THE SAC’BE LESS TRAVELED

Are we the captains of our own fate, as I want to believe? Or are we destined to take the side roads that change our lives forever, where we look back and wonder what would have happened if we had only remained on the original path? I fear someday I will know the answer… and wish that I had never asked.

We reached a crossroad where the cavern branched off in a dozen different passages, while the main part of the white road curved to the left before vanishing through one of the larger entrances. A side road of more white stones, at a right angle off the Sac’be, marched straight into a different passage and disappeared as well.

A stelae had been set in the natural rock floor right before the intersection, and Rainbow hurried over to begin reading it as I told everyone to go ahead and rest. As they unslung packs and set down their weapons, I let my rifle dangle in my hand as I walked over to join her. “Is this our turn off?”

“This is it,” she replied, excitement in her voice. “According to this glyph,” her forefinger tracing the strange, stylized head with curved fangs, without touching the stone, “this smaller road reaches the entrance in about a quarter-hour, according to these numbers,” her finger moving over a carved line with two dots over it. “The next glyph,” her finger over four separate glyphs crammed together, “is an ancient unit of measurement. I know how far a distance six hundred count arm-spans are, which aren’t measured by Eldarion arm-spans but something else, and roughly how long it takes to walk it.”

I stared at her in amazement. “I would have to sit down with paper and a pencil to figure that out, yet you just calculated distance and time in your head. You have to be gifted.”

Rainbow shrugged as if it did not matter, though I could tell she was pleased by the smile tugging at her lips. “Part of the training to be a shaman is calculating far more complex problems than this one. Now, the stelae doesn’t say how far it is to the shrine of Ix-Chel, but this glyph,” her finger passing over several glyphs to hover over the carved symbol of a round hare with a human-like face and swept back ears, hunched over a writing table with a stylus in its paw, “indicates the shrine is close by.”

“It looks like a rabbit.”

She nodded. “It’s the symbol for the Rabbit Scribe, who serves as Ix-Chel’s representative here on earth and acts as the guardian of the shrine, according to our mythology.”

“So when they wanted to indicate the shrine, they use the glyph for its guardian.” She nodded again and I asked, “What does the shrine look like?”

“I have no idea, since it’s only visited by those who are having trouble getting pregnant.” Her gaze went back to the glyph as her voice took on a wistful tone. “I wish we could conceive our child there. Before the Spanish came, fighting queens were conceived and born in that place, the union of a Maya noble and an Eldarion female. They were the symbol of unity between the races.”

I gave her a puzzled look. “Fighting queens… did they lead armies?”

Rainbow shook her head. “They fought monsters with the Chosen, who in turn were humans drawn from all the city-states of the Maya. Grandmother claims that, since the treaty, the Camazotz has increased the number of the Zotz to hunt down the monsters who slip through into our world.”

“I thought the Maya ruled themselves.”

“We do, more or less, but the Spanish insisted that no more fighting queens could be conceived, as a way of showing our willingness to remain peaceful with the Mexican government.”

“But if she was conceived there-”

“Our daughter can never be a fighting queen since you aren’t Maya. Ix-Chel would have to show her approval by granting our daughter the abilities she gave others in the past, and since the time of the Conquest, only a few shaman like Ran-Li have ever received them.” Rainbow sighed. “And even those abilities granted are shadows of what they once were. No, I fear the time of the fighting queens of the Maya is over.”

“Abilities?”

Rainbow regarded me for a moment as if weighing something in her mind. Then she lowered her voice. “Promise me you won’t make light of this and speak of it to the others.”

“My word of honor that I will treat it with all seriousness, and only speak of it at need.”

“I suppose that’s fair. Alright, among the Maya people, human and Eldarion both, we believe that every one of us has a spirit companion who is part of us, taking the form of an element like fire, an animal in nature, one of the Maya supernatural beings, or even a Christian saint.”

“Really?”

She smiled. “Among the humans it’s more a tradition than actual fact. However,” the smile slipping away from her face, “the most powerful of our Eldarion shaman have the ability to project themselves out of their bodies and become their spirit companion.”

“Like an illusion?”

“Nothing like that at all. The projection is a real creature with supernatural powers, but also grounded in the real world and tethered to the shaman’s body, so if the projection dies, the shaman dies with it. My grandmother’s one of the few who can do it.”

I was skeptical, yet having seen so much already, I was willing to accept her words without proof. “What is her spirit companion?”

“A Messenger Owl. It’s a powerful spirit of Xibalba, which is not hell as the Christian priests sometimes call it, but is truly a land of darkness and disease where the monsters, like the one that attacked you, are said to come from.”

I struggled to make sense of what she was telling me. “So this Messenger Owl is an evil spirit?”

“Not evil, but powerful and cruel in the way creatures of Xibalba usually are. It’s the reason Ran-Li’s the strongest shaman anyone’s known in living memory, and the reason she’s so respected and feared.” Rainbow lowered her voice. “She’s the only one who would dare stand up to the Elder who lent you his dog.”

“Hey boss,” Drog called out, “what’s the word?”

“A quarter-hour down this side road and we will reach the entrance to Acorn’s village.”

Goro nudged him, and Drog cleared his throat. “We were talking among ourselves, and I was wondering if we could go up as well and breathe air that doesn’t smell like the inside of a Koncava’s boot, before we go after Bella again.”

“I want to see daylight,” Baroda added. “We’ll see this through with you to the end, but if everything turns into a bloody dog’s dinner, I want to remember the feeling of the sun on my face one last time.”

I wanted this over with and my grandfather safe, yet my friends had a point. “I would not mind a bit of fresh air myself. Miss Rainbow, what do you think?”

She shrugged. “I’m bound to you. Where you go, I go as well.”

“Reckon if we catch up too soon,” Jack said, “things could get a mite awkward, if you catch my drift.”

That settled the matter as Acorn asked Rainbow a question and she answered, the two going back and forth for a short time before she turned back towards me. “Acorn says if we don’t want to continue traveling in the dark, her village is not only close to the exit, but also close to a swift river that runs beside Ix-Chel’s shrine, where there’s another entrance to the Sac’be.”

I gave her a skeptical look as the memory of dark waters closing in over my head returned. “Travel by boat?”

“By canoe. There’s a path as well, but it takes a lot longer to get there. She’ll ask the warriors of her village to take us, as they’ve got to go past the shrine on their way to the city of the Eagle polity anyway.”

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Seeing my expression, Rainbow put a hand on my arm. “I understand your fear, but this entrance connects to a different Sac’be that also leads to Zotz-Na. There’s a chance we might be able to move faster than both groups this way, since she’s weighed down with the automaton and we’re not.”

My expression turned thoughtful. “We might be the ones waiting for her. Alright, we will discuss this later,” my heart dead set against an idea my head thought was a good one, “and see Miss Acorn home.”

Rainbow gave me a calculating look, which meant I had not heard the last of this ‘travel by canoe’ idea, but only nodded and joined me as everyone hefted their packs again and followed Jack as he led us down the side road.

After a quarter-hour or so, the white road branched again, going perhaps fifty feet before ending in a set of stone steps leading up. A stone stelae like the ones at the entrance to the Sac’be stood beside the stairs, and Rainbow chanted as she made the small, blue webbing's the glyphs absorbed, before crossing in an interconnected pattern. She spoke a word and the jaws above us began to open with the sounds of gnashing stone teeth.

Daylight peeked through the widening gap. I realized Drog was spot on in needing to see sunlight again and Ripper must have felt the same, for he bounded up the stairs, giving a loud woof before disappearing again. Jack waited on the stairs for me and Rainbow, who wiped her brow with a cloth Je’kyll pulled from his pocket and handed her as she passed, earning him a smile.

Above us, a child’s voice gave a wordless shriek. “What in tarnation?” Jack took off up the stairs, taking them two at a time, while the rest of us pelted up the steps as fast as we could.

The dank smell gave way to clean, humid air as we stopped at the edge of the jaws, which locked into place with a loud stone snap. Before us, the vegetation was more jungle-like than it had been around Campeche, with birds calling to each other as they flew past, the monkeys in the trees above us screeching at the intrusion upon their domain. I also saw something else. “Jack, there is a young boy out there beside a tree.”

“I see him.” The boy was around ten years of age, thin and short, with black hair and dressed in a white tunic and trousers. Ripper was standing in front of him with his ears alert and mouth open in a seeming grin. The boy looked terrified. “Reckon you better call off your dog.”

“Ripper,” I called to him, slapping my thigh, “come here, boy.” The massive dog turned and bounded towards me, woofing as if telling me what he had found, before turning forward again and whopping me with his tail.

Acorn saw him. Striding out of the stone jaws, she called to the child in their language and he raced toward her like a shot, wrapping his arms around her leg as he began to cry. Rainbow had the three of us remain where we were until Acorn had gotten the child to speak, and as he did, Rainbow’s expression became grim. “The child says his family has been captured by a giant whose feet are turned backward. He was able to slip through a crack and escape, but the others are too big and the giant’s already eaten his grandfather. When he ran to the village for help, they were so afraid that they abandoned the village and fled by canoe. So, he came here and prayed to the ancient gods, the ones we are forbidden to call upon… and both of you came out.”

That made me more than a little uneasy as the boy pointed first at me, and then at Jack, babbling away in Maya. “The boy thinks you are Hunahpu, because of your dark skin, while you,” Rainbow turning toward Jack, “are Xbalanque, because you’re pale with a sparse beard. In our myths they were known as the Hero Twins, because of the great deeds they did.”

Jack said, “Ran-Li warned me about that giant critter. She said it’s so strong that its muscles crushed its bones, so if it falls over it’s gonna have a hard time getting back up again. Otherwise, most folk can’t hurt it.”

“You can hurt it,” Rainbow replied. “The problem is, no one’s been able to kill it, and if you try, you only make it angry.”

I asked, “Is there anything we can do to save the boy’s family?”

Rainbow hesitated. “There is, but if it doesn’t work, all of us could end up being captured as well. In times past when a traveler met the giant on the road, instead of trying to outrun it, the traveler tore off some branches and made up a silly dance that made the giant laugh so hard it fell over. Since then, many people have used this trick to escape, but it doesn’t always work.”

“Are you sure people have actually done it?”

She nodded. “Long before I was born, my grandfather and his warriors did exactly that, according to my mother.”

Glancing back at my friends, who were standing deeper inside the mouth, listening, I remembered Goro telling stories about the Olympic Revels. “Rainbow, I think I have an idea. Goro, do you remember telling us about the part of the Revels you called ‘Madame’s Follies’?”

Goro understood at once. “We’ll need skirts and anything else that makes us look silly, or strange.”

Drog grumbled, “What are you getting us into now?”

“Your chance to shine like a star.”

Baroda made a face. “I hate it when he starts sounding cheerful.”

“Rainbow,” I said, “can you tell Acorn to run back to the village and get the things Drog said we need, while the rest of us take a look at this giant?”

She grabbed me by the front of my shirt. “I’ll go with her and help, but only if you promise not to disturb the giant until we get back.”

“We’ll be quiet as mice in my mother’s kitchen, I promise.”

“Good.” Then she pulled me forward and kissed me open mouthed. Surprised, I had no time to respond before she pulled away and began speaking to Acorn, the young Eldarion vigorously nodding before speaking to the boy, motioning several times at me. The boy nodded as well. “He’s promised to guide you back to his home. We’ll return soon.”

The two of them took off running down the dirt path winding its way to the left, Ripper bounding off with them, and I watched them go, my thoughts only of the way the sunlight slanting through the foliage caressed Rainbow’s body as her raven black hair streamed out behind her. “Old Hoss,” Jack said, breaking my reverie, “we’d best get a move on. Sun’s gonna be down soon.”

I exhaled as I struggled to reorder my thoughts. “Right.” Turning towards the boy, who watched me with eyes wide as tea cakes, I motioned for him to lead the way. He nodded, but Jack grabbed his shoulder before he could move and turned him around, the half-blood Eldarion making exaggerated motions of sneaking through the forest. The boy nodded again and began leading us down a different path that snaked through trees dripping with vines.

We reached a narrow trail crossing our path and followed the boy down it, the trees blocking enough of the sun so its light was dappled as it touched the leaf covered ground we were striding past. It ended in a clearing with deep ruts dug into the ground. The boy stopped several yards away with all of us still deep inside the foliage, his body trembling as he pointed across the open space at a structure resembling a log fort. Entire trees had been shorn of their branches and rammed into the dirt, set so close together that I could see no way of escape. Facing us were five trees lashed together with vines and propped up against the structure.

I whispered, “So where is the giant now?”

Jack pointed at a spot in the trees to the right of the structure. “Right there,” he whispered back, “holding onto a tree for support.”

Peering into the shadowy forest beyond the clearing, I saw where he was pointing and gaped in shock, my mind refusing to believe what my eyes were seeing. Manlike in form, it stood as high as the trees surrounding it, its body muscular in an odd way, with a certain fluidity in its flesh I had never seen in a living creature, and no visible joints. Its massive head rested between its round shoulders without any neck, more ropes of flesh giving it the semblance of a face, its lanky hair and beard hanging down like vines.

It opened its mouth and I saw jagged stones where teeth should have been. Its wide eyes were black as dark pits, while wiry black hair bristled all over its legs and nether region. It stood hunched over, holding onto a small tree it had ripped out for support like an old man with a walking stick. The giant should not have existed; could not, by the laws of physics I had learned. Yet, there it was.

It was also watching us. “Jack,” I said as my heart began hammering in my chest, “I am having second thoughts about this.”

He put his hand on my shoulder for a moment. “Reckon you ain’t the only one.” The others muttered in agreement as he went on. “But according to Ran-Li, it’s more likely to stay close to the food it’s got trapped behind the logs than go stumbling through the woods after fresh.”

“Boss,” Drog said, “this ain’t our fight.”

Glancing at the tears streaming down the boy’s face, I looked back at Drog as my nerves steadied. “It is now.”

“If it comes after us,” Jack said without taking his eyes off the giant, “everyone scatter in all directions. I’ll run towards the fence and try to get the folks out, which should get its attention, while you follow the dirt road I saw going away from the clearing. Reckon that leads to the village.”

We discussed our plans while the giant continued watching us, until a rustling began in the bushes. Ripper bounded out to where we were kneeling and licked my face, his tongue like a soft metal file rasping at my skin. A moment later the two female Eldarions joined us. “We grabbed four old skirts and ribbons for your hair,” Rainbow said, adding, “We also found these.”

Acorn showed us four small wooden masks with round eyes and mouths, their carved hands at their cheeks. Goro smiled. “Those are perfect, but we aren’t going to wear them where you’d expect.”

After we gave Rainbow and Acorn our rifles to hold, Goro got me fixed up, securing the mask before placing the skirt around my waist. He began working on the other two as Rainbow put her hands on each of my shoulders. “If you hear me scream your name, please, please, run to me as fast as you can.”

“Jack said to scatter like mice, more or less.”

“Hopefully that will confuse it. Hopefully.”

Rainbow sounded about as confident as I felt, and I dearly wished there was another way to fight this creature as Goro finished with the other two and then himself. “Jon, can you fix my hair?” The idea of fixing an Orku’s hair, even a half-blood’s, was so ridiculous that I smiled as I tied the ribbon in his coarse strands. He lowered his voice. “You don’t have to do this with us.”

“Yes, I do.” As I said it, I felt like I did when the old man in the courtyard had tested me. “Anyway, if I do not, Baroda will never let me live it down.” Goro shook his head, giving me a sardonic smile as I exhaled. “Everyone ready?” I got affirming nods and walked forward. “Then let us begin.” The four of us moved onto the edge of the clearing and the giant took notice, its backwards pointing feet making the earth tremble as it moved a few steps toward the clearing as well. We linked arms together and I called out, “Now!”

We began to dance the Can-Can.

According to my uncle, who knew Jonathan well, this is one of the few stories he ever told about his adventures.