no supplies with them. All she had was the dagger from her brother and the clothes on her back.
An idea hit her like the lightning still flashing across the dark, swirling clouds above them. She stopped swimming momentarily and shoved her dagger underwater to where her long loincloth skirt tangled with her kicking legs. Mayana pulled the dagger through the long fabric until a strip longer than her arm came free.
“Angle yourself toward me if you can,” she told the prince, and he obliged as best he could.
