Sasha became aware that the tables had gone silent, that everyone was looking at her.
“You hanging in?” Michael asked.
She nodded. “Just rearranging a few very deep-seated preconceptions.” Like the one that said Ambrose had never wanted her, never loved her. He’d given up his life for her. How could that not be a form of love?
And at the thought, she had the glimmer of an idea, a strategy that might just get them into the haunted temple.
“I have something for you,” Strike said, gesturing for her to rise. “Come around here.”
Keeping the nascent plan to herself for the moment, she stood and joined him at the front of the group, in an open spot beneath the edge of the ceiba tree’s reach, where the shadows gave way to sunlight. Nerves hummed through her as she realized, from the serious expression on his face, that they’d moved into the formal-acceptance part of the morning’s meeting. She’d halfway expected something along those lines. What she hadn’t expected was for her stomach to go tight, for it to matter to her as much as it suddenly did.
She, who’d never wanted to believe in the Nightkeepers, now wanted to belong to them. She wanted to be one of them, wanted to fight with them, for them. She wanted her birthright, damn it.
Standing straight and tall in the strange orange sunlight, looking every inch the king even without his regalia, Strike pulled a gleaming black knife from his belt and held it out to her, haft-first. “Sasha Ledbetter, as a member of the jaguar bloodline and the royal house, this knife is yours by right of descent and the warrior’s mark,” he said formally. “Will you accept it?”
Her breath went thin in her lungs at the sight of the etched knife, which was sand-polished obsidian, worked with the jaguar and the ju. “Whose was it?” she asked softly, curling her fingers into her palms to keep from reaching for the blade, even though she was dying to snatch it from him. She didn’t know whether the impulse came from her newly minted warrior’s instincts or a chef’s appreciation of a good edge, but she wanted the knife, wanted it badly.
“The queen’s.”
The queen. Her mother. The woman who’d saved her by giving her to a madman. Sasha wasn’t sure how she felt about that, wasn’t sure what to think about the things she’d just learned. But she could no more refuse the knife than she could undo the past. She wanted the blade, wanted the symbol. She reached for it, then hesitated and looked at Anna. “You don’t mind?”
“Warrior’s prerogative,” Anna said. “Go ahead, please.” She touched the heavy chain she wore at her throat. “I’ve got our mother’s pendant.”
Our mother, thought Sasha, her heart kicking in her chest at the realization of a childhood wish fulfilled, though not how she ever would’ve expected it to be. Not now, she told herself. Later. She could process everything later. Her time wasn’t entirely her own anymore, and the Nightkeepers had priorities other than welcoming their newest member.
Throat closing, she took the knife, which was warm and heavy in her hand. As she tested its weight, Strike stepped forward and kissed her on the cheek. “Welcome home,” he said simply. Then, moving to her side, he waved the others forward to formally welcome her into the group. Anna was first, and gave her a big hug. The others greeted her one by one, both winikin and magi, with a handshake or brief kiss, acceptance as one of them. More, acceptance as royalty.
Michael held back until last. When he finally moved up to face her, the intensity in his eyes brought a jitter to her stomach and a skirr of warning from her warrior’s mark. Instinct said for her to back away, but pride had her holding still and offering him her hand rather than a kiss. He ignored the hand, leaned in, and touched his lips to hers. For a moment, she thought she heard his voice inside her head, a soft whisper: I’m sorry for last night.
Then he withdrew, leaving her to stare after him, trying to figure out if that had been wishful thinking or not. More shaken than she wanted to admit by the suspicion that she’d just touched on Michael’s thoughts, another sign that they were destined—or had been at one point—to be mates, she gripped her new knife convulsively. Forcing herself to ease up, she returned to her seat as the others took theirs. She didn’t move away from Michael, didn’t want to deal with the questions the move would raise. And, damn it, she would’ve been physically aware of him regardless of where either of them sat.
Strike brought the meeting back to order. “Jade? Anna? One of you want to bring us up to speed on where we stand with the Aztec research?”
In the weeks since Sasha’s rescue, although she’d been immersed in her studies, she’d been aware of the Nightkeepers’ ongoing efforts to find Iago’s stronghold, or at the very least project the Xibalbans’ next set of moves in the countdown to the end-time. Strike had sent teams to check out several of the mountains the Aztec had considered sacred, but they’d come back with a whole lot of negatives. The Florida compound was a crater, and there was no sign of Iago or his people anywhere else. It was like they’d disappeared, though not even Iago had power enough to tuck a few hundred Xibalbans into the barrier. Apparently it was far easier to fold away inanimate objects than people—it required serious magic to get a sentient being across.
Their inability to find Iago or catch a hint of any Xibalban activity on earth had left the magi trying to guess what they would try to do on the night of the winter solstice, when the three-year countdown began. Also, there was no sign of the Banol Kax. Instead of reassuring the magi, it had put them on edge.
Anna stood and walked past the tables to take Strike’s place. “I’m going to assume you’ve all read—or at least skimmed—the report Jade sent around last week. Suffice it to say that the deeper we go into the research, the more it looks like the Xibalbans all but created the Aztec empire, and that, if it hadn’t been for Cortés’s arrival and the subsequent Spanish conquest, the Xibalbans and Aztec might have wound up ruling all of Mesoamerica.” She paused. “Based on what we’ve seen from the Xibalbans so far, I think it’s a pretty good bet that Iago is planning to complete that rulership. I don’t think he’s trying to ally himself with the Banol Kax, as we had originally believed. I think he destroyed the intersection and hid the hellroad with the prime purpose of barring them from the earth for the time being.”
“But why?” Strike asked, frowning.
“I think he’s trying to preempt the end-time itself.”
That brought a murmur of surprise from the assembled group. When it died down, Anna continued. “The Aztec calendar was akin to, but not identical to, the Mayan Long Count. It delineated a five-thousand-year cycle broken into five periods, called suns. Each sun began with peace and prosperity, then deteriorated toward chaos, whereupon the gods rose up and destroyed their creations in order to bring them back to life, purified. The first period—the Sun of Precious Stones—ended when the jaguars and other animals rose up and slaughtered mankind. The Sun of Darkness ended with the destruction brought by a huge hurricane. The Sun of Fire was destroyed when fire rained down from the heavens. The Sun of Water ended in a terrible flood. The final and current period, called the Sun of Movement, is destined to end on December 24, 2011, almost exactly a year before the actual zero date. On that day, a terrible earthquake is, at least according to Aztec prophecy, supposed to tear the earth apart.” Anna spread her hands. “Game over.”
Michael frowned. “What good does it do Iago to precipitate a full apocalypse? Unless he’s an idiot—which I don’t for a moment think he is—he’s got to have a plan to keep the earth intact and install himself as ruler, presuming that’s his goal.”
“There’s an even more specific Aztec prophecy dealing with their end date,” Anna revealed. “It predicts that the Life Tree will bear a new sort of fruit, namely a new world order. At that point, the god of death will remove his jade mask, revealing himself as Quetzalcoatl, god of peace, and returning the great emperor Moctezuma back to his rightful place as the ruler of all creation.” She paused. “I suspect that Iago is taking this to mean th
at the earthquake will destroy civilization but not the earth itself, making room for the Xibalbans to move into power. He may even see himself as the reincarnation of Moctezuma, the god-king who ruled the Aztecs at the time of the Spanish conquest.”
“But if the Xibalbans are an offshoot of the Nightkeepers,” Sasha said, thinking aloud, “then how did they come up with a different zero date? Is there a conjunction on the earlier date, too?”
Anna shook her head. “If you ask me, it’s an artificial date, one designed to preempt the Nightkeepers’ end-time.”
“It might work, too,” Michael said grimly. “If Iago’s magic is stronger than we think, and he’s truly managed to trap the Banol Kax in Xibalba, we could be in serious trouble here.”
“I think it’s more likely that it suits the lords of darkness to remain below for now,” Anna said. “But you’re right that we could be in trouble, either way. Which is why I think we need to plan a raid on the haunted temple as soon as possible. Hopefully, we can get past the demi-nahwal now that we have Sasha with us.” She paused, then looked at Sasha. “We need the library now more than ever. Please tell me you’ve got an idea of what we should do.”
Sasha nodded. “Maybe.” Hopefully. “The ch’ulel talent didn’t work on Rabbit, but as Strike pointed out, those of you who’ve found your talents outside of a formal talent ceremony have done so in the process of saving someone you love. I think we can make that work for us here.”
Strike raised an eyebrow and looked from her to Michael and back. “How?”
She smiled, well aware that the expression carried an edge. “This doesn’t involve Michael. I’m talking about Ambrose. We had a . . . difficult relationship, but I did love him.” She paused. “If I can use that love, or what’s left of it, to trigger the ch’ulel talent and heal his spirit, I might be able to bring him back to his version of sanity. At a minimum, I may be able to prevent him from attacking us. Who knows? I might even get him to lead us to the scroll, or answer some questions.” Gods knew she had plenty of those.
There was a moment of speculative silence before Strike nodded, a smile curving his lips. “Yeah. That could work. Let’s do it.”
“The hell,” Michael growled. “No way she’s going in there. Or have you all forgotten what the demi-nahwal did to Anna?” He rounded on Sasha. “He made her slash her wrists and she damn near bled out. Sound familiar?”
Her stomach knotted, but she forced a sharp-edged smile. “I’m an old pro, thanks. And I don’t remember asking your permission for any of this.”
His eyes snapped to her. It wasn’t until that moment that she realized he’d been deliberately not looking at her through most of the meeting. He’d touched her just twice, once playing footsie, and again during her formal acceptance into the group. He’d been banking his magic those two times, she realized, because now, when he reached out and cupped her chin in his hand, his touch all but seared her with red-gold power tainted with that strange, compelling power she’d sensed in him the previous night.
In a flash, the hormones were there inside her, wanting him. Damn them.
She nearly jerked back, but forced herself not to. Narrowing her eyes, she said, “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t touch me. Or if you’re going to touch me, then touch me, for chrissake. Make up your mind—do you want me or not?” In that moment she didn’t care that they had an audience of nearly two dozen, and that she’d be living with all of them for the foreseeable future. All she cared about was getting through Michael’s thick-assed skull that he couldn’t push her away with one hand while touching her with the other. It was making her crazy, and she didn’t do crazy.
For a moment she thought he was actually going to answer her, that he might finally let rip with what was really going on inside his head. Instead he shoved to his feet. “Shit.” To Strike, he said, “I’ll catch up with you later on the planning. Just keep one thing in mind: If she goes into the haunted temple, I’m going in with her. That’s not negotiable.” He followed up that declaration by stalking off along the path that bifurcated out of sight, one branch leading to the firing range, the other to the ball court. He didn’t look back.
“And there he goes,” Sasha murmured, too annoyed to be embarrassed, too tired of his inconsistency to be truly surprised, or even all that hurt, though she suspected that would hit her later, in private. “Pain in my ass.”
A muffled snort from Jade made her feel better, though it probably shouldn’t have. For a second, she was tempted to ask the others about the strange silver magic. But she didn’t.
Muttering something uncomplimentary under his breath, Strike turned away from watching Michael’s strategic retreat, and returned to the matter at hand. “We’ll start at the campsite and exhume Ambrose’s body. Maybe that will attract his spirit outside of its normal boundaries, allowing you to talk to it where it’s not necessarily at its strongest. We need to recover the corpse regardless.”
Sasha nodded gratefully. “I promised him a proper burial.” She flashed back on that last time she’d seen him, when he’d asked for the old promise once again. Working the time line, she’d realized that had been right after the summer solstice, when the barrier had reawakened. He must’ve sensed it somehow, despite having been severed from the barrier. He’d known, and he’d gone south to the temple. Maybe he’d intended to reconnect himself somehow, and bring her proof of the magic. Who knew?
“He’ll get his funerary rites,” Strike promised.
“Red-Boar . . .” Anna’s voice caught a little on the name, then steadied as she continued, “Red-Boar and I buried the remains near the cenote clearing. I didn’t have any trouble with the mad—um, with the demi-nahwal until we got closer.” She paused, then asked Sasha, “Do you have any thoughts on the dogs you saw in your vision?”
She’d thought about them numerous times, thank you very much. Big, gaping jaws tended to make an impression. But in all honesty she had to say, “Michael didn’t have much trouble neutralizing them, so I don’t think they’re an actual threat to us in this context. More bark than bite, and all that. Besides, it was a vision. I’m not sure why, but my instincts say they weren’t really part of the scene, that they were in the vision to tell me something else. Question is, what?”
Anna pursed her lips. “Dogs play any number of parts in Mayan, Aztec, and Nightkeeper mythology, but if we stick with the big one that seems the most relevant at the moment, we’re looking at the sky. More specifically, the sun.”
A chill ran across Sasha’s skin. She wasn’t the only one who looked upward at the pale, orange-tinted ball hanging midsky.
On the other side of the table, Jox frowned. “You think the dogs Sasha saw were the companions?”
“Companions?” Sasha queried.
“According to legend, the Mayan sun god, Kinich Ahau, starts at one horizon and travels across the sky each day, shedding light so mankind and his crops can flourish, et cetera, et cetera. When he reaches the other horizon, he enters the underworld and Night Jaguar takes over the sky. During the night, Kinich Ahau has to sneak through Xibalba without getting caught; he has two companions to help him get through the challenges of the underworld—a couple of black dogs. They help guide the sun god beneath the plane of mankind, until he comes out on the opposite horizon each morning as the sunrise.”
Sasha looked up into the strange orange sky. “So why would I see these companions in my vision?”
Anna turned her palms up. “If we’re lucky, the answer to that one too will be in the haunted temple.”
Sasha nodded. Forcing herself not to look in the direction of the ball court, she said to Strike and the others, “Okay. Let’s pick a day.”
Strike glanced at the sky. “The next conjunction of any real power is going to be the Geminid meteor shower.”
“Which is when?” Sasha asked.
“It peaks on the fourteenth.”
Sasha grimaced. That was eleven days away, and just seven days prior to the winter solstic
e. “There’s nothing sooner?”
“Sorry, that’s the best we’ve got. Besides, there’s the connection between Gemini and twins. Could give us a bit more of a boost than otherwise.”
“Then that’ll be the day.” Suddenly realizing she’d taken over a meeting—and a decision—that wasn’t hers to take or make, she spread her hands in the king’s direction. “Sorry. Habit. I always got in trouble with the head chefs for overstepping.”
“It’s your plan, your temple, your foster father, and your talent,” he said reasonably. “I’d say you’ve got the right.”
For a few heartbeats, the statement of support made her feel very alone, as though he’d just stuck her out in front of their tiny army. Which made her wonder whether this was how their father had felt, leading the Nightkeepers into battle when so many of his advisers had argued against the move. And that brought a nasty parallel to mind. The jaguars didn’t just have the reputation for being stubborn and rule benders, she knew. They also had a habit of being led into trouble by their dreams and visions, believing in portents that others didn’t see. Strike had defied the thirteenth prophecy to take Leah as his queen, based on his visions, and had nearly paid the ultimate price. Their father had led the Nightkeepers to slaughter on the weight of his dreams.
“What if . . .” She trailed off, then forced herself to say it. “Do you think I could be misinterpreting the vision? What if the scroll isn’t in the temple, after all?”
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