The Seven Serpents Trilogy (20 page)

At his command—he still spoke in a commanding tone, only a little less peremptory than formerly—I mounted Bravo.

“I had one of the warriors pour out only a third of the keg to complete the bomb,” he said. “The rest of the gunpowder we'll use in the cannon when Don Luis Arroyo and Moctezuma the Second pay us their visits.”

As the unwieldy craft nosed into the
embarcadero
, I made ready to ride ashore.

“When the powder explodes,” the dwarf said, “—and fervently pray that it will explode, for much depends on it—at that moment when the earth shakes and smoke rises in a stupefying cloud, ride through and emerge on the far side. I will be there to lead you on your way to the Temple of Kukulcán. It's the taller temple, the one on the left. Built, incidentally, in your honor, some 442 years ago, ten years after you fled the island, or so I am told.”

The dwarf preceding me, I rode up a wooden ramp, carved with many figures, to a terrace that was seven sided and paved with wooden blocks. On all of its seven sides were serpents, each alike, carved from stone, with their heads resting on their coiled bodies, their eyes halfclosed and mouths agape.

The terrace was empty except for warriors, who, spears in hand, stood guard beside the serpents. The dwarf motioned for me to halt, scrambled to the middle of the terrace, set down the powder, and covered it with his feathered cloak.

The flotilla was now moored in the lagoon. The three priests were huddled on the landing, seemingly awaiting further word from Cantú. They had taken off their masks and, in their feathered headdresses, no longer looked like jaguars and a howling monkey, but more like giant birds of prey.

Beyond the dwarf, from the broad thoroughfare that led to the plaza and the two temples, came a chorus of wild sounds, the cries and shouts and silences of a mul titude, swelling and dying away.

In a moment of silence the dwarf drew back his cloak and touched the fuse with tinder. I sat fifty paces away or more, with a tight hold on the stallion. Among my many real and imagined fears was the fear that he might bolt, for I lacked spurs and bit, to which he was accustomed.

The fuses caught, sputtered, apparently went out, then in an instant caught again. The explosion was not so heavy as the one I had set off under the statue of Ix Chel, but it was loud. The stallion reared and shied away. I managed to hold him more by words than by the halter.

Through the cloud of black smoke that rose over the terrace I urged him on. A pair of clowns with false faces and circular stripes around their bodies suddenly ap peared in front of me and were joined by a dozen or more musicians. Led by Cantú, the dwarf, the assem blage then moved forward to the rattle of drums and clownish chatter.

These were the only sounds I heard. The bronze-skinned crowd that lined both sides of the thoroughfare was silent. It was the deep silence of awe and adoration.

We had not gone a furlong before the dwarf whis pered from his place at Bravo's flank, “The stallion has won the day. The explosion helped. The populace be lieves that it was the voice of the horse. And you, de spite a certain tightness around the mouth, as if you felt the rusty taste of fear, look very much as a god should look. Hold firm, Lord Kukulcán. Have courage. And as our brave forebears on the heights of Granada shouted into the very teeth of the Moors, ‘Santiago!'”

Bringing to mind that ancient scene, following the dwarf 's admonitions, I held firm and swallowed my fears. The stallion responded. He must have remem bered the fiestas in Seville at which he had carried Don Luis through flower-decked streets. He turned his neck and took mincing, sidewise steps, lifting his hooves as if he were treading on snakes.

I was suddenly aware that the silent crowd was watching me from a distance. But when I came upon the people, all of them, on both sides of the thorough fare, quickly turned their backs. I saw no face except that of a child, a girl of four or five, who gazed up at me with wondering eyes, as if truly I
were
a god. The only god she had ever seen or would ever see again.

Farther along, a boy ran out in great excitement and fell in front of the stallion. He lay stunned. Ordinarily, I would have jumped down and seen to him, but thinking of my new role as mighty Kukulcán, I rode on.

 

T
HE SILENT THOUSANDS FELL IN BEHIND US AS WE MOVED ALONG
—the painted clowns cavorting out in front, the dwarf hobbling along at my side, the priests following close. We came to the broad plaza outlined by columns that were painted a shining red and carved with scenes of battle. The twin temples I had seen from afar, thrusting into the sky through clouds of copal smoke, now stood before me.

The dwarf said, “The citizens are silent, but don't be misled. They are ready to acclaim you. The words now tremble on their lips. Come, and we shall accomplish the final act.”

The clowns had disappeared, and the three priests, joined by a dozen or more retainers, had set off up a long flight of stairs that led from the ground to the terrace at the summit of the Temple of Kukulcán.

“Seventy-seven steps,” the dwarf said, leading me through the forest of red columns. “There's a shorter way.”

We came to the far side of the pyramid-like temple and I followed him into a shadowy passage, just high enough for me to enter if I crouched low over the stal lion's neck. It was musty with the smell of bats that clung to the roof and flapped away at our approach.

The dwarf struck light to a wick in a bowl of tallow and led me upward, round and round in tight circles. The stone walls dripped water. Stalagmites that proj ected from the earthen floor made it necessary for us to advance with caution.

We came to a series of narrow alcoves through whose openings the light shone, revealing rows of obsidian slabs carved with figures of owls and frogs, other creatures that I could not distinguish. These places, the dwarf told me, held the bodies of dead kings and high priests.

The air grew stale. The dwarf stopped with an excla mation of anger. “
Nombre de Dios
,” he said. “We have taken a wrong turn.” His words sounded down the pas sageway and by some trick came weirdly back to us in decreasing echoes from far above. “We must return. We need to reach the god house before the priests.”

It was not easy to square the stallion around in the narrow place, with the dwarf shouting instructions. Finally he ran back, holding the light aloft, and I followed. We traveled for half a furlong, to the last of the crypts. There, he took a left turn and, scuttling ahead, urged me on.

With visions of being trapped in miles of tomb-like tunnels, I quickly caught up with him and kept hard on his heels. The widening walls no longer dripped water. We came to a large room, where the dwarf's light shone on shelves that rose from floor to ceiling and ran far back into darkness. Upon these racks, their cheekbones touching, were human skulls in endless rows.

“Is this a cemetery?” I asked the dwarf.

“In a way of speaking. The heads, but not the bodies, are brought here when the ceremonies are over.”

We reached a wide, heavily carved door. Shoving it open, he said, “Ride! Come to a halt upon the parapet.”

Light flooded in through the doorway although the day was sunless. For a moment I was blinded. The stal lion neighed and backed off into the darkness. I put hard heels to him. He took only a step toward the door, and there set his hooves. The dwarf shouted, to no avail. Dismounting, I tried to lead him to the doorway, but again he flinched and backed away.

“Time is short,” the dwarf shouted. ‘Tether him here in the alcove. No matter. You cannot appear always on your horse. You cannot take him to bed with you.”

I tethered Bravo at the door and stepped out upon the wide stone parapet. Far away to the margin of the sea, to the very reaches of the eye, shimmering red and blue and yellow and turquoise green—all the colors Ceela had painted upon the walls of my hut—lay the walled City of the Seven Serpents.

Below, far down, seeming as small as insects, stood the multitude, a river of insects flowing away in the distance.

The dwarf was at my side. “Raise your hand,” he said. “Raise it high.”

I had no sooner done so than a chant, like the sound of a distant storm, floated up to me. The chant grew louder, became a shout, then it was a single thunderous word repeated over and over: “Kukulcán! Kukulcán!”

The dwarf cocked his head at the sound. He did his little jig. “Hexo, Xipan, and Chalco will conduct a vote,” he said. “They will confer with the city elders, the
nacom.
The outcome, however, is no longer in doubt.”

The priests, toiling up the long steep flight of steps, had nearly reached the terrace upon which we stood. They paused to watch the chanting multitude, all save Chalco, who, dragging his feet, continued slowly on his way.

The three priests in their towering headdresses came together on the terrace. Without a word they bowed to me, to the teeming crowd below, to each other, and turned their backs. They looked insignificant against the vast dome of the sky. Chanting went on, died away, rose up again stronger than before.

“These ceremonies,” the dwarf said, “often get out of hand. Also, you will not like what you see. But remem ber that you are now a god and that gods flourish upon blood.”

Off to my right, in front of the god house where I stood, at the edge of the terrace in order that the throng could see, was a large, curiously shaped object. I took it to be a decoration or a statue of some Maya god.

“The sacrificial altar,” the dwarf said.

It was longer than a man's body, some three feet in width and the same in height, curved upward in the center.

Seven priests came through a doorway at the far end of the god house and took up positions at the head and foot of the sacrificial stone. They were followed by a muscular Indian clad only in a breechclout.

Through the same doorway a prisoner was led forth and placed upon the stone altar, face up. Its curved shape caused his chest to be thrust upward and pulled tight like the skin on a drum.

Two
chacs
, priestly helpers, spread-eagled the young man, holding his arms and legs, though he made no ef fort to move. The muscular Indian, the
nacom,
swiftly and surely ripped his obsidian knife across the victim's chest. He then reached down into the gaping wound, seized the exposed heart, and snatched it out.

The dwarf said, “It is not new. Centuries past, the Carthaginians sacrificed children to the god Baal-Haman. As many as three hundred in a day were placed upon the outstretched arms of the idol and then rolled off into the fire beneath.”

“The acts of ancient barbarians do not condone these acts,” I replied.

“The point is, the people of Carthage were not bar barians. Carthage was a city of public baths. We have none. They printed money with marks of value. We use cacao beans. They domesticated animals—hundreds of elephants, for one thing—and used them to carry bur dens. We carry burdens upon our backs. Around the city were walls twice as high as those you see before you. Their immense galleys carried goods to a hundred ports from Asia to Britain. The cities they conquered paid them more tribute than ever was paid to Athens. I envision a city that someday we will build together.”

The sun went behind a cloud. The gray smoke of St. John the Baptist, the fiery mountain, flowed off into the west. My head reeled. I was silent.

 

I
WATCHED IN DISBELIEF AS THE VICTIMS WERE LED FORTH FROM THE
god house, one after the other, each man painted a bright blue and wearing a peaked, featherless hat. Their blood was caught in a stone basin. There were few sounds from them. Only one young man caused a disturbance. As he was spread out on the curved altar, he raised his head and spat out a series of loud imprecations.

“He is one of Moctezuma's Aztecs,” the dwarf said. “They are a rebellious and unrepentant breed. You shall see more of them in the future.”

I counted fifteen victims and quit my counting. Through it all, High Priest Chalco stood off by himself at the edge of the terrace, silently gazing down upon the throng. Once I caught his eye. He quickly looked away, yet in that brief moment when our gazes met I knew that if it were within his power, he would soon have me stretched upon the sacrificial stone.

As each heart was ripped out, the
nacom
passed it on to a retainer, who rubbed it against a small clay idol. The body was then shoved over the parapet to those be low, and the still-beating heart flung after it. A growing hecatomb of hushed hearts lay at the base of the temple, at the very feet of the chanting throng.

“It is an act of devotion,” the dwarf said. “Devotion to you. The idol is made in your image.”

I had watched the sacrifices with growing disgust, but somehow they were distant, a happening that was not related to me, that would have taken place in memory of me had I not been there.

The murky sky that had cast shifting shadows across the terrace now closed down upon us like a shroud. I tried to speak, to shout my disgust, but managed only a gasping breath.

The
nacom
asked for a new and sharper knife. He was handed a blade of chipped obsidian, carved in the semblance of intertwined serpents. The
chacs
were dripping blood. Their long, black hair was matted with blood. The stone basin overflowed.

Turning in horror, I saw that the great door of the god house, through which I had come, was closed and barred. There was no way to reach the labyrinth and disappear. But not three short paces away the terrace ended in midair. I could walk to the edge and launch myself into emptiness. I could leave, in an instant and forever, all that lay around me.

The dwarf must have sensed my thoughts, for he drew closer and put out a restraining hand.

“You and I, we together, will make the city a marvel of the world.”