 
## _______________________________

## MUNDO MAYA:

## Revenge of the Jaguar King

## _______________________________

## by

## Jay Hersh

### Mundo Maya: Revenge of the Jaguar King

### Jay Hersh

### Copyright 2007 by Jay Hersh

### Smashwords Edition

This is a work of fiction. The events and characters described here are imaginary and are not intended to refer to specific places or living persons. The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher.

Cover image derived from an original image of the Mask of Hanab Pakal by George and Audrey DeLange. The derivative cover and the original image it is based on are copyright George and Audrey DeLange. Their use is under license from, and with permission of, George and Audrey DeLange.

This book may not be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in whole or in part by any means, including graphic, electronic, or mechanical without the express written consent of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

ISBN-13: 978-1-4327-0614-2

Library of Congress Control Number:

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please go to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the rights of this author to make money from that work.

For more information go to www.jaguarking.com

or email jaguarking@jaguarking.com

## Acknowledgements

I would like to acknowledge the following people, who contributed greatly to this book via their editing, suggestions, and encouragement: Jan Hersh, Joan Hersh, Christa Miller, Jeff Hersh, Steve Miller, Evan Cotler, and John Bartel.

I'd also like to thank Jeff Pzena for convincing us to check out Belize in the first place.

## Dedication

### This book is dedicated to Joyce.

Without her love and support

it would never have been possible

#

#

# Chapter 1 - Arrival in Belize

The plane landed with a thud. Oh no, Julie thought to herself, he's going to tell it again. Almost as soon as the thought entered her head she saw her brother Greg, an archeology professor at Southern Arizona University, turn to the poor passenger across the aisle from him. She knew what the next words out of his mouth would be.

"Must be a Navy pilot," Greg said to the unsuspecting tourist next to him.

"How's that?" the tourist asked.

"You can always tell the difference between Navy pilots and Air Force pilots," Greg retorted. "The Air Force pilots land 'em low and slow, but the Navy pilots slam them down onto the deck!"

No sooner than Greg had said this, Julie cringed because she knew the next thing that would follow from his mouth would be his snort of a laugh, and it did. Julie had resigned herself to the fact that her brother was a geek. He was a highly respected archeologist and she loved him very much but no two ways about it, he was a geek.

The poor tourist seated across the aisle from Greg had kept to himself during the flight. However, upon hearing Greg's quip he seemed to make the same recognition Julie had just made. Eager to extricate himself from Greg's presence, the traveler quickly gathered his belongings and scooted into the aisle ahead of him in anticipation of the conclusion of the flight.

On seeing her fellow passenger's reaction Julie realized she was glad that while she couldn't choose her siblings, she could choose her fiancée. In that regard she had done pretty well.

Kevin, her fiancée, was a student of Greg's. Greg often joked that Kevin would likely "exceed the Master" as he put it, but Julie knew he was right. His almost completed thesis, published papers on archeoastronomy, and especially his discoveries about the way astronomy was integrated into the Anasazi culture had astonished the archeological world.

Okay, she thought, so it's a small world to astonish. Still, his achievement had been quite a breakthrough in what had previously been a very deep mystery. The pieces were all there but until Kevin's insight into them no one had been able to make the breakthrough. Enough of thinking about work, Julie mused to herself, we're here to relax and let someone else do the research. Taking the lead of the tourist who had been sitting across from Greg, she stood up as the plane came to a stop on the tarmac outside Belize International Airport, pulled down her carry-on baggage, and followed the others down the aisle toward the plane's door.

Kevin stood up after her and grabbed his things, as Greg followed close behind him. Together the three of them strode down the plane's aisle, out the door, down the stairs, onto the tarmac, and into the bright sun and moist tropical air of Belize. They were directed to the nearby terminal to get their bags and go through customs.

The terminal wasn't much of one, certainly not by American standards. It was a beige stucco two story building. The architecture looked like something from the drab era of the late '50s and early '60s when Western modernist and Soviet utilitarian design almost seemed to converge, and for a moment in time you couldn't tell one from the other.

Inside, the terminal was not much better. Although Belize was a stable and relatively prosperous country, now independent from its former role as a British colony, they still hadn't quite worked out all the details of providing electricity on a regular basis. At the moment what little light there was in the terminal filtered in from the slotted windows high up at the tops of the walls. It was enough light to see in, and it occurred to Julie this part of the building's design was somewhat ingenious in how it allowed as much outside light in as possible. Her first impulse, borne of being raised in a place where electricity garnered about as much attention as breathing did, was to realize Belize was, after all, not a first world country.

Into the building the three travelers went, their luggage following shortly behind them. It had been unloaded onto carts which were wheeled by hand right into the building, where their contents were quite unceremoniously dumped onto the floor. As the pile of baggage grew, each of the passengers began to engage in the usual travelers' ritual of scanning the incoming bags. It took some time for them to locate their baggage, after which they pushed further into the dimly lit interior of the building to where the customs desk stood.

The customs line was a disorderly jumble snaking back and forth across the entrance hall. Every once in a while it lurched into motion, only to then stall again for what felt to Julie like an eternity. Eventually they reached the customs officer.

"Purpose of your visit?" the customs and immigration agent asked them each in turn, in a voice whose accent was somewhere between the King's English and the lilt of Bob Marley. "Vacation," they each answered, also in turn, and for each of their answers the agent dutifully followed up his first question with "Duration of your stay?" Again they each replied "Two weeks." After all three had undergone the same routine they received the same cheerful greeting of "Enjoy your stay in beautiful Belize," from the agent. Once past customs they found themselves on the other side of the building at the street entrance, casting their eyes to and fro for the driver the resort had told them to look for.

They quickly found themselves in a sea of taxi drivers. The taxi drivers of course knew most of the tourists coming into Belize would be looking to be picked up by someone sent from the resort they'd be staying at, and who of course was probably late. So they hustled and pleaded, trying to convince some impatient visitor that rather than wait for the driver from the resort, who surely would not show, they should let themselves be whisked off in one of "Belize's finest taxis." Had Julie not insisted they wait Greg might have been taken in by these pleas. The resort was over an hour's drive away and its manager had clearly specified the transportation to it was included in the rate, so she made Greg be patient. They bided their time in the heat and humidity, until after a little while they spotted a driver holding a sign with their names on it.

Stepping past the disappointed taxi drivers they loaded their belongings into the resort van and settled in for the trip out to the resort. The driver introduced himself as Mario. He spoke English with a Hispanic accent and was a native Belizean, which meant he was not of English descent. By way of apologizing for his tardiness Mario said "it is good that you waited for me," and then added, "many of these drivers are not so honest. They will tell you the price and let you think they mean in Belize dollars. Then when you are on the road in a place no other taxi can be found they will insist you pay them the amount in American dollars or they will leave you in the middle of the jungle. So they end up charging you twice as much, or sometimes more."

"How do you mean twice as much?" Greg asked Mario.

Before Mario could answer, Julie, ever aware of Greg's ability to live up to the role of absent minded Professor, interjected. "The Belizean dollar is fixed at two to one against the American Dollar. I told you that before we left," she answered.

Before her comment could even register with Greg, Mario joked to them, "And the Belizean minute is fixed at two to one against the American minute. So I was actually on time to meet you!"

At Mario's comment, Greg, who had not gotten the joke, spoke up "but that's not possible." He was about to explain why when the snorts of muffled laughter emanating from the back seat, where Kevin and Julie were sitting, caused him to realize his mistake and cease his line of reasoning.

Mario, being kinder to his passengers than the other drivers of Belize, replied, "We are not in much of a hurry here in Belize. You will see. Life is slower here, but that is why Americans like Belize so much."

Despite Mario's admonition to Greg that life in Belize is slower, it soon became apparent that when it came to driving, Mario had more in common with his namesake Mario Andretti than his fellow Belizeans. The road was a two lane strip of undivided concrete except where it became a one lane strip of dirt. It mattered little to Mario, who passed any other car he came upon with equal aplomb. Nor did Mario discriminate as to which side of the road he passed on. Left or right, shoulder or no shoulder, it mattered little to him. The van roared up the Western Highway passing any traffic it encountered on its way to the resort.

Shortly into the trip, when Mario mentioned they had plenty of time before dinner to stop at the Belize Zoo on the way, all three of them welcomed the chance for a respite from their white knuckled horror. They had read the brochure and knew the zoo was a fine collection of animals native to Belize who, for one reason or another, could no longer care for themselves in the wild, and so had come into the zoo's keeping. As such, it presented their best opportunity to learn about Belizean wildlife before they commenced their own outings, in the hope they might better recognize these creatures if they did see them in the wild. It also probably represented their one chance to see quite a few of them, such as the jaguar, who were known for their reclusive ways.

As one might have expected, Mario's turnoff at the zoo was abrupt and involved large clouds of dust kicked up from the shoulder of the highway and the zoo's parking lot. From the outside the zoo didn't look like much. It was a white stucco two story building which looked as if it could have once been a plantation mansion. The entrance corridor passed through it, offset slightly from the center, and there alongside it stood the gift shop and cashier's window. Mario reminded the group that the resort price didn't include entrance fees to the attractions and they would have to pay their own entrance fee. Then he shuffled back to the van for a little nap while Greg, Kevin, and Julie stepped inside.

A quick look around the gift shop did little to bolster their confidence in the quality of the pending experience, but the cost, at $4 U.S. - $8 Belize as Greg reminded them - was cheap enough. So they bought their tickets and picked up their maps. Julie rolled her eyes at Greg's repetition of the price in both currencies and began to regret Mario's having mentioned the exchange rate earlier. Being aware he was somewhat absent minded, Greg had developed a habit of repeating information he did not want to forget. Unfortunately, he tended to do this out loud and in a way no one around him could fail to notice. Those who knew him at first considered this as slightly odd. As time progressed, however, along with the number of repetitions of the fact to be recalled, most of Greg's friends came to find it increasingly annoying, although they almost never said so to his face.

The means for relief from exposure to this odd behavior came when one was able to part company with Greg, or when he found a new tidbit to repeat and the old monotony could be traded in for a new one. Fearing a new tidbit was not soon to be had Julie grabbed a map first, and Kevin's arm next, then said to Greg, "The zoo is laid out in a circle. Why don't you go one way, we'll go the other, and we can meet up in the center then tell each other what we've seen and see if we want to spend more time here." Oblivious to Julie's true desire for a little time alone with her fiancée, and away from him, Greg, amicable as always, agreed to this and set off to the right, following the path counterclockwise, while Julie and Kevin headed left in a clockwise direction.

As she and Kevin wandered, Julie noticed that although it was not much to look at from the outside, the zoo's collection of animals was rather impressive, especially for such a small country as Belize. Curious about this she stopped a caretaker and inquired of him, "How is it that in such a small country you have such a magnificent zoo?"

The caretaker smiled at her interest and started to explain the zoo's fortune in this respect. "Well Ma'am the zoo owes the diversity of the animals here to the sheer number of animals native to Belize as well as a campaign popularized by the government to protect and preserve the native animals. Many injured animals are often brought to the conservation authorities by the local populace. The ones that can be saved are brought here. If they recover sufficiently they are returned to the wild after their rehabilitation. For those we can not rehabilitate the choices are keep them here at the zoo or put them to sleep. So most of them end up staying here. It is unfortunate for them in some respects, but good overall since it helps further increase the awareness of the fragile natural resource we have here." Julie thanked the caretaker, then she and Kevin moved on.

As they walked, Julie was chatty, but as usual, Kevin was much quieter, seemingly lost in thought. The sound of Julie's voice reading the signs filled his ears and his mind began to wander. He recalled how Julie had told him that before embarking on her graduate studies in anthropology she had taken courses in botany as an undergraduate. Her constant fascination with plants and animals was a source of both great endearment and irritation to him. Never being one to easily identify different types of animals and plants, Kevin found Julie's talent in this regard to be welcome when they were off working in the field or traveling in new places as they now were. What sometimes caused him consternation was her inability to recognize that spotting new plant species on the sides of the highway while driving a speeding car was neither a safe, nor endearing, trait. Given their present locale, and his recent experience with Mario's driving, Kevin was not of a mind to dwell on such a small thing. Instead, he simply reveled in her enthusiasm, taking joy in her ability to help him truly appreciate the beauty of the many exotic plants and animals the zoo had to offer.

Together they passed spider monkeys, crocodiles, and the many species of birds the zoo had. Some of the animals were familiar to Kevin and Julie from zoos back home, although they had never seen them as close up as they could here. A few they had never seen or heard of before, and others, while similar to species they knew from home, were variations unique to Belize. The turkeys were unlike the plainly colored wild ones they had seen when hiking in the woods of Maine. Those here had a splash of color and an almost indescribable iridescence. The vultures, with their white bodies and incredibly bright orange heads, were a stark contrast to the brooding black birds that circled the skies of the American Southwest high above the archeological dig sites Kevin and Julie worked on. Even the eagles, though they bore no bright colors, had more distinctive markings, as well as a bearing about them which set them apart from all but the most regal of raptors they knew of back home.

Meanwhile, around the other side of the zoo, Greg was strolling in his usual absent-minded manner taking in the many different types of small animals he had never heard of before. The coatimundi, or coati for short, reminded him a little of the many raccoons he'd encountered camping. Its color differed somewhat, as did the shape of its body, nose, and tail, but the animal had the same curiosity about it. This was confirmed to him by the signs admonishing visitors to not feed the coatis and to keep their bags away from the fence. The sign included a picture of what remained of a camera bag a curious coati had "borrowed". Greg smiled to himself at the foolishness of any tourist who would let that happen to themselves, then continued on.

Wandering around the zoo, he came to the section where the native cats were housed. Impressed though he was at the degree to which the zoo had gone to make the animal habitats as natural as possible, this attention to detail now presented a problem for him and the other tourists milling around the cages of the big cats. The habitats were filled with lush natural vegetation. Beautiful though the enclosures were they made it difficult to catch a glimpse of the typically nocturnal cats, who were sleeping in the shade as the heat of the day started to rise.

At each of the cages Greg stared deeply into the brush, moving his head side to side in order to try to better see the shy cats. No matter how hard he tried, the small cats, such as the margay and the ocelot, proved impossible to view. The cats were too small and there was too much cover for them to hide in. Frustrated he moved on to where the jaguars were.

Arriving at the jaguars' cages he was pleased to see that at least they were being more cooperative. He stood there viewing them lazily lying in the sun, but having seen these cats many times before at zoos back home, his attention proceeded to wander, until he noticed a sign pointing the way to the black jaguar's cage. A black jaguar, Greg thought to himself, I didn't know there was such a thing, and he turned to follow the direction of the sign.

Arriving at the cage labeled "Black Jaguar" Greg stood and gazed, but he saw nothing. That figures, he thought, with my luck it's probably off getting shots or something. He was about to give up and walk away when he saw a slight rustling. Slowly he shifted his position, following the exterior of the black jaguar's enclosure, which stood across a pathway from the enclosures of the other jaguars, trying to zero in on where he saw the movement. Following the enclosure he found, to his annoyance, it was butted up against that of another type of small animal. The sign on the cage read "Kinkajou" but Greg took no notice of it. He continued circling around and was relieved to find the extent of this other animal's cage wrapped back on that of the black jaguar. It occurred to him there were just these two enclosures in a little isolated island-like space surrounded by pathways. Though the space was large, Greg realized if he carefully maneuvered around it looking high and low, he would eventually catch a glimpse of the black jaguar, even if he had to do it by looking through the other animal's cage.

Greg's patience paid off as he was slowly able to discern the outline of the large beast. When he did so he almost felt embarrassed. The huge animal lay in the shadows under some brush right at the corner where its cage touched up against that of the kinkajou. The jaguar was so close, he realized, that if he stepped over the small safety fence just a few feet from the enclosure he was pretty sure he could reach through the wire mesh and touch it. Not that this was something he would ever dare to do.

He did wonder, though, how could he have missed the beast when it had basically been right there in front of him. Then he recognized how truly amazing an adaptation the black jaguar's camouflage was. Unlike its spotted cousins, it seemed to melt into the plentiful shadows of the forest floor. It was an attribute which allowed it to hide in almost plain sight. No wonder it's the top predator in its realm, surprising there aren't more of them, he thought to himself.

Entranced by this incredible beast, Greg leaned in to get a picture. Owing not just to the deep shade, but also to the lack of contrast between the big cat and its surroundings, his camera chose to do what any self respecting electronic device would do at such a moment. It refused to function as Greg desired and would not take the once in a lifetime picture that was there in front of him. Cursing under his breath, he turned his attention to the misbehaving camera, trying not to make any noise that might startle the sleeping jaguar.

As he did this, Greg was himself startled by an incredibly loud and extremely vicious shrieking sound coming from the adjacent enclosure to his immediate right. He had been leaning forward, trying to take the picture, and as his body jerked in reaction to the hostile noise so close to him it caused him to lose his balance, pitch forward, and fall over the safety fence onto the ground right in front of the enclosure.

Greg was not the only one startled. His tumble caused the black jaguar, who, as is the habit with all cats, had previously been slumbering with one eye half open, to instantly twist its lithe body like a coiled spring unwound. In a single motion the cat righted itself, while simultaneously lashing out with its muscular paw and sharp claws through the mesh of the enclosure and towards the place where Greg lay face down in the plants between the safety fence and the jaguar's cage. Seeing the sharp claws swiping at him, Greg in turn let out a blood curdling shriek, then hastily pulled himself up and scrambled backwards away from the jaguar. In doing so he subsequently fell once again, this time tripping over the low safety fence, finally coming to rest on his butt right in the middle of the footpath.

Meanwhile, Kevin and Julie had been traversing the circular zoo layout clockwise. As they strolled slowly, endlessly fascinated by the small, yet diverse, offerings of the zoo, they began to forget themselves and really started to feel like they were on vacation. The zoo was designed to try to give its visitors the feeling of truly being in the forest with the animals, and to further this effect it contained several small cul de sacs, waterways, and footbridges. Caught up by the relaxing locale, Kevin and Julie availed themselves of one of these hideaways to cuddle and kiss like the soon-to-be wed couple they were.

As they did so, they heard a shriek of laughter nearby them and the sound of voices approaching. Through the brush they could see a beautiful, statuesque blond woman walking on the path nearby. In a loud voice, rich with a British accent, she exclaimed, "I can't believe the bloody tapir wee'ed on me!" A handsome young man strode along side her. Choking back his laughter he replied, "Well, you were the one who chose to ignore the huge warning sign in order to get a better picture." Playfully she swung her arm at him, giving him a good natured rap on the shoulder. As they strode off, the last bit of their conversation Kevin and Julie could make out was the woman asking someone where the restrooms were.

A moment later they were tugged from their amusement at the British couple's unfortunate encounter when they heard a loud snarling sound, like that of a tiger, followed by a scream in what sounded like Greg's voice. This was quickly followed by the calls of other zoo patrons for help. They immediately rushed towards the sound only to discover that while the zoo was built to convey the feeling one was walking casually through the jungle encountering the animals, such a design was not conducive to rapidly traversing it. The path ahead of them diverged both left and right, and they did not know which way to go. Instinctively Julie went to the right, Kevin to the left, as both rushed to the sound of the commotion. Fortunately for them the two paths circled around what appeared to be a large enclosure and joined at the front part of the jaguar exhibit. There they found Greg lying on the ground with a zookeeper assisting him.

"What happened?" Julie asked.

"I leaned in to get a closer picture of the lion, tiger, er, jaguar while it was sleeping, when that little rat like thing next to it snuck up behind me and spooked the hell out of me. I was so startled I fell forward towards the wire and the cat sprung at me and tried to swipe me with its paw!" Greg exclaimed, pointing to the spot at the cage where the jaguar had stuck its paw through.

Julie turned to the cage to see the jet black jaguar lazing in the sun just inside the bars, as if nothing at all had transpired. As she had done so many times before, she rolled her eyes at Greg's mistaken identification of the cat, remembering she was the one with all the botany knowledge in the family.

"Nonsense! The black jaguar is very old and quite peaceful." The zookeeper said gently correcting Greg. "He has never been aggressive towards anyone." Then chided Greg further, "Besides you should not have been beyond the safety fence and leaning in so close to the bars. You have scared both the kinkajou and the poor old jaguar. We should throw you out right now for such behavior!"

Greg continued to protest to the zookeeper that he was behind the safety fence concentrating on taking a picture, when the kinkajou, or "rat" as he kept referring to it, provoked the jaguar to lunge at him. As the two of them argued, Julie noticed something on the ground right in front of the spot where Greg had indicated the jaguar had stuck its paw through the cage. Pointing to it she interrupted the two bickering men and asked, "What's that on the ground there?"

The zookeeper stepped over the low safety fence, the one Greg had fallen over, to take a closer look. Reaching down into the dirt and grass he lifted up the body of a snake whose head had been torn off. "This is a leaping viper," he stated, "one of the most poisonous snakes in the western hemisphere." Then he added, "A bite from this snake could have killed you in minutes. This must be what the jaguar was swiping at."

The zookeeper was staring intently at the dead viper with a look of absolute awe on his face. "What is it, what's wrong? Did it bite me?" Greg asked, as he noticed the zookeeper was transfixed by the dead snake.

"Well, it's definitely a leaping viper, you can tell by the markings," The zookeeper said still studying the snake. "It's just that I've never seen or heard of one anywhere close to the size of this one. He's got to have been at least four foot long. This snake rarely grows to over two foot." Then he looked over to Greg and continued, "Given the size of this thing, if it bit you you'd already be dead, or too far along for anyone to help. I guess maybe you were telling the truth, so we won't kick you out after all. But please man, be more careful. This is not the city here."

"It would appear the jaguar saved your life," chimed in Kevin, who so far in this trip had not said much to anyone other than the customs inspector. "Shall we see some more of this zoo?"

Greg got up and dusted himself off. From this point on he insisted they stick together while touring the rest of the zoo. As they were about to walk away the zookeeper called out to Greg, "Hey, you'll want to take this," and he handed the dead snake's body to Greg. "You'll want to have the body to show folks when you tell this story. Otherwise, no one will ever believe you." Greg shied away a bit. Julie had a look of utter revulsion on her face at the thought of him carrying around the body of a dead snake.

Seeing his reluctance the zookeeper encouraged Greg, "Seriously. Take it man. It damn near killed you, so it's yours by all rights. You can have it made into a belt. I know a great place right on the road to Cayo, real near where all the resorts are. Won't take them but a few days to tan it. You could be wearing it by your flight home."

Kevin chuckled at the thought and reached out to take the snake's remains. "If you don't want it, I'll take it. You'd probably never see another belt like that." As he did so Julie started to shake her head side to side in the classic "no way" motion many a prospective bride has made.

She soon realized there was no point to her admonishment. Greg had by now shaken off his bewilderment at first almost being killed, then being offered the decapitated body of his erstwhile assailant. "What the heck," he said to no one in particular, then reached out to take the snake from the zookeepers hands. As he did so he could see the sigh of relief on Julie's face at the knowledge Kevin wasn't going to be the one keeping the snake.

"What's the name of the place?" Greg said to the zookeeper.

"Haitian Hatti's," the zookeeper replied, "Your driver will know the place. Big souvenir spot for the tourists." Greg thanked him and the three of them went on to see more of the zoo.

The rest of the tour of the zoo was uneventful. When they got back to the van Mario was napping. Kevin wanted to play a joke on him by putting the snake in his lap and then waking him, but Julie absolutely forbid him. Fortunately for Mario, their debate over this awakened him. When he saw what Greg was holding he called out, "Madre Mio! Where did you get a snake such as this? You can not take animals from the zoo Señor." Greg explained what had happened to him, and how the jaguar had killed the snake, which was a wild one and not part of the zoo. Mario was still spooked.

Neither mellowed by his nap, nor chastened by something Kevin said to him on the way into the van, Mario went even faster for the second half of the trip. There was something about the snake which appeared to spook him, and he wanted to get it away from him as soon as possible. Surprisingly, Greg, who had been the one most unnerved by Mario's driving on the way to the zoo, didn't notice.

After about forty-five minutes of driving Mario came to another abrupt stop in a cloud of dust at a modest sized red building on the side of the road. There was a sign on top that read "Hatti's". Between the size of the sign and the bright pink color of the building it was difficult to miss the place. Judging by the number of cars and tourist buses in the lot very few did. Just before the three of them went inside Greg asked Mario, "Why do they call her Haitian Hatti?"

Mario replied, "Before she came to Belize they say she was a Voodoo Priestess in Haiti. They say she came here to escape bad spirits. Probably a bunch of mumbo jumbo. She got the best Belize souvenirs though." As the three of them walked away they noticed Mario stayed in the car. He called out to them as they walked away, "Please, no shopping now. You will come back here on one of the resort trips and we can't be late for dinner."

Inside, the store was bustling. It was full of all kinds of things for tourists. From the typical t-shirts saying "You Better Belize It", to rugs woven in native Mayan patterns, and intricately carved jaguar face masks. Julie was not much of a shopper as women go, but she was in awe of the truly beautiful and skilled hand crafts she saw on display. Greg was all business and went right up to the register. "Is Hatti here?" he asked.

"Who wants to know?" the young girl behind the counter asked. Greg put the dead snake up on the counter and said, "The zookeeper at the Belize Zoo said she could make this into a belt for me." At the sight of the snake on the counter the young girl stammered something and ran off to the back of the store. Not a minute later a husky black woman with a brightly colored dress emerged from the back.

"What you got here?" she said with a thick Haitian accent. Then she saw the snake, "Take some powerful spirit to kill a creature like this." Greg explained to her what had happened at the Zoo. Hatti looked at him suspiciously for a moment, then picked up the phone on the counter and stepped a few feet away from Greg. A minute or two later she was back. "Your story checks out. I had to check. Many animals are protected in Belize. We get in big trouble if we handle illegal stuff. What do you want for this?"

"I don't want to sell it. I want to have it made into a belt," Greg said.

"Mighty handsome. Good luck too. Normally, a jaguar kill a snake, it would eat it. Must be lucky it left it for you. You pick out a buckle and tell me your belt size. Then come back in a week. We have it ready for you. Twenty American. Okay?" Hatti said.

Greg nodded his acceptance. After picking out a belt buckle as Hatti had instructed him he gathered up Kevin and Julie, who he had to reluctantly tease from the shop, as they had become enmeshed in their admiration of the many beautiful native crafts. He bundled them back into the car and Mario kicked up a cloud of dust pulling out of the gravel parking lot and back onto the road.

They arrived at the resort shortly before dinner. They were greeted by their hosts, shown to their rooms, and washed up. As is typical of much of Belize, the drinks were included in the resort price. The three of them availed themselves of this opportunity to sample several local concoctions with names like Banana Velvet, Rum Punch, and Coconut Smoothie. As they listened to the resort's manager tell them about all the trips planned for them during their stay, their fatigue, and the effect of the drinks, overcame their excitement and all three began to grow tired. The resort manager recognized this and, bidding his guests good night, advised them to sleep well and he would tell them more about the other adventures in store for them over breakfast.

The sun had set during dinner and, as the three of them walked to their cabana, they noticed a sound which had been hidden from them by the Jimmy Buffet and Bob Marley playing in the restaurant bar. It was a sound none of them had ever heard before, an eerie deep throated bellowing that seemed to come from all around them, and the pauses between it were few. It was not the last time they would hear that sound in Belize.

Chapter 2 - The Trip to Caracol and the Museum

After eating breakfast Julie climbed into the van for the ride to Caracol, while Kevin and Greg stood outside it in the sunlight overlooking the slow flowing river the resort was situated on. It was not her first ride in the van and she had become accustomed to the morning routine. As she sat down she noticed a new face among the group. "Hi, what is your name?" Julie greeted her.

"I'm Marci. I arrived at the resort sort of late yesterday and missed the happy hour introductions," the newcomer said smiling somewhat shyly. Julie smiled back. Encouraged, Marci continued her inquiries, "So what have you done so far since you've arrived? I'm only staying a few days before going out to the coast and could really use some help figuring out what I should do. It all seems so interesting."

As Marci asked this, Kevin and Greg climbed in. Julie slid over to make room for them, then replied, "We've been here a few days and so far we've gone river rafting, tubing through caves, nature hiking in the tropical reserve, and explored the ruins of Tikal over in Guatemala, as well as Xunantunich which is right up the road from the resort." She paused for a moment, then thinking she might have been bragging, she hastily added, "Oh and we've also spent some time relaxing by the resort pool reading about the culture and history of the Maya."

Kevin, noticing the new face, spoke up, "We booked two weeks so we could do all the adventure stuff and still have some time to lounge at the pool. It's hard to know what to recommend. It really depends on what you like most, archeology or nature?"

As the group talked, Jimmy, their guide from the resort, closed the van door and climbed into the driver's seat. His assistant Santos, who was both his trainee and nephew, sat next to him on the passenger side. Starting the van, Jimmy, who was a certified guide, set out down the road. He had apprenticed for several years in order to get his Belizean guide's license, since only licensed guides could work in Belize. Santos, his nephew, was working with him in order to become licensed as well.

Jimmy had encouraged his nephew to become a guide, telling him the time he spent as an apprentice would be well worth it. With the growth of tourism the resorts were in need of licensed guides. The pay was good and the work pleasant and easy. After all, what could be more fun than traveling around one's own country pointing out all the beautiful animals, plants, flowers, and trees it had to offer?

Jimmy had become very good at it. The tourists were constantly amazed at how, without the aid of binoculars, he could correctly identify and point out what, to them, looked like small specks in the trees. Whether it was the howler monkeys, whose eerie nocturnal bellowing had unnerved Julie on the way back from the resort bar on the group's first night there, toucans, macaws, lizards, or any number of other animals who made their homes high up in the trees shying away from the approach of humans, Jimmy's eyes could spot them hundreds of yards away.

As Jimmy drove he heard Marci responding to Kevin's question, "Well, I guess I'm probably a little more interested in seeing the wildlife than anything else, but today was the one chance I had to make the trip to Caracol since it only runs once per week."

Kevin was often quiet, but, as Julie had learned early on in their relationship, he could become quite garrulous when he had a chance to be helpful. Now he found himself with such an opportunity, "I'm Kevin, by the way," he said to Marci, "and this is my fiancée Julie, and her brother Greg."

"We haven't been to Caracol yet but we've learned that even on the archeological trips, if you stick close to Jimmy here, you'll see a lot more wildlife," Kevin said. "At Tikal he was taunting tarantulas to come out of their holes and he also spotted some iridescent wild turkeys hiding just off the side of the trail. We would have completely missed them without his pointing them out to us."

Marci replied, "Thanks." She paused a moment then said, "Umm, is there anything I should know about the Maya before we get to Caracol? I'm really not up on the history of this area."

At Marci's comment Julie could almost here the gears turning in Kevin's head, and knew it was time to settle in and get comfortable for the ride to Caracol. The poor woman had inadvertently flipped on the professor switch in Kevin's brain. Julie had been with Kevin long enough to know that when he was really excited about something, especially if it was something he'd recently learned, any time an opportunity arose to recount it to someone else he almost never missed the chance. It was a way for him to review to himself what he had learned, as he found teaching others helped him better collect his own thoughts.

Unfortunately for Marci, she was not aware of this when she asked her innocent question. She had no idea it would start Kevin in on a recounting of the history of the Maya, as well as their methods of timekeeping and astronomy, based on what he had learned from his reading by the pool, and his explorations of Tikal and Xunantunich. It all started so slowly and innocently.

"Did you know that Mayan civilization is over 2000 years old?" Kevin asked Marci.

"I had no idea," Marci replied.

"Mayan pottery, believed to have been used in burial rituals, can be traced back as early as 2600 BC," Kevin said to her. Marci didn't reply. Kevin took this as a sign of interest and continued on. Soon he was telling her, and any of the others in the van that cared to listen, about the rise of the Maya. He described to them the most noted phase of the Mayan civilization, referring to it as the "Classic Period", and stating it had occurred between 200 and 900 AD in what is now Southern Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras. Then he explained how, as their civilization rose, the Maya built a system of strong city states who sometimes waged war upon each other.

Encouraged by the rapt attention of his captive audience Kevin kicked it into high gear. He began telling them of the Maya's accomplishments in astronomy and how they charted the movement of the stars and planets with an accuracy unrivaled by other early civilizations and which, in some cases, equaled that of our modern scientific achievements. He spoke of the special affinity of the Maya for the planet Venus, whose cycle held sway over their religious sacrificial events. Then, in a style that was starting to sound more and more like class was in session, Kevin described how Venus' orbit caused it to disappear from the sky twice in each cycle, first when it went between the Earth and the Sun, in what he termed the "inferior conjunction", and again when it passed to the far side of the Sun from the Earth, in what he called "superior conjunction."

A glimpse of recognition showed on Marci's face at the mention of these terms. Like a student who knows the answer to a question the teacher has posed to someone else, Marci blurted out, "I've heard of those! I've read about conjunctions in my horoscope and when I had my chart done once by an astrologist."

Kevin had never put much stock in astrology, but interpreting Marci's comment as a sign of continued interest, he blithely bantered on, detailing the eight day timing of the inferior conjunction and how its end was marked by the magical reappearance of Venus from being hidden by the sun and thus its birth as a morning star.

Using his hat, his camera, and his water bottle he made a little model of Earth, Venus, and the Sun on his lap. Then he ran through each of the relative positions of the three heavenly bodies and how they would look to an observer in the Earth's sky:

  1. Venus first becomes visible in the morning sky after passing in front of the sun (a.k.a. Inferior Conjunction)

  2. Venus stops moving eastward in the sky after Inferior Conjunction

  3. Venus begins moving westward after Inferior Conjunction

  4. Venus disappears behind the sun at Superior Conjunction

  5. Venus reappears from behind the sun and is now visible in the evening sky, still moving westward

  6. Venus stops moving westward before Inferior Conjunction

  7. Venus reverses its path across the sky (i.e., retrograde motion) before inferior conjunction, and now appears to move eastward

  8. Venus disappears behind the sun, restarting the cycle

Using his props he demonstrated why, as a result of both planets revolving around the sun in the same direction, Venus appears to move Eastward in the sky for forty days of its five hundred eighty-four day cycle.

Another passenger, a woman named Jan who was seated next to Marci, now joined in the conversation, "What the heck does Venus have to do with Mayan city states fighting each other?"

Kevin nearly giggled at the perfect timing of her question. "Funny you should ask that. It leads right into the rest of the discussion," he said, not noticing some of his fellow travelers' eyes were starting to glaze over. "The Maya believed Venus was a god, and they named it Chak Ek'. They didn't know about planets and orbits however. So when Venus' position in space put it too close to the sun to be visible from Earth, the Maya thought the god had descended into the underworld through the fires of the sun. When its position in our sky was such that it was no longer hidden by the sun they considered it to be the god's re-emergence from the underworld. Because Venus' west to east passage in the sky through the fires of the sun lasted for only a short part of its cycle, the Maya interpreted this as an especially important omen, one they believed was a sign of a favorable time to wage war on their enemies."

Whether from actual interest, or sheer information overload, the other passengers sat silently not knowing how to stop him. Kevin, not considering that his torrent of information could possibly have overwhelmed his listeners, mistook their silence for interest and pressed on. Without so much as a short pause he said, "Let me tell you about the Maya's calendar systems. They're really cool!"
He started with the calendar called the Tzolk'in. "The Tzolk'in works a little differently than our calendar," he said. "It has a two hundred and sixty day cycle divided into a sequence of thirteen day numbers and twenty day names. In our calendar, when we cycle through the seven day names they repeat themselves but the day numbers only start over when they reach thirty or thirty-one. Well sometimes twenty-eight or twenty-nine, but anyway.... In the Mayan Tzolk'in calendar there are fewer day numbers than day names so the day numbers restart first. Here, I'll draw you a diagram to demonstrate this."

As he attempted to explain this, Kevin drew two circles, one adjacent to the other. In the first he wrote the numbers one to thirteen. In the other, the day names Imix, Ik, Ak'bal, K'an, Chikchan, Kimi, Manik', Lamat, Muluk', Ok, Chuwan, Eb, Ben, Ix, Men, Kib, Kaban, Etz'nab, Kawak, Ahaw. "The two wheels turn simultaneously, so it starts at 1 Imix then goes to 2 Ik but when the numbers reach thirteen they reset to one, even though the day name wheel has not completed one revolution. In order for the two wheels to come back to the starting position it takes twenty times thirteen, or two hundred and sixty days."

"Oh I get it," said Jan, "but that seems like kind of a strange calendar. Why would they use something like that and not something based on the movement of the sun?"

Kevin rose to the challenge. "The Maya actually kept time in at least three different ways. In addition to the Tzolk'in calendar they had two other calendars. The one they called the Haab is a three hundred and sixty-five day calendar based on the movement of the earth about the sun. It's very similar to ours. The other important one is called the Long Count."

"Why would anyone need three calendars?" Marci asked, trying valiantly to keep up with the discussion.

"Some archeologists theorize the Tzolk'in was created to try to track the movements of Venus. Unfortunately the cycle of Venus in the Earth's sky varies in length because neither planet travels in a perfect circle around the sun. So if the Maya did create the Tzolk'in to track Venus they got it wrong. The Tzolk'in has a two hundred and sixty day cycle which falls out of sync with the five hundred and forty to five hundred and eighty-four day period of Venus. They would have had to continually adjust for this but there is evidence they did so in some of the few surviving Mayan religious books called codices," Kevin said, then paused.

Continuing on he said, "That didn't answer your question though. As you were hinting at, for agricultural reasons they also needed another calendar. This they called the Haab. The Haab is synchronized with the Earth's movement around the sun so the Maya could track the growing seasons.  It has a total of three hundred and sixty-five days divided into eighteen months of twenty days each. That's only three hundred and sixty days however, so they added a five day ritual new year they called the Wayeb."

Oblivious as to whether anyone was still paying attention Kevin drew another diagram and recited the names of the months as he wrote, "Pop, Wo, Sip, Sotz', Sek, Xul, Yaxk'in, Mol, Ch'en, Yax, Sak, Seh, Mak, K'ank'in, Muan, Pax, K'ayeb, Kumk'u."

Kevin continued, "What's even more interesting is how the Maya linked the Haab and the Tzolk'in together. This linkage created a fifty-two year cycle archeologists refer to as the Calendar Round. It is sort of the Mayan equivalent to our centuries and was marked by important religious ceremonies and construction of buildings on a huge scale."

M arci was starting to feel like she was back at college sitting through a lecture in one of those "core curriculum" classes no one ever liked but had to take anyway. She could feel her mind beginning to fog and wondered if Kevin could see her eyes starting to glaze over, but Kevin continued on. Not knowing how to stop him, and not wanting to be impolite, she fell back on something she had learned in college, she tried to change the subject. "This sure is a long drive," she said to no one in particular, hoping Kevin would take her hint.
He didn't. Barely noticing Marci had said anything Kevin replied, "That reminds me. I haven't told you about the Long Count calendar." Marci let out an audible groan. One of the other passengers in the van, noticing her plight and hearing her reaction, chuckled. It was all Julie could do to keep herself from laughing out loud at the whole scene, but she knew it wouldn't deter Kevin from continuing and it would just get her in trouble with him. So she choked back her laughter and left poor Marci to her fate.

"The Long Count is the simplest of the Mayan calendars. It is literally a count of the number of days since the creation of the world in their mythology. It consists of five groupings. Each day, also known as a K'in, is counted. Twenty K'in make up a Winal. Eighteen Winals, which takes three hundred and sixty days, is called a Tun. Twenty Tun make a Ka'tun, and twenty Ka'tun make a Bak'tun. The Long Count began in 3114 BC and has 1,374,951 days in it, meaning it ends on December 21, 2012. It was the Maya's belief that the end date of the Long Count marks the subsequent end and rebirth of all existence, so you really should make an effort to see as much of what remains of Mayan civilization as possible before it's all gone."

Kevin said this with such a straight face that at first Marci did not react to his astonishing little bombshell. She recovered quickly, and now, somewhat irritated, blurted out loudly, "What the heck does all this have to do with the ruins we're going to see?"

Somewhat indignant at Marci's snapping at him, Kevin seized upon her question as if he had put her up to asking it, using it to wrap his lecture up in a neat little package. "Up until around 900 AD, when the Mayan civilization disappeared for reasons yet unknown, they had a very complex and advanced civilization. They built the incredible ruined structures you're about to see today. Every structure had a purpose, be it residential, commercial, or religious. And like our own culture, the Mayans fought wars amongst themselves, commemorated their victories, got married, had babies, planted crops, and so on. Their lives were run by the motions of planets, which they took for gods, especially Venus. So they needed priests and astronomers to track their gods, interpret their signs, and convey prayers to them. For that their priests used the Tzolk'in calendar. But maintaining a complex society capable of having dedicated priests and astronomers required a sustained agricultural output and careful coordination of the planting with the growing seasons. For that they used the Haab calendar. Lastly, they used the Long Count to track the passage of time so their kings could commemorate important events. In short, the Maya used their calendars the same way you use ours when you are reading your horoscope to determine the best time to do things like going on vacation to Belize."

As she shrunk back in her seat at Kevin's closing tirade, all Marci could say to in reply to him was, "Thanks, I think."

Seeing her shrink from him, Kevin realized not only might he have been rambling on, but his closing salvo had also been a bit harsh. In recognition of this he sheepishly muttered to Marci, "I guess I should have told you I'm a Ph.D. archeologist specializing in Native American cultures." Then, as abruptly as it had started, the storm that was Kevin stopped.

After what could only be termed as a lecture by Kevin, Marci now saw her way out of it. Recognizing his embarrassment she simply did not respond to him in the hope he would take the hint that she had reached her limit. In the face of Kevin's discourse, others among the group, who had initially been intrigued by the facts he poured forth, had, one by one, gone quiet. They dared not say anything. The remaining passengers, who had been astonished at this discourse, sat still in the awkward silence enveloping the van.

During the time Kevin had been talking, the van had turned off of the Western Highway, then bumped and bounced down the dusty dirt road leading south to Caracol. As it did so it had been slowly climbing a low range of mountains where the vegetation changed over from tropical jungle to a sparser pine forest occasionally interrupted by pre-historic looking ferns the size of small trees. Without any advanced notice to the passengers Jimmy pulled the van up along the side of the road at a spectacularly beautiful waterfall, which lay upon a stream that had emerged from the forest to parallel the road. Shutting off the engine Jimmy turned back to his passengers and encouraged them to get out, stretch, and enjoy the view. He advised them they still had over thirty more minutes to drive since, while the distance was not that far, the dirt roads were much slower than the paved ones. So he encouraged his passengers to take advantage of the fresh air and beautiful scenery.

For the tourists in the back of the van the stop came not a moment too soon, as they had begun to shift in their seats in recognition of the awkward silence. At Jimmy's urging they quickly piled out of the van, stretching themselves in the sun, dipping their hands and feet in the clear, cold water, and absorbing the view as tourists are wont to do. After what seemed a too short ten minutes, Jimmy and Santos rounded them all up and back into the van, and their drive to Caracol continued.

The second half of the trip proved to be much quieter than the first, with folks mostly looking out the windows, or talking quietly to their travel companions. Julie kidded Kevin, whispering in his ear that no one dared risk saying something to him that might bring on another lesson. At this remark Kevin shrunk back in his seat, stewing in embarrassment in the corner of the van, until Julie began to tickle him to stop him from moping. Then, at the point when it felt as if they had been driving forever, the van turned off the main dirt road onto an even smaller one passing a sign with an arrow pointing towards Caracol. A mile or so later the smaller road opened up into a clearing with some picnic grounds, buildings, and other small structures. Jimmy pulled the van up at one of the buildings and announced, "We're here!"

Kevin was relieved to get out of the van and away from his embarrassment at having run on about the Maya. Greg followed him out of the van and caught up to him as he was heading towards the small Caracol museum. "Kevin, wait up," Greg called to him. "Don't be upset. I was impressed by your ability to absorb so much about the Maya this quickly, and how you were able to turn it around and present it in a fairly intelligible manner to lay people. Up until now I'd pretty much never heard you talk about anything other than the work we've done together, and since I knew how well you knew that it wasn't a fair gauge for me of your abilities to quickly understand and communicate knowledge."

Unconvinced, Kevin continued on to the museum but Greg stayed with him. "No really, I'm not just saying this to make you feel better. Once your Ph.D. is complete you're going to have to be writing grants to fund your research if you intend to work in this field. If you show the same skills doing that as you did back there in the van the money will pour in. Well maybe it won't exactly pour in but you'll probably be a lot more successful than your peers."

Kevin shrugged, mumbled his thanks at what he perceived to be Greg's attempt at cheering him up, and turned into the museum. Greg noticed Julie approaching the museum with the rest of the group and stood outside the door to wait for her, letting Kevin go ahead. "Thanks for trying to cheer him up," Julie said to Greg, "guess I shouldn't have ribbed him."

"He'll be okay," Greg said. Julie was sure he was right. Greg was a good older brother and a great mentor to his students. He always looked after them and was a good judge of their strengths and weaknesses. More importantly he knew how to motivate them to work on the skills they lacked, encouraging them to do so by openly recognizing their strengths. As a result, quite a number of his former students had become lead researchers on important projects around the world, although, as Greg often noted somewhat sarcastically, "That and five bucks gets me a coffee at Starbucks."

Greg, Julie, and the rest of the tourists joined Kevin in the small museum. Despite being small, the museum was well laid out and had quite a bit of information about the Maya in general, and Caracol in particular. The most prominent features of the museum were several important stela, or carved stones, which had been unearthed at the site and were now housed in the museum to protect them from weathering, vandalism, or looting. Stopping in front of these Julie read the description, "The stela on the right was found as a centerpiece on the ceremonial ball courts. It celebrates the victory of Caracol over the rival city of Tikal, located in present day Guatemala. Tikal is the most widely excavated Mayan site at the present time. The stela on the left depicts the victory of Caracol over the rival city of Naranjo, which the stone indicates occurred during the rule of K'an II in 631AD."

Also in the museum were several maps. As Julie read them she learned the Maya in Belize had once numbered over a million, and by some estimates as much as 3.5 million. Drawings above the maps showed that, unlike today, the country would have been covered in terraced agrarian land instead of tropical rainforest. These farms supported small villages centered around larger cities, which were the realm of the ruling and religious elite. These cities existed peacefully in the initial periods of the Maya but later on took to waging war on each other.

After about fifteen minutes Jimmy and Santos stuck their head into the small museum alerting the group that their guide for Caracol was ready for them. Hearing Jimmy's call, Greg and Julie were the first ones out of the museum. Kevin was straggling behind, still moping, when Marci and one of the other tourists from the van went over to him.

"Thanks for all the info back in the van. You really shouldn't be embarrassed. I was a little blown away by it all but after having read the stuff here in the museum it all made a lot more sense to me than it would have if you hadn't told us all that other stuff on the way," Marci said.

Kevin smiled at her comments, feeling somewhat exonerated. He held the door for Marci and the others from the group as they exited the museum, then joined them outside near where the guide from Caracol awaited.

Although Jimmy was a licensed guide he was trained as a naturalist. At the major archeological sites the resort always made sure to present their guests with the opportunity to hire a guide from the site itself, one who knew the many details of the site and was up to date on any recent discoveries. Greg, Julie, and Kevin had jumped at the chance to have a guide more knowledgeable in archeology take them around the site, and when the other tourists learned the cost was only ten dollars split between them they all quickly ponied up their share. Jimmy took no offense at this. He got paid the same one way or the other and their hiring a guide meant he got to stretch out in the hammocks and take a nap while everyone else walked around. He did send Santos along with the group though, since his nephew needed the training and someone had to carry the group's lunch for them.

The group gathered around the guide from Caracol who had been waiting for them outside the museum. The guide introduced himself, "I'm Esteban, and I'm your guide for the next few hours as we walk around the ruins of Caracol, see the wonderful buildings the Maya erected and learn what these structures meant to them." He started down a path leading away from the museum. "Please follow me and if you have any questions, feel free to ask."

They followed Esteban for about ten minutes on the path through the jungle forest. All about them they saw and heard birds in the trees. Eventually they came to two low terraced mounds. They didn't look like much more than rectangular piles of stones but, upon closer inspection, Greg could tell they were actually built up from cut stones which were assembled with some skill. Between them there was a long rectangular field of grass and in the center of this was a round stone.

Esteban stopped in the center and began to speak, "We are at one of the Mayan ceremonial ball courts. This is where the round stone you saw in the museum was originally located. The one here is a replica."

"When played at sites like this one the Maya ball game was a serious ritual. The court was a representation of the place of creation in Mayan mythology. The game itself was played to re-enact the creation myth. When the ball passed through the ring, which served as the goal, it was symbolically passing through a portal into the other world. The game itself was associated with ritual sacrifice. Some of you may have heard that as a reward for victory the winner was given the honor of being sacrificed but this is a modern myth. What evidence we see now, for example, from sites like Chichen Itza, is that when the game was played on important occasions the leader of the losing team was the sacrificial victim."

Esteban continued, "As for the play of the game itself, not much is truly known. Archeologists have made deductions based on depictions of the game in stela, pottery, and from more modern games which may be related. The play revolves around trying to bounce a rubber ball. The ball would have varied in size from as small as a softball to as large as a volleyball, and might have weighed as much as eight pounds. Based on the depictions of the dress of the players, and how the modern game is played, it is believed no hands or feet were used to bounce the ball. Instead, it would have been bounced with the hips. Others think additional body parts, except for the hands and feet, might have been used. The sides of the court were sloped and at the top of the slope, in the center of the sides, were the goal rings. The players would bounce the balls up and through the ring to score. No one knows how the score was kept."

Moving slowly from the center of the court to the embankments at its side Esteban continued speaking, "The number of players is also not known. Some depictions show twelve, but because of the importance of the number thirteen in the Mayan culture, others think it is more likely. Players wore heavy padding and ceremonial costumes. You might recall some illustrations of this from the museum."

As quickly as he had launched into his discussion of the ball court, Esteban stopped, then turned to continue on through the ruins. The group followed him, talking among themselves. Julie overheard Marci saying something to one of the other tourists, "Wow, it must be hard to recruit new players if you're always sacrificing the losers." Julie knew from her poolside reading the sacrifices occurred at times when the game was played in its most ritual form at great religious sites such as Caracol. Most of the time, however, the game was played as a form of sport and entertainment in the smaller villages dotting the countryside, and without any sacrifice involved.

She decided not to make a point of it to the others. No use in them thinking we're all a bunch of geeks, she thought to herself. Julie didn't really have many friends outside archeological circles, and the ones she had within those circles were mostly men. So, while she wasn't sure she had much in common with Marci, or any of the other women at the resort, she figured she'd keep a little lower profile than Kevin had done earlier.

The group followed Esteban for several minutes. He stopped occasionally along the way to point out features in the landscape such as depressions in the ground, which he said were man made cisterns, or wildlife he spotted on or near the trail. Soon they emerged from the woods into a plaza bordered by three large stone structures. The tallest of them was on the north side of the plaza. Two smaller ones were situated in the southeast and southwest. Stopping in the middle of the plaza, Esteban called the group together so they could hear him.

"This is the main palace and astronomical observatory here at Caracol. The structure on the north side is called the Canaa. It is the place where the king lived, and where the priests would stand to observe the motions of the planets and the sun. At the time the Maya ruled here, the jungle was mostly cleared and this would have been an open plain with lines of sight off to the distant horizons. By standing in certain positions on the platform of the Canaa, markers on the platform can be lined up with certain features of the other temples. Those alignments show the locations of where the Sun will rise and set on the days of the summer and winter solstices, as well as the spring and fall equinoxes. The Maya also used these to track the points of furthest movement to the north and south of the rising of the planets, especially Venus, which had important religious significance. Ritual sacrifices would have been performed from the top of this temple as well as the smaller ones."

"We're going to stop here so you can explore these ruins. Please be careful when you are walking on them. They are very steep and there may be loose stones. Keep in mind you are responsible for your own safety. Belize is not like America. We do not have strict laws for your protection that regulate where you can go and what you can do. So you must use caution."

With that Esteban turned and walked to the south end of the plaza where one of the smaller temples was covered in several large tarps. He called out as he approached the tarps and two men came out to greet him. He shook hands with them, then together they all disappeared back under the tarps.

As Esteban walked away, Kevin, who was in a much lighter mood than he had been earlier, turned to Greg and Julie. He pointed to the top of the Canaa and said, "Looks like the best view is up there." He didn't waste a moment before starting towards the base of the temple as Greg and Julie followed after him.

When they reached the base Kevin immediately headed up the steep stairs. Greg quickly followed, but Julie hesitated and looked up. "Looks kind of steep," she said, hoping one of the two of them might stop or slow down. They didn't. The Canaa towered over her. It must be close to one hundred and fifty feet high, she thought to herself, how am I going to get up and back down this.

Not wanting to be shown up by the boys, she slowly set out to climb the stairs herself, trying to focus on the steps directly in front of her and not up, down or to the sides, lest she be reminded of the size of the temple and the height she was at. As an anthropologist in the American Southwest who studied links between current Native American cultures and their predecessors, she didn't get called upon to do much climbing. She left the cliff face excavation work to archeologists like Kevin and Greg, keeping mostly to the lab when studying the artifacts retrieved from the more remote sites.

Now she was in a much different setting, and on vacation no less. So she'd be damned if she was going to let a little thing like her fear of heights keep her at the bottom of one of the most magnificent structures of the Meso-American world. As she climbed she kept her balance low to the steep steps for fear of falling on them. Still she couldn't help but look down from time to time and she began to notice how high up she had climbed. Instinctively, fear welled up inside her and she almost froze where she was. Then it occurred to her she was climbing the same steps once climbed by people who knew their destiny was to be sacrificed at the top, upon the altar there which had just become visible to her. For some strange reason, knowing it would not be her blood running through the channels cut into the stone at the sides of the steep stairs gave her the courage she needed to make it the last few feet and pull herself up onto the platform at the top of the steps.

Reaching the top, she pulled herself up onto the platform and past the altar, several feet back from the steps. Grabbing onto the altar she pulled herself up and looked around for Kevin and Greg. It was only then she noticed she wasn't actually at the very top of the pyramid. There was another smaller structure about seventy-five feet high set back from the front of the platform where she had pulled herself up. Oh crap, she said to herself, after noticing Greg and Kevin were already at the top of it and were waving to her to join them. She rested a moment, took a drink of water, and then moved on to join them.

"Julie," she could hear Kevin shouting down from above, "I need the camera." She stood at the bottom of the smaller structure, frozen by fear. Kevin came bounding down the steps and ran up to her. "Now I'm going to have to climb it a second time," he gasped, being somewhat out of breath from running down the smaller building.

"Well, you should have thought of that before you shot on ahead of me. You know I'm afraid of heights," she chided him.

"Sorry," he said, "but the view is so great I didn't stop to think you might not come up here. Don't worry, the steps on this smaller temple up top are wider and much less steep. You won't have a problem. Come on I'll show you how I think they lined things up with the sky." Grabbing the camera from her he bounded back up the smaller structure.

Julie dusted herself off and followed him. Indeed, as he had promised, the stairs were much less steep here. This building being shorter, she imagined herself walking up the stairway in the building where she worked at Arizona College. By doing so she made it to the top quite easily.

"Come here," Kevin called out to her from behind what appeared to be some type of parapet or fortification. When she walked the twenty or so feet to where he was she could see he was standing close to the edge, looking out towards the western most of the two smaller temples. He called her to come join him at the edge on the top of the parapet, but there was no way she was going to climb up on top of the wall. "I can see fine from here," Julie said, and in fact she could. "What is it I should be looking for?" she asked as she stood below him, noticing he had his pocket GPS unit out and was lining it up with something.

"Make a line through the gap in front of you, over the near corner of the platform and the farthest right corner of the southwest temple. If I recall correctly what I was reading earlier about Venus, this line should mark its southernmost point of setting in the evening sky," he said, looking down to where she stood. As he said this, he pivoted on top of the wall and raced across it to the east side.

"Watch out," Julie shouted, "you kicked gravel on me." That wasn't really why she said it to him, though. Kevin was on the top of a crumbly, old, six foot high parapet wall, at the top of a seventy-five foot temple, on a platform at the top of a one hundred and fifty foot pyramid, dashing about gleefully like a school kid, not watching at all where he was going.

"Remember what Esteban said about being careful," she called after him, following him across the top of the upper pyramid.

"If you do the same on this side it lines up with the southernmost point of Venus' rising in the morning sky," Kevin said to her as she caught up.

In his excitement he hadn't noticed where Greg had gotten to. Greg appreciated the significance of astronomy in archeology, but he wasn't as wrapped up in it as Kevin was. As a kid Kevin had spent hours outside in the cold New England nights looking up at the stars through the small telescope he had gotten in his early teens after years of begging for one. It wasn't the one he'd wanted, but it was the best his parents could afford at the time, and although he'd long since bought himself a better one he still had it tucked away in a closet back home for sentimental reasons.

Like so many kids, Kevin had dreamed of being an astronomer or an astronaut. Though not bad at math, once in college he quickly realized he didn't have a grasp of the subject sufficient to be competitive with the many others who also chose to pursue that path through life. He decided he'd be better off trying something else. At about the same time a friend had given him a copy of "Chariots of the Gods" by Erich von Daniken. Kevin was unimpressed by the book, considering it the most ludicrous piece of junk he'd ever read. Ironically it convinced him he should channel his interest in astronomy into the context of archeology, in order to prove ancient human civilizations had the capability to achieve the types of feats Von Daniken had ascribed to influence by alien visitors. It was this strange twist which first led him to archeology, and in turn to study the Anasazi, their temples, and how they charted the heavens. Now it found him here on vacation studying the monuments of other cultures who had made the same types of achievements in astronomy he had shown the Anasazi had made.

Julie's voice called him back from his revelry at reaching this particular place in his life. "Umm, Kevin," she called up to him, "Have you seen Greg?"

He jumped down, looked around, then said, "No. I lost track of him when I got to the top here and started checking out all the alignments. Maybe he's down on the platform below us." Realizing Greg was nowhere to be seen, they turned to head back down from the top of the temple to try to locate where he had gone off to.
Chapter 3 – Defeat of the Jaguar King

The Jaguar King stood atop the temple platform. The night was dark around him and rage filled his heart. He hoped his vengeance would soon be taken, and that which had been stolen from him would be restored to he, its rightful owner, even as he recalled what had come to pass.

It had been not quite one full round of the Tzolk'in since he had taken the daughter of the king of Bital as his bride. The joining had occurred on the day when Chak Ek', the wandering star, first rose in the western sky. It was the day which marked the end of its journey through the underworld, as it moved from east to west across the sky, and of its resurrection from the flames of the Sun.

Before then, at the time Chak Ek' had ceased his brief wandering to the east, the Jaguar King had received a message from the King of Bital. In his message, Lord Bital proposed the Jaguar King be wed to the daughter of Bital, saying this would bring both cities great peace and prosperity and forever put their feuds behind them. The Jaguar King had believed the words of his advisors, who told him such a match would make his kingdom stronger. Heeding the advice, arrangements were made for the daughter of Bital to travel to Caracol so she could be bound to the Jaguar King at the most favorable time, the time when Chak Ek' was reborn from the flames of the sun.

Her name was Feather Lily, and when he first beheld her the Jaguar King knew good fortune had shone upon him. She was more beautiful than any Mayan Princess he had ever seen. It was not her beauty alone that swayed him. For though she was young, he quickly learned she had wisdom well beyond her years and knew much about the ways of the earth and the myths of the Mayan people.

For her part, she was scared at first. Would the man she had been promised to be kind or cruel? Would she ever again see the place she had been born or those she loved? She knew she had no choice in the matter. Her father had promised her to the Jaguar King, and she was bound to obey him. To her relief she soon found the man her father had given her to was both kind and wise. He did not treat her cruelly, but she was a young girl and often spent her time crying for those things of her youth she had been forced to leave behind. His way with her was tender and he dried her tears, promising her that one day she would walk once more in the land of her birth. She smiled at this promise, although she was not sure if it was one he would keep. She knew only time could tell this.

To the Jaguar King it seemed all was right with the world. After the wedding, Chak Ek' continued his march westward, grew brighter, and stood still in the sky as the priests proclaimed he would. Then, on the morning of the day upon which Chak Ek' reversed his journey through the sky, turning from the west back towards the east, the Jaguar King was told his new bride could not be found within his house. Worse yet, he learned the Jade Mask of the Maize God, the face from which he drew his power over heaven and earth, was gone as well.

He had his guard search the house again, but no trace of them was found there. Word went out throughout the city, his glorious capital of towering limestone palaces and temples, to look for his bride. No stone was to be left unmoved they were told, but search as they might, his soldiers found no trace, not even a footstep.

With each passing hour he grew more distraught. His priests and counselors came to him, but at first he sent them away. They returned, insisting he send out men to search to the borders of his land for any sign of Feather Lily or the Jade Mask. Reluctantly the Jaguar King heeded their words, but neither his bride nor the mask had been seen by any who would tell. It was to him as if the gods had come and carried them away.

Growing fearful that the gods had stolen the thing most dear to him, he demanded his priests make sacrifice to them, to ease their wrath so they might return to him what he had lost. He himself, the Jaguar King, would also fast and give of his blood for this sacrifice, knowing his blood, above that of all others, could gain the favor of the gods. There, inside the temple high atop the Canaa, he held the stingray spine in his hand, then loosed his blood from the most sacred place in his body. Collecting it in a painted bowl he then handed it to a priest.

As the priest lit a small fire on the altar of the temple he fed pieces of bark, onto which the Jaguar King's blood had been poured, into the flames. As he stood over the fire breathing in the fumes of the flame, a trance came over the Jaguar King. In his vision he saw his bride, surrounded by mists, kneeling before her father, the Jade Mask in her outstretched hands. He cried out, then pitched forward onto the small flame, extinguishing it as he lapsed into unconsciousness.

When he awoke a short while later he was lying in his bed, his priests and counselors gathered about him. He told them of his vision and they began to cackle like crows. "Of course it was her My Lord, the greater the treachery, the greater the beauty that is needed to disguise it!", "My Lord, though you treated her well, did she not cry for her home each day?", "My king, was it not her father, your enemy of old, who sent her to you? Could not his promise to you have been false?" Their voices rang in his head.

At first the Jaguar King could not bring himself to believe that one so beautiful could hide a heart so evil. Why would she have gone from him? He had been kind to her and had given her no reason to fear him. She had made a promise to him before the gods to honor him above all others. Would not the gods enact their retribution if she had deceived them?

His thoughts fought within him in a great conflict he could not subdue. The words of his priests echoed in his mind over and over, and he slowly came to understand he had been deceived by his enemy, blinded by the most obvious of tricks, laid low by her beauty. As this thought took hold in his mind his rage could not be contained. He vowed his revenge. He declared that when the mask had been returned to him, her blood, and the blood of all who helped her, would flow from the top of the temple as an offering of thanks to the gods.

Eager for vengeance though he was, the Jaguar King stayed his hand, at least for now. For on such things as this he knew the day to act must be chosen carefully, and the gods must be with him or he would risk certain death. So he waited. He waited as the day numbers cycled back to their start. He waited as the day names cycled back to their start. He waited, and still the mask was not his, nor did the blood that would slake his thirst for vengeance flow. He knew what it was he waited for. He waited for Chak Ek' to descend once more into the fires of the Sun. For he knew the day it was reborn, rising eastward from the sun, would be the day the god would reveal to the Jaguar King the most favorable time to take his vengeance.

Finally the night came when Chak Ek disappeared from the evening sky. Unable to sleep, the Jaguar King stood watch all night at the top of the temple platform, looking for the god to reappear in the sky just before the dawn. The Jaguar King watched carefully, hoping that when Chak Ek' did rise again from the sun the god would foretell to him what he should do. As the morning came and passed, and the sun had risen without the face of Chak Ek', the Jaguar King's heart grew heavy. He turned to go into his palace telling himself it was good that Chak Ek' had not come this day. The omens for this day were very unfavorable. The omens for the next would be more in his favor.

As the sun rose, the day turned hot and he took to his bed to wait for the next dawn. Though he was unable to find sleep the Jaguar King did not stir, for he knew Chak Ek' must surely come tomorrow. Two more nights he looked to the sky and two more dawns came with no sign of the god. Two more days in which he could find no sleep. Each day as the sun rose high in the sky and beat down upon the land the Jaguar King returned to his bed repeating three things to himself: the omens for this day were unfavorable; those for the next would be more in his favor; and Chak Ek will surely come tomorrow.

On the sixth day, late in the afternoon, the moon rose in the east shortly after the sun had set in the west. The moon was clear and bright in the sky but that was not the reason why sleep would not come to the Jaguar King. Until Chak Ek' had shown his face and foretold what action he should take, the Jaguar King could find no rest.

As the night grew long and the moon set, the early morning sky darkened and the Jaguar King stirred once again from his bed to scan the heavens in search of his fate. In the dark he walked from his palace atop the Canaa, crossed its plaza, then climbed to the top of the observatory to stand at the altar, in the spot appointed by the gods, waiting to see if Chak Ek' would show himself this morning. The night was hot, the air humid and close. No breeze stirred atop of the Canaa, nor did any sound rise up its steep sides. The night tightened about him like a dark cloth and he felt as if he might smother, until ever so faintly he saw the sky begin to lighten. The sun was rising, but would Chak Ek' come before it?

Slowly the sky crept from black, to inky blue, to deep blue. As it did so, the Jaguar King stood, eyes fixed to the east, straining to see. The Jaguar King's priests joined him atop the Canaa as the sky turned to pale blue. When the golden rays of the sun seemed to be just a breath away, the Jaguar King heard the priests call out and point to the eastern horizon. The Jaguar King strained his eyes to see what they saw, but he could not. Yet the priests joyously called out the welcome to Chak Ek'.

As they did so, the sun burst over the horizon with such brightness that all who stood atop the pyramid were blinded by it and turned away, their hands held before their eyes to block the sun's blazing rays. All but the Jaguar King, for he did not see what the priests told him they saw. As the sun rose he stared into it searching for answers from the gods. He stared until its light grew so bright he knew he too must finally turn away from it or go blind. When he finally did turn away, he strode down the stairs of the observatory atop the massive Canaa, retreating into the darkness inside the temple atop it to seek his counsel and prepare for war.

Once inside the temple the priests knelt before the Jaguar King and foretold to him of the return of the Jade Mask and the destruction of those who had taken it. Loudly they shouted that Chak Ek' has bidden the king to take up arms, defeat his enemies, and sacrifice them upon their altars. Such prophecies lifted the Jaguar King's heart, but only momentarily, for he knew there were many things the gods did not reveal which could mean the difference between victory or death.

The Jaguar King knew the sacred stone, which held the secret of the mask, remained in its proper place. The gods were tricky, and neither his vision, nor those of his priests, could tell if his enemies had read the stone and discovered the secret to wielding the power of the mask. This thought hung heavily within his heart. If his enemy had learned the secrets of the mask, any attack upon them would be no better than if he marched himself to their sacrificial altar, lay upon it, and pulled his own heart, still beating, from his chest. For if his enemy could wield the Jade Mask, this would surely be his fate.

Also, without any help from the gods, the Jaguar King knew that if his enemy had learned the secret of the Jade Mask it would not be long before they used it to make war on him. Recognizing war must come one way or the other, he had the wisdom to know it would be better if it were waged on his own terms, and at the time appointed by the gods, rather than to wait for it to come to him.

Word was sent to all the soldiers of Caracol. To each came the portent of war the priests had foretold to the Jaguar King. Each of them responded to it by grabbing their weapons; spears with stone tips, bows and arrows, clubs, axes, and shields. By the hundreds the soldiers of Caracol came, called by their king upon pain of death should they fail to answer.

The soldiers marched to Caracol and there, in the plaza between the temples, they gathered and kneeled at the foot of Canaa, atop which stood the Jaguar King. The Jaguar King no longer looked as he had a few hours before. He was now adorned with a cloak made of jaguar skins and on his head he wore a helmet with the face of a jaguar. From within the jaguar's mouth, his face could be seen, painted with the markings of war.

As he stood before his solders he did not wear the Jade Mask, for he did not possess it. Even if it were still his, he would not have worn it before his troops, for such a face was solely for kings and gods to look upon. It was only then, when he himself a god among men, rose up on the altar of the temple and read the incantation on the sacred stone while making sacrifice to the gods, that he could wear the mask. It was only then, when the gods gazed upon the mask and recognized him as one among them, that he could invoke their power to destroy his enemy.

With the mask having been taken from him, he stood at the top of the Canaa in a more mortal guise, ready to march to war to recover it. He looked down and called out to all assembled there before him. "Chak Ek' has bid us to war. We go today at his direction to fight our enemy. We know we shall win because the gods have foretold it to us. Go now and bring back victory to the gods who bade you fight."

Once he had finished speaking, the troops rose and marched from the plaza at the foot of the great temple, eager to seek out and destroy their enemy. Climbing down the temple the Jaguar King watched them stream outward. When he reached the ground he mounted the litter that would bear him to war.

It was a massive chair astride two long poles. The poles extended forward and back from the chair itself, the ends of each carved into the shape of the paws of a jaguar. Each pole was borne by five men in front and five behind. The canopy over the chair was shaped as the head of a jaguar, with the seat inside the jaguar's mouth. The chair itself was covered in pillows sewn from the skins of many jaguars.

Such a carriage proclaimed the king's glory to all who saw it. It was not simply that to be borne aloft was the mark of a king. To be borne aloft in such a carriage signaled the truly awesome might of the Jaguar King, for the jaguar was an animal sacred to the Maya, and this king its living incarnation. The mighty creature's elusive nature also made its skin a rare commodity, and any man who could kill one was deemed by his peers to be a truly skilled hunter and warrior. Those who saw such a carriage, one covered in the skins of so many jaguars, knew the king inside it must command many such skilled warriors and was therefore powerful indeed.

So as the drums of war beat, and his priests and counselors stood gathered around him, the king climbed into his carriage. His personal guard marched before him also wearing the skins of jaguars to denote their status. In this manner the Jaguar King was carried out of Caracol, to the place where the gods had bid him do battle.

Days later, as Venus brightened in the morning sky, the king's carriage returned. Upon it, borne by men who carried the deep scars of war, and surrounded by many other wounded and weary men, was the Jaguar King. He held his head in triumph as he was carried past the Canaa and the priests who stood at its altars, but he was too injured to climb down from his chair, or to ascend the Temple for the rituals to the gods his victory required.

It was not a victory in the manner the king had desired. For while his army had driven his enemy's soldiers from their city in a swift assault which took them by surprise, his troops could not find any of what the Jaguar King sought. They did not find his bride, they did not find the king of his enemy, and they not find the Jade Mask. On hearing this the Jaguar King dismounted his carriage and marched into the city of Bital to lead the search himself, refusing to let his soldiers leave the city until the mask was found.

When his generals questioned why the Jaguar King did not pursue the enemy's soldiers into the forest in order to take captives for sacrifice, the Jaguar King would only answer that he was doing the will of the Gods. When his generals asked him what it was they searched for in the city, he would only answer that he was doing the will of the Gods. When the generals wondered why they stood to hold a city stripped of all but its stones, he would only answer that he was doing the will of the Gods.

Thus the Jaguar King sat atop the highest temple of his enemy, looking down on the destruction his troops had left all around him and pondering his triumph. Had the gods deceived him? Had his priests misread the heavens, or had they lied to him to gain his favor? It mattered little. His search for the Jade Mask was a failure, and soon his army would be set upon by the regrouped forces of his enemy.

As he anticipated, the enemy rallied bravely to try to recapture their city. In doing so, the Jaguar King believed they would carry the mask with them. He knew if they regained their captured temple, then there, upon its altar, they would perform the ritual by which they would wield the power of the mask to destroy him and his army once and for all. There was no other choice left to him, if he withdrew from the temple all would be lost to him. It was there he must make his stand. If they were to die, then they would die fighting to recover the mask.

The jungle was silent about them, the tumult of the earlier battle having driven the birds from their perches. Each moment seemed like an eternity as they awaited the return of their enemy. Then, at last, the Jaguar King and his men were set upon by a force too large for them to turn away. They fought bravely, but their valor was in vain. The Jaguar King had erred, his enemy had not brought forth the mask this day. It was the Jaguar King himself they sought, and not the altar he and his men had captured.

Surrounded by his enemy, the Jaguar King was struck down. The sight of his peril rallied his personal guard, for they knew if he were captured alive he would be sacrificed to the gods by their enemy upon the very altar they now fought to defend. Fighting more fiercely than they ever had before, the jaguar skin clad warriors regained the spot where their king lay long enough to bear his broken body up, then carry him down the temple's side and away into the jungle. To their woe, they could not salve his mortal wounds. All they could do was to place his failing body atop his mighty carriage and, with what few men they could rally, retreat back to Caracol.

Thus it was the Jaguar King came back to Caracol to die. As he lay dying a final vision came before him and he knew at last it was not the gods who had abandoned him. He called his priests to attend him. When they did he sat up from his deathbed and spat on them, denouncing them as liars. He told them he too had looked into the Sun on the same day they had foretold Chak Ek's promise of victory, but unlike them he had not seen the god. The priests fell at the feet of their dying king, protesting their innocence and begging his forgiveness. With his last breath the Jaguar King cursed them. He cursed all who he believed had lied to him and had tricked him into falling into the trap his enemy had set. Then he died.

There was now no king in Caracol. The priests began to argue among themselves about what they should do with no king to protect them. Worse still, they had been cursed by their king as he lay dying and feared the wrath of the soldiers who served the king even in his death. Some of the priests panicked and fled, while others kept their heads, realizing that to do so would be suicide. The smartest among them recognized that if their enemy had discovered the secret of how to wield the mask not one of the soldiers of the army of Caracol would have returned. They knew their enemy would soon look to Caracol, and to the priests themselves, for the secret of how to wield the mask. Knowing they had no means to fight such an enemy they chose instead to try to save themselves.

Quickly the priests gathered a small group of workers and had them dig a makeshift tomb underneath one of the lesser temples to the east of the Canaa, a place where no one would look for the burial of a great king. Inside this tomb they placed the body of the Jaguar King. Along with the king's body they placed the stone bearing the secrets of the Jade Mask, which they had pried from the altar atop the Canaa, into the makeshift tomb. They did this in the hope that by doing so it would never again be found. Then, as quickly as they had dug it, they sealed the tomb, replacing the stones of the temple above it in such a way as to conceal the tomb's entrance from all eyes.

With the stela hidden, the priests sent for soldiers to march the workers who had dug the Jaguar King's makeshift tomb up to the altar atop the Canaa. Then, when Chak Ek' had reached the furthest point of its wandering to the east in the sky and appeared to stop its movement among the stars, they sacrificed the workers, praying to the Gods for protection from their enemies. Finally, in order to cover their deeds and confuse anyone seeking the true resting place of the Jaguar King and of the stela bearing the secrets of the Jade Mask, the priests hid the bodies of the sacrificed workers in the unused tomb the Jaguar King had built for his own burial, sealing it as well.

Only then, once the secrets of the Jade Mask were safely hidden, did the last few priests don the clothing of peasants and try to steal away from the city. They were too late though. The enemy's troops swept into Caracol, looting all they could find, and killing anyone they saw. In this way the great city of Caracol fell, and in its fall the Jaguar King's dying curse, that the priests who misled him be punished and the secret for wielding the power of the Jade Mask be lost to time, was thus fulfilled.
Chapter 4 – Discovery at Caracol

It took a while for them to descend the steep Canaa. More accurately, it took Julie a while. Kevin strode right down the steep steps. While descending the smaller temple at the top of the pyramid proved easy for her, the long, steep stairs she had ascended earlier were an altogether different matter. As soon as Julie poked her head over the edge of the platform in front of the altar at the top of those stairs she immediately became gripped by fear. How am I going to get down this, Julie thought to herself. Then it occurred to her she could just sit on her butt, stretch her legs down to the step two steps below, slide her butt to the next step, and repeat the process, all the while looking back up the steep steps of the pyramid so she wouldn't see how high she really was. It wouldn't be graceful, but it would eventually get her down.

Using this technique she methodically worked her way down the steps. By the time she was about three quarters of the way down Kevin came bounding back up the steps to where she was and said, "I found Greg. He was across the way, under the tarps, talking to some of the excavation staff."

"That's nice," Julie replied sarcastically. She was focused on the task of getting down the steps and annoyed at Kevin for being oblivious to her struggle to do so. Not that she wanted his help, or would have accepted it if he offered. Nor did she actually expect him to have noticed her struggling and consider whether to offer his help to her in the first place.

Kevin, however, noticed both her predicament and her sarcasm. In response he replied, "I was going to offer to help you but I figured you'd probably snarl at me."

Julie glared at him. He ignored it. He had learned sometimes it was better to let her work things through on her own and not offer to help.

"Anyway," he continued, "Greg spoke to some of the workers. They are friends with Esteban and he was able to arrange for us to go meet the folks leading the dig here. They're all from CCF."

"CCF?" Julie said, not recalling the reference as she maintained her focus on sliding down the stairway.

"CCF, College of Central Florida. I think we might have even met some of them at a conference in the past," Kevin replied.

By this time they were so far down the steps Kevin was back pedaling, knowing that if he did fall he wouldn't have had more than a few feet to go. Noticing this, Julie finally turned her gaze to look down. Upon realizing where she was, she stood up and walked the last few steps down to the bottom, embarrassed at being so focused on sliding down one step at a time that she had lost sight of where she was and had long since gotten past the tough part. As Kevin took her hand she laughed at herself for being so silly.

"Actually, before we leave the plaza there are two more things on one of the southern temples you should see," Kevin said.

The southern temples on the plaza were in the process of being excavated. In fact, there was still so much work to be done they looked more like grass and tree covered mounds than the square sided pyramids they were. It was amazing to Julie how, in the few hundred years since the fall of the Mayan civilization, the jungle had completely engulfed the site. On top of these mounds large tarps were stretched to protect the diggers who were working to strip away the centuries of soil deposited on the sides of them. The tarps provided shade from the hot summer sun and kept the work area from being soaked by the rain. Julie supposed it wasn't the greatest climate to work in if you were a digger, but at least the tarps were better than nothing.

Kevin led her over to the base of the eastern-most of the two temples and they ducked under one of the tarps. Right before they disappeared under the tarps Julie noticed the workers on the side of the temple were working from the bottom up and not the top down. She found this somewhat curious thinking that given the possibility of the dig collapsing, or earth being washed down from above in the rainy season, they would want to work from the top down. She made a mental note to ask the researchers about this.

Underneath the tarp they found Greg talking with the workers who were excavating the center of the pyramid. At the center, as was typical of the Mayan pyramids, were the ceremonial steps. To the right and left of the steps there were ornate figures carved into the stone. Julie couldn't quite tell what they were.

Greg spoke before she had a chance to ask. "Julie, glad you could join us. Did you have a nice squat down the Canaa?" he asked her jokingly.

She punched him in the arm. He knew she didn't like to be teased, but he'd been teasing her all his life. Not so much because she deserved it, but mostly because she was one of the few people he could get away with doing it to.

As a child Greg was usually the one who got picked on. It came as a part of growing up a gangly, awkward looking kid who was smarter than most everyone around him. Julie realized that if it wasn't for his having a little sister to tease, he'd probably have had no one to pawn off his frustrations on. Who knows, she thought to herself, if I didn't let him tease me he might have turned out even weirder. So although she didn't like being teased by him, her reaction, if she showed one at all, was usually limited to "love taps" such as the one she'd just delivered.

Greg got the message from Julie's punch in the arm. While his sister had some quirks, like her fear of heights, he knew she was actually the tough one in the family, so he chose not to press her further. "Take a look at either side of the steps and tell me what you see," he said to her.

"Looks like stone carvings," she answered, "but I can't quite tell what they are supposed to be of."

"You're half right," Greg replied. "To answer your second question first, these are how the Maya represented the jaguar. See the eyes, nose, ears, and mouth," he said pointing out the features on the carving, which at about six feet high was not quite as tall as he was. "You can see other animals represented to the sides of the jaguar head, along with glyphs that tell the time of their carving. The jaguar was important to the Maya. It represented one of their gods. In the case of these two, from what I can gather using my limited Spanish to talk to our friends here," he said as he gestured to the diggers, "it also represented one of their kings."

He continued on, "About your noticing they are carvings, you're only half right. The one on the left which they are still excavating is a carving. The one on the right is actually a fiberglass casting made from the first carving they uncovered. They start off by making a cast of the actual carvings and color the cast to match the original. Then they use the cast to cover the original to protect it from the weather and the tourists. This way they don't have to worry about the original being degraded. This technique also allows them to make multiple castings, so they can display replicas of the important works in museums here and abroad."

Julie was suitably impressed. It was evident the Belizeans appreciated the uniqueness of their Mayan heritage. It also seemed to her they recognized it was something they needed to take economic advantage of, since next to the natural beauty of the country it was their most abundant resource. Still, they appeared to be determined to do this in a manner which kept this heritage alive rather than locking it away in a museum, or worse, losing control of it to foreign influences. As an anthropologist she recognized it was always a tough balance for a local government to let researchers in to work while keeping control of the things they might discover.

"Well, that was what I wanted you to see," Kevin said as he wrapped his arms around her from behind. "I'm glad you showed it to me," Julie said and turned to give him a kiss on the cheek. As she did so Esteban leaned his head under the tarp and said to them, "We need to move on with our tour. I will be taking the group to where they can sit down and have lunch, but Greg said you would like to talk to the researchers. I will show you to their offices as we walk to where the rest of the group will eat. Santos will give you your lunch, and then will come back to get you so you can rejoin the group."

On hearing this Julie was very glad she'd researched the resorts a bit and was convinced she had chosen the right one. Most other resorts would have balked at deviations from the planned itinerary, but the one they had chosen was proving to be very accommodating. The three archeologists waved their thanks to the diggers then ducked back under the tarp to the outside, following Esteban around the side of the pyramid to where the rest of the group was sitting in the shade.

"Sorry we kept you all waiting," Julie said to no one in particular. No one paid her any notice. The group was content to simply sit in the warm air under a shady tree, soaking up the sounds of the jungle and the views of the ruins around them. Julie's thoughts went back to Mario's joke about the Belizean minute being convertible at two to one to the American minute. It was something she was really starting to appreciate about this place.

Though hesitant to disturb his charges, Esteban realized they needed to move on and began to speak, "Everyone please follow me. We're going to head to a picnic area near the temple complex called Plaza A. It's about five minutes walk." He turned and strode ahead as everyone else followed.

One of the tourists caught up to him and Julie could hear her ask, "there's another temple complex here?"

Esteban replied, "There are four here in all. The one we are leaving is the main one. The others are called the Central Acropolis, the Southern Acropolis, and the Plaza where we go to now. Much of this site has yet to be excavated though, so we are only able to see a little of it. The best parts are where you just were and where we will go to for our lunch."

As they got a few hundred yards away from the temple complex Julie noticed a row of three small rectangular buildings up ahead of them. Buildings was a loose term, they were basically huts with screened sides and thatched roofing. There were some tents pitched around them.

As they got to the turn off by where the buildings were Esteban spoke, "If you would please wait here. The archeologists in your group want to meet their colleagues who are doing the excavations here. I just need to introduce them, then we will continue on for our lunch and they will join us later." Esteban waved to Julie, Kevin, and Greg to follow him while the others sought out some shade in which to await his return.

Esteban led the way and Julie, Kevin, Greg, and Santos followed. Santos had brought their lunches, entrusting the cooler with the lunches for the rest of the group to Marci. It was a short walk, perhaps a few hundred feet, to the buildings. When they arrived, Esteban walked in and asked them to wait outside. A minute or two later he reappeared.

"Gentlemen and Lady," he said, "I'd like to introduce you to Señor McCutchins, he is in charge of the excavations here." With the introductions out of the way Esteban turned back up the path to lead the rest of the tourists off to their lunch.

"Doctor McCutchins, I'm Greg Fowler, Professor of Archeology at Southern Arizona University. This is my sister Julie Fowler who is a doctoral candidate in Anthropology at Arizona College where she works on cultural links between current and ancient native southwestern American civilizations. This is her fiancée, and my student, Kevin Nellis, who is a doctoral candidate at Southern Arizona working on archeoastronomy," Greg said as he made his introductions.

Julie cleared her throat and glanced her eyes over towards poor Santos, who stood there silently. Getting her drift, Greg introduced the guide, "Oh, and don't let me forget our guide from the resort, Santos, who is apprenticing to become a licensed Belizean guide."

"My pleasure to meet you Professor Fowler, or is it Doctor Fowler? I never know the right way to address people. Anyway, I've read of your research and especially of the work of your protégé Kevin here." McCutchins replied. "By the way, everyone calls me Mac," he added.

"No one calls me Doctor either, Mac. Please call me Greg."

"Is that your lunch I see in Santos' hands?" Mac asked as ushered them into the building.

"Yes Señor," Santos replied.

"Terrific," Mac said, "I was about to stop for my lunch as well. Why don't we sit down and I can tell you a bit about the work we're doing here. I assume that's why you stopped by, but if you're not interested, please don't let me bore you with it."

Kevin was the first to answer, "No Doctor McCutchins, er, Mac, we're very much interested in hearing about your work here, it's why we asked Esteban if he could introduce us to you."

Mac smiled. It didn't take a genius to figure out a Professor in Archeology, his graduate student, and his anthropologist sister wouldn't be knocking on his door if they weren't interested in hearing about his work, but he'd learned long ago it was best to not make any assumptions about people's interests or intentions. Besides, he was basically a humble person, and it was simply polite to ask.

"Glad to hear it," Mac said. "We've been digging here for about three years. We can't really dig much at all in the rainy season. It takes too much work to move all that muck around. Hard enough digging in the dry months."

"You've probably been to the museum already and up to the main temple complex?" Mac asked. His guests nodded their agreement. "I figured as much, the guides pretty much always take folks around in the same order. Makes it easier for them to recite what they've learned. The guides here are a nice enough bunch, and they don't loot the place, which is pretty important, but they're mostly locals from right around here and they don't have much education. The museum hires them and trains them as best they can, but only a few of them understand much about our work. A lot of them are downright superstitious and won't come on site to work if the stars and planets aren't aligned correctly. You got lucky with Esteban. He's one of the better ones. His mother married a missionary after the man's first wife died of malaria, so he actually got something of an education. Fortunately, things are changing these days and most of the young folks, like your friend Santos here, are getting some schooling. Well, enough about the guides," he said, taking a big bite out of what looked like a burrito.

He chewed a bit, swallowed, and then started in, mostly addressing Greg, "Let me tell you about what we're working on. If I recall what I've read about the work you and Kevin are doing, it's been focused around the Anasazi and how their construction was used for astronomical observations. I don't know how much you've read about the Maya but when it comes to astronomy they seem to have discovered some of the same things about the sky. In fact, in many instances, they appear to have been as knowledgeable as any civilization known."

Kevin was in mid-chew of the sandwich Santos had handed him a few moments earlier, but this didn't deter him from acknowledging Mac's comment. "Yes, I've been reading quite a bit about that actually," he said, choking a little on a piece of his lunch.

Julie smacked him hard on the back, as if she was trying to help dislodge whatever he might be choking on, but her comment showed otherwise. "Please excuse him Mac, we don't take him out in front of polite folk too often," she said, smiling.

"Not to worry," Mac said, "the same goes for me." At Mac's comment Kevin chuckled and shot a glance towards Julie. "Touché," she said after noticing Kevin's look, then turned to Mac and added, "Please continue."

"There are similarities between the Maya and the cultures of the American southwest with regard to their architecture, specifically the construction of their pyramids. As you probably know, the Maya primarily built their temples in the form of the step pyramids like you see around here. The Maya not only used them for astronomical purposes, as we have been finding here, and as other researchers have discovered elsewhere, they also seem to have served in a manner similar to the way in which the pyramids served the Egyptians. By that I mean they also functioned as burial sites for their kings." Mac said.

He paused for a moment, took a bite of his lunch, then before he had finished chewing he started in again. "We've learned this from a few things, and by 'we' I of course mean the community of archeologists working on the Maya, not just my team here," he said in his characteristically humble manner.

"First, we began to read and decipher the glyphs we were finding on the many temples, stelae, and other monuments. Initially we thought the glyphs were carved on the temples to record and commemorate the reigns of the various rulers. Then we literally dug further and found they were very often constructed one on top of the other. This piqued people's curiosity and a lot of conflicting theories arose. Eventually a consensus emerged that the smallest pyramids were usually built by various rulers for religious usage. As such the glyphs they contain celebrate a ruler's reign and his construction of the temple."

Mac paused for a moment to see if they were following him. Realizing this last fact did not surprise any of his guests he continued, "The more interesting thing these excavations have shown is how many of the larger temples have been built on top of smaller ones. What has been unearthed so far shows us that most of the powerful rulers constructed their temples over those of their predecessors. There are even instances when a ruler buried his predecessor, often an ancestor, in a tomb atop the temple they had built, before building their own newer, larger temple over that of their ancestor's. Sometimes they also built tombs for themselves in this manner. It's not clear if this was done in an honorific manner or in a triumphal fashion. We suspect a mix. Researchers are still examining different sites to decipher if there is a pattern as to how this occurs. Of course no one is quite sure how to tell which rulers entombed in underlying pyramids were ancestors and which were victims who had their thrones usurped, so there is some guess work involved."

Mac noticed his guests had finished eating and turned his attention back to his own lunch. A few quick bites and his food was gone as well. Seeing him wolf his food down, Julie now understood the meaning of his earlier comments. When he finished she took the opportunity to ask him about something she had noticed earlier at the southeastern temple on the main complex.

"Doctor McCutchins, I mean Mac, I noticed at the dig on the main complex plaza that it looked like they were digging from the bottom up. Why is that?"

Mac complimented her, "You're not just an attractive young lady, but a very observant one too." He blushed slightly at the realization he was flirting with another man's fiancée right in front of him. Then, undaunted, he continued, "It's a rather unusual excavation. You probably saw the carvings on the side of the temple. The jaguar faces?"

"Yes," Julie replied, "Kevin brought me over to them. I didn't realize they were jaguar faces until Greg pointed out the features to me. What is their significance?"

"Well," Mac said, "according to the inscriptions on it that temple was built to honor a ruler we refer to as the Jaguar King or Lord Jaguar. We call him this because we don't know how to pronounce his name. Keep in mind Mayan kings were more than rulers though, they were also held by their people to be incarnations of gods. This particular fellow was the incarnation of the Jaguar God. From what we see of the carvings, glyphs, and marker stones called stelae, he was a very powerful king indeed, and this pyramid temple was supposed to be his burial place. Normally when excavating a temple we would start at the top. Much easier that way since you don't have to worry about shoring up what's above or having dirt sliding down on you and so forth. Because this Jaguar King appears to have been a big player, however, we were worried about the possibility of his tomb being looted while we worked our way down from the top. So we decided we needed to dig directly into the side and try to find the tomb itself."

"Cool, that means I guessed right." Julie said.

"And what was it you were guessing about?" the elder man inquired.

"Well I was guessing the way you were excavating seemed unusual. Maybe it means something has rubbed off on me from these two guys over the years. But I'm glad to hear you beat the looters to the tomb."

Mac's eyebrows raised at her last comment, "That's the strange thing. We're not sure whether we beat the looters to the tomb or not."

"What do you mean?" Greg asked, now both curious and concerned by his unusual comment.

"We did find a tomb. Judging from the placement of it under the pyramid, the compaction of the dirt, and the layout of it, there is no evidence of it having been previously excavated or looted. If you've seen any looted sites you can virtually always tell they've been looted. The looters almost always go after things they can carry away. They look for gold or precious stones, mostly in the form of jewelry, and other personal items of the tomb's occupant, but they'll also grab pottery and anything else they can carry that they think will get a price on the antiquities black market."

Mac continued, "And they're usually very careless in how they excavate. They always leave damage along the entrance way, walls, etc., and they virtually never cover their excavations back up. They're always in a hurry to get in, grab what they can, and then get out. This tomb didn't have any signs of that. The stones enclosing the chamber were in place and it looked as if they had never been disturbed. The dirt outside them was compacted and showed no signs of having been removed and replaced."

This made Greg even more curious, "So what makes you think the tomb might have been looted?"

Mac replied, "When we opened it up, there was nothing in it except a dozen skeletons. The walls bore all the glyphs and decorations indicating it was the tomb of the Jaguar King, but there was no sign anyone in the tomb was a king. There was no sarcophagus or other signature burial. No jewelry. No shield. No personal goods. None of the types of things other archeologists have discovered in other Mayan royal burials. Just a bunch of bodies that seem to have been haphazardly tossed in with no ceremony associated with their burial there."

Kevin was intrigued by this mystery as well. "Have you talked to any of your peers working in this region?" he asked. Then he added, "Or done any forensic analysis on the bodies you found to see if you can determine why they were in there? Maybe the tomb was robbed shortly after the king was buried. Or maybe they were tomb workers killed in an accident while building the tomb and for some reason, maybe superstition, the work on this tomb was halted and another one built instead?"

"So far we've decided to keep this quiet," Mac replied. "To answer your first question, right now we don't quite know what we have here, and quite frankly we don't want to be embarrassed by announcing a major find only to have it end up we've misinterpreted things. In regards to your other thoughts, it's a good idea, and one we did consider until we learned a few things about the skeletons. We brought in our own expert and did a forensic analysis ourselves. Our experts tell us these skeletons didn't appear to be nobles. Their bodies had evidence of having lived a life of hard labor. The analysis also showed these skeletons all evidently died as a result of sacrificial rites. There is clear indication in the form of cut marks on the ribs of each of them which match up with the types of cut marks made by sacrificial tools known to be used by the Maya. We believe the chest cavities of these individuals were cut open in the ritual manner done when the hearts of sacrifice victims are cut out."

Mac could see Julie wince at his detailing of this fact. "We also did some carbon dating in addition to the forensic analysis. We took pulp samples from the roots of teeth in the skulls of the skeletons we found in the tomb and used the most recent carbon fourteen dating protocols. We went so far as to correlate the results with tree ring records to make sure we had it right. When the results came back we didn't believe them at first, so we had two different labs reproduce them, anonymously of course, so we wouldn't tip our hand."

"So what did the results tell you?" Greg asked.

"The results show these skeletons came from the exact same time period as the Jaguar King ruled and died in. We can't say whether they were put into the tomb before or after he was dead, and we can't figure out why they were in there in the first place. If they were looters who were sacrificially killed in reprisal for robbing the Jaguar King's tomb after his death why would their bodies have been placed in it? And why is there no sign of the body of the Jaguar King in a tomb clearly displaying all the typical glyphs, murals, and markings associated with the burial of such an important ruler? Its been baffling us for close to a year," Mac said with an exasperated look on his face.

No one spoke. The three archeologists simply sat there pondering the mystery he had revealed to them. Santos also sat there thinking about this, having, upon hearing Mac's dilemma, quickly forgotten he was supposed to rejoin the others. For a few moments there was nothing but the sound of the wind and the birds in the trees. Then they heard the sound of someone running towards them breathing hard.

Moments later a young woman burst into the building where Mac and his new friends sat having lunch. "Professor," the young woman said, huffing as she tried to catch her breath, "we found something really extraordinary."

Her arrival broke the pensive silence which had ensued subsequent to the quandary Mac had posed to the group. Mac was taken aback for a moment by the woman's arrival and her brusque comment. Regaining his composure he began to introduce the young woman, "Let me introduce Trisia, she's one of the undergraduate students from CCF down here for a semester completing a practical by helping on the digs."

Mac turned to address Trisia. "Trisia, let me introduce some of our colleagues in the field. You may have read some of their work in your studies, or at least you should have if whoever is teaching them is worth anything," he said not noticing the young woman's apparent excitement.

Trisia wasn't sure quite what to say. It wasn't often she got to talk to the Professor, as she and the other undergrads referred to Mac, let alone interrupt him when he had important company. Still, she had been told by Randy, the dig director, to tell the Professor this was incredibly urgent, and not to come back without insisting he come to the site while personally escorting him there.

Before she could get up the nerve to say something Mac spoke again, "This is Dr. Greg Fowler, and ..."

She didn't let him finish. Summoning up her courage Trisia blurted out loudly, "NO PROFESSOR. YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND. WE FOUND SOMETHING REALLY, REALLY EXTRAORDINARY. YOU HAVE TO COME WITH ME RIGHT NOW!"

Mac was now not only taken aback by the woman's arrival, but also by her tone and volume, which were bordering on the impertinent. He was, after all, a full tenured Professor while this woman was merely an undergraduate who worked with the graduate students as a digger and trainee. "Trisia, remember yourself. This is quite rude. I have important guests here," he scolded her, "What could be so important at your dig? It's a minor peripheral temple."

"Sorry, Professor." Trisia said. "That's just it. We found a small tomb at the site. Filled with stelae, codices, jewelry, and a stone sarcophagus. As soon as he saw what was in the tomb Randy told me to run down here and get you, and not to bother ever coming back if I didn't bring you back with me."

"That's astounding," Mac bellowed. "We better go have a look then mustn't we? We wouldn't want to get this lovely young woman into hot water with a graduate student, would we?" he said with a laugh. Then, turning to his guests he added, "Would you folks care to join me?" Without even waiting for their reply Mac popped up, tossed his hat on, and was out the door.

It was all Trisia could do to keep up with him as he shot out the door, down the path leading away from the buildings past the main complex, and out towards the site's periphery. In her wake came Greg, Kevin, Julie, and Santos, in that order, each surprised with the haste the one before them showed in dashing out after the sprightly old Professor.

That site is about a mile from here, Mac thought to himself, if the poor girl ran the whole way no wonder she was huffing and puffing when she arrived. In his mind he knew he couldn't run the distance, but he'd get there quick enough. If what she was reporting to him was true, however, it would be very curious indeed. His team wouldn't normally dig at such a site. It was far from the main temple complex and the other larger adjacent complexes at Caracol. Despite its remoteness, some relatively recent work in surveying at the site had shown this minor temple lay on certain lines of astronomical sighting from the Canaa. As a result, Randy, one of Mac's most promising graduate students, had insisted it might be more significant than its size and distance from the center of the complex would suggest.

Mac didn't usually let graduate students dictate their projects, but Randy's suggestion wasn't without merit and his father was a benefactor of the school, as well as of Mac's dig itself. There was some grumbling among the other students of favoritism and impropriety, but Mac's decision to let Randy do an exploratory dig there wasn't unprecedented. Besides, the others knew the sites they were working on were actually more likely to produce finds worthy of their thesis studies. So they took to jokingly calling the little temple the "Folly Berger", after Randy's last name.

Mac darted down the jungle path, the others trailing after him in hot pursuit. Normally Trisia would have had no problem keeping up with him, but she'd just run the mile over here and had barely caught her breath before Mac took off. The other archeologists had less of an excuse. They weren't in poor shape, but none of the three were particularly athletic.

Then there was poor Santos, who was beginning to wonder whether they should be getting back to the rest of the group lest he get in trouble with Uncle Jimmy. He kept stopping to look back in the direction they had come, hoping for a glimpse of Esteban, the other tourists, or the hut by the car and museum where Uncle Jimmy was probably snoozing at this very moment. Finally he gave up, realizing if he didn't keep his eyes on the archeologists, who themselves were trying to keep up with Mac, he would lose them. Then not only would he be in trouble for letting them head in the opposite direction of where he really wanted them to go, he'd also be in trouble for losing track of them.

After a few more minutes of walking at quite a brisk pace Mac turned down what seemed like the third or fourth path they'd taken so far. As he turned onto it, the jungle path widened out into a small clearing. Tools, dirt screens, and boxes were scattered about a small temple that rose about twenty feet up out of the jungle. Vines draped the temple and moss covered its stepped sides. Around the far end was a tarp covering a gap in the stone base of the small temple. The tarp was where Mac was headed.

When he reached the tarp Mac called out, "Randy! Randy! What's going on out here? Trisia said something about a spectacular find."

As he said this he ducked under the tarp and headed down a short ramp. The ramp was barely tall enough so that when Mac lowered his head beneath the temple steps, which formed the roof above it, he found himself crouching down into a space about five feet high, fifteen wide, and about as many deep. When he did so he saw Randy and two of the local diggers looking about them in awe. Mac now understood what Trisia meant. He also understood why Randy had sent her to fetch him while remaining there himself to make sure the local diggers stayed where he could see them.

What Mac saw was, simply put, one of the most incredible finds he had ever seen or heard of in Mayan Archeology. In the future he would have the time to actually sit down and grasp how long fully analyzing and conserving this discovery would take, but at the instant in which he saw it he could merely stand there and marvel at the contents of this unlikely tomb. While most others might have remained distracted by the astounding nature of the contents of the chamber he was in, it quickly struck Mac's highly trained mind that something about the chamber itself was not right.

The chamber was dug directly into the earth, its walls were unfinished, and they bore no stone. There were no glyphs, murals, or other markings one might typically find in a tomb containing such artifacts. The chamber itself appeared to be an earthen bunker dug into the ground between the pillars supporting the temple above it. To Mac's trained eye it was evident it had been constructed as an after-thought and not as a part of the original temple itself, although its contents were undeniable.

Those trailing behind Mac were about to duck their heads into the cramped opening as well when he shifted his focus and abruptly turned back up the ramp to stop them. "It's rather close in there and we can't be sure the roof is supported properly," he said. Then he leaned in towards Trisia's ear and whispered something to her, she nodded, turned and retreated back up the tunnel and out into the daylight.

As she did this Mac called back into the chamber, "Randy, it isn't safe in there. You need to take yourself and the workers out of there until we can get some proper supports in place." This comment jolted Randy from his ardor at admiring the chamber's contents. He started to protest but Mac assumed his most fatherly tone, "Do it now Randy," and with that Randy waved to the workers to leave.

Mac let the workers step past him, then leaned in close to Randy and said to him, "I've told Trisia to go round up crew with cameras to document this, as well as tools and material to shore up the structure, and lock boxes for what's in here. You need to keep those two diggers under your control. If word gets out about this before we can get the site locked down, who knows what might disappear."

Randy began to understand the Professor's urgency. He stepped past him in the tunnel to take charge of the workers before they might get any ideas. The local workers were mostly honest, but even the most honest usually had mouths to feed. While pay for work on the dig was equal to, or better than, that of other jobs in this part of Belize, the black market price of just a single important artifact in good shape could relieve a man of a lifetime of toil. The temptation was high and the black marketeers knew how to take advantage of this, so Mac had learned that for significant finds extra caution was merited.

When he popped his head back out of the hole Mac offered his apologies to his guests, ensuring them his denying their entry to the tomb was for their own safety. In answer to their questions, he indicated nothing more than Trisia had already said to him in their presence, refusing to comment further. He made the usual noises to them about the need to not contaminate the site, make sure it was structurally safe, catalog and secure the contents, etc. Being fellow archeologists they acknowledged the propriety of everything Mac was telling them. It was clear to Mac, however, that their interest was piqued, as they kneeled and tilted their heads hoping to get a glimpse at what could prove to be a major find. Recognizing their curiosity, as well as the debt of professional courtesy, Mac's politeness took over. He invited them to return in a few days, assuring them that once the discoveries had been given a proper initial review he'd be happy to give them a preview.

Disappointed to not be able to see the discovery now, but grateful for Mac's offer of professional courtesy, Greg thanked him and reluctantly turned away. It was only then he realized it had been well over an hour since they'd set off from the group and first noticed the anxious look on Santos' face.

"Well, Santos, perhaps we should rejoin the others?" Greg said to him.

The young man replied to Greg, "Yes sir, I would like to, but I don't know where we are or how to get back. I've never been on this part of the Caracol site before."

The worry in his voice was discernable to Julie. She looked over at Kevin and, addressing him by one of her many pet names for him, asked "Hey Pigeon Boy, can you get us out of here?"

Kevin stopped trying to steal a peak into the underground chamber, stood up, and pointed, "Sure. Back round this temple, up the path on the northwest side of the clearing. West out that path, two lefts, two rights, Jack's a donut there you are."

When Julie heard the last bit she cringed. She couldn't recall where he'd picked up that stupid saying, some British comedy no doubt. He didn't use it all the time, just often enough to make her sometimes wonder if Greg's personality was rubbing off on him. Or maybe he was always like that and those similarities to her brother were what attracted her to him. She cringed again at the thought, then conceded to herself he did at least have a talent for navigating. Maybe it was why he was so good at archeoastronomy. Even on grey days, when there was no sun to guide him, he seemed to have the human equivalent of inertial navigation. Somehow he could always tell where he was and how far he'd gone. It was almost eerie, hence she gave him the nickname "Pigeon Boy." Sometimes for fun he'd give her the GPS unit and then take pride in telling her what the readings on it were. He was always eerily close.

With this in mind, Julie turned to Santos and said, "Not to worry Santos. Kevin can help us find our way back to the Professor's offices. Can you find the way from there?"

Santos gave her a skeptical look, but she gestured to him as if to repeat the question and he spoke up, "Yes, ma'am I can."

Workers began to quickly pour into the small clearing and Mac busied himself supervising the work. Julie, Kevin, Greg, and Santos thanked him for his hospitality and said their good-byes. Then, as Kevin had phrased it to Julie, they headed back round the temple, up the path on the northwest side of the clearing, west down that path, two lefts, two rights, and Jack's a donut there they were, back at the Professor's offices, which had become a beehive of activity.

In actuality it wasn't hard at all for Kevin to find their way. A stream of students and workers was strung out along the trail heading towards the new discovery. One merely needed to walk from one to the next to find the way. Julie mused to herself that they reminded her of a line of ants diligently marching to or from a work site. Much like those of the leaf cutter ants she had seen here in Belize, carrying the impossibly large pieces of leaf they dragged back to their nests. These ants had a different purpose though.

Once at the Professor's offices Santos led the way back out to the main road used by the tourist guides, then back past the Plaza A complex. It was a large grouping of structures including some small pyramids, although none of them were close to the size of the Canaa. The largest of these topped out at perhaps one hundred feet, if that. What it lacked in size the complex made up for in numbers. Julie, Kevin, and Greg started to wander off as Santos whirled around calling out for Esteban or Jimmy.

"We were supposed to meet them here, but I don't think they're here anymore," Santos said. The other three didn't pay much attention to him, so Santos spoke up more loudly. "I think we need to go back to the museum. Jimmy will be very angry with me if we are late to return. The roads are not good, and we shouldn't drive them at night."

At this second bit Julie took notice, and began calling out to Kevin and Greg, who were starting to amble up small pyramids at opposite ends of the plaza. Shouting out loudly she said, "Santos is right. We need to be going if we're going to catch our ride home. It's a pretty long walk."

Santos continued on across the plaza to the road that took them back to the museum and the parking lot where Jimmy would be waiting. The three of them followed. A few more minutes down the path and they could see the museum clearing ahead of them. The van was still there, but at first Santos didn't see Esteban, Jimmy, or any of the tourists from the resort. As he got closer he felt relief upon seeing his Uncle Jimmy swinging in a hammock under the covering for the museum's picnic area. Next to Jimmy were some of the other tourists, also swinging in hammocks, relaxing and sipping beers. Santos was beginning to understand why the resort always had a cooler full of beer with them in the van.

Uncle Jimmy had often told Santos about how a group he led one afternoon had become stranded. As the story went, while Uncle Jimmy and the group were within a cave it had begun to rain very hard. Unknown to Jimmy, during the several hours he and the tourist group spent canoeing along the underground river inside the cave, the river outside of it had swollen so high the van could not make it back across. Jimmy had to climb up to the top of a nearby hill so that his cell phone could get a signal in order to call back to the resort. It took some time before the Humvee they sent arrived to ferry the tourists across the river and back to the resort.

Recalling this tale Santos smiled to himself at the wisdom of bringing along a cooler full of beer. This being Belize, you could never tell when the unexpected would happen and you might have to wait a while. Along the way the resort managers recognized the impatient American and European tourists they hosted were much less likely to get upset if the staff dressed up any delay as an opportunity to relax, unwind, and experience the beauty of their surroundings. Of course they also realized it helped even more to serve up such an opportunity accompanied by a few cold ones.

"Santos, we were starting to worry about you. Que paso?" Jimmy said. Then he whistled a few loud blasts. This caused some shapes down the road at a drainage pond, which they had walked past at the start of their tour, to startle and take flight. The object of their observation having flown away, several other shapes rose up from below the rise of the pond's banks and began walking towards the van.

Jimmy picked up the cooler and walked towards the van, joining those who had come from over by the drainage pond. "What took you so long hombre?" Jimmy asked. Santos, Julie, Kevin, and Greg responded by telling him and the others of the mystery Mac had recounted to them and the discovery at the outlying temple. The days' events were the talk of the van as Jimmy pulled out onto the dirt road back to the resort whistling as he drove down the dusty road.

Chapter 5 - The Challenge

In the days since the discovery at Caracol, Julie, Kevin, and Greg had tried to keep themselves distracted with activities sponsored by the resort. Prior to their trip to Caracol the three of them had done much of what was on the list to choose from, yet many other activities still remained: the canoe trip down an underground river which flowed deep within a cave; bird watching; and horseback riding, among them. Try as they might to put the strange happenings at Caracol out of their minds, every place they went bore reminders of the presence of the Maya. From pottery burials in the underground cave, to unexcavated - but looted - mounds in the bird preserve, to the small temple the horse guide took them to, signs of the past presence of the Maya were all about them. Each reminder caused them to dwell on the remarkable events of their visit to Caracol, making them ever more eager to return.

Unfortunately for them they were running out of time in their stay in Belize. There were just two days before their flight home, and in the time left to them the resort had only one more scheduled visit to Caracol, leaving that same day after breakfast. Their efforts at calling down to Caracol had not yielded any word back from Mac or his team about the state of the new discovery. Undaunted, they decided to risk wasting the time it would take to make the trip once more against the likelihood Mac would not have the time to talk to them.

The trip back to Caracol would also not be without other costs. The three of them had been at the resort for over a week and in this time there had been some turnover in the other tourists staying there. The resort manager was adamant that for any particular trip new guests had priority for seats in the van over those who had already visited a destination. A quick head count told Kevin there would be one more guest wanting to make this trip than there was seats in the van. He realized if all three of them were to go, one of the other guests would have to give up a seat.

When Julie got wind of this she insisted she should stay behind, leaving the available seats for Kevin and Greg. Kevin was equally set on wanting her to be there with them. He knew he'd feel terrible if Mac consented to letting them see the new find and she wasn't there. Without telling Julie, or the resort manager, Kevin made a deal with one of the guests, paying him to switch his plans around and see Caracol on a later day. Julie would have killed him if she had known. When the guest with whom Kevin had made the agreement caught onto this, he took further advantage of Kevin by making him shell out hush money in order to keep him from saying anything to Julie.

Kevin felt like he'd been taken for a chump, but he really wanted Julie to be with them if they did get a chance to talk to Mac and view the new find. Besides, he knew there was only one other way they could get down to Caracol, try to find a taxi to take them. This would have cost at least as much as he'd just allowed himself to be taken for. When he'd previously asked the resort manager about this he was told it was a bad idea. Even if they paid the taxi to wait for them they couldn't actually count on it being there at the end of the day. It appeared taxi drivers in Belize were no more reliable than anywhere else in the world, and if the taxi left them there they might have a hard time getting another one to travel down late in the day to bring them back. Not wanting to risk getting all the way out there and then getting stuck, Kevin decided it was safer for him to buy their way into the ride on the resort's van. The things I do for love, he thought, smiling to himself.

"Making a second trip?" Jimmy said as he noticed the three of them climb into the van along with the other guests from the resort.

Greg smiled and replied, "You couldn't keep us away from a chance at viewing the new finds," then he added, "Is Santos coming today?"

Jimmy started the engine as the last tourist climbed in and answered Greg "No," he said, "Santos has business in Mopan to attend to. He said he must renew his training permit." Jimmy pulled the van out of the resort and headed through the small town next to it, down the main highway, then onto the turn off for the dirt road to Caracol.

The trip was uneventful and despite their heightened anticipation at what they hoped to see upon their return, they were surprised at how short it seemed this time. When the van actually pulled into the lot in front of the Caracol museum, Jimmy ushered the passengers out and directed them towards the museum.

As he did Greg turned to him and said, "We are going to look for the CCF archeologists. Will you join us?"

Jimmy politely declined, "Thank you, but because Santos is not here I must stay with the rest of the group. You can meet us back here later, but please do not be later than three o'clock. We must leave on time because the roads can be very dangerous after it gets dark and you do not want to be late for dinner at the resort."

If Jimmy had been talking to anyone other than an archeologist focused on getting a glimpse of an important new discovery in his field, his admonishment about not being late for dinner might have been a strong inducement. The resort was well noted among its peers in Belize for the quality of its cuisine. They had sent their head chef off to a U.S. culinary school for several months of training. When he returned he created a menu varied in the types of cuisine it offered. Unlike other resorts where the menus consisted solely of regional dishes, which the local cooks made passable efforts at whipping up, theirs featured a dish from a different nationality each night of the week. They carried this out quite impressively, especially given the difficulties presented in Belize at obtaining authentic ingredients. A guest could spend two weeks there and never have the same meal twice.

As Jimmy, who greatly appreciated the job perk of being able to take his meals at the resort, said this to Greg, he recalled who he was talking to and recognized the single-minded archeologist was not one to be induced by such things. Seeing Greg turn hurriedly towards the buildings of the archeological dig crew Jimmy worriedly called out to him once again, "Please do not be late. Three o'clock. The roads get VERY DANGEROUS!" He made sure to shout the last words loudly hoping Julie would also hear them. He was somewhat comforted when she turned and waved back to him.

Kevin led the team from the museum parking lot back to the archeologist's camp site, exactly the opposite of the way they had come before with Santos. When they turned down the small road off the main path they noticed something which was not there upon their last visit. Next to the huts and tents there now stood two steel shipping containers. Outside of them were posted two soldiers with semi-automatic weapons. As they walked past, the soldiers eyed them suspiciously. Kevin decided it was best to give them a wide berth as they headed for the office where they had first met Mac.

They reached the building where they had eaten lunch with Mac on their first visit. Kevin was about to step inside, when, right at the same moment, Mac stepped through the door carrying something. "Please do be careful," Mac said, as he narrowly avoided colliding with Kevin and crushing the priceless artifact he was carrying, "These are extremely fragile." Without even so much as a pause, he headed towards the shipping containers.

Greg, who was a few steps behind Kevin, tried to get Mac's attention, "Professor, er, Mac. Do you remember us? I'm Greg Fowler, Archeology Professor from Southern Arizona University. We met with you here the other day."

"Oh yes. Please excuse me. Things have been a whirlwind since the last few days. I was just on my way to put this item back," Mac said, being uncharacteristically impolite in his lack of attention to what Greg had said.

"We're sorry to interrupt you, but we're only in Belize for two more days and we were hoping you might be able to tell us something more about the new discovery you made when we were with you the other day," Greg said.

At the mention of this, realization dawned on Mac as to who it was who was addressing him. He stopped and turned around. "You must excuse me Professor Fowler, er Greg. I actually hadn't recalled you at first. We've had more than a few inquiries lately about the discovery, including some souvenir hunters showing up and milling about. Why don't you and your colleagues follow me?" Mac said as he continued on to the two containers.

"I'm really not supposed to work on these outside the containers, but the light is so bad it's tough for these old eyes to work in there'" Mac said. As he reached the container on the right the soldier stepped aside. "It's okay," he said to the soldier, "these are my guests," then motioned the three of them to follow him into the container. As they did the door of it clanged closed behind them. Mac set the item he was carrying down on a table inside the container. "The government of Belize sent us these two containers and insisted on providing soldiers to guard them. I'm actually thankful for their concern. These two units have AC powered air conditioners, so we're able to keep the items we discovered at a better temperature and humidity for their conservation. We'll be moving them shortly to a better location but we needed some time to analyze them onsite where they could be close to the context of their discovery."

Mac was about to continue but Greg interrupted him, "What is it you've discovered, Professor?"

"Oh yes, I'd forgotten. We sealed everything off rather quickly the other day. You mustn't have had a chance to see. Well, we'll take you round there later if there is time," Mac said, then paused for a moment. "Let me think. We were having lunch and discussing the mystery of last year's discovery of the Jaguar King's tomb, the one missing the actual Jaguar King. Then we were interrupted by news of the find at the outlying temple," Mac said. "Well, I think we may have found our missing king. Though for the life of me I have no idea what he was doing in the place we found him."

Greg was first to speak, "What do you mean?"

"A large number of the items we found at that outlying temple, including the sarcophagus itself, bear glyphs identifying the sarcophagus' occupant as the Jaguar King. They match up very nicely with the glyphs and identifying marks from the tomb we discovered last year, the one we found filled with the sacrificial victims, but the place where we found all of this is not a tomb at all."

"After you left the other day we set about making sure the chamber was structurally safe to work in. After reinforcing the site we moved generators out there and have been working almost non-stop since. We brought lights in and did an immediate and extensive survey and photographed the entire chamber. The chamber itself, if you can call it that, was entirely without adornment. Our examination leads us to believe it was hastily dug out between the support pillars underneath the base of a minor temple of a type we've never seen used for entombing anyone, even priests, let alone a person of the Jaguar King's stature. The chamber contained what you see in this container, plus the sarcophagus which is housed next door at a different temperature and humidity because it has the Jaguar King's remains in it," Mac said.

As Mac said this the three looked about the dimly lit container. There were several hastily constructed shelves and a few long narrow tables. On the shelves and tables lay a few dozen items. Among them were a few items made of gold that appeared to be jewelry, some intricately carved jade artifacts such as combs, bracelets, etc., and the pieces of a necklace. Also carefully laid out on the tables were sheets of paper made from bark. Lastly there were a few medium sized stones with carvings on them.

Kevin, who had been reading up on the Mayan culture before and during the trip, immediately recognized the carved stones as being stelae. He was less certain of what the paper was but had a guess. "Are those codexes?" he said to Mac.

"Yes, they are codices. You're quite a perceptive young man," Mac replied, while simultaneously correcting and complimenting him. "We believe they are. How is it you're able to recognize what a codex looks like? There are very few Mayan codices in existence, and none in the museums in America or here in Belize," Mac added.

"Well, I've been doing a bit of reading on the Maya. Several web sites have images of some of the truly important codices such as the Dresden, Paris and Madrid Codices," Kevin replied.

"Hmmm, you ambitious youngsters and all your new technology are going to put me out of a job," Mac growled. "We've had a chance to photograph them and read through them. It's a first pass but our analysis indicates they are different from other codices discovered in the past. The ones you mentioned, and the few others known to exist, served mostly to document the Mayan calendar system and provide information on the timing of when various rituals should be performed. The three codices we found don't match that usage. Our translation of them is very preliminary, but from what we've translated so far, two of them seem to be intended for teaching Mayan religious practices. They contain the same information in three different representations like some type of dictionary or Rosetta Stone. Randy's the one with the linguistics background and is our expert in the various Mayan languages and their inter-relations. He thinks he recognized one of the new representations as possibly being a direct ancestor of a language still spoken by modern tribes descended from the Classic Period Maya. If that's truly the case it could lead to development of a definitive pronunciation guide. Imagine that. Our being able to stand on top of a Mayan temple and recite their ceremonies as they would have sounded a thousand years ago. It would be a great find if Randy's theory is correct."

"You mentioned a third codex, what is in that one?" Greg asked Mac.

Mac replied, "Hmm, the final one is even more curious. We found it inside the sarcophagus of the Jaguar King. The translation we've done is also very preliminary. It was written in the standard Classic Period glyphs, but because it's not like any codex we know we're very reluctant to have any mention of our theory get out. So please keep this to yourselves for now, but we think it is the Jaguar King's epitaph."

Mac proceeded to explain how the final codex told who the Jaguar King was. It contained a lot of standard stuff which would normally have been found on one or more stelae placed at the foot of a temple dedicated to a dead king by his successor. He went on to inform them that other than what was on the walls of the ceremonial tomb of the Jaguar King, no stela or other markings had ever been found at the Caracol site to memorialize him. Mac said because the codex delineated the Jaguar King's ancestors, and his ascension to the throne, it might somehow serve the same function a stela would have, and therefore represented a change in Mayan burial practices. He indicated it was too soon to say whether the change was unique to this burial, or some as yet undiscovered shift across the entire Mayan culture.

Stranger still, Mac added, was the story this codex told of the downfall of the Jaguar King. It spoke of his wedding to the princess of a city, referred to by a glyph associated with a site he referred to as Buenavista. It told of how she stole a jade mask from the Jaguar King, how the king vowed his revenge at the theft, and how the soldiers of Caracol marched to war to recover the mask and, though surprising their enemy, failed to recover it and were driven back. Finally it told how, despite the Jaguar King's great valor in this fight, he was mortally wounded, then brought by his personal guard back to Caracol where he died shortly after.

At the end of this Mac paused, drew a long breath, and said, "It explains a lot, but unless we missed something the one thing it doesn't explain is why the king was entombed in the place we found him and not in his proper burial chamber." The three of them could see Mac was somewhat exasperated by this new mystery. "I guess it was too much to ask that such a major find might actually answer the questions we've been working on for the last year. Instead, not only do we still have the previous mystery as to why the king wasn't in the tomb built for him, but now we also have the new mystery of what he was doing buried in the place we found him!"

Greg, recognizing the position Mac found himself in, tried to be helpful, "What about the other artifacts, the jewelry, pottery, and stelae stones? Do they have any clues?"

"Nothing we can tell so far," Mac said. "We've haven't really had more than a preliminary look at this find though. It appears most of the artifacts celebrate the Jaguar King's rule. The only one mentioning his death, however, is the one I just told you about, which we're calling the Epitaph Codex."

"What are the artifacts which don't celebrate his rule?" Kevin asked.

"Most are small personal items, except for this one stela here. We can't make any sense of it at all. I mean from a literal standpoint it's actually the thing we understand the best out of all the glyphs and symbols on any of these artifacts. But its meaning has no relation to anything else we found in the tomb, or to the Jaguar King himself, or to any known Mayan rituals. Without a lot of additional study to interpret what it means, it's mostly meaningless to us right now. It will probably turn into some misguided graduate student's lifelong quest," Mac harrumphed.

"What does it say?" Kevin asked.

"You'll have to ask Randy for the translation. Like I said, he's the one in our group with the linguistics background. I think he's next door working on a translation of the inscriptions from the sarcophagus. Let's go join him, you'll want to see that anyway," Mac said and he turned to step from the container.

As the last of them stepped out of the container, and past the soldier guarding it, Mac leaned in and locked it behind them. He then squeezed past the three of them, stepped between the containers, passed by the other soldier, thumped on the door of the left container, and shouted, "Randy, are you in there?" A muffled noise came back in answer from inside the container and Mac pulled the heavy hinged door open a crack, stepped in, motioned the others in after him, and pulled the door closed behind him.

"Randy, I don't recall whether you were introduced to these folks the other day. They were touring the site with the group from the resort. We were having lunch and talking about our work here when Trisia interrupted us with news of the find," Mac said. He then proceeded to introduce Greg, Kevin, and Julie.

Randy immediately recognized Kevin's name, "I've read some of the papers you've published on your archeoastronomy work at the Anasazi sites. I can't say I understood all of it, since my specialty is linguistics not astronomy, but I was impressed by what I read. It was what I learned from your papers that led me to come up with my hunch about the outlying temple being more significant than was previously thought. Its location on the line between the Canaa at the main complex and one of the key points in the cycle of Venus fit in with your theories. I followed my intuition and convinced Mac to let me dig there. So I guess I have you to thank for this discovery in a way."

Before Kevin could acknowledge Randy's compliment, Mac, in an obvious hurry, blurted out, "Randy, I'm going to leave our guests with you. I have a lot of paperwork to do for the Belizean government. They're very anxious to get an accounting of what we've found. I dare say they don't trust me." Mac slipped through the door of the container and it clanged shut behind him before Greg, Kevin, and Julie could thank him.

Kevin was the first to speak, although he was too embarrassed to address Randy's prior comments, "Mac showed us the unusual stela among the artifacts in the find and said you could tell us what it said."

"Yeah, it's pretty weird. The stone, that is. The glyphs are from the Classic Period. We're pretty sure about what it says, but there are a few symbols we're not completely certain of the translation. In English it would translate it to something like this...," and he recited the words from the stela.

It is said on that day, at dawn, was seen the face of Chak Ek'

[che' ta k'in, ti ahal ilah uwich chak ek']

it is said on that day, it is the self of the king, he is in the presence of the God Mask

[che' ta k'in, ub'ah ajaw yichnal koh k'uh]

It is said on that day sacrifice is made

[che' ta k'in ch'ab'-t]

It is said on that day the Quetzalcoatl burns

[che' ta k'in tok-k'uk'chan]

It is said on that day the King fights

[che' ta k'in nak-Ahaw]

He is in the act of creating

[Ubah ti Ch'abil]

The fire is the divine conjuring

[Al K'ak Uk'uhul tzahk]

He conjures the spirit of warfare

[Utzakaw Uk'awiilil utok'pakal]

He conjured the Gods with his creation and his darkness

[Utzak K'uh tuch'ab tiyak'ab'il]

Then the King shall destroy those who fight (him)

[Ka' Ahaw hom nak-ha'ob]

"Pretty strange, huh? We have no idea what it means. We're guessing it is perhaps some type of pre-battle sacrifice ritual. We're not sure as to why it was in with the rest of the stuff. It's unusual for a stela with a sacrifice ritual to be buried with a king. It's the only item in the find which doesn't have anything to directly connect it with the Jaguar King himself. Even the codices with the religious rites on them at least had dedications to him," Randy said.

Kevin replied, "Well if I recall correctly, Chak Ek' is the name the Maya used for Venus when it rose in the morning sky, the time when they considered it as the portent of war. Maybe it has some relation to the tale of how the Jaguar King met his end."

"That's a good theory," Randy responded, "and we thought of that ourselves, but we don't see how it connects back to the Jaguar King, or what it means to be in the presence of the God Mask. Anyway it's not really important right now. I'm working on translating the sarcophagus inscriptions."

Just then Greg, who had been quiet for most of this time, dropped a bombshell on them. "The answers are all at Buenavista," he said in a calm and very matter of fact voice.

Randy stopped his work translating the sarcophagus inscriptions and stared right at Greg. From the look on his face, it was as if Greg's statement had turned a light bulb on inside Randy's head, and indeed it had. Randy hesitated to voice what it was that had occurred to him, for fear his idea might not be the same as Greg's, and what he was thinking would make him look ridiculous in front of his guests whom he greatly admired.

It took a second for Greg to notice Randy's hesitation but when he didn't respond Greg continued, "If your translations prove to be correct, then there is something at Buenavista the Jaguar King was willing to wage war for. I think Mac said it was a jade mask. It seems the Jaguar King gave his life in a failed attempt to retrieve it. Maybe the stela you found might be related to why the Jaguar King died. Maybe the reference on the stela to the God Mask refers to the Jade Mask the Jaguar King waged a war to recover. In many societies a mask is often a very strong symbol. The theft by a rival of a symbol like the Jade Mask would have greatly disgraced the Jaguar King. It certainly would have given him strong cause to wage war in search of it."

As he heard Greg's words Randy smiled. What had popped into his head at the instigation of Greg's first comment was the exact same thought Greg had given voice to. "You're right. We need to go to Buenavista and find that mask!" Randy said, almost shouting.

At this point Julie spoke up, "I've been listening to all of this and I'm confused by something. Caracol and Buenavista are Spanish names for these places. How could the Maya have possibly used these names."

Randy was the first to answer, though he could see the dejected look on Kevin's face at his having beaten him to the punch, "Those are the common names given to these sites by the first explorers and archeologists to survey them. Most sites were given Spanish names because the Spanish coined the names we use today for most of the places around here. Since the Spanish first started naming these sites archeologists have better surveyed many of them, and new discoveries have been made. We know the glyphs with the names used by the Maya for many sites, but for some of them we still have to use their common Spanish names because we either haven't discovered the Mayan glyph for it yet, or if we have, we don't know how to pronounce it. Caracol and Buenavista are some of those places, but for others like Xunantunich or Chichen Itza we have enough information to pronounce the Mayan names and so we use those instead."

"So how can you be certain where the site you've referred to as Buenavista is?" Julie replied to Randy.

"Well...," Randy began, then his voice trailed off momentarily.

"Has it been excavated?" Julie asked impatiently.

"Maybe, maybe not. You see the glyph in the codex containing the Jaguar King's epitaph is the same as one generally taken to be associated with a site off the Western Highway known as Buenavista. The same glyph has been found on a stela at Xunantunich, in reference to a city the people there alternately traded with and waged war on, as well as on stelae at a couple of other places. But there is only one piece of evidence which has ever been found that identifies the site we call Buenavista as the place the glyph refers to. It is a stela found before modern archeological techniques were in use. More recent excavations there have failed to turn up any other markings or stelae bearing the glyph, and whoever found that stela there certainly didn't know then what we discovered this week. Maybe they misinterpreted the markings on the stela. Or maybe the stela was brought there from someplace else as a war treasure. If so the site this glyph refers to might not really be the one located off the Western Highway. "

"So if you're not even sure where it is how do you expect to be able to go there to search for the mask? Julie asked.

"Well, until Greg said something, I'd been so busy with my work on all this I hadn't made the connection between the Epitaph Codex and the stela. The Epitaph Codex had some stuff I didn't fully translate about the march of the Jaguar King and his soldiers to Buenavista. Most of it seemed like nonsense, but it may have enough information in it for us to try to determine if the site we call Buenavista is really the same as the place the glyph refers to," Randy replied. "Let's go next door and have another look."

The four of them exited the container they were in, stepping past its guard on their way out, then moved over to the second container. Getting past its guard was a little more of a challenge. Mac was not in the second container at the moment and Randy had to sweet talk the guard into unlocking it and letting him and his guests back into it. It was clear to the guard that Randy was a key researcher on this find, and since his guests had been inside the same container with Mac just minutes before, he didn't put up much resistance. Once inside, Randy went straight to the table upon which the so called "Epitaph Codex" lay.

He studied the document for quite some time. No one dared disturb him or break what had grown to be a tense silence. Only the occasional whir of the climate control unit's motors, which had kicked on as the relentless tropical sun began to heat the container, disturbed the quiet inside.

After what seemed to them like an eternity, Randy spoke, "Yes! Yes, there is some kind of reference in here we might possibly be able to use to place this site. I'll have to work on translating it further, but there are directions as well as a mention of the length of the march in terms of the rising and setting of the sun. Not really a lot to go on though."

Then he turned to Kevin and asked him, "The Epitaph Codex has the Tzolk'in date the Jaguar King began his march to war. I can easily convert it into the date in our calendar when this occurred. If you knew that, plus a few astronomical bearings, along with the duration of his march, do you think it would be enough for you to navigate by?"

Kevin smiled and replied, "I've navigated on less."

"Well then, maybe we can find out from this codex if the site we call Buenavista is the one this glyph refers to. If it isn't, we might be able to find the real one and, with a little luck, the mask it speaks of," Randy said, his excitement at the prospect of being on the verge of another major archeological find quite visible. "Do you think you'd be able to work with me on this?" he asked Kevin.

Kevin was both excited and flattered by the request. Turning towards Greg he asked, "Well, Professor?" addressing him in the manner he reserved for those times when Greg wasn't his friend and future brother-in-law, but the person who held sway over his academic fate.

"I suppose we could do without you for a few weeks," Greg replied. "After all, you'd just be sitting around waiting for the comments back from your thesis defense and it won't hurt anything if the panel has to wait a little longer for you to incorporate them into your final draft."

Randy chortled as if he was a kid whose mother had given him the okay to go outside and play. "Let's go find Mac," he said, and was on his way out the door. Julie had to remind him to make sure he locked up the containers behind them, not that the soldiers with the rifles weren't enough of a deterrent to any potential thieves.

They headed over to the row of buildings and tents at the far side of the clearing from where the containers stood. The four of them, Randy in the lead, peered into the building Mac used as his office first, but didn't see him there. Next they checked the other buildings, tents, even the latrines. Mac was nowhere to be found. In fact the entire area around the archeologists quarters was almost entirely empty. This was not atypical since the graduate students, their undergraduate assistants, and the few local diggers who lived onsite rather than riding in from town each day, would all be out working on their digs at this hour. This made it even more curious that they couldn't find Mac in his office, as he valued the relative quiet available to him when the staff was all off working elsewhere.

Randy considered trying to raise Mac by radio on the small chance he might have taken one with him, although this was something he rarely did, as he disliked gadgets of most kinds. He was about to look for the radio when Trisia came walking into the camp.

"Hi Randy. Mac is looking for you. He wants you over at the temple where we found the Jaguar King. The head of the Belizean antiquities office is here and he needs you to review the discovery with them," she said.

"Do you have time to come along with me out to the site?" Randy asked.

Julie glanced at her watch and said, "Maybe for a little while. We had also hoped to see some things we missed on our first visit as a result of getting caught up in everything that happened that day."

At her acceptance Randy turned, headed out of the clearing, and down the set of paths leading to where the new discovery was made. The three visitors followed, with Trisia racing ahead of them trying to keep up with Randy. Julie was starting to notice something about Trisia. Something which seemed familiar to her because she had lived it herself. Julie was convinced Trisia had a crush on Randy. Especially since Randy had just made a big find. She was certain of this because it had happened similarly for her and Kevin, although Julie wasn't as young as Trisia at the time.

Julie hadn't set out to work in archeology. When she was a young, idealistic undergraduate she studied sociology and thought by becoming a social worker she could change the world for the better. It only took her a few years to find out she couldn't. By then, Greg, who was eight years older than her, had finished his Ph.D., completed his post-doctoral work, and gotten on a fast track to tenure. Even before she got her undergraduate degree he was pulling in grant money and collecting a team of bright young minds to work with him.

In her late twenties at the time, she found herself becoming more interested in the type of work Greg did. He encouraged her to consider moving into a related field. Her background in sociology had fostered an interest in how human societies organize themselves. So she settled on graduate school in anthropology at Arizona College, near where Greg taught.

Studying the links between past cultures and present ones helped her connect better with people, especially Greg. When she was trying to settle on a thesis topic she realized she might be able to work on relating the discoveries her brother made in his research of past human cultures to those in the present. He was flattered by her idea and helped her work with her adviser to write a proposal which would allow her to cooperate on some of his projects. Soon they were working together. It wasn't long after that she met Kevin.

Her initial introduction to him was brief, occurring as it had at one of the crowded gatherings Greg occasionally held for his graduate students and other members of the department he worked in. Her first impression of him was that he was just another awkward graduate student obsessed with his own research. It was a fair impression, but after she joined onto Greg's team she couldn't help but notice how often people commented about how smart he was. Perhaps it was her secret attraction to geeks, but eventually she started to take an interest in him.

He, however, showed no sign of having noticed her, so she soon took to trying to find ways to make him do so. She started out by volunteering to help out on digs. When that didn't work she resorted to tagging along on almost anything else she figured he had an interest in. After about six months she began to think he couldn't possibly be interested in her. By that time it was obvious he knew her name, but it seemed to her he didn't know much else about her, nor did it appear he had any desire to.

She couldn't have been more wrong. One day, as the group was finishing its lunch on the dig site and everyone was starting to head back to work Kevin stunned her, and everyone else, by asking her on a date. It wasn't just that he asked her on a date which surprised her and the others, it was how he did it. In front of about a dozen people, he walked right up to her and blurted his invitation out for all to hear. Then he stood there like a deer in the headlights waiting for her to respond. The look on his face was one of sheer terror, but she also thought she recognized something else. It was an unmistakable sense of utter determination in his eyes. She almost choked on the last bit of her sandwich trying to say yes before he bolted in fright. His acknowledgement of her response was so soft at first she wasn't sure he'd even said anything, but she found his shyness somewhat endearing.

Julie later learned Kevin had noticed her from the first day she showed up to visit Greg in his office. He noticed her at every party and every time she volunteered, and was, it turned out, very interested in her. In fact, he'd asked Greg a lot about her, but he was so sure she couldn't have noticed him, or if she did that she wasn't interested in him, he could never work up the nerve to ask her out. Until he started to realize her time on the dig was coming to a close. He knew once this happened, both he and she would be burying themselves in the tasks of writing their respective theses: he at one school, she at another.

When he realized this, he knew if he didn't ask her soon the chance might slip away. So he screwed up his nerve, and there, in front of a dozen people, he blurted out his invitation to her, then stood there for what felt like an eternity awaiting her reply. When she answered him he wasn't sure at first if he'd heard her correctly, but when he saw her smile he knew her answer was yes. Still, he was unprepared for it, and all he could do was stammer back that he would call her to set something up. Then he bolted for the safety of the dig, in order to come to grips with what he'd done, and to figure out how to keep his nerve up long enough to actually follow through on what he'd set in motion.

He kept his promise and called her soon after. They had lunch together. Then they had dinner together. Then soon they were spending all the hours they could sandwich in between their studies with each other. As she got to know him better, Julie found she was right to have been attracted to him. He wasn't handsome in a movie star sort of way, but he was not a bad looking guy, and while it was his intelligence which initially attracted her to him, it was his sense of humor that sealed the deal. The two of them clicked and the rest, she thought to herself, is history.

So now, as she walked through the forest a few yards ahead of her guy, she couldn't help noticing in Trisia some of the same things she recalled in herself. Trisia followed after Randy, trying to get him to notice her, much the same way Julie had done with Kevin. And in much the same way Kevin had initially appeared to not notice Julie's interest in him, Randy now also failed to notice Trisia's interest. That, Julie suspected, was something she might be able to help with. So in her head Julie schemed as they walked on. Soon they came to the clearing at the outlying temple where the Jaguar King's sarcophagus had been discovered.

Randy and Trisia had turned into the clearing ahead of her. Greg and Kevin were close behind. As they circled round the temple to the spot where the opening to the tomb was she saw Mac and another man emerging from the low sloping ramp underneath the structure.

"Oh good, just in time. Randy, this is Mr. Hull, head of the Belizean Office of Antiquities," Mac said.

"Mr. Randy," the gentleman said in his patois accented English, "it is very good to meet you. Congratulations on this most magnificent discovery. We could not be happier at such a wonderful find." At this Mr. Hull grabbed Randy's hand and shook it exuberantly.

Inexperienced as he was with the ins and outs of managing government officials, Randy stood there not knowing the right way to answer. Hull spoke first, as he continued to shake Randy's hand, "Please tell me how it is you decided to dig underneath a temple such as this?"

"Umm," Randy cleared his throat as he attempted to graciously retrieve his hand back from the palm of Mr. Hull's, where it was swallowed by the much larger man's hand. "Well, we spent several weeks clearing the brush back from the temple mound. Once we finished we were able to start photographing and cataloging the glyphs carved on the temple itself. We worked from the top down and what we found was routine for a temple such as this. It is aligned with the four cardinal directions, north, south, east, and west, and the glyphs honoring those are carved into the temple on the lowest tier of each of the steps leading to the top."

As he talked Randy walked along the steps of the low temple motioning to Mr. Hull to follow him. "If you look at the carvings on the north, south, and west sides you see the carvings face left, right, and away from the temple, but not towards the temple itself. If you step down here to where the stone from the east steps of the temple is," he said, stepping off the temple platform and over to where the stone which had been removed from the temple now lay, "you'll see this stone had been carved facing not just left, right, and away from the temple, but also facing back towards the temple."

Mr. Hull stood there motionless, smiling. There was an awkward silence as Randy recognized Mr. Hull did not yet follow his meaning, then he continued, "You see sir, this stone was carved differently than the other three. It was the only one of the stones whose carvings faced in all four directions. That struck us as being odd. We usually don't find glyphs carved facing up the temple itself. The few known instances of this have always been carved on the southern steps, and is something we believe was done so they could be read by priests who were descending the temple. However, on this temple a stone on the eastern steps was carved so it faced up towards the temple. This caused us to examine this stone very closely. When we did, we could see the carvings facing in one direction were different from the carvings facing in the three other directions."

Mr. Hull continued smiling patiently. It was as if he could sense Randy still had not gotten to the heart of the matter. Rather than interrupt he simply waited for Randy to continue. Randy began to feel a little awkward, but Mac motioned to him to continue on, so he did. "This temple is actually quite a bit older than the others at the site. Based on the carvings it was most likely used to celebrate important dates in the Haab calendar, the one which corresponds most closely to our modern calendar. But the fourth set of carvings on the stone from the eastern step looked to be of a style several hundred years later than the rest of the carvings. Stylistically they appeared to be from the middle of the Classic Period, around the time of the Jaguar King."

Randy could see Mr. Hull was beginning to understand. "At first we couldn't figure out why such late markings would have been made on such an older temple. The content of the later glyphs themselves was consistent with the temple's design as a place for offerings for the Haab festivals. After examining the stone closely we noticed it didn't fit properly with the stones adjacent to it. As you probably know the quality of the stone work on these temples is such that for the most part you usually can't even slide a piece of paper between two stones. Again this struck us as odd until we realized this stone had been moved."

Now the look on Mr. Hull's face changed. He seemed drawn in and somehow tensed, ready for the denouement from Randy, although he certainly already knew how the story ended, having just come from the chamber underneath the temple with Mac. Randy did not disappoint him.

"When we realized the stone had been moved we were able to figure out by examining the other stones that this one had been rotated ninety degrees from its original position. Someone had taken the stone out at some point in time and it was put back incorrectly. Rather than dig the stone out and re-lay it, new carvings seem to have been made to correct its appearance. Having no idea why the stone would have been taken out in the first place, or why it was put back and the carving updated, we decided we might find some clues by removing the stone and having a look underneath it to see if something had perhaps been concealed. What we found was far beyond anything we could have imagined would be hidden there."

Up to this moment Randy had been very caught up in telling the story, but upon reaching its conclusion it dawned on him he might actually be in a lot of trouble. What Randy had done, was, after all, not proper procedure. He had basically taken apart a temple over fifteen hundred years old without any prior approval from the Office of Antiquities. He turned to look at Mr. Hull, searching for some sign from him, but Hull had a face almost as stone-like as the carvings on the temples themselves. This unnerved Randy somewhat and he felt he'd best fess up lest he get in trouble despite the significance of his find.

"Umm, I'm really sorry Mr. Hull. I should have had Mac contact your office before we took the stone out of the temple. I guess I got too excited and didn't think things through. This site didn't really seem to have much significance, so it didn't occur to me the rules should be applied equally at every dig no matter the outward appearance of the site."

Mr. Hull laughed a long, loud laugh. "Thank you Randy," he said. "Your hard work, intelligence, and insight are excellent qualities, and they have led to this remarkable find. None of those qualities are so important as your humility and contrition at recognizing your mistake. So long as you always remember it is your foremost task to preserve the treasures of the Maya when you are working here in Belize, then you will continue to be welcome to work in our country. I think from seeing your results you will have a long future working here if you do not forget this." Then he laughed again.

Randy had stood there breathless, like a child waiting for his punishment. Hearing Hull's genial words he breathed a sigh of relief and smiled back at him. He glanced over to Mac, who had not said a thing to him about any of this. Mac, he realized, must have had quite a talk with Mr. Hull, once Hull had seen the site. Mac smiled back at Randy. Perhaps the one person Randy didn't notice in all this was Trisia, who had been looking at him in a way no one other than Julie recognized.

Mac now introduced Hull to the visitors. As Kevin, Julie, and Trisia chatted with Hull, Greg pulled Randy and Mac aside and spoke to them, "Randy, let's tell Mac what we think about Buenavista."

"Buenavista?" Mac replied.

Randy answered, "Professor, it occurred to us there is something missing in all this and the place to look for it is Buenavista." He proceeded to tell Mac about their theory that the epitaph of the Jaguar King was somehow linked to the writings on the stelae by the fact that they both mention a jade mask, the same mask the Epitaph Codex indicated was stolen by the Jaguar King's enemy, and whose attempted recovery cost the Jaguar King his life.

"It all sounds very speculative to me," Mac said.

"Well, so was my theory this temple might be more important than it first appeared," Randy said pleading with Mac.

"Well, that may be so, but you and I both know this temple was never built as a tomb for a king. Your hunch about exploring this temple turned into a lucky find, and while I don't discount luck as a factor in good archeology it isn't something one should treat as a basis for one's career," Mac countered.

"Well, Professor, I did go back and re-examine the Epitaph Codex. There are actually several passages I had skipped over at first. The ones regarding the march by the soldiers of the Jaguar King to battle. I believe they may be more than just narrative. It may be possible to interpret them in the context of the Mayan calendar and navigational astronomy to discern the route the Jaguar King took on his march to war. At the very least we might be able to confirm whether the glyph currently thought to be associated with Buenavista is really correct, or whether it refers to somewhere else. Kevin and Greg have agreed to assist me with this. That alone should be worth setting a few weeks aside. If we can at least find the true location the glyph refers to then someday someone else might be able to excavate there and find the mask."

Mac tilted his head towards Greg and asked, "Are you sure you have the time and resources to devote to something like this?"

Greg replied, "Well the reason we're all down here in the first place is because we're helping Kevin celebrate the defense of his thesis. It will be several weeks before he'll get comments back, and then a few more before he'll need to finalize it. So he has some time. As for me, I can delay some projects. The toughest part will be to scrape together some funds if this actually pans out into something."

At the mention of this Randy beamed, because he knew he had won. "That's no problem," he said, "My dad's loaded! And when he finds out the funds he previously donated to Mac's, er Professor McCutchins', work resulted in my discovery here, I'm sure he'll have no problem writing another check!"

Mac found himself cornered by Randy. He knew he was lucky to have a student like him. Smart, hard working, enthusiastic, and with the ability to bankroll his own pet projects with funds left over to share with others on top of it. Despite this, he felt uneasy about letting him rush off on another hunch and tried to rein him in.

"Well Randy, let's do this," Mac said, "If I recall correctly Professor Fowler and his traveling companions are heading back to the states very shortly. Why don't we let them get back to the states and think about this a little. In the meantime you can get back to work on translating the Epitaph Codex. Communicate your findings to Kevin. If, after reviewing them, he and Professor Fowler still believe there is enough to go on, then I'll let you follow this where it leads."

Randy looked like he was about to let out a cheer at Mac's decision, but before he could Mac shot him a stern glance, saying to both him and Greg, "Not a word of this to anyone, especially Mr. Hull. Let's make very sure of what we're getting into before we let word of this get out. Otherwise you might get there and find someone else has beaten you to it..."
Chapter 6 – Search for a Lost City

On the ride back to the resort some of the other tourists asked the group if they'd learned anything more about the new discovery. Other than politely giving them snippets of info Mac and his crew had already made public, the archeologists were mostly quiet. When they did talk amongst themselves, it was in whispers.

The balance of their stay in Belize was uneventful, and they heard nothing new from Randy or Mac during it. This was as expected, since they had previously agreed there was no safe way for them to communicate by phone in Belize without risking information they wished to keep confidential from potentially being leaked. Mac was worried about this due to the significance of the new find. He was afraid the chance of looters finding the site was real. He was even more worried that others in influential positions, people who might be seeking enrichment or self promotion, might try to gain the upper hand in controlling what they had already found and any new finds it might lead to. So they agreed to hold off with any further contact until after their return to the U.S., and then only to use secure electronic communications with pre-arranged passwords to plan their next moves.

On their return to the U.S. they were inundated with questions from colleagues who hoped their presence in Belize at the time of the new finds might somehow make them privy to information not reported in the media. While this was, in fact, the case, the three of them bit their tongues and kept a low profile, not letting on to their colleagues about what Mac and Randy had shared with them. As scientists, they were used to discussing new ideas and discoveries with others, so this proved tougher for them than they had expected, but they hid their excitement in exchange for what they hoped would turn out to be a chance to look for the Jade Mask.

About a week after they returned home Kevin received a message from Randy. The message contained an improved translation of the portions of the Epitaph Codex which detailed the march of the Jaguar King and his soldiers. Along with his translation Randy cautioned Kevin that in order to make a guess at the meaning of the many previously unknown hieroglyphs, his work in translating the Epitaph Codex had been forced to rely upon the new codices found alongside the Jaguar King's sarcophagus. He reminded Kevin it had taken many long years of work, by many different researchers, to create the body of knowledge currently used for reading and interpreting Mayan glyphs. Without the aid of anyone else to review the new codices he was now working from, any conclusions Randy made as to the interpretation and meaning of any of the reviously unknown symbols were highly speculative. He concluded by voicing his concern that any incorrect guesses he made might reduce the value of the translation as a guide for their search.

As he read all this, Kevin realized Randy had done the best he could to analyze such a complex find in such a short amount of time. It would now be up to him to review the material and decide if Randy's translation had enough information for him to go on in order to guide them to the site the codex referred to. Whether this site would prove to be the one they knew as Buenavista, or someplace entirely different, he could not say.

Kevin shared Randy's note with Greg and Julie. They concurred in the opinion that Kevin would have to be the one to apply his unique skills to the material Randy sent. Furthermore, they decided while he did this Greg would go about making discrete inquiries in order to try to have the resources ready to launch a survey in case Kevin could determine the location of the Jade Mask's resting place from the information in the Jaguar King's epitaph.

Julie should have gone back to working on her own thesis. She had taken a break from it during their trip to Belize, but all this excitement was making it hard for her to concentrate. Instead, she decided to keep her head immersed in things Maya. She had been reading up on them on vacation, so why not just keep going, she thought to herself.

To keep from getting in Kevin's way Julie kept herself busy at this, and in doing so she came upon many new and interesting facts. It was a widespread belief the Maya had vanished, that they had somehow been killed off by the Conquistadors or by the diseases spread by them. Julie now learned that while Mayan culture had begun to deteriorate at the end of the Post Classic Period, long before Columbus set foot in the Caribbean, it had never entirely disappeared. Rather, it had been quietly handed on from generation to generation in oral traditions as well as in books detailing their rituals. It was books such as these, knows as codices, which were burned by the Spanish in their attempts to make the Maya give up their "pagan" religions and accept Christ. A few of these books, such as the Dresden Codex, survived, along with carvings buried by the jungle. These were all that was known at present about Mayan writing.

This interruption of the transmission of written knowledge had hindered study of the Maya since the first western archeologists had laid eyes on the magnificent remnants of their civilization. While much progress had been made in the last few decades to rebuild an understanding of the Mayan language, work was far from complete. Despite this, Julie found a wealth of anthropological and sociological work on the many tribes of the modern Maya and their ways. How much of these were true to the practices of Maya from the Classic Period was a point of large debate. She found it encouraging to learn a modern version of the ballgame existed and was still played in some places, although judging by the lack of human sacrifice, the rules had clearly changed.

At times like this she was glad she studied at a different school than Kevin. She knew how hard it would be for her to keep from constantly asking him how the work of examining Randy's translation was going. She also knew if she did it would drive Kevin crazy. Their work styles were completely different. This was something she had learned as she had gotten to know him, when they first began dating. She would lay out a plan and methodically work through it. She could pace herself, stop at intervals, adjourn to her home, family or other cares, and then go right back to where she had left off, starting back up as if she'd never been away.

Kevin, on the other hand, was quite different. He became totally absorbed in his work when he was on to something. He could spend days never leaving his office. He often went for a day or more without eating unless Julie or another fellow student said something to him. He could block out everything else around him. At times he would sit motionless at his desk in what almost seemed like a trance, even though he was in fact furiously working through a difficult problem in his mind. He now had such a problem at hand.

So, as Julie had expected, Kevin sequestered himself in his office to work on this task, and she did not dare disturb him. She figured she would see him again when he had reached a point in his work where he felt ready to share something with her and Greg, or when he had become so exasperated at an impasse he needed to completely withdraw himself from the problem for a time. If neither of those things happened, then Julie knew he was still hard at work and she'd have to wait.

Wait she did. Kevin worked at this problem like few others he had ever faced in his short career. In much the same manner in which he had done with his thesis work, he chose to start work on this problem from scratch. He read through everything he could find about Mayan astronomy and navigation. Then working from the basics, as he had in his research on the Anasazi, he built his own theory from the ground up as to what tools and geographical or astronomical guide points the Maya would have used to navigate by. He didn't want to take anything for granted.

He asked himself fundamental questions about the Maya, then set about trying to answer them. Sometimes he would send a query off to Randy, trying to determine if there were any books or papers on a given question. He tried as much as possible to keep to his own line of reasoning, seeking to re-create the sciences of astronomy and navigation in the same manner the Maya would originally have done. In this it was necessary for him to be careful about the approach he used. He was seeking to re-discover secrets of a culture he wasn't an expert on, without the luxury of much time to become an expert. As he labored in the little time available to him to improve his expertise there was always the danger that in consulting the work of others, their theories could become prejudicial to him.

As he set about his task, he treated the information he referenced with care. He was almost relieved to find more was not known about the Maya than was actually known about them. Much of what was originally thought to have been known had begun to be altered by what was learned from new discoveries. Recently this had been happening with increasing frequency, and sometimes quite radically. This complicated his task further, since it meant he continually found himself verifying facts published only a few years ago against papers posted as little as a few weeks earlier.

As he worked Kevin constantly referred back to the list of questions he set out to answer, adding and deleting to it until the list, which stared down at him from the white board above his desk, read as follows:

  * What tools did the Maya use to observe the heavens?

  * Was the Maya's observational astronomy developed solely for religious ritual and seasonal agricultural usage, or did they apply it in other ways such as navigation?

  * Did they have maps of any form?

  * Did they have any type of road network?

  * Was there any evidence the Maya used any larger plan with regard to how they located their cities?

He hoped that by posing and answering such fundamental questions as these he could in turn answer the question he was most concerned with. Was the information contained in the Jaguar King's epitaph sufficient for them to trace his path and locate the city of his enemy?

Kevin knew that just as Randy had done in his translation of the Epitaph Codex, he too would have to make some guesses, so it was important he did his research well. That way when he did have to make a guess at least it would be one based on a logical foundation. There was, he hoped, a real difference between an educated guess and a wild guess: a difference which could determine whether they would get close enough to have a chance of finding what they were looking for, or simply waste their time wandering in the jungle.

As he worked Kevin delved into the Maya's view of the heavens. Their concept of the stars and planets was based on an astrological and religious view of the world. While they had mapped the motions of those which appeared over their heads each night, day to day, year to year, he could find no evidence the Maya utilized this knowledge in the same manner as the Europeans, Chinese, or other seafaring peoples. All the evidence indicated long distance maritime navigation was unknown to them, and that whatever water based travel the Maya did was limited to fishing and trade via coastal waterways or inland rivers and lakes.

Furthermore, although he learned the Maya had an empirical understanding of latitude, there was no indication they ever used it for navigational purposes. Instead, their knowledge of the position of the sun in the sky above them was bound up in the designs of their temples, the construction of which was done in such a manner that the presence or absence of shadows cast by decorative or architectural elements signified important dates on their agricultural calendar. Nor was there any evidence map making had been practiced by the Maya, for if it was, it had long been lost without a trace. Neither could Kevin find an indication of any discoveries showing the Maya had possessed navigational tools such the compass or sextant.

He did find that it had been discovered the Maya built impressive roads, called sacbe, surrounding their cities. Some of these were many miles long and spread from the plains of the Yucatan, to Belize and Guatemala, often connecting cities separated by very long distances. Both Caracol and Tikal were known to have some, but other than having been viewed by satellite imaging, the Mayan sacbe remained mostly uncharted by modern archeologists.

The architectural feats of the Maya civilization were puzzling to Kevin, as puzzling as those of the Anasazi had been to him during his thesis work. He knew it was possible to build massive structures aligned with recurring astronomical events by using only basic tools such as sticks, rope, and stones. It was much tougher, however, to use the same tools to build perfectly straight roads connected to distant places well over the horizon. Yet both the Anasazi and Maya had done just that, leaving no evidence as to how they had accomplished these engineering feats.

Pondering the lost skills of the Maya, it occurred to him how lucky it would be if there turned out to be a sacbe between Caracol and Buenavista. Then finding the mask could end up being as easy as walking down an ancient road. That is, if you call trying to locate and follow a road dozens of miles long and hidden under centuries of thick jungle brush easy, Kevin thought.

He quickly cast this musing aside. The purpose of sacbe was still the subject of dispute in scholarly circles. Some theories held they were ceremonial connections between religious sites. Others believed they had a more commercial nature to them. These disputes aside, Kevin had to date found nothing indicating there were any of these Mayan roads known to exist between Caracol and Buenavista. Those which were charted at Caracol all connected outlying areas to the city's ceremonial center.

In his mind he chastised himself simply for entertaining the notion that confirming the location of the city in the Epitaph Codex could be as simple as a jaunt down a Mayan country road. Better to take this line of inquiry up with Randy, he decided, and see if his team knew of any sacbe at Caracol which might at least point them out of it in the right direction, than to dismiss it outright. Maybe it had just never occurred to them to look for such a thing before.

While he waited for word back from Randy, Kevin turned his attention to other facets of the search. Up to now, both in preparation for his recent trip and since his return, he had been focusing on the links between the architecture of the Maya and their view of the heavens. While he had gained much insight into this, he decided it would be a good idea to pass the time with a broader investigation into other parts of their mythology in search of answers to questions such as how the Maya conceived of the connection between heaven and earth. Like much else regarding the Maya, Kevin discovered this did not yield a simple answer.

One of the trips the resort had taken them on was to an underground cave the ancient Maya had once used for ceremonial purposes. Kevin found the cave itself fascinating. It was filled with beautifully carved and painted ceremonial offerings left there by the Maya. Despite being deep underground, and most likely owing to the dozens of spotlights illuminating it, the cave had proved far hotter and more stifling than even the jungle above it had been. In addition to the heat, the air was permeated with the foul smell of bat guano, which had collected in a huge pile at a secondary opening to the cavern the creatures utilized.

To make matters even worse, the pathway through the cave was lined with little tin coffee cans containing scratchy sounding speakers blaring out an oppressively loud and distorted sound track accompanied by narration spoken in a heavy non-native English accent. To Kevin the effect was like being on a cheesy carnival ride and he found himself constantly distracted by it during the tour. In order to make the best of the situation he fought back the urge to vomit by covering his nose and mouth, mopped the sweat from his brow, tuned the cheesy narrative from his mind, and focused on the geological and archeological wonders the cave offered.

Now, as he read through the Mayan mythology he thought back to the cave, and a recollection of the sound of the narrator's voice, as well as the drum beat of the music accompanying it, echoed in his mind. "The Maya believed the heavens, the earth, and the underworld were all bound together by the ceiba tree which they called the tree of life. The branches of the tree, growing high atop it, held the heavens aloft. The base of the tree held the earth, spreading out from it in all directions. The roots of the tree, which they saw penetrating down into caves such as this, reached down below the earth to the underworld, the place they called Xilbalba."

He read on and as he did so the wavering tone of the traditional Mayan wind instrument which had accompanied the drumbeat inside the cave danced through his thoughts. "It was into caves like this the Maya believed their gods, in the form of stars like Venus, traveled back and forth to Xilbalba, when their journey through the skies ended with their descent into the fires of the sun. So it was at the roots of the ceiba tree where they came to worship the gods and to leave their offerings to them."

The memory of the music made Kevin begin to feel the same stifling, nauseous sensation he had felt closing in about him inside the hot, still cave. He stood up for a moment shaking his head and leaned to open the window. Breathing in the fresh air, he gathered his composure, forcing the memory of the music, and of the discomfort he associated with it, from his mind. Thankfully, as he continued reading on, the subject veered away from that which had transported him back to the memory of such unpleasant surroundings, and on to things he associated with more welcome memories.

"The Maya used certain glyphs to represent the cardinal directions, each associated with a color: The glyph for white represented north, yellow with south, red with east, and black with west." These somehow seemed logical to him. Black for the direction the sun disappeared into each night, red for the one it rose from each morning. Yellow for where it stood in the sky during the day, and white for the sky in which it never traveled. All nice imagery, but did it actually have any significance, he mused to himself.

On reading this passage, Kevin made a mental note to go back and review the translation Randy had previously sent him. He recalled there was some mention of this in the translation of the Epitaph Codex, and he wondered if Randy had recognized this during his work. As a linguist, Kevin thought to himself, Randy might not recognize any references to astronomical or cardinal directions in the texts he was reading. It was yet another small detail he realized should not be taken for granted.

Kevin had not returned home in the several days it had taken to get his research underway. Before she let him lock himself away to work, Julie had made sure to give him copies of the pictures they had taken on their trip. She innocently suggested he'd need them in order to review the astronomical and navigational alignments of Caracol. He considered it a great idea, and, in fact, it was, but that was not her only motivation for doing this.

The longer Kevin worked on the problem, the more he found himself trying to better visualize the site at Caracol in order to connect himself to the people who built the awesome structures there and used them to chart the stars. Try as he might to focus, his mind kept returning to the fact that the problem now in front of him had its source in his vacation with Greg and Julie. It felt like the harder he worked on the problem, the more he would inevitably come across pictures of Julie and the more he found himself missing her company. Then it dawned on him this might not be accidental. Perhaps she had done this on purpose. Rather than get angry at what he suspected was her subterfuge, he simply smiled. After all, he realized he now had a commitment to something else besides archeology and he was glad of it.

It was a surprise to Julie when Kevin came home. It was true she hadn't seen him in almost six days, but she wasn't really expecting to. She knew how focused he could become when he was working on a project.

Before he could make it from the car to the house she began to speculate in her head as to why he was here. Maybe he had figured something out already. Or worse, maybe he had already reached a dead end and he was returning so soon because he had already decided there was no way he could guide them based on what Randy had translated from the Epitaph Codex. Though she didn't doubt Kevin could solve such a tough problem in so short a time, it seemed to her to be far too soon for him to have done so, or to have given up on trying.

It hadn't occurred to her at all he might have decide to take a break from his work on his own, so she was pleasantly surprised when he revealed to her he had done just that. His revelation caused her to feel a tinge of guilt at the possibility she had distracted him from the task at hand. Had her little trick of making sure pictures of her were mixed in among those of Caracol worked? She consigned herself to the thought that she would most likely never know, since either way she couldn't admit her ploy to him. If he hadn't figured it out already he'd be furious at her if she revealed it, and if he had, he would never confess to her it had worked. Taking a good look at him she realized if she had indeed distracted him it was probably for the best, as his disheveled appearance silently made the case against her guilty conscience.

Upon his return home Kevin made her promise him two things. The first was not to ask him about the project. The second was not to tell Greg he'd taken a break. Julie knew the first would be the tougher promise to keep, even if he only stayed long enough for a shower and a good night's sleep in their own bed. She bit her tongue and agreed. He showered and the two of them headed off for a romantic evening out.

As they sat at dinner Julie made small talk. She was dying to ask Kevin about what he'd been working on, but she had promised him she wouldn't. That didn't mean she couldn't talk about the Maya though, and if he happened to volunteer something then she'd still be keeping her promise. She knew it was sneaky but she was incredibly curious about whether he'd found anything out yet.

As they talked Julie told him about all the reading she'd been doing into modern Mayan anthropology. Unfortunately for her he didn't take the bait. Eventually their dinner came and she ran out of fresh material on theories about similarities between modern Mayan folklore and rituals, and their Classic Period ancestors. When dinner was done Kevin turned the subject over to Greg's efforts.

"So how has Greg been making out?" Kevin asked.

"Pretty well," Julie answered. "He's been in touch with Randy's dad. Enough funding is lined up for an expedition of about two weeks. He's been quietly making inquiries to see if there are any graduate students, post docs, or other folks he trusts who might be able to join a team on short notice for a short duration effort. He said that's actually the tough part since he can't tell them what the project is, when it will start, or how long it will last."

"Well, I can understand that. Who would want to interrupt their entire career to head off on some kind of wild goose chase where they don't even know what they're looking for? I mean besides us that is," Kevin said smiling. As he said this the waiter walked by and slipped the bill onto the table for them. Kevin shot Julie a glance, laid enough cash on the table to cover the bill, then stood up and reached across the table to grab her hand.

The next morning, refreshed by his time with Julie, Kevin was back in his office. Other than this brief interlude he had put off the rest of the world, with the exception of the few messages he had sent to Randy. He decided before getting back into the flow of his work he'd check to see if Randy had replied. Fortunately, Kevin thought to himself, Randy hadn't responded yet. This meant at least he didn't have to decide whether to read what Randy wrote and be influenced by it, or set Randy's comments aside until he had convinced himself he was ready to read them. So once again he retreated into the work of trying to see if there was any astronomically significant pattern to the layout of Mayan cities, or any significance in the timing of the events leading up to the Jaguar King's death.

Kevin started to assemble maps of the locations of the Mayan cities which had been unearthed to date. As he brought these together he also reviewed what was known of these sites. The Maya ran their lives based on the stars and their calendar systems, this in turn determined important events in the lives of their kings. These events were commemorated in glyphs found carved on their temples and the statues surrounding them. Clearly time was important to the Maya. Thus the obvious approach was to classify the sites based on the dates archeologists believed they were built.

This task was harder than it first appeared. The Mayan culture had evolved in several phases over a long period of time. These phases were classified as the Pre-Classic, Classic, and Post-Classic Periods, and denoted significant differences in the level of achievement of their civilization. So although the Mayan culture spanned thousands of years, Kevin chose to focus his efforts on the Classic Period. He did this for two reasons. First because it represented the timeframe during which Caracol would have been one of the most important cities in the Mayan world. Second because the Classic Period, spanning the years between 250 and 900 AD, was, by definition, the timeframe representing the dates of the earliest and latest commemorative glyphs archeologists had so far discovered. Written records would only be known for cities built in this timeframe. The dates of origin for any others would be much harder for him to accurately determine.

In addition to compiling their locations, and the dates of their founding, Kevin also researched the history of wars between Mayan city-states of this time. To this he added information on the ancestry of the Jaguar King. As he combined all this he noticed there was a history of warfare between Caracol and Buenavista, but this was not unusual. In fact Caracol had fought with, conquered, or been conquered by several other cities. At some point prior to their history of warfare with each other both Caracol and Buenavista had been dominated by a city named Kalak'mul, which pre-dated either of them.

Mayan domination of one city by another could take several forms. An existing city could be captured and its rulers kept in power, subjugated to the ruler of the conquering city. Alternately the leader of a conquered city could be taken away as a sacrificial victim by the conquering city and a new ruler of its choosing put in place. It was then that Kevin had a hunch.

What if a different means existed? What if new cities were built as a place for a dominant ruler's children to rule? Other cultures built cities for such reasons, perhaps the Maya did this as well and it had yet to be demonstrated by archeology. This type of partitioning of a kingdom could manifest itself in the same type of internecine warfare often seen in medieval Europe, where wars frequently occurred between familial relations. If Buenavista and Caracol were both built by the powers of Kalak'mul there could be both an astronomical significance to their locations as well as a familial significance. These might be related to the causes of their later battles.

It was a bold theory, but one which made sense to Kevin. Why would the Maya not build cities in the same manner as other cultures had? It was true the architecture of their cities differed in many ways from those of other cultures, but it also bore many similarities. Many questions remained to Kevin. Would it be possible to prove such a theory? Even if it were, would that have any impact upon his goal of trying to determine if Buenavista was truly the site the Jaguar King's epitaph referred to?

He puzzled over these questions for some time before it occurred to him there might be a way to prove this theory while at the same time solving the riddle of where the Jaguar King's end had befallen him. Kevin realized the answer lay in searching for a pattern that could show how a Mayan king would decide upon where to found a new city. His first thought on how to go about this was that perhaps the Maya had, in the same manner as the Anasazi, sited their structures along astronomically significant lines. The Anasazi had built structures located miles apart and well out of line of sight from each other in such a manner. Why couldn't the Maya have done the same?

After all, Kevin thought to himself, the Maya had performed other astounding feats of architecture based on orienting their buildings to astronomical waypoints. Why couldn't they have located their cities in a similar manner? If the Maya had done this then Kevin realized he was the person to be able to discern such a pattern, so he now chose to whole-heartedly pursue this line of inquiry.

He recognized if there was any significance to the siting of Mayan cities of the Classic Period it would have to exist within the religious, commercial, and cultural framework of Mayan society. To analyze this he would need to know which cities might have been subordinate to one another. Such information would allow him to plot locations of these cities in a way he hoped would reveal any pattern. Without it he'd end up with a bunch of random points on a map. Though he possessed such a list, the source was an old one and Kevin questioned whether its findings would prove accurate after so many years of new discoveries. There was no question in his mind about the need to double check the validity of any list he might work from, so Kevin sent a new inquiry off in a message to Randy.

Awaiting Randy's reply, Kevin moved on to the final piece of this puzzle, establishing the actual date the Jaguar King waged his war to recover the Jade Mask. The king's epitaph told of the appearance of Venus as the morning star on the day the gods revealed their plans to him. Kevin believed that by knowing the date this occurred he could correlate it with the positions of other astronomical markers. By combining these markers with a map of the Mayan world as it existed at the time, Kevin hoped he could use the account of the Jaguar King's march to war to navigate the way the Maya would have.

Of course he realized in doing so he might end up throwing a huge bucket of cold water on the entire enterprise. If the position of Venus on the date in the Epitaph Codex didn't match up with the known motions of the planet in the heavens it would call the entire tale into doubt, since if that part of the story was wrong then maybe there wasn't really a jade mask, or a battle to reclaim it.

In the course of his research Kevin had discovered it was not uncommon for Mayan rulers to relocate the actual dates of their births, or the births of their ancestors, to coincide with certain past dates which held special ritual significance in the confluence of their several calendar systems. By doing this, a Mayan king legitimized his rule in the eyes of his subjects. Sometimes they even created entirely new myths to glorify themselves and their ancestors, such as the Mayan creation myth, or the other myths carved into the stelae celebrating the rulers of many a Mayan city. So, as any thorough researcher would, Kevin worried there was a chance it might turn out the epitaph could prove to be just another myth created by a Mayan ruler to bring glory upon himself. If Venus wasn't where the Epitaph Codex said it was supposed to be then everything would unravel.

Luckily for Kevin, not only had the motions of the planets been solved mathematically, but software existed that could tell him the positions of the Earth and the planets in the solar system on any given day, be it yesterday, or a day over thirteen hundred years ago. In addition there were online programs available to convert dates in our calendar to dates in the Mayan calendar and vice versa. Randy had told Kevin the date he had found in the Epitaph Codex was 9.12.13.3.6 in the Mayan Long Count calendar. He even mentioned the date on the Tzolk'in calendar was 9 Kimi, foretold as "utz kin", which meant a lucky day in the Mayan prophecies.

When Kevin translated this he found it was June 29, 685 in the modern calendar. Plugging the date into his software he was relieved to see it show that Venus was in a position consistent with inferior conjunction. The computer showed Venus passed between Earth and the Sun on June 23, 685, and might indeed have first been visible on the morning of June 29, 685. The software also showed Kevin one other fact the Maya would have considered important -- Mars was in opposition to Venus on the same date.

While the software could verify the alignment of the planets in space, it couldn't convey what the Jaguar King and his priests might have actually seen on that day. Other variables, such as cloud cover, latitude, positions of other heavenly bodies, or Venus' angular proximity to the sun could affect the day it might first be visible to an observer on Earth. Kevin found himself wondering if it really could be seen as soon after its passage between the Earth and the Sun as the legend related. Rechecking the data, he found that on the date in question Venus would have crossed the horizon at 4:47AM, barely twenty minutes before sunrise and closer to the sun than Mercury, a planet known for being difficult to spot. He also checked the moon's phase and position. On the night in question it would have set a few hours after sunrise, meaning it would have been directly overhead, brightening the early morning sky at the time Venus rose.

When he checked the next day, as well as several after it, Kevin saw Venus proceeded to rise several minutes earlier each day, while the moon continued to set later. While there was no way he could say for certain, Kevin began to think it would have been much more likely for Venus to be seen as the morning star on one of those days, and not the one the legend foretold.

Intrigued, Kevin took the dates for a few of the other days and plugged them into the Mayan calendar tool. When he checked these days against the Mayan auguries all but one of them came out as "lob kin", or unlucky days. Not being well versed in astrology, especially of the Mayan variety, he wasn't sure how much this actually meant.

Based on what Kevin had read in Randy's emails, the Jaguar King seemed to think he was going off to war on a good day. Yet from the accounts related in his epitaph, things turned out very badly for the king. What if, Kevin mused to himself, the Jaguar King's priests had been mistaken about seeing Venus as the morning star? Or worse, what if they had lied to him to gain his favor? Then he might have marched to war on the wrong day. If it turned out the true day on which Venus was first visible as the morning star was different from the one the priests had foretold, a day when the prophecies were negative, then the Jaguar King would have been unaware of the terrible fate which awaited him.

All this was too much for Kevin. It was one thing for him to think in terms of astronomical markers when he was looking at site plans and trying to understand the belief systems of the ancients, but he was a person of science schooled in twentieth century thinking. He didn't believe the auguries of ancient Mayan priests could really determine the fate of a king one way or the other. To him it was simply a curiosity he would pass along to Randy. In any case, he thought to himself, at least this provides some confirmation the events in the Epitaph Codex could have actually happened.

Kevin had been working at the problem for over ten days now and it had been a little under a week since his first messages out to Randy, but he had yet to hear back from him. Recognizing the opportunity awaiting Randy's reply provided him, he decided to head home to catch up on his personal affairs. It was shortly after sunset when he stepped from the building where his office was located. He felt tired and hungry and was in a rush to get home. As he strode away from the building it occurred to him that between being on vacation and doing all this research regarding the Maya and Venus he hadn't actually been paying much attention to where it was in the sky. It only took a moment to change this. Looking to the west he saw Venus shining like a jewel in the evening sky, much the same as it would have appeared to the Maya so many centuries before. Soon it would be moving between the Earth and the Sun, only to rise again as the morning star. He smiled and thought to himself, I hope the day it rises in the morning sky will be Utz Kin, then he turned away from the star and headed home in time to have dinner with Julie.

Chapter 7 – A Ghost Watches

Kevin went into his office late the next day in order to spend some time catching up on things not related to Caracol, the Jaguar King, or the Maya. It was well after lunch before he eventually got around to checking his email to see if Randy had responded to him. Thinking back to Mario's comments about how "time in Belize is exchanged at two to one with American time" he really didn't expect to hear back from him too soon. In fact, Kevin wasn't sure if he would hear back from Randy at all. He had started to think Mac and his team must be so caught up in working on their new discoveries that they'd have long since forgotten about the quixotic search for the Jade Mask.

Upon checking his messages Kevin found he couldn't have been more wrong. Not only had Randy gotten back to him but something in Kevin's inquiries appeared to have struck a chord with him. Although Randy had sent just one message in reply to Kevin's many inquiries, the subject of this reply caught Kevin's attention. It read simply, "Boy have you kept us busy!"

Kevin opened the message. At a glance he could tell Randy's response was long and detailed, and it would take some time for him to work his way through. The first few sentences said quite a bit though. In them Randy related Mac's compliments, conveying how impressed Mac had been with the depth of Kevin's research, his insights into the problem, and perhaps most surprising to the old professor, the fact that even though he was a newcomer to the field of Mayan research, Kevin was asking questions no one else had thought to ask before.

Working through the reply Kevin learned the main reason it had been so slow in coming was as a result of the many questions he had posed to them. Rather than dismiss these questions, as others might have, Mac took them quite seriously. While he often outwardly professed to being an old fool, Mac was in fact quite a shrewd man. Shrewd enough to know Kevin's fresh perspective on some of the more hotly debated issues regarding the Maya could stir things up for years to come once they became public. It was even more shrewd of him to recognize that being the ones privy to this information gave his team a big jump on what could turn out to be a race to prove or disprove whatever new theories might arise from Kevin's inquires.

Rather than allow Randy to speculate on the answers, Mac had him hold off on any reply. Instead, he sent one of his teams out to do some ground work. First he had them survey the areas outlying Caracol, especially in the direction of Buenavista, looking for any previously unknown sacbe. None were found. Next he had them check the known ones, most of which had, up until now, only been mapped by infrared satellite. These included one or two believed to lead to far off sites like Naranjo in Guatemala. Despite the number and length of these, Mac felt that since very few of them had ever been ground checked it would be wise to do so. He had no real expectation of there simply being a hidden road with a marker saying "this way to the Jaguar King's lost mask" waiting in the jungle for them to discover. He also knew, however, that it was at least theoretically possible for a survey team to traverse the terrain laying above these long buried roadways via the use of satellite imagery, GPS navigation, and more than a few machetes. So he decided to spend the time needed to eliminate them as a factor in their attempts to determine the true fate of the Jaguar King. It took his teams a few days but, as Mac had expected, they found no evidence of a sacbe leading beyond the historic outskirts of Caracol in the direction of Buenavista.

In reading the description of the unsuccessful search Kevin was initially confused by the positive manner in which Randy wrote of it. As he read on he recognized the source of Randy's outlook. For while the others were off surveying in the jungle Randy was afforded both the time and the quiet he needed to more thoroughly re-examine the Epitaph Codex.

Kevin anxiously continued on to the end of the email, his hopes rising that yet one more reading of the codex by Randy might provide something new. In great detail Randy noted how, on this review, he had paid careful attention to Kevin's comments regarding the linkage between colors and the cardinal directions, the potential use by the Maya of the positions of the gods in the sky for navigation, and any mention of geographical features like rivers or mountains. Kevin's heart sank upon reaching the end of the email when he read Randy's conclusion that while the Epitaph Codex was a great story, it didn't have much utility towards recovering the mask as it provided nothing more than vague details about the Jaguar King's route to war.

Kevin sat there disappointed, rereading the email, reviewing the tale told by the Epitaph Codex, and trying to recall what he might be missing. The vague details of the journey echoed in his mind.

After favorable portents for war from the priests the Jaguar King had gathered his soldiers and climbed atop his litter to be borne before them in their march to war. The King's troops carried him forth from the city of Caracol to a river, which they followed. From this river they crossed a mountain, traveling until they came to another river, then followed it, too.

Consulting a map, Kevin saw Caracol was located just to the south of a small river which originated in the mountains and ran west before joining another to form the Mopan river. He also noticed it was situated to the southwest of a bend of the Macal River. The Macal also sprang from the mountains, running westward until it turned almost perpendicular to its original flow, and continued flowing due north. If the river the Epitaph Codex referred to was the Macal, then heading north along it would have taken the Jaguar King to Buenavista. If it were the Mopan then the Maya cities of El Naranjo or Xunantunich were the more likely identities. All three of these places had been thoroughly studied and had yielded no trace of the tale told in the Jaguar King's epitaph. So far things were not looking good. He turned back to Randy's translation.

The Jaguar King and his men marched along the second river until it met yet another river. They left the river, marching further north until the night before battle. The morning of the battle they prayed to the gods and waited for the dawn. Then before the sun rose over the horizon they marched westward, attacking from the east out of the rising sun.

Kevin pondered this passage. If they were marching north along the Macal it would take them to where it flowed into the Mopan and formed the Belize River. Buenavista lay near there but it was located to the southwest. This confused Kevin. If the Jaguar King had been following the Macal then it would have led him north and east of Buenavista before he left the river to march still further north.

Reading this, Kevin realized Randy was right, there was too little for them to go on here. All he could really tell from the Epitaph Codex was that the Jaguar King had marched somewhere in the vicinity of Buenavista. If what the Epitaph Codex said were correct, however, he would have marched right past it and to the north of it.

This made no sense to him, owing to what Randy had told him about Buenavista. It was a small site just off the Western Highway which had been thoroughly excavated as a result of its easily accessible location, though little of interest had ever been found there. Putting his head down on the desk to think Kevin was sure there was nothing in the Epitaph Codex to help him to determine if Buenavista was the same city the Jaguar King had attacked. Then he realized there was something missing from Randy's reply.

Reopening the message, Kevin began to look for the updated list of cities subordinate to Kalak'mul which he had previously requested from Randy. He read through the message again. It was not there. Frustrated at Randy's omission, he thunked his head back down his desk. He was about to lift it up in order to send a reminder to Randy when the computer went bing, and the little notice popped up advising him he had a new email. Its subject line caused him to smile. It read, "Oops, almost forgot this."

Hastily, Kevin opened the new email and found, much to his relief, that Randy had sent not only the updated list of cities subordinate to Kalak'mul, he had also included the names and dates of the rulers of those cities. Several asterisks appeared by certain dates, followed by a little note at the end cautioning him some dates might be missing or uncertain and could potentially change the relationship between Kalak'mul and the others. Though there were many cautions in the message, Kevin was encouraged by it. He thought to himself that if the Maya spent so much effort planning the layout of their cities then there was also a chance they had some larger plan as to how they chose the sites of the cities themselves. So if the Jaguar King's epitaph wouldn't tell them his secrets, Kevin's next step was to pursue the theory that the Maya may have placed their cities along archeo-astronomic lines, since otherwise they had nothing else to go by.

The names on the list of sites Randy told Kevin to look into were Kankuwen, Dos Pilas, Ixk'un, Wolantun, El Peru, Yaxchilan, K'una, Piedras Negras, Altun Ha, Pomona, and, of course, Buenavista and Caracol. As he read the list it occurred to Kevin he was going to need a much better map of the region than he had been working from, as well as accurate surveyor's information on them. He set off to the library in search of what he needed to plot the locations of these sites, hopeful that by doing so he would be able to discern a pattern in their positioning.

After a few days of digging around both in the library and in several online databases, Kevin was able to compile the necessary site surveys, as well as a topographic map on which to plot them. When he saw the results his jaw dropped. Unless he'd made some mistake the results were so obvious he'd wondered why no one had noticed them before. Then he realized maybe no one had looked. The satellite derived topographic maps, the GPS based site surveys, even the field of archeoastronomy itself were all fairly new, and as far as Kevin knew the technique of combining them to guide excavations had so far been applied to only a few sites in North America and Europe, not Central or South America.

What he saw before him was nothing short of astonishing. It was as if the wheel of the Maya calendar had been superimposed on the map laid out before him. With a single exception, the sites he had plotted fell onto two circular arcs with Kalak'mul at the center of both of them. The exception was Buenavista. As he stared at the map in surprise, Kevin began to notice other patterns. The sites of Wolantun and Kankuwen lay on a line oriented north to south originating at Kalak'mul. Could this be a coincidence, he wondered to himself.

Kevin started to draw other lines on the map hoping they might reveal more. They did. When he drew a line from Kalak'mul to K'una it crossed right through the location of El Peru. His suspicion that there must be something more significant behind the placement of the sites grew stronger. Next he measured the number of degrees along the outer circular arc between the line from Kalak'mul to K'una and the line from Kalak'mul through Wolantun to Kankuwen. Using a compass and protractor he reflected the measurement he made to the east side of the line between Kalak'mul and Kankuwen. The mark fell right at the position of Caracol. He was convinced he was on to something, but when he drew a line from Caracol back to Kalak'mul there was no site along it at the point where it intersected the inner arc. The closest site was Buenavista, but it was well off the line, lying too far south and east. He thought he must be mistaken and wondered if he was trying too hard to find patterns where none truly existed, an all too common mistake among over eager archeologists.

He chastised himself, thinking if there was a pattern then surely it would have been based upon astronomical markers important to the Maya. That was what he had originally begun to look for before he started in to arrogantly thinking he had observed some new pattern, so he decided to return to this line of inquiry. Working from an assumption that the sites of new cities built by the rulers of Kalak'mul would be made relative to an observer located there, Kevin calculated the directions from it of astronomical events important to the Maya: events such as the summer and winter solstices, spring and fall equinoxes, and the rising and setting of stars or planets the Maya considered gods. Using this information he plotted lines radiating outward from Kalak'mul towards where these events would appear on its horizon. When he examined the lines he was confused. None of them connected Kalak'mul to the locations of the sites on his list. They didn't even connect to anything of significance, just to random points on the map.

As he sat staring at the map he felt he must have forgotten something. He tried to think of anything which could account for the fact that the lines based on the astronomically significant markers pointed nowhere, while those based on simple geometry bore an irrefutable pattern. Was there a calendar or compass adjustment he was overlooking? A tilt in the earth's axis over the last several hundred years that would have altered the astronomical alignments? Or were there other astronomical events known to ancient sky watchers and no longer deemed important to modern observers which he was failing to account for? Kevin racked his brains for some possible source of the discrepancy, but every alternative he considered turned out to be just another dead end.

He pored over the plot, reviewing the data he had on the locations of the sites and checking his work in positioning them on the map. Each time he came up with the same results. The sites of Piedras Negras, Yaxchilan, K'una, Dos Pilas, Kankuwen, Ixk'un, Caracol, and Altun Ha all fell along an outer arc at regular intervals. The sites of El Peru and Wolantun fell on an inner arc, also at regular intervals. The positions of all these sites fell on a regular geometric pattern, a pattern conforming to the layout of the Mayan calendars. Still, Kevin was having a hard time believing a pattern this simple could have been overlooked by all of those who had studied these sites before him.

The cities he plotted were all situated twenty degrees apart on concentric rings surrounding Kalak'mul. He knew the number twenty was important to the Maya. Both the Haab and Tzolk'in calendars were based on cycles involving this number. The Haab was based on an eighteen month by twenty day cycle, and the Tzolk'in on one defined by thirteen numbers and twenty names. It was far too obvious for others to have missed.

He contemplated the implications of his theory. If the pattern was right it would mean the architects of Kalak'mul laid out their new cities on a circular plan based on their calendar. Each city would have been placed on one of two arcs, one arc for the Haab, and one for the Tzolk'in. They would have been separated by a number of degrees equaling the ritual number twenty. The sole flaw Kevin could find in this theory was that there was no city at the spot on the inner arc where the line between Caracol and Kalak'mul crossed it. If his theory was correct then there was a city missing.

The last thought echoed in Kevin's mind. He kept repeating it to himself, as if he did not believe it. If this theory is true then there is a missing city. Turning to the plot he slowly went over it all again. The nexus was straightforward, for this new theory to be correct, the glyph which had been believed to refer to Buenavista all this time must actually refer to another site. An undiscovered one. He looked at the map again, right at the spot where the line from Caracol intersected the inner arc. Buenavista was in the wrong place. It was in the wrong place!

His mind raced. The glyph did not refer to Buenavista, it referred to someplace else. It now made perfect sense to him. Of course no record of the events recorded in the Jaguar King's epitaph were ever found at Buenavista, it wasn't the place upon which the Jaguar King had waged his war. The people who had surveyed Buenavista so many years ago had been mistaken. All this time the site had been misidentified!

As he considered this his attention kept turning back to the map. If he was right then he had a pretty good idea as to where the city the Jaguar King had attacked could be found. It would be at the intersection of the inner arc and the line from Kalak'mul to Caracol. It would lie close to Buenavista, a few miles to the northwest, but it was not Buenavista.

Kevin continued to be skeptical of his own theory. While he didn't lack confidence in his skills this was a bombshell he didn't want to toss without being absolutely certain. Though only a soon to be minted Ph.D., he was smart enough to know any theory challenging the long held beliefs of a research community was typically greeted quite skeptically by it. Doubly so when it came from someone outside their community. Before he tried to convince Randy, Mac, or anyone else, he'd first have to convince himself this theory could stand up to the kind of scrutiny it would encounter.

He spent two more days going back over everything, and each time he reviewed it he came to the same conclusion. The answer had been hidden in plain sight all along, if one knew where to look for it. Rather than locating their cities based on astronomical markers, the Maya of Kalak'mul had used the same foundation upon which they had built the rest of their world. They had located their cities based on the fundamentals of the calendar round. The conclusion seemed inescapable to Kevin, especially since his theory told him exactly where to start looking for the Jade Mask. To avoid confusion he decided to cast aside the incorrect reference to Buenavista. Instead, he dubbed the site "El Pilar", taking the name from an old Spanish reference to a small rocky promontory marked on the map close to where his theory predicted the unknown city would be found.

Once Kevin decided to trust his conclusion he was overcome by excitement. He recounted his results in a hastily written message to Randy and Mac, sending the message, as he did with all the others to them, using the pre-arranged encryption. The short message opened with a caution to both Randy and Mac that although its conclusion might at first sound far fetched to them, Kevin was very certain of it. It also included a promise from Kevin to provide complete details on his method, details which would quickly convince them of the soundness of his new theory, if they could arrange for a more secure means to discuss it at length. At the conclusion of this message he drafted another to Greg and Julie requesting they come to his office so he could reveal his conclusions to them as well.

It was mere minutes after Kevin sent his message before Greg, whose office was right down the hall, showed up. Excited at the prospect of sharing his discovery Kevin launched right in to explaining what he had found, and how he had found it. With maps and papers covering the desk in front of him, he was animatedly retracing the steps he had worked through for Greg when Julie came bursting in, having literally run there from her office across town.

"Geez, you couldn't wait for me?" she said, huffing and puffing to try and catch her breath.

"Um, sorry Jules," Kevin said, "I got a little carried away. Mind if I start over Greg?" Greg nodded his approval.

Realizing they'd want the full details, and not just the Cliffs Notes version, Kevin took a deep breath and began from the top. For a second Julie's mind flashed back to the van ride in Belize, but she bit her tongue and held on for the ride as Kevin related to them how he approached the problem; what inquiries he had made of Randy; Randy's answers; and Kevin's follow-up to these, which led him to his conclusions.

After listening intently to the recounting of his research methods both Greg and Julie silently nodded their heads in acceptance of Kevin's conclusions. They both knew his astronomical and navigational knowledge was far better than either of theirs and by now so too was his familiarity with many aspects of the architecture and culture of the Maya. The one question remaining to them was would Randy, and more importantly Mac, be convinced? Though none of them voiced it they knew each other well enough to know it was foremost on the others' minds and that they all would have to wait together to learn the answer.

It was Kevin who broke the silence by suggesting they grab some lunch, hoping Randy would check his email sooner rather than later and respond to it quickly. All during their lunch they talked of nothing else but the Maya. Everything from Kevin's startling new theory, to what Julie learned about the common links between the culture of the modern Maya and the ancients, to Greg's efforts to have a team ready to go if and when Kevin made a breakthrough. They talked so long they lost all track of time and it was several hours before they returned to campus.

When they got back to Kevin's office the message light on his phone was blinking. He quickly dialed in his password, expecting to hear Randy's voice but he did not. The message was brief and it was a few moments after it finished playing over the phone's speaker before Greg realized he had heard the voice before. As soon as he made the recognition he spoke up, "I've heard that voice before! I am pretty sure it is Randy's father."

The only answer to his comment was an odd look from Kevin, so he continued, "I've been in contact with Mr. Berger about possible financing for the survey. At Mac's request I've never mentioned your involvement to him. In fact Mac had asked me not to discuss the names of anyone else involved with the find over the phone. So I'm not sure how he had known to contact you."

None the less, there on Kevin's phone, was a message from Mr. Berger. All it said was, "We need to talk. Please call as soon as possible."

The message did not contain a return phone number. If Greg's recognition of the voice was correct and the caller was Mr. Berger, then he already knew the unpublished number, which he had, of course, gotten directly from Randy. They raced down the hall to Greg's office, dialed the number, then held their breath as the phone rang.

"Hello Professor Fowler," Mr. Berger answered, "thank you for calling back. I presume Mr. Nellis is there with you?"

"Yes," answered Greg.

"Is anyone else there with you or within hearing distance of you?" Mr. Berger asked.

"Just my sister Julie, but you can speak freely. She is also part of the team," Greg replied, forgetting his former promise to Mac.

Mr. Berger continued, "Good then. I'm calling you at Randy's request. Randy has a secure satellite phone he uses to talk to me. Up until now it has always been for my protection since I consider the work I do to be sensitive, or at least my competition does. In order for me to be able to talk freely to my son I needed the link at his end to be secure. Besides, it lets me keep tabs on him in the middle of that jungle. I never dreamed he'd want to use it for anything he is working on, but earlier today he told me he wants to do exactly that. Not to talk to me though. He wants to talk to you, or more specifically, Mr. Nellis. So at his request I have arranged to get you the equipment you need to talk securely with him. It should arrive first thing tomorrow. As soon as I have received confirmation the equipment has arrived there Randy will contact you. Unless you have any other concerns, I need to get back to my business, but Randy was quite insistent about this."

"No, that's fine. Thank you, Mr. Berger," Greg said, then hung up the phone.

"What was that all about?" Kevin asked Greg.

Greg filled the others in on his conversation, "Well, Mr. Berger spoke with Randy. At Randy's request, Mr. Berger is sending us some equipment tomorrow so we can talk securely via satellite with Randy, and, I presume, Mac as well. I'm guessing they have some questions. Looks like we have a little time to kill until then."

Although they had patiently endured the wait while Kevin worked towards his conclusions, the suspense they felt at awaiting Randy's response left them all on edge. None of them slept much that night, especially Greg, who woke early and headed down to his office. Along the way he stopped by Kevin and Julie's, but seeing no light on he chose not to disturb them, leaving a note instead to inform them he would call as soon as the equipment arrived. Then he continued on his way.

Unlike the other two, who could work on their research at their own pace, Greg not only had his own work to tend to, he also had responsibilities to many others. In addition to Kevin, several graduate and undergraduate students worked upon projects he supervised. They all required his guidance to keep their work on track. Additionally he needed to prepare for the fall class schedule, which, while still many weeks off, always seemed to have a way of creeping up on him unexpectedly.

So, although Greg had managed to carve out time from his schedule for the recent trip to Belize, it had already occurred to him that if Kevin's collaboration with Randy did yield something new he might be making a return visit. Thus, unlike Julie, Greg was thankful it had taken Kevin some time to come to his conclusions. It had given him the chance to get a lot done. For him this meant if Kevin's conclusions were correct, he'd be able to sneak back off to the jungle with them.

The prospect both excited and scared him. While the sites Greg worked on weren't danger free, in fact between the scorpions and the rattlesnakes they were far from it, they were known quantities to him. He'd worked in the American Southwest for many years, so he knew the countryside and he knew its hazards. Besides, he thought to himself, these days he spent more time in his office writing grants than digging where snakes might be sleeping.

Belize, however, was a different thing for him. He didn't know the land, didn't know its people, didn't know its plants and animals. The belt he wore from his encounter at the zoo served as a reminder to him of that. He'd survived the incident, he told himself, but he continued to harbor a feeling that until he had spent a bit more time there he would remain out of his own element.

Greg was startled from these musings by the ringing of his phone. It was 8:30, and he had been in his office working for over three hours. He yawned as he lifted the receiver to answer the call. Putting the phone to his ear he immediately recognized the voice on the other end. It was the department secretary, calling to tell him someone was there to deliver some equipment. Greg told her to send the man up.

A few minutes later the technician arrived in Greg's office carrying a small suitcase. It wasn't at all what Greg had imagined. He'd expected some big bulky thing to be wheeled in on a hand truck. The technician smiled, saying he was used to that reaction. He soon explained the technology had changed a lot, and these days the equipment was about as big as a slightly oversized cell phone. The technician opened the case, took one out and handed it to Greg. He then showed him how to use it and left him with a number to contact to arrange for its return. Greg thanked the man and showed him out of his office.

Picking up the phone on his desk he called Kevin and Julie to tell them the equipment had arrived. Kevin answered it. "Kevin, it's Greg. The satellite phone is here, but from what the guy who delivered it was telling me it won't work inside an office. Randy really wanted to talk to you anyway, so why don't I head over there and you and Julie can wait for his call?" Kevin agreed. Placing the satellite phone in his backpack he walked out of the office. A short drive later he was at their house, staying just long enough to drop off the phone and drink a quick cup of coffee, before heading back to work.

When Randy's call came it was shortly before noon in Arizona. It had taken him that long to convince Mac to stop working on the recent finds and devote some time to talk to Kevin about what Mac referred to as "his crazy idea" of where they should look. Ever the pragmatist, Mac insisted he listen in on the call while he took his lunch, telling Randy "at least this way it won't be a total waste of my time."

By the time the call was over Mac would never again accuse Kevin of wasting his time. In the course of the call Kevin reviewed everything for Mac and Randy, just as he had done the day before for Greg and Julie. Randy was quickly convinced. Mac was more skeptical but it was clear his interest was piqued. He asked many detailed questions of Kevin about his methods and the basis for his conclusions. By the time the hour Mac normally allotted for his lunch had ended his skepticism was satisfied, although his stomach remained otherwise. Giving Randy and Kevin the go ahead to proceed with the search for the site, which they now agreed to refer to as "El Pilar", he excused himself and returned to his other work. Randy concluded the call by advising Kevin that his father would contact Greg in order to transfer the funds necessary to get the expedition started.

The next day was a whirlwind for all involved. Greg kicked into high gear. His first order of business was to get in touch with Mr. Berger and make sure financing was in place. Immediately following the call with Kevin, Randy had contacted his dad with the go ahead. It wasn't long before Mr. Berger had one of his assistants set Greg up with access to finances. With the funding in place the real work of pulling a survey team together could begin.

While Greg had previously made some preliminary calls to check on the availability of old friends and former students, none had jumped at the offer. That didn't surprise him though. Who would jump at an offer to work on a survey without knowing any details about it, or, for that matter, even the start or end dates.

Chastened by his early lack of success Greg had insisted Kevin advise Randy of the likelihood that, lacking the ability to tell potential recruits more about the survey, he'd be unable to get anyone to help them out. The point was well taken by Randy. In addition to asking Mac to relent in regard to what Greg could reveal, Randy also promised to try to convince him to loan some of his students to the search effort. If that failed, he told Kevin, they could always use some of the money his dad was providing to hire some locals to help out, though they'd be a poor substitute for trained archeologists.

Armed with the additional details of the Jaguar King find which Mac and Randy were now willing to let him divulge to potential recruits, as well as the luck of timing, Greg had better fortune this time and was able to convince two former colleagues to join the team. One was a past graduate student of his, the other a post doctoral researcher. Summer was about to start, and both of them found themselves in a sort of limbo awaiting prospects on the horizon. For both of them the chance to join in on what Greg had described as "practically a paid vacation wandering among unexplored Mayan ruins" couldn't have come at a better time.

Second on his task list, right after making calls to find members for the team, was rounding up equipment. This, he knew, could prove to be at least as hard, if not harder. Some of the things they would need, like digging tools, could be bought easily enough right there in Belize. Others, like GPS surveying equipment, metal detectors, and an underground sonography rig would be a bit tougher. Usually equipment like that was purchased for a project out of grant money. You couldn't rent it, in fact you usually couldn't buy it off the shelf in a store. It was mostly special order and could take weeks, sometimes months, to be delivered. Once a project managed to get its hands on such equipment it didn't easily let go of it.

Fortunately for him, Greg was the one who wrote most of the grants, and supervised most of the projects in his department. Despite this, he knew he couldn't simply order the students working for him to give up their equipment so he could spirit it off to Belize for a survey the department didn't know the first thing about. Though he was only planning to take the tools for a couple of weeks, if someone complained to the department chairman he would never get approval. So he decided to avail himself of the mantra that it is better to ask forgiveness than permission. This was where a bit of bureaucratic legerdemain would work to his advantage. Being the leader of so many projects he knew if he told a few white lies here and there he could pull together everything they needed long enough for no one to notice.

The idea was fiendishly clever. He would ask one team to "loan" some equipment to another for a few days by telling them the other team's equipment was being repaired. Then he himself would "volunteer" to transport it to where he said it was needed. By doing the same thing to a couple of different teams he figured he could get all the equipment he needed, and hopefully nobody would figure it out. At least, that is, until he and the equipment were already in Belize. By then it would be too late to stop him and he'd deal with the consequences when he came back. Besides, he thought, if we do make a find no one is likely to complain, and if we don't the department chairman isn't likely to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs.

Two days later, Greg, Kevin, and Julie were at the airport, tickets in hand, and a dozen or so crates of equipment by their side. Joining them were the two recruits Greg had managed to round up. Marc Harrington was a former student of Greg's who had finished his graduate work the prior year, but had taken too long to finalize his Ph.D. As a result he had gotten off track from the usual post doctoral hiring cycle and had found himself having to wait for the following semester. Instead of being upset by this he had just gone back to his native Southern California where he was catching waves. Luckily for Greg the promise of some quick cash for helping out in Belize managed to lure him away from surfing for at least a little while.

The other recruit was Cynthia Oliver. She had come to work with Greg two years earlier as a post doctoral researcher. She had graduated from Vancouver, after having studied the Native American cultures of the Pacific Northwest. When the opportunity had come up to work for Greg she jumped at the chance in order to get a break from the cold, wet weather. At first Greg worried he might be taking a chance by hiring her. Her training was in a different sub-specialty than the one his team worked on. She had quickly proven herself adept at managing a dig site, however, and in the time she worked for him he never once regretted having hired her.

When Greg learned she had chosen to accept another research post he was quite sorry to see her go. Outwardly he seemed not to take it personally. Inwardly, though, he wondered if there was some dynamic between them he had failed to notice which contributed to her decision to move on. Still, he knew that if she wished to be considered for a tenure track professorship she needed to make a name for herself by working on more than one high profile project.

So after two years of working for Greg, Cynthia lined up a new post-doc position at Pennsylvania, and just like that she was gone. Were it not for a foul up in the grant which was supposed to fund her position there she probably would have been too busy to return his phone call, but when she heard Greg's message offering some quick cash in exchange for a few weeks of helping him out in Belize it seemed like providence. That and a way to pay her bills until the grant came through. So she returned his call and soon found herself in a cab on the way to the airport. Figuring the less said the better all she told her boss was that a friend had offered her a free trip to Belize and she'd be back by the time they fixed the snafu and could start paying her.

Kevin and Julie had met both Marc and Cynthia before. The four of them had all worked for Greg during the same time frame and were friendly enough to each other. With the exception of Kevin and Julie, however, none of them had ever worked together on the same project. How those two got on was a known quantity to Greg, but having overseen several projects he'd quickly learned you could never predict how any two people would get along. The reality of it was that as a team leader, no matter how well you knew someone beforehand, when you worked them hard in the field and housed them in primitive conditions for days or weeks at a time, it became impossible to predict who would manage to get on each others' nerves.

In that respect Greg had been fortunate in the past. While there had been some minor tiffs, there had never been any major blow-ups among his charges. Having heard enough stories from colleagues about arguments so bad they made the working conditions at dig sites in even the hottest of locales become unusually frosty, Greg considered himself fortunate in this regard and hoped his past luck would hold out.

On the flight to Belize Julie sat with Cynthia bringing her up to date on what had happened during their vacation. Marc slept. It was something he had long ago developed a reputation for doing on dig sites. He'd work as hard as anyone else, if not harder, during his shift. When his shifts were over, or when there was any other reason for work to stop, he was always quick to grab a nap. It had even been said by some of his co-workers that he could sleep standing up. "It all comes with the territory of being a party animal," he would quip when teased about it, so there was little chance he'd pass up the opportunity to sleep on the connecting flight to Belize.

While the others kept themselves busy, Kevin and Greg pored over maps trying to figure out the best way to get to where Kevin had concluded they should survey. Not knowing the terrain complicated this task. Satellite imagery and topographic maps helped, but they were no substitute for someone who knew the area well. As far as they could tell from the maps, they were in for a good hike. If they were lucky the terrain would allow them to use horses to move their equipment in. If they weren't they would have to leave some of it behind, but there was no way to know for sure until they reached Belize and discussed their plans with Mac and Randy.

Arriving at the airport they collected their equipment at the baggage claim and headed on through customs. There they ran right smack into something Greg had completely forgotten to account for, namely the customs inspector. Having never worked in Belize before, nor for that matter outside the U.S., Greg failed to consider what would be involved in taking survey equipment into another country. It was an honest mistake, as his only other trip to Belize had been traveling on vacation with just those belongings a typical tourist would bring. On that occasion he breezed right through customs, but this time it was different.

While Greg pressed his case with the customs inspector the rest of the group sat outside the big customs hall and waited. He told the inspector they had come to Belize in order to help out the team working on the new discoveries at Caracol. Surely the inspector must be familiar with the new find, he insisted, but the inspector would not relent. He held firm that without the proper paperwork he couldn't allow them to bring the equipment into the country without paying customs duty on it. Greg argued with the inspector for a while, to no avail.

Seeing the commotion, a supervisor came over, and once again Greg recounted his predicament. Fortunately for Greg the supervisor was willing to work out a deal. He told the inspector to inventory the equipment and take down the serial numbers. Then he told Greg he would charge him the import duty in the form of a bond. If he left the country within thirty days with the same equipment he came in with then he would get the bond back. Otherwise he would forfeit it to the government. Greg took the deal.

Feeling like he'd pulled off a bureaucratic coup Greg was smiling as he walked over to rejoin the group, which had been waiting for him for well over half an hour. When he got there Kevin asked, "What the heck was going on, and what are you so happy about?" Greg relayed the details of the problem and the achievement of his minor triumph to the rest of them. Kevin groaned, "You wasted all this time on that? What the heck did it matter? All the money is coming from Randy's dad anyway!" On hearing Kevin, and realizing he was right, Greg's smile disappeared and the feeling he was out of his element began to creep over him again.

Things went more smoothly at the car rental counter. Not knowing for sure what kind of roads they'd need to drive on, they played it safe by arranging for three large four-wheel-drive trucks. Like all the other travel arrangements the car reservations had been done through Mr. Berger's people. Although he had never done business in Belize before, Randy's dad knew people, who knew other people, who knew the right people in Belize. Not only did they get the trucks they wanted, they got every heavy duty four-wheel-drive truck on the airport lot. All three of them, as the young woman at the rental counter cheerfully commented.

After they cleared the rental counter the baggage porters descended on them like flies on a mango rotting in the midday sun. The large amount of luggage they traveled with made them an obvious target, and a dozen different hands reached for the bags and cases. Worried about equipment being stolen, Greg tried to chase them off but the porters were not easily deterred.

As Greg wheeled around shouting at them, Kevin quickly realized he had to take charge of the situation. "You, you and you," Kevin called out, pointing to three of them at random, "grab these and follow me."

"What are you doing?" Greg protested to him.

"The way to make some of them go away is to pick a few and let them carry the baggage. Then the others will realize they've lost out and look for other tourists to hustle," Kevin replied.

Sure enough, once they saw Kevin had picked a few of them, the others turned away. Greg grumbled something inaudible to Kevin and turned to head out to where the trucks were parked. The rest of them followed, a strange ensemble of pale white Americans and sun soaked Belizeans, all trundling bags and equipment cases.

The trucks themselves were somewhat of an amazement to Greg. They were covered in dirt and dents. The first thought that entered his head was, no way these are going to run, but run they did. In fact, they ran quite well, and he realized it was the disconnect between the outward appearance of things here and their inward functional integrity which so often confused him. It occurred to him this might be an apt analogy for Belize.

Before Greg could ponder this further, he was besieged by porters. Having loaded the vehicles, the porters now wanted to get paid. Initially they had converged on Kevin, who was the one who hired them. He in turn steered them to Greg, who held all the money. Simply wanting the men to be gone, Greg dug in his pockets, pulled out some more of Mr. Berger's money, which he seemed to be going through at an exponentially increasing rate, and paid the porters. He tossed a set of keys to Kevin and one to Julie, then turned to Marc and Cynthia saying, "Marc, why don't you ride with Kevin. Cynthia, you can ride with Julie. I'll be okay by myself. We'll need to stay together anyway. We also need to stop for equipment, food and other supplies. Randy said we'd be best off doing that in Belmopan."

Greg got in the first of the three trucks, closed the door, started the engine, and waited for the others to do the same. It was already well past noon and they had a bit of driving ahead of them, plus the stop at Belmopan. We'll be lucky to get to Caracol today, he thought to himself.

Randy had warned them not to drive the dirt road at night, but Greg didn't recall there being much in the way of lodging, or anything else for that matter, on the Western Highway between Belmopan and San Ignacio. If they couldn't make Caracol then they'd have to either continue on to San Ignacio in order to find a place to stay, or turn back to Belmopan. Once again he felt buffeted by forces beyond his control and figured he'd have to wait and see what time they got to Belmopan before making the decision as to whether or not they should try to make it to Caracol that day. With the others settled into their vehicles and awaiting him to lead them he put the truck in gear and turned out onto the road to the Western Highway.

As he drove down the Western Highway Greg recalled how, on his first trip there, one of the guides had pointed out the ruins of an old railroad steam engine. In the late 19th and early 20th century, when Belize was a colony called British Honduras, the colonial government had attempted to exploit Belize's natural resources. Over time they had learned that when there are no roads, just moving the heavy equipment necessary to build them can be a challenge in itself.

So Greg didn't take it for granted that the Western Highway was a good road. Despite the fact that fairly skilled labor could be had in Belize for $12 a day, it was still costly and difficult to build roads in a place where the rain and the jungle constantly fought back to reclaim them. He knew the road he was now on, a paved, two lane undivided highway similar to a typical numbered county road or secondary state highway in the U.S., was the best Belize had to offer.

As good as the Western Highway was, the trip to Belmopan was a slow drive. Belmopan was the new capital, a planned city, built with the intention of drawing more people to live in the middle of the country, and away from the hurricane prone coastal areas. As it turned out, the plan had a flaw. Few folks, even the ones who worked for the government, actually wanted to live there. Virtually everyone working for the government, or having any business with it, traveled there and back. It didn't matter if you wanted a driver's license or were a member of parliament, chances are you didn't actually spend the night in Belmopan. The result was that at least between Belize City and Belmopan, the Western Highway was crowded with buses, trucks, and cars moving at a snail's pace. After a few miles Greg started to realize why Mario had taken to passing traffic on the right. If he had to drive this road between Belize City and the western border almost every day it wouldn't be long before he would do likewise. Unlike Mario though, Greg didn't know the road and had two other vehicles following him. All he could do was follow in the slow but steady flow of traffic.

It took over an hour until they finally arrived in Belmopan. The hardware store and supermarket Randy had told him to look for were close to each other, and easy to spot, as they were right on the road. This meant they could split the shopping between them in order to make up for some of the time lost on the drive. Greg sent Kevin and Julie to the hardware store to get pick axes, shovels, rope, tarps, and anything else they might need to dig, stake, and cover a work site. The hardware store wasn't incredibly big by American standards but it had what they needed. It didn't occur to them that two Americans walking into a hardware store in Belize to buy a large amount of digging tools might raise suspicions. The folks in the store were friendly enough, and never asked what Kevin and Julie planned to do with the tools they were buying. They did, however, take notice of their purchases.

In the meantime Greg, Marc, and Cynthia had headed over to the supermarket. In anticipation of their heading into a remote area Greg made sure they had brought a large supply of dried food. He had also brought water purification equipment as well as collapsible containers to put the water into. Water was heavy, but in the heat of Belize they'd need plenty of it. Fortunately it wasn't scarce there and with the right equipment the team could process what they needed, as they needed it, instead of having to carry it all in with them. The only other thing he'd brought along was emergency medical gear, something he hoped they would not need.

There were plenty of items the team would need which were easily found in Belize. Rather than hauling those down on the plane Greg felt it would be best to buy them there. Most important of these was some form of vitamin C. Dried fruit would serve for that and there was no shortage of varieties to choose from. The same went for batteries, mosquito repellent, and other sundries which they proceeded to clean the small Belmopan market out of. Had this been the coastal town of San Pedro, or one of the other tourist spots, the locals might have paid no heed to such behavior. It was, however, unusual for tourists to stop in Belmopan for anything, let alone for them to clean a store out of such items as the team was now doing, and the locals stared at the three of them as they stood in line to cash out.

It took the two groups about half an hour to gather what they needed then pile it all into the back of the trucks. When they finished the five of them stood by their vehicles in the hot afternoon sun discussing what to do next. The conversation focused on whether they should head straight for Caracol or get rooms somewhere nearby and wait for the following morning to finish the drive. Having no previous experiences in Belize, Marc and Cynthia opted out of the discussion. Greg vacillated, while Kevin and Julie disagreed completely.

Julie opted for caution. She argued it was fifteen miles on the Western Highway before the turnoff at Georgeville for the road leading to Caracol. From there it was still another twenty miles on the Chiquibul Road, and fifteen more on the much slower and bumpier dirt road into Caracol. Recalling their past trips, and what the guide had said to them about not traveling that road at dark, she was convinced they should stay in Belmopan.

As sometimes occurs among scientists, Kevin looked at the same set of facts and came to the completely opposite conclusion. He argued that since they were now traveling west of Belmopan there would be less traffic on the Western Highway. Running through the same turnoffs as Julie had just done he estimated thirty minutes to the Georgeville turnoff; forty-five on the Chiquibul Road; and an hour on the poorly graded road which eventually took them into Caracol. By his estimation they could easily make Caracol by sunset, adding that if they got there tonight they could use the evening to review their plans with Randy and Mac, as well as to load the trucks with whatever equipment the CCF team would be bringing. This would allow them to start the expedition first thing the following morning. Otherwise, if they stayed in Belmopan tonight they'd lose at least a half day, maybe more, because, as he stated, even if they set out for Caracol at first light the next day they'd have to pick up Randy, plus all of his crew and equipment, then back track several miles to the place off the Western Highway where their real trek north, the one on foot, would first begin.

Greg stood between the two of them listening to them argue back and forth and trying to make up his mind. Before they had departed for Belize Greg had tried to get Randy to meet them at Belmopan. He pleaded with Randy that everything would be so much easier that way, but his real motivation was to avoid having to drive through unfamiliar terrain without a local escort. Unfortunately for Greg, Randy responded it wasn't possible, or rather that Mac wouldn't allow it. Mac had only a single truck at his disposal, which was, among other things, used to ferry workers to and from the dig sites each day. If Randy took it in order to meet Greg's team in Belmopan then the day workers would have no way to get to Caracol, and the work schedule for everything else Mac had going on at the site would be disrupted. Since Mac had already agreed to let Randy take some of the students with him to help search for El Pilar, there was no way he would also allow the other projects to suffer the loss of the day workers for yet another day.

It was because of this Greg found himself doing exactly what he didn't want to, having to navigate unfamiliar roads with no local guide. Finally he decided he had heard enough of Kevin and Julie's bickering. He had reached a decision, now all he had to do was get them to shut up long enough so he could inform them of it.

"Stop it, both of you," he shouted at them, "we're wasting time, which is something we don't have a lot of if we're going to have a chance of getting there today." The two of them fell silent at his outburst.

"We're going to Caracol, get in the trucks." For a split second Julie considered pressing her point further, but she knew her brother well enough to know not to argue any more. He wouldn't change his mind and if she pressed him, she'd just end up pissing him off more. Each of them walked back to their trucks, climbed in them, then turned out onto the highway for the rest of the drive. During their heated discussion none of them had noticed the truck that had pulled up in front of the market a few spaces from where they stood arguing. Now, in their haste to get on the road and reach Caracol before dark, they also didn't notice it pull out behind them onto the Western Highway.

Kevin was right about it not taking them long to reach the turn off at Georgeville, and after only about twenty to twenty five minutes they found themselves on the Chiquibul Road. The first part of this road was actually paved, but not surprisingly it was also heavily rutted. This proved a problem to the team. Had it been a dirt road the government might have re-graded it. Being a paved road, however, the ruts hadn't been filled in due to the higher cost of re-paving, thus traveling along it proved to be slower than if they were driving upon a graded dirt road in good condition.

Once again their unfamiliarity with the country presented an unforeseen complication. Their prior trips to Caracol came in from a different direction and had never taken them along this particular road. They had instead taken them via the most direct route from San Ignacio. That road was a well graded dirt road, and they had all just assumed the Chiquibul Road, marked as paved on the map, would be a better road. It was a natural assumption for them, based upon a lifetime of experience with paved roads, that a paved road would be faster than an unpaved one. It was an assumption which now proved false and it was costing them time.

Greg was in the lead car, but it was almost as if he could hear Julie in the trailing car fretting about how this was adding time they didn't have onto the trip and they should turn back while they could still safely do so. He dismissed the imaginary voice. He'd made his decision to get to Caracol tonight, and felt he had no choice but to continue on if they were to do so. He breathed a sigh of relief, when, after a few miles the rutted paved road changed over to a well graded dirt road and his truck began kicking up clouds of dust in its wake.

Unfortunately, by then what should have taken five minutes to travel had taken well over twenty. Little by little their small miscues were adding up and the sun continued to get lower in the afternoon sky. Trying to make up some lost time Greg gunned his truck, accelerating down the dirt road. This merely served to kick up more dust, causing the drivers of the trucks following him to drop further behind in order to be able to see the road. Noticing this Greg eased up on the pedal, afraid that if he got too far ahead they might become separated.

This resulted in a sort of balancing act. Each time Greg tried to pick up the pace his truck kicked up more dust. The cars behind him would drop back in order to see the road better, then he'd lose sight of them and slow down so they could catch up. Shaking his head to himself Greg noted this as one more thing they hadn't considered, since on their prior trips to Caracol they had always traveled in a single vehicle. In the end Greg found that in order for the group to keep together he had to keep his speed down to twenty on the straight parts and fifteen or less where the road took sharp turns. Either way it was slower than he had counted on.

Just before they reached the waterfalls at the Rio On, the place where they had stopped to stretch on their prior trips to Caracol, the sun began to dip below the tree tops. From this point on the road got rougher. As he drove Greg started mumbling to himself. "Let's see, about ten more miles to where the road splits," he said. Reaching over to the map laid out on the seat beside him with one hand, while driving with the other, he attempted to measure the distance from the fork to his final destination. "Then it looks like another seven miles to Caracol. Hmm, this is interesting. I hadn't noticed before that the other road at the split leads on to a ranger station in the Chiquibul Forest. Must suck if you miss the turnoff and end up all the way out there..."

As he tried to simultaneously drive and measure, the truck swung back and forth across the road. The horn of an oncoming logging truck quickly drew Greg's attention back to the task at hand. Settling for reviewing the distance left in his head, rather than trying to measure it while driving, Greg estimated that at their current speed there was around an hour and a half of driving ahead of them. What troubled him was whether there was also an hour and a half of daylight left.

Looking out the window to his right he glanced at the sun in the sky, guessing there was perhaps twenty or thirty minutes until it set. Add in forty minutes of dusk, he thought, and it meant they had cut it too close. It seemed certain to him they would be driving the last few miles into Caracol in the dark. The only comfort Greg took at this was his faint recollection of the road straightening out once they crossed the bridge over the Macal, right before the turn off for Caracol. He hoped he'd remembered correctly.

Realizing they had no time to stop he kept driving right on past the waterfall, beautiful and tempting though it was. As it grew darker he turned his lights on, hoping the others would do the same. With the dust kicked up by his truck, and the oncoming dusk, he found it getting harder and harder to see the trucks behind him in his mirrors. He was glad when Kevin and Julie realized they should turn their lights on, yet even with them on, the dust and darkness made it hard to see their vehicles unless Greg slowed his speed still further, allowing them to all drive closer together.

It felt like it had taken them forever to finally reach the bridge over the Macal. It was a one lane bridge, made of wood, and about fifty yards long. Slowly Greg pulled out onto the bridge making sure the other trucks kept up with him. As he did so he checked his mirror to be certain they were close behind. It was then he first noticed a third set of lights on the road behind him. Wonder who else would be out on this road so late, he thought to himself as he pulled off the bridge.

Bumping off the bridge Greg steered his truck up the dirt road which climbed the shallow embankment on the other side of the river. Not long after this the road flattened out and he tried to pick up speed, still being careful not to become separated from the trucks following him. He felt more relieved at the sight of the sign for the Caracol turnoff than he had at anything for a long time. The feeling didn't last long, however, as he locked up the brakes, his truck screaming to a halt inches before a small tree blocking the road. Not seeing his brake lights in the large cloud of dust his sudden stop had kicked up, the other trucks came up quickly behind him. Each truck in turn screeched to a sudden halt just a few feet away from the one in front of it.

Hidden by the dust and dark, Julie could not see Greg's truck in front of Kevin's. Worried that something had happened to her brother she bolted from her truck and ran forward shouting out, "Is everything all right?"

"Yes, I'm okay," Greg shouted back, "but the road is blocked. Looks like a small tree came down. It shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes to move but I'll need some help." He stood there for a second looking the tree over, then turned to Julie and said, "Why don't you and Cynthia move the trucks so we can use their headlights to see what we're doing. The rest of us will try to swing this thing off the road."

Marc and Kevin walked over to help Greg with the tree while Julie and Cynthia climbed into the two trucks sitting on the road behind Greg's. As they did this two cars came up on them, one from the direction they'd come in, the other from the road leading towards the Chiquibul Forest ranger station. Initially Greg didn't pay them any attention. He figured they were just some locals going to and from the small village called Millionario, which was the last place on the map between where they were now and the forest preserve. Then he heard the shouts of angry voices. Turning to look in their direction he quickly realized the cars had stopped and the occupants of them were coming towards him. In the dim light he saw guns being pointed at him and when he began to make out what the voices were saying he grew fearful.

"Put your hands up and step back from the vehicles," the voice shouted as it approached. "You two ladies in the trucks, get out and join the others." The man talking was accompanied by another man. A third got out of the second vehicle which had come from the direction of Millionario. It appeared the three of them were together.

"Who are you? Where are you from? What are you doing way out here at night?" the voice asked him.

Greg started to answer, "My name is Greg Fowler. I'm an archeologist from the U.S....," but the voice cut him off.

"Come over here, all of you. Turn around and put your hands on the truck," he said to Greg and his companions. Then he turned to the man who had approached from the direction of Millionario, "Victor, check inside their vehicles and see what they have in there."

Victor took his flashlight and walked over to the group's first truck. He rummaged through the back of it, then did the same for the other two as they sat there idling in the dark, their lights shining on the downed tree.

Victor came back and whispered something to the man who was evidently in charge. In the dim light none of them could make out very much about the men, although they could see the silhouettes of the guns they held in their hands against the light of the flashlights they also held.

The man in charge spoke to them again, "What are you doing out here in the dark with all this equipment. Are you looking for Mayan treasure? Do you know looting Mayan artifacts is a serious crime in Belize, punishable by jail? I think we will have to take you in."

Greg protested that they were not looters, but as he did the sound of a vehicle approaching could be heard, its lights dimly visible on the road from Caracol. Startled by the sound of the unexpected vehicle approaching, the man in charge cut Greg off.

"Silence," he said, "off to the side of the road. If anyone says anything they will be shot." Then he turned to Victor, "Shut off those cars and their lights, then move off into the bushes where you can't be seen. If I whistle, you cover us," and with that he motioned to the third man, who had yet to say a single word, to keep his gun trained on the group.

Greg was beginning to think he should have heeded Randy's warning rather than trying to travel at night. He was afraid these men were some of the bandits they had been warned of, and that they would be robbed for their gear, shot, and their bodies dragged off into the woods where they might never be found. So it was with great relief when, just after the screech of a truck's brakes, Greg thought he heard a familiar voice.

"Mr. Hull, what are you doing out here at this time of night?" Mac said as he and Randy climbed out of their truck.

"Professor, I should ask you the same question," Mr. Hull replied. "We had reports from the stores in Belmopan of foreigners stocking up on excavation tools. We have not issued any new permits and thanks to this downed tree we have caught the looters here on the road before they could get to their destination."

"Did you happen to ask their names, Mr. Hull?" Mac responded. "We're out here looking for some colleagues of ours we think might have gotten lost. A Mr. Fowler and his party. They were coming down to join us for a few weeks of digging on the site and were bringing additional tools and supplies at our request, since we've had to divert some as a result of the latest find."

"A Mr. Fowler? No, I don't think so," Mr. Hull called back across the downed tree to Mac.

When he heard Hull say this, Greg, who along with the others was face down in the dirt on the side of the road a few dozen feet back along the direction they had come from, lifted his head and called out loudly, "Fowler right here Professor!" As he did this he heard the unmistakable sound of a trigger being cocked. It was the trigger of the revolver held by the nameless third man who was standing over them.

"My pardon, Professor, did you say Fowler?" Mr. Hull said, hearing Greg's voice and realizing Mac must have heard it too.

"Yes Mr. Hull, Fowler, Greg Fowler," Mac shouted out as he stepped across the downed tree and approached Mr. Hull.

"Louis, put your gun away and bring those folks over here. I think we have made a mistake," Mr. Hull said.

The man standing over them said only one thing, "Get up."

Quite relieved, and not in need of any further prodding, Greg, Kevin, Julie, and the others quickly got up from the ground, brushed themselves off, and headed towards the lights of Mac's truck.

"My apologies, Mr. Fowler," Mr. Hull said turning to Greg and his group. "My apologies to you and your companions. One can't be too careful out here at night. Thinking you were looters, who often travel in groups, I could not be sure that what turned out to be the Professor's truck might not have been some criminal accomplices who would have had no hesitation at shooting us to rescue you. It would not have been the first time our police were shot at by looters. We cannot be too careful."

"No apology necessary," Greg replied, "I'm just thankful this got cleared up without anyone getting hurt."

"Since the Professor vouches for you, I am satisfied. It is dark and your journey is not yet over, so I will delay you no longer. Perhaps my men can help you clear the road," Mr. Hull said.

"That would be appreciated," Greg responded as he turned back to the task of getting the downed tree out of the way. A few minutes later the tree was shoved over to the side of the road. Mr. Hull and his two men climbed into their vehicles, both of which then headed off down the road to Millionario. Mac and Randy got back in their truck, turning it around to lead Greg and the others the last few miles into the camp at Caracol.

Upon reaching the camp Greg and the others gathered what they would need for the night from their trucks. As they did so Randy came up to them and said, "I wonder what Hull was up to back there."

"What do you mean?" Kevin replied.

"Well, I discussed this with Mac, and he thinks I'm nuts, but I heard Hull initially deny having seen you when Mac first asked him. If Greg hadn't called out I'm not sure he wouldn't have sent us off and taken you all into custody," said Randy.

Overhearing what Randy said to Kevin, Greg asked, "Do you think Hull suspects something?"

"I'm not sure," Randy said, " I've heard rumors from some of the diggers working for us that Hull has been known to sometimes look the other way. It's said he protects the important finds for fear of too many questions being asked if something truly remarkable shows up on the black market. They also say he lets some unauthorized digging go on in secondary sites so he can collect bribes from the looters. If that's true then we can't be sure whether he was interested in you because you were some outsiders who he thought he could catch looting and soak for bribe money, or if he might know what we're up to. We should probably get an early start and have someone in the first and last car keep an eye out for anyone trying to follow us."

With that they sat down to a late dinner while starting in to work on the plan for their search. Randy had been busy in the few days since they had spoken on the satellite phone. Between bites he brought Greg and Kevin up to speed on what he had been doing. "I went up towards Buenavista to speak with some local guides who knew the area north of there. I asked about the possibility of a guided nature trip in that region so as to not to give away any details about what it is we'd really be doing up there. I was able to get some info on the terrain in the area as well as to decide on which guide would be the best one to hire."

Eating as he spoke Randy filled them in on what he had learned from the guides he had spoken to. The result was his advising the others that they'd attract the least attention by not taking the shortest route to the search area. The short route would take them on the road through the small town of Bullet Tree, but since tourists didn't travel through there often they were sure to be remembered. Instead, he told them, they would draw much less attention by setting out from a horse ranch right near Buenavista. Randy knew the guide who ran the ranch and felt he could trust him. It would also allow them one last chance to check out the site at Buenavista in an attempt to learn more about why the site had, up until now, been linked to a glyph found at Caracol, a glyph they believed really referred to El Pilar.

"Besides," Randy told them, "traveling to Buenavista in the guise of touring it would serve as a diversion in case Hull does have men watching us. At the ranch we can unload the vehicles inside the horse barn where no one can see us transfer the equipment to horses. We'll send the vehicles back to Caracol with the day workers in our place. Hopefully by doing this anyone watching us will be fooled. Then we'll head out the other side of the ranch and onto the horse road. We can follow the Mopan to the north and west of Bullet Tree until we get to where the river takes a sharp turn to the east. There is a ford there we can use to cross the river, then it is a straight shot north along a rarely used jungle path until we get to where Kevin says El Pilar should be."

In his mind it all sounded so simple, but Randy knew taking this route would add at least an extra day compared to driving to Bullet Tree and starting into the jungle from there. Either way, the last several miles would be through heavy jungle with few or no trails, heavy undergrowth, and a lot of gear to move. He expected it would take them two to three days to move the gear and set up a base camp somewhere near the rocky outcropping Kevin had spotted on the map. From there they could survey the roughly twenty or so square miles where they expected to find the site they were searching for.

Searching the jungle for a lost city wasn't as easy as one might think. The jungle in Belize had a way of hiding its secrets, which is why they were called "lost cities" after all. If Kevin's theory was correct perhaps it would lead them right to El Pilar, but they couldn't count on that. His calculations used the city of Kalak'mul as his starting point, but the site was a large one and he couldn't be sure which part of it served as the geographic reference point the Maya would have based their building plans upon. Uncertainty in the starting point of the calculations meant uncertainty in the end point they predicted, and it was quite possible his prediction could be off by several miles in any direction.

Recognizing this the team devised a search plan they hoped would maximize their chances for success. The plan they came up with called for searching a large grid of jungle by starting in its center and spiraling outward until they had covered all of it. This approach relied on the experiences of many past Maya archeologists who had found that the large cities where kings and priests resided were typically surrounded by dwellings which once housed the people supporting them. Probability dictated the team stood a better chance of finding evidence of the ruins of one of these many smaller dwellings surrounding a city, than finding the city itself on the first try. In the hands of an experienced surveyor armed with the right tools such information could potentially narrow a search and save them valuable time.

Having agreed on a plan and finished their meals the group called it a night. Greg's team had all had a long trip and were exhausted. For his part, Mac wanted the group to leave early enough so that the CCF truck could be sent back in time for the workers riding down from San Ignacio to put in a full day's work. Randy wanted the truck to stay on its normal schedule. For these reasons they had decided it would be best for them to get on the road well before sunrise. This, and his recognition that the darkness would help obscure the presence of three additional trucks heading out of Caracol, all factored into the calculation of their pre-dawn departure and correspondingly early bedtime.

Randy woke after a few hours and began to gather the students Mac had consented to loan him from CCF's Caracol dig crews. In addition to the four people Greg had brought with him, three others would join the survey. When Trisia got word they were going she practically begged him to let her go along. Randy didn't mind though. She'd worked well with him up to then, so he knew she was reliable. Mac, however, took a little more convincing. Because Trisia was an undergraduate down in Belize on an internship Mac was reluctant to allow her out on a survey into a remote jungle area. Randy stood up for her, arguing that in order to reduce the number of new people who would know what they were up to it would be best to have as many people as possible who had worked with him on the recent findings included in the search team. To his surprise, Mac bought it.

Also joining the team was James Ludivico. James was a first year graduate student working at Caracol with a background in geology. That meant, as he put it, that he could "read" rocks and soil to determine whether they had been worked by man or by the forces of nature. Randy liked James because he was always good natured. It also didn't hurt that he was strong as an ox and never seemed to get tired. This made him a good man to have helping out on a dig, and Randy was pleased when James agreed to join him.

The last person Randy was "borrowing" from Mac was Bob Atkins. Bob was a bit of a loner who kept mostly to himself, reading and working. Since Bob didn't socialize much with the other students, either here in Belize or back at CCF, and he worked on different projects than Randy did, the two of them had not interacted very much with each other. The project Bob had been working on was the excavation of the first of the Jaguar King's tombs, the one where the skeletons of the sacrificial victims were found. This meant he was familiar with the history of the Jaguar King's reign, and was what first made Mac think he would be a good addition to the search team.

At the time the empty tomb was found it had been considered a very important discovery, although it had since been eclipsed by Randy's find. It was Bob's work on the earlier find that had set the stage for them to quickly begin to make some sense of the items Randy had discovered. Unfortunately for Bob, as a result of Randy's discovery Mac had temporarily suspended most of the follow-up work on the first tomb, devoting the resources to the new find instead. Because the prior discovery was also the topic of Bob's doctoral thesis, which he had been close to completing the field work for, he had taken to moping around the site, unwilling to help out on anything else ever since the new find had diverted resources from his work.

Mac had noticed this and it contributed to his decision to ask Bob to help Randy out. Not surprisingly, Bob wasn't too hot on the idea, but Mac persisted in his fatherly way, promising to restore resources to his project if he'd lend a hand to Randy for a week or two. It wasn't just putting an end to Bob's moping that Mac had in mind. He also knew if the expedition had a chance of finding anything at El Pilar they would need more than one person experienced at surveying. When it came to that, Bob was one of the best Mac had available. For all these reasons he was an obvious choice to help Randy out, and Mac, ever the pragmatist, wouldn't tolerate such a resource sitting idle. Poor Bob never had a chance against the wise old man and it wasn't long before he gave in.

So it was that Randy now went quietly around the little compound of huts and tents where Trisia, James, Bob, and all the other CCF students lived, trying to get them ready to move out without waking the whole camp. Owing to their long journey of the previous day, he thought he would let Greg's team sleep longer. It was a warm night and Greg and his team had chosen to sleep under the stars near their trucks. When he went to wake them he found there was no need to. In anticipation of the start of their search, hardly any of them had been able to sleep. With all the team members awake, and their gear loaded the previous night, Randy ushered them towards the trucks even before the sky began to lighten with the first hint of dawn.

"Is this everyone?" Greg asked when he saw Randy's team totaled only four people.

"This is all Mac could spare, but we'll be meeting up with a guide and some locals I've hired to serve as porters. They don't know anything about where we're going or what we're doing. All they know is they're supposed to meet us at the ranch and they might be gone a week or two," Randy answered. "I wouldn't have told them that much but for the fact that some of them have families and had to tell their wives how long they might be gone for."

Seeing as there were only nine of them, Julie suggested they ride three to a truck in the vehicles Greg had rented, stating it would look less suspicious if the CCF truck left with just the regular driver in it. She really had something else in mind though. Having recalled noticing Trisia's interest in Randy upon her first visit to Caracol, Julie was now in a mischievous mood. From what she could tell by speaking with her last night, Trisia's presence on the team wasn't accidental. Something about Randy's demeanor told Julie he still hadn't noticed the same thing about Trisia as she had. This gave her the idea that maybe she could use the time on the ride to do something about this. So, in addition to pointing out the detail about the CCF truck, she also invited Randy to ride with her and Kevin, saying it would be a good opportunity for the two of them to continue their planning. Without giving it a thought Randy eagerly agreed.

Since James knew the roads better than the others he volunteered to drive the second truck while Marc and Bob accompanied him. Greg, Cynthia, and Trisia rode in the last truck. This time Greg intended to keep a sharp eye out for any signs someone might be following them. With all of them finally on board the three trucks headed up the road from the CCF compound towards the road out of Caracol. Their planned route would take them through San Ignacio, then west on the Western Highway towards Buenavista. The dawn sky had begun to lighten and in the dim morning light they drove with their lights off to avoid being seen.

Upon reaching the wider road which ran past the Caracol Museum Kevin started to pick up speed, only to stop suddenly when Randy shouted, "Look out!" Instinctively Kevin slammed on the brakes, skidding to a halt just in time to avoid hitting a black jaguar that had leapt from the side of the road and right out in front of them. The two trucks behind them caught up to the lead one seconds after its sudden stop.

Greg bolted from the trailing vehicle, the prior night's events fresh in his mind. "What's up?" he asked leaning into the window of Kevin's car.

"We stopped to avoid hitting a jaguar in the road," Randy replied leaning out the window into the morning air. "Lucky to see one. Too bad you missed it. It was a big black one. They're pretty rare. We don't see jaguars, even the regular ones, very often. They're nocturnal and very solitary. Kind of strange to see one in the road like that. "

"That's okay," Greg muttered, "I got to see one real close up at the Belize Zoo a few weeks ago." He turned and walked back towards his truck.

"Guess he's grumpy before coffee," Randy said turning to the others in the car.

"He really did get to see one close up at the zoo," Julie replied, "too close." Kevin lurched the truck back into gear as Julie explained to Randy what had happened to Greg at the zoo.

"At least he got a really nice belt out of it," Randy said upon hearing the tale.

In telling the story to him, what Julie hadn't said to Randy, or to Kevin for that matter, was her concern that Greg was becoming unnerved by some of these events. Instead, she asked something which surprised Randy, "Do you know if that guide you hired will have a gun with him, in case we do run into anything dangerous?"

Her question took him by surprise and it was a moment before he realized she was serious and replied, "Umm, no, but you're probably right. I can call him from Buenavista and see if he can bring one with him." Whether it was her question which caused it, or just the anticipation of the quest before them, the car the three of them rode in grew suddenly quiet.
Chapter 8 – A Dangerous Journey

Other than the jaguar sighting, the truck ride out from Caracol was uneventful. When the sun rose to their right, the clear dawn sky was at first illuminated with brilliant hues of pink and orange, but halfway into the trip clouds rolled in. Soon the weather turned dreary and a light rain misted the windshields of their trucks as they drove up the lonely dirt road. The lead car had grown quiet. Julie decided to try to lighten the mood, which had begun to match that of the skies above them, and under the guise of expressing interest in a fellow woman's career in science she began asking Randy questions about Trisia.

"So Randy, is Trisia the only woman studying archeology at CCF?" Julie asked.

"No, there are others," he replied. "Trisia is down here as an intern, but there are plenty of female archeology students at CCF. She's the only female undergraduate though. The other women working on Caracol right now are all graduate students. I think she's also the only one on the Caracol site at the current time. If I recall correctly there is one other woman who works here in Belize, but she's over at the Museum in Belmopan doing artifact conservation. The rest are all back at CCF. Why do you ask?"

"Just curious. I didn't originally start out in archeology. Well, actually, I'm not an archeologist at all, I'm an anthropologist. I specialize in studying whether cultural artifacts found at archeological digs relate to anything in the culture of corresponding modern civilizations. If it weren't for my brother Greg, I'd never have gotten into it. Women in science need all the encouragement they can get. Too many of you guys treat it like some kind of old boy's network," Julie said a little defensively.

"Oh, you don't have to worry about Trisia. She may be just an undergraduate but she can go toe-to-toe with almost anybody," Randy stated. "You should have seen how she conned poor old Mac into letting her go with us. At first Mac was dead set against it. 'Can't have undergraduates out in remote field locations. Too dangerous. I could get in trouble' etcetera, etcetera, he said to her. Then she went to work on him. Me too, now that I think of it. By the time she was done I was convincing Mac I couldn't do this without her. I'm still not quite sure how she managed that. I don't mind though. She's very enthusiastic, works hard, and generally does whatever I need her to do. Wish every woman I knew was like that," he said.

Julie knew Randy was baiting her and she had to bite back the urge to laugh at him. Poor guy, she thought to herself, from the sound of it he doesn't know what he's in for with her.

Before Julie could think up something to say on Trisia's behalf Randy started in again. "She's a bit of a freak though. Did you notice the body piercings? One through her eyebrow, several in the ears, one in the tongue, one in her belly button. She said she did them all herself. Man, that's got to have hurt!" he said wincing at the idea.

In the second truck what little conversation there was had a more pedestrian air to it. As could be expected, Marc had curled up in the back and gone to sleep. Bob was not known among his peers as a conversationalist. After exchanging a few initial pleasantries, he stuck his nose in a book as soon as the daylight grew bright enough for him to read. James would have preferred to have had better company on the ride. Instead he deferred to the actions of his companions and chose to quietly focus his attention on the road.

In the last car Greg's attention was divided many ways. Foremost on the list was keeping an eye out for anyone who might be following them, though he had other things on his mind as well. Namely Cynthia. Ever since she had first arrived from Philadelphia and met up with the rest of the team for the flight to Belize Greg had been trying, unsuccessfully, to find a way to talk to her in private. She had left Arizona rather suddenly after accepting the post doc job in Pennsylvania, and despite Julie's trying to convince him otherwise, Greg had gotten it into his head Cynthia was mad at him. Now, although he lacked any real plan for doing so, he hoped to find out if he had somehow offended her.

Unfortunately for him, Trisia's presence in the truck was making that impossible. When it came to talking to members of the opposite sex Greg was not very accomplished. His relationship with Cynthia had always been professional, and it would have been tough enough for him to discuss something like this with her even if they were alone. But with Randy no longer in her presence, Trisia could not stop talking about him. Why won't she shut up and take a nap, Greg thought to himself, squirming in his seat at this predicament. Trisia, however, was in her own world.

Nothing she said about Randy was particularly provocative. She simply gossiped on about the discovery he had made, the work he did on translating the codices and the stelae, his reading of the glyphs on the Jaguar King's sarcophagus, and so on and so on. Cynthia took little notice, but Greg was starting to think maybe there was more to Trisia's chattering than the admiration of an enthusiastic student for a talented superior. He quickly dismissed the idea. That's the kind of silly stuff Julie would read into a situation like this, he told himself.

Still, he was irritated by Trisia's enthusiasm, which was hampering his chance to speak to Cynthia, as well as distracting him from his driving. After listening to Trisia babble on for what seemed to him like forever he noticed they had reached the outskirts of San Ignacio. As they passed through the town the group of heavily loaded trucks slowed down to traverse the many speed bumps strategically placed to slow down traffic within the town center, where pedestrians and bicyclists significantly outnumbered cars and trucks.

It was early in the day, but the streets of San Ignacio were already starting to fill with the signs of life. Greg concentrated on keeping up with the trucks in front of him, which wove left and right through the narrow streets, following the poorly marked route the Western Highway took through the town center. As they cleared the center Greg felt relief at the anticipation of what should have been the last short leg to the ruins at Buenavista. Instead, he saw the trucks ahead of him pull off the road at a combination souvenir shop, snack stand, and market at the outskirts of San Ignacio.

What now, he thought. His first instinct was to continue on the road hoping the others would pull back out behind him, but he decided against it. He knew the group had to stay together, so he had no choice but to follow the others and pulled off to the side of the road behind them. It was raining hard and despite being in the tropics he felt a little cold inside. He was tired too and knew it would probably be a long day ahead of them. When he saw Kevin and Julie approaching he rolled down the window to find out what was going on.

"What's up?" he said to the two of them as they huddled in the rain.

"None of us have had anything to eat or drink and we have a long day ahead of us. We're heading in for some coffee and food. Why don't you come in with us?" Julie asked him.

Seeing Bob and James climbing out of the other car ahead of him, Greg realized there was no point in arguing the wisdom of their decision to stop. He turned to Cynthia, who was sitting in the front besides him, and said to her, "Why don't two of us go in and the other one can stay in the car while we get something for them."

Before Cynthia could answer Trisia blurted out, "Oooh, I'll go with you, I love this place. They have the coolest stuff."

Greg rolled his eyes at Trisia's interjection, a look of defeat on his face. Giving no sign as to whether she had noticed this Cynthia said simply, "Sure go ahead, I don't mind waiting here."

Greg and Trisia climbed out of the third car, following the others who had already gone into the roadside store. Marc slept soundly in back of the second car, while in the first car Randy slid over to the driver's side of the truck, then started in making the call to the guide as Julie had requested of him earlier.

When Julie and Kevin climbed back into the truck a few minutes later they were laughing uncontrollably. Randy turned to her and said, "I spoke with the guide. He said if it makes us feel better he'll bring his rifle along with him just in case we run into any dangerous animals."

The two of them tried to stifle their laughter while Randy was speaking but failed. Randy stared at them perplexed. "What is so goddamn funny?" he asked impatiently, then waited for them to calm down enough to answer him.

"I guess you were right about Trisia," Julie said starting to answer him. This caused Kevin to start into laughing once more, triggering Julie to follow suit. It was another minute or two before she regained her composure and continued. "She was in the shop looking at some of the souvenirs. Some really sharp, pointy stingray spines. Greg wandered over to her and asked her why she was interested in those. She told him she had read the Maya used to use them for performing self sacrifice and body piercing."

"Okay, what's so funny about that?" Randy asked.

"Nothing, it's what happened next," Julie responded. "Greg stared at her and said 'Looks like you've pierced about everything there is to pierce,' and in a totally straight face, by which you could tell she really meant it, Trisia responded to him 'Not at all. I still haven't pierced down there' and she nodded her head downwards. Greg looked down at her bare midriff and said 'I don't get it, you already have a belly button piercing.' Trisia rolled her eyes at him, then nodded her head further downwards, responding loud enough for the whole store to hear 'No silly, DOWN THERE!' "

At this Julie burst out laughing again. She tried in vain to suppress her laughter as she struggled to complete the story, "You should have seen the look on Greg's face! All he could do was stammer and say 'That is soooo wrong!' Then his face turned bright red as he spun around and headed straight for the cash register. It was hilarious. From the look on his face you'd have thought she was proposing he do it to her right there in the store," at which point she and Kevin erupted in an uncontrollable fit of laughter lasting for what felt to them like several minutes.

"I told you she was a bit of a freak," Randy said. "Now if you can stop laughing long enough we should get going. Buenavista's pretty close and I'd like to have another look around there. I've been by there in the past but the stupid museum always seems to be closed so I've never gotten a good look at the stela. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky today and can do more than just peer through the greasy windows at it. I never had much reason to care about that stela before, but something about it is really bugging me. I mean why would a stela containing the glyph matching the one in the Jaguar King's epitaph have been found at such a minor site as Buenavista? It doesn't fit with your theory about where the city of the Jaguar King's enemy is supposed to be, and it doesn't fit with what else is known about Buenavista. I'm starting to doubt whether the stela in the museum at Buenavista was really found there and it would help if we could get a good look at it in order to learn anything more about it."

When the others filtered out of the shop Randy started his truck, then impatiently waited for them to start theirs. As soon as the two other trucks had also started, he lurched his into gear, checked his mirror to make sure the others were with him, then turned out onto the Western Highway. A few minutes later he pulled off the highway at the entrance to the site of Buenavista.

The full name of the place was Buenavista del Cayo. It was a small site with only one low mound. There were hundreds of small settlement sites like this in Belize alone, with perhaps thousands more scattered throughout the rest of Meso-America. Some of them had been excavated. Most of those had proved to be places where the Maya conducted their simple day to day lives. A very few showed some small indication of limited rituals being performed at them. Some even had evidence of the Mayan ballgame being played there, but none were believed to be sites of truly important ceremonial value.

The idea that a site like Buenavista wasn't the type of place any Mayan king would have adorned with a ceremonial stela continued to bother Randy. He strongly suspected the stela didn't really belong here, but, as he knew first hand, Mayan archeology was often full of surprises. As a good archeologist he had committed himself to try to put his preconceptions aside and follow a discovery wherever it might lead. This meant he couldn't discount the possibility something important, something which merited a commemorative stela, had indeed happened there. His goal at Buenavista today was to use what he had learned from the new finds at Caracol to better examine the older one here.

With this goal in mind Randy was furious when he stepped out of the truck only to find the door of the small museum locked as it had been on every other occasion he tried to visit it. "Museum" was actually a kind way to describe it. It was really just a hut. A hut with a glass window and a door and, most infuriatingly to Randy, a lock on the door. The sign on the door showed opening times indicating the museum should be open. Nonetheless it was locked. Angry, Randy pounded on the door, then he kicked at it as well for good measure. He wasn't trying to break it down, nor could he have, as the door was the sturdiest part of the otherwise decrepit building. He was simply venting his frustration at once again being unable to get in to see the stela which, in the grey light of the rainy day, was barely visible through the dirty window of the unlit museum.

His pounding on the door did have some effect though, for after a few minutes of kicking and cursing, an old man appeared from a hut a few hundred feet down the road. Hearing the commotion he had come out of his house by the highway turnoff, and was shouting angrily as he approached Randy. Unfortunately Randy's Spanish wasn't very good and he couldn't understand much of anything the agitated old man yelled at him. Instead, he stood there in the rain looking perplexed. Up until this point Trisia had been sitting in the third truck staying dry, but when she heard the old man yelling at Randy in Spanish she got out of the truck and walked over to see what was going on.

Trisia was a young woman who, as her tattoos and body piercings suggested, defied stereotypes. She had grown up in a very exclusive suburb near L.A. and although her last name was Hernandez, her well to do immigrant parents had insisted upon her speaking nothing but English. Increasingly defiant as a teenager she did what any rebellious teen in her situation would do, she did exactly the opposite of what her parents wanted. She reached out to the culture her parents had tried to distance her from by immersing herself in it. By the time she graduated high school her Spanish was good, almost as good as if she had learned it while growing up. When coupled with her love of history and sense of social justice she became drawn to learning about the cultures of the peoples of the Americas who predated Spanish colonial rule. On entering college she learned a career in archeology would not only satisfy these interests but would also allow her to work outdoors in exotic tropical settings. She was sold.

Of course she soon learned archeology wasn't quite as glamorous a career as the movies made it out to be. Digging up mud and dirt, then sifting through it to look for shards of pottery, with the hot sun beating down upon her the whole time, could be quite tedious at times. Lucky for her she was possessed of an indomitable spirit, and no matter how tedious the work got just one small thing could make her forget all of the bad things about it. The pungent smell of tropical flowers, the sight or sound of brightly colored native birds, or the discovery of a small piece of polychromatic Maya pottery would set her to wondering what things were like in the time before the Maya's civilization fell.

Even more rewarding to her was the fact that she was able to help out on the project by doing more than just digging. She wasn't the sole bilingual member of the CCF team, but she often found herself being called upon to translate between the research staff and the local workers. Both groups liked her, sometimes too much, she thought. The graduate students liked her because although she was new to archeology she had quickly grasped the basics of day-to-day work on the dig site. This allowed her to be their eyes and ears among the workers, freeing them to spend their time examining what the dig teams discovered. The local workers liked her because she was "Una chica bonita!" and they could flirt with her without their wives or girlfriends knowing. That, and it was clear to them that, unlike some of the other students, she truly cared about their well being.

Now as she climbed from the truck and approached the museum she readied herself to ply those same skills which had made her popular with the diggers on the old man. The old man was upset and speaking very fast. It took her a moment or two until she recognized he was talking in a mix of Spanish and a local Maya tongue she didn't understand. From what she could make out he was telling Randy they would have to pay admission to get into the museum. Speaking slowly she addressed the old man in Spanish in a soothing tone, saying to him, "Please calm down Señor. My friend is sorry. He has tried to see the stela in this museum before but each time he has come it is always closed. Is it possible for us to get inside to see the stone?"

On hearing someone behind him addressing him in Spanish the old man turned to see Trisia standing there. He must have been spooked by her appearance though, because the only word out of his mouth was "Diablita." Randy understood enough Spanish to know that loosely translated it meant "little She-Devil", and upon hearing the old man address Trisia in this manner, he snickered. Hearing his furtive laughter Trisia shot him a dirty look, one he took to mean, "shut up I'm trying to help you here," at which point he wisely chose to keep quiet.

"Por Favor Señor," she pleaded in Spanish, "No esta una diablita. Estoy solamente una chica normal." (Please Señor, I'm not a she-devil, just a normal girl.)

At this the old man seemed to calm down somewhat. "Que cuesta para entrada en el museo?" Trisia said, asking the man the entrance fee in the hope of distracting him from his preoccupation with her appearance by changing the subject.

"Dos dólares Belize," the old man responded.

"He says it's two Belize dollars to get in," Trisia said to Randy, "Give the man two bucks and he'll let you in."

Randy pulled out a twenty. It was all he had. The man began to protest that he didn't have any change but Trisia said, "Por los todos. For all of us."

Satisfied, the man nodded, pulled a key from his pocket, and unlocked the padlock on the door. "Quince minutos," he said and walked back up the road.

"He says we got fifteen minutes," Trisia translated for Randy.

It was his turn to shoot her a dirty look as he said, "I speak that much Spanish," then pushed past her into the small hut. He was followed in by Trisia, Greg and Julie. The others had gone off to take a look around the site or continued to sit in the cars to stay out of the rain. "Crap, there isn't any light in here," Randy said.

"I've got one out in the truck. I'll be back in a minute," Trisia said. She darted back out through the door while the rest of them stood in the dim grey light of the hut. A minute later she was back inside pointing the flashlight onto the stela while Randy tried to read it.

"It's very badly worn. It hasn't been properly conserved and not much of it is readable. I think I can read some of it though. This is the glyph we think refers to the name of the Jaguar King's enemy. This is the one for Caracol. This is the glyph for Venus. These are the ones for the Moon and Mars," he said his voice trailing off.

He was quiet for a moment as he focused intently on one area of the large stone, then he spoke again, "It's damaged here but I can make out part of a date. Looks like the first parts of a long count date. 9.12.13. Wish I could read all of it, but the first part matches with the date I found in the Epitaph Codex. As best as I can tell this stone looks like it records the date of an astronomical event. If I'm translating correctly, it commemorates a victory in battle over Caracol, a battle whose outcome was foretold by the astronomical event which occurred on the date recorded here."

Randy turned to Trisia, "Trisia, can you get that old man back here? I want to see if he knows anything about this stone."

"I'll try," she said, ducking back out of the hut and into the rain. She ran up the road in the direction the old man had originally come from. A few minutes later she approached the museum with the old man in tow. Randy stepped out into the rain to meet them.

"Ask him if he knows where this stone came from," Randy said.

Trisia translated Randy's question and the old man's answer in turn. "He says it came from here," she replied.

"Tell him that's impossible. Ask him who found it, when they found it, and exactly where on this site it was found?" Randy said to Trisia, who dutifully translated his question and the old man's answer.

"He said his father found it in 1915, not long after the first road was built here so that British tourists could travel to Tikal from Belize City. He said his father told him when he was a boy the tourists would pay money to see this," Trisia said.

"Ask him what his father's name is," Randy said then waited while she translated.

"Luis Trajero," said the old man.

"Ask him if his father ever knew a man named Alfred Maudslay," Randy asked Trisia and waited for the reply. As she talked back and forth with the old man she absent-mindedly fiddled in her fanny pack for something. Her long dark hair was wet and had fallen in her face. She pulled it back with one hand while with the other she pulled out one of the stingray spines she had purchased at the roadside stand. For a moment she held it in front of her face while she twisted her hair, then neatly slid it into her hair to pin it in place.

As she did so a frightened look came over the old man. Maybe it was the mention of Maudslay's name, or maybe it was the visage of Trisia, pierced body parts and all, brandishing the pointy stingray spine in front of him, but just then the old man started in to babbling. Trisia tried to keep up with translating what he was saying, but he broke down into tears, then turned and shuffled back up the road away from the small hut. Trisia stood there with a perplexed look on her face then ran after the old man.

Randy followed after her shouting over the downpour, "What did he say, what did he say?"

Trisia called back over her shoulder to Randy as she followed the old man trying to get him to stop. "He said when he was a young boy, shortly after his father discovered the stela, a man named Maudslay came to visit his father. He said his father had worked for Maudslay before he was born and that Maudslay had come back many years later with some government men. His father had an argument with Maudslay and the government men about the stela. A little while after that his father took ill and died. The old man says Maudslay put a curse on his father."

She turned back towards the old man and pleadingly said something Randy couldn't hear or understand, then she turned back to Randy "He thinks I am a she-devil and I mean to bleed him for sacrifice with my stingray spine. Guess he still believes in some of that old Maya stuff. Anyway, he says he won't talk to us anymore and we should leave."

"Tell him we know his father didn't find the stela here! Ask him if he knows where his father actually found it! Tell him it's important! Tell him we'll pay him for the answers!" Randy said shouting at her now. She winced at him as if she didn't want to do it. "Ask him!" he yelled.

"I don't think he's going to talk to me anymore," Trisia said.

"Maybe you can wave that stingray spine in front of him again," Randy said.

"Randy!" she shouted back at him. Then she turned back to the old man, who was shuffling up the road away from them, and tried asking him once more what Randy had requested. The old man didn't stop or reply, he just kept walking back to his house. Seeing this Randy turned and tromped back to the hut through the mud with Trisia following after him.

While Randy and Trisia headed off in pursuit of the old man, Greg went off towards the ruins in order to collect the others. He quickly located those who had been wandering in the rain among the small set of ruins. Between the unimpressive nature of the site, and the rotten weather, Greg didn't have to work too hard to convince them it was time to head back to the trucks so they could get moving. The trucks were parked right next to the museum and as he headed towards them, Greg ducked his head into it to deliver the same message to Julie, whom he had left alone there a few minutes before. When he did this, he found Randy and Trisia, who apparently had gotten nowhere with the old man, had returned to the hut. Randy was standing there fixated on the stela. Trisia stood next to him with a scowl on her face.

Standing in the doorway, Greg looked at Julie and pointed at his watch, motioning to her that it was time to get moving. Randy, however, was oblivious to anything going on around him and continued to stand there looking at the stela, not acknowledging Greg's gestures. Greg made a motion to Julie as if to say, "What's up?" She responded to him by nodding her head toward Randy and raising her hands in a manner as if to say, "beats me!" Greg chose not to break Randy's concentration.

For several minutes Randy stood transfixed, a brooding expression on his face. All the while Trisia said nothing. Seeing the look on Randy's face Julie also decided it was probably best if she did not say anything. The only sound was the rain on the roof of the hut. Then suddenly Randy's expression changed as a thought struck him. He pulled out his cell phone and stepped past Greg, outside into the rain.

Much of Belize was relatively low lying, and cell coverage was surprisingly good. The government phone company had invested quite a bit in the placement of towers, especially along the main roads such as the Western Highway. Additionally, they had put many of them at geographic high points in more remote areas, using microwave links and solar power to connect them. As costly as it was to initially build the system, the price of using it had steadily come down. Eventually it dropped to a point where enough Belizeans could afford the service that more of them now had access to a cell phone than if the government had tried to run land based phone wires. As such, cellular technology had proved transformative to a small country like Belize, allowing it to leapfrog older technologies and grow its economy.

At the current moment, though, none of this mattered to Randy as he pulled out his phone and called down to the compound at Caracol. He hoped someone there would answer. Luckily for him Mac did. Trisia stood in the rain next to him as he talked. "Professor, this is Randy. I'm at Buenavista. Do you recall that Alfred Maudslay biography you once loaned me? Yes that's the one. Do have your copy of it at the site with you?" He didn't say anything for a moment. He stood there with an impatient look on his face. Then he breathed what appeared to be a sigh of relief and spoke again, "Great! Can you see if there is a mention of someone named Luis Trajero in it? I seem to remember it being in connection with one of Maudslay's trips to Tikal."

He stood there for what felt to her like an eternity. "What does the book say about him?" he said, and there was another pause. "Is there anything else? No, thank you Professor. That's good enough. I'll explain it all when we get back. I can't prove it but I have a really strong hunch the stela here at Buenavista wasn't actually found here. Thanks." He shut the cell phone and headed back to where the trucks, and everyone else but Trisia, were waiting.

"Who the hell is Maudslay? What the heck just went on here and why is that old man so scared?" Trisia asked. Randy kept walking. When he reached the lead truck he got into the back seat of it. Trisia grabbed the door as he got in and held it open as he tried to close it after him. "Randy answer me," she said insistently.

Instead of answering her he turned to Kevin, who was now in the drivers seat, and said, "Let's get out of here. We've wasted too much time here already. I'll tell you where to go. Head back east on the Western Highway. About a half mile up on the left you'll see a dirt road. Turn off onto it and follow it until it forks, take the left one and it will bring us to the Ranch."

Trisia glared at Randy through the open door. Realizing she'd continue to do so until he answered her questions he said, "Climb in, I'll tell you while we drive." Reluctantly she did so.

"Maudslay was a British explorer. He was a self taught archeologist and one of the first Europeans to tour Mayan ruins. He made several trips to this region over a forty year period beginning around 1880 and was the first person to photographically document many of the Mayan ruins," Randy said.

Upon hearing Randy's answer Trisia stopped glaring at him and asked, "So why did the old man think Maudslay was responsible for his father's death?"

"Beats me," Randy said and he proceeded to tell Kevin, Julie, and Trisia what Mac had relayed to him. "But when he said his father's name it sounded familiar to me. It took a few minutes before I could place it and I wasn't sure if I was remembering correctly where I'd seen it before. That's why I phoned Mac, to have him look it up. We're lucky Mac had Maudslay's biography down here with him. According to his biographer, Maudslay had written in his diary about a man named Luis Trajero who lived around here. I think Trajero was the old man's father, he's about the right age. Evidently Maudslay had hired Trajero on one of his expeditions to photograph Tikal, but Trajero proved untrustworthy and Maudslay dismissed him. Judging by notes of Maudslay's included in the biography, Trajero got the idea from his brief experience working with Maudslay and a few other late 19th century archeologists that there was money to be made in locating Mayan antiquities and selling them to European collectors."

Catching his breath Randy continued on, "Keep in mind there was no regulation of this at the time, no black market as today, so it would have been legal for him to do so. Still, according to Maudslay's journals, many archeologists bitterly objected to this practice saying that while removing artifacts for proper conservation in European museums was justified, the objects needed to first be studied where they were located and should only be removed later, after they had been photographed and documented in place. Based on what Mac related to me from Maudslay's biography, Trajero and some others cared more about money than archeology and the issue came to a head a few years later after several sites had been disfigured by local artifact hunters. There were even rumors some attempts had been made to transport very large stela, like the one here at Buenavista, but those efforts were abandoned when it proved impractical. While the rumors were never proven they did eventually result in Maudslay convincing officials of the British Colonial government to accompany him as far as here on his last trip to Tikal. Together they paid a call on Trajero in order to warn him and others off from such ventures. It was merely a coincidence that Trajero died shortly thereafter, although I can see how in the mind of what was then a small boy, now an old man, the two events could have become indelibly linked."

Julie peered over her shoulder from the front of the car and said to Randy and Trisia, "I get it. You think the monument at Buenavista wasn't found there. You think Trajero found it somewhere else and had it hauled out to the road hoping to cart it down to the coast and sell it to a European museum or collector. When Maudslay and the Colonial officials showed up to put the heat on him, he denied its true origins and claimed he had found it at Buenavista."

"That's exactly what I'm thinking," Randy replied.

"Poor old man," Trisia said. "No wonder he was so upset. He lived all his life thinking his father was one of the few locals to ever make an important discovery about the Maya and that Maudslay had him killed for it. Then we show up out of nowhere, drag up something traumatic which happened to him years ago, and call his father a fraud."

"His father was a fraud," Randy said, "at least that's what I think."

"You're probably right, but that's not how that poor old man sees it," Trisia replied.

As she made her point, Kevin tried to focus on driving. The rain was starting to come down harder as the truck reached the fork in the dirt road Randy had told him about. Just past it was a shallow creek of fast flowing water. Kevin stopped the truck. "Is it safe to drive through that?" he said to Randy, turning his head backwards to face him in the back seat.

"Well it's usually a dry creek, except when it rains really heavy. It doesn't look too deep but if we're going to get across it, get the trucks unloaded and send them back out then we better do it soon," Randy said.

Kevin turned back around, kicked the truck into gear and hoped for the best. The water came about halfway up the tires of the truck. As he drove, Kevin could feel the force of the water pushing the truck slightly sideways. Though he had to steer against it, the truck easily crossed the creek and pulled up the muddy embankment on the other side. A few hundred yards further along the road he saw the barns and buildings of the horse ranch.

"See the big barn with the open door?" Randy asked Kevin, "Drop me off at the door and then pull into the building and all the way up so the others can pull in behind you."

When Kevin stopped, Randy popped out of the truck and into the rain outside the barn, signaling to the other trucks to follow Kevin into it. Once inside, everyone got out of the vehicles. "Start unloading everything you want to take with you," Randy told the team, "we have to get the trucks emptied out fast so they can get back across the creek. I'm going over to the office to find our guide."

The guide Randy had hired was named Onofre. He was an experienced horseman and ran the ranch, although he was not its owner. He also frequently served as a broker for day laborers working on the digs, and for porters assisting naturalists and tourists traveling in the back country. Randy had asked him to arrange for ten horses and at least two dozen men to help them carry their gear. He knew he'd be lucky to end up with eight horses and a dozen men, especially since he needed to send some men back to Caracol with the trucks as part of the ruse to cover their tracks.

When he arrived inside the office Onofre was nowhere to be seen. There were perhaps twenty or so men sitting in the little covered picnic area and bar next to the office. Good thing the bar isn't open, Randy thought to himself, otherwise I might not get a dozen men to go. He looked around the men to see if he recognized any of them from previous work on the site. Finally he spoke up, "Do any of you speak English? I am looking for Onofre. Do any of you know where he is?"

"I speak English," one of the younger men said to him. "I think Onofre is out in the far horse shed," as he pointed to a building set back away from the others and near a fenced in field.

"You look familiar, what's your name," Randy asked the young man.

"We never actually met. I am Santos. I usually work as a guide in training for some of the resorts. I was there with some tourists on the day the new discovery at Caracol was made," Santos said to Randy.

"Oh yes, you were the guide that was with Greg, Kevin, and Julie as I recall. What are you doing with this crew? Doesn't the guide work pay much better than this?" Randy asked him.

"I am only a guide in training and at this time of year there are fewer tourists so they don't have as much work for me. I try to get work with the back country tours. It lets me practice spotting wildlife and is not as hard as other work," Santos answered him.

"Well it's good to have someone like you with us. You'll probably recognize the three folks from the resort who were with you that day, they're with our group as well," Randy said to Santos.

"Where are we going Señor?" Santos asked.

Randy hadn't told the porters where they were going, nor did he want to, but at Santos' inquiry he realized he hadn't come up with a good cover story to tell them in case anyone asked. He quickly came up with something, "Well, your former charges had such a good time on their last trip they returned to see some more of the back country. They were kind enough to invite me along in gratitude of the professional courtesy we showed them on their first trip, and myself and some of my crew have been working so hard we figured we'd take them up on their offer and see some more of Belize than just the dirt at Caracol."

Then he asked Santos, "Is this all the men we have?"

"I believe so, sir. Onofre would know for sure," Santos responded.

"I'm going to go locate Onofre," Randy said back to Santos. "Can you please ask the men to decide who is willing to go do porter work in the back country and who is only willing to do day labor on the dig site down at Caracol? I'll be back in a few minutes with Onofre," then he walked out from under the thatched roof of the picnic area and into the steady rain.

On his way out to the horse shed Randy took a detour to where the trucks were to see how the unloading of them was progressing. The task was about half complete so he turned his attention to moving among the group as they worked, quietly filling them in on the cover story. "Remember," he told each of them, "no one but the nine of us should know what we're up to until I say so. I haven't even told our guide. So make sure you keep it straight." Then he headed off to the horse shed at the far end of a nearby field.

The shed had a strong smell of damp horse, but it was better than standing out in the heavy rain. When he stuck his head in he didn't see Onofre, but he could hear the sound of men working at the far end so he called out, "Onofre, are you here?"

Onofre answered him, "Mr. Randy, it is a pleasure to see you again. How are you? Are you ready for your adventure?"

Onofre was generally a very happy person and warmly greeted all his guests, but there was something in his tone today which made Randy suspicious his greeting was hiding some bad news. "I'm very well and despite the rain we are looking forward to getting on the trail. I saw the men waiting over at the bar, are you expecting more than that?" Randy asked.

"Well Mr. Randy, it is possible some more will come but then we must wait to see. I have asked as many men as I could, but many did not want to go on such a long trip and many said they would come but have not shown. It could be they are delayed by the rain or they do not wish to work in the rain. You know many men here will not work in the rain," Onofre said to Randy in an apologetic tone.

Randy sighed. He knew there wasn't much Onofre could do if men didn't want the work. As an American he always found it puzzling that even when a good wage was offered, sometimes double the prevailing wage, many men would not work on certain days, in certain places, or certain weather. Some chose the days they would work based on the prophecies of the Maya Tzolk'in calendar. Some believed certain places were unlucky or haunted by spirits. Others chose to work only when they needed money, doing it seasonally or simply based on the weather.

It wasn't that the workers were lazy. In fact, Randy found they could be very hard working and industrious. To an outsider their attitudes towards work could be best summed up as having been shaped by thousands of years of culture and traditions which placed a different set of priorities on the choice of when and where work should properly be done. These priorities often came into conflict with those of the British Colonials in the late nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries, and more recently those of American archeologists. At the Caracol dig Randy had learned to shrug it off and do the best he could with the men he could get. Today, however, he chafed at the inconvenience this presented him. At least, he thought to himself, we'll have the horses. Then he realized he'd better check with Onofre about this too, since who knew if the horses might refuse to work in the rain as well.

"What about the horses?" Randy asked Onofre.

"They are much more reliable than the men Mr. Randy. We will have six strong ones for you!" Onofre answered.

"Only six? I'd asked you for at least ten!" Randy replied with some exasperation in his voice.

"Yes I am sorry, Mr. Randy. We usually have eighteen to twenty-four horses here so I did not lie to you, but two days ago the owner came in from the coast and took many of them for the other ranch. He said he had a very big group from a cruise ship and told me he would bring them back by today. He has called this morning and said he would not come because of the bad weather. He left us with only eight. One is pregnant and I would not take her on a trip of this length. Another has hurt his leg just this morning. We were working on him to see if he could still make the trip but he will need some days of rest. The six we have are some of the biggest we own and are very strong and healthy," Onofre said.

Randy could see Onofre was telling him the truth, and that he was ashamed he could not deliver everything he had promised to Randy. "I'm sure you have done your best Onofre. We will make do as best we can. Let's take the horses over to the car barn. All our gear is waiting there. I had hoped we would have enough horses to carry both the heavy gear and our group. Instead, we will put the heavy gear on the horses we have and everyone else will walk on foot. Once we have the horses loaded we can distribute the rest of the load among the porters."

"Yes, Mr. Randy, thank you," Onofre said and then went to the back of the horse barn to call out the two men who were working on the injured horse. Together the three of them led the six horses over to the car barn while Randy walked beside them.

After they entered the car barn Randy explained the situation to Kevin and Greg. They decided some of the heaviest gear, like the sonogram sled and the computer that processed its readings, would have to be left behind. Other heavy gear such as axes, shovels, pick axes, hand saws, chain saws, gasoline cans, surveying equipment, and things of a similar nature were loaded onto the horses. The food, tents, sleeping bags, medical supplies, clothes, cameras, tarps, water jugs, and everything else they were bringing along would be distributed into the packs of the porters and the team.

Their plan was to hike in to the place they had chosen for the base camp in two days, three at the most. As far as Onofre knew he was taking them out to help them choose a spot to set up a camp from which they would spend ten days hiking, camping and observing animals in the back country. He didn't know Randy and his group had other plans. Randy intended to send most of the porters home along with Onofre once they made camp. This would conserve food and keep up the appearance of their plan. He would keep a few men on hand to assist with hauling the gear around on each day's surveying. Then, if they did find something, they could send for Onofre early, before the pre-arranged day he was to come get them, and ask him to bring additional men to work on digging. At least that was the plan according to Randy.

Admittedly it wasn't the greatest of cover stories, but it was enough to keep too many questions from being asked of him. The porters usually kept to themselves and worried mostly about getting paid. They were a rowdy lot and even if they did say something on their return, most people would likely dismiss their stories. Telling the porters a cover story was one thing, telling it to Onofre, however, was something entirely different. He was trustworthy and Randy didn't like keeping him in the dark about the true nature of the trip. Randy had done so up until now out of fear that someone close to Onofre might figure things out and not be as circumspect as he was. He decided he must confide the truth to him before they set out, but he hesitated in search of the right moment.

Inside the car barn Onofre's men tied up the horses and proceeded loading them. Onofre started to help as well, but Randy pulled him away, "We must see to the other men. Some of them need to take the cars back down to Caracol and work on the dig there today."

"You would have men digging in this weather?" Onofre asked Randy.

"Normally we wouldn't but you must have heard of the recent discoveries? There is much work to be done to make sure we haven't missed anything and we are behind schedule, so the Professor needs the men there today as well," Randy told Onofre. It was a lie. Onofre was right, there would be no digging at Caracol today because of the weather, but Randy was going to pay the men anyway, so what would they care? They would ride down in the three trucks, lounge around in the hammocks for the day, get paid, and then Mac would have someone take them back in the regular truck which had gone out this morning as usual, but had already returned to Caracol empty. If they were lucky anyone who might be watching out on behalf of Hull would be fooled by the ruse and Hull would think they were all still at Caracol.

Back at the picnic tables next to the office, the men were waiting patiently. As Randy had requested, Santos had asked the men to decide if they wanted day work or were willing to spend days, or as much as two weeks, in the back country. When Randy arrived with Onofre he was to be disappointed again. Of the twenty-one men, only eight of them, Santos included, said they were willing to go into the back country. Randy had been hoping for eighteen so they could carry extra food and the packs could be kept light enough to allow them to make better time.

Randy realized it looked like there would be no more than these twenty-one men to pick from, since with the rain falling as hard as it was it would be unlikely any more would show up. He also realized he'd need to send nine men back to Caracol in order to fool anyone Hull might have watching. At best he'd have twelve men plus Onofre and the nine on their team to carry everything they couldn't get on the horses. That was, if he could convince twelve men to head out with them.

Randy talked this over with Onofre and Santos to see what could be done to induce a few extra men to go. Onofre convinced Randy he would have to offer more than the normal wage for the men who would go with them. He argued the men were probably figuring digging under the tarps at Caracol, although harder work, would be preferable to hauling a heavy pack through the mud and rain for several days. Randy agreed, and Onofre made the new offer to the men. Most shook their heads no, but Santos spoke once more and three relented, agreeing to join them.

"What did you say to them Santos?" Randy asked.

"I knew most of the holdouts were men with families who did not want to stay away from them long. But I also knew a few were single men, so I reminded them how useful some extra money would be in getting the attention of the ladies when they returned," Santos said.

"Good thinking," Randy replied. He then turned to Onofre, "Onofre, I forgot to ask. Do any of the men going down to Caracol know how to drive and can be trusted to take the trucks straight back?"

"Yes Mr. Randy. I know all these men and their families. There are some among them who can do this," Onofre responded.

"Well then, let's get over to the car barn and get the group that is going back to Caracol on their way before the creek gets any higher. Then the rest can load up their packs so we can all get moving," Randy said.

With the manpower issue sorted out, the trucks pulled out of the ranch on their return to Caracol with the decoy passengers. The twelve men who agreed to serve as porters in the back country grabbed the packs provided to them by Onofre's ranch hands and proceeded to load them full of provisions. The horses were fully loaded with the heavy gear. As soon as the porters were ready, the team of archeologists, led by Randy and Greg, pulled their packs on too. Randy called for Onofre to lead the way and the entire lot of them followed him out of the car barn, back towards the horse barn, through the fence gate, and across the field to the far side where another gate led out onto a dirt road which had since turned to mud.

"This is the old road leading to Buenavista del Cayo. It goes past it then turns north and follows the Mopan to Bullet Tree. We will follow it as far as where the Mopan bends sharply to the east. There, a few miles west of Bullet Tree, is a spot in the river where it is shallow enough for us to cross. Then we can continue north to a place a little higher up in the forest. I think that would be a good place for you to make your camp. I will show you on the map later, but we should go now so we will still have light when we make our first camp," Onofre said to Randy and Greg, who were at the head of the column of men and horses.

"Sounds good," Randy said back to him and he tugged gently on the reins of the horse he was leading.

The road was muddy and the rain had begun to fall more heavily. With the heavy packs the going was very slow. Those at the lead of the column had to pick their way carefully. In some places they had to roll logs or rocks into the trail so they could step over spots that had become pools of thick mud. The entire time they walked the rain fell.

They endured this misery for several hours but they couldn't have gotten more than two miles before Onofre said they should make camp. Being the skilled guide he was, he told his charges there was nothing to be gained by continuing any further today. They would not find a better spot to sleep, for although the ground was wet where they now were, the rest of the terrain between it and the river crossing was lower and was therefore sure to be nothing but mud. The team recognized his good advice.

In this bad weather they knew the clouds and rain would cause it to get dark earlier. Eager to get out of the rain and into the relative shelter of their tents, the group moved swiftly. Their dinner consisted of dehydrated meals cooked in rainwater. Those who were willing to brave the downpour assumed the role of chef, carefully balancing little pots on top of the lightweight camp stoves the team had brought along, while other stalwart volunteers held lamps for them.

As they sat under tarps eating their meal in the fading grey light Julie mused idly, "Wow, even the accommodations of the desert dig site seem luxurious compared to these surroundings."

Greg, worried her remark might set a bad tone for the trip from the start, replied to her, "Well, this is only our first night out. You'll get used to this pretty fast and hopefully the weather will improve."

The rest of the group ignored the exchange and no one else made any other effort at talk, the bad weather having gotten most everyone's spirits down. Finishing their meal, they quickly headed off for a fitful night's sleep in the wet conditions. It rained most of the night but let up a few hours before dawn.

Soon after the rain ceased, the clouds began to clear and the sun poked through them here and there as it rose. The group broke camp quickly and packed up their rain soaked belongings. They'd have to find some other time to dry them out. They set out marching along the muddy trail running parallel to the river, both of which took a northward track. Just as it had the day before, the mud along the trail made the going very slow and even the sure-footed horses had to pick their way carefully.

After about an hour and a half of slogging through muck they reached the spot of the river crossing. The river was muddy and looked turbulent. Onofre turned to Randy and said, "Mr. Randy. This is the place I wanted to cross. Normally this would be an easy place to cross on horse or by foot. It would be no deeper than your knees. Today, because of all the hard rain, it looks like the river has risen rapidly. I can not say for sure but I think the water would be as high as your waist and it is moving very fast. I do not think we can cross here. We must continue down river and take the cable ferry at Bullet Tree."

"We can't do that Onofre, we must cross here," Randy said to him.

"This is not possible. It would be much too dangerous," Onofre replied.

"Walk with me away from the men Onofre, I must tell you something I have kept from you," Randy said realizing he could no longer delay telling him the truth. As he walked Randy told Onofre about the real purpose of their trip. He was careful not to tell him too much, but he explained that if others saw where they were headed, they might be set upon by looters or bandits. As dangerous as the river might be, Randy tried to convince him it was safer for them to cross it there so they could keep their work a secret.

Onofre reluctantly recognized this. Thinking over their options he decided the best course of action would be for them to make a test. They would unload one of the strongest horses, then Onofre, who was a very skilled rider, would take the horse across. If he could do this then it might be possible for the rest of them to cross.

The plan was simple. Onofre would take a strong rope with him and tie it across the river so the horses could be tethered to it. Then, with a smaller line which he had also stretched across the river, the horses' bridle would be looped to the strong tether line. The horse would be guided into the water then pulled by the bridle line along the tether line. In this way they could lead the horses back and forth across the river from either bank.

To accomplish this they would have to lighten the loads so the horses would not have both the weight of the packs and the current of the river to struggle with. Lightening the load meant it would take several trips to get the gear across. Once the gear was across they would send the horses back again. The good riders among them could then take others with them who could not ride across the river on their own.

Onofre and Randy discussed the idea. They agreed there were a few drawbacks to this plan. The first was the realization that crossing in this manner was going to take quite a bit of time. The second, however, was of much greater concern to them. If the horses became too tired from the many trips the crossing would require, they might not be able to complete the crossing and the team could end up being split. Worse yet was the risk someone could get hurt.

Randy realized this, but he saw no other way around it if they were to cross the river without attracting attention. The only way to know for sure if the plan was feasible was to try it, so he gave Onofre the go ahead, telling him to be careful. Onofre selected a tall horse and had his men clear all of the gear off of it. Then he climbed on and slowly nudged the horse towards the river.

Having more sense than its rider or his companions the horse hesitated on seeing the steep river bank and the swiftly moving water contained in it. It took Onofre a bit of kicking and coaxing but the horse relented and strode into the fast moving river. The horse was strong but still it seemed to struggle against the flow. Slowly it moved out deeper into the river until the water covered its legs and was halfway up its body.

As Randy watched the horse go deeper into the water he guessed from the depth it was submerged to that were he in the water himself it would come up to just beneath his shoulders. Being 6'2" he realized this meant the water would be well above the shoulders of many of the others. He began to think this plan might not be such a good idea, but he felt some relief when he observed the horse start to rise out of the water.

Evidently the river was at its maximum depth for just a few feet of its approximately seventy foot width. Beyond the deepest point, the last thirty feet or so was waist deep or less, and judging by the change in the horse's gait appeared not to be moving as swiftly. Under normal conditions I bet most of this river is all shallows and mud flats, Randy thought to himself, but not today. Today the tough part will be getting the returning horses up onto the steep bank on this side.

Once across Onofre tied the strong rope off to a sturdy tree, then Randy did the same on his side. Onofre mounted the horse again and forded back across the river. As Randy had feared, the horse had a tough time with the steep bank on the near side. Onofre threw a smaller rope, which he tied off to the saddle horn, down to his men in order to allow those on the bank to help pull the horse from the river.

With the tether line in place it was time to string the bridle line. Onofre took a longer, but smaller, line and in the middle of it he tied a loop about the stronger, thicker line. He then tied this to the horse's bridle. Next he tied a third strong line to the saddle horn and steered the horse down the steep bank, into the river and back across.

For a moment it wasn't clear to Randy what the third line was for. When he reached the other side Onofre dismounted the horse and walked several yards downstream. He carefully selected a spot on a strong tree, low to the waterline, and motioned those on the near bank to copy what he had done. Now the third rope hung low across the water in the middle of the river. Smart, Randy thought, on seeing what Onofre had done, he's put up a safety line downstream so that if anyone gets washed from a horse they have a chance at grabbing it.

Onofre walked back upriver to where he had left the horse tied off by its bridle to the thick tether line. Taking the horse by the bridle, he turned and led it down to the water, then he motioned to the men on the near side to pull on the bridle line. The horse, feeling the tug, waded back into the river and crossed back over it for a second time. Once again, upon reaching the near bank, the men had to struggle to pull the horse up and out of the strong flow.

When the horse reached the top of the bank the men untied it to let it rest while they put part of its load back on the animal. One of the strongest of the other five horses, which had already been relieved of half his load, now had his bridle tied to the line looped about the tether line which stretched across the river. When this was done it was led down to the river bank. On the other side Onofre pulled hard on the bridle line while the men pushed at the back of the unwilling horse, coaxing it down the steep bank and into the river.

The team stood there watching Onofre's men. "This is what it must have been like for Maudslay," Randy said to the others. "I mean, think about trying to travel to places like Tikal when there were no rails, no roads, no bridges. You'd take the rivers as far as they could take you if you were lucky enough for them to be going in the direction you wanted. If they weren't, you'd travel by horse, mule, or foot. If you had equipment you'd need many men. I'm betting Maudslay saw a scene like this more than a few times in forty years of exploring Mayan ruins."

The second horse struggled much more than the first, and at one point almost slipped below the furious torrent before managing to pull itself out. After the horse had made it across Onofre untied it and the smaller bridle line was pulled back to the near side. The next horse stood by, ready to cross. Onofre shouted across the river that they should try a lighter load for the next horse. This worked better, as the lighter load eased the horse of some of the burden placed upon it by both the weight of the gear and the flow of the river.

One by one, each of the horses had most of its load pulled down and the remainder redistributed upon it's back. The horse was then steered to the river, pushed in, and pulled across. On the far side Onofre unloaded the horses and let them rest. When all six were across he tethered them up one by one and sent them back, where they were each in turn wrestled from the water by several men. It took four trips by each horse to get all the gear across. Onofre saved the largest horse for the final return trip and came back across the river on it, leaving all the gear sitting on the far bank.

"Mr. Randy, I am a little worried," Onofre said to Randy. "The horses are tired and they were not able to carry as much as I had hoped they could while also fighting the current. We will not be able to ride two at a time across the river. We must go one by one."

"I saw this too, Onofre," Randy said, "Do you think the horses will be able to manage?"

"I hope so Mr. Randy, but there is another concern," Onofre answered and his face grew worried.

"What is that?" Randy asked.

"The horses are afraid and need to be pulled out of the steep bank on this side. This takes many men, four or maybe six. We must plan for this so there are enough men to pull the horses out on this side and still leave enough horses to transfer all the men," Onofre said.

"You are very wise and experienced, Onofre my friend. I am very glad I have hired you," Randy said to him. "We haven't been of much help yet. Why don't you send some of the men who have been working hardest over to the other side first so they can rest. We have a lot of work ahead of us but with luck we can do it all in three trips. We'll send the women and the smaller men over in the second group since the smaller ones might be able to double up. After that we can give the horses a rest and then the last of us can go over on the third trip. We'll have to leave the ropes in place since there won't be anyone left behind to untie them."

"I shall do as you ask Mr. Randy," Onofre replied, and he turned to ready his men to cross.

One by one, the six men Onofre had selected crossed to the other side of the river. Then, one by one, the horses were sent back and pulled up the steep bank on the near side. Randy couldn't be certain, but it seemed to him the horses were becoming more hesitant to enter the swift flowing water. Perhaps they were getting tired, he thought. The trip across must be frightening and strenuous for them and although they had been given some rest the toll must surely add up, even on such magnificently strong beasts as these.

Once all six horses were back on the near side it was time to load the next group. Sticking to their plan, they decided to leave the strongest men for last so enough would be available to pull the horses up the steep near bank. This meant that for this trip the smallest of the riders would have to double up, but when it came time to decide who would ride with whom things got tricky.

Besides the two large men Onofre had chosen to stay for the last trip, the four smallest remained. Onofre said they were all good riders and had worked for him around the ranch before, but two of the group were hesitant to trust them. Those two were Trisia and Bob. Trisia said point blank the only person there she trusted her life to was Randy, and whether he was good on a horse or not, he was the only person she would share a ride with.

Randy tried hard to convince her to ride with one of Onofre's men, saying to her that given his size the two of them riding together would be too heavy. She stubbornly refused, reminding him that despite his 6'2" frame he was thin as a rail. Besides, she said, she'd rather turn around and go back to Caracol than put her life in the hands of someone else.

Exasperated from arguing with Trisia, Randy eventually gave in to her. This turned out to be a bad decision though, because while Marc, Julie, and Cynthia all said they had no problems riding with Onofre's men, Bob now chose to be troublesome as well. Whether it was arrogance, bigotry, or just an unwillingness to trust men he didn't know, he began insisting he was a better rider than any of Onofre's men and told Randy he'd rather take his chances on his own. When Randy argued with him, Bob countered that he'd given in to Trisia and accused him of showing favoritism to her. Randy was backed into a corner and had to give in to Bob as well.

Walking away from the encounter Randy muttered to himself, "It doesn't matter, he's such a fat little pudge it'll probably be better off for the horse if he rides alone." Trisia overheard him mumbling as he walked by her and started to snicker. He shot her a nasty look as if to remind her she was the cause of all this.

The pairings were decided, but due to the obstinacy of both Bob and Trisia the first of Onofre's men would travel by himself. He urged his horse down the bank and into the water. This time, perhaps now better rested and more used to the task, the horse moved gracefully down the steep bank, across the river and up the other side with no problem. The next to go was Marc who was teamed with one of Onofre's men. They were followed by Julie who held onto another of the rancher's team. Both groups crossed safely and uneventfully. It was Randy and Trisia's turn next.

Randy had done some riding before, in fact it was how he had met Onofre in the first place. Sometimes, during his days off from the Caracol dig, he would catch a ride out on the truck sent to fetch the day workers, spend the day riding at the ranch, then catch a ride back in the evening. He had done this many times over the last several years.

He was a good rider but he had never forded a deep, swift stream on horseback before and there was a look of uncertainty on his face. Trisia, who was seated on the saddle behind Randy, was clutching him tightly trying to keep her short wiry frame close to his. She held him so tight it seemed like she would squeeze the breath from him, but he was comforted by the fact that her position behind him meant she couldn't see his hesitancy. Onofre did, however, and he nodded assuringly to Randy as if to say to him, "Go ahead, I'm sure you can do this." At the sight of Onofre's gesture Randy felt more at ease and guided the horse into the water and across the river.

Bob was next to go. He confidently marched the horse right down the bank and straight out into the water. Too confidently Randy thought, as he looked back from the far side after having lowered Trisia, then himself, down out of the saddle. At first Bob appeared to be doing fine. He had already made it across the deepest, fastest part of the river without a problem, but just as the horse climbed out of the slower moving water and up the shallow bank, Bob sneezed. Reflexively, he shifted his weight backward in the saddle and kicked his leg in the stirrup. The horse reared up and Bob fell back off of it, into the river and right on his butt. The horse trotted up out of the river on its own as Bob flailed in the shallow, slow moving water. Randy stepped towards him, reached down, and grabbed his arm to help him up.

At the sight of Bob's antics Onofre's men on the far bank let out a howl of laughter. Bob, embarrassed by both the incident itself and the men laughing at him, turned beet red and pushed Randy away so violently he fell backwards . "This is all your fault," Bob shouted at a surprised Randy, who suddenly also found himself on his butt in the muddy shallows. "I was going along just fine with my project until you and your goddamned discovery. Now I'm stuck out here in this muddy hell hole with you and your wild goose chase in order to avoid pissing the Professor off!" Bob screamed with a crazed, frustrated look on his face.

Randy stood up and Bob lunged his short, stubby frame towards him in an attempt to push him back down in the mud a second time. As Bob moved towards Randy, Trisia took a half step forward and slid her foot in front of his, throwing him off balance. The shorter man tumbled forward, missing Randy completely and falling face first into the mud of the shallow river bank. Again Onofre's men let out a howl of laughter, this time at the sight of the small, pudgy, red-faced man being bested by the wiry young woman.

Randy quickly got to his feet and towered menacingly over Bob. "Pull yourself together Bob," he said to him, "I didn't ask for you to be here, the Professor did. If you bail on me you'll be in a deep pile of shit with him. So you have two choices. Go back across the river and back to Caracol where you'll have to explain yourself to him, or calm down, wipe yourself off, and let's get on with things."

Bob rolled over in the mud and sat there for a few moments feeling like a fool. Randy reached out his hand to help him up and Bob grabbed it and mumbled an apology to Randy for causing a scene. As he let Randy pull him up, Bob shot an angry look at Trisia as if to tell her he would not forget what she had done. He then walked further up the bank to a spot in the sun to try to dry off a little and wait for the others.

The rest of the group stood on the near bank watching Bob and Randy tussle, not knowing what was going on. Cynthia and the man she would ride with stood by the last horse, waiting for the bridle line to be unhitched from the previous horse and pulled back across. As they did so the man shuffled his feet nervously. Once the incident between Bob and Randy had been settled, and the horse Bob had ridden over on was untied, the rope was pulled back across and the two of them mounted up.

The man guided the horse to the bank, but the horse was hesitant. Greg, Onofre, Kevin, and James pushed it down the bank and into the water. As they did so the horse bucked and started to rear. When it realized the men would not relent it resigned itself to its task and waded out into the fast flowing river one more time. Part way across it spooked for a second time. Onofre's man tried to control the horse and keep it heading for the far bank, but the frightened horse twisted and thrashed, turning its head back towards the way it had come. Seeing this, the men on the far shore pulled the bridle line to try to keep the horse moving towards them, but they pulled too hard. The horse lost its balance and, for a second, horse, rider, and passenger all slipped below the surface of the fast flowing river.

As they did so Cynthia was swept off the back of the horse by the force of the rushing water. Onofre's man, who had also begun to slip from the saddle, tried to hold onto it with one hand while reaching out to grab Cynthia with the other, but the river carried her off before he could reach her. The men on the far bank tugged on the horse again and it righted itself and lurched towards them, pulling Onofre's man with it as he clung tightly to the saddle's horn.

The strong flow washed Cynthia swiftly down-river. As it did so, she managed to pull her head and hands up above the water in time to catch the downstream safety rope Onofre had slung across the water earlier. The others stood watching helplessly as she pulled herself onto the safety rope, with the exception of Greg who ran downstream, grabbed onto the rope, and plunged himself into the river to help her. Clinging onto the safety rope he quickly waded out into the river, hoping she could hold on until he got there. Seeing him wade out into the fast flowing river, she struggled to keep her grip on the wet rope as the torrent buffeted her relentlessly. When he reached her, she threw one hand about his shoulders while clinging to the rope with the other. As soon as he was sure she had a hold of him he turned back to the near bank, pulling on the rope hand over hand until the two of them were close enough for Onofre, Kevin, and the others to reach down and pull them up the steep embankment and out of the water.

"Are you okay?" Greg asked her as he threw himself down on the muddy bank huffing and out of breath.

"I'm fine," she said, also breathless from her struggle with the river. She breathed hard in and out for a few moments, catching her breath and calming herself. Then she turned to Greg and kissed him full on the lips saying, "That was the bravest thing I've ever seen anyone do." Greg stammered, not knowing what to say, then he hugged her close to his chest.

The two of them sat there, clinging to each other on the muddy banks of the river for a few minutes, until Kevin, who was still standing over them after having helped pull them from the river, cleared his throat. Recalling his surroundings, and suddenly embarrassed at his actions, Greg quickly pulled himself away from her, stood up, and said to no one in particular, "We'd better finish getting the rest of us across."

Onofre's two remaining men turned back to the task of pulling the horses across the river. In order to give each horse the most rest possible they returned in the order in which they had gone across. Now, however, the last horse to cross, the one that had thrown Cynthia into the river, refused to cooperate. Onofre's men on the far bank pushed while those on the near bank pulled but the horse would not relent, and after struggling fiercely with it for several minutes they gave up.

Onofre turned to Greg and said, "I am afraid we have a problem Señor. One of the horses will not come back across. And because of your friend's fall we now have seven riders but only five horses. The horses are too tired to handle more than one rider, especially because we have left the largest ones for the last. I do not think we can get everyone across. What shall we do?"

Greg sat there puzzled at what to do for a moment. Then he turned to Cynthia and said, "Are you willing to try again?" She nodded yes. "Now for the tough question. Do you think you can ride yourself across this time?"

She turned towards him, hesitated for a moment, then with a determined look on her face said, "I've done some riding before. I think we would have been okay if the men on the other side hadn't over-reacted and pulled the horse off balance. As long as they don't do that I think I can manage it by myself."

Greg smiled at hearing this. He turned to Onofre and said, "I've already been in the water once. It actually isn't as strong as I had thought it would be when I was looking at it from out here. I can make it across on foot. I'm tall enough that my head will be above the water. If I loop the bridle line about my chest and hold onto the tether rope with my hands then your men can help pull me across from the other side. If one other of us is willing to do this too, then we can all get across."

"But that is very dangerous Señor," Onofre said.

"Probably not any more dangerous than being on the back of a tired horse in the middle of a raging river," Greg answered. Then he looked at Kevin and James.

James spoke first, "I'm bigger and stronger than Kevin and I've actually done stuff like this before. You know, the whole extreme sports thing. I'll go ahead and do it."

"Good man," Greg replied.

With the problem resolved the first of Onofre's remaining two men mounted a horse and steered it into the river. The horse went across with no troubles. The second of Onofre's men followed. It was now Cynthia's turn.

Onofre turned to her and said, "You have no worries Señorita. This is the strongest horse we have. He is very brave and he knows you are brave too. He will take you across safely."

Cynthia smiled at his comment and Onofre grabbed the bridle line and led the horse to the steep bank. As if it knew Onofre's mind, the horse carefully descended the steep bank then waded out into the fast current. Chastened by their earlier mistake the men on the far shore were careful not to pull too hard on the bridle line, but they had no need to, as true to Onofre's word the horse took Cynthia across without incident.

When she arrived on the far side the man she had ridden with on her first attempt to cross approached her and addressed her in Spanish, offering his apologies. She didn't understand all of what he said, but she got the gist and, in the little Spanish she knew, responded to him, "Gracias, no es importante. Estoy buena."

Only Onofre and Kevin remained to ride across. Onofre turned to Greg, "Señor, if we see about sending some horses back there are still enough of us to pull them up the bank." Greg agreed to let them try, but as Onofre had feared the horses on the far side had made the crossing too many times. They were now too tired and none of them would allow themselves to be pulled or pushed into the river again. Greg thanked him for trying and assured him it would be okay. So Onofre bade Kevin to cross ahead of him, then followed himself.

With all the horses on the far side, there was no longer any way to return them while the river continued to flow so swiftly. Onofre untied the bridle line from the last horse and Greg pulled it back across. Then he turned to James and said, "After you."

James ducked his head into the loop of the line tucking it under his arms. He scrambled down the bank, grabbed hold of the thick strong tether rope the line was looped about, and stepped cautiously into the water. As he strode in further he could feel the strong current sweeping past him. The river deepened gradually for the first few feet, but then it dropped sharply and he was soon up to his chest in the fast flowing water. He was startled at first by this, lost his footing for a second, and grabbed tightly to the strong line. Seeing this the men on the far side began hauling him across the deepest part by pulling hard on the guide line. They pulled him across the deepest portion and once past it he was able to regain his footing, and strode out of the river unfazed by the experience.

"How was it?" Randy asked him as he walked up the bank.

"Not too bad but I wouldn't want to do it again," James said smiling at him.

It was now Greg's turn to do the same. He pulled the rope back across the river and looped it under his arms just as James had done. He realized that unlike James' trip, there would be no one on the near shore to take up slack behind him on the guide line or pull him back to the near shore if he got in trouble. It was all the way or nothing.

The idea actually comforted him. He'd been ill at ease about this trip on several occasions, both before they left and since. He realized that when he saw Cynthia fall into the river, instead of thinking and worrying about it, he simply reacted. In doing so he made the right decision, possibly even saving her life. Once more he was faced with a challenge and rather than think or worry about it, he took action, grabbing onto the thick, strong line and plunging himself into the river. Then, almost as quickly as he went in, he was safely out the other side, having been hauled across by Onofre's men.

As he strode up out of the water the rest of the group let up a small cheer and Greg smiled. It had taken several hours but they had all made it safely across. Spreading their gear out in the sun to dry, they ate their somewhat soggy lunch and let the horses rest for another hour while doing the same themselves.

As the sun slid lower towards the horizon Onofre turned to Randy and Greg and said, "Señors, we should begin to pack our gear and get moving. The horses are better rested but we must still cover some ground before we can camp for the night."

Randy and Greg agreed. The team gathered its gear and slowly moved on along the narrow trail on the far side of the Mopan River. The trail was heavily overgrown and Onofre's men at the lead had to cut their way through with machetes. The going was slow and by Kevin's reckoning they had covered less than two miles before Onofre said they should stop to make camp. The jungle cover was thick here and the pocket GPS unit Kevin had brought along could not lock in on enough satellites for him to determine where they were. He briefly considered digging around in the baggage for one of the more powerful units they had packed, but his exhaustion from the days events convinced him it would be easier just to trust that Onofre had taken them as far as they could go for the day. Besides, he told himself, I can try to take a reading in the morning. So he settled down with the others to prepare dinner and make camp for the night.

While the food was no better than the previous night, the rain was gone and an occasional star or two could be glimpsed through gaps in the thick jungle cover and wispy clouds which passed over it. This made the current night's camping much more pleasant than the previous one's, and some of the company lingered by the small fire they had made until the hour grew late. As they headed off to bed the same eerie, deep throated bellowing Greg, Kevin, and Julie had been startled by on their first night in Belize rose from the forest that surrounded them. And just as on that first night, the pauses between it were few and the sound unsettling to those who were reminded by it they were not of this place.
Chapter 9 - A Walk in the Woods

The morning of the third day broke with a clear sky. The cries of the howler monkeys gave way to the calls of tropical songbirds even before the sun broke upon the forest canopy. Despite the brilliance of the dawn, little direct light made it to the forest floor. Only isolated shafts could be seen under the tree tops, though throughout the forest floor indirect light filtered down to it. The temperature began to rise quickly, and as it did, the moisture from the previous day's rain turned into a steamy haze which lent an eerie quality to the isolated shafts of light poking through the trees.

The light and sounds of the morning caused the team to stir from their sleep. One by one they rose to make coffee on the camp stoves, prepare their breakfasts and perform their personal morning rituals making themselves ready for the new day. A day they hoped would be their last of moving equipment, and their first of searching for the site Kevin's research promised lay waiting undiscovered in the jungle ahead.

A few hundred feet from where the scientists slept Onofre's men had made their camp with the animals. On trips such as this Onofre liked to keep his men, as well as the animals, separate from the people they were guiding. The animals needed to be tended to, and while they meant well, the tourists often interfered with this chore. Also, since the groups Onofre typically was hired to guide often didn't speak the same language as his men, keeping them separate was a good way to prevent cultural misunderstandings or the risk of the workers developing any resentment towards the visitors.

This morning his men were in good spirits as they rose. Many of them figured it would be the day they got paid and could return to their homes and families. As they joked with each other several of them wandered off into the steam and mist of the forest, to relieve themselves away from the team's campsite.

Julie was finishing her coffee when she heard the sound from off in the distance. It was a terrible shrieking sound she at first mistook for the call of the howler monkey. This struck her as somewhat weird since she had been told the monkey's cries were primarily nocturnal. As the noise continued she soon realized it was not the cry of a monkey. This was different. It was a cry of pain and agony, a human cry. Then above it she heard another sound. It was the shouts of Onofre's men, but she did not understand what they were saying.

Still mostly asleep, Trisia had not heard the first sound. She was, however, awakened by the shouts of Onofre's men just as she was climbing out of her sleeping bag underneath the mosquito netting. Seeing Trisia emerge from the tent Julie called to her across the small clearing where the scientists had camped, "Can you tell what they're saying?"

Trisia stood up and stretched her small, thin frame to try to shake off the sleep, then turned towards where the sound was coming from. "It sounds as if someone is injured," she replied to Julie.

As she said this one of Onofre's men came running into the scientist's camp. Julie recognized him. It was Santos, whom she had originally met on their first trip to Caracol when he was working as a guide in training for the resort.

"What is it Santos?" Julie said to him.

"Do you have any first aid kit?" he asked, his normally good English failing him somewhat due to his excitement.

"Yes, I think so," she said back to him then turned to rouse Kevin, who was still asleep. "Kevin, Kevin do you have a first aid kit handy?"

"Please ma'am. Quickly. One of the men is badly injured," Santos said, catching his breath.

"Kevin," Julie called out more loudly, stubbing her foot into his prone body as she did, "we need a first aid kit RIGHT NOW!"

Julie's foot in his side quickly got Kevin's attention. He pulled the upper half of his body out from his mosquito netting. Leaning out of the tent to where his pack lay he reached into it and grabbed the kit. Tossing it over to Santos he said, "This is a basic kit but I have other supplies if necessary. Do you know what's wrong with the injured man?"

Santos did not wait around to reply to Kevin. Catching the kit Kevin had tossed him, he turned and ran back towards the camp of Onofre's men, then beyond it, to where the cries of the injured man emanated.

Both Julie and Trisia quickly pulled their shoes on and ran off in the direction of the cries. Kevin rustled through his pack, grabbed some other medical supplies and hastily hurried after them barefoot. They all ran in the direction from which the cries came, the same direction Santos had run towards moments before.

As they approached the source of the noise they saw a small group of men standing a few feet from a patch of dense undergrowth. Just past them, standing to his waist in the undergrowth, was Santos who appeared to be reaching out to someone. It was one of the workers, a middle aged porter named Carlos who lived near the ranch.

It was Carlos' anguished voice they heard crying out in pain. Something seemed to have a hold of him and Santos was trying to calm Carlos down while pulling on his arm in an attempt to free him. As this happened the others stood helplessly by, too frightened by Carlos' cries to risk the same fate.

The three scientists pushed past the small group of Onofre's men. As Santos grabbed at Carlos, Kevin leaned into the undergrowth pushing it back in order to see what could be holding the injured man so tightly. It was not at all what he expected.

Kevin's mind had envisioned the man caught in some type of animal trap or wedged under a fallen tree. Instead, when he parted the brush, he saw Carlos' foot wrapped up to the ankle in something brown and leathery, rooted fast in the ground. It looked like nothing he had seen before. Whatever it was, it had a firm grip and was continuing to inflict great pain upon its poor victim. Seeing Onofre's men standing idly by, Kevin grabbed a machete from one of them and stepped into the tangle of undergrowth towards where the man's foot was caught.

"Be careful Señor," Santos said to him, "you do not want to cut his foot accidentally."

Kevin cut back the undergrowth surrounding himself, Santos, and the injured man. When he did he saw many small pink circles varying in diameter from about eight to twenty-four inches scattered on the ground about them. Bending to look at them more closely he noticed the pink circles had brown leathery edges. Curious, he poked at one with the machete. In response the strange plant curled up slightly, showing more of its brown leathery underside. Slowly but steadily it continued curling up until Kevin could see a thick center stalk exactly like the one on the bottom of the thing gripping Carlos' foot.

Guessing at what he was up against, Kevin wheeled round to face the injured man and in a single motion sliced down with the machete, cleaving the plant enveloping Carlos' foot just inches above where it emerged from the ground. Low enough, he hoped, so that it was below where the man's foot was inside the thing, but high enough to allow the man to be carried away to where he could be treated. As the sharp edge of the machete caught the plant the stalk split smoothly. Freed from what had held him, Carlos lurched suddenly towards Santos, who was pulling him by the arm. The two of them tumbled to the ground and into the undergrowth which remained around the spot Kevin had cleared.

As he fell to the ground Santos instinctively thrust out his hand to break his fall. On touching the ground he immediately shrieked and pulled his hand back towards his body. Pushing up with his other hand he gained his balance, stood up, then stumbled out from the ferns and plants to a clear spot near where the other men had been standing. The rest of Onofre's men reached out and pulled the injured man to safety, as Santos cursed and shook his hand calling out, "Que es esta?"

Kevin's Spanish was good enough to understand him, and he called out to Santos, "Rinse your hands with water or something liquid! Do it quickly, it's acid from the mushroom!"

Santos grabbed a jug from one of the men and poured it over his hand.

Kevin stood frozen where he was and called out to Julie and Trisia, "Help the other man! You'll have to slice the mushroom from his foot, then just keep pouring water on it to rinse the acid off."

It took no more than a split second for Trisia to understand the same thing Kevin had. Instantly she turned to Onofre's men, directing some of them to fetch more water and others to help her remove the mushroom from the man's foot.

Julie stared at Kevin and said, "Come up here and help us!" Then she noticed Kevin glancing downward. Kevin thrashed the machete in a wider circle about him sweeping away the remainder of the vegetation about where he stood. Only then did Julie, seeing the large number of pink circles surrounding him and his bare feet, realize why he was still standing there. In a worried voice she called to him, "Don't move!"

"I wasn't planning on it," Kevin replied, "at least not quickly." He scanned around him, then said to her, "Are these things what I think they are?"

"If you think they're those carnivorous mushrooms, then they're what you think they are, but these are over ten times the size they're supposed to be. All the field guides say they don't grow more than two inches and feed on small insects which get trapped in them," Julie replied.

"Well these don't seem to have read the field guide!" Kevin snapped back, "So let's work on getting me out of here quickly please."

"You're pretty close to where it's clear. Can you use the machete like you did before to make them curl up. That will give you some space to step between them," she called back to him.

He reached out to one not immediately adjacent to him and poked it with the machete. No use pissing one off nearby and having it drip acid on me, he thought. Slowly it curled up. Encouraged he poked another, this one right up next to his foot. It too slowly curled up and he was able to edge forward into the spot vacated by the curling mushrooms. He reached out again and again poking one mushroom after another in slow succession, causing those between him and Julie to slowly curl. In this way he was able to clear footfalls between himself and the edge of the patch of dense underbrush. When he was close enough to Julie, she and Greg, who had only just learned of the injured man, were able to grab him and pull him clear.

"What the hell are those?" Greg said.

Kevin ignored him and reached into the supply bags he had brought with him. He tossed some ointment and a bandage at Santos who had managed to rinse the acid off of his hand. Then he went over to where Trisia was rinsing the injured man's foot. He put his hand on her shoulder and pulled her away so he could get a look at Carlos' blistered foot.

Greg, who also had training at dressing wounds in the field, leaned in as well. "What the heck did that to him?" he exclaimed as he saw the man's mangled leg. "It's like something sucked the flesh right off him!"

"It did," Kevin said. "Those things down there appear to be some kind of relative to those carnivorous, insect eating mushrooms we saw on our first hiking trip here, but these are ten times the size. They secrete acid to dissolve the insects. He must have accidentally stepped in one of them barefoot. It wrapped itself around him and he couldn't get out on his own. Santos and I had to pull him out, but he must have had the thing secreting acid on him for several minutes."

As he talked Kevin tried to salve a burn ointment on Carlos' wounds. The flesh had melted from the man's ankle on down. Every touch of ointment made the man writhe in pain. Greg suggested Kevin take a different approach and he prepared a bandage covered in ointment which could be applied to cover the wound in one quick move. Carlos would certainly scream at that, but they had no choice. There was no doubt he needed to be transported for treatment. To do this the wound had to be covered, otherwise it would quickly become infected in the jungle climate.

Kevin told Greg and the others to hold Carlos down. Then, as quickly as possible, he wrapped the bandage around his foot and ankle. The injured man screamed and writhed in pain but another of Onofre's men held his head and poured liquor in his mouth, then stuffed a rag into it for him to bite down on. A few minutes later Carlos had calmed down some and they poured more liquor into him. He rolled his eyes and passed out, but whether it was from the liquor or the pain they could not tell.

As the injured man quieted down, Onofre came rushing into the clearing and said, "I was out grazing the horses. I just now heard of this and rushed straight here."

Kevin explained to Onofre what had happened and told him Carlos would need immediate medical attention. Onofre nodded his understanding, replying, "we will send him back to the ranch on a horse with someone."

Kevin and Greg agreed, although they knew this would slow their search even more. What choice did they have? The injured man required more treatment than they could provide out in the jungle and in his condition it was obvious he could not return for treatment on his own.

Onofre did not make the same connection. With no thought other than the injured porter's welfare he rushed off to get a horse upon which the man could be carried back to the ranch. It was not long before he returned, galloping up to the clearing. As he dismounted he noticed the dressing on Santos' hand and said to him, "Are you badly hurt as well?"

"No," Santos replied, "my hand fell into one of those things as I helped pull this man from the mushroom. It was not in contact with the acid long and I rinsed it quickly."

"Good, then you can ride Carlos back to the ranch and make sure both he and you get to a doctor," Onofre said to Santos. Santos began to protest that he did not need to have his hand looked at, but Onofre cut him off, "I send you Santos, because I know you will take care of this man and you will also be able to follow the trail and re-join us once you have done this. I trust no other as much as you to do this important thing for me."

Santos realized Onofre was right and argued with him no further. He climbed into the saddle and the others helped lift the injured man up after him. Now upright, the injured man regained consciousness although he was clearly in pain and shock from his injury. Onofre bade him "Vaya con Dios" and Santos and Carlos headed back down the way the team had come.

Onofre turned to his men and ordered them back to their camp telling them to get ready to move. He knew letting them stand idle any longer would only give them cause to ponder the unfortunate incident. Then he turned to the scientists and said hopefully, "He will be okay I think. In weather like this a good rider like Santos can cover the way we have come very quickly. I have told the men to repack the animals and get going. It is not good for us to stay here. The men will start to talk nonsense among themselves if we don't get them thinking about other things soon."

While Onofre went to gather the horses Kevin, Greg, and Julie packed up the first aid equipment. Trisia, impatient to tell Randy and the others what had happened, advised Julie she would meet them back at the campsite. Heading back towards her tent she passed by the porters who were packing their few belongings and pulling the heavy packs with the group's gear onto their backs. As she passed she heard some of the men talking amongst themselves as Onofre had predicted they would. Not wanting them to know she was listening she kept her distance as she passed, but walked slowly and quietly enough to hear them. It was a few moments before she felt the men's gaze turning towards her and realized she'd better keep moving, so she turned and quickly continued on to the scientists camp.

As she approached the camp Randy, James, Bob, Marc, and Cynthia were finishing their breakfast. At the smell of the food Trisia became hungry and grabbed herself a plate. Eating as she talked, Trisia relayed the story of how Kevin and Santos had freed the trapped porter. Greg and the others arrived shortly after and soon the whole team was discussing what had transpired as they packed to move out. As the archeologists were completing their packing Onofre came by to advise them the horses had been repacked and they, along with the men, sent on ahead. Now he stood there waiting to show the rest of them the way forward.

Hastily eating the last of her breakfast while simultaneously stuffing her pack, Trisia looked up at him and innocently asked, "What is El Pilar Del Diablo?"

"Where did you hear that?" Onofre replied.

"I heard the porters talking when I walked past their camp. They said something about 'El Pilar Del Diablo' and of a place where offerings are made to the gods. They said we had been cursed because we had not made any offerings before approaching this place," she said to him.

"Stupid superstitions," Onofre said, "El Pilar is where we are going. Some of the men refer to it as 'El Pilar Del Diablo', the tower of the devil. They are descended from the Maya and still practice certain rituals but these are not the rituals of the true Maya. They are just superstitions dating back to the time after the conquistadors came, when the people of the Post-Classic Maya were ravaged by disease and war and retreated to believing foolish things. They say there are some places you must ask permission from the gods to visit, and if you do not they say you are cursed. They believe El Pilar is one of these places. It is nonsense, pay it no attention."

"You don't have to convince me, but it sure sounded like they believed it," Trisia replied as she finished pulling her things together.

The others had their gear gathered and as soon as Trisia was ready Onofre led them forward. Although it was only morning, the day promised to be a hot one as the mist and steam left by the prior day's rain began to burn off. They walked in silence listening to the jungle around them.

After about an hour Onofre and the team caught up to the rest of the men and the animals. Though they had neither the mud nor the river of the prior day's journey to contend with, the packs had become that much heavier as the loss of two men and a horse required the others to bear a greater burden. The slope of the terrain was rising before them, and, owing to the fate of their injured compatriot, the men insisted on cutting the brush along the path, which was very dense in places. All this conspired to make their pace that much slower.

Recognizing this, Randy, James, and some of the others decided to take turns in the lead helping to clear the dense brush they ran into. Not only did they hope to speed the journey by this, they also sought to allay some of the fear Onofre's men still had after the morning's incident. When the porters saw this they laughed to themselves at the foolish tourists, and became content to stay back with their heavy packs, letting the team of scientists do the hard work of clearing the trail.

When he noticed this Onofre berated his men, but they pleaded that their packs were now too heavy for them to also do the work of cutting trail. After much back and forth between he and his men Onofre relented. The result was the scientists attempt to help speed the journey simply served to replace the labor of Onofre's men, while the overall pace of the team remained the same.

After a few hours of this, both groups, the porters as well as the archeologists, needed a rest. After a short break for food and water the team got back on the trail. Slowly they continued, those in the front clearing brush when necessary, while both horses and men trudged under the weight of their burden down the path which led on up the sloping terrain of the forest. All the time they walked Kevin kept note of the sun's position. The entire time it remained behind them. He was guessing the path Onofre was leading them on ran almost straight north from the spot where they had crossed the river.

Two hours or so after their break the trail they walked upon came alongside a stream. The stream was small, but the crystal clear water flowing in it made a soothing sound so peaceful that as they walked besides it some of the group began to forget the weight they carried. This tranquil accompaniment didn't last very long, however, as they soon reached the origin of the stream. It issued from a pool situated at a spot where a spring bubbled up from the ground. A second stream also originated at the pool, flowing away from it in the direction opposite from the one they had approached.

On arriving at the spring Onofre spoke to them. "Señors y Señoritas," he said, "this is the last clean water you will find before we reach the spot I have chosen with Kevin and Randy as the place for you to set up your camp." Then before any of them had the chance to ask he continued, "We have less than an hour to walk until we reach that place. We should fill every jug you have brought with water and load up the horses with as much as we can, since it will be easier for them to carry it now than for you to have to carry it later on foot."

As always, Onofre's advice was sensible and no one other than the horses objected to it. When they began to walk again Kevin noticed the path Onofre led them on had changed direction and they were now marching west. Despite their having changed direction the terrain still sloped gently upward. While they were at the spring, Kevin had observed some curious traits about the terrain. The first was that the two streams which flowed from it ran in opposite directions. One ran south along the path they had come from, while the other ran north. Based on this he guessed the terrain to the north of the spring must also slope downward.

The second was that to the east of the spring, the ground also continued to rise. It was as if the spring lay in the middle of a sort of saddle shape with the terrain sloping down from it to the north and south, and up to the east and west. Wondering where they were, he pulled the GPS from his pocket, but once more the jungle canopy prevented the compact unit he carried from being able to get a satellite lock.

Undaunted he decided to try use a dead reckoning technique to calculate their location. Using the features of the terrain he had just noted, combined with his observations of how long they had been walking since leaving the ranch, Kevin was able to scroll across the topographical map in the GPS to calculate where they were. He soon learned he needn't have bothered. A few minutes after his attempt at dead reckoning he saw that not far ahead of them the forest opened out into a clearing.

The clearing was basically a shallow depression in the terrain stretching a few hundred yards from its eastern edge, where they now stood, to its far side. It was a little under a thousand yards long and ran north to south. There was very little brush, or anything else, growing in the clearing due to the rocky terrain. At the far side of it was a small cliff, perhaps thirty to forty feet high at its highest point. On top of this, right about at the center, was a rocky outcropping jutting another twenty feet or so up from the highest point. From where he stood it looked like a small pillar. El Pilar, Kevin guessed to himself.

The forest surrounded the rock outcropping on top of the cliff and came right up to its edge. As Kevin scanned the terrain it struck him that if anyone had flown over this place they'd have barely noticed the small cliff, or even the rock outcropping. The whole clearing was no larger than a strip mall parking lot. It was shaped somewhat like a lemon wedge, thicker at the center and tapering toward the edges. From the air it would have appeared as only a small break caused by a slight irregularity in the evenly sloping terrain of an otherwise endless carpet of jungle. If it wasn't for the rocky outcropping at the top of the cliff this place probably wouldn't have made it on the map. In an otherwise vast expanse of forest, the small clearing and outcropping were points of relative distinction.

It was this clearing Onofre had chosen for them. He had decided upon this place based upon Kevin's description to him that "the spot he wished to start his search was located near to the place called El Pilar on the map." Although he knew the clearing wasn't actually the spot Kevin and Randy planned to search for the lost Mayan city, Onofre chose it anyway, knowing it would be a good place for them to make their camp. The spring was not far, and the clearing would allow them the only line of sight to the sky in an otherwise forest covered landscape. This was important because it was the one place in an otherwise dense jungle where he felt certain they could take the sightings necessary for their survey work. As always, when Onofre advised Kevin and Randy of his sensible reasons for choosing this spot, they quickly agreed with his suggestion.

Having finally reached their destination the team turned to the task of unloading the gear from the horses and getting the camp set up. Onofre was hopeful they could unload quickly enough to have the camp prepared by dusk. Then he and his men, who were scared of this place and anxious to leave it, would camp there just this one night and start back towards home early the next morning. With the horses unloaded and the men able to ride on them their return would easily be possible in a single day.

With everyone turned to the task of unloading gear and sorting it about to various locations within the site the work progressed rapidly. As Onofre had hoped, his men proved able to unload the horses, sort out the gear, and set up the tents in the short time remaining before sunset. The rocky ground made them do some searching to find a suitable spot for the camp, but eventually the archeologists chose a place under the trees at the edge of the clearing. As they had done the night before, Onofre and his men set up their camp a little distance away from them in the forest.

While the sun set, and the two camps cooked their dinners, Kevin wandered out into the middle of the clearing. Pulling the GPS from his pocket he gazed up at the stars, which were beginning to become visible in the fading light. He was pleased to find the clearing's long axis lay close to a line running from north to south. This meant he'd easily be able to take sightings from it. It also meant he'd be able to get a line of sight to the satellite they had an internet uplink with. Just because they were in the field didn't mean he shouldn't be able to access resources if he needed them, he thought to himself. After all the uplink unit and the solar cells to charge it were some of the smallest, lightest equipment they brought, assuming it still worked after its trip across the river.

In the fading light Kevin gazed across the clearing towards the cliff. The top of the cliff, or perhaps up on El Pilar itself, was possibly the only place around here he would have a clear line of site out to the eastern and western horizons. Such a line of sight would allow him to locate the spots where the planets rose and set. This might in turn help him to better determine where the Mayans would have built a temple nearby.

The immediate problem was how to get up there in the dark. Straining to see in the approaching dusk, he hoped to locate a path upon which he could walk to the top. Unfortunately, the hue of the sky had rapidly deepened from blue to black and Kevin realized he'd have to wait for the next day to try to find such a path. Content to delay his search to the morning he wandered back to the camp at the edge of the clearing, where his dinner awaited him as did some well earned sleep.
Chapter 10 - A Lost City is Found

The next morning, Kevin and Julie woke before dawn, and before the others. They dressed quickly and, with flashlights in hand, made their way across the wide clearing to its westernmost edge where the base of the cliff lay. From there they had a reasonable view of the dawn sky to the east and, they hoped, of the sunrise. As the sky lightened in the pre-dawn they kept their eyes fixed just above the treetops to the east hoping to view the planets or the sun rising, but they were disappointed.

"Damn," Kevin said to Julie, "I thought Venus would be visible in the morning sky by now. It was getting lower in the evening sky when we were back in Arizona but with all the commotion leading to the start of the expedition I forgot to check on the timing of things. Guess I mistook the day."

"Don't worry about it," Julie replied. "It's romantic just being out here watching the sunrise with you. When was the last time we did that together?" she said smiling and gave him a kiss.

"Not since all this began, that's for sure," he said and kissed her back. "But after what I turned up I'm wondering if the day it does rise will be an Utz Kin or Lob Kin," he continued on.

"Huh?" Julie replied.

"Lucky day or unlucky day on the Mayan calendar" he replied. "See, I have this theory that the Jaguar King's Priests got the day of Venus' rising wrong and it really occurred on an unlucky day. However, the Jaguar King didn't realize his priests got it wrong so he made his decision to march off to war on the wrong day, which, as we know, turned out badly for him."

"Umm, Kevin, you're starting to sound like Onofre's men," Julie said teasingly.

"Oh I don't really believe that stuff, though I can't help but find myself thinking about it these days when I'm looking up at the sky. Guess I wonder what it was like for them back then. You know, living in a world where people believed your life was predestined and you took those types of prophecies into consideration every day," he said, although he wasn't sure if he himself hadn't started to believe this at least a little bit. "Anyway, let's see if we can find a way around this cliff. Best as I can determine the clearing down here slopes up at both the north and south ends. I think it must join to the terrain above. It looks like whatever direction we choose, north or south, will take us the long way around through the forest to the base of El Pilar. It's either that or take the short way."

"What's the short way?" Julie asked.

"Climb straight up," he replied jokingly.

"Well, the climbing bit is right out for me," Julie responded choosing to ignore his jest. "Let's try the north, this way the sun won't be in our eyes, and with any luck we can walk in the shade of the forest as we backtrack along the top of the cliff."

"It's your call," he responded as he turned to the north.

As they walked north along the base they noticed the cliff face itself was spotted with mosses, ferns and trees growing sideways out of it. Here and there were places where Kevin could see what looked to him like harder rocks underneath, some with grooves and scratches on them. He was curious as to what could have caused this, but couldn't make much sense of it himself and figured he'd be better off asking one of Randy's crew, someone with experience in geology.

As Kevin predicted, the further they advanced towards the clearing's north end, the more the cliff sloped downward and the clearing upward until they came to a point where they met. As they approached this spot the clearing narrowed on both sides of them, the jungle to their right growing ever closer to the forested terrain atop the cliff. Eventually they reached a place where the rocky terrain of the clearing ended and the jungle on the east of the clearing merged into the jungle that had been above the cliff. There they turned south, heading back towards the spot they had set out from, only now they did so along the top of the cliff.

At first the forest cover was thin close to the edge of the cliff, but as they progressed further along it grew thicker. Finding the thicker undergrowth impeded their progress they attempted to stay where the forest was most easily passable. In doing this they slowly found themselves moving further back into the forest and away from the cliff's edge. Soon they could no longer see where the forest ended and the cliff's edge began. Instead, all they could see through the trees was intermittent spots where the forest appeared to have a brighter backdrop behind it than at others. Not wanting to get so deep into the forest that they could no longer tell where the cliff's edge was, they stopped.

"It's no use," Kevin said to Julie. "The forest seems to have grown thickest towards the top of the cliff. Probably because of the extra light filtering down to where the clearing creates a break in the forest cover. We're going to have to cut our way back towards the edge of the cliff. Keep a sharp eye out for those damned mushrooms. At least this time I have my boots on, but who knows how strong the acid is that they secrete."

Kevin was glad they'd brought the machetes. Foolishly, they didn't bring much else. They had naively thought they'd be gone just a short while. Their plan was to walk out across the clearing, using the pre-dawn light to scout out the cliff face and find a way around it in order to watch the sunrise from El Pilar at the top of the cliff. They had assumed the going would be relatively easy. Were it not for the occasional thick patches of jungle they had encountered on the previous day's journey they might not have chosen to bring the machetes with them at all.

Slicing away with them it wasn't long before they realized they had underestimated the density of the forest undergrowth standing between them and their goal. The growth here proved to be thicker than anything they had encountered so far in their journey. As he hacked away at the brush Kevin noticed the pre-dawn light was brightening and he realized they would not make it to the cliff's edge in time for the sunrise.

Then it also occurred to him that if it was already visible in the morning sky, he'd also miss Venus. Annoyed at the thought he would have to wait for another day, he hacked even harder at the brush, venting his frustration on the vegetation standing in his way. The morning was already warm and they soon worked up a sweat taking turns hacking at the dense jungle undergrowth between them and the cliff's edge. They couldn't have gotten more than a hundred yards or so back into the jungle from the cliff's edge, but as they raced the approaching sunrise it felt to Kevin like it was taking them forever to cut their way to it.

Slow as the work seemed it never occurred to him to stop or call for others to assist him. Sunrise or not they needed to check out El Pilar itself to determine its significance to the Maya, and whether it bore any markings that might point the way to the lost city they searched for. Besides, Kevin realized, at this point it would take them about as long to walk back the way they came as it would to cut their way to the cliff's edge. From the cliff's edge they could signal to the rest of the team, who, by now, would be awake and wondering where the two of them had gotten off to.

After some twenty minutes of putting all they had into their task they got to where they could see what looked like the cliff's edge. With the sweat pouring off them it felt like they had been working for an hour or more and they stopped a moment to rest. Just ahead, off to their right, they could see a darker spot in among where the rest of the forest had a brighter, more open backdrop.

Pointing with her machete Julie said, "That's probably it over there, where the shadow is."

Kevin, noticed the same thing, wiped his forehead and replied, "let's work our way towards it."

Several minutes more of cutting at the dense growth put them at the base of El Pilar where it stood upon the edge of the cliff. Kevin reached into his pack and pulled out a signaling mirror. The sun had broken above the horizon and was almost directly opposite him. It was tough for him to make out the campsite, which was placed back off the edge of the clearing specifically so it could not be easily seen. The glare of the sun in his face didn't help any either. He took a guess as to where it would be and flashed the signal mirror to try to get someone's attention.

As he did so Julie tapped him on his shoulder, "Hey Jungle Boy, did you forget we hauled radios up here with us in all that packed up gear? I brought one with us today, in case we had an emergency."

Kevin blushed. He'd been so intent on getting a quick start that despite having remembered to pack the GPS, some light survey gear, and the machetes, he'd totally forgotten they had brought the radios along. The look on his face told Julie his answer, but he quickly made something up in his defense.

"No, er, of course not," he said unconvincingly to her. "I figured they probably wouldn't have them on if they didn't know we might be calling them so I figured I'd get their attention first by signaling."

Julie flipped the radio on and immediately kicked it over to scan mode. Within a few seconds it had locked on a channel and she heard Cynthia's voice, "Julie, Kevin, can you hear us?"

Julie signaled back, "Cynthia, is that you?"

Cynthia replied, "Yes, where are you? You weren't here when we woke up about a half hour ago and we were starting to worry a little. Greg and a few others were about to start searching for you in case maybe you'd stumbled into more of those mushrooms or something, but then he noticed one of the radios was gone and asked me to try reaching you on them, which I've been doing for the last ten minutes."

"Sorry, we should have left a note. We wanted to try to watch the sunrise from up on El Pilar so we headed out early. It took a lot longer to get there than we had thought it would. Kevin is using his signal mirror now, can you see him?" Julie radioed back.

"No, but I think I can see your backpack from here. Tell Kevin to turn his signal more towards the north," Cynthia said. "Yes, that's it, now I can see it. Anyway, you can tell him to stop since we have the radios. We're cooking up breakfast down here. How much longer until you get back?"

"I think Kevin wants to circle back by the south, but the jungle is pretty dense so it might take a little bit of cutting. We'll probably look around here for fifteen minutes or so and be back there in about an hour. Maybe less. Save us some breakfast and maybe get some pack lunches ready so we can start surveying when we get back. Thanks," Julie said to Cynthia.

Before Julie could sign off, Kevin motioned to her to give him the radio. "Cynthia, this is Kevin. Can you ask Randy if anyone from his team has a geology background?" he said looking out over the clearing and back towards the camp.

"Will do, hold on," she radioed back to him. A minute later she was back on, "Randy said James does."

"Can you ask James if he can head over to the cliff and look it over? I'm not a geologist but something about it seemed a little strange to me and I'm wondering what a geologist would make of it," Kevin said back to her.

"Sure thing. Shall I have him meet you at the cliff or at the camp when you get back?" Cynthia asked.

"Ask him to take a look and then meet us back at the camp. We'll see you in a bit. Over and out," and with that Kevin handed the radio back to Julie.

"He's on his way over there, see you when you get back," Cynthia said, signing off.

Kevin and Julie spent some time looking around El Pilar. To their surprise it was unadorned by any markings or other signs it might have been of significance to the Maya. Kevin climbed up it as far as he could, but the rocky prominence proved to not be tall enough for him to get a view over the jungle canopy to the west. His view to the east would have been excellent were he not looking straight into the sun, which was now well over the horizon.

As a result Kevin was determined to clear a path through the jungle on the way back, one that would allow him to return even in the dark, early enough to view the morning sky before sunrise. Having rested, they got out their machetes and turned their attention back to the work at hand. They cut their way southwards along the top of the cliff, far enough back so they could walk the path in darkness without stumbling over the edge, but close enough so they could keep the clearing and the eastern sky in constant view from the path.

Back at the clearing Onofre visited the scientists as they prepared their breakfast. He sought out Randy and asked him, "Was someone up there at El Pilar on the cliff this morning?"

"Yes," Randy replied, "Kevin and Julie went up to try to see the sunrise."

"Were they signaling to you?" Onofre asked.

"Yes that would have been Kevin. He forgot Julie had brought the radios and he was trying to get our attention," said Randy.

"All he succeeded in doing was scaring the men more. They already believe this place is haunted. They saw the light and said it was a warning from the evil spirits here. They are very anxious to leave. I don't think I will be able to get any of them to stay with you. In fact I do not think I will be able to get any of them to come back to help dig if you do find something," Onofre said in a very excited voice.

"Is there no one you can leave with us who knows the way back and is not superstitious? In case we have an emergency," Randy asked.

"I have already thought of that. It is why I asked Santos to return. He knows this area some and is well schooled and not superstitious. I will probably meet him along the trail today as we return. I will make sure he comes back to join you. Now I must go. If we do not hear from you I will come again by horse in a week with some more supplies," Onofre responded.

"Vaya con Dios, my friend," Randy said to him. Onofre headed back to where his men were waiting and Randy turned back to breakfast and to the rest of the group.

"Looks like we're on our own out here for a bit. Onofre will come look in on us is a week or so. He'll send Santos back, too, so we have someone here who knows the way back, but Kevin managed to spook the rest of the porters with his signal mirror stunt so none of them will stay here."

"Just as well," Trisia said. "Those guys were creeping me out. I overheard some of the stuff they were saying. It was so ridiculous I won't waste my time translating it, but I find it scary people still believe stuff like that. I mean if they believe such things then can you really rely on them, or would they run off and leave you when you might need them most? So I'm just as happy they are going."

"Well, unfortunately we have a lot of ground to cover and it might have been nice to have the extra men, but you're probably right. Who knows if they would be too scared to report back to us anything they found. Kevin and Julie will be back soon. We can finalize the search pattern when they get back. In the meantime let's get whatever we need in the way of food, water, communications, and survey gear ready so we can get going as soon as they get here," Randy said.

Fortunately for Kevin and Julie the southern cliff face of El Pilar proved to be the easier route to clear brush from. They made it back to camp in less time than they'd originally anticipated, and upon their return found the others had made breakfast for them. Even better, the team had already gotten everything ready for the survey work they would shortly be undertaking. The only thing stopping them all from heading right out to start work was that James had not yet returned from examining the cliff face as Kevin had asked him to.

Instead, the latecomers used the time to eat their morning meal. While Kevin ate he listened as Randy reviewed their plan to search the area. It was a simple plan. As their starting point they chose the spot on the map which Kevin considered his best guess for the location of the lost site. He was by no means sure if this was where the city would lie, but it was as logical a place to start as any other.

The targeted spot lay about a half mile north of where they were camped and as they finished eating they discussed the best pattern to use in searching the jungle, whether the equipment they had packed for the day were the right tools to start with, and how to divide the team up.

Seeing James return from examining the cliff Kevin signaled him to join he and Randy and said, "Hi James. Were you able to find anything interesting over at the cliff face?"

"Well, I was a little confused at first as to what I should be looking for," James said to them, "but after having a look at the cliff I'm guessing what you meant by interesting is whether or not the cliff is man made. I took a good look up and down the length of it and climbed up a short way. From what I can see it looks like the cliff face was made by quarry work. And while I can't be one hundred percent sure without doing a little more surveying I'm pretty certain the entire depression that makes up this clearing here resulted from a combination of quarrying and subsequent erosion."

Both of them sat quiet for a moment, a stunned look on their faces, then Kevin broke the silence, "Actually, that wasn't what I had been thinking at all. I noticed the markings but my original thought was to ask you whether the cliff could contain any caves since I was thinking those markings might have been signs of habitation here. It never occurred to me this could have been a quarry." He paused for a moment, then, grasping the implication of James' statement, he continued, "So you think those markings were made by quarrying?"

"Yes, almost certain of it. This area has limestone buried under the surface. Limestone was used a lot for Mayan buildings because it's plentiful around here and soft enough to work with stone tools," James replied. Then he gestured to the terrain and continued, "I'm guessing they started by digging a shallow sloped trench running north to south. Probably over there a little past where the clearing starts. They would have cut blocks on one of the faces of the trench by working edges into the limestone with stone tools. Once a block was cut away from the surrounding limestone they would have tipped it down into the trench. Then it would have been easy to drag it up the shallow slope of the trench and out of it. Well, as easy as moving anything that weighs a ton or more can get. As they worked one face of it the trench would have widened and deepened and eventually it wouldn't even look like a trench anymore. Just a wide flat spot in the ground with a cliff on one side where the terrain they cut into sloped away from it."

As James gestured, Randy and Kevin began to recognize the features on the landscape he was pointing out. Lost in his thoughts Randy muttered to himself out loud, "Of course, why didn't I notice this before?" Then he turned to James and asked him, "James, let me make sure I understand what you're saying. You're saying this entire clearing spanning a couple hundred yards wide by a thousand long was made by quarrying?"

"Sure looks like it to me," James said.

"Any idea how much stone that would have produced?" Randy said continuing his line of inquiry.

James paused for a moment, then answered, "Well there would have been a lot of spoil and there has also surely been a bit of erosion over the years given the amount of rainfall this area gets, but possibly enough to have built several temples on the order of the small to medium sized ones down at Caracol."

"So we could be standing right in the very same spot from which the stones for the buildings at El Pilar might have been cut?" Randy asked.

"Can't say for sure but it's certainly a possibility," James said.

Kevin latched onto the same thought as Randy and joined in, "Well that tells us we might be close."

"Then again we might not." Randy said, tossing cold water on Kevin's enthusiasm, "We know the Maya often hauled the building blocks of their temples for quite some distance. Possibly as far as Caracol." Then he turned to James and asked, "James, is there any way to tell from looking at the cliff how big the blocks they cut were? Maybe if we knew that we could make a guess at what kind of effort it would have taken to haul them and how far they might have taken them."

James considered the question for a moment then answered, "I don't think so, at least not easily. Its been quite some time since this quarry was worked. Between the overgrowth and the erosion any clues would have been washed away or hidden. It's probably not worth the time and work it would take to clear away enough of the face to try to figure that out."

"Hmm, too bad," Kevin said back to James, "Still, I think this is a useful discovery." Then turning to Randy he said, "I think we should change our previous plan. Rather than starting north of here why don't we just start our search pattern from right here. If this really is where the stones for the site we're looking for were cut then we might run across something surrounding this location to indicate what direction they were moved."

Randy replied, "It's your call. You're the expert with regard to how they would have chosen to site their cities. Make a plan and we'll follow it."

Kevin reached into his pack, pulled out the maps of the region he had brought with him, then sat down to go over them once more. He stared at them intently for a bit then looked up and spoke, "Well, even if my theory about how they chose their sites is correct I don't know the Maya's exact surveying and siting methods. Without that info there's enough uncertainty in my calculations for the spot where I think El Pilar is located to be off by a mile or more in any direction. If we search two miles around it in each direction then we'd have at least sixteen square miles of area to cover with the search pattern, more if we searched farther out. In that area we're looking for a site comprised of an unknown number of structures of unknown size and height, and most likely hidden under centuries of forest growth. Unless we're lucky it could cover an acre or less and be completely indistinguishable from the terrain itself."

Randy stood there for a moment with a quizzical expression on his face, then said, "So are you saying it doesn't really matter where we start?"

Kevin nodded at Randy's comment and replied, "Umm, yeah. We're pretty much looking for a needle in a haystack, so it doesn't much matter where we start. We might as well at least start in the same place they did."

"Okay, let's get the team together and get started," Randy replied.

Kevin stood up and called to the whole team, who had been milling about waiting, to come closer so he could talk to them. Knowing the natural curiosity they shared, a trait that had brought all of them to work in archeology, he explained what he, Randy, and James had just determined. Pointing out the same features James had showed him, he related how the clearing they were camped at was actually a quarry and was likely the source of the stones used to build the site they were searching for. This piqued their curiosity, at least until Kevin advised them how this information didn't necessarily help their search. Finally he summed up why, despite the fact that identifying the quarry might not really help, he still wanted to start their search in it anyway.

At this point Randy took over speaking. He advised the team they were looking for anything which would give them an indication of an inhabited site. Things such as evidence of a raised causeway, stone markers, house mounds, or, hopefully, a temple mound itself. Setting a more reasonable goal he finished by saying that even if they couldn't find the site itself on their first effort anything they might find on this survey could at least point them in the right direction for future surveys there.

For a few moments the team members stood silently, then they began to talk amongst themselves about what they had just been told. Realizing there wasn't much point in letting them think too much about the difficulty of the task ahead, Randy leaned in to Kevin's ear and said, "No point in waiting. We'd best get them moving."

At Randy's suggestion, Kevin began calling out each team member's name and directing them into position on the search line. One by one he spread the group out into a long line stretching west to east. The line stood in the jungle facing north, positioned at the most southeasterly point of the clearing. Each person in the line was separated from the one next to them with as much space as possible, though not so much they couldn't still see and call out to that person.

In their initial discussions about the search plan, Randy had advised Kevin that Bob was the most experienced surveyor on the CCF crew. Keeping this in mind, Kevin instructed Bob to take a radio and GPS unit and position himself at the far end of the line as an anchorman, while he anchored the other.

Kevin's plan was simple, or so he thought. He would spread the line out as wide as possible by spacing each member of the team about eighty yards apart, with Bob at the far end. Then, by using the GPS and radio to direct Bob, he hoped to keep the line oriented in the desired direction while marching them forward. If it worked, they could search a half mile wide swath on each pass. At the end of a pass he would pivot the line ninety degrees, then resume marching them forward. In this manner the line would trace a sort of squared off spiral path, one half mile in width, which would eventually encompass the entire search area.

Kevin's hope was that by doing this they would find some trace of El Pilar if the site was in or near the search grid he had chosen. Of course only then, if they did find something, could the real work truly start. The difficult and tedious work of clearing away the jungle to determine the nature of any structures they might find. It had taken researchers years of work at Caracol before the accidental discovery of the Jaguar King's tomb. Unlike the work at Caracol, Randy, Kevin, and the others had set out with the knowledge that El Pilar potentially contained the tomb of the Jaguar King's nemesis and, with any luck, the Jaguar King's Jade Mask inside it. Despite this the odds of their finding something on a first survey were not in their favor and they all knew it.

As calculated by Kevin, searching an area of sixteen square miles total would mean covering sixty-four grids, each of them a half mile on a side. This meant traversing a straight line distance of thirty-two miles across places where the dense forest undergrowth would require them to cut their way through, sometimes foot by foot. Conferring with Randy, who had experience searching this type of terrain, Kevin estimated an average progress of eight miles per day. So if things went according to plan they could cover the initial search area in about four days.

If the initial search grid provided no clues they would have to make some tough choices. The obvious ones were to keep extending the spiral search, change the pattern to extend the search area to a particular direction, or give up and head back. Kevin had run through the contingencies in his mind. Giving up was not an option he or, he assumed, any of the other team members would choose. Changing the search pattern only made sense if they found anything in the initial search which would point them in one direction over another. The third option, extending the spiral search, had serious limitations as well.

Every turn of the spiral they added would exponentially increase the size of the search area. The first four by four mile spiral grid totaled thirty-two miles of walking. Extending it by even a half mile on each side, to a five by five mile grid, would mean they would have to walk an additional eighteen miles. Adding a second half mile, to enlarge it to a six by six mile grid, added twenty-two more miles of walking, and so on, and so on.

Thus, even if they could exceed the eight mile a day average Kevin hoped to achieve, an extension to a five by five mile grid would add two additional days of searching, and a six by six mile search three more on top of that. So although each extension was a small additional increment, Kevin knew in the end any extension of their search would eventually exhaust whatever time was available to them. When he ran the numbers through his head he realized at best they had no more than ten days to allot to searching before they would have to give up. All he could do was cross his fingers, hope he'd guessed right about the way the Maya located their cities, and start the team marching.

Taking a whistle from his pocket he blew it loudly to signal the start of the search. On Kevin's signal the team began moving north through the jungle, Bob on the left side, Kevin on the right, each using the newer, more powerful GPS units which until now had been packed in the gear the team had brought with them. Steadily, the line moved straight north. So far so good, Kevin thought to himself as he observed their progress.

When they had gone about a half mile Kevin blew the whistle again, signaling them to stop. He took the radio from his belt and called to Bob, "Okay let's try this pivot maneuver and see if it will work. If it won't, then we're going to have to think of something else. Hold your position and I'll try to swing the line ninety degrees so we face west."

Bob radioed back one word, "Okay."

Kevin started the maneuver, keeping one eye on the GPS and the other on the ground in front of him. Slowly walking forward he called down the line to the person next to him, "I'm starting the pivot maneuver. Pass word down the line that everyone should move forward just enough to keep the person to their right in line with them. Tell them those closest to Bob will have to move the least, while those closer to me will move further." Then, not awaiting a response, he continued forward.

Kevin's goal was to trace an arc from the spot half a mile east of where Bob was now, to the spot half a mile north of there. If he could do this while everyone else simultaneously kept the person to their right and left in sight then he hoped he could cause the search line to pivot with Bob at the fulcrum while remaining straight. Moving carefully, Kevin proceeded through the forest underbrush trying to walk as close to a circular arc as possible, in the hope that if he moved in the right trajectory the others would too. Little by little, as he sighted down the line and took readings on the GPS, he could see the line was pivoting as he wished it to. The speed of the maneuver seemed agonizingly slow, especially to those closest to Bob whose positions changed little. Despite this Kevin was in no rush. He knew his path on the outside of the arc meant he would have to cover more distance than those walking on the line to his left, but he preferred accuracy over speed, especially at the outset of the search. He figured that at least from a morale standpoint, there was more to be gained by executing the maneuver slowly but accurately rather than quickly and haphazardly.

His goal was for the team to get comfortable enough with the maneuver as the search progressed so when it was required of them Kevin could simply send the pivot signal down the line, then use the GPS to walk the outside arc and the practiced team would pivot the line smoothly on his command. Keeping in mind the old adage "practice makes perfect" he realized the first few executions of the maneuver were the most critical and chose to take whatever time was necessary for the team to grow comfortable performing it.

Recognizing the inherent difficulty of directing a line of people through a densely overgrown forest, he had tried to have a backup plan in case the pivot maneuver prove difficult to execute. In reality it wasn't really a backup plan. It was more of an allowance for the occurrence of the inevitable. No matter what type of search pattern they chose, periodically the line would have to change orientation. If they searched in straight lines, at the end of each sweep the line would have to be re-formed facing the opposite direction. In this respect the spiral search pattern had no real benefit.

Basically it was yet another trade-off Kevin had to factor in. If the team could master the pivot maneuver it might speed up the search. If not, he might have to frequently intervene in its execution. In the planning stages he justified the choice with the rationalization that by searching in a spiral centered about their camp site the distance they needed to walk at the beginning and end of each day would at least be reduced. As he led the team through the maneuver, all the calculations he had run through in his mind gave way to the cheerful recognition that they were actually pulling it off.

Though quite pleased with himself at having managed to guide the team to completing the maneuver successfully on their first try, he showed no sign of it outwardly. Could have just been a fluke, he thought. Instead, when he reached the end of the arc and was ready for the entire line to start moving again, he radioed a terse message to Bob, "straight west this time Bob, until I tell you to stop."

As before Bob radioed back one word, "Okay."

To Kevin's relief, and that of those along it, the line began moving forward once more. The line moved a half mile before Kevin called a stop in order to attempt the pivot maneuver a second time. Slowly he traced an arc through the forest and as he did so the line pivoted with him. Having completed the maneuver once again he breathed an audible sigh of relief upon realizing their earlier success was not a fluke. He called Bob on the radio to advise him of the team's success and to have him start them forward.

They went on like this for several hours. March, pivot, march. With each round of marching the distance they walked grew longer and so did the time between execution of pivot maneuvers. With the exception of Bob and Kevin no one on the line knew exactly where they were. The position of the sun, slightly north of directly overhead, gave little clue to any but the most experienced navigator as to what direction they were heading. Belize lay south of the Tropic of Cancer, and the sun's place in the northern half of sky at this time of year defied any northerner's lifetime of experience with a sun which rose and fell in the southern half of the sky. This most likely accounted for why not one of the team noticed Kevin had been sweeping them in an ever growing spiral around the clearing.

When they decided to stop for lunch Kevin and Bob used the GPS units to guide them inward from the ends of the lines toward the center where Randy was, collecting the other members of the team as they went. As they had seen nothing of any note in their first hours of searching, just the dense forest and the gently sloping terrain it grew upon, their lunchtime talk was light hearted. Randy followed it up by reviewing with everyone exactly what it was they were looking for, reminding them that most of the search would probably be like this morning, basically a slow walk in the forest.

The afternoon went on much the same as the morning. March, pivot, march. The one thing which did change was the time interval between pivot maneuvers. It became longer with each turn of the spiral. Moving slowly through the forest they could hear the sounds of the jungle birds all around them. To judge from their sounds the forest seemed to be filled with birds, but catching a glimpse of the shy creatures while remaining in line and looking for signs of the Maya proved difficult. As a result only a few of the team's members saw any birds, although several were lucky enough to at least find feathers from several different species. Julie was especially pleased to find some from the increasingly rare quetzal, a bird the Maya considered sacred. It struck her as a good omen.

Finally, as the sun dropped below the tree line, Kevin called Bob on the radio, "I think we should call it a day. Let's march in to the center, collect everyone, and I'll lead the way back to camp." As had become Bob's habit, he radioed back the single word "Okay" to Kevin, at which time the two of them both headed in towards the center of the line.

After he had gathered the team together at Randy's position in the center of the line, Kevin began leading them back towards the camp. Several minutes into this, Julie, who had been chatting with the others, moved up towards Kevin's spot at the head of the group and said, "We walked a long way today. Will we have enough time to make it back to camp before dark?" On hearing her question Kevin laughed, for just then they reached the spot where the forest opened out onto the clearing. Julie could see the tip of El Pilar jutting up into the sunlight. The rock had taken on the same deep orange color the sun does when it has sunk low into a clear blue sky. Julie blushed a little then said, "I should know by now never to question Pigeon Boy."

Still laughing, Kevin replied, "Why not? I've been leading you around in circles all day long."

Julie looked at him with a blank expression.

"Didn't you notice the sun change position in the sky as we pivoted?" Kevin asked.

"Not really. I was doing what you asked. Keeping the person on either side of me in my sight and looking around the forest in front of me as I went," Julie replied to him as the team approached the camp, "I did find a lot of really cool bird feathers though. Check them out."

"Oh yeah, very nice," he said with mock enthusiasm. She mimed a fake pout and he gave her a hug. "Really they are pretty cool. I heard some of the others saying they found some too. Maybe you can trade with each other. The Maya used to actually do that, you know. Feathers and cocoa beans were both a form of currency to them," Kevin replied to her.

She gave him a skeptical glance not knowing if he was teasing her. Sensing her hesitance he continued, "Really I'm not making it up. Bird feathers had great ceremonial importance to the Maya." Realizing he was telling her the truth her face lit up. Sensing he was out of the danger zone for having teased her, he turned back to the true topic of interest to him, "So you really weren't aware I was leading us in a big spiral the entire time?"

"Nope," she said, shaking her head.

"Well, it turned out to be easy for me to keep the line moving where I wanted it to, so I guess it's a workable search method. Plus it has the added benefit of never leaving us too far from camp," Kevin said.

"Let's hope it's a successful search method," Julie replied.

When they reached the camp a minute or so later, Kevin was initially startled to see someone in it. He quickly realized it was Santos, who had returned to join them as Onofre had promised. He had brought good news with him. The injured man would recover, although it would take some time for his skin to heal and he would always have an ugly scar.

The team turned their attention to making dinner and settling in for the night. Santos eagerly joined them. While he was the only native Belizean among a group of American scientists he was quickly made to feel welcome by them. As dinner was served he related his excitement about being with Greg, Kevin, and Julie when the discovery of the Jaguar King's tomb was made and told them stories about this area he had been taught as a child. Some of them were the same stories Trisia had overheard bits of when she passed the porters talking a few days before.

While the sun set and the stars rose the team talked amongst themselves and ate their meals. As Kevin had suggested earlier those who had found feathers showed them to each other and some spirited trading ensued. Their merriment did not last long however. Having risen early and macheted their way through the forest for most of the day they quickly grew tired and soon all were asleep.

Kevin had set his alarm to awaken him early the next day. He wanted to see the stars in the eastern sky before sunrise. When it rang beneath the head of his camping cushion he poked his head from the tent, but on seeing nothing but clouds above he decided to roll over and go back to sleep. When his alarm rang again the others had already gotten up and made breakfast. The team went about their morning chores quickly and before long Kevin had them back in a line marching through the forest.

North, west, south, east, they marched under the grey skies, a light misty rain falling on them. All morning they marched, stopping briefly for lunch before they were back at it once more. It seemed as if nothing would break the monotony of their slow march under the grey skies, but then suddenly, after several dreary hours, one of them found something.

It was Cynthia. She was moving through the forest when a few dozen yards ahead and off to her left she saw a low mound. She called out to the others and ran to it. Immediately word went down the line, which quickly collapsed, as the scientists, in their excitement, all moved in to where the call had come from.

When Kevin reached the mound he saw it was fairly nondescript. It was about six feet high and had three distinct tiers. Its overall size was about twenty feet by forty feet, roughly the size of the foundation slab of a typical middle class American house.

"What do you make of this?" he asked Randy.

Randy walked around the small mound and after circling it, responded to Kevin, "Looks like a house mound. There are literally thousands of these scattered about Belize. Most of them aren't marked or surveyed. Sometimes you find them clustered about important sites. There are several groupings of these around Caracol. Unfortunately you're also just as likely to find them in isolated clusters that aren't near anything important."

"I was afraid you might say that," Kevin replied. Then turning to the others he called them around. "This appears to be a house mound. It could mean there are more in the area if there is an important site located here. Or it could be part of an isolated group," he said to the team. "This brings up something I need to remind you of. If someone does find something, you must not rush in to see it. We may find many house mounds if there is a site nearby. We can't have the line break and run at every find. If someone does find something, stop and send word down the line. The rest of you hold your position if you hear someone has found something. Then whoever is closer, Bob or I, will come and take a GPS fix on it and have Randy also take a look. If we exercise some discipline, finds like this will be of more use to us in trying to pinpoint where the site itself might be."

The members of the group shook their heads in acknowledgement then Kevin and Bob guided them to re-form the line. The whole incident probably took no more than ten to fifteen minutes before they were back in line and marching forward again. Not long after they started moving others began to send word down the line of sighting small mounds. Kevin's words still fresh in their minds, they showed discipline at each new sighting. Instead of rushing to the call each time something was found, the team members stopped, sent word down the line, then waited. Each time they stopped either Bob or Kevin would move in to the location and record it on the GPS unit, then Randy would come over to examine it.

In a short span of time they found over a dozen mounds. Then, as the survey line advanced through the forest, its spiral pattern wheeled it away from where the mounds lay. As it did so the team was returned to the slow routine of marching through the dense undergrowth beneath the low hanging clouds. Though they found nothing more for the rest of the day the discovery of the mounds had raised everyone's spirits. First the quarry, then the signs this area was indeed inhabited by Maya. Both findings were good news to the team since they felt they improved the likelihood something more could be laying in wait for them to discover.

Back at the camp, while some of the team cooked, Kevin worked with the laptop onto which he was busily downloading the data from the GPS unit and plotting it on a terrain map. Randy stood impatiently looking over his shoulder. When the two of them saw the results their optimism became much more tempered than that of the rest of the team, who were busy cooking dinner and discussing the day's events. What they observed on the screen in front of them was not what they had hoped to see.

Kevin turned to Randy and said, "Looks like the mounds we found today are arranged in an isolated cluster. I was hoping they might show up in some kind of pattern pointing towards a more central site."

Randy replied, "That wasn't likely. Usually when groups of house mounds appear they are clustered together. Current thinking among scholars studying the Maya is that the clusters were family groups. It's when you find multiple clusters that they're usually arranged around some type of more central site. We'll have to keep going and hope we find more of these clusters." Subdued by Randy's comments, Kevin powered down the laptop and they both turned their focus to food and sleep.

The next morning Kevin rose before dawn and for the second day in a row he stuck his head out of his tent, only to find the sky above overcast and grey. Disappointed, he rolled over and went back to sleep. When he did rouse himself from bed he kept his breakfast routine short and soon had everyone back out in a line in the jungle.

This day, the team seemed to have an energy about it. Almost a sort of electric apprehensiveness, as if they were collectively holding their breath in anticipation that this would be the day they found what they were looking for. As they marched on through the forest, hour after hour, the morning came and went. Other than the birds in the trees they saw nothing. By the time their lunch break rolled around the unspoken promise they had felt at first light had waned.

It began to rain just as they started their break and they ate their lunch quickly without much conversation, their mood dampening with the weather. They soon returned to the search but the forest would reveal nothing. The rain increased in its intensity and the skies grew dark early as the afternoon progressed. With night and the weather both closing in on them Kevin pulled out the radio, "Bob, we're going to have to cut today short. Hold up and bring everyone in to the center."

As usual Bob radioed back his single word acknowledgement to Kevin. "Okay," was all he said.

As the group gathered Kevin approached Randy and quietly said to him "That Bob is one talkative guy. What's his problem?"

Recalling Kevin was on the far side of the river when Bob fell from his horse, Randy proceeded to tell him about the altercation between he and Bob which followed, and about how Bob blamed Randy for his being pulled away from his work.

"Well, can't say I blame him. I'd probably be pissed too if my advisor pulled me from a project I was leading and sent me off on somebody else's wild goose chase," Kevin replied back.

Randy was about to protest the use of the term "wild goose chase" but before the words could leave his mouth Greg came up behind him and, having heard Kevin's comment, he leaned in, smiled and said, "But Kevin, isn't that exactly what I did to you?"

The three of them responded to Greg's comment with a hearty laugh. Nearby, Bob, annoyed by the grey weather, and thinking the three were having a laugh at his expense, pulled his hood tighter around his face, silently following behind them.

The end of the third day of searching found them returning to camp with nothing to show for their efforts. The rain stopped as they reached the camp and the conditions under which they prepared their dinner were more pleasant than those they had endured while searching. Still, the mood of the team was low and the camp unusually quiet. Under the low clouds an early bedtime beckoned the team, who sought the escape of sleep to put the day behind them.

As on the previous mornings, Kevin rose an hour before dawn. This time when he stepped out to the clearing he could see the light of the stars above him. Though no one was awake to see it, nor could they have done so in the darkness, a broad smile lit up Kevin's face when he saw the weather had improved overnight. Eager to take advantage of the clear skies he ducked back into the tent, stumbling in the dark as he turned on his flashlight, put his clothes on and grabbed some gear.

As he did so Julie rolled over in her sleeping bag. He shut the flashlight to avoid waking her, but then, realizing he had already done so, he leaned close to her and whispered into her ear, "Julie. Julie. The sky is clear and the stars are beautiful. I'm going to go look for Venus in the morning sky. Get up and come join me."

She mumbled something inaudible and rolled over with her back towards him. Kevin decided not to try again. He climbed out of the small tent and stood upright, then turned to close the tent flap behind him. As he turned round to head toward the edge of the clearing he was startled by the sound of someone or something behind him.

In the dim starlight he could just barely see the outline of a person. Quickly he swung the flashlight in its direction and snapped it on. The bright light caused the figure to be momentarily blinded. In that moment Kevin recognized it was the face of Santos he was now jack-lighting and realized he must have woken him as well.

"Sorry to wake you Santos," Kevin said to him apologetically.

"That's okay. I often rise early to listen to the morning birds calling. What are you doing up?" Santos asked him.

"I'm heading up to El Pilar to see the morning stars. Would you like to come with me?" Kevin replied.

"Might as well, I'm already awake," Santos responded.

As the two of them walked around the camp to the south side of the clearing, Kevin took care to avoid waking any one else. Crossing the clearing, he directed them to the spot where he and Julie had cut a the path through the brush a few days before. It took Kevin a few minutes to find the path in the dim light but soon he and Santos were walking along it back to El Pilar.

The ground was muddy and made a squishing sound as they walked, and at each squishy footfall the sky lightened a little bit more. Finally they reached El Pilar and Kevin turned east. He stood there motionless looking out to the horizon as the sky continued to turn from black to blue. Then, only moments before the sun broke the horizon, he thought he saw it, a point of light barely visible in the brightening blue sky. Kevin squinted his eyes trying to focus on it, assuming his new Belizean friend was doing the same, but he wasn't.

Until that moment, Santos had been standing next to him watching the sky. Maybe it was some noise he heard, or maybe it was simply intuition, but for some reason he had turned his head away from the sky for a moment. It was then, in the brightening light of the dawn, that he saw something in the mud he had not previously noticed as they made their way up to the lookout. It was something which frightened him very much.

"Señor, look. All around us!" he said to Kevin, the alarm clearly evident in his voice.

Hearing the sound of fear in Santos' voice, Kevin looked down. All along the path he could see the large paw prints in the fresh mud. He turned to Santos and said, "Maybe we'd better be going."

They turned and headed back down the path to the southern edge of the cliff. They couldn't have gone more than a few dozen yards when something suddenly appeared in front of them out of the underbrush. Startled by it, Kevin fell backwards. It was an enormous jet black jaguar and it now stood in the path blocking their way. Santos reached down to Kevin and helped him quickly scramble to his feet.

"Señor, do not turn your back to run. It will sense the fear and charge you. Just back up slowly towards El Pilar," Santos said to him quietly.

The two of them began to back up along the path. The jaguar took one or two strides towards them as they did, then stopped. Kevin and Santos continued slowly backing up the path until they reached the base of the stone pillar, right at the spot where the second trail Kevin and Julie had cleared the other day connected to the one he and Santos were on.

As they did this, they saw the brush rustle between where they were and where the jaguar stood. The jaguar held motionless for a second then it lunged forward. Forgetting what Santos had told him Kevin broke and ran down the path heading west, away from El Pilar and up the sloping forest terrain. Frightened by the sudden movement, a dozen or more large wild turkeys shot up into the air from the undergrowth. As they rose into awkward flight their iridescent feathers shimmered in the dawn sunlight which broke over the cliff's edge. The cloud of birds rising from the forest floor startled Santos as well, and a split second later he too bolted down the path not far behind Kevin.

Up the macheted path Kevin ran, out of the deep undergrowth, past the point where the trail started, and in a straight line away from El Pilar. He ran until he was out of breath and couldn't run anymore. A moment or two later Santos caught up with him.

"Señor. Señor. It is okay. The jaguar was not after us. It was after the turkeys!" Santos said to Kevin. Kevin huffed and puffed, looking at him with a blank gaze as he tried to catch his breath. "There were wild turkeys hiding beneath the undergrowth. They are native here. The jaguar must have been stalking them when we came upon it. When it jumped it must have been going after one of them."

Kevin stood there trying to catch his breath and calm down. Then he cast his gaze upward slightly, noticing something off in the forest behind Santos. It was at least twenty or possibly even thirty feet tall. At first he thought it was the moss covered trunk of a decayed tree whose top had fallen, but when he scanned the forest around it he saw no sign of any of the rest of it. Invisible gears turned in his mind.

"Hey Santos," he said, "what do you make of that?"

"I think it is just a tree Señor," Santos replied, more worried about the jaguar than what Kevin was pointing at.

"I'm not so sure," Kevin said. "Given the width of that thing, if it were a tree trunk it would have come from a tree over a hundred feet tall but there isn't any sign of any other debris from a tree close to that size on the forest floor here."

Then Kevin noticed it didn't have quite the right shape for a tree. He walked past Santos and towards the large object. On reaching it, he started pulling the moss from the thing. It was only then he truly recognized what it was he was looking at. His face went blank as he stood there with his hands full of moss, staring at the unmistakable Mayan hieroglyphs spread out before him. Santos was speechless as well. Kevin pulled out his cheap pocket GPS unit but, as it had done several times before under the jungle canopy, it couldn't get a lock on enough satellites to give a reading.

"Santos, I can't get a GPS reading on this. One of us has to go back to the camp and bring the better GPS unit and some help back here while the other one stays here so we don't lose the position of this. Which one do you want to do?" Kevin asked him.

"Does going back mean I must go past where we saw the jaguar?" Santos asked.

"No, there is another way around. To the north along the edge of the dense undergrowth. Julie and I came in to El Pilar from there the other day. The path we just ran down is the one we cut that day," Kevin said to him.

"Okay, Señor, I will go this way. I do not want to risk disturbing the jaguar while he is feeding," Santos said.

"Santos, one more thing."

"Yes, Señor."

"Call me Kevin please."

"Yes, Señor, I mean Kevin," Santos responded, his voice showing some ease. Then he headed off into the forest in the direction Kevin had indicated to him and quickly disappeared into the undergrowth.

The sun continued to rise slowly and although Kevin had originally planned to set out to El Pilar himself, actually being alone in the jungle now proved somewhat unnerving to him. It was almost as if an eerie quite had settled on the jungle about him. At first, he worried a little the jaguar might still be hungry and would come after him. Then he recalled what he had read at the zoo about their nocturnal and solitary nature. With the sun up the big cat would be long gone, he reassured himself. At the very least, even if it lingered nearby, the magnificent creature was certainly more wary of him than he of it. The thought that he wasn't very far from the cliff of El Pilar, barely far enough off in the distance for him to no longer see it through the forest cover, kept the image of the jaguar in his mind.

Trying not to let his own thoughts spook him, he paced back and forth around the stela. All he had to do was stay put until help arrived and they could mark its position. As best as he could reckon, he and Julie had walked within a few hundred feet of it the other day and not noticed it at all. The survey line had also gone right past this place, but spread out as it was it wasn't surprising the moss covered stela had simply blended right into the forest such that none of them had seen it. If he hadn't literally stumbled onto it he'd probably never have found it in the first place, and he realized if he left it now they might not find it again. So he sat in the forest waiting for help to arrive.

As the time passed, it felt to him like he must have been waiting there forever, until, seeing something moving far off in the dense undergrowth he breathed a sigh of relief at what he assumed was the approach of Santos and the others. Anticipating his friend's approach he listened for their voices calling to him, but all he heard was the hushed sound of the wind above the tree tops.

Not hearing the expected voices, Kevin strained his eyes to see what was moving. His first thought was it must be some birds, perhaps the same turkeys the jaguar had been stalking. For a moment he could see nothing, but then, in the dim light of the forest floor, he saw a silhouette against the green of the forest undergrowth. Whatever it was, it wasn't a turkey. Slowly the outline of the animal became clearer, its black coat now standing out from its surroundings. When he realized what it was his breath caught in his throat. It was the jaguar.

He tried to stay calm, convincing himself the big cat would smell him and avoid him. He'd broken quite a sweat running away from it the first time. Surely an animal with a sense of smell like the jaguar must be able to detect him. The jaguar showed no sign of doing so however. Slowly, carefully it crept towards him, close enough so that if he tried to run it could easily catch him. His heart was pounding in his chest, but all he could do was sit there with his back to the stela, trying to stay as motionless as possible, hoping the others would finally arrive and the noise of their large group would scare the jaguar off.

Steadily the jaguar moved towards him. One hundred feet, eighty feet, closer, ever closer, until it couldn't have been more than twenty feet from him. As close as the one he almost hit on the road the morning they set out from Caracol. Suddenly something occurred to him. It was an idea so preposterous he immediately dismissed it. Yet as he watched the big cat staring at him, and he sat there staring back at it, he realized maybe it wasn't so preposterous. He was certain the beast in front of him now was the same cat which had run out into the road the morning they left Caracol. In fact, it was the same cat they had seen at the Belize Zoo.

How could that possibly be, he thought to himself. He was pretty sure the distance from Caracol to here or the zoo would be more than the normal range of a cat like this. How could it have possibly followed them here? And why? He told himself he must be mistaken but the more he stared at the big cat, and the more it sat there staring back at him, the more sure he became. It was the same animal.

Then the big cat lurched its head sideways and pricked up its ears. Kevin didn't hear anything other than the beating of his heart. The cat turned its head back towards Kevin and shot forward. Kevin was certain he was about to meet his end, but the big cat ran round the other side of the stela from where he sat and off into the woods. A moment later Kevin heard the sound of voices. The cat, with its much more sensitive hearing, must have heard them before he did and was scared off by them. He breathed a sigh of relief.

Randy, Trisia, Greg, Julie, and James had returned with Santos. They had the other GPS unit, a hatchet, rope, and some other tools with them. As Randy quickly set about starting to clear the stela, Kevin grabbed Julie and told her what had happened to him.

"Don't be silly Kevin. It couldn't possibly be the same jaguar. Caracol is thirty-five miles from here and so is the zoo. In different directions, no less. Even if it somehow escaped the zoo it couldn't possibly have come all that way," Julie said dismissing his tale.

"I can't tell you why, but I know it's the same one," Kevin responded in a pleading tone.

"Look, while it's true black jaguars are somewhat rare, you've never been very good at identifying animals in the first place. And you were pretty shaken up. Seeing a jaguar you thought you'd just escaped from come after you a second time would shake anyone up," Julie said trying to dispel this silly notion. Not seeing a look of acceptance on his face, she turned to Santos for support, "Santos, do you know what the hunting range of a jaguar is?"

"Yes. I have read they can range over a hundred miles in the desert if food is scarce, although their range is typically much less here in Belize where the forest is more bountiful," Santos replied.

"You see, I told you it was the same one," Kevin said to her.

"Okay, I'll grant you it's possible it was the same one, but it's still not likely. Even if it is the same one, and that's a big if, I'm sure its being here is purely coincidental. I mean why would a jaguar be following us back and forth across Belize?" she said to him with a skeptical look on her face.

"If I knew why I'd tell you," he said.

"Anyway enough about the jaguar, let's help Randy with the stela," she said, trying to change the subject to divert him from obsessing over what was clearly an anxious experience for him.

The seven of them surrounded the stela and pulled at the moss which clung tightly to the surface of the stone and filled the grooves of the carved glyphs. They used water from their canteens to soften it and brushes to try to scrub it free. Soon they had managed to clean the lower five or six feet of the stone well enough for most of the writing to at least be seen, if not read.

Randy studied the glyphs carefully, trying to read them. Many of them were worn down over the centuries by the secretions the mosses used to leach nutrients from the stone. After a few minutes Randy shrugged his shoulders. "I can only read a little of this. First off, it's written top to bottom in columns and the top two thirds of it is still covered in moss. Secondly, from what I can see of it, it is pretty badly worn. We need to figure out a way to clean off the rest of it if I'm going to have a chance to figure out what this is a marker for," the exasperation evident in his voice.

Greg had an idea, "Well we have rope, and there is plenty of wood around us. Let's make some ladders. Then half of us can hold the ladders and the other half can climb them and clean the stela up to the top."

Recognizing a good idea when they heard it, the team quickly scattered about the forest in all directions around the stela, looking for wood to build the ladders they needed. They didn't have to look too far. The forest cover was dense here and there were many small trees of suitable height and thickness handy. Greg pulled the hatchet from his belt and quickly cut several of them to serve as vertical poles. He then cut some others of a similar size and chopped them into smaller cross pieces. As he did this the others dragged the wood back to the stela and lashed the cross pieces tightly onto the longer poles.

After about a half hour of work they had three sturdy ladders leaning up against the tall stone with three people on them cleaning the stela. Because there was much more area to clean up high, where only those on the ladders could reach, it took a while until they had managed to clean the entire stela. Once it was clean enough Randy set about trying to read it.

This was no easy task. The filtered daylight reaching through to the forest floor was not very bright, and the glyphs themselves were worn. When coupled with the need to ascend the ladder, then slowly descend it while reading each row from top to bottom and simultaneously taking notes, it was an arduous task. A task which had to be repeated for each row of glyphs until Randy had made note of all of the writing upon the stela.

It was over an hour before Randy had finished. Climbing down off the ladder he wiped the sweat, which served as evidence of the hard work he had been doing to read the glyphs, from his forehead. As he stepped off the ladder he was greeted by a sea of expectant faces.

"Okay, everybody just give me a minute," he said to them, wiping his forehead once more, "I need to go over my notes. Reading this stuff isn't like reading a newspaper in a foreign language. It's a bit more complex than that and I don't know what a lot of these glyphs mean. I couldn't read more than about two thirds of them to start with because of the condition of the stela and the fact that there are several of them here I've never seen before."

Despite Randy's cautionary comments they stood close around him, tense with anticipation, as he read and re-read his notes. Finally he looked up at them and said, "Here is what I could make out. This stela is very similar in design and carving style to the one in the museum at Buenavista. I think they might have been a pair. If so it would confirm my suspicions about the one at Buenavista not really being from there. It probably came from here. Without a more careful examination I can't be sure, but it's awfully suspicious." Then he stopped for a moment to wipe his forehead yet again.

The others waited impatiently for Randy to continue, but he stood there until Trisia spoke up, "So? Does this one have anything on it that could help us out?"

"Umm, oh yeah," Randy said still trying to cool off from his exertion. "The first date on this is a long count date starting with 9.12.13 but the last two digits are too eroded to be read. It is followed by the Venus war symbol and it also says on this date someone named Smoke Serpent defeated his enemy, but I can't make out the symbol for the name of the conquered foe. It contains some glyphs I've never seen before. Then it says something like this stone is placed where all who look upon the coming of the Venus God shall see it and remember the greatness of Smoke Serpent. It's followed by a lot of other dates with names of other rulers and claims by Smoke Serpent of them as his ancestors. None of the other dates are in the same timeframe as the Jaguar King's reign."

Kevin was the first to speak after Randy finished. "Could this be a monument erected to mark the victory of the ruler of El Pilar, this Smoke Serpent guy, over the Jaguar King of Caracol?" he asked Randy.

Randy replied, "It could be. Rulers were often known to erect monuments to establish a link between themselves and some past ruler whose feats were legendary. Their goal in doing this was to legitimize their rule by claiming a connection back to a past ruler revered in their historical tradition. What the heck this stela is doing out here in the forest, away from any other buildings or monuments I couldn't say."

Kevin responded to him, "Well I have a theory about that but I'll need the GPS readings from the other day to check it out. Those are in the laptop back at the camp. The quickest way back is past El Pilar and onto the path Julie and I cut to the south of it. The jaguar has moved off from there already, so it should be safe to go that way and I'm curious to really see if it was us or some wild turkeys he was after."

Kevin marked the stela's location in the surveyor's GPS unit Greg had brought up for him. Then they headed back to the cliff edge and onto the path leading to the south of the stone pillar. When they got back to the stone pillar they could clearly see the jaguar tracks in the fresh mud, which had begun to dry in the late morning sunshine. They also found a number of feathers from an iridescent turkey scattered about the edge of the path, although there was no sign that a jaguar might have dined on one there.

Arriving back at the camp, Kevin took out the laptop and started working on it while Randy and Greg watched over his shoulder. Julie proceeded to tell the others who had been waiting for them at the camp what they had found. When Kevin finished uploading the position reading he had taken back at the stela into his mapping software his eyes lit up.

"Hey, take a look at this," he said to Randy and Greg, who leaned in closer as he pointed to the screen. "Check out the place where these two lines intersect. It's in the second half mile grid square we're due to search today."

"So what does that mean?" Greg asked him.

"I think it means this is where we're going to find what we've been looking for," Kevin replied to him.

"What makes you think that?" Randy asked, curious as to what Kevin was thinking.

"Well, this first line runs from the spot on the eastern horizon where the sun rises on the day of the equinoxes and goes through the location of El Pilar. This second line goes from the mid point of the path that the planets traverse when crossing the sky through where stela is located. The spot the two intersect is the only vantage point from which you can see both events lined up with each of those two markers. And according to the topographic maps it is also one of several level places around here where the Maya could have built a large temple," Kevin said back to him.

Randy, forgetting what he had learned from having read Kevin's work on the Anasazi, still wasn't following him, "And in plain English that means?"

"It means the stone pillar on the cliff there isn't simply a rock outcropping at the top of their quarry. I think they built their temple further up slope, situated so that back when none of these trees were here, if they gazed from it out over the eastern horizon the pillar would mark the point where the Sun rose on the day of the equinoxes. Then, later on, when they put in a monument to honor the Venus War achievements of a great ruler, they placed it to mark the mid point of the plane of the ecliptic where the planets crossed from the underworld and into the night sky. Both those events were of astronomical significance to the Maya, so anyone observing either of them from this point here would always see the monument," Kevin said.

The look of confusion on Randy's face was quickly displaced by a look of understanding. "So you think if we march back uphill starting at the stela and running along the path of this line it will take us to the lost city we're looking for?" he said to Kevin.

"Bingo," Kevin shot back. "Let's get everyone gathered together at the stela. I'll orient us so we can head up away from the cliff in the right direction and we'll see what we find. Let's not say anything to anyone though. I don't want to get their hopes up just to have them crash if this theory turns out wrong."

Greg and Randy agreed with Kevin's request and rounded the team up. It was late in the morning now as the entire team headed south across the quarry clearing, back north along the cliff path, past the stone pillar, then west to the spot where the stela stood. As they had on the past three days, Bob and Kevin used the surveyors' GPS units to fan the team out into a long line with Randy at the center.

Once they were in line, and in the orientation Kevin wanted them in, he gave the signal to Bob and the others to move the line forward. This time he hoped they would find something significant. Foot by foot, the line moved forward. As they did so they moved slowly up the slope. Kevin swept his eyes back and forth from the GPS to the path in front of him, his heart racing in expectation of hearing at any moment word that they had found something.

When word did arrive he could scarcely believe what it was they had found. There, in the jungle, hidden under the thick forest canopy, was a mound at least forty feet high and one hundred feet across at its base. Trees grew out of the sloped sides of the mound, and the tops of them blended in with the trees around them.

They quickly found this mound was not alone. As they circled around it to the west they saw an even bigger mound further up the slope of the hill from the first one. This mound must have been sixty feet or more in height, and one hundred and fifty feet at its base. It, too, was covered in trees, the tops of which blended in with the tops of those on the forest floor around it.

As Kevin walked along the southern most edge of the second mound he noticed the terrain leveled out around him. Approaching the western edge of it he saw the terrain sloping downward off to the west. There, a little down the slope to the west of the second mound, he could make out a third one off in the forest.

In his initial excitement Kevin had forgotten to take GPS readings. He now started in to doing this as he circled the base of the second, center-most mound. As he came around the north side of it there was another lower feature in the terrain. Unlike either the mound he was circling, or the first one, this feature was not very high. It was also rectangular in shape instead of square. He was not sure if this was a man made feature or a natural one but he took readings on its location just in case.

As he took his GPS readings Kevin could hear the shouts of the others as they ran about the forest in their excitement at the find. He sat down on the side of the center mound to revel in what he saw about him. Seeing him sitting there Randy approached and said, "I'm amazed. It's right where you said it would be."

"Don't thank me, thank the Maya for being orderly architects," Kevin replied back. Then he added, "By the way, what exactly have we found?"
Chapter 11 - Doing Battle with the Rain God

Randy stood under the forest canopy looking at the mounds surrounding them, Kevin's question echoing through his mind, 'By the way, what exactly have we found?' What indeed, Randy thought to himself. Had they truly found a previously unknown Mayan city? Or was what they now stood before something more limited? Perhaps a residential palace complex or a religious center? Whatever it was, from its size alone he knew it was more than a simple residential mound.

He also knew it would take all the equipment they had brought, all the strength they could muster, and probably all the time they had available to them just to begin clearing and surveying it. Looking around him he sensed the reality of this had not yet sunken in with the others. As their leader it was his job to keep them focused, so one by one he circulated among the group of elated archeologists, putting a damper on their euphoria and guiding their thoughts back to the task ahead of them.

It wasn't long before Randy had the whole group gathered around him, discussing their next move. At his suggestion they quickly agreed they would need to relocate their camp closer to the ruin mounds, but there was a problem with this. If they camped on the mounds themselves it would interfere with their attempts to clear them. The forest floor around the mounds sloped sharply, however, and was such a tangle of tree roots that there was hardly a single level spot clear enough to pitch a tent. Kevin, being most familiar with the topographical charts of the area, soon had a remedy. The forest uphill from the stela was a fraction of the distance from the quarry and possessed a few mostly level areas, he told them. They could easily clear a space for their camp in no more than a few hours.

Having settled on a spot, they set out upon the task of moving their camp from the quarry. It took them several hours to haul their gear across the quarry, along the cliff edge, then up the path from El Pilar, past the stela and to the chosen spot. During this time Onofre had returned as promised. Better still, he had come by horseback. It was a great help for them to use the horse he had rode in on to move the heaviest gear. Despite this, by the time they had packed the gear they needed, moved it up to the spot closer to the ruin mounds, and unpacked it all once again it was well after noon.

Standing at the new camp site and catching his breath after trundling up the hill with a load of gear, Randy took note of where the sun stood in the sky. Then he started to run some numbers in his head. Three days marching in with all their gear, another three wandering the survey path through the forest, and most of this, their seventh day, moving gear around. It would take two days, maybe more, to clear the trees off the ruin mounds. Only then would they first be able to start moving the dirt off to reveal what was underneath it. Who knew how long that would take, he thought.

As this ran through his head he laughed to himself. Onofre saw the smile on his face and came to him. "You are satisfied with what you have found?" he asked Randy.

"I was thinking how real archeology sure isn't at all like Indiana Jones," Randy replied. "Even though we're going to be taking a lot of short cuts in clearing this site there are still many days of hard work ahead of us. I almost feel like a looter, digging up the site without a truly methodical survey. In many respects, that's pretty much what we're about to do Onofre. We're about to loot this site."

Onofre consoled him. "Señor," he said in his calm, fatherly voice, "you know well that as soon as people hear about this place, the real looters would surely come. If you do not find this treasure first then whatever might be here would surely be lost to archeologists. It would be lost to Belize. It would be lost to the world."

"As always, you are wise my friend," Randy said, reaching down to pick up a chain saw. Holding it up he spoke again, "Once we start these up the sound will carry for miles. Then it won't be long before other eyes will come to see what we are doing here...," his voice trailed off as the sounds of the other chainsaws echoed through the forest late in the afternoon of the seventh day.

Onofre tried to re-assure him, "I took care on my return here and did not take a direct route. I kept my eyes open about me and did not see or pass anyone on my way. I think you should not be so worried. The forest here is very thick and no sound will be heard as far off as you fear."

"Is there any chance you might be able to get any of your men to come back to help?" Randy asked.

Onofre shook his head. "If it will help I can stay an extra day, at least to help you clear the trees and stumps, but if I stay too long I will be missed and people will come to look for me."

Randy smiled, shook his hand, and accepted his offer. Then together they turned to head up the slope and begin the work of clearing the mounds, and as much of the space between them as was practicable, of the trees and stumps. The trees first had to be felled then cut into sections small enough to be carried, dragged, or rolled to the edge of the site. The site itself was between two and three acres in size.

Although some of the trees were over eighty feet high, most were far shorter. By Randy's count there were about one hundred they would need to remove, most of which seemed to be growing on the mounds themselves. This was good luck for the archeologists because, unlike elsewhere in the forest, the trees grew more sparsely, and less tall, over the tops of temple mounds since their roots could not penetrate the stone underneath them. Instead, the roots snaked along the surface, making them easier to clear away. When a tree was felled, if it was done a certain way, its own weight would often tear the roots right off of the stone below.

Under the most favorable circumstances it would take a group their size quite some time to clear all the trees. Recognizing this they came up with a plan to cut no more than the absolute minimum necessary for them to survey the site. Then they set out working in two teams of four, with two others operating the chainsaws, to implement their plan. In this manner they managed to get a dozen trees felled and cleared before the fading daylight forced them to head back to their new camp.

Back at camp the conversation over dinner was tempered by their exhaustion at the day's hard work, as well as the realization that there was much more of it ahead of them. Still, the mood of the team was one of excitement. Sleep came to them quickly that night and no sound the howler monkeys could make was able to stir them from their slumber.

Early the next day Kevin, Greg, and Randy moved brusquely to rouse the team before the sun rose, so they could be ready to work as soon as there was enough light. The morning ritual was kept brief and they set right to their task. All morning long the whir of the chainsaw, the crash of trees, and the grunting of the researchers as they lifted the tree sections out of the way drowned out the usual sounds of the forest.

Starting at the tops of the mounds they worked their way downward. While one team felled trees and cut them into sections to be moved, another worked to clear the stumps and roots left behind by them. Sweat poured from Randy's face and as he rested for a moment, he recalled some of what he had read in Ian Graham's biography of Alfred Maudslay.

Maudslay was one of the first of a new breed of ninteenth century archeologists who had visited what is now referred to as Meso-America, the land the Maya called home. His travels there included trips to places like Copan, Tikal, and Quirigia. At some of these sites he was the first European ever to set foot there. Even when he wasn't first to see a site, he was often the first to bring teams of laborers to clear and map it.

After clearing a site he would photograph the stelae and temples he found there and make drawings or take casts. How grueling the work must have been, Randy thought, for unlike his team, Maudslay's would have had only hand axes, not chainsaws. What his team of ten men and women could accomplish in a day or two with modern equipment would have taken Maudslay's men at least a week, likely more. Knowing others had managed such feats before them, with far lesser equipment, persuaded Randy it was possible to achieve their goal, although it didn't make him sweat any less.

The morning sun rose in the eastern sky, became the noon sun, and then slipped slowly into the west. Despite regular breaks for water, food, and rest the day seemed an endless repetition of the same tasks over and over again. With each felled tree and each cleared stump they sensed themselves drawing closer to unearthing the mysteries of this place. They worked until the light of day waned, then dragged themselves back to their camp. They finished their meal quickly and exhaustion soon washed over them, transporting them to sleep like so many logs floating downstream upon a swiftly flowing flume.

The next day started out much as the one before it had, and they soon found themselves on site clearing trees by the time the sun broke the eastern horizon. On this day, however, they knew there would be an end to this heaviest of work. The shapes of the three mounds, stripped of most of the trees and stumps which had been on them, were now apparent. With the exception of the flat area north of the mounds, they had chosen to cut as few trees around and between them as possible, in order to save time.

In the flat spot to the north of the central mound were two low rectangular structures. Randy speculated the shape and layout of these appeared to be those of a Mayan ball court. This convinced him the area needed to be cleared, since the only way to test this supposition was to clear not just the low rectangular structures, but also the space between them. Fortunately for them the height of the central mound itself had shaded these structures, and what few trees grew upon them were far smaller than those on the mounds themselves.

They worked all morning cutting, hauling, and clearing the trees and stumps remaining at the bottoms of the three mounds, as well as those standing on what they had taken to optimistically calling the "Ball Court." By the time lunch break came around, the site was cleared to the point where only a few more hours of work remained. Talking as they ate their lunch, Kevin and Randy decided it would be best to begin surveying while the last of the trees were being cleared. That way they could create a site map from the survey tonight for use in making decisions about where to dig the next day.

As the tree crews finished eating, Kevin and Bob gathered up the surveying gear and set to work with transom, GPS, tape measures, and other tools to map the layout of the site. Taking care to stay clear of the others as they finished the heavy work, the two of them moved around the site recording their measurements and GPS readings. Kevin had enough survey experience to know they'd end up redoing this work each day as more of the site was uncovered, but it was necessary to create a preliminary site plan which would help guide them as to where to start.

By late afternoon the preliminary survey work was finished. Bob packed up the gear while Kevin climbed up to the top of the tallest of the mounds to start in on the work of downloading the survey data onto the laptop, and manipulating it into a preliminary plan of the site. As he sat there the sun cast his shadow down the side of the mound. Next to him lay the portable solar cells he was using to recharge the batteries the laptop and GPS equipment relied on. Below him the tree clearing teams, their energy and enthusiasm fading like the day, trudged about the last of their work.

Seeing Kevin working up on top of the mound, Randy and Greg set their tools down and climbed up to join him. Engrossed in his work, Kevin didn't notice their presence. They stood there a moment, amused at how transfixed he had become by his work, until Greg finally decided to get his attention.

"Ahem," Greg said, clearing his throat with a loud coughing sound.

The sound startled Kevin, who instinctively moved to stand up. Then, suddenly, he lost his footing on the loose soil atop the mound, which had been ripped up by the tree removal work, and promptly fell flat on his butt. Arms flailing as he fell, it was all he could do to keep the laptop from sliding out of his hands and down the slope of the temple. Randy and Greg let out a laugh at the sight, but were quickly chastened by Kevin's unamused reaction.

"Geez! What the hell are you trying to do?" Kevin shouted. "We can't afford to lose this laptop. It's got all the survey data on it and it would take me all night to restore that from the backup if I'd dropped the damn thing."

"Sorry," Greg said, "We were just having a little fun with you."

Kevin shot him a look as if to say, "you should know better," but before he could voice the thought Randy changed the subject.

"It sure would have been nice to have the ultrasound equipment," Randy said. "We don't really have any way of knowing whether there is six inches or six feet of earth covering what's underneath here. At least with that we might have gotten some idea."

"Agreed," Kevin replied, "but we'll have to make do. I think our best bet is to dig survey trenches. I've double checked the orientation of these mounds and the two lower ones appear to be aligned with the position of the rising and setting sun as it would be viewed from the taller central mound. Does that give you any ideas?" he asked Randy.

"Yes, actually it does," Randy said, "In Mayan culture the east is associated with the rebirth of the sun after its nightly trip through the underworld. At other Mayan sites it has been noted that part of their veneration of the dead is to bury them in the structures on the east of any grouping. It's the reason I picked that temple out on the east edge of Caracol to dig at. I figured I might find burials there, though I never expected to find a king. I was expecting a nobleman or someone else of a lesser stature."

"So are you thinking the eastern mound here could contain a tomb?" Kevin asked.

"Possibly, but it's hard to say for sure," Randy said. "Just at Caracol alone we've found a range of burial styles. From plain burials similar to the way we do things today, to crypts and tombs. Their practices were highly varied and ritualized," he continued. "With mounds like this we have found if they hold any burials at all they are most likely to contain tombs. That could mean a single interment in a tomb, or multiple interments. Multiple interments were usually made over an extended time period. Also, the Maya often built new temples on top of old ones. So a mound could hold the burials of multiple rulers, priests, or noblemen at different depths and places within it. There are some sites where new burials have been found underneath old ones, even after years of exploration."

Greg, who had been listening intently, now began asking questions, "Well, if there is more than one tomb in a mound, how would we know where to dig to find them? Or whose tomb we might have found if we do find one? Or who is buried there if there is more than one skeleton?"

Randy turned to Greg and answered him, "All good questions. The overall history of the site might give us some clues. The Maya usually marked each phase of construction with some type of dedication, in hieroglyphs, of course. I can go back and review what I transcribed from the stela we found since it seemed to have some history of this site and its rulers. Assuming the mounds at this site were built in a manner similar to others in this region we stand a chance of uncovering dedications from the different phases of construction by digging survey trenches along the faces of the mounds. Additionally, the tombs themselves often contain paintings and hieroglyphs. When we combine these with the info from the stela it could help us interpret anything we might find. If we're lucky we'll find something which corresponds to the rule of this Smoke Serpent and might point us to his tomb."

"Well then, it sounds like we have a plan. You go over the stuff from the stela and I'll go mark out survey trenches on the faces of the mounds. We can decide in the morning what trenches to start with," Kevin said to Randy. "Given what I've learned about the Maya I'm guessing the most likely places to dig survey trenches would be on the faces of the mounds aligned with the south and east. Would you agree?"

Randy replied, "That would be my pick, too. Of course it still leaves a lot of area to dig, but since we're tossing archeological standards aside hopefully we can dig a lot faster than we would normally."

Randy sat down to review the notes he had hastily taken of the inscriptions on the stela. After working on these for a little while he paused to seek out James. When he found him, the two of them headed down the hill from the camp site in order for Randy to take another look at the stela while James held the ladder for him. While they were off doing this Kevin worked to mark the trenches along the faces of the mounds.

Using rope and sticks he marked lines from the top of the mounds to their bases. Each line lay along one of the faces of the mound, north, south, east, and west. He took special care when marking the southern and eastern faces, since these were the ones most likely to produce a find.

He also marked trench lines along the low rectangular mounds to the north of the central mound: the so called "Ball Court" mounds. He did this in the hope that if these two mounds did indeed form a ball court, then by digging trenches running east to west along their length and about halfway to their tops the team might uncover the ceremonial "goal post" rings. Virtually every known ceremonial ball court had such rings, so discovering them here would confirm their guess as to whether this was a ball court or not.

It took Kevin a little over an hour to mark out the trenches. When he was done, the sun had set below the tree tops. Julie came up to call him back to the camp, where the rest of the group had been relaxing and preparing dinner. Arriving at the camp, the two of them settled down to eat. As they did, Randy and James returned from the stela. Randy grabbed his food with barely a word to anyone, then sat by himself off to the side, eating as he worked. Trisia walked over and began to sit down next to him, but he was immersed in his task and motioned her away.

Spurned by Randy, Trisia instead headed over to sit with Julie and Kevin. "What's Randy so wrapped up in?" she asked them.

Kevin replied, "Well, we've been at this over a week and we don't have enough time to excavate this whole site. Randy thought the stela might provide some more clues, so if we do find anything while excavating we can determine what ruler it was from, and whether it merits further digging right away or can be skipped for now. So he's working on translating what was written upon it."

At Kevin's reply, Julie noticed a disappointed look on Trisia's face. A look which told Julie this trip probably wasn't working out quite the way Trisia had hoped it might. Between the long days of exhausting work and the constant meetings to plan and coordinate the group's work Randy had barely spoken to her since they left. Julie was guessing that by helping out on this search Trisia had been hoping for an opportunity to be alone with Randy. Other than the dangerous river crossing, however, he'd hardly said two words to her.

Well, Julie thought, that's not going to change tonight. She was right. For even as the rest of the team finished their meal and headed off to bed, Randy started in to working in his notebook by the light of a camp lantern.

When the next day dawned the camp was quiet. At first glance it appeared there was no movement in it, save for that of Onofre who had risen early to ride back to the horse ranch. Onofre had planned to wake Randy in order to say goodbye before his departure, but to his surprise he found him already awake and working. Addressing his friend he said, "Mr. Randy, I am surprised to see you up this early. Have you been awake all night?"

"Yes, Onofre. I think I have been able to translate most of what I could read from the stela," Randy replied.

"That is good. The others showed me the stone and told me of how you found it. It is amazing it stood disguised in the jungle untouched for all these years. Although given the superstitions of the men about El Pilar, I would guess not many have come out to this place before," Onofre said to him.

"Well, I think our search plan might have found the mound site if we continued on long enough. I believe were it not for the jaguar, though, we would not have found the stela with the information on it about the dates this place was built. Information that I hope will help us focus our search. Otherwise I think we might have had to dig up the entire place, which would have taken quite some time," Randy said.

"Well I wish you luck with your searching. I will return again in a week if I do not receive word from you before then. I am guessing from what we carried in that unless you send someone back with a message for me to send you more supplies you will have only enough left for about six or seven more days. Correct?" Onofre asked.

Randy replied, "Yes, you are correct. I'm afraid if we don't find what we're looking for in the next few days then we will have to stop our search for now. We may have just this one chance to dig here without others knowing about it, and when they find out we will have to use proper equipment and procedures. It would take a lot of time to arrange for such an excavation and while we waited the site would be unprotected until we could return. Who knows what will be lost to looters in that time?"

Onofre looked at him with a face full of wisdom and said, "If God wishes it then you will find what you are searching for."

Randy sighed, then smiled to his friend, saying, "Thank you for all your help my friend. Vaya con Dios."

Onofre walked from the campsite to where his horse was tied up, climbed on it, and turned it towards the path leading past the stela. From there he headed around the cliff edge, across the quarry, down to the river, and to his ranch beyond it. As Randy watched Onofre ride off, the morning sky continued to lighten above the trees and the sound of the howler monkeys gave way to the call of birds. Others began to stir in the camp just as Randy finally nodded off to sleep. He didn't get to sleep long before Kevin woke him for breakfast.

Randy rubbed his eyes as Kevin asked him, "How late were you up?"

"Umm, I went to sleep right after Onofre left, not long before dawn." Looking down at his watch he yawned and continued, "Maybe got forty five minutes to an hour."

"Sorry, I didn't realize you were up all night or I wouldn't have woken you so soon. Were you able to figure anything out?" Kevin said apologetically.

"Yes, I think. James and I went back down to the stela while you were marking trench lines. James held the ladder for me and I reviewed the hieroglyphs there one more time. There is quite a bit I can't read because it's too worn, and a bunch of stuff I could read but I don't know the meaning of. I copied down as many of the symbols as I could possibly make out, figuring that some of them were probably names of other kings who ruled here. I need to go over it all again but I think I came up with two things that might help," Randy said and then yawned.

"Do tell," Kevin replied as he stood there sipping coffee from a cup in his right hand, while holding a second cup in his left.

Randy fought back another yawn. "Well, I was able to come up with enough dates to at least place any other names of rulers we might find in temporal relation to the rule of Smoke Serpent. If we encounter any of them while digging then at least we'll have an idea as to whether we're looking at something from before or after his reign," Randy said. Then, eyeing the second cup Kevin continued to hold, he asked, "Is one of those for me?"

A look of embarrassment flashed across Kevin's face as he handed the hot liquid to his friend. Randy paused, took a sip, then continued on, "The other thing is I believe I know the name the Maya used for this place. If I understood what was on the stela correctly they called it Bital. Not that that will help us find the mask...."

"Wow," Kevin said, "it's amazing you can determine so much from so little information." Then he offered his hand to Randy to help him up from the ground.

"Well sometimes you don't have to be able to read all of a language to spot clues and patterns. That's how the people like Proskouriakoff first deciphered what we've leaned about Mayan writing so far." Stretching as he stood, he turned his attention to more mundane matters, "We'd better get something to eat and get to digging. Something tells me we're going to have quite a bit of earth to move before we find anything useful."

As had become their norm, breakfast was cooked and eaten in a minimum of time so they could get working as soon as possible. Upon finishing their food the group headed up to the dig site and split into three teams. One team worked on the south face of the center mound, a second on the east face of the eastern mound. Rather than have the third team work on the western mound it was decided they should work on the ball court mounds, those being likely to have had the greater cultural significance at this site.

Each team was to dig a trench wide enough to stand in and as deep as it took to reach whatever was underneath. To make sure each team had someone familiar with the Maya, Randy, Bob, and James were split among them. Randy measured the trench on the east mound to be sixty five feet long, the one on the central mound to be one hundred feet long, and the one on the ball court to also be one hundred feet long.

It was agreed if any team should finish sooner than another they would move over to assist a team still working. The teams were also instructed that once they had finished digging out the trench itself they would need to brush and clean what was underneath it in order to properly assess what was there. The first order of business though was to get to work on digging the trenches.

Having reviewed their objectives with Randy, they set to work digging. All morning long, with the hot sun beating down upon them, the three person teams dug in a non-stop rotation. At any moment two of them would be down in the trench digging while the third rested nearby. The work was made that much tougher by the presence of sinuous plant and tree roots in the soil.

The soil itself was the remnant of centuries of plants which had grown over the top of the mounds. As a result of this, when they did hit stone beneath the soil they were confident it was the surface of the structure underneath, especially when they could hear the clang of their shovels on it. When this occurred they stopped digging downward and shifted further along the mound so that, little by little, the trench grew.

As the morning progressed the teams made good progress. In just the first few hours they had managed to dig their trenches as much as thirty feet along. The bright sunshine and early success buoyed them in their belief they would be able to complete the first trenches and brush them clean before lunch.

The digging so far had given them no glimpses of stone carvings or hieroglyphs, but this was to be expected. Only the most elaborate of Mayan structures would have large amounts of these on them. The presence of carvings or hieroglyphs at most Mayan structures were usually limited to certain parts of the structure. Digging survey trenches served as a way to try to identify the overall architecture and function of a structure before deciding on where to truly focus their efforts.

The team on the small eastern mound was the first to finish digging. Once finished they began brushing the bottom of their trench clean, revealing nothing but smooth stones underneath. Undeterred by their lack of any major discovery in their trench they soon moved over to the central mound to assist the team working there. Soon they had a new hole formed at the bottom of the marked line and were digging their way up the slope of the mound and towards the other team, who were working from the top down.

The team on the ball court mounds had also made good progress. Their trench cut across the slope of the much lower mounds, sparing them the added difficulty of digging on a steep embankment like the other teams did. As such their work was less strenuous, although there was more of it.

With the sun reaching its zenith, the teams took a much needed lunch break. Randy and a few of the others used the opportunity to examine the survey trenches that had been dug so far. As he had hoped, the southern face of the central structure appeared to be a staircase. Stooping to brush off the bottom of the unfinished trench, he noticed some of the steps on it contained hieroglyphs upon them. Wow, Randy thought to himself, this looks similar to pictures I've seen of the one at Copan, I hope when we get them fully uncovered they yield some useful information.

The trench on the eastern mound was less promising. It revealed nothing more than the outline of a steep block pyramid, with no sign of a stairway. The top of the eastern mound was flat with no hint of any structure, hieroglyphs, or carvings to give an indication of its function.

At the small mound which lay in the shadow of the large central one, just to its north, Randy found a truly pleasant surprise. The contents of the trench there definitely confirmed their guess that this was a ball court. Not only did the trench reveal the sloped sides typical of a ball court, it also revealed what looked to be the lower part of one of the goals. Details of the court's decoration, and therefore its true status, were yet to be uncovered, but even this partial discovery was good news indeed, for the presence of a ceremonial ball court greatly increased the chance this site was one of real archeological significance.

When he finally sat down to eat his lunch Randy pondered what to do next. He called the team around him, talking as he chewed his food. "I think we should keep working in three teams," he mumbled between bites. "One team can dig on the southern mound to reveal the rest of the hieroglyphs on the stairway there."

He stopped for another bite, chewed quickly, then continued, "A second team can work on the ball court. Dig out the rest of the stone marker and see if it really is a goal. Maybe try widening the trench to see if we can expose the vertical face and find any hieroglyphs. Also maybe dig on the opposite side from whatever you find. If it is a ball court then it will be symmetrical."

"What about the eastern mound?" Kevin asked.

Randy stuffed the last of his lunch in his mouth, chewed, and gulped down his food. He paused only long enough to catch his breath after the quite audible swallow, then he spoke, "I'm not sure about that. This morning's survey trench there on the eastern slope didn't expose anything useful. Just the side of a typical Mayan block style pyramid with what appears to be a flat top. We could try digging a new survey trench across a different face. Maybe the southern one. Or we could try to expose more of the top of the structure itself and see if we find signs of anything. Any ideas or preferences?"

To Randy's surprise it was Bob who spoke up. "I think we should dig three shorter trenches running north to south along the top of it. Most of what's of interest in Mayan temples is usually up at the top. If we dig in this manner we'll find something if it's there to be found."

Randy was glad to hear Bob's comments. Since they had found the stela he had begun to detect something of an improvement in Bob's mood. He hoped that maybe now that they had actually found something Bob was having fewer regrets about being drawn away from his thesis work, which was, after all, pretty mundane stuff. In order to encourage Bob getting caught up in the excitement of their search Randy decided not just to accept Bob's idea, but to let his team be the one to execute it.

"That's a great idea Bob. Would you like to lead the team digging there since it's your idea?" Randy replied.

"Why not? A trench is a trench and I'm guessing you'd prefer to work over on the stairway since you're the one best at reading hieroglyphs," Bob answered back.

With the afternoon's work plan set the teams went about their tasks. As the sun made its way across the sky the site began to slowly reveal its secrets. One by one, the hieroglyphs carved onto the stairway of the central mound were exposed, the ornately carved stone goal posts on either side of the ball court emerged into the sun for the first time in hundreds of years, and a series of trenches along the top of the eastern mound took shape.

Bob's team was comprised of Greg, Cynthia, and himself. At his direction they now worked in a manner different from that which they had done earlier in the day. Instead of two people digging while the third rested, they dug simultaneously, each of them working in their own trench. The result was three parallel trenches barely wide enough for them to stand and dig in. At first the work went fast. It seemed like the stone structure underneath the mound was very close to the surface, closer in fact than anywhere they had dug during the morning.

Soon the new trenches they dug extended over the northernmost half of top of the temple and had crept past the spot at the middle of the eastern slope where the morning's first trench lay. As they started to dig in the southern half of the temple's summit Bob noticed something strange about the terrain beneath him. Rather than the shallow trench which only a few minutes earlier had easily exposed the stone of the temple inches below its surface, he found himself digging much deeper with no end in sight. A foot at first, then two, and almost three, yet he still did not strike the stone beneath him. His initial thought was this must simply be an anomaly, maybe a hole left by a tumbled stone or the excavations of some past looter.

When he looked up from his trench he noticed the others were also digging deeper than before without reaching the stones of the temple below. When he realized all three of them were encountering the same thing, he began to think the siting of these new trenches might have placed them in a spot where the structure of the temple beneath them had suddenly dropped off. Perhaps there was some type of raised feature at the top of the mound, and only now were they actually digging beyond the top if it and down to the platform itself hidden somewhere below it.

He'd seen such constructs on other temples, and was guessing this might be what was happening here. Until they dug further he really had no idea what the true shape of the structure beneath them was. He had a hunch but was reluctant to pull Randy away from his work on the hieroglyphs in order to run it by him. Instead he jumped up from his trench and instructed the others to stop working for a minute, while he sat there contemplating what to do about this development.

It occurred to him that if they had just traversed the edge of a raised feature then the spot they were now digging in should be right at the face of it. What if, he thought, instead of continuing the three trenches to the south as he had originally planned, they changed course by ninety degrees and dug a new trench in between them, along the very top of the mound? Such a trench would connect the two outermost ones and meet at the one in the center, thereby exposing the entire face of whatever it was they had been digging over the top of.

He ran this through his head again. If they started digging from the outside in towards the center it would essentially mean digging two trenches around fifteen feet long. His best estimate was that if they dug them all the way down until they hit stone they'd be about six feet deep. That was a lot of digging. It would almost certainly take them the rest of the day. If his hunch was right, though, they probably wouldn't have to dig more than a few feet down before he'd be able to confirm it. If he was wrong they'd waste a few hours and Randy would be pissed at him.

It seemed like a justifiable risk for him to take. Better to spend their time digging in a way that would yield an understanding of the shape of the structure beneath them than waste it moving dirt around at random. To hedge his bet he'd have them start off by digging the trenches shallow, perhaps only a foot deep, moving from the ends inward towards the center. When they reached the center he'd have them turn around and dig back along the way the came. This way if there was anything which might prove contrary to his guess they'd find it sooner rather than later.

As a result of this change in plan, he decided to have his crew switch back to the morning's method, two people digging and one resting in rotation. Bob was sure he was onto something, so he chose to be the first one in. Excited as he was at what he thought lay beneath them, he really put his back into the digging. Greg followed suit while Cynthia stood by resting.

As he tired, Bob's initial frenzy of digging gave way to a steadier pace. Soon it was his turn to rest. Stepping out from the slowly deepening trench something else began to worry him. Both Greg and Cynthia were very experienced archeologists. Greg especially so. He was also a part of the leadership team of this expedition, yet he didn't question Bob's decision to alter the digging plan. He began to wonder why Greg didn't say anything. Had he not been paying any attention to the planning and was simply doing what he was told? Or was he also guessing the same thing about what lay beneath them?

Either way, Bob decided, he didn't want to risk bringing it up. If he made his thoughts known to Greg he risked having them second guessed. As long as they were digging where he wanted he was satisfied for now. Or at least he'd be satisfied if they found something that would make the digging worth the work. So when it was his turn to dig he kept his mouth shut and the dirt flying.

In the strong sun of the tropics the sweat poured off them as they worked. It felt to Bob as if each shovel full cleared only an agonizingly small amount of dirt from what appeared to be an endless supply of it, but as the trench slowly deepened he started to notice they were indeed exposing a vertical stone face. Not just a plain stone face, but a carved one. He breathed a sigh of relief at the realization he had guessed correctly and continued digging even harder despite the heat.

It didn't take much more digging before Greg and Cynthia also noticed what the trench was exposing. At first they just continued digging, but soon Greg stopped, turned to Bob, and said, "Bob, shouldn't we tell Randy about this?"

Bob, for his part, was worried Randy would be upset because he had deviated from the plan they'd made earlier in the day. When he answered Greg there was some uncertainty in his voice, "Randy's busy working on the hieroglyphs on the central mound. Since we're not certain what we're onto here let's keep digging for a bit until we know for sure whether it's worth disturbing him."

Greg looked at him unconvinced, shrugged his shoulders, and went back to digging. By the time they had gotten the trench almost three feet deep there was no longer any question as to what it was they were unearthing. They were digging out the face of a wall covered with ornate carvings. The carvings seemed to have extensive relief on them, but the detail was so packed with dirt that until it could be properly cleaned it was impossible to tell for sure what the carvings were. Bob knew carvings such as these were made by many Mayan cultures over the course of several centuries. So he knew it would require close examination of their details to say when the ones they were uncovering here had been carved. There was one thing Bob was certain of. They had found a major architectural element of the structure and most of it still lay hidden beneath them.

As more and more of the carved relief became exposed Greg also became sure they were on to something important. In the light of the late afternoon he climbed up from the trench, turned to Bob and said, "Bob, I'm no Mayan archeology expert, but this looks like something pretty important here. We really need to let Randy have a look."

Bob, now much more confident his hunch was correct, finally relented. "Sure, okay," he replied. Then turning to Cynthia and tilting his head in the direction of where Randy was working said, "It's your turn to take a break. Why don't you go over there and get him while Greg and I keep digging?"

Cynthia, who had been digging, stopped and responded, "Sure, I don't mind taking a break and going over there." She put down her shovel, climbed up out of the trench, and started down the western slope of the eastern mound.

As she walked off Bob jumped down to replace her and went right back to digging. He dug hard, even more determined to have something spectacular to show Randy in answer to what he anticipated would be his reaction to Bob's unilateral decision to change plans. Bob was working close to the center of the three trenches they had started right after lunch. As he dug furiously he heard a sound he didn't expect. A sound causing both apprehension and excitement in him. It was the sound of his shovel striking stone.

That's odd, he thought to himself. He had begun to guess that the carved wall they were digging out was the backdrop of the top of a temple. Such decorative elements on temples usually consisted of large blocks of stone, sometimes ten or more feet in height, which were hoisted to the top and carved with hieroglyphs and ritual drawings. He had fully expected they would have to dig down six feet or more to expose the entire front of it, yet the trench he was digging in was only about three or four feet deep. If he was striking stone at this shallow a depth then maybe his guess had been wrong. He stood there puzzling at the inconsistency in the terrain hidden below him. His real concern was the possibility he might have guessed wrong, and that Randy would arrive just in time for him to make a fool of himself once again.

Trying to stay calm he decided to probe the rest of the trench. Stepping a few paces down its length he thrust his shovel into the dark, rich earth. It slipped deep into the soft soil and he hefted the dirt from the ground and out of the trench. Then he stepped forward to where he had heard the shovel strike stone and dug in. He felt the shovel touch something. Next he stepped about the same distance along the trench in the opposite direction from that which he gone before, stopped, and pushed the shovel home. Soft earth. Relieved he set the shovel down. As he did this he glanced up and saw Randy standing over him.

"What are you up to Bob?" Randy said without a hint of emotion.

Bob lingered on this query, unsure of the tone of Randy's voice. His first instinct was towards defensiveness, but he caught his breath instead and spoke calmly, explaining to Randy his decision to alter the plan after finding a change in the contour of the structure hidden underneath them.

Randy said nothing as he jumped down into the trench next to Bob to have a closer look. Then he slapped Bob on the back and said, "Mac was right about you. I wasn't so sure myself after you tried to knock my head off back there at the river crossing, but I think you made the right choice."

Randy jumped up out of the trench, then turned round and reached his hand back down and pulled Bob up after him. "It's pretty late and I don't want to pull the other teams off what they're working on today, but I think tomorrow we should double up over here and get more of this cleared out. Why don't the three of you keep working here until you're out of light? I'll have some of the others start dinner. Then we'll have a closer look at this in the morning."

Bob nodded in agreement. As Randy walked off Bob jumped back down into the trench a few feet from where he had been standing before Randy arrived. He motioned to Cynthia and Greg to both grab shovels, and together the three of them dug a little longer until the sun slipped below the horizon. Soon the light faded to the point where Bob was forced to admit they could no longer see well enough to work. Climbing from the trench, they got some flashlights from out of their packs, then headed back to the campsite for some dinner.

Talk at dinner was of the day's successes and the site's true nature. Speculation abounded that the evidence of a ball court, in the form of two undamaged goals, was a valuable find. Proponents claimed such a structure was a strong clue as to the nature of the site. The more skeptical among them countered that a ball court was, in and of itself, not sufficient to classify it, since ball courts were routinely found at sites all over Meso-America, even small, relatively unimportant ones.

This conservative interpretation was rebutted by the observation that it was the combination of structures which gave the place significance. The presence of carved hieroglyphs on the stairway of the central mound led some to think it could be a residential palace. The ornate carvings on the eastern mound made them hope it would prove to be a temple. When coupled with the ceremonial ball court, the optimists argued these proved the site was definitely more than a family residential grouping.

In fact, they claimed, it had all the signs of being a small to mid-sized city. Slowly the optimists camp began to win over that of the skeptics. Finally, after much spirited discussion, they agreed that no matter what the true significance of the site turned out to be, in a single day they had managed to uncover enough of it to confirm that, while small when compared to places like Caracol or Tikal, it was nonetheless a significant find.

Eventually the dinner talk turned from academic banter over the finds of the day to the plan for the next. In doing so it became apparent that opinions within the group split along lines mirroring each archeologists view of the ball court's importance. A small faction, including Randy and James, wanted to divide the teams as before and continue work in as many places as possible. Most of the group, however, wanted to focus as much effort as they could spare on completing what Bob's team had started on the eastern mound.

Whether it was due to a sincere academic difference of opinion, or simple stress and fatigue, tempers began to flare. It was only Greg's experience leading teams in the field that precluded a full blown argument. Thinking fast, he decided to call for a vote.

"It's clear we're not going to resolve this by debate," he said. "Let's see a show of hands as to who wants to work on what. Everyone who wants to work on the eastern mound first, raise your hands."

As the archeologists held their hands up Greg took count. "All who want to work on the ball court first," he continued. Once more he counted hands.

"And finally, all who want to work on the stairway on the center mound first," he said as he took the final tally. "Well, some of you voted twice, but it looks like almost everyone wants to see work on the eastern mound take precedence. For the few that don't, which includes those who voted more than once, you're gonna have to decide what you want to work on," he concluded. As he did, Randy leaned in and whispered something into his ear. Greg shook his head.

Rebuffed by Greg, Randy spoke up, "Well we're short on manpower, and while I would prefer that we not entirely abandon work on the ball court, I have to work on the central mound since we need to uncover and understand the hieroglyphs there if we're going to make sense of what this place is. So I'm hoping some of you will reconsider."

Randy's plea went unheeded. The group had reached a consensus and with the exception of Randy, they seemed too tired to continue debating its merits. Instead, all but Randy accepted the decision of their peers to spend the next day working to continue the excavation Bob's team had begun on the eastern mound. With the day behind them and plans for the next agreed upon, the tired crew soon found their way to their tents and a well earned night's sleep.

On waking the next day their excitement at the prospect of completely unearthing what they had begun to expose the day before was soon tempered by a grey and threatening sky. No one relished the thought of digging in the rain, and the mud it would create, but on this expedition they did not have the luxury of extra time. Their choice was simple, dig in the rain or risk not finding what they sought.

As agreed upon the prior evening all but two of them set off to work on the eastern mound. Those two, Randy and Trisia, would work on the hieroglyphs on the central mound. Randy was in a foul mood. He was less annoyed at having been out-voted the night before with regard to how to deploy the limited number of people they had than he was by the fact that they lacked the resources to continue work on both the ball court and the eastern mound. He knew the ball court stood at least as good a chance as either of the mounds did to yield useful clues regarding the date of its construction and the ruler who built it. Unfortunately, the size of it alone dictated that they would have to put off working on it for now. This was a reality he was not happily accepting.

Randy was not the only member of the team in a bad mood. As the team marched up to the dig site it began to rain. Though it fell lightly at first, it put most of the team in a dour mood. Most, but not all. Julie was sure she could see a wry smile on Trisia's face. In fact, it appeared to her Trisia was almost as happy as if the sun were shining. Why not, Julie thought, after days of hiking with a heavy pack, walking in a survey line in the woods, and digging trenches, she's finally getting what she came here for, the chance to be alone with Randy for several hours. Julie figured she'd know by dinner time whether Trisia was able to take advantage of the opportunity. In the meantime she'd have plenty to keep herself busy.

On reaching the eastern mound the team set down their packs, picked up their shovels, and climbed into the trench. Without really thinking about their task they all started to dig in the trench at the same time. Though the trench was fairly long, with all of them simultaneously digging in such close proximity to each other, it soon became clear it was not big enough. Bob climbed up from the trench and called a halt to the work. He decided to have them switch back to a rotation system with five people digging and two resting. When they resumed work things went more smoothly at first, although they soon came to an abrupt halt at the echo of a loud clanging noise. It was the unmistakable sound of steel upon stone. One of them had struck something under the ground right near the center of the trench.

It was only then Bob remembered he had hit something in about the same place while digging there the previous day. How stupid of me, he thought, I should have told them about that. Still, it didn't really seem of much importance since someone else had found it. At least he felt that way until he went over to the spot of the noise and saw something which made his heart sink.

The noise had come from where James had been digging. When Bob kneeled in for a closer look, carefully clearing away the dirt at the floor of the trench, he saw a triangular shaped piece of limestone containing hieroglyphs upon its face. Mixed into the dirt around it were pieces of crumbled limestone. Also there was the fractured edge of a larger stone the bulk of which was still buried in the dirt. At that moment Bob realized whatever was underneath them had just been accidentally damaged by James' digging.

Angry at himself for forgetting about this, Bob instead yelled at James to go dig someplace else. James looked at him quizzically, shrugged his shoulders, then shifted positions in the trench to get out of Bob's way. Now clear of James, Bob set to work trying to carefully determine the extent of what lay buried beneath him while the others dug away at the rest of the trench. Probing with his shovel, Bob determined that the stone at the trench's bottom originated at the base of the carved wall they were unearthing. The stone was about three feet wide and ran perpendicular to the carved north wall of the trench. Probing carefully with his shovel Bob found the stone stretched beneath where he stood and across the width of the narrow trench before disappearing under the side opposite the carved stone face.

Realizing this he called up to the people resting to come down into the trench and help him. He began digging at the spot where the stone retreated under the wall of the trench. He dug like a madman, extending the width of the trench at the point where the stone slab ran underneath it. Pulling the soil above the slab down into the trench itself he left it to those around him to clean the loose dirt out from where he tossed it. In doing this he was slowly but surely creating a large bulge about four feet wide in the southern side of the trench wall.

When the depth of the bulge he was digging reached down to the floor of the trench, Bob stopped to help the others who were carefully clearing the dirt from off the stone. It was now quite obvious the stone comprised the floor of the trench in the area where they were working. When he was satisfied enough dirt had been removed he resumed probing into the wall at the trench's bulge. He found that although he had managed to widen the trench by a few feet, the stone beneath him continued still further underneath its wall. Frustrated, he launched into digging right at the base of the trench, determined to find the full extent of the stone in the trench floor rather than continuing to widen it from the top down as he had been doing. He dug a cavity several feet into the side of the trench then reached into it with his hands and clawed at the dirt, trying to find the end of the stone below him.

With his head turned away from the base of the wall where the hole was, he reached into it as far as he could and felt around for what he hoped was the stone's edge. As he did so, the side of the trench gave way and a pile of dirt slid down on top of him covering his head as well as the upper half of his body. Choking and thrashing, Bob writhed to extract himself from the soil that had collapsed onto him. Seeing what had happened, those nearest to him grabbed his legs and pulled him out of the pile of dirt.

Bob's entire face was covered in dirt and he flailed at his head and hair trying to brush it off, while spitting dirt from his mouth. "Goddamn son of a bitch," he shouted. Then, turning back to the slab, he launched into digging again, this time with his bare hands, calling out, "Help me clear this off, but be careful. There is some sort of a stone slab under there and it's fragile."

With the help of the others they dug back the edge of the bulge in the trench, removed the dirt, and uncovered the true extent of the stone slab beneath their feet. As they brushed the dirt clear from it, they could see the surface of the slab was covered in a ring of hieroglyphs circling its outer edge. In contrast it's center was flat and unadorned. The only other feature was some type of groove or channel which ran around the perimeter of the stone just inside the ring of hieroglyphs. In two places the channel ran across the ornate carvings and right to the edge of the slab itself. It appeared almost as if the channel was there to aid in draining liquid from its surface.

Bob dug around the outside of the slab itself, directing the others working with him to do the same. Shovel by shovel they worked carefully to dig down into the soft dirt surrounding the slab on three of its four sides. The fourth side of the slab was butted up against the vertical stone wall with a seam so small no shovel could fit into it.

It took them several minutes of work before they reached stone again. This time when they struck stone it lay about two and a half feet below the surface of the slab. Curious about this they decided to dig down to the bottom of the trench further along its length, at the place it opened onto where the slab stood. When they did so they found the stone underneath the rest of the trench was at the same depth as the stone floor immediately surrounding the slab itself.

This allowed Bob to form a better picture of the layout of the temple top in his mind, and he realized the stone slab must be propped up on something. Some kind of pedestal perhaps. That would mean the stone might be an altar of some sort. Chastened by the thought they had already damaged it he realized they must begin to work much more carefully here, since if this truly was an altar they were standing beside it would be an incredibly important find. One which could add substantially to what was known about the Maya.

With the others spending the rest of the morning digging out the remainder of the trench's length, Bob and Greg were free to work on clearing what they began to refer to as "The Altar". When the five remaining team members had completed digging the trench along the thirty foot length of the carved stone wall to its bottom it became obvious the stone in the center of it was definitely some kind of raised slab. The slab was three feet wide, about seven feet long, and stood two and a half feet above the floor beside it.

The ornately carved wall itself was packed full of dirt which clung deep into the recesses and relief of its carvings. The team realized clearing the wall would be a delicate task and was sure to take them the rest of the day to complete. Likewise, the stones at the base of the trench were also covered in dirt they would need to brush off, although at least it was now possible to walk in the trench along the entire face of the carved stone wall, after making a slight jog in the middle to go around the slab. The hieroglyphs on the top and sides of the stone slab were also covered in dirt and would need to be cleaned as well before Randy could be called over to read them.

Knowing a lot of work remained to be done, they did what any other tired, dirty, hungry group of archeologists would do in their situation. They stopped for lunch. The thickness of the clouds in the sky above them made it hard to tell it was the middle of the day. All morning rain had been coming down in a fine mist. The rain had made the air cooler to work in, but the ground, though moist, was not yet muddy. As they set about eating their lunch the weather worsened, and it began to rain harder. Sitting and eating in silence, it occurred to several of them that the rain might at least help to clean some of the dirt off of the carvings and the stone slab.

The grey, wet weather made even the otherwise welcome lunch break a dreary affair and they finished quickly. As they returned to the work of cleaning the face of the carved wall and carefully removing the dirt from around the stone slab, they found the heavier rain was turning the dirt to mud. As it did, the task of lifting any of it out of the trench became harder and harder, the heavy brown muck oozing off the shovels as fast as they could lift them.

Working with shovels soon became a task of diminishing returns. They turned instead to trying to sweep the mud away from around the blocks supporting the stone slab by using brooms made from sticks and thatch they had previously gathered from around the site. Assembled in a line, like a rain drenched bucket brigade, they swept the muck down the trench, out to its sides, and over the top edge of the mound. Sweeping the rain and mud like this rapidly turned the bottom of the trench into a chocolate colored ooze which obscured the stones on the floor of the trench. Before long enough rain had begun to collect in the trench so that the murky liquid started to slowly flow out towards the edges on its own. Seeing this the archeologists gratefully returned to the work of cleaning the detail upon the stone slab and the carved face of the wall.

With more of the muck out of the way, Bob and Greg could see that the slab was sitting on a half dozen ornately carved footstones. The slab itself was about four inches thick and its sides were also carved with hieroglyphs. Underneath the slab it appeared there was nothing but more of the plain stone blocks that made up the floor of the temple. It was hard for them to say for sure though, because as the hammering rain continued, the falling water collected in the trench at a surprising rate, obscuring its bottom.

Water not only fell directly into the trench, it had also begun trickling into it from the walls on its sides. The seepage was slow at first, but as the rain increased in intensity, so too did the rate of water seeping into the trench through its walls. James was the first to notice this and he acted instinctively. Moving along the length of the trench he started to alert those close to him to stop what they were doing and get out. The driving rain was falling so hard that even those standing right next to him could barely hear his voice above the sound of it. Nor could they see more than a foot or so in front of them as they tried in vain to clamber up the muddy, rain-soaked sides of the trench.

The slow trickle of water which ran down the length of the trench and out its sides had become a fast moving flow about ankle deep, and it pushed against their legs as they struggled to pull themselves out of the trench. Realizing their situation was rapidly deteriorating, James continued moving down the trench line, shouting into each of their ears over the din of the pouring rain, then reaching down to help lift them up the slippery wall and out of the trench.

Unimaginable as it seemed, the tempo of the rain increased further still and the trench filled faster than before. Now those who James had not yet reached began to understand why he was lifting the others out of the trench. They looked upwards to find that those who had already escaped out of the trench were reaching down to help pull them safety.

Water and rain continued to pour down into the trench from everywhere. James was the last to flee the trench and, owing to his large frame, it took three of them to haul him up. A split second after he cleared the top of the trench James motioned to the others to retreat from off the top of the eastern mound. Seeing this, several of them launched themselves over the southern edge, sliding down its face before regaining their footing at the bottom and bolting into the relative protection of the jungle surrounding the mounds. Only Bob and James remained behind watching in dismay as the sides of the trench gave way.

The water moving sideways through the soil at the top of the eastern mound had made it so saturated it took on the consistency of pudding. This resulted in a pool of thick, gelatinous mud oozing downward as the face of the trench opposite the carved stone wall gave way. Where minutes earlier a three foot wide, six foot deep, thirty foot long trench had stood, there was now just a wide, shallow depression in the crown of the mound. The top few feet of the carved stone wall was still visible but the trench had collapsed and the water level in what was left of it continued to rise.

Bob walked over to James and shouted something close into his ear, hoping to be heard over the pouring rain. James nodded, then each of them stooped down and grabbed shovels. Waving down to the others, who had retreated into the forest below them, they motioned frantically for them to return. Not waiting to see if the others did so, the two of them moved hastily to opposite sides of the mound and started to dig frantically.

At first it wasn't clear to those who stood watching from below what they were doing, but it soon became apparent. They were digging a channel inward from the edge of the mound towards its center, trying to breach a mud berm which had formed inside the collapsed trench. The berm was allowing a thick, mortar-like layer of mud to pool up inside the trench, and the mud was beginning to bury everything they had worked so hard to uncover. In the pounding rain the two of them raced against time, trying to drain the trench before the brown ooze could thicken and settle, and become impossible for them to remove.

Seeing this the others scrambled to assist them. As they did, the rain, which was coming down at an impossible rate, proceeded falling harder still. One by one the remaining archeologists clambered their way to the temple's top, struggling to keep their balance on the steep slippery slope of the mound as they ascended. Reaching the apex, they grabbed whatever tool they could find and joined in the struggle.

Slowly but surely the teams on each side of the mound managed to get a narrow channel dug through the berm and out to the sides of the mound. By this time what was left of the trench had almost filled to overflowing. A thunder clap burst directly over head, and then another, but the team labored on, it was all or nothing for them now. Digging hard and fast into the oozing muck they tried to scrape it away. It flowed around their shovels, contemptuous of their attempts to deepen the channels in which the water from the trench was beginning to flow.

Suddenly the wind rose around them and a bolt of lightning split the sky above. It was almost as if the gods of the Maya were angered by the impudence of the archeologists, who worked to turn aside the forces of nature the deities commanded. Undeterred, the team continued to dig in a frenzy, sensing that they were on the brink of turning the tide, that they could battle the elements and win.

Their efforts paid off. The water flowing from the trench began to work for them instead of against them. It began to flow faster, spilling out the east and west sides of the mounds and down their faces. The channels were small at first, but as the onslaught of rain continued they grew deeper and wider, the force of the water flowing through them cutting into the soft mud. Even as the rain continued to fall in an unbelievably hard torrent, the level of water in the trench started to recede. The gods had lost, their secrets would be revealed.

Exposed by the removal of trees and roots that had both nurtured it and held it tightly in place for centuries, the soil at the top of the eastern mound was granted free flow by the saturating rain that magically melted it away. In minutes, a plaza fifteen feet front to back and thirty feet in width, once covered for centuries under soil as much as six feet deep, was rendered almost completely bare by the sheer power of water. The top of the temple stood transformed.

Exhausted, the archeologists threw themselves down on the newly exposed stone at the top of the carved wall. Sitting in the rain they watched as the torrent, which only minutes before had threatened to drown them, now scoured the mound clean on their behalf. Then the tempo of the rain began to slacken. Almost imperceptibly at first, but soon slowly and steadily, until the torrent ebbed to a misty drizzle. It was as if Chaac, the Rain God, having expended his fury and still been bested by his foes, succumbed to the inevitable and yielded to his new masters.
Chapter 12 - Revenge of El Pilar

While the others were working on the eastern mound, Randy and Trisia had spent the morning working on the central mound. The trenches on it were shallow due to the steep slope of the hidden stairway they covered, and the portions of it where the hieroglyphs were found had been cleared of dirt. In fact, the hard rain had actually aided them by washing the hieroglyphs clean. Despite the rain pounding down all around him, Randy kept his head down, sketching the glyphs, taking notes, and trying to piece together what the stairs said.

He did all this under the protection of a large tarp which kept him and his notebook dry, while the rain cascaded down around him, flowing harmlessly down the mound and the stairs on which he was working. The tarp was, of course, held over him by Trisia, who stood next to him, head down, completely soaked by the rain. The din of the rain pounding on the tarp blocked out any other sound from the jungle surrounding them, even the shouts of those working frantically on the eastern mound. Not that any sound emanating from there would have been noticed by either of them were the weather better. They were both off in their own worlds.

Trisia was decidedly distracted from anything around her by two things: how miserable she was from standing in the pouring rain; and her failure to be noticed by Randy. All she could do was stand there holding the tarp, sulking at the perception that her entire contribution to their search had so far consisted of doing the most unpleasant tasks Randy had available. This snub was exacerbated by the fact that although Randy was working only inches away from where she stood, he might as well have been on another planet for all the attention he was paying to her.

In contrast Randy was warm and dry, covered as he was by the large tarp. This left him free to be completely engrossed in his work. Not that he wouldn't have been anyway were he even half as wet and miserable as Trisia was.

The net effect of their equal, but opposite, levels of distraction was for both of them to be totally unaware of what was transpiring upon the eastern mound. Their isolation might have continued unabated had Julie not scrambled up the stairway they were working in. Frantically, she tried to both catch her breath and shout over the rain, urging them to come see what had occurred.

When Trisia saw what Julie was pointing to she reached down to tap Randy on his shoulder. Emerging from underneath the tarp, Randy stood up and turned to look towards the top of the eastern mound to see for himself what Julie was going on about. A look of amazement swept over his face at what he saw. Hurriedly he jammed his notebook into a bag to protect it from the rain, then bolted down the stairway, almost ending up on his butt a few times while trying to navigate the slippery stairs.

Getting up the eastern mound was a more difficult task than descending the central one had been. It was completely saturated in water and mud, and each time Randy tried to clamber up the slope he slipped back down half as far as he'd managed to scramble up. It took him quite a bit of effort to gain the top, and when he did he was as covered in mud as the team on the mound who had been frantically digging the channels to drain the trench.

Having reached the top, he waded down into the muck filling the wide, shallow depression where the trench had once been. Randy stood there, deep in the muck in front of the carved wall, staring at what the rain had wrought. Curiously, the first thing that occurred to him was to wonder how long it would take to clear away the mud which remained around the slab and at the base of the carved wall.

Then he noticed something else. Thanks to the mudslide, the entire contour of the top of the eastern temple was now plainly visible. Indeed, he could see there were two other stones sticking up from out of the mud at the southeast and southwest corners of the temple's summit. Perhaps these were some other type of altar, he thought to himself. He hoped they would find out one way or the other when they managed to get the muck cleared away from them, but for the time being he just stood there trying to catch his breath.

As Randy stood there, Bob, who had previously climbed up on top of the wall, called down to him and pointed over to the stone slab in the center. Randy waded through the muck and over to the slab, bending down to read the hieroglyphs upon it which had by now been washed clean by the rain. He sloshed through the muck, circling the slab as he read the ring of glyphs around its top edge and sides. He stopped abruptly when he got to the corner where the missing piece had once been. For a moment he stood there bent over looking at the stone, then he turned his head up to Bob.

Before Randy could say anything Bob realized he was wondering about the missing piece. He leaned down from the top of the wall at the same time as Randy straightened up and the two of them barely missed literally butting heads. Bob was afraid they might do so figuratively as well, and began to apologetically explain to Randy how he had originally found the stone slab while digging, became distracted, forgot about it, and this had resulted in someone else accidentally damaging it.

Inside his head, Randy's initial reaction was anger and disappointment. What if the damaged piece had contained some critical clue, he thought. Normally impetuous, Randy did something uncharacteristic, he took a moment to compose himself before answering. In that moment he recognized something like this could happen on any dig, especially one employing the hurried and unprofessional techniques they were using to excavate the site.

When he did speak, rather than responding in anger as Bob had been anticipating, Randy commented calmly, "It's okay, Bob. It's not your fault. If we'd been using proper procedure this wouldn't have happened. Any chance you know where the missing piece is?"

With a relieved look upon his face Bob replied, "It was right on top of the stone slab."

When Randy looked to the spot where Bob indicated he saw nothing there. Somehow the large piece of limestone, half the size of a phone book and weighing several pounds, had been washed away when the trench collapsed. Realizing the broken piece was not where he had indicated, Bob jumped down from the top of the wall to the front of it and started to feel around in the muck at Randy's feet.

"It must be here somewhere," he said to Randy. "It was a pretty good size and weight. I think it would have been too heavy to have washed away." As he spoke he dropped to his knees and, much more in earnest, began to claw around in the mud looking for the missing piece of the stone slab.

Randy knelt down and joined in to searching as Bob called on some of the others to come help them. Soon there were half a dozen archeologists probing in the knee deep mud on top of the eastern mound in search of the missing piece, but it was to no avail. They grabbed shovels and tried to move the muck away, but their efforts were futile as it simply oozed off their tools as they tried to move it around.

As they searched without luck for the missing piece the sky over them lightened. Soon an occasional patch of blue became visible in among the thick grey clouds of the waning afternoon. Then, suddenly, as if in some clichéd scene from a movie, a shaft of light burst through and shone down upon them. On the western horizon, in the gap where the light broke through, the orange glow of the sun's last rays created a fleeting rainbow. Then, almost as suddenly as it had appeared, the sun dipped below the horizon and was gone.

Knowing the grey clouds would bring darkness early, Randy reluctantly instructed the team to give up the search for the missing piece of the slab. Bob felt the responsibility for the loss of the missing piece most keenly and his first impulse was to argue with Randy's decision, then he thought better of it. Randy had gone easy on him and he sensed that challenging his judgement would only create more tension among the tired and edgy team.

Instead, he quietly joined the others, who had piled their tools up on the top of the mound before heading back down to the camp. Bob hoped that with a little luck the mud would dry up some over night and they could once again begin the work of digging out the top of the mound the next day. Hopefully they'd find the missing piece while doing so and the incident would soon be forgotten, but for now all he and the others could do was head back to camp and try to clean themselves up.

Returning to their camp they found another unpleasant surprise. The campsite, though covered by the tarps they had strung over it to protect the tents and equipment, had been completely soaked by the driving rain. The storm had been so severe that virtually everything they had brought with them was drenched. Dejected as they were at this discovery, they set about salvaging what they could and converting it into a miserable dinner of soggy food. After choking down their water-logged meal they dragged themselves off to their equally soaked beds.

Despite the accumulated exhaustion of many days of hard work few of them slept that night. Some tossed and turned, bemoaning the state to which their living conditions had degenerated. Others spent the time chiding themselves for the mistakes they had made so far. A few fretted about whether it was time for them to abandon their search altogether.

When morning came the next day it was clear none of them were in a good mood. Everyone could sense the team was near a breaking point. Their supplies were getting low, especially since the rain had ruined much of their remaining food, and the time left them to find the mask was running out. These were facts no one dared to discuss at the moment. Their choices were plain: focus on the task at hand and try to see it to completion; or admit defeat, pack up and leave.

Quietly, and in desperate need of good news, they set about readying for the day ahead. Ever practical, Julie thought to herself it would be a good distraction for her if she asked Trisia how she had fared with Randy the previous day, especially since the boys were busy trying to figure out the work plan for the one ahead. Grabbing her food she walked oven and sat down next to Trisia.

"At least it's cleared up today. I kind of like the way the forest is when it warms up quickly after a rain. The steam rising through the vegetation seems so eerie and primordial," Julie said trying to make small talk. Trisia gave a sort of nod, barely acknowledging that Julie was even talking to her, and kept on eating. Julie tried again to engage Trisia, being more direct this time. "So how did things go with Randy yesterday?" she asked. Trisia ignored her and kept on eating.

Abandoning all subtlety, Julie posed her inquiry to Trisia a third time, "Did you get a chance to tell Randy you're interested in him?"

"What do you mean?" Trisia said defensively.

"You are interested in him, aren't you?" Julie replied.

Trisia realized Julie was on to her and dropped the pretense of defensiveness. "Is it that obvious?" Trisia replied.

"To Randy? Apparently not, but to someone who's been in your shoes before, yes it is," Julie said to the younger woman in a sisterly tone. "So how did it go?"

"Pretty miserable. All I did was stand there and hold a tarp over him while he worked and I got soaking wet," Trisia said testily. "He had his face down in a rock, working the whole time. He barely said two words to me."

"Well, the weather definitely wasn't conducive to casual conversation," Julie said, realizing she had hit a sore spot. She hesitated a moment then decided to go straight to the heart of the matter. "He's intimidated by you, you know."

"Huh?" said Trisia.

"You totally intimidate him. You weren't aware of that?" Julie said to her.

"I'm the one who's intimidated," Trisia shot back, starting to raise her voice, then checking herself to avoid embarrassment should everyone else find out her secret. "I'm just a goddamn sophomore. He's a graduate student. He's older than me, smarter than me, and much more self confident than I am. I'm usually lucky if I can say two words to him without running off and bursting into tears."

"You don't get it, do you?" Julie said, realizing the irreverent looking young woman with the body piercings and the tough girl persona was no longer hiding her insecurities. "Look at yourself," Julie said. "The image you project terrifies a guy like Randy. The piercings, the black clothes, the tough self confidence. Then look at him. Just because he's older than you and further along in his studies doesn't mean he isn't just as insecure as you inside. Don't confuse the fact that he's in a position where he is in charge of other people as meaning he's self confident when it comes to things like women."

Trisia looked at Julie unconvinced. Julie put her arm around the younger woman. "I was the same way when I met Kevin. He is one of Greg's graduate students, you know. I must have tried everything I could for six months to get him to notice me. I thought for sure he wasn't interested in me at all. Then one day, about a week before I was set to finish working on his project, he came up to me and asked me on a date. When he did it he had this look in his eyes, like he was sure I was going to say no and he was going to die as a result. It turns out the only reason he even asked was he knew he was running out of time. Somehow the fear of missing his chance to ask me out won over the fear of being rejected. He was as frightened as a deer in the headlights. So make no mistake about it, you scare the heck out of Randy."

"I'm not sure what you mean. Are you saying I should wait to see if Randy realizes he's running out of time and clues in that I like him?" Trisia said.

"Not at all, but you should realize that if he does like you, and I do think he likes you, he may not have made a move yet because he's just as scared as you are. The same way your personality can hide what's really inside you, the self confidence he projects is probably covering up the fact that he's not very good with women. It's up to you whether you want to make the first move or not, but whatever you do try to remember there is a good chance he's as scared as you are," Julie said.

Trisia hesitated a moment then responded, "Thanks. I've never really had anyone I could talk to about stuff like this." The older woman smiled, then the two of them began cleaning up from their meal.

While Julie and Trisia had been talking the boys discussed what the team should do next. Randy revealed that although the hieroglyphic stairs confirmed the dates he found upon the stela documenting Smoke Serpent's rule, it yielded little else which might aid them in their search.

Hearing this James spoke up, "I think maybe we made a mistake last night when we voted on how to proceed. I've changed my mind and now I'm thinking there's a good chance the ball court here could have a stela buried in it like the ones found at Caracol. Those yielded evidence of Caracol's past successes in warfare. If we found one here it might celebrate El Pilar's victory over Caracol, or maybe even document something as significant as the capture of the Jade Mask and help us find it."

James' comments now put the question before them as to whether they should put all their resources into the eastern mound or split the team to see if the ball court held any more clues. A lively discussion ensued. While most agreed James was making sense, they were less certain than he that they'd find anything significant at the ball court. Their preference was to delay shifting any resources there until the new finds on the eastern mound had been examined more closely.

James countered that doing so meant digging the mound back out from the muck of the collapsed trench. A task which could take hours, possibly days, he contended, and might leave them with nothing but a picture of some pretty carvings. He insisted archeological precedent dictated the best place to find something commemorating a monumental battle, such as the one between El Pilar and Caracol, would be on the goal rings or center marker of the ball court. He felt it would be much quicker to dig in these two limited spots than to try uncovering the entire mound from underneath thick mud.

Greg and Kevin sat listening to the arguments on both sides but neither felt they had sufficient expertise in the practices of the Maya to weigh in on the debate. In the end it fell to Randy to make the decision. Mac had put him in charge of the search and it was his job to find a way forward.

Randy sat there a moment in the brightening dawn deciding what to do, then he hit on it. "You make a strong argument James, one not easily dismissed, but I really think I should at least take a closer look at the stone slab before we commit ourselves one way or the other. While I'm doing that I'd like the entire team to start work on cleaning off the eastern mound. If the stone slab doesn't provide anything useful, or there aren't any other dedications on the eastern mound, we'll reconsider sending a few people over to the ball court while there is still some daylight left."

With the day's plan in place the team made their way up to the temple atop the eastern mound. The sky was blue as the sun crept over the horizon. The top of the mound was still muddy, but overnight the mud had thickened enough so it could now at least be shoveled away. Picking up the tools they had left there the previous day the archeologists set about digging out the mud, one heavy shovelful after another. It was slow work.

Fortunately for Randy, the slab stood high enough above the temple's plaza so that it had not been covered by the settling mud. He advised the others to keep an eye out for the piece of the slab which had gone missing the previous day. Then, as the rest of them dug, he set out to read the glyphs on the stone slab. Worn as they were, the hieroglyphic inscriptions upon the slab took some time for him to read. When he had finished it was clear from both the shape of the slab, and the writing upon it, that Bob's guess was right. It definitely appeared to be a sacrificial altar.

Only such a purpose could explain the grooves carved into it. Such a feature would have been useful to channel a sacrificial victim's blood so it could be collected and burned with the other offerings to the gods. All Randy lacked was the date of the altar and who had built it. As luck, or lack thereof, would have it, his reading of the glyphs indicated to him that this information was carved upon the missing piece.

Excited, Randy quickly shared his assessment that the carvings on the slab confirmed its role as a sacrificial altar. Knowing it was an emotional boost the team was much in need of, he speculated further that the mound could very well be a burial temple. Then he grabbed a shovel and joined them in digging, hoping to spur them to shake off their lethargy while reminding them to keep a sharp eye out for the missing piece. The morning sun shone brightly on the mound and helped to dry the mud, lifting their mood, and slowly but surely lightening the work in the process.

With all of them digging in earnest the team made much better progress than they'd anticipated in the dreary mood of the prior day. In a few hours they had come close to clearing as much of the mound's surface as had been visible before the trench collapsed. When the scouring effect of the rain on the wall carvings was taken into account they might even have come out a little ahead.

Choosing to skip their ritual morning break and continue working, they gathered every brush available and focused on clearing off the wall. There were not enough brushes to go around, however, and some of the team were tasked instead with searching for the piece of the slab which had yet to be found. It was unpleasant work, probing about in the thick, knee deep mud that had collected on the slopes below where they had cut the runoff channels to drain the trench during the prior day's deluge. It was also futile work, for the mud extended yards outward in every direction and the chances of the missing piece being found in it were fairly small.

Despite their prior deprivations, luck seemed to be the one thing they had a good supply of. It was only minutes before Santos called out to them from down the side of the mound. He had found a large stone under the mud, a stone whose size and weight matched that of the piece missing from the sacrificial altar. All but a small corner of it was buried, but, with the keen eyes of a lifelong bird watcher and aspiring tourist guide, Santos had spotted it.

The stone was too deeply embedded in the thick mud for them to pull it out, so they dug the muck away from around it. Once freed they carried it back up to the top of the mound and reset into its original position on the sacrificial altar, then stepped back so Randy could read it. When he did a look of confusion spread across his face.

Standing there staring at the piece of stone he said to himself, "This makes no sense," though he spoke loud enough for the others to hear him.

"Well are you going to tell us what you see or are you just going to stand there mumbling to yourself?" James called out to him in an uncharacteristically impatient manner.

"This can't be the right piece," he said.

Now it was Bob's turn to goad Randy, "For Christ's sake will you just tell us what it says?"

Hesitantly, Randy replied, "If I've done the date translation right, then the date on this reads 9.13.10.7.16 which is in July 702 and it says on that date Lily Jaguar became king of Caracol."

"That can't be right," Bob said back to him, "The records of Caracol we've discovered don't have any mention of a ruler named Lily Jaguar. I know the whole lineage of rulers at Caracol and I'd have remembered such a pansy sounding name."

"Didn't I just tell you it didn't make any sense!" Randy snapped back at him.

"Are you sure it's the right piece? Maybe there was more than one carved limestone fragment buried in the dirt up here?" Trisia asked.

"No I'm not sure it's the right piece, but the carvings match up with what is on the rest of the altar, and it fits perfectly into the place where the stone slab is broken. What are the chances that another carved piece of stone which just happened to be lying around here would fit? Pretty damn slim I'd think. Still I don't see how it could have washed all the way down to where Santos found it," Randy said.

Randy continued kneeling there next to the altar as he puzzled over whether this could, in fact, be the missing piece. The broken stone in front of him was far too heavy to have been swept off the mound by the flood, and the inscription upon it conflicted with everything they thought they knew about the lineage of the kings of Caracol. Yet the fact that the piece in front of them fit perfectly into the space on the slab was incontrovertible. Randy knelt there contemplating this for several minutes until he felt his jeans becoming soaked through with water. Looking down he realized his knee was resting in a puddle. He stood up, and as he did so, the stone beneath his boot rocked ever so slightly back and forth.

Randy might not have noticed this except that as the stone rocked, the puddle atop it acted like a mirror causing the sunlight to glint back and forth, its rays catching his eye. Something about this struck him as odd, although he could not immediately put his finger on it. Then it occurred to him. Most of the time the stones of a Mayan temple fit together so tightly it was hardly possible to slip a sheet of paper between them, yet the one below him rocked beneath his weight.

He reached over to James and, grabbing the shovel from his hands, stuck the blade of it into the gap between the stones and pushed down on it. This caused the stone at his feet to lift up a little. He called out for others to help him. Kevin and Julie jumped in, and tried working together to pry the large stone up, but they were foiled when the wooden handles of their shovels snapped under the stone's immense weight.

Seeing this, James blurted out, "I know what we need," then he turned and ran back to the camp. He returned a few minutes later with several pry bars to find the three of them still struggling at the stone with the broken remains of their shovels as the others stood by watching. Tossing a few pry bars down in front of them he said, "You might have better results with these."

Seeing the pry bars James had just dropped, Randy blushed in embarrassment at having succumbed to the excitement. All he could manage to say was, "Um, thanks."

Randy and Kevin stooped down to pick up two of the pry bars as James stepped past them and pushed the one he held down into the slot beside the stone. Kevin and Randy quickly joined him in slipping two more pry bars in the crack around the stone. Together the three of them pushed down hard and the stone inched up a little. Julie jammed a fourth pry bar into the gap they had created, in order to prevent the stone from slipping back. The three men heaved again and the stone slid up a little more. Julie adjusted the pry bar she had previously jammed in place so it secured the additional gains they made. Breathing hard they pushed again with all the strength they could muster and this time the large, shallow stone lifted up above the level of those surrounding it. All four of them wedged their bars underneath it, muscling the heavy stone sideways and out of its resting place.

Once the stone was pushed aside Randy knelt to have a closer look at it. From above the stone had appeared no different than those besides it, just another of the building blocks comprising the top of the eastern mound. When removed, however, the stone revealed an important difference from that of those which surrounded it. This stone was only a few inches deep.

Looking into the shallow space they had exposed the archeologists could see the adjacent stones were larger. How much more they could not say for the depth those stones descended below the plaza was masked by dirt and debris. The adjacent stones had another curious feature, each was cut with a notch at its top. This notch was what allowed the shallow stone they had removed to rest upon its neighbors in a manner that could not be detected from above.

"This is pretty amazing," Randy marveled aloud. "See how the four stones surrounding this one are larger and are notched so that the stone we removed could rest upon them. I've never seen a feature exactly like this on a Maya Temple before but I guess I shouldn't be surprised at it. It's the same type of masterful stone work one comes to expect from the Maya."

Kevin shrugged his shoulders at Randy's comment and instead stuck his shovel into the muddy soil which lay previously undisturbed beneath the stone they had just removed. Realizing the architectural subtleties he was marveling over could wait, Randy started to follow his lead. It took them a couple of minutes to clear away enough soil to see what appeared to be a step buried in the hole. Probing around with their shovels they revealed what seemed to be a second step below it, although the rest of the hole remained covered in dirt.

While the rest of the team stood there watching, Randy and Kevin continued digging until James spoke up. "Randy, what are the rest of us supposed to do while the two of you dig there? There isn't enough room for all of us to dig in such a small space."

Randy stopped digging for a moment and caught his breath. "Sorry, you're right. I just got caught up. We can probably only work two at a time here if we're lucky. Maybe even only one at a time after we start to get further down this stairway. You said earlier you wanted to dig on the ball court some more. You might as well take some of the others and give it a try while we keep going here. Maybe you'll find something down there that can explain why the name of a king of Caracol we've never heard of is carved on the altar here," he said replying to James. "Julie and Trisia, why don't you two stay here and help me and Kevin? Everyone else can go work with James and Bob over at the ball court."

As James and the others headed off, the four of them started in to taking turns digging in the three by five space exposed by the removal of the stone they had pried up. The soil was moist and heavy with the water which had seeped into it from the prior day's rain, and the confined space was tough for them to work in. When they had cleared a foot or so of dirt from the hole it became clear to them they were digging out a buried stairway.

Meanwhile, over on the ball courts, James led the remainder of the group in surveying the situation there. Shaded as it was by the central mound, the area of the ball court had not been overgrown in the same way as the large mounds were. Still, the team had worked to remove many trees, stumps, and roots in their first days at the site. This had left a lot of exposed soil, most of which had now also been washed away by the prior day's rain in a manner similar to what had occurred on the eastern temple mound. As a result the sides of the ball court were mostly uncovered and it didn't take the team long to clean off what remained.

Once finished, they could see the walls were unadorned with any markings or hieroglyphs besides those they had found carved upon the stone rings in the center of the court's walls and the stone markers at each end. Seeing this James realized if there was anything else hidden there it must be under the earth in the middle of the ball court itself, in a similar spot to where the ceremonial marker had been found at Caracol.

As the sun shone down from high overhead he and Bob measured out the location of the ball court's center and marked a grid for the five of them to dig in. Standing at the center of the court after completing this task James could make out the silhouettes of four figures sitting on the top of the eastern mound. Goldbricks, he thought to himself, they've already knocked off for lunch. Shrugging it off he began to lead those on his team in probing the soil beneath center court.

As James had noticed from below, those up on the top of the eastern temple mound had stopped for lunch, their energy and enthusiasm waning. The warm sunshine was inviting and they rested in it as they ate. It was clear to Randy, who was sitting off on his own, that none of them, himself included, were in much of a hurry to get back to digging. Taking the opportunity to procrastinate, he reviewed in his head what they had accomplished so far. It didn't seem to him to amount to very much.

True, they had found an unknown Mayan site which, judging by its size and architecture, was likely of some importance, but they had found nothing that tied the site in any way to the fate of the Jaguar King. In fact, all they had found was a single odd reference to a past king of Caracol whose name no one had ever heard before and who lived sometime after the Jaguar King's death. Even that was on a broken piece of stone they couldn't conclusively link to the site, other than by the fact it was found there.

The voice of Mac resonated in his head, "You know as well as I do Randy that the stone you found could have been brought back from Caracol by the people who lived at El Pilar and it's only a coincidence it matches the gap in the slab. And even if we assume it is the broken piece, the slab itself could be the spoil of some conquest over Caracol. You'll need more proof than what you have now..." The imaginary voice in his head trailed off as he sat there thinking about all this, depressed at the realization he'd dragged everyone else out into the jungle and worked them close to exhaustion with nothing to show for it.

Noticing Randy off by himself Julie nudged Trisia who was lying in the sun next to her. "He looks kind of down. Maybe you should go talk to him" she said to her.

Trisia took the hint and wandered over to where Randy sat. "You look pretty tired," she said to him. He glanced up at her and shrugged. Trisia decided this time she was going to take Julie's advice and not be deterred by his seeming indifference to her. So she continued on. "Maybe more than just tired. Maybe kind of worried," she said to him, cautiously trying to probe his feelings.

Normally Randy would have changed the subject, or worse, simply ignored her. Whether it was the physical exhaustion, the sense of desperation now seizing him, or something in her tone that told him it was okay to trust her, this time, rather than push her away, he opened up to her a little. "Yeah, I guess I am worried. After all, it was pretty much upon my insistence to Mac that we came out here on this wild goose chase," he said to her.

"Wild goose chase?" she said back to him. "What do you mean? Look around you. Look at what we've found here," she said trying to lift his spirits.

"That's exactly it. What have we found here? Some second tier Mayan religious site probably better off left undiscovered. Nothing we've found so far conclusively links this place back to the find at Caracol, and now that we've uncovered it, what is here will just end up getting looted and hauled off in pieces thanks to us. To make matters worse, I managed to piss away a pile of my dad's money and drag nine other people out here to work their asses off in the jungle for two weeks for the privilege of ruining this place," he said his voice tinged with regret.

She sat down on the ground next to him and put her arm around his shoulders. "Well I can't speak for anyone else, but this beats the hell out of what I'd be doing right now if I weren't here. I don't regret for a moment coming out here in the woods with you on your wild goose chase," she said to him.

Then she looked him right in the eye and said, "Besides we haven't finished digging out the stairway. I know we're going to find something important when we get it dug out and I'm not leaving here until we do," and with that she leaned in, kissed him on the cheek, then jumped to her feet and walked away.

Randy sat there for a moment not knowing what to do or say. He quickly composed himself before she walked away and called after her, "Did you mean that?"

She stopped mid stride and turned back to him and said, "Did I mean what? What I said or what I did?"

Surprised by her question he stammered for a second, "What you said, um, what you did. Er, both of them."

She smiled a coy smile back at him and nodded yes. Then she turned and headed back over to where Julie was sitting, trying to keep her composure as she did. While Randy sat there trying to absorb what had just happened, Trisia pushed past Julie and sat down where she thought he couldn't see her.

"How'd it go?" Julie asked her.

Trisia's heart was pounding, and she was sure she was about to hyperventilate as she tried to answer Julie. "Oh my god. I can't believe what I just did. I kissed him on the cheek," she said, giggling like a thirteen year old and looking over her shoulder to make sure Randy wasn't watching her.

"Good for you," Julie said to her.

"I hope he doesn't think I was goofing on him. I got to talking with him and he was really upset we still haven't found anything here that ties this place back to the Jaguar King. He was feeling all guilty for dragging us out here and busting our asses. He seemed so cute and vulnerable. I sort of couldn't help myself," Trisia whispered to Julie. "Now he's gonna think I was yanking his chain."

"Calm down," Julie replied "he'll only think that if you start acting all weird around him. You've got to try not to be embarrassed or act differently around him. It's when you do that that they get confused and can't tell what you meant by it. Stay calm around him, act like nothing major happened, and give him a chance to make the next move now that you've sent a signal."

"What if he doesn't?" Trisia said to her.

"Let's worry about that later," Julie said to the younger woman then noticed Kevin peering over at her suspiciously. "I think we'd better get back to work," she said and rose to her feet.

Randy returned to the stairway and began talking to Kevin. Distracted by this, he turned his gaze away from Julie and back to the work of digging. Seeing this she started over to where the two of them were working, whispering to Trisia as she walked, "He'd better be telling Randy the right thing."

Trisia, however, was not listening to her friend. Surrendering to her nerves, she remained frozen to the spot where Julie had been conversing with her only a moment before. Julie reached back and tugged the younger woman's shirt. Reluctantly, Trisia came along. As the two of them approached, Julie was certain she heard Randy hastily changing whatever subject it was the two men were talking about. Good sign, she thought, glancing over at Trisia who continued to show signs of self consciousness about having kissed Randy earlier.

It all was so sophomoric, she decided, and realized she would have to take action to head the younger woman off from messing everything up. Her plan was simplicity itself, get her doing something which would keep her mind off it. "Trisia, would you mind digging first? I need to run back down to the camp and get something," Julie said. It was a lie, but it wouldn't hurt anything and it would give Trisia something to think about for a while besides Randy.

"Um, no," Trisia replied sheepishly.

Julie waited until Trisia had set in to working before she wandered off. Walking slowly, she peeked furtively back over her shoulder to make sure the younger woman was okay. She didn't even bother to go all the way back to the camp, just far enough to ensure the amount of time she'd be gone was long enough for none of them to notice any difference.

When she returned it was apparent that what they were working to clear was indeed a stairway descending within the eastern mound. Unfortunately, it was also clear there was not enough space on the stair for two people to dig together. Kevin had climbed out of the hole and Trisia was digging alone. Sidling up next to her fiancée Julie commented "If this stairway goes much deeper then pretty soon whoever is digging is going to have to get the others to haul the dirt out for them."

Her comment prompted a reply from Randy, "I was thinking the same thing myself but I'm not sure what to do about it." He stood there thinking for a moment then turned to Trisia and said, "Trisia, why don't I take over digging for a little bit while you head back to camp and see if you can find anything we can use to haul dirt up and out of the stairway."

Covered in sweat and panting from the exertion, Trisia shook her head in agreement then climbed up from the stairway to make way for Randy. She rested for a few moments, catching her breath, before heading down for the camp. Arriving back at the camp Trisia hunted around but at first didn't see anything there she thought they could use.

Cooking pots? No. The ones they had were all too small. They'd be sending them up after only a shovel full or two and at that rate it would take them forever to get the stairs dug out. Besides what would they cook with the rest of the time they were there?

Collapsible water jugs? Maybe, but they were made of lightweight plastic and probably wouldn't stand up to being hauled out of the stairway on a rope. What else was there? She scanned the camp. Tents. Sleeping Bags. Mosquito Netting. Metal gas cans. No, no, no and no. Nothing seemed like it would do. Then she hit on something.

Maybe the tarps would work. True, they weren't very strong, but there were a lot of them stretched over the camp. Tie some rope through the eyelets and they could double them over to strengthen them. Lower them down into the stairway, fill them with a reasonable amount of dirt, lift them out of the hole, and flip them to the side to empty them. Easy as pie.

Even better, if they filled one tarp up while dumping the other one whoever was digging could work uninterrupted. That way they wouldn't need to put too much dirt on any one tarp. And since there were over a dozen of them, if one broke they could just replace it and keep going.

Convinced her idea would work Trisia cut three of the tarps down, folded them up, then grabbed some heavy rope and headed back up to the dig site. When she got there Randy and Julie were resting above the stairway while Kevin stood in it digging. The hole was almost to the height of his shoulders, deep enough so that each time he tried to lift the shovel to dump the dirt out of the stairway he would inevitably bang it against the side and some of its contents would spill.

It was clear to Trisia continuing on in this way would be frustratingly slow. She dropped the tarps down next to the hole and started in to prep them as she had envisioned, but stopped when Randy approached. Standing over her his first reaction was not encouraging. "What the heck are we supposed to do with those?" he snapped at her.

Undaunted by his comment she demonstrated her idea. "It's easy. We fold the tarps like this, tie the eyelets together, then lower them down into the hole. The person digging can quickly fill it, then we just pull it up out of the way and replace it with another."

The utility of her idea was so self-evident Randy immediately realized he'd made an ass of himself. Changing his tone he apologized and applauded Trisia's creative thinking, "I'm sorry Trisia, that's actually a really good idea. I shouldn't have snapped at you. I'm a little on edge. Why don't you rig up the other two and we'll test your plan with this first one to see how it works."

Trisia agreed, and Randy and Julie set about to lowering the first tarp into the hole. Kevin worked to fill it while Trisia readied two others. One to swap in when the first was filled up, and a backup in case one broke.

Kevin shoveled slowly at first, hesitating to fill the tarp too much lest it break. After only a few shovels of dirt he signaled Julie and Randy to pull it up and empty it. Pulling on the ropes Trisia had tied to its eyelets the two of them were able to easily lift the tarp from the stairway and flip the small amount of dirt Kevin had placed upon it almost effortlessly off to the side before lowering it into the hole once again.

Repeating this a few times the team quickly gained confidence, recognizing that the tarps, although flimsy looking, could hold more than one might think. Encouraged by the initial results Kevin decided to test their limits, filling them more and more each time before Randy and Julie pulled them up. It took a few more tries before the metal eyelets on the tarp they were testing began to tear away from its edges. They had learned the technique's limits. Trial and error showed the tarps would hold about the same amount of dirt as would fit in a cheap wheel barrow. They hoped this would prove good enough.

Swapping the torn tarp out for the replacement Trisia had previously prepared, they pressed on. Randy climbed down into the stairway and changed places with Kevin after instructing the wiry undergraduate to return to the camp site for additional tarps. While the tarp technique might work for hauling the dirt up, it was clear that with only one person at a time able to dig in the stairway the progress would be slow. Recognizing this they decided to shorten the length of the shifts in order to prevent whoever was digging from tiring too easily and slowing down.

The further down the passageway the digging progressed, the more the genius of its Maya architects was revealed. The stairway had been constructed in a corbeled fashion which caused the stones at its top to step back along its length as the stairway descended. This had the fortunate effect of allowing a person descending the stairs to stand fully upright as they did so. To the archeologist's consternation, however, this design had negative implications for their attempts to clear it since it meant the cross section of the stairs, and thus the volume of dirt they needed to remove, remained constant with each foot they dug downward.

As he dug, Randy tried to keep an eye out for any hieroglyphs he hoped might give him a clue as to the nature of the stairway they were unearthing. Unfortunately, with the stairs being below ground level and the sun beginning to rapidly fade from the sky, this did not make for an easy task. With his shift over, Randy emerged from the stairs. He noticed Trisia had thought ahead and brought several lamps back with her from the campsite. She really is a sharp girl, he told himself, but his musing over her qualities was cut short by the arrival of James upon the eastern mound.

"Randy, we need you to come take a look down at the ball court," James said.

"What's up?" Randy inquired.

"Well, we decided to dig in the center of the ball court since at Caracol that's where the stone markers were buried. We found a flat stone under the surface but after we cleared the dirt off it we couldn't see any markings on it. We're not sure if it's of any significance and were wondering if you could come take a look."

"Sure, I'll follow you down," Randy said, and the two of them descended the eastern mound together. Although it was in the dim light of dusk when he saw the ball court uncovered for the first time, it struck Randy this must have been pretty much what it would have looked like in the time of the Maya. When he reached the court's center he realized he'd neglected to bring any sort of light, but he shrugged it off and leaned down to have a look at the stone James' team had unearthed. What he could see in the meager light which remained left him dismayed. The stone was completely unadorned. In fact, it bore no trace he could detect of its ever having been worked by human hands. Disappointed at this, and anxious to rejoin those working on the eastern mound, he advised James to cease work on the ball court until the next day and head back to camp to start dinner for everyone, adding that his group would join them soon.

Randy returned to the top of the eastern mound in time for his turn in the stairway. Not wishing to repeat the mistake he had made on the ball court, he now made use of the lamps Trisia had brought to examine the sides and steps of the stairwell. In addition to looking for any markings on the stairs he attempted to gauge the rate of progress they were making, in the hope of answering a question that had just come to mind. The question of whether to continue digging or not.

It seemed a strange question. From the moment they had found the stairway he had simply assumed they'd dig until they found whatever was at the end of it, but two thoughts kept nagging at him. The first was that they had no idea what the stairs led to. Judging by the lack of any adornment on the stairway's walls the temple was in no hurry to offer up any clues as to what was at its bottom. It would appear the only way for them to find this out was to dig to the bottom of it without knowing if they were wasting their time in doing so.

This led to the second concern, trying to figure out how long it might take them to actually find the stairway's bottom. As a student of archeology Randy knew there had been other hidden stairways uncovered at Mayan temples. Those at structures such as the Tomb of the Inscriptions at Palenque, and the Castillo at Chichen Itza, had taken quite some time for the archeologists working upon them to clear. Unfamiliar with the details of what it had taken the archeologists who made those discoveries to achieve their finds, he wasn't sure he could use them as a means to make an educated guess at the task which lay before his team.

He decided instead to do the math. If he could calculate the rate they were digging at, and estimate how far down they were already, then based on the height of the temple mound he could make a guess at how much further they would have to go. Standing in the stairway he observed that the top of it was at about the same height as his head. He judged this to mean they had dug a little over six feet. When combined with the amount of time they'd been digging he was able to gauge the rate they were descending. This was the easy part of the calculation.

Guessing how much further they had to go would be tougher. That depended upon whether the stairway ended in a chamber above or below the level of the ground outside the eastern temple mound. Unfortunately the Maya had been known to use both techniques and there was no way for Randy to tell the one they had used here. He decided to plan for the worst case, but when he ran the numbers in his head he was not happy with the result.

From outside the stairway, Trisia noticed the digging in it had stopped. She called down to Randy to advise him that the little daylight left to them would be gone soon, and appealing to him to come up so the four of them could head back to camp and eat. Reluctantly he complied. On the short walk back, and all throughout dinner as he sat there picking at his food, he was pre-occupied with the conclusion he'd come to upon the stairway.

Suddenly, Randy put his food down and spoke up. The group, which had been sitting in a circle around him busily talking and eating, went quiet as they heard the stern tone in his voice. "I need volunteers to dig through the night," he said.

"What for?" Bob asked him.

"Well we've made somewhere between six to eight feet of progress in the stairway but the mound is forty feet high and we don't know if the bottom of the stairway is one foot or fifty further down. As of tomorrow we're just about out of food. What extra we had got trashed by the rainstorm. Mac expects you, James, and Trisia back by the day after tomorrow, and I'm pretty sure Greg and his crew can't stay here indefinitely. So if we don't keep digging tonight and we run out of time tomorrow, then not only do we risk not finding what's at the end of the stairway but we'll have ended up doing most of the work for the looters. I think we need to take lanterns, go back up there, and keep digging, even if it takes all night," Randy responded.

This created a murmur in the rest of the team as everyone mulled over what Randy had said. As each of them thought it through they realized he was right. Their best bet to find what lay at the bottom of the stairway was to keep digging. So, one by one, each of their hands went up to show they were willing to help.

"Okay, great. Thanks everyone. Since only one person can dig and it basically takes two others to handle the tarps we can work in rotating teams of three. That way we can all at least get a little sleep. Any preferences on who gets what shift?" Randy said.

James spoke up, "Well, you've been working the hardest and have been down in there all day. Plus you haven't been getting much sleep since we found this place. Maybe you should get some while the crew that worked on the ball court takes the first shift."

"That's very kind of you, James, although I'm not sure if I'll be able to get any sleep tonight. How about you, Greg, and Cynthia team up for the first shift? Think you can handle four hours?" Randy asked him.

"Okay by me," he said and he looked to Greg and Cynthia, who nodded in agreement.

"Bob, Marc and Santos can take the second shift, if it's necessary. The rest of us will take the third," Randy said, looking around to the rest of them, who nodded in agreement as well. "If anybody finds anything, come wake me immediately. Let's finish eating and I'll head up there with the first group to show them what we rigged up to lift the dirt up out of the hole."

After dinner Randy escorted the first team to the mound, helping them to carry extra lanterns. When they reached the top he described to them the method Trisia had devised for clearing the spoil. The other members of the team, those who would dig later, set right off to sleep. Before long Randy returned to the camp, and then he, too, settled down to sleep.

Exhausted as he was Randy slipped quickly into the world of dreams. As he dreamt, disconnected images of the Maya raced through his head. A mighty black jaguar sitting upon a stone altar, the sun shining brightly behind it. Warriors dressed in reed mats and ornate feathers dashing back and forth beneath the rings of a ceremonial ball court. The last image he dreamt was the most disconcerting of them all, for in it he saw Trisia, a stone knife clutched in one hand, towering over him as she held a still beating heart in her other one. Before his alarm could even ring he jolted awake from his fitful sleep, just in time to witness the return of James' group.

Shaken by his dream, Randy climbed from his bed to speak with the returning diggers. James reported they had made steady progress and by his estimation had cleared perhaps another six feet of the stairs, guessing they had cleared close to fifteen feet in total, but they had not yet reached bottom. Randy thanked him for his hard work then retreated back into his tent. James stepped past him and proceeded to wake the group taking the next shift.

Inside his tent Randy rolled over and tried to get back to sleep. He tossed and turned as time seemed to slow down for him. Counting the minutes off in his head during which no news came back from the stairway, he felt like sleep would never come again for him. His senses were alive to the slightest movement in the forest around him, and at the first sound of footsteps he poked his head out of the flaps of his tent. It was Bob's group returning from digging, but their report was no more heartening than that of James' group before them. His team had dug for several hours, but they too had failed to find the stairway's bottom. Randy thanked him, then dragged himself from his tent to set about rounding up Trisia, Julie, and Kevin.

The next team headed out from the camp, but on reaching the top of the mound Randy held them up from launching right into digging, insisting they allow him to measure the progress the other teams had made. When he climbed down the stairway with a tape measure he found only about eighteen feet had been cleared so far. Was James' estimate incorrect? Had Bob's team not made as much progress as the one before it? Whichever it was, he couldn't blame either of them. They were all tired, and in the dark of the night, on little rest, the hard work of digging in the narrow stairway would have taken a lot out of them. Every inch of progress must have felt like it took an eternity to achieve.

It was now sometime past two in the morning, but Randy wasn't paying much heed to the clock anymore. All he cared about was finding the stairway's bottom. It was hit pay dirt or go home empty handed, so he picked up the shovel he had brought down the narrow stairs with him and started in to digging. Furiously he stabbed the tool home, hauling shovel after shovel of dirt onto the tarp, then clanging the stone walls of the stairway with it to signal those above to lift the dirt out and drop an empty tarp down.

In the dim light of the lantern, bone tired, and near the breaking point, he almost missed noticing the change. The awkwardly shaped space he stood in was comprised of the two vertical walls of the stairway, the stairs below him, and the stairway's roof which sloped at the same angle as the stairs. Now, however, there appeared to be a change in one of these sides. Down at his feet a small black space had emerged along the sloping side of the roof line. He pushed his shovel into it. It ran horizontally.

The implication was clear, the roof line had stopped descending and began to level off here. The stairway was opening up into a passageway. His heart raced at the thought. He dug harder at the hole, trying to see if what he had dared to think might be true.

Clang. He banged on the side wall for them to lift the dirt. Crunch, crunch, crunch went the shovel as he dug faster and faster, excited by what he believed was an end in sight. Clang. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Clang. He dug in a frenzy until finally the others above him couldn't help but take note of the increase in his pace.

It was Trisia who was the first to notice. She descended the stairway and called out to him. "Randy, are you okay?" she said.

"I'm fine," he replied back. "I think the stairs have stopped descending and there is a passageway here. I'm trying to clear out the top of it to see how far it extends."

She kneeled down the stairs, squinting into the dim light, keeping her distance to avoid being hit by the shovel or the dirt, while also trying to keep out of the way of the tarp and the rope. As she did this she could barely make out what it was he was talking about. The far wall no longer angled downward and Randy was now pushing the shovel underneath it, scooping dirt back from it and onto the tarp to create a growing gap between the top of the dirt and the ceiling of the passageway.

Clang. Randy banged the shovel forcing Trisia to dart backwards in order to keep from getting caught up in the tarp which Kevin and Julie hauled up at his signal. Right then another tarp should have dropped down from above, but since Trisia was in the stairway she wasn't there to do so. Randy heaved dirt for a second or two until he realized there'd been a break in the rhythm.

"Well don't just stand there, get back up top and get back to work," Randy called to her excitedly.

"Are you sure you don't want to change up? You've been down here a while. Let someone else take a turn," Trisia said to him plaintively.

"I'll be fine. I'm too excited to be up top anyway. Just get back up there so I can stay in rhythm," he said to her reassuringly.

Boys, she thought to herself, always so stubborn. She turned to head back up the stairs when the tarp dropped right onto her head. "Hey watch out," she shouted, then from above she heard a muffled, "Oops, sorry." She pushed the tarp off her and into place, then headed back up the stairs to tell Kevin and Julie what was up.

About twenty minutes later Randy emerged from the stairway huffing and puffing. "So is there a passageway there, and have you cleared it all out by yourself yet?" Trisia asked him teasingly.

"Okay, you were right. Someone else should take over for a while but yes, the stairway ends and there is a passageway. It's not very deep. More like a landing at the bottom of the stairs. I reached through to the back wall and cleared about two feet or so down from the top. I can't tell if there is some kind of door there at the back or not. It seems like it's made of stone. Maybe one of you can dig for a while so I can catch my breath," Randy said as he bent over and breathed heavily.

"I'll take the next turn," Julie said and headed down the stairs. Trisia took her place helping Kevin haul the tarps, while Randy caught his breath and got ready to drop the next tarp down as soon as the two of them hauled up the full one. Julie dug hard and long, and it was fifteen or twenty minutes before she asked for a replacement.

Trisia went next. Reaching the bottom she saw for herself what Randy had described. It looked like a landing, the kind you'd see at the bottom of any stairway, although this one ended in a wall of stone. As she dug at the remaining stairs the distance between them and the wall of the landing grew smaller and smaller, as did the amount of dirt she needed to remove. This had enabled Julie before her to clear close to two feet of depth in only half the time it had taken Randy to accomplish the same thing. Now the geometry of the stairs allowed Trisia to make even more rapid progress until soon she could feel the tip of the shovel hit the stone floor that lay somewhere beneath her.

Trisia dug faster, trying to move away enough dirt to confirm whether she had indeed found the bottom. A few more minutes at this pace and I'll be able to tell Randy I've cleared the landing, she thought to herself. She too got to digging in a rhythm, just as Randy had done earlier. Clang, shovel, shovel, shovel. Clang, shovel, shovel, shovel. Then finally it was done. She set down the shovel and stood there in the dim light of the lantern, hoping that after all this work there was actually something worthwhile at the end of the stairway.

She ran her hands all around the edge trying to feel for an opening of some sort where the stone at the back of the landing stood perpendicular to the sides of the passageway. As she did this the loose dirt crumbled away and her slim fingers found an almost imperceptible gap. She traced it downward to the floor, across one side to the other, then up the other edge. She ran her fingers as high as she could reach, which wasn't very far, before convincing herself this was, in fact, a door. She stood there for a moment amazed at how the Maya were able to fit huge stones like this so close together. Then something else occurred to her, something more practical and less academic. How the heck are we going to move this thing, she thought.

Not coming up with any instant answer she decided to climb the stairs and tell the others that while the good news was they were done digging, the bad news was they now had a new problem. As Trisia strode up out of the stairway the inky black night was giving way to the pale orange dawn and the stars were fading from the sky. Turning to the others she said, "That's it. I reached the bottom of the stairway. There is nothing left to dig. It looks like there is a huge stone at the end of the landing but I have no idea how we're going to move it."

Buoyed by the good news, Randy replied somewhat cheerily, "The same way we managed to get the stone up that was covering the top of the stairway. Julie, can you run back to camp and get Greg and James? And see if there are any more pry bars there. We'll start in with the ones we have here."

Julie nodded, then took off running down the temple mound and back towards the camp. Randy and Kevin grabbed two pry bars which had been lying on the ground near the altar. Though it had only been hours, it seemed like it was much longer since the moment when the team had used the bars to pull up the stone previously covering the stairway. The anticipation of an imminent discovery held their fatigue at bay as the two men descended the stair, Trisia following behind them with a lantern in each hand.

Reaching the bottom the two men felt around the stone for a gap large enough to slide the pry bars into. Trisia noticed them doing this and blurted out, "I already tried that." Randy turned round and glared at her, and she meekly added, "but maybe I missed something, I am kind of short."

The onset of dawn brightened the bottom of the east facing stairway with a diffuse light, the first sunlight to shine upon the surfaces of the stone passageway in over a thousand years. For a split second Randy was certain he could hear a faint hissing sound, like air escaping from a tire, then it was gone. When he ran his fingers around the edges of the stone again he found there was a gap on one side just large enough to fit his pry bar into. Sliding the pry bar in, he pushed against the stone but it didn't budge.

Kneeling next to Randy, Kevin also searched along the edges of the stone. "There's another crack a little lower down," he said, and put his pry bar into it. Together they pushed, but even with both of them pushing they could barely move the stone.

Hearing Greg and James arrive upon the stairs, the two of them paused. When the two big men reached the bottom, it became clear the small stairway was too crowded for all of them to work in. Greg leaned over and tapped Kevin on the shoulder, saying to him, "There isn't room for all of us down here. Smallest one out."

Kevin started to protest. "I'm as strong as Randy," he said, which was probably true since although Randy was taller than him, he was also very skinny. Then he realized there was no sense arguing about it. It was Randy's show, better to let him deal with it, Kevin thought. Instead, he climbed back up the stairs in order to give the three others room to work. Besides, he consoled himself, this way I can watch the sunrise with Julie.

As he reached the top of the stairs, Kevin could hear the grunts of the others struggling in the passageway behind him to move the heavy stone. Emerging into the crisp morning air atop the mound, he was greeted by the site of Venus clearly visible above the horizon. He knew instantly he'd made the right decision in not arguing with Greg. Close to Venus stood Mars, and next to both hung a tiny sliver of the Moon. Kevin wondered to himself whether there might soon be a conjunction of these bodies, and made a mental note to check the star charts on his laptop.

Only then did he notice Julie. She was standing by herself, off to one side of the eastern mound, looking up in childlike wonder at the same sky he had been peering at analytically. Sneaking up behind her, he slipped his arms around her and kissed her on the back of the neck, as the first rays of the Sun broke over the horizon. "You always help me remember how to look at the world with wonder," he said to her, as she clasped her hands over his.

Kevin and Julie's romantic moment was interrupted by the sounds of the three big men heaving and grunting at the bottom of the stairs. "One, two, three, push," they shouted over and over, as they leaned into the pry bars. Several minutes of such effort had not moved the huge stone very far, although it had proved enough to create a gap large enough to see into. While the others stopped for a moment to catch their breath, Randy shone a flash light into the gap, his gaze following after it.

What he saw excited him greatly. "It definitely appears to be a tomb of some kind. Judging from what I can see of the colors on the wall, it looks like it's a royal burial. I can also make out some bones and what looks like burial jars. Let's see if we can get this thing open wide enough for someone to crawl into."

Urged on by Randy's observations they put their backs into the task. "One, two, three, push," they shouted over and over, leaning into their pry bars. Slowly the great stone in the passageway began to yield. Just as they were starting to make some progress another stone, this one in the roof above them, shifted. It barely moved a quarter of an inch, but in doing so it came to rest right atop the stone they were trying to move, the one which formed the doorway to the tomb.

The sound of the shifting stone startled them, and the three large men and the small wiry woman crammed into the narrow passage instinctively scrambled back up the stairs a step or two at the noise. Gaining their composure, they quickly assessed the situation. The stone in the roof of the stairway had not shifted enough for them to even notice, so they moved forward again to continue their task. This time no matter how hard they pushed upon the huge stone blocking the entrance to the tomb it would not move.

ver and over they pushed, but it was futile, the stone would no longer budge, not even a fraction of an inch. Exhausted, they finally stopped. As they stood there catching their breath Greg looked up, then pointed right at the spot where the roof stone had shifted. Instantly it was clear to all of them what had happened. The stone in the roof had settled just enough so that its weight now pressed down upon the stone they were trying to move, freezing it in place.

Rested somewhat, they went at the stone one last time, until breathless again from their efforts, they recognized there was no more they could do. Looking at the gap they had managed to open, Randy sized up the situation. The gap was small, but he was both skinny and desperate, so he twisted his body, trying to see if there was any way he could squeeze through the opening. There wasn't.

Then a thought occurred to him, I may not be able to squeeze through there but perhaps someone much smaller could. A split second later Greg and James realized the same thing, and when they did, all three of them turned together to look back at Trisia.

During the time the men had been struggling with the stone, Trisia had been behind them, leaning against the passageway wall in a sleepy daze and holding the lanterns for them as they worked. Yawning with her eyes half closed, she hadn't noticed the three of them turn round together. Tired as she was it took her a moment before she noticed they were all looking at her and another one to realize why. When it finally dawned on her, she began to shout at them, "Oh no. There is no way I am climbing through that tiny crack into a dark tomb filled with skeletons. NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO!" she shouted and edged back up the stairway. Randy slowly started moving towards her.

Kevin and Julie heard her shouts from above and thinking something was wrong, rushed down the stairs to help. Unfortunately for Trisia, they did this just in time to block her retreat. Randy advanced towards her.

"What's wrong?" Julie called out as she came up behind Trisia, who tried to push past her. Randy grabbed her by the back of her shirt. The stairway was utter confusion.

"They managed to get the tomb open a crack and now they want me to go inside" Trisia shrieked to Julie as Randy's grip on her shirt prevented her from fleeing. Behind her, she could hear Randy's voice, it had an almost eerie quality to it.

Tris. It's the only way. The stone is completely stuck. You're the only one in the whole group who is small enough to fit through the gap. Please Tris, we need to know what's inside the tomb," and as he said the last sentence his voice changed from forceful to pleading.

Hearing this she stopped squirming, and admitted to herself that he was right. She was the only one among them small enough to get through the gap and take a look inside the tomb, but she was frightened. Not because she was a woman, or was easily afraid, but because she was smart.

What person in their right mind wouldn't be frightened at being asked to crawl through a narrow gap between two stones into a pitch black tomb with skeletons inside it, where the door might give way at any moment trapping you inside to suffocate to death? Okay, maybe it isn't that drastic, she thought to herself, they'll be right on the other side of the door, and I'll be able to talk to them the whole time. They're counting on me. I can do this.

Screwing up her courage, she wheeled back around, looked Randy straight in the eye, and in a stern voice said, "Randy Berger, you are going to owe me big time for this!"

Randy breathed a huge sigh of relief, pulled a flashlight from his belt, and handed it to her. Squeezing past him and the two other big men who filled the landing at the base of the stairs, she took a couple of deep breaths, then shimmied her tiny frame through the gap and into the tomb.

"What do you see in there?" Randy called out to her.

She described the tomb to him, "Its about six feet wide, and maybe eight feet deep, with a kind of bench on each side. On each bench is a skeleton facing towards the door of the tomb, which is to the east if I remember correctly."

"Yes, that's east, which is consistent with Mayan royal burials we've seen before," Randy remarked back to her. Then he leaned over his shoulder and whispered something to Kevin, who turned away, ran up the stairs and came back a minute later with a backpack. Randy reached into the backpack, pulled out his notebook, then thumbed through it until he found the page he was looking for.

Sliding the book through the gap, he called to Trisia to come take it from him. "Tris, grab my notebook and take a close look at the paintings on the walls. I want you to see if the glyph on the page I have it open to appears anywhere in the tomb."

Grabbing the book, the young woman turned round examining the walls of the small chamber in the dim light. Then she stopped, shined the flashlight down at the book, then up at the walls, then down at the book again before responding. "I think I see the glyph you're asking about on the wall here," she said, "but I'm not really good at reading these things so I'm not a hundred percent sure. Is there anyway you can look at it?"

"Shine the flashlight on it and I'll see if I can get my head far enough into the gap," he said, squirming on the floor in an attempt to push his head as far into the gap as possible. "That's it! That's the symbol for Smoke Serpent. This must be his tomb!" he shouted, trying to extricate his head from the narrow gap.

"Can I get out of here now," Trisia moaned.

"Sorry, not yet," Randy replied, "Next I need you to examine the skeletons and see what you can tell me about them. If they have any clothing, jewelry, or anything else on them." He thought he could literally hear her shudder when he asked her to do this, but she calmly moved ahead, pointing the flashlight down to the bodies on the benches in order to take a closer look at them.

As she did so she let out an excited gasp. "One of them is holding a pottery jar, and has a necklace of some type," she called back.

"Take the necklace off the skeleton, and bring both it and the pottery jar over here," he instructed her calmly.

Slowly she picked up the pottery jar from where it was clutched between the hands of the skeleton and set it down on the bench next to the bones. Then she reached her hands around the head of the skeleton and carefully lifted the necklace off of it. With the necklace looped over her arm, she picked up the pottery jar and brought it over to the door by where Randy was. Forgetting about the necklace for a moment, she tried to hand the jar to him through the gap, but it wouldn't fit. Anxious to get out of the tomb, she turned the jar this way and that, until finally, Randy told her to stop.

"Hand me back my notebook and flashlight, and hold the jar in front of the gap where I can look at it and copy down the glyphs on its face," he said to her.

Trisia stood in the pitch black darkness, slowly rotating the jar in front of the gap, while Kevin beamed the flashlight upon it and Randy sketched. As she did this the necklace kept shifting on her arm, nearly sliding off it as she turned the jar on Randy's command. She stood there for several minutes patiently complying with every request until she felt something slowly crawling up her leg. Awkwardly she lifted her leg, shaking it in an attempt to dislodge whatever it was that was crawling on her.

"Can you hold still Tris? I'm trying to sketch this thing," Randy said to her.

With no other choice, she pressed the jar tightly against her body to steady it, while freeing up the hand with which she held the necklace. She looped the necklace around her head so she wouldn't drop it, then swung her arm down to her leg trying to brush off whatever was crawling on her. In response, the tarantula that had made its way down the dark stairs in search of a new home, and had since climbed up Trisia's leg, reacted by biting her on the ankle. She screamed and lost her grip on the pottery jar. It fell to the ground, cracking into pieces.

Hearing her cry Randy called out to her, "Tris, are you okay?" and he shone the flashlight into the gap.

"No, I'm not okay. Something bit me. I think it was a spider. I couldn't really see it," she said to him. "My leg feels like its on fire. I want to get out of here."

Shining the flashlight down to the floor Randy peered into the darkness to see if he could spot what had bitten her. It was then he saw it lying there in between the pieces of the broken pottery jar. The Jade Mask. Momentarily forgetting about Trisia, he reached his arm into the gap trying to grab the mask even as she tried to climb over him and shimmy out of the tomb. He stretched as far as he could, but the mask lay tantalizingly beyond his reach.

"Get out of my way. I'm getting out of here," Trisia shouted, but Randy put his arm up to stop her.

"Trisia, wait. Look down. It's the Jade Mask. It's what we've been searching for," Randy said to her through the gap.

She was in tears now, the spider's bite making her leg start to swell, as she grew dizzy and began to swoon from the pain. Realizing this was what they had spent all their time and effort in search of, she fought back the urge to faint. Instead, she leaned down and pushed the pieces of the pottery jar, with the Jade Mask lying in among them, towards Randy's outstretched hands.

Just as his slender fingers caught the pieces, Randy saw Trisia faint and fall forward. In a single motion he used one hand to sweep the mask and shards through the gap, while reaching up with the other hand to steady her. As soon as he felt the mask reach the waiting hands of someone behind him he swung his other hand upwards and pulled Trisia towards him, through the doorway of the tomb, and back out into the light and air of the passageway. Lifting her up in his arms, he turned to carry her up the stairs. The others, who had been watching from close behind him, had no way to clear the narrow stairway other than to rush up the stairs ahead of him.

Atop the buried stairway the sun had broken the horizon. Those who had stood behind Randy on the stairs now rushed up them ahead of him, emerging into the daylight. The rapid transition from relative darkness to bright sunlight caused them to squint in the glare. It took each of them a moment for their eyes to adjust, but when they did they could not help but notice the two men with guns who awaited them.

It was Mr. Hull and his man Victor. Hull quickly motioned the archeologists to stand in front of the carved wall, facing into the light, while he and his man stood with their backs to the rising sun.

Carrying Trisia in his arms, Randy was the last one to exit the stairway. When he reached the top, he immediately knelt down, setting Trisia gently upon the ground, not noticing Hull at all, or the guns he and Victor brandished at the rest of the team. His only focus was on Trisia.

Her leg was swelling quickly around the spot of the bite. Having treated injuries like this before Randy knew that although they were rarely life threatening, prompt treatment was needed. Besides the intense burning pain, which had apparently caused Trisia to faint, the spider's venom could cause tissue damage. Sometimes it could even cause a person of her small size to go into shock and die. However it wasn't just his first aid training kicking in that caused Randy to focus so intently on her, it was also the feeling within him that he had been the cause of her injuries.

Randy was so intent on treating her Hull had to speak up before he noticed him. "Mr. Berger, I had warned you about excavating without the proper permits," Hull said looking down at the younger man.

The sound of Hull's voice jolted Randy into recognizing there were people standing over him, people with guns drawn and pointed at him. Randy grimaced for a moment, realizing he was in a pile of trouble, but he shrugged it off, and turned back to attending to Trisia. Under other circumstances Hull might have been angry at Randy's ignoring him, but before he could react to the slight, something else caught his eye and his attention shifted.

"What do we have here?" Hull asked, noticing both the Jade Mask and the pieces of the broken pottery jar James held in his hands. Hull motioned to Victor to take the artifacts from him, which he did.

"Now I must decide what to do with you," Hull said, as he stood over Randy. "If I simply turn you in, then it will be difficult for me to sell this lovely item on the black market, since you will almost certainly talk." He paused, then continued, "But if I say I came upon your bodies after you had been robbed and killed by looters, no one will suspect anything. I can sell this at my leisure and your deaths will be a lesson to others about the dangers of looting."

Hull cocked his gun to fire, but at that very moment, from around the sides and over the top of the eastern temple mound, Randy saw something coming towards them which no human had seen for several hundred years. He saw Mayan warriors in full battle dress. The strangely dressed soldiers moved quickly and were in amongst them in an instant. They clubbed Hull and his man to the ground, then lowered their spears to threaten the archeologists with the sharp flint tips of them.

Next they did something even more unexpected. Pushing Randy aside, two of the Maya soldiers lifted Trisia, who still lay unconscious with the necklace around her neck, up from the ground and bore her away. The remaining soldiers motioned the archeologists to march down from the top of the eastern temple and towards the ball court, forcing them to carry Hull and Victor, who were unconscious from the clubbing they had received.
Chapter 13 – Escape

Turning the corner to round the carved wall at the back of the eastern temple mound, the archeologists could see down to the ball court. Assembled on it were dozens and dozens of soldiers, all dressed in the same manner as those who now prodded them with flint tipped spears. More of them continued emerging from a hole in the ground at the center of the ball court.

The Mayan soldiers marched the group down the rear of the temple mound and over to the center of the ball court near to where the hole was. Arriving there they found themselves reunited with the rest of the team, who had been sleeping back at the camp site. Another familiar figure was also present, the man whom Hull had addressed as Louis during the incident upon the road to Caracol.

The team stood together, grouped near the center of the ball court, surrounded by spears which held them at bay, wondering who these people dressed up as ancient Mayan warriors were and what they wanted. The soldiers around them were discussing something. As they talked Randy thought he could understand some of what they were saying. He leaned over and whispered to Bob and James, "Am I nuts, or does the language they're speaking sound kind of like Yucatec?"

The blank looks on their faces yielded their answer. Either they couldn't understand the language the soldiers spoke in, or they were too confounded by what was going on to be thinking clearly at the moment.

Randy knew he was the only one of Mac's graduate students with any advanced training in linguistics, but some of the others had taken workshops in ancient and modern Mayan languages at archeology conferences. He'd hoped perhaps some of their training had sunk in. Unfortunately, their blank stares betrayed that hope.

Abruptly, the stream of men dressed in Mayan warrior outfits climbing up from the hole at the center of the ball court stopped. A group of them stood around the hole and it looked to Randy like they were struggling to lower something down onto it. With so many people crowded at the court's center he couldn't get a good look, but he thought for a moment he saw a round stone carved with hieroglyphs. Randy leaned over again to James and whispered, "You sure you didn't find any markings on that stone you uncovered in the center of the ball court?"

James shook his head, "You saw the stone for yourself. Did you see anything on it?"

Randy pressed him further, "When you showed it to me it was still in the ground, and it was kind of dark. Did you dig it up and check the bottom of it after I left, or did you just look at the top?" James' expression told Randy the answer to his question. "My bad. I should have told you to do that right then instead of letting it wait until the next day," he said apologetically to James.

The soldiers immediately surrounding the group kept their spears lowered towards them while those beyond continued to talk. Randy noticed the ones talking were dressed somewhat differently than the others. He was trying hard to overhear what it was they were saying when Greg leaned in to his other ear and said, "Do you have any idea what the hell is going on here?"

Randy turned, fixed him with a deadpan expression, and said, "If I told you, you would think I had gone absolutely insane."

Greg glanced at the men surrounding them with spears then glanced back at Randy and said, "Any more insane than them?" gesturing at the men with the spears.

"Actually I think they're quite sane," Randy responded. "Remember how Onofre said his men believe El Pilar is haunted by ghosts?" Greg nodded yes and now the others in their group, overhearing the conversation, also leaned in. "I think they were right."

The expressions on their faces confirmed Randy's hunch that if he said what he was thinking they would think he had lost his mind, but he continued, "I recognize the costumes these men around us are wearing from illustrations in a recently published research paper. They're Holcan, a Mayan social class comprised of warriors. The ones over there, the ones I'm pretty certain are talking in ancient Yucatec, they're Nacom, sort of the ancient Mayan equivalent of officers. This leaves two possibilities. The first is you'd have to be one of a mere handful of archeologists who know what these costumes look like. The second is you'd have to be the real thing. Since they all seem to be speaking in ancient Mayan I'm thinking they're the real thing."

The rest of them just stared at him in disbelief so he went on, "In our modern understanding of it, the Mayan ball court is believed to be a ceremonial portal to the underworld, the place where the dead reside. Perhaps I've seen one too many action adventure films but I saw more of those Holcan climbing up from that hole in the ground than clowns climbing out of a gag car at a circus. So maybe I've totally lost it but I'm thinking this ball court is more than a ceremonial link to the underworld, it's also a real one. If that's true then these guys around us with the spears are really ghosts of Maya Holcan who we somehow disturbed by digging up the ball court or opening the tomb at this site."

At this suggestion there was a flurry of discussion among the archeologists for a few moments. Momentarily ignoring their circumstances, as they became engrossed in discussion about the true nature of what was occurring around them, none of them noticed Hull and his man Victor had regained consciousness. Not realizing where they were or how they got there, the groggy Belizeans began to stand up, thereby drawing the attention of the Mayan officers who had themselves been busily discussing something which Randy could not make out. Turning towards their prisoners the officers approached the group. It was then that Randy realized he'd completely forgotten about Trisia, who had been separated from them by the Mayan soldiers.

He didn't have long to worry about her, for as the officers approached the group a shout went out from among the soldiers assembled on the ball court. Atop one of its sides Randy could see the reason for their cheer. Trisia, who was now somewhat conscious, had been borne to a spot above one of the ball court's ceremonial rings.

Seeing her there he instinctively took a step forward, as if to move to her aid. He was cut short by one of the soldiers who came menacingly close to him, war club in hand, shouting something Randy could not discern. Then the soldier, seemingly an officer, spun round and shouted to the other soldiers who responded by quickly clearing the ball court.

Or mostly clearing the ball court, for now, counting the officer who had shouted at him, there stood only a dozen of the Mayan soldiers on it. The rest of them had moved off to the ends of the court or up onto its sides. Randy turned and counted the people around him. James, Bob, Greg, Kevin, Julie, Cynthia, Marc, Santos, himself, Hull, Victor, and Louis. A dozen. He had a sinking feeling. The feeling was quickly confirmed at the sight of a rubber ball, whose size was somewhere between that of a softball and a volleyball, being lofted towards them from on top of the sides of the court.

"Oh crap!" he called out.

It was Kevin's turn to be the one to wonder what it was they were caught up in. "What do you mean 'Oh crap'? What the hell is going on?" he shouted at Randy.

"Humor me for a minute and let's go with my current theory that these guys are ancient Mayan soldiers risen from the dead. We're their captives and it looks like they're about to do what any Classic Period Maya would do with captive soldiers," Randy replied.

"And what the heck is that?" Kevin said not giving him a chance to finish.

Before Randy could answer another voice chimed in. It was Julie's. "Play the Mayan ball game," she said.

"Ball game?" Kevin answered back quizzically, having, in the stress of the moment, forgotten all of what he'd learned on his first trip to Belize.

Julie quickly set him straight. "Remember when we were on the tour at Caracol? The guide told us about the Mayan ball game," she said to Kevin. Then she turned to Randy and said, "Umm, Randy. If I remember right, doesn't the losing team get sacrificed?"

He started to respond to her but was cut short by the head officer of the Mayan soldiers, who strode confidently up to him. In their confusion none of the archeologists had been paying much attention to the Maya, who had changed from their battle dress and were now clothed much differently. It was James who caught on first to the significance of the new clothing the Maya wore, as the officer stood staring Randy down.

"Randy, if I recall correctly what they're wearing does, in fact, look like what the players in the Mayan ball game wore in the depictions I've seen in textbooks and museums," James said. "I think we'd better make a run for it."

At James' suggestion several of them made a dash for one end of the ball court, but it was no use. The entire court was ringed by Mayan soldiers standing several deep. At the approach of the archeologists they lowered their spears, the sharpened flint tips of them glinting in the morning sun. Their weapons may not have been modern, but there was no questioning they could be deadly. The team quickly found themselves inching back into the center of the court.

"What are we going to do?" Bob asked Randy, as the group huddled together again towards the center of the ball court.

"What else can we do? If we try to run they'll kill us. All we can do is to play the game against them and try to beat them at it," Randy replied.

Bob, who had been relatively quiet up to this point, came unhinged at Randy's answer. Grabbing Randy's shirt he screamed at him, "And how the hell do we do that? Nobody even knows how they played the goddamned game!"

Julie reached in, and pulling Bob away answered him back, "Calm down. I have some ideas. I was reading up on the modern Maya a bit when we were back in Arizona, killing time while Kevin was working out where this place was located. Sociologists have studied the modern Maya of Chiapas and they play a ball game believed to be descended from the one the Classic Maya played," she said.

The team crowded in around her as she hastily described to them how the modern game is played. They tried to listen intently, knowing their lives might depend upon what Julie was telling them, but at the same time they could also sense their captors growing impatient at the delay. Julie wrapped things up quickly with a last bit of instruction, "No one knows for sure whether this is how the ancient Maya played this, but maybe using this as a guide we can watch them at it and copy what they do."

Bob was unconvinced. "That's not much of a plan! What if we can't copy them, or try to and just can't keep up with them. They've had a little more practice at this than us you know."

Julie shot right back at him, "Well Bob, if you've got a better plan, now is the time for it. It's pretty certain if we don't play them then they aren't going to let us out of here alive." Then she gestured over to where the head Mayan officer, fully dressed in his ball game regalia, was standing and said, "And by the looks of it, they're getting kind of antsy. So we can at least stall for time by giving it a try."

Bob, and any of the others who were previously unconvinced, became resigned to their fate. They fanned out across the ball court, copying the alignment of the players on the Mayan side. Randy guessed that because the head Mayan officer kept addressing him, he must assume he was their leader. Accommodating this, Randy stepped to the center opposite the officer, a sign the Maya immediately interpreted as an acceptance of their challenge to play.

From somewhere up on top of the sides of the ball court a conch shell horn sounded. "That means the game has begun!" Julie shouted out to the team, and indeed it had, for at the sound of the horn the Mayan officer standing opposite Randy threw the ball high up in the air. The ball came straight down, struck the stone in the center of the court, and bounced back up into the air above them.

On seeing this, Randy's instincts as an archeologist couldn't help but kick in. With little thought for the circumstances around him he theorized the stone, which contained hieroglyphs on one side, had been buried with the carved side down and the smooth side up because the ball would not bounce properly on the carvings. It struck him as just one more example of the eminently practical nature of the Maya that an ornately carved stone designed to commemorate the ball court and mark the spot of the entrance to the Mayan underworld, would be placed carved side down to facilitate the play of the game.

As Randy's mind wandered, musing upon the nature of the stone, he was struck by something else. Literally. The Mayan officer slammed his body into Randy's, delivering a very violent reminder as to where he was. Randy tumbled backwards to the ground while the Mayan officer stretched his hip out to strike the ball, skillfully directing it up onto the sloped portion of the ball court's side and towards the goal ring jutting out from it.

The shot missed the goal, though just barely, and the ball ricocheted back towards the middle of the court where another Mayan player was waiting for it. Randy scrambled to get to his feet while the rest of the archeologists, transfixed at what they were seeing, stood there not knowing how to react. The Mayan player nearest to the ball leaned his body in and with a skill not witnessed in over a millennium, directed the ball up and through the goal.

From atop the sides of the ball court a conch shell horn sounded. "I'm pretty sure that means they scored a point," Julie shouted out to the team, who were bewildered by the speed of the play.

Her knowledge of the game notwithstanding, she was as surprised as the others at the ease with which the Mayan players manipulated the ball. The collected wisdom of modern archeologists, at least those she had read in preparation for this trip, had led her to believe scoring goals in this game was much more difficult than the players around her had just demonstrated it to be. Momentarily infuriated at the notion that she had been misled, she was about to blurt this fact out, then stopped herself. The team was demoralized enough without her pointing this out to the rest of them, she decided. Better instead to keep this to herself.

The sound of Kevin's voice called her back from her introspection. "You wouldn't happen to know how many more of those they need to score until we're in real trouble?" he said.

"No," Julie shouted back, "the archeological records don't contain any indications and the modern games vary widely." It was a lie. The archeological literature was rife with conjecture on the subject. She realized though that none of it was likely to be any more accurate than their speculations upon the ease of scoring, speculations convincingly debunked before her eyes only moments earlier. Since one of the many things they lacked at the moment was the luxury of time for a scientific debate on the merits of the opposing theories regarding play of the Mayan ballgame, Julie quickly judged it would be better for everyone if she kept the conflicting theories on scoring to herself. Otherwise she risked having the rest of them launch into the type of instinctive debate they were known for. At least this way they would be left to focus on their current predicament.

Her ruse worked. The team of archeologists quietly took up their positions opposite the Mayan players. This was accomplished with great ease since it meant no more than resuming the same positions they held before the first time the conch shell had sounded. In fact, with the exception of Randy, who had been knocked to the ground during the face off, and the two Maya involved in the play, the Mayan team had scored so quickly no one else on the field had even managed to move.

Not that most of the archeologists had felt compelled to react to, or engage in, the play of the game. With the exception of Randy, Kevin, and Julie, the others were still transfixed by the surreal nature of the people and events in which they were enmeshed. The return of the Maya into the face-off position re-focused the attention of the archeologists, who stood anxiously wondering what would happen next. Then the conch horn sounded once more.

As before, the Mayan team leader responded to the signal by tossing the ball high in the air over the center stone. This time Randy had some idea what was coming and he braced himself for the Mayan team leader's blow. When it came he kept his feet. Although he was unable to make a play on the ball himself, he managed to disrupt the Mayan player's timing just by standing his ground.

The Mayan player glanced off of Randy then hip checked the ball. Rather than moving in a graceful arc towards the goal as it had in the first round of play, the ball wobbled off to the side. Encouraged by what he saw Kevin darted over to it to try to make a play. He was beaten to the spot by another Mayan player. Sliding gracefully, the Maya extended his leg forward in such a manner that the ball arced off his padded leg right above the knee and bounced back up into the air. It came down in a gentle arc, struck the angled side of the court well wide of the goal, then careered down the length of the court.

The action on the field followed the path of the ball. A third Maya warrior sprang to join the play. He caught Hull's man Victor, who was standing closest to him, completely by surprise with an elbow to his stomach then played the ball towards the court's goal ring with his shoulder. As the play moved away from him, Victor dragged himself off the ground with a look of rage upon his face.

Missing the goal ring, the ball bounded off the court's angled side and out towards its center where a nearby Mayan player dove to intercept it. He was thwarted by Bob who now involved himself in the action merely by sticking out his foot. The Mayan player tripped over it and fell flat upon his face. The ball caromed past him, bounced on the grass at the court's center, then continued across the court and up onto the angled side opposite from where the play had previously been.

Kevin was the first to voice an observation at what had transpired. "Hey, none of the Mayan players retaliated against Bob. Maybe playing rough is considered part of the game," he called out to the others.

With Kevin's words fresh in their minds the archeologists became encouraged. Despite being unsure of the rules of the game, or the proper technique with which to play the ball, they realized it was worth trying whatever they could to disrupt the Mayan players in the hopes of at least preventing them from scoring again.

No newcomers to the complex game, the Mayan players recognized their foes were quick learners and skillfully adjusted their tactics. Rather than playing the ball in the air as it descended they now made feints at it, thereby luring their opponents into trying to check them. When the archeologists bought the fake, the Maya ducked the check and played the ball after it landed rather than before.

The result was many an upended archeologist sprawled upon the ground, while the Maya continued to move the ball at will. When mixed with their earlier aggressive approach this more sophisticated style generated an outcome to be expected, the sound of the conch horn echoing across the ball court marking a second Mayan goal. The ornately dressed soldiers surrounding the field let out a cheer and the teams moved to reassemble themselves for another round of play.

The players assumed their positions, the conch horn sounded, and the game resumed. As play proceeded, the archeologists continued trying to adjust to the skill and tactics of the Mayan players in an attempt to save themselves. It wasn't long before the conch horn sounded marking a third goal for the Maya.

At hearing the horn announcing the third goal, Louis, Hull's second man, made a panicked dash for freedom at the far end of the court, where he had been standing up until this point staring in amazement and confusion at the strange events swirling around him. As close as he was to the lines of Mayan soldiers at the end of the court, he could not sprint past them before they reacted. Quickly, and in unison, the well practiced phalanx lowered their spears and thrust them forward. The combination of Louis' rushing towards the soldiers, and the swift and simultaneous response of their spears leveled to thwart his advance, resulted in his being struck in the arm and knocked off his feet.

Crude though they were, the Maya's weapons were sufficiently sharp to tear a large, jagged gash in his forearm and he screamed in pain as he fell. Hull rushed over to Louis, but the Mayan soldiers brandished their spears at him as well. Hull stopped, held his hands up, and started backing away, calling Louis to come to where he was. Louis scrambled the few feet across the ground back to where Hull stood. Hull tore his man's tattered shirt away from the wound and used it to tie a tourniquet around the bleeding gash in Louis' arm, temporarily stanching the flow of blood.

As all this was happening at one end of the court, at the other end the horn sounded for play to resume. Victor, whose anger had been growing at all this, now reacted quite rashly after seeing the wound which had been inflicted upon his friend Louis. As soon as the Mayan team leader tossed the ball in the air Victor rushed to the center, knocking the warrior aside in a soccer style attempt to head the ball. Victor's attempt was true and he made direct contact with the ball. He had not, however, counted on the fact that the Mayan ball was unlike any soccer ball he was used to playing with. Instead, it was made of solid rubber and was both heavy and extremely dense. When Victor's head struck the ball his skull fractured, and he dropped to the ground, dead in an instant.

If Randy had been surprised by Victor's sudden rush, he was more astonished at its result. He hesitated over the body for a moment looking down in disbelief at what had happened. Then, as if afraid to confirm his worst fears, he slowly reached down to check for a pulse or any other sign of life. Hull, Louis, and the archeologists all moved in to see. Pulling his hand away from the young man's neck the surprise in Randy's voice was palpable as he said, "He's dead." Unmoved by the dead player sprawled out near the center of the court, the Maya continued playing the ball game and shortly the conch horn sounded again.

At the sound of the horn several soldiers ran onto the court, pushed the members of the archeologists team aside, then grabbed Victor's legs and dragged him off the field. Randy stood up as they did so, and with a blank stare he asked of no one in particular, "How many goals is that?"

"Four by my count," Kevin replied, "We'd better start figuring this out soon or we're all going to end up like him."

The Mayan players assembled in their positions and reluctantly, so too, did the archeologists. The conch horn sounded and play began for a fifth time. This time, though, its tone seemed to mark a shift in the demeanor of the members of the team. Previously they had been reluctant to completely acknowledge what was going on around them. Even those who had engaged in the events unfolding about them did so with an air of academic detachment. The death of Victor had changed all that. It shocked them into accepting that no matter how surreal the appearance of the circumstances they found themselves in, the consequences of ignoring it were not at all academic. They were as real as life and death itself.

It was Greg who addressed this stark reality. "It's pretty apparent the Mayan players are much more skilled at this game than we are. But they're also much smaller than any of us. Well maybe all but Bob. Modern medicine and nutrition have provided us with advantages over whoever or whatever our opponents are. If we're gonna live through this then we better start making use of those advantages."

Up to this point in the game not one person on the archeologist's team besides Victor had managed to make a play on the ball. They had simply been trying to prevent the Maya from playing it. Now Greg's words forced them to realize they must not only try to play the ball, they must succeed if they were to survive.

When the conch horn sounded for play to start again Randy determined to use his greater height to his advantage. With the ball tossed in the air, he not only blocked the Mayan team's leader this time, he also succeeded in leaning his thigh into the ball. His success immediately brought yet another unanticipated aspect of the game to light for him. He was completely lacking in any of the padding the Mayan players wore as part of their uniform, and the impact of heavy, dense rubber ball striking him was painful. Like Julie before him, he realized the morale of his teammates was fragile, so he fought back the pain, muffling his response to it in order to not dissuade the others from engaging in the play.

Randy had directed the ball towards the angled side of the court, where it struck the side then bounced back towards the center of the field in Greg's direction. Greg gritted his teeth in determination and used his size to block out the smaller Mayan player trying to check him away. Despite his success at positioning himself between the Mayan player and the ball, when it made contact with his hip, the jostling from the Mayan player was such that his shot went awry, skittering towards the far end of the court. Striking the angled side of the court, the ball bounced high into the air, then hit a marker stone protruding from the corner of the court at its far end. At the same moment something happened which surprised everyone on the archeologists' team; the conch horn sounded.

At the sound of the conch horn the Mayan players stopped and headed back to their positions on the court. The archeologists stood there confused. Greg called over to Julie, "Did I just score? Or is that an out of bounds?" Julie stood there not knowing what to answer.

Without knowing whether they had scored or not the rest of the team did the one thing they could do, they returned to their starting positions. The conch horn sounded and play started for the sixth time. Randy had begun to get the hang of the face-offs and was once again able to use his height to get a first strike on the ball, sending it towards one of the goals. On striking the angled side of the court the lively ball took an awkward bounce and headed towards the end of the court where Cynthia and Marc stood.

Neither of them had engaged in the game to this point, but with the ball headed towards them they had little choice. Both of them rushed from different directions towards the spot on the ground where the ball was headed. So too, did one of the Mayan players. Not seeing the Mayan player Marc was knocked off stride by him, but the Maya hadn't counted on Cynthia. Slowed by his blow to Marc, the Mayan player was beaten to the ball by Cynthia, who jumped up and struck it with her shoulder sending it back towards the center of the court. The coup de grace came when Cynthia, who had timed her jump well, landed with her full weight upon the Mayan player driving him hard into the ground.

Cynthia's volley landed short of the goal. The ball bounced off the side wall then back out towards the center of the court to where Julie stood. With no Mayan players near her Julie was able to lean her shoulder into the ball unchallenged. Playing the ball for the first time, Julie discovered what Randy had learned only moments before, it hurt. Unable to quash her reaction she let out a yell, then stood there rubbing her shoulder watching as the ball arced towards the stone ring which formed the goal. Her shot was off the mark by a few inches and instead of going through the ring it struck the corner of it, then bounced away and back towards the center of the court.

Out at center court a Mayan player positioned between James and Kevin skillfully played the ball, redirecting it towards the other goal before either of them could make a play on him or the ball. Once again the Maya's skill at the game was evident. Encouraged by their success in winning the face-off, the players on the archeologists team had bunched up and followed the ball. When the play returned to center court the Mayan player had quickly redirected the ball across to the other side where two of his teammates were in position to strike it unchallenged. Their first volley arced up and over their goal, as members of the archeologists team scrambled to get back into position. They were too late though. Anticipating the shot arcing over the goal the second Mayan player waited for it to bounce then calmly directed it back towards the goal, evading a diving attempt by Bob to try to block the shot. The ball passed through the goal and the conch horn sounded. All Bob had to show for his effort was a huge scrape along his elbow where he had landed.

Realizing they were in trouble Kevin tried to rally his side while conveying some strategy along to them. "Don't get discouraged, we can do this!" he called out. "Be patient, don't race after the ball, stay spread out and you won't get caught out of position. Remember, use your size to your advantage."

The teams lined up at center court and once more the conch horn sounded. Up in the air went the ball. Randy had now definitely gotten the hang of the face-offs and played the body on his opponent. Having muscled the Mayan player aside he caught the ball on a second bounce using his hips to push it wide to Greg rather than play it directly towards the goal ring. Greg was uncovered and leaned a knee into it the ball, directing it up onto the sloped side of the court. It fell short of the goal, bouncing up and to the right of where Julie was standing part way up the angled side of the court. Julie lunged forward leaning her shoulder into the ball and driving it through the goal ring. The conch horn sounded.

Some of her teammates cheered at the shot, although Julie herself just marched back to the center of the field rubbing her shoulder. She turned towards Randy and Kevin and said, "Well, I'm pretty sure that one is a goal. If the one Greg hit into the end marker was also a goal then we're down five to two. If not we're down five to one, but I have no idea whether we play a fixed number of points or until one team reaches a certain score. I am pretty certain, though, that they'll let us know if we lose."

As before the teams lined up, the horn sounded, and the face-off was tossed high into the air. Unfortunately, Randy mis-timed his jump, missing both his opponent and the ball, which struck the ground and bounced away from the two of them. Seeing the ball ricochet down the court Kevin moved to play it, but was beaten to the spot by a Mayan player. As the Mayan player slid to strike the ball from underneath with his padded hip, Kevin reached out and pushed him from behind. The push drove the Mayan player forward and, rather than hitting the ball with his padded hip as he'd intended, it struck him squarely in his ribs a few inches above the protective belt he wore. Kevin could hear the sound of bones cracking as the ball bounced off his unprotected chest. The Mayan player dropped limply to the ground. So, Kevin thought, even if Randy's crazy theory is right and these guys have returned from the underworld they don't seem to be immortal.

The ball bounced down the grassy center of the court, right to where Mr. Hull was standing. Since their failed attempt at escape, and Victor's subsequent death, both Hull and Louis had contented themselves to remain at the far end of the court watching the bizarre spectacle unfold. Now, as the ball bounced towards him, the archeologists shouted to him to play it back to them. Hull ignored them and stepped aside letting the ball bounce past. When the ball moved past the edge of the court the horn sounded. Hull stood there unmoved, while the spear wielding Mayan soldiers kept their gaze locked upon he and Louis, wary of another escape attempt by them.

"Crap," Randy yelled to no one in particular. "They sounded the horn for a ball out of play. So we still don't know if Greg's shot against the end marker was blown for being a score or for being out of play."

Moving back into position Kevin replied, "Well I don't think we can count on Hull or his man to help us get ourselves out of this. It looks like he's a firm believer in the philosophy of 'every man for himself.' I've lost count. Was that eight or nine rounds we've played? "

Randy answered Kevin's question, shouting over the sound of the conch shell, "This is the ninth just starting."

This toss up was accompanied by another attempt from Randy to outmaneuver his Mayan opponent. This time he was unsuccessful, as the Mayan player skirted the attempted blow. Despite this, the player was unable to make contact with the ball which struck the stone at center court and rebounded into the air towards the opposite side.

Its trajectory took it closest to James, who leaned his hip into the descending orb, sending it towards the angled side of the court. James' play was not a good one. The ball struck the side of the court and bounced back towards the center, right back to where the face off had been. Having held their positions, both Randy and his opponent tried to gauge the spot where the ball would descend. This time the Mayan player judged it better and he edged out Randy, then leaned his hip into the ball, redirecting it to the side of the court where one of his teammates stood waiting near the goal ring.

The ball struck the angled portion of the court on the Maya's side then bounced upward. Attempting to track its trajectory, the nearest Mayan player was forced to look back towards the sun that had by now risen well above the tree tops. In doing so he did not see Kevin's approach, though he certainly felt the subsequent check Kevin delivered, a furious blow which sent the player sprawling onto the ground while simultaneously dislodging some of his protective gear.

Although his hit denied the Mayan player a chance at the ball, it also left Kevin without a play on it, and the ball bounded in the direction of where Bob stood. Athleticism not being one of Bob's fortes, he mistimed his jump. The ball sailed over his shoulder. A Mayan player, anticipating Bob's muffed play, slid gracefully behind him directing the ball back up into the air off his outstretched knee. The ball caromed off the sloping side of the court. Greg moved into position to try to steer it to where his teammates awaited.

As Greg lined up his play on the ball, one of the Maya moved to contest his shot. The small, ornately dressed warrior's impact did little to displace Greg's much larger frame. It was enough, however, to disrupt his unskilled attempt to steer the ball. Instead, the dense, black rubber sphere careened towards the far end of the court. Marc, being one of the more athletically adept members of the team, reacted quickly to Greg's errant shot. Copying the Mayan players style, he slid forward, thrusting his knee beneath the ball thereby directing it up into the air and back towards the center of the field of play.

The ball came down at center court one more time, and Randy jostled with the Mayan team leader to play it. This time Randy got the better position and shouldered the ball into the air and towards the goal. Randy's shot, while on target, was at right angles to the opening of the goal ring, which was itself positioned perpendicular to the side walls of the court. The shot struck the edge of the goal then bounced away towards the end of the court where Cynthia readied herself to play it.

Focusing her attention on the ball, Cynthia did not notice the Mayan player whom she had leveled earlier in the game was lining her up for payback. As she leaned in to play the ball her opponent hit her from behind. The hit sent her sprawling forward, the ball glancing off the side of her face as she fell. Pulling herself up off the ground Cynthia shook her head side to side, then spit blood in the direction of the Mayan player. The short, stout man glared back at her as Cynthia's errant shot was retrieved by a teammate of his who directed it back up into the air.

Highly frustrated, and furiously intent on the play of the game, Kevin now recklessly launched himself upwards in the direction the ball. From the way his airborne body towered over the Mayan player covering him, and the left to right motion of his head, it was obvious to even a casual observer he had forgotten what had transpired to Victor earlier and was about to foolishly attempt to play the ball soccer style. Recalling Victor's fate Julie reacted in a split second, screaming out Kevin's name as loud as she could. Whether it was simply the sound of Julie's voice calling his name, or the ferocity with which she did so, Kevin's head turned instinctively in her direction. In doing so he moved a fraction of an inch, but it was just far enough for him to clear the ball's trajectory. As the ball passed his head, Kevin's body bumped the Mayan player he was challenging, thereby pushing the much smaller man right into the path of the descending sphere causing it to glance off the Mayan player's skull. Although the more experienced player wore some type of protective head dress, the force of the heavy ball striking his head caused him to stagger. Julie and Kevin locked eyes in a moment of shared relief before the play of the game distracted them once again.

Having glanced off the head of the unfortunate Mayan player, the ball bounded down to the end of the court where Hull and Louis stood passively. This time an outlying Mayan player moved to intercept it in front of them. Employing the same graceful technique as his teammates, he slid his bent leg out under the low bouncing ball sending it in a smooth upward arc along the length of the court. When it descended it struck the angled side of the court and bounced back into the center of the field of play. A Mayan player positioned near center court moved himself right to where the ball was set to come down and, with the skill of someone well practiced in the sport, he thrust his hip under the ball directing it right towards the mouth of the goal. From every vantage point, be it that of the crowd or the players, the shot appeared to be on a trajectory which would carry it right through the goal loop. Somehow it missed, striking the edge of the goal mouth and rebounding back in the direction it had come.

James quickly moved underneath it and, copying the form of the most skilled of the Mayan players, he redirected it across the court and back to where the archeologists stood waiting. When James' shot bounced back off the angled wall of the court Randy was perfectly positioned to direct it towards the side of the goal. Playing the ball unhindered, Randy's pass caromed perfectly off the angled wall rising up in front of Julie at shoulder height. With no one else anywhere near her she lined up her shot, then, as she had done earlier in the game, she leaned her shoulder into the ball. The ball bounced off her shoulder and straight through the goal.

As the ball passed through the goal mouth the conch horn sounded, but this time there was something different about it. Unlike the previous short single blast, this one was a long blast followed by a sequence of short ones. At its cessation the Mayan soldiers, who had been watching the game from the ends of the court and from atop the walls on its side, started to stir.

"Anyone have any idea what's going on?" Julie called out, the elation of her scoring draining away in response to the movement of the soldiers.

The Mayan soldiers who had been watching from the ends of the court began to move in a single line inward towards the center. Having no other options the archeologists moved towards each other, clustering together at the center of the court. "Looks to me like whoever was refereeing thinks the game is over," Randy said. "By my count we played only nine balls. If you don't count the one that went out of bounds on the end then the score was five to three for them."

"If the game was best of nine then why did we even play that last point? What kind of screwed up scoring system is that? We couldn't have caught up to them anyway when they already had five of nine," Kevin said.

It was James who posited an answer to the question, "Just a wild guess here, but maybe the number of points they play is as important as the score. Nine may have some special significance given that the Mayan ball game is a ceremonial thing relating to their creation myth. If the ball court really is a portal to the Mayan Underworld, which has nine levels, then maybe we played a point for each level of the underworld."

At the far end of the court the Mayan soldiers nearest to Hull and Louis lowered their spears. Hull stepped back, but Louis became wildly agitated, lunging forward and grabbing a spear away from one of the Mayan soldiers. Quickly spinning it around he thrust the weapon at the soldier he taken it from, driving its point deep into the Mayan soldier's mid-section. The soldier dropped dead to the ground. The Maya reacted mercilessly. A half dozen spears thrust out at Louis and he fell screaming. The entire incident took but a second or two, and in reaction to it Hull turned and ran to where the archeologists stood together.

"Mr. Hull, nice of you to join us," Randy said sarcastically. "Not much for playing games, are you? I suppose you think we can somehow get you out of this?" Hull said nothing back to him. With the soldiers closing in around them there was no choice for the team but to stand and await their fate. As the others began to recognize what it was that was about to befall them, Randy realized there was something he'd completely forgotten. For the first time since the ball game started he scanned the tops of the ball court's sides in search of Trisia.

With one hand raised to his forehead in order to block out the bright sun, he looked to where he had last seen her, to the spot where she had been seated at the start of the game. She wasn't there. He did notice, however, that the Mayan soldiers who'd been playing the ball game against him had changed their attire once again. They emerged onto the tops of the ball court's sides adorned in a type of ceremonial outfit he had not seen before. He continued scanning the crowd for Trisia with no luck. As he searched he noticed the crowd of soldiers starting to stir. The Maya in the ceremonial outfits lifted some type of litter onto their shoulders and bore it down from the atop the ball court. It was only then he finally spotted her. She was seated upon the litter, which was ornately carved in the shape of a jaguar. It seemed to float above the crowd, moving in the direction of the eastern temple mound.

Randy suspected they would all be heading there soon. As the men bearing Trisia approached them the soldiers who had closed about the archeologists' group shifted their stance. Those who flanked them on the side opposite from the eastern temple mound lowered their spears, while those between them and the temple turned and raised theirs. They were trapped between two phalanxes of soldiers. One behind them who, with leveled spears, motioned them to walk towards the temple, and another in front leading the way. It didn't take any more than the points of the soldiers' spears to convince the reluctant group they had little alternative.

Trying to make light of the situation Randy blurted out, "It looks like we're going to get to do something no other archeologist has ever done, witness a Mayan sacrifice ritual first hand." No one laughed.

The procession of ceremonially dressed Maya that bore Trisia aloft moved past the prisoners, who were made to fall in behind it. They marched out the eastern end of the ball court, past the back of the eastern temple mound, then turned and continued around the mighty structure to its front. Randy tried calling out to Trisia as the soldiers carried the litter she rode upon past him, but she either did not hear or did not recognize him. He worried she might be in shock from the effects of the spider's bite, but surrounded as he was, he realized that at the moment there was little he could do to help her.

Reaching the front of the temple mound, the procession turned and began to climb the recently exposed stairs of its southern face. The stairs were bathed in the morning sunlight as the bearers carrying the litter with Trisia on it strode up them. Right behind it the prisoners were also forced to mount the steps up to the top of the temple. The remainder of the large contingent of Mayan soldiers who trailed the procession did not mount the temple. The plaza atop it could not have held them, nor would Mayan religious tradition have permitted their presence there. Instead, the throng of warriors kneeled down at the temple's base facing upwards to its apex, awaiting what was about to unfold there.

Atop the temple there stood a small group of Maya who crowded the shallow space between the altars at its front and the carved wall towards the rear. One part of the group consisted of the dozen or so soldiers who ringed the prisoners, the sharp points of their jade spears lowered directly at them, the sunlight glinting off their tips, keeping the archeologists at bay. The remainder consisted of the eight Maya dressed in elaborate ceremonial costume, their faces painted in grotesque caricature and their bodies and heads adorned with brightly colored plumes and necklaces strung with the teeth of the many creatures they had conquered.

These eight were the same men who had borne Trisia upon the litter. They stood in front of the ornately carved wall at the back of the plaza. Randy guessed they held the role of Mayan priests. It was a thought he did not get to ponder for long, as several of them grabbed him and quickly bound his hands. They spun him around and tied a rope to his bound hands, then pulled him by it to the altar. "Guess I'm first," he called back stoically to the others.

He tried to struggle, but it was in vain as the eight men around him pushed and pulled at his bonds. Wielding small, sharp knives of black obsidian they forced him down backwards onto the altar. His arms were pulled up and back over his head, and his legs were grabbed and held down as he kicked at the men holding him. He was splayed out upon the altar, his chest thrust upward as a result of his limbs being pulled out to the far corners of the stone slab.

It momentarily occurred to him their earlier hypotheses about the function of the channels on the stone was about to be tested, but he pulled his mind back to the reality of the situation he was in and struggled with all his might against those restraining him. As he struggled, he realized he probably had only a few moments left in this world when suddenly Trisia loomed over him.

On seeing her he felt relief, since it occurred to him that if she were standing above him now all of this must be some kind of dream from which he was about to awaken. In the split second before he anticipated her touch awakening him, his vision focused on several things: the swollen spot on her leg where the spider had bitten her; the Jade necklace with Mayan motifs dangling about her neck; and the black obsidian dagger in her hands. Realizing this was no dream he shouted out to her as he writhed violently in a futile attempt to break free of the grasp of the Mayan priests holding him down, "TRISIA! TRISIA! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? IT'S ME, RANDY!"

He shouted at her with all the strength he could spare, but she either did not hear or did not recognize him. He thought she must be in some kind of trance induced by her reaction to the spider's bite. Standing over him she brandished the obsidian dagger, holding it high in the air. The crowd below shouted their encouragement up to her as they saw the sunlight glint off the edges of the ceremonial tool. Randy fell silent, frozen by the realization that it was Trisia who was to be the executor of his sacrifice.

Trisia stooped over him and started to lower the dagger. She was about to thrust it into his chest, right at the spot where his racing heart lay, when her head turned for a second as she caught a flash of motion out of the corner of her eye. Randy saw it too. On top of the carved wall, above and behind the altar where Randy lay, a large black jaguar had suddenly appeared. Without a moment's hesitation the majestic beast launched itself gracefully into the air. Bound upon the sacrificial altar as he was, Randy could only lie there and watch the magnificent beast as if it were something from another world. Although it must have weighed close to two hundred pounds the creature landed gracefully on the altar, right over his prone body, its nimble paws balancing its weight without ever treading upon him. In a single fluid motion it brushed its muscular body against Trisia, toppling her from where she had been poised above Randy, and off of the altar before she had a chance to thrust the obsidian dagger into his ribs.

Forced off the sacrificial altar stone, Trisia fell at the spot where the archeologists had removed the stone in the floor beside it and right into the stairway leading to the tomb. Tumbling from sight she careened downward to the bottom of the stairs. Lithely, the jaguar stepped over Randy and sprung towards the Mayan priests, who stood at the foot of the altar holding his feet.

Frightened by the jaguar's approach the priests let go of Randy, attempting instead to fight off the huge beast with the small sacrificial daggers they held in their hands. Freed from their grasp Randy rolled off the altar and onto the floor of the plaza next to it, himself barely missing the same plunge down the stairway that Trisia had just taken.

When he landed on the floor he was surprised to see, right there in front of him, the backpack with his notebooks still laying exactly where he had dropped it some hours before, during the moment in which Hull had surprised him. Next to it lay the Jade Mask and the pieces of the broken pot the mask had been in. More importantly, also laying next to it were two guns. The same two guns Hull and Victor had been about to shoot him and the others with when the Mayan soldiers had surprised them all. Though his hands were tied together Randy realized he could grasp a gun in them. Thinking fast, he bent over, picked one of them up, and scrambled to his feet, aiming the weapon at the Mayan soldiers who stood surrounding the rest of the group.

Calmly he squeezed the trigger, and to his surprise when the gun went off the soldier he aimed at dropped to the floor. This should have come as no surprise to Randy, for Kevin had noted earlier that while they may have risen from the underworld, the events of the ball game had shown the Mayan soldiers were not immortal.

Confusion and panic came over those crowded onto the small plaza at the top of the eastern temple, although it came slowly at first. When the Mayan soldiers heard the shot they did not react, nor should they have, for they had no experience of guns or gunpowder in the pre-Conquistador time in which they lived. They could not connect Randy's actions, and the noise accompanying it, with the fate of their fallen comrade.

Something about the ordeal he had endured had dulled Randy's thinking, for despite the weapon achieving its desired effect, and the lack of reaction by the Maya to it, he let several moments elapse before he recognized the advantage he held and began to squeeze off additional rounds at the Mayan soldiers. Unfortunately for his colleagues, when he resumed doing so he was also completely oblivious to the fact that they were standing right next to the soldiers. The shouts of the archeologists quickly drew Randy's attention to this oversight, and while he continued to fire, he now took more care to provide his friends the opportunity to dive for cover. With each shot another Mayan soldier joined his comrades, slumping lifeless to the ground.

Hearing the shots Hull's mind raced back to the guns, the mask, and the events of earlier that morning. Realizing there was a second gun near the backpack he tried to take advantage of the growing chaos to lunge past Randy and make a grab for both it and the Jade Mask. Greg, who was closest to Hull, noticed him start to crouch. Immediately recognizing what Hull was up to, he surprised the corrupt official with a swift kick in the butt, just as the older man was bending over to reach for the backpack. Hull went tumbling head first into the carved stone wall at the back of the plaza. Moving quickly, Greg stepped over Hull's prone frame. With one hand he grabbed the gun and with the other he reached for the backpack. Lifting the backpack open, he used his foot to push the mask, Randy's notebooks, and the pot shards inside of it. Then he turned back towards the rest of the group, leaving Hull lying dazed upon the ground.

At the outset of the chaos, Kevin and Julie had observed Trisia's fall into the stairwell as the jaguar pushed her from atop Randy and the altar. As Randy walked towards them firing at the Mayan soldiers, they dove down into the stairwell not only to get out of the line of fire, but also to look for Trisia. They found her lying unconscious part way down the stairs to the tomb. Kevin quickly picked her up, hoisting her small body over his shoulder, then he and Julie inched their way back up the stairs. Listening for the sound of gunshots he carefully stuck his head up over the top of the stairway in time to hear the clicking of the gun in Randy's hand as he ran out of bullets. He realized the sound meant it wouldn't be long before the Mayan soldiers regained their composure. With Trisia slung over his shoulder like some lifeless doll, he popped up from out of the stairway leading Julie by the hand just behind him.

While Randy had been busy taking out the soldiers atop the temple, the jaguar had stood upon the altar, gnashing its teeth, snarling, and brandishing its razor sharp claws to hold the surprised priests at bay. The few soldiers still alive on the platform were frozen in place, not knowing whether to try to subdue their prisoners or help the priests fend off the beast attacking them. Hull regained his senses and sprang back to his feet. Having been beaten by Greg to the gun he decided the continued confusion provided his best opportunity to flee, so he bolted towards the side of the temple and leapt over its edge, tumbling down the steep side.

Seeing Hull make his break over the side of the temple the others also realized the virtues of a well timed escape. Taking advantage of the confused state of their few remaining captors they followed Hull's lead and made a break for it down the eastern slope of the temple mound. Greg led the way, gun in hand. Kevin followed, carrying Trisia in his arms. Julie was close behind him. Randy, now out of bullets, stood to the rear motioning to those who remained to follow the others. For a moment he menacingly brandished the empty gun toward his captors, then he launched himself over the side of the temple at the heels of his colleagues.

In front of the temple the Mayan soldiers remained kneeling on the ground. The mystifying spectacle above filled them with awe, but without guidance from their priests they were unsure of how to react. Rather than pursuing the fleeing captives, they remained in place obediently awaiting the interpretation by their priests of the strange events they had witnessed.

With the soldiers fallen, the priests in confusion, and the archeologists having fled from atop the temple, the jaguar turned to retreat. Gracefully it vaulted from the altar toward the spot at the top of the temple's carved wall at which it had first appeared. From there it moved swiftly down the sloping back side of the temple, then quickly vanished into the forest.

With the jaguar gone the priests fell to their knees. What had just occurred was as strange to them as their very existence was to the archeologists. What could be the meaning of the jaguar's appearance? Why would the gods send such a creature to disrupt their sacrifice to them? Was the jaguar itself an incarnation of one of the gods? Had they chosen a sacrifice of which the gods disapproved? Until they could divine the will of the gods the priests dared not do anything, especially pursue their fleeing captives.

Chapter 14 – Defense of Caracol

The group ran over the side of the temple mound, but unlike Hull they did not tumble down it. Having worked at the site for several days they were more familiar with its terrain and were prepared for the drop they would encounter at the precipice. Once over the edge they quickly made their way down the steeply sloping sides without falling. Although Hull had tumbled down the side of the temple, he found himself uninjured on his arrival at the bottom. Quickly regaining his feet he ran off eastward into the forest.

Upon reaching the bottom of the mound the archeologists also headed eastward and down the path to their camp, keeping a constant lookout behind them. At any moment they expected to see the Mayan soldiers pursuing them and were greatly relieved when, arriving at the camp site, they found this had not yet transpired. Taking no chances they grabbed only what they needed to make a quick escape from this place. Machetes, water bottles, GPS unit, radio, medical kit, and maps. Luckily these things were all lying out in anticipation of what they had expected to be the day on which they broke camp and departed from the dig site.

Lingering at the camp site not a second longer than was necessary, they continued along the path from their encampment near the stela to the stone pillar at the top of the quarry cliff. There they turned onto the southern path along the cliff face, heading south to the spot where the cliff edge descended to meet the clearing. In their haste they cut straight across the clearing, right out in the open where anyone along the cliff's edge could have seen them, taking the shortest route to the path back to the river. Nervously they looked back over their shoulders and towards the top of the cliff, fearing they would see the Mayan soldiers trailing them, but no pursuit was visible.

Reaching the opposite side of the clearing they marched eastward at close to a jog, back onto the forest path in the direction of the spring they had passed on their way in. Moving fast on the downward sloping path they quickly arrived at the spring. Tired and in need of water, they stopped to rest briefly while continuing to keep a wary eye out for signs of anyone approaching from behind them.

As the team drank at the spring and filled their bottles Greg tapped Marc on the shoulder and said to him, "Grab some water and come with me. We'll set up a lookout a couple of hundred yards back up the trail in case any of them are following us." Marc filled his bottle then, grabbing a radio, he and Greg let the others know of their destination before heading back up the trail in the direction they had just come.

Arriving at the spring, Kevin was exhausted from carrying Trisia. He took the opportunity to rest, setting her down gently upon the mossy ground. For her part, Trisia remained unconscious. Reluctant as he was to move her without knowing her condition there was no question they dared not stop until now to check it. Figuring they didn't have much time, Kevin quickly turned his attention to the task.

Time and again Trisia had proven how tough she could be, but now as she lay unconscious on the ground in front of Kevin she struck him as being very frail. Opening the medical kit he pulled out a small flashlight, then he spread her eyelids open and shone the light into her eyes.

"Her pupils are responding normally so it doesn't appear she has a concussion," he said as he examined her. "No contusions or any other sign of trauma on her head. Pulse, respiration, and heart rate are all normal. The spider venom should have worn off by now but she's not responding."

He turned to Julie and pointed to the medical kit, "Can you see if there are any smelling salts in there? I'm wondering if she might have gotten a concussion from her fall despite the lack of outward signs."

Julie responded to his request by handing him an ampoule of smelling salts which he broke open under Trisia's nose. Slowly Trisia opened her eyes, choking a little at the ammonia fumes emanating from the ampoule. Then she began struggling and started calling out in a language unintelligible to Kevin.

Randy was the first to recognize the language she was shouting in. "That sounds like Yucatec she's speaking. What the hell? She's only an undergrad. She doesn't know any Mayan languages." Randy leaned over and shouted at Trisia, shaking her violently, "Trisia, snap out of it. Do you hear me? Trisia! Trisia!"

Kevin pulled him away. "Calm down Randy! I don't think the bit back there with the obsidian knife was anything personal. She's clearly delusional and throttling her for trying to sacrifice you isn't going to help things any."

Randy let go of her. As he did he noticed the necklace she wore around her neck laying just beneath the edge of the shirt. He reached around her neck to lift the necklace off her. Still groggy she weakly tried to stop him while continuing to mutter in Yucatec. Brushing her hands aside, he quickly whisked the necklace over her head while softly reassuring her.

With the necklace gone from around her neck she seemed less confused and ceased her struggling. A moment later she stopped speaking. Slowly she opened her eyes and looked around her. Acting as if a fog had been lifted Trisia turned towards each of the faces standing over her, speaking each person's name in English as she did.

"Randy, Kevin, Julie," she said. Then, noticing the sound of the spring nearby she realized they were no longer at the temple mound and asked "Where are we? The last thing I remember I was in that dark hole of a tomb Randy made me go into to. Something bit me on the leg and I passed out. What happened with the mask? Were you able to get it out of the tomb?"

On hearing Trisia talk, and recognizing she was okay, Randy forgot himself for a moment and threw his arms around her neck and hugged her. Then, remembering their situation, he pulled his arms away and said to her, "Don't worry about that. We'll explain it all later. Right now we need to get moving. How is your leg? Do you think you can walk on it?"

"I'm not sure," she replied.

He stood up, then leaning down he grabbed her hand to help her to her feet. She struggled upwards to see if she could stand on her own but as she tried to put weight on the leg which had been bitten she winced, then slumped back towards the ground. Randy grabbed her before she could slip downwards. "Stay with us," he said to her. For a moment he thought she was about to pass out again but he kept talking to her, "Can you hear me Trisia?"

She shook her head and started to come back around a little bit, "Yes, but I'm feeling very light headed. It must be that spider bite."

"Maybe. Or maybe it was something else. What was it you were wearing around your neck?" he asked her.

"It was the necklace from the skeleton in the tomb. I put it round my neck since I needed both hands to hold the pottery jar. What happened to it?" she said in answer to him, while at the same time unconsciously sliding her hand to the spot around her neck where the necklace had been.

"I put it away so it doesn't get damaged," he replied. He began to suspect there was a connection between the necklace and her strange behavior, but he decided not to let on about it until he'd had a chance to study the artifact further.

Like a small child who'd been deprived of a favorite toy she pressed him further about the necklace, "Where is it Randy? Can I put it back on?"

Bending down, he lifted her up in his arms. "Sure, maybe later, after we've had a chance to study it some," he said to her, "but we really do need to get moving and you don't seem like you're going to be able to walk on your own. Try to rest some and me and the others will take turns carrying you."

Kevin and Julie stood close as Randy spoke with Trisia. Julie, noticing he had taken the necklace from around Trisia's neck, asked him about it, "What was that necklace you took off her?"

"Well, this is going to sound like more nonsense but it's the necklace Trisia found on the skeleton in the tomb. I think it might have something to do with why she was speaking Yucatec when she woke up," Randy responded.

Julie stared at him incredulously at first, but after recalling all the incredible events that had just transpired, she just shrugged. She was about to say something to him, but before she could Randy cut her off, "Radio Greg and tell him we better get moving." Then he shifted Trisia's body so he could carry her on his shoulders, and turned to head onto the path away from the spring, southward down the slope in the direction of the river.

As Randy moved off from the spring he was certain he could hear the sounds of drums behind them. He decided not to stop to investigate. Although he had started first, the others soon caught up with him, including Greg and Marc who, having backtracked to stand guard, had been furthest behind. On seeing the two of them Randy questioned them about the sound.

"Did you guys hear the sound of drums coming from behind us as we set out from the spring?" Randy asked.

The two men nodded, then Greg spoke, "I wasn't sure myself at first but Marc heard them too. It almost sounded as if it was slowly growing closer but we didn't see any movement in the jungle behind us."

On hearing this Randy handed Trisia off to James and encouraged the others to keep up their pace. Grabbing the machete James had been carrying he signaled to Greg, who was armed with the loaded one of Hull's two guns, to follow him to the back of their small line to cover their retreat.

Randy was reluctant to yield the task of carrying Trisia. Having convinced her to enter the tomb he felt quite guilty about the condition she was in. It was more than just guilt. He was genuinely concerned about her well being, but even if he hadn't wanted to satisfy himself that the Mayan soldiers weren't close on their heels, he'd have eventually had to let others take turns carrying Trisia. Though she only weighed in at around one hundred pounds, no heavier than the packs most of them had carried on the trip out, he had quickly realized carrying her wasn't quite the same as hauling gear. Without switching off with the others no amount of guilt would have given him the strength to carry her the entire way back, especially at the pace they were presently making.

Fortunately for the team, aside from Trisia, they carried little else. The path they were on, which had taken them so long to hike up on the march in, now sped by as they marched in double time with the urgency of those pursued. With no heavy packs or rain to hinder them, and with the slope of the terrain working in their favor, they managed to cover the distance between El Pilar and the river in hours rather than days.

When the river at last came into sight there was plenty of daylight left. Randy breathed a small sigh of relief at the thought of putting a natural barrier between the team and their would be pursuers. Yet standing on its banks, with the river stretching out before them, he momentarily grew concerned as to why they had not seen or heard any sign of the Maya since their departure from the spring. Then it occurred to him that his pursuers were skilled warriors and hunters, and could easily move through these forests without being observed. He quickly turned his focus back to the problem of how to get across the river.

The level of the river was much lower than when they had crossed it previously, although it still flowed swiftly. Unlike before they did not have Onofre's strong horses to bear them across. Randy wondered how they would manage it, especially with the need to carry Trisia in her weakened state. Then he recalled Santos had made the crossing while taking the injured porter back to be looked after. Perhaps he would have some suggestion.

Randy turned to the young guide seeking his advice, "Santos, how was it crossing the river when you returned with the injured porter? Was it difficult to get across the current?"

"Well because I was with the injured man I knew I could not cross here. I crossed further down river at the hand cranked ferry on the road from Bullet Tree Falls," Santos replied to him.

Hearing his reply two thoughts crystallized in Randy's mind. The first was trivial. Hull already knew about the site so there was nothing to by gained by not heading down river to cross on the ferry. The second, however, cut him to the core. He now realized how, despite their efforts to not be discovered, Hull had found out about the expedition and managed to track it down. Worse yet, it was all Randy's fault.

Randy had given Onofre instructions about his wish that their search should not become known to others and Onofre himself had taken steps so as not to be followed on his travels to and from the site. But Randy now recognized that in the rush to get the injured man to treatment no one had told Santos of the secrecy of their search. His initial reluctance to trust the men he had hired to help him had now come back to haunt him.

Hull was no fool, when he could not account for Randy and the visiting archeologists he must have started asking around. Belize was a small country and it wouldn't have taken him long to learn of Santos' movements across the ferry with the injured man. Hull would have quickly put two and two together and figured out the team's whereabouts. None of which was any fault of Onofre or Santos, who had simply done the best they could to get an injured man to safety.

Under other circumstances Randy could have kicked himself for being so stupid, but at present he had more important priorities. Abandoning any hope of attempting to cross the river here, he turned the group east to follow its northern bank downstream to the ferry crossing at Bullet Tree Falls. As he pondered whether this change in course might help throw the Mayan soldiers off their trail, he became concerned once again by the apparent lack of haste they seemed to display in pursuing them. Surely, he thought, if the Mayan soldiers had set out to catch them they could have easily done so by now. So what was stopping them?

If they could have easily caught up to them, as he believed, and they had chosen not to, then why hadn't they? Thinking this over it occurred to him the drums he had heard earlier might signal a war party. If he was right about this then the Mayan soldiers would not march in immediate pursuit. Instead, they would gather their forces and march on the city of their enemy. More specifically, they would march to Caracol.

With this thought in mind Randy realized the route the team took back to Onofre's ranch didn't matter. What did matter was that they beat the Mayan soldiers of El Pilar back to Caracol and figure out a way to defend it or, at the very least, to warn those there to flee. This assumed, of course, that he could get any one there to believe his story.

Marching double time along the banks of the Mopan River they quickly reached the ferry at Bullet Tree Falls. There they were lucky to find an empty taxi waiting for the ferry to take it across on its way back to San Ignacio. Randy knew they couldn't all fit in the taxi, but at least Trisia could. When the ferry arrived on their side of the river they boarded it, and the ferry operator slowly cranked the cable which carried it back across the narrow, fast flowing river. Approaching the southern bank of the river Randy put Trisia, Kevin, and Julie in the taxi and asked the driver to take them to the clinic in San Ignacio.

Leaning into the window of the taxi he told Kevin and Julie, "Take Trisia to the clinic at San Ignacio and get her checked out. Tell the driver to wait for you and then take the taxi to meet up with the rest of us at Onofre's ranch. He knows the way."

Perhaps more than anyone else, Randy worried about whether Trisia would be okay. Despite having been carried through the jungle for several hours she appeared to be doing much better, but he figured it would still be best to have her checked. Thinking to himself, Randy realized that whether Trisia actually needed it or not, having her double checked would do at least as much to make him feel better as it would her.

Besides, he rationalized, the taxi would have to go through San Ignacio and right past the clinic anyway, since there was no direct road a car could take from the ferry to Onofre's ranch. In the time it took for the taxi to head into San Ignacio, stop to have Trisia checked out at the clinic, then continue on to Onofre's ranch, the rest of them could take the horse path by foot, get cleaned up at the ranch, and put in a call to Mac for the truck from Caracol to come pick them up. It would also give him time to figure out how he was going to convince Mac he wasn't totally insane, as well as to come up with some idea as to what to do about the advancing ghost soldiers of El Pilar.

Reaching the far bank, the little ferry tied up quickly and soon the taxi was bumping its way off of it and down the road to San Ignacio. The remaining members of the team made their way off the ferry and up the sloping side of the river. A few dozen yards up the road they turned off onto the horse trail, which angled away to the southwest between both the river and the road.

The late afternoon weather was warm and dry. It was so pleasant, in fact, that the sounds of birds in the forest along the horse trail transported Randy's thoughts. Surrounded by the tranquility of their setting, it was almost hard for him to believe the things which had so recently transpired. That this occurred so easily to him made him certain some of the others would also be feeling the same sort of disconnect between where they were now and where they had been.

Recognition of the implications of this made the tranquility that had come upon him so quickly melt away even more rapidly. He began to wonder in earnest about how the others would interpret the meaning of their recent experiences. He decided to try to find out.

Dropping back from the head of the column he fell in next to James and Bob. Guessing there was no use in subtlety he posed the question directly to them by saying, "So, what the hell are we going to tell Mac about what happened?"

Bob replied, "What's there to tell? We found the site, we found the Mask, and after we had some sort of mass hallucination about Mayan soldiers returning from the underworld we ran off scared for our lives just like the porters who hauled our stuff up there."

"So you think none of what we experienced up there really occurred?" Randy said to Bob.

Before Bob could answer James spoke up, "Well, it all seemed pretty damn real at the time, but look around us. Where are the Mayan soldiers now? Maybe Bob's right. Maybe it was some kind of mass hallucination. Stranger things have happened. You ever hear about the Oracle of Delphi? Turns out archeologists recently discovered there is a natural gas seep under the site of the temple at Delphi. They now think that's what accounted for the strange visions and prophecies of the Oracle. Maybe there is something like that going on up at El Pilar."

James looked to Randy. Seeing the scowl on Randy's face at his agreement with Bob he continued on in his defense, "I mean you have to admit, it's a pretty far fetched story. Who's going to believe it? They'll think we made it up to scare looters off until we can go back and excavate the site further."

Randy grew agitated, "You don't get it do you? The Maya waged two types of warfare, raiding parties to capture rival kings for ceremonial sacrifices, and full scale attacks on rival cities. Both types are triggered by astronomical signs. Did either of you notice Venus was in the morning sky earlier today? I think those soldiers we brought back from the underworld are real. I also think they believe we were a raiding party trying to grab a sacrifice and that they thwarted us. Since we managed to escape them they're probably not going to go out looking for the raiding party. They're going to want payback. Which means marching to Caracol and staging a full attack. So we need to get back there and figure out a way to defend it."

"You can't possibly be serious? You've completely lost it!" Bob said derisively.

Randy, however, was serious. Dead serious. He quickly realized that while James might listen to him, he wasn't going to convince Bob. Dismayed, he let the subject drop and they walked on in a silence interrupted only by the sounds of the forest.

Tired as they were the team moved more slowly than when they had first set out. Their pace being as slow as it was, it took them about an hour to get to Onofre's ranch. When they arrived the sun was low in the sky and Randy knew it would not be light for much longer. To his further consternation, upon their arrival he learned Onofre was out in one of the fields training some new horses. It took the ranch hand quite some time before Onofre could be located and brought back to the main building. With nothing else to do as he waited Randy called down to Caracol to arrange for the ride back there.

It was a small bit of luck that Mac did not answer the phone when he called, for he was not really prepared to update him. Instead, the phone was answered by one of the newer graduate students. Turning aside the inevitable questions about the fate of his expedition he met additional good fortune on hearing that the truck had yet to depart from Caracol to return the day workers to San Ignacio. Anxious not to miss the driver's departure, Randy sent his colleague scurrying from the phone in order to make certain the truck would come to collect them from Onofre's ranch before returning to Caracol from San Ignacio.

Hanging on the phone, Randy strained to hear over the boisterous sounds of the rest of the team, who had finished cleaning up and were settling in at the bar right outside where he sat in Onofre's office. While their revelry complicated his need to take care of the business at hand, he couldn't fault them for relaxing and enjoying their first taste of the comforts of the civilized world in many weeks. Eventually, after several minutes on hold, he received word back confirming the truck would indeed come to retrieve them.

It will be a little while before the truck arrives, he thought to himself as he put down the phone, guess I'll have some time to join the others in relaxing. He stood up to head into the bar, but as he stepped from the office he saw Onofre approaching.

"Randy my friend," Onofre said smiling as he strode past the group of revelers, "I am glad to see you have returned safely. Was your expedition successful?"

Rather than reply in front of the others he placed his hand on Onofre's shoulder and turned him aside, heading back into the office to tell him of all that had occurred and of their urgent need to return to Caracol. Onofre gave Randy a disbelieving look then said, "Mr. Randy, you have such a sense of humor. From the look on your face I almost believed you. But these are just the same tall tales the local men tell of this place, so surely you must be joking with me."

Even as he said this, Onofre could see from the look on Randy's face what he had been told was no joke. Randy could hear the amazement in Onofre's voice as his jaw dropped, then he spoke, "Madre Mio! You are telling me the tall tales are true?"

Randy shook his head and said, "Well maybe it was because we cut down the trees around the site and uncovered the ruins, dug up the ball court's ceremonial marker to the entrance to the underworld, or opened the tomb and removed the mask and some other artifacts, but something we did made these ghosts come to life. The worst part is, I think they are heading to Caracol."

"Madre mio!" Onofre exclaimed once again, only louder this time, "I will pray for your safety."

Onofre was about to say something more but just then a taxi pulled up next to the lodge where the office and bar were located. Inside it were Kevin, Julie, and Trisia. Randy ran over to them as they climbed out.

Before he could say anything Trisia spoke, "They gave me a cortisone shot at the spot of the bite and the swelling has already gone down enough so I can walk on my own. The nurse said it wasn't unusual for someone of my small size to get a little delirious from a bite like that. Probably explains the weird dreams I had where I thought I was a Mayan princess. She also said the spider's venom seems to have already worn off and there wasn't any point in keeping me overnight."

"That's good news," Randy replied as the taxi pulled away.

Then somewhat sheepishly she added, "Kevin and Julie tell me I was about to stab you with some kind of obsidian dagger back at the altar on the temple. Ummm, sorry about that...."

She looked at him for a moment not knowing what kind of reaction to expect, and hoping for some kind of sign of forgiveness from him. Oblivious to her comment, he launched straight into telling the three of them about why he felt Caracol was in great danger. He was quite relieved to learn they didn't share Bob's belief about what had transpired to them being some type of mass hallucination. Unfortunately none of them had any ideas as to what to do about the danger, other than to return to Caracol and try to warn the others there.

It wasn't long after Kevin, Julie, and Trisia's return before the truck from Caracol arrived. As the sun set the nine archeologists climbed into the truck and bid farewell to Onofre, as well as Santos, who lived nearby Onofre's ranch. The ride back to Caracol was uneventful. Weary from their expedition most of the group soon fell asleep in the back of the truck.

Randy chose instead to set right in to examining the items they'd collected at El Pilar, in the hope of finding something to support the outlandish story he would soon be telling Mac. His plan was quickly thwarted by the constant jostling of the truck along the bumpy road and the total lack of light in it. Resigning himself to the reality of the truck's unsuitability as a place to perform research he let his exhaustion wash over him and soon joined the others in sleep.

The thumping of the truck's tires on the wooden planks of the bridge over the Macal jolted Randy awake shortly before they reached the archeologists' camp at Caracol. Rubbing his tired eyes a sense of dread gripped him when he realized he still wasn't sure exactly what he was going to tell Mac. His mind raced as the truck thumped off the bridge and drove up the road to Caracol.

If I tell him what really happened he'll think I'm insane, Randy thought to himself, and judging by Bob's earlier comments it's almost certain he's going to say we experienced some kind of hallucination. His dilemma was clear. If he hid the truth from Mac he would be risking people's lives if there really were ghost soldiers at El Pilar. Yet if he told Mac the truth, something the old professor probably wouldn't believe anyway, Mac might think he'd been overcome by the stress of leading the expedition.

Hearing the truck turning into the camp he knew his time was up. The truck's brakes screeched to a halt and he glanced out of it in time to see Mac approaching. His mind was made up. When Mac greeted him Randy quickly steered him aside and into his hut then closed the door.

Mac listened attentively to what Randy had to say, taking it all in with rapt attention in his usual grandfatherly manner. Then, when Randy had finished, he told him quite simply that he wished to speak with the others. In the meantime he advised Randy to get some rest. Randy began to protest the truthfulness of his story, then, realizing it would only make Mac more skeptical of it, he relented. As Randy headed out of the hut Mac invited the next person in, then proceeded to spend the rest of the evening talking with each of the archeologists from CCF, as well as with Greg and his group.

An hour or so after Randy left Mac, Trisia joined him in the archeologists' mess tent. "I saw you squirming in the back of the truck the last few miles. I'm guessing you were trying to figure out exactly what it was you were going to tell Mac?"

Randy nodded to her glumly.

"So what did you tell him?" she asked.

"Well I wasn't sure what to tell him. At first I thought that if I told him the truth he'd think I was insane or something. Then I realized if I didn't tell him and those soldiers from El Pilar showed up, we'd all be in terrible danger. I was pretty confused, but finally I decided I had to tell him what really occurred and trust in him to do the right thing," Randy replied.

"So, what was Mac's reaction?" she asked.

Randy answered her, the exasperation clear in his voice, "Well that's it. I don't really know. He didn't contradict me or tell me I needed to have my head examined or anything. He just listened to it all calmly and then ushered me out of his tent and told me to get some rest. When I protested to him that I wasn't crazy or making any of this stuff up he responded that he was taking everything I said very seriously and would act on it soon. Has he talked to you yet?"

"I just came from there," she said.

"What do you think he makes of all this?" he asked her.

"I'm not sure," she said. "He talked to Bob and James before he spoke with me. I guessed you two probably had very different stories, so I asked him if he believed your version or Bob's, but he didn't answer me. I don't know what James told him, whether it was your version or Bob's. I told him as much as I could, but I was honest, and unfortunately all I recall after the spider bit me was some delusional venom induced dream of being a Mayan princess. I don't think he believed me though. Ever since the day you discovered the Jaguar King's tomb and I had to shout at him in front of Greg and Kevin to get him to come out and take a look he's taken to thinking I'm an impudent undergraduate."

"You're pretty perceptive for an impudent undergraduate. So what made you think Bob wouldn't tell him what really happened?" Randy asked her.

"As if!" she said. "That guy's a turd. I could tell in a second he wouldn't tell Mac what had really happened. He'd say anything to get in good with Mac, and he'd avoid saying anything that might make him look like a loser." She paused for a second, realizing her words might not have come out sounding the way she meant them to, then tried to retract them, "Umm, sorry. I didn't mean to imply you're a loser."

"That's okay," Randy said gently to her. "But don't be so hard on Bob. He's just scared. I talked to him on the road from the ferry to Onofre's. He thinks it was all a hallucination. Something we ate or something in the water. You have to admit it's a pretty weird tale. I mean when you heard the baggage porters telling tales of things like that you wrote them off."

His voice trailed off for a moment but then he continued, "As for Mac, well he's just trying to make sense of the fantastic tale I presented to him, especially when its been followed up with other conflicting stories. I tried to convey a sense of urgency at the coming danger but can you blame him for not reacting immediately. After all, even if he believed me how would he begin to know what to do about it in order to safeguard the dig site here and all the people at it?"

"Well I believe what you told Mac. I'm sure Kevin and Julie do too. So what are we going to do?" She asked.

"Thanks for believing in me Tris," Randy said, then he shrugged. "Anyway Mac can think what he wants to for now, but if those Mayan soldiers do show up he'll change his mind real fast. In the meantime I don't think we have too long before they get here."

"How long do you figure?" Trisia asked.

"I went back over my notes on the Jaguar King's epitaph and what it said about the march he took his men on when they attacked El Pilar. It was really sketchy, but based on it I'm guessing the route the Maya would have used to travel between these two cities follows the Macal from where it meets the Mopan, turns west where the Guacamallo Bridge is, then travels over the ridge to the river which runs near Caracol. The Epitaph Codex is too vague to tell how long it took the Jaguar King's men to march that distance. We also don't have any idea how many men the Jaguar King was marching with, and that can also make a big difference. So with pretty much nothing to really base it on I'm guessing they'll arrive around dawn, if for no other reason than because that matches up with the battle tactics the Jaguar King used when he attacked them. Attack from the east out of the rising sun," he replied to her.

"Doesn't give us much time to figure out what to do, does it?" Trisia said to him.

"No, it doesn't," Randy replied.

"Well, what about the mask?" Trisia said innocently.

"What about it?" Randy replied.

"The Jaguar King was willing to give his life trying to recover it. So it must be important. Maybe it's some kind of weapon? Wasn't there something in the stela we found in his tomb about the mask and the king destroying those who fight him?" she said to him.

"Hmm, I'd completely forgotten about that. Let me look at my notes again," Randy said to her with some surprise. "By the way, can you tell me anything more about the inside of the tomb, like where you found the jar the mask was in and the necklace you were wearing?"

Just as Randy asked her this Kevin and Julie poked their heads into the hut. They were in time to hear her answer.

"Well," Trisia began, "it's a little fuzzy because of my reaction to the tarantula bite and that crazy dream I had of being a Mayan princess, but let me think a little." She paused for a few moments then continued, "When I squeezed into the tomb I saw two skeletons in there on berms. The skeleton on the left was larger and its skull was damaged. It had a shield and spear. I'd guess from the size of the skeleton and the weapon it held that it was a male, although I'm no expert and can't really be sure. I am sure the skeleton on the right was noticeably smaller, so I think it was a female. That and because it was wearing the necklace. Oh yeah, it was also holding the pot."

Julie waited for a pause in their conversation before asking them, "How's it going?"

Trisia turned away from Randy and replied to her, "Not too good. By now Mac probably thinks we're all nuts for continuing to persist in believing what I'm sure Bob has managed to convince him was some kind of mass hallucination born of overwork, lack of sleep, food poisoning, or some other such thing. That notwithstanding, the two of us are convinced those Mayan ghost soldiers are marching down the Macal as we speak and will most likely get here around dawn and lay waste to the place and kill everyone they find here." Then she added cheerily, "So how'd it go with your talks with Mac?"

Julie noted the sarcasm in Trisia's voice and replied, "Well, for what it's worth, the two of us told Mac what we experienced and how we don't think it was a hallucination. To our surprise, Greg and Cynthia seem to be agreeing with Bob that what occurred to us couldn't possibly have been real. I think too many years as a professor have beaten the imagination out of my brother."

"So it's just the four of us who believe we're in danger," Trisia said to her.

"Any ideas on what to do about it?" Kevin asked.

"We're working on that right now. Well Randy is anyway," Trisia replied. "I was telling him about where I found this stuff in the tomb before I got bit."

Randy had the artifacts they had recovered from the tomb at El Pilar, the Jade Mask, the fragments of the broken pot which the mask had been contained in, and the necklace, arranged on the table in front of him. Next to them on the table were several large format books with color plates in them. As the others talked he leafed through the books, glancing back and forth from the books to the artifacts. Randy was lost in this for many minutes, then he looked up and said, "Trisia, can you go get James for me?"

"Sure," she said, and she ducked out the door.

Randy went right back to what he was doing while Kevin and Julie sat there silently, not wishing to disturb him. As they sat there he picked up the pot to take a closer look at it. He compared the markings on it to the notes he had taken while Trisia was holding it in the dimly lit doorway of the dark tomb. Not surprisingly, he found several mistakes and corrected them as he worked.

After a few minutes he set the pieces of the pot aside and turned to the necklace. He examined the front closely, then, after turning it over, a look of surprise appeared upon his face. "This is interesting," he mumbled to himself.

Kevin and Julie had been sitting quietly, but now they couldn't help but overhear him. "What's interesting?" Julie inquired.

Not realizing he had been talking to himself out loud, Randy was surprised for a second by her inquiry. When he realized she was talking to him, he replied, "Oh, the markings on the back of this necklace. They read 'Lady Feather Lily, Wife of Lord Jaguar, King of Caracol.' Trisia said she found this on the smaller skeleton in the tomb. These markings would mean it came from the daughter of Smoke Serpent, the one who married the Jaguar King and then betrayed him by stealing the Jade Mask."

"That's pretty curious!" Julie blurted out at hearing this.

"What is?" Randy asked back.

"Why would she have been buried wearing a necklace given to her by someone she hated enough to betray?" Julie replied to him.

"What do you mean?" Randy asked, not understanding her question.

"You guys are sooo daft sometimes," Julie sneered back at him, "no wonder you still haven't noticed Trisia has the hots for you." Julie immediately realized what she had said. If she hadn't, Kevin's elbow being jammed in her side would also have quickly reminded her. Embarrassed she immediately changed the subject. "I mean," she continued, "she probably was wearing the necklace because she actually loved the Jaguar King."

"But if she loved him, then why did she betray him?" Randy replied, not getting her meaning.

"Aaaargh!" Julie growled, "That's just it. She didn't betray him! Someone else did. Maybe her father did, or maybe it was the priests. Whoever did it, they betrayed both her and the Jaguar King." She could see the unconvinced look on Randy's face, but she pressed her theory further, "The Maya used to send raiding parties to capture rival kings, right? Maybe Smoke Serpent sent a raiding party to kidnap his daughter back and steal the mask from the Jaguar King."

Now Randy started to get it. "So you're saying you think the fact that she was buried with this necklace shows she really loved the Jaguar King, even though his epitaph says he thought Lady Feather Lily was the one who betrayed him? If it's true and her father actually betrayed the both of them by having his men kidnap her and steal the mask, then it's a pretty sad story. It would mean that when the Jaguar King died trying to retrieve the mask he believed she stole from him, he didn't know she was actually innocent and really loved him."

"Not only that, it's even sadder," Julie responded, "Feather Lily continued to love him until she died as proven by her being buried with the necklace he gave her."

Randy considered her theory a moment more. "Hmmm, if it is true then the inscriptions on the pot and the sacrificial altar make a lot more sense. The pot said 'Lady Feather Lily, Mother of the Lord of Caracol', and the altar had an inscription commemorating a date in AD 702 as the date when Lily Jaguar became king of Caracol. There is a record here at Caracol of a king ascending the throne in 702 but up until now we'd only known him as Ruler VII. "

Julie looked confused and said to him, "I don't understand."

"Now you're the one being daft," Randy shot back at her. "Until the mask was stolen and she fled or was kidnapped back to El Pilar, Lady Feather Lily was the wife of the Jaguar King of Caracol. I'm pretty sure Mayan newlyweds did the same things other newlyweds do. So she must have been pregnant with the Jaguar King's child when he was killed. There is a seventeen year gap in the lineage of Caracol's kings at the time. If she did have a male child by the Jaguar King, then he wouldn't have assumed the throne for about that long. But why wouldn't Smoke Serpent have assumed the throne of Caracol after he defeated the Jaguar King?"

"Didn't Trisia say the other skeleton in the tomb had damage to its skull?" Julie asked.

"Yes, but why do you ask?" Randy responded.

"Well there may be no way to prove this, but...," Julie said and her voice trailed off.

"But what?" Randy asked, getting a little irritated at being distracted from examining the artifacts.

"You said Trisia confirmed to you that the glyph on the wall inside the tomb indicated it was the one for Smoke Serpent. That would mean the other skeleton, the one with the damaged skull, would be his. What if, some time after her child was born and she knew it was a boy, Lady Feather Lily had her father killed in revenge for his role in the death of her husband? She would have become regent of both El Pilar and Caracol, and seventeen years later her son would have become king of both cities. As regent her name might not have been recorded in the lineage."

In the hopes of putting the speculative discussion to rest so he could get back to work, Randy replied, "It's an interesting theory, but right now we don't have any way to tell if it's true or not. Maybe someday we will do some proper excavations at both sites and make more discoveries. Who knows, maybe the tomb of Lily Jaguar is still waiting to be discovered some place down here or up there. Not that I'm in a hurry to go back there after what we've been through." He started to turn back to examining the artifacts then something clicked in his head and he turned back to Julie and said, "Did you say Trisia has the hots for me?"

Julie blushed as she tried to think of an answer to Randy's question which wouldn't get her in trouble with either Kevin or Trisia. Fortunately for her, James and Trisia entered the mess tent before Randy could ask again.

On entering the tent, James had the look of a man brought before his accusers. Rather than wait for Randy to say anything, he spoke first. "Mac asked me to tell him what happened up at El Pilar. So I told him what I experienced. When he pressed me as to whether I really believed all of that could have happened or if maybe we might have imagined some of it, I wasn't sure how to respond," James stammered apologetically. "I hope I didn't make you look like a fool, but I don't know what to believe. It all seemed so real, yet when I think about it now it seems so crazy."

Randy replied, "Thanks James, but that isn't actually why I wanted to talk to you. We'll find out in a few hours whether what happened was real or not if the soldiers from El Pilar show up here. In the meantime I figure the smart thing to do is assume they're coming and try to decide what to do about it. If I'm wrong then we'll have lost one more night of sleep. If I'm right then we'll need to figure out how to defeat them. So I was hoping you could take a look at this mask and tell me what you think it is."

On the walk over James had been preparing for Randy to lash out at him, and he to defend himself. He was momentarily surprised when Randy didn't, and it took him a second to respond. It was long enough for him to recognize that not only did what Randy said make a lot of sense, it also meant he still respected James' opinion.

Relieved at avoiding the nasty conflict he had anticipated, James turned his attention to the mask. He studied it in silence for several minutes, then quietly voiced his opinion, "It looks to me to be somewhat similar to the Jade Mask of the Maize God found at Santa Rita in the Corozal District a year or two ago."

Randy's answer to James was simple, "Exactly what I thought too." As he said this, he flipped open one of the books to a picture of a jade mask similar to the one sitting on the table in front of them. He read the caption under the photo, "Mask of Maize God, 700-900 A.D., found at Santa Rita in Corozal District, Belize."

Randy continued on, "So it looks like this is a mask of the Maize God." Then, thinking to himself out loud again, he said, "What is the significance of the Maize God?"

Trisia, not realizing Randy was thinking out loud, answered without missing a beat, "Death and resurrection. The Maya believed people were made of corn. Each year corn was planted in the earth in the spring. They linked planting to death and burial, but the corn seed they planted grew up from the earth and produced the plant which created more corn, and this they recognized as a rebirth. So the power associated with the Maize God is the power of death and resurrection."

"Sounds like you've been paying attention in class," Randy replied, then decided to probe her knowledge further, "So how could such a mask convey these powers to someone?"

Once more Trisia was equal to the task, "The Maya believed when humans donned the costume of a deity they assumed the traits and power of the deity, in effect they were temporarily transformed into the deity."

The others realized what Randy was getting at, and though they all reached the same conclusion, it was Julie who was first to voice it. "So what you're saying is, by donning the Jade Mask of the Maize God the Jaguar King could have assumed the traits of the god itself and been able to wield the power of death and resurrection? No wonder he wanted the damn thing back so badly he ended up dying for it."

"Well, they wouldn't have considered it quite that easy. Besides donning the mask they probably would have had some kind of ceremony where they presented offerings to the gods," Randy said gently correcting her.

"And that's where the stela we found buried with the Jaguar King comes in!" Trisia blurted out. "I'm betting the inscription on it describes the ceremony by which the wearer of the Jade Mask assumes the power of the Maize God over death and rebirth. It must have been buried with him so it wouldn't fall into the hands of Smoke Serpent. It would explain why the Jaguar King was buried in the strange place where we found him, and not in the tomb actually meant for him! They were trying to hide the secret to wielding the Mask!"

"My thoughts exactly," Randy said. "Maybe after all these years we can do what the Jaguar King failed to do. We've recovered his mask. Maybe we can also wield it to defeat his enemies. At least if we can figure out what the inscription means."

Randy fumbled back and forth in his notebooks looking for the notes he had made from the inscription on the stela. "Ah. Here it is. This is all we have to go on. The stela itself has already been moved to the Belize Archeological Museum in Belmopan."

"What does it say?" Trisia asked excitedly.

Randy read back the translation from the stela:

It is said on that day, at dawn was seen the face of Chak Ek'

It is said on that day, it is the self of the king, he is in the presence of the God Mask

It is said on that day sacrifice is made

It is said on that day the Quetzalcoatl burns

It is said on that day the King fights

He is in the act of creating

The fire is the divine conjuring

He conjures the spirit of warfare

He conjures the gods with his creation and his darkness

Then the King shall destroy those who fight him

As Randy finished, Kevin spoke up, "Well we have a good start. I recall seeing Chak Ek', um, Venus that is, in the sky this morning."

Then Trisia added, "And we have the God Mask. But what about 'the self of the king'?"

"Judging by the fact that the Mayan priests were going to cut up Randy first, and that they chose him to play center court in the ball game, maybe they think he's our leader," Julie said half in jest. "Besides, he's the only one of us who can speak ancient Mayan, so he's got to be the one reading the incantation anyway."

"Great," Randy said sarcastically. "Well, it's better than being a human sacrifice. So now we have to figure out where we get a Quetzalcoatl to sacrifice as a burnt offering. That's probably going to be a little tougher considering it's a mythical creature."

"Maybe not," Julie replied. "It's a plumed serpent, right? Trisia and I were collecting feathers in the jungle the whole time we were looking for the site. I think a couple of the ones I have were Quetzal feathers. Maybe Trisia found some of those too," she said as she dug around in her fanny pack.

"I definitely found some Quetzal feathers," Trisia said, and she too started to look in her waist pack.

"Well, unless we go out and catch a snake, which is not only dangerous, but a lot harder than you think, that's only half of it," Randy said, still unconvinced.

"Here's the chance for Greg to help us," Julie said smiling.

"Um, I hate to spoil your fun Jules, but Greg's already asleep and I don't think he wants anything to do with this," Kevin said to her.

"Better still, he won't have a chance to complain when you grab his belt made from the snake that jaguar at the zoo killed," she replied to Kevin.

"Me? No way. He's your brother, you go grab it, I have a Ph.D. awaiting his signature," Kevin whined.

"I would, but he's sleeping in the men's tent, so you're going to have to do it. Don't worry, he sleeps like a log, and snores like a chainsaw. Plus he never wears his pants to bed. All you'll have to do is slip it off them and bring it back here. He won't have any idea who took it," Julie said to him sternly.

Kevin shrugged his shoulders. He knew he couldn't win. Deciding to get the deed done with as quickly as possible, he headed out the door of the mess tent and over to the one where Greg slept. In the meantime the others continued pondering the incantation.

"Okay, let's say the feathers and the serpent skin is all we need. Do you really think wielding this thing can really be as simple as my standing up on the Canaa, burning some feathers and serpent skin, and reciting the inscription? Ancient Mayan isn't exactly a well understood language. I can't be sure of the translation. Even if the translation is correct nobody really knows how ancient Mayan was actually pronounced. So I could end up standing there, babbling into the wind while those soldiers from the ball court at El Pilar trash the place and everyone in it," Randy said, doubting whether this was really a good idea.

Kevin came back in time to hear Trisia's reply to Randy. "We don't have many options here. Nobody else believes any of this, so they're not about to leave. We can't run away and just leave them here to be killed, and we don't have anything else we can use as a weapon against whatever those things are."

"I take it you're starting to have doubts about this?" Kevin said to Randy. "Who can blame you? But she's right, what else can we do?" he said as he pulled the rolled up snake skin belt from his pants pocket and set it down on the table in front of Randy.

"It's a few hours before dawn. We should climb up the Canaa before it starts to get light. If anyone wants to grab some sleep, now is the time. I'm going to go over this stuff again to make sure I haven't missed something, and to try to figure out the correct pronunciations," Randy said to the other three.

The hut they were in was a fairly large rectangular building with screens for walls. It served as dining room, meeting place, recreation room, and library for the students working on the site. On one end of it were a couple of hammocks, towards which Kevin and Julie now retreated in the hope of grabbing a couple of hours of sleep until the time came for them to accompany Randy to the Canaa.

Trisia remained seated across the table from Randy. He tilted his head towards the hammocks to suggest she too should try to get some sleep. She shook her head, then said, "Tired as I am, there is no way I could sleep now. My mind is racing with everything that has happened."

Randy started to turn his attention back to his notes, then thought better of it and looked toward Trisia. She could see he wanted to say something, but he hesitated. She sat there patiently. Finally, not knowing how else to say what he wanted to, he just blurted it out, "So I hear you have the hots for me." The look on her face made him instantly aware he had not chosen the best way to phrase what he meant.

"Who told you that?" Trisia said, scowling.

Randy knew he was on thin ice and began to tread more carefully, "Umm, well Julie did, but she didn't mean to." He saw Trisia turn her head and shoot a dirty look in the direction where Kevin and Julie were sleeping. Randy awkwardly continued, "Don't blame her. She didn't say it that way. And I didn't mean for it to come out that way either. Umm, it's just...," and his voice trailed off.

"Just what?" Trisia said angrily, trying to keep her voice down to avoid waking Kevin and Julie.

Randy was cornered. His eyes darted about for a second until he realized there was no way he was going to get out of it. Squirming in his seat he tried to extricate himself from his predicament, hoping to not make things any worse than they already were, "Just that what would a really cute woman like you see in a guy like me? I'm at least eight years older than you, and to be honest I'm kind of a geek who spends all my time wrapped up in my work."

Now it was Trisia's turn to feel awkward. She blushed when Randy had said she was cute, and she was pretty sure he'd noticed it. She realized, however, that the cat was out of the bag and this was a make it or break it moment, so she tried to stay cool. "Randy, you are one of the nicest, sweetest, most intelligent guys I've ever met. You're completely different from the guys my age back at the dorms around school who are always hitting on me and treating me like a piece of meat. You've always shown respect for me as a person. You never talked down to me, well almost never, and I've learned so much from you. That really means a lot to me."

Then she did something impulsive. It was something she'd wanted to do for a long time, and she figured now was the only chance she might ever get. Standing up, she leaned across the table and kissed him passionately on the lips.

To her surprise and relief, he kissed her passionately back. They held the position, each of them leaning across the table towards the other, and kissed for what seemed to them quite a long time, although in reality it was not more than a minute or two. They kissed until the sound of Kevin's snoring startled them, at which time they each pulled back to their own sides of the table. Then they sat there for a moment in awkward silence, the two of them grinning at each other.

Trisia spoke first, "I've been kind of interested in you since before I even came down here. I kept looking for some good way to try to get your attention but you were always so wrapped up in your work. I started to get discouraged and figured there was no way an older guy like you would be interested in an undergrad."

Randy answered her, "Well, I have to plead guilty to being so wrapped up in things that I probably missed a lot of signals you might have been sending that you were interested in me. In my own defense, I guess I just figured you and I were from different worlds. I didn't really think someone into the kind of stuff you are, you know, the body piercing and everything, would be interested in a guy like me."

Their feelings revealed, a second awkward silence held for a long moment before Randy remembered their predicament. "I hate to break the mood Tris, but we don't have much time and I need to work on this."

She stood up, then walked around the table, pulling her chair along with her and placing it at his side. She kissed him tenderly on the neck, sat down next to him, put her head on his shoulder, and said, "You keep working and I'll try to get a little rest. Remind me to tell you later about the dream I had after the spider bit me." Randy took her hand in his, then turned back to his books while trying to also keep one eye on the clock.

Focused as he was on the task of figuring out how to wield the mask he didn't notice the time until it was almost 4 A.M. and he realized he needed to get the others up and over to the Canaa. He had spent the last several hours reviewing books on the ancient Mayan languages hoping they would enable him to recite the incantation correctly. The whole idea was crazy and probably wouldn't work, he thought to himself. What if they didn't have the correct offering to burn? What if there was some part of the ceremony they didn't know about? What if the Jade Mask was just a mask?

Fed by his lack of sleep, the doubts raced in his mind until a realization dawned upon him. If Mayan ghost soldiers from El Pilar were real, then the mask had to be as well. One could not exist without the other. Buoyed by this recognition it mattered little to him that he'd have no way of knowing if he was reciting the incantation correctly. If the soldiers were real then the mask was real, and if the mask was real he told himself, he would find a way to wield it.

Putting his hand on Trisia's shoulder he gently woke her. Together the two of them went over to where Kevin and Julie slept, and woke them too. Then all four of them grabbed flashlights and headed out of the mess tent into the darkness.

With only a sliver of moon hanging low in the sky the night was very dark. Randy knew the place well though, and even in the dark he had no trouble finding his way from the archeologists camp, past the Central Acropolis, through the ball court, and over to the base of the Canaa. He began to climb it and the others followed right behind him, except for Julie who looked up at the dim shadow of the massive structure in the dark.

Noticing her stop Kevin turned back to her, and reached his hand down saying, "Come on Jules, you can do it. It's dark out, so you won't be able to see how high you are." She shrugged her shoulders, took his hand, and together they slowly climbed the temple.

When they reached the top Randy and Trisia's flashlights illuminated the feathers, snake skin, and matches, which they had already set down on the altar towards the southeastern edge of the platform. "Damn!" Randy called out, "we need some twigs or bark or something to light in order to burn the offering."

"I'll go get something," Trisia said and ran back down the steps, moving so fast into the darkness Julie gasped and held her breath, thinking she must have fallen. A moment later the light from Trisia's flashlight crossing the field told her Trisia hadn't fallen, and Julie breathed a sigh of relief upon realizing she had just been projecting her own fears.

As they stood in the cool of the morning air before dawn, Kevin cast his eyes out to the eastern horizon in search of Venus' rising. "There," he said, pointing, "out on the horizon. That should be Venus. Can you see it now?"

"All I see is a sliver of the crescent moon," Randy replied. Then he paused a moment before he realized what Kevin was pointing to. "Is it that bright star right next to the crescent moon?" Randy asked.

"Yes, and look to the east of it. That's Mars rising right after them!" Kevin said, now very excited, "I've never seen a conjunction of Venus, Mars and the Moon. They don't occur too often."

"That's interesting," Randy replied, "conjunctions of the planets often held special meaning for the Maya. I'm hoping it's a good omen for us."

"Speaking of which, did you check what today is on the Tzolk'in Calendar?" Kevin asked him.

"9 Kimi. Utz Kin. Good day!" Randy responded.

"Well at least we know we're already in better shape than the Jaguar King was," Kevin replied.

"Where the heck is Trisia?" Randy said. Before anyone could reply, he heard something. It was a low dull boom and it didn't sound far off. There was a brief silence, and for a moment he began to doubt whether he had heard what he thought he had. Then it sounded again, even louder this time.

"What the heck was that?" Julie asked.

"Mayan war drums would be my guess," Randy said, "I hope Trisia gets back here really soon."

"Oh crap!" Kevin called out, pointing over to Venus.

"What does 'Oh Crap' mean?" Randy replied.

"It looks like the moon is about to occult Venus!" he called back to Randy.

"What the heck does that mean?" Randy asked, mystified at the terminology Kevin used.

"Venus, it's about to disappear behind the moon. Didn't the incantation say something about the face of Chak Ek' being seen at dawn?" Kevin said nervously, shouting to be heard over the sound of the drums which were clearly closing in on them. "I think you better get moving before the moon blocks it out completely, otherwise it might effect whether or not the mask is gonna work."

"None of this is going to work if Trisia doesn't get back here soon with something to burn for the sacrificial offering," Randy replied. Just then he saw a flashlight moving across the ball court below them in the darkness. As it reached the bottom of the steps to the Canaa he began to breathe a little easier until he noticed the light stop and reverse direction a moment later.

The drum beat was right below them now and Randy realized this meant the soldiers of El Pilar were as well. He called out, "Trisia!" and started to run down the steps, but Kevin grabbed his arm to stop him.

"Look," Kevin said, pointing to another flash light moving rapidly from the ball court across the clearing and over to the base of the tall temple. Then they heard the crack of a gun. The drums stopped abruptly. The gun sounded a few more times before the two flashlights moved across the clearing and ascended the steps of the temple.

Two figures reached the top of the temple, silhouetted by the slowly brightening dawn sky. It was Greg and Trisia. When he reached the top, Greg turned to face back down the steps, pointing the flashlight and the gun back down them. A figure in Mayan war dress moved far below them on the steep stairs. Greg fired the gun. The figure toppled backwards. Those behind it stopped for a moment, having learned to fear the power of the strange weapons their enemy wielded against them.

Greg turned and called out over his shoulder to Randy, "If you got any mumbo jumbo you better get it working now or we're all dead."

Trisia stood at the Altar and dropped a pile of bark and wood onto it. Randy quickly lit a match and set it to the paper. The fuel on the altar caught fire. Trisia fed bits of bark, twigs, snake skin, feathers, and cocoa shells into the flames which hissed and crackled. Randy held the Jade Mask in front of his face and proceeded to recite the incantation:

Che' ta k'in, ti ahal ilah uwich chak ek'

Che' ta k'in, ub'ah ajaw yichnal koh k'uh

Che' ta k'in ch'ab'-t

Che' ta k'in tok-k'uk'chan

Che' ta k'in nak-Ahaw

Ubah ti Ch'abil

Al K'ak Uk'uhul tzahk

Utzakaw Uk'awiilil utok'pakal

Utzak K'uh tuch'ab tiyak'ab'il

Ka' Ahaw hom nak-ha'ob

They could hear the drums start once more as Julie stood next to her brother right at the edge of the temple. The dawn sky continued to brighten and the soldiers of El Pilar became clearly visible below them on the steps of the temple. Greg fired shot after shot at them until the gun ran out.

Noticing that Greg had run out of bullets, Julie called out fearfully to Randy, "Umm, this doesn't look like it's working."

With the mask in front of his face blocking his eyes, Randy could not see what was occurring around him. The soldiers of El Pilar had almost reached the top of the steps. All of the others, except Trisia, retreated back up onto the smaller buildings that stood behind them on the Plaza. Trisia stood next to him feeding the sacrificial offerings into the flames while Randy kept reciting the incantation over and over.

Then, without any warning, she dropped to her knees besides the sacrificial altar in front of Randy. In a single rapid motion she pulled his shorts down from his waist with one hand, while with the other she reached out to grab his penis.

"I had hoped the first time I would get to see this would be under different circumstances," she said.

Then, using the hand with which she had just pulled Randy's shorts down, she reached back into her hair, grabbed the stingray spine from it, and in a lightning quick motion jabbed it right into his sexual organ. She did all this so fast Randy had no time to react. At least until she jabbed him with the stingray spine.

He let out a shriek so loud it drowned out the sounds of the drums coming from below them, echoing across the space between the great Mayan temples, out into the valley and for miles around. In great pain, Randy tried violently to free himself from her grasp, but she kept a death grip on his most sensitive part with one hand as she collected his spilled blood in the palm of the other.

The soldiers had climbed over the top of the temple steps and were only a few yards away from them. She yelled at him, "Don't stop! Keep reciting the incantation!" and poured his blood onto the last handful of bark that was there upon the altar, and cast it into the flames where the other offerings still burned. Despite the pain he was in, Randy returned to reciting the incantation.

As the flames engulfed the bark covered with Randy's blood the Jade Mask glowed with an eerie internal luminescence. A bright light flashed from inside it, and the soldiers of El Pilar fell where they stood. So did Randy and Trisia. The bodies of the Mayan soldiers lingered in the light of dawn for a second, seeming to hover somewhere in time between the past and the present, then they disappeared.

Randy lay on the ground next to the altar, bleeding. Trisia and the Jade Mask lay next to him. The others quickly rushed in to attend to them.
Chapter 15 – Restoration

The tropical sun shone down on the steps of the brand new visitor center at Caracol. A bright yellow ribbon stretched across the doorway to the center, and on the steps were arrayed a quite unlikely group of colleagues.

At the center of the group was the Prime Minister of Belize. On his right was Randolph J. Berger Sr., the wealthy American industrialist whose generous gift had made possible this new center, which, of course, bore his name. Beside Mr. Berger was his son, Randolph J. Berger Jr., who, despite his father's initial wishes, had chosen a career in archeology, something his father had finally come to fully accept. Further along stood Professor Alfred Maudslay McCutchins, known to his friends and students as "Mac" and whose own illustrious career in archeology seemed to be foretold by his parents' otherwise curious choice of namesake.

To the Prime Minister's left stood Mr. Hibbert of the Belize Department of the Interior. Several Professors from the Archeology Department at Belmopan University flanked him. At the far end, trying to look very inconspicuous stood one Mr. Joshua Hull, head of the Belizean Office of Antiquities.

Gathered round the group on the stairs was a crowd of reporters, onlookers, and well wishers. In addition to celebrating the opening of the newly expanded visitor's center, the Prime Minister's speech had also announced plans for major improvements to the road leading to Caracol, as well as investments to expand education and training of Belizeans in archeology so that, as he put it, "in the future, such finds as will be displayed in this fine museum may increasingly be made by Belizeans."

With those words the ribbon was cut, photographs taken, and the assembled crowd allowed to filter into the new center to view its exhibits. Central to these was the Jade Mask of the Maize God, believed to date from the late 7th Century AD, and the necklace of Lady Feather Lily also from the same time. Both were beautifully displayed in state of the art security enclosures. Also on display was a sarcophagus, funeral pottery, and several new codices, the first ever displayed in Belize. Conspicuously absent, per the curious wishes of the new museum's benefactor who had insisted it be displayed at an American museum, was the small round stela containing the incantation Randy had used to wield the Jade Mask. The exhibits themselves mentioned nothing of the manner in which these items were found and returned to Caracol.

It only took moments after the ribbon was cut for Trisia to try to make her way through the crowd to where Randy stood. She was stopped well short of her goal, however, by the many photographers and reporters pressing around him in search of details about the newly displayed find. Randy saw her waving to him, but he stood there dutifully answering the reporter's questions. Until he saw who she had with her, at which time he brushed the reporters aside, promising them to return later. He then pushed through the crowd to where she stood.

"You sneak," Randy said to her, "You told me they said they couldn't make it!" He reached out to grab Kevin's hand, then leaned over to give Julie a hug.

"Well that's what they said at first, but when they emailed me to say they had changed their mind they asked me to keep it a surprise!" Trisia replied.

"What the heck was Hull doing up there? Shouldn't he be in jail?" Julie said to Randy, almost snarling as she did.

"I wanted to report him to the authorities but Mac convinced me nobody would believe the story. We had no evidence against Hull, or even of anything that had occurred at El Pilar," Randy said.

"What about the bodies of his two henchmen? Didn't they find them at the site?" Julie said insistently.

"That's actually a curious thing. Remember how we figured the Mask was that of the Maize God, who had the power of death and rebirth? The two of them evidently walked out of the woods alive a couple of days later. Whatever power we unleashed from the Jade Mask must have brought them back as well. That is, if you actually believe what happened to us," he said, laughing along with the others. "By the way, where's Greg? Didn't he come with you?" Randy added.

"No," Julie replied, "He's back in Arizona. He's winding down work on his current projects and writing an entire new set of grants. You'll never guess on what!"

"No way!" Randy exclaimed.

"Yup! He's putting together grant proposals for a dig up at El Pilar!" Julie said. "He said to tell you he's sorry he sold you out to Mac, and that he'll stick up for whatever version of the story you want to publicly tell."

"Well thank him for me when you see him. I'm actually amazed he's willing to go back there!" Randy replied.

"Not only is he willing to go back, but he convinced Cynthia to work with him if he gets the grant. It might not be easy for him to get it, since he's never worked on Meso-American cultures before, but he said after our expedition he's hooked on working on the Maya!" Julie chimed back to him. "Oh, we have one other surprise!" she added.

"What's that?" Trisia asked.

"Well after hearing about Belmopan University's plan to expand their archeology program, Kevin said he is going to try to see if he can get one of the new professorships they're creating. That's why we changed our minds and came down here, so Kevin can interview there," Julie said. "Any chance you can get Mac to help write a recommendation for him? Assuming he doesn't think we're all a bunch of crackpots?"

"Well, Mac and I had a long talk. He convinced me we're better off keeping the whole thing low key. I'm not sure if it means he believes us or not, but in the end since no one got hurt and we recovered what we were looking for I realized it doesn't gain us anything to go around telling the true story. In fact, it might actually make it harder to get grant proposals and appointments if people think we believe in the local legends, although a whisper here and there should hopefully keep the looters at bay. Anyway I think I can probably get Mac to write Kevin a recommendation," Randy responded.

Then he turned to Kevin and said, "By the way Kevin, did you get the newspaper clipping I sent you? You may have been right about the black jaguar."

"What newspaper clipping is that?" Julie asked him.

"He didn't show it to you? I'm surprised," Randy said back to her. "I figured he'd be all over you since you were doubting him. The black jaguar from the Belize Zoo. It apparently escaped the day before we set out from Caracol. The really strange part is it returned to the zoo on the same day we performed the Mask ceremony. The paper said they've never heard of a captive jaguar returning on its own after escaping."

"Oh, you mean the day Trisia stabbed you in your you-know-what," Julie said mockingly.

"Joke as you will, but there is something weird about that jaguar. First it saved Greg in the zoo. In doing so it killed the snake whose skin we needed for the mask ritual. Then it helped steer Kevin to accidentally find the stela in the forest after our survey had missed it. If we hadn't found the stela, we might have missed the spot where we found the temples, or at least lacked the information we needed to make the connection between Smoke Serpent and the Jaguar King. And, oh yeah, lest I forget, it also saved me from Trisia's attempt to stab me on the sacrificial altar at El Pilar," Randy said back to Julie.

"You mean Trisia's first attempt to stab you," Julie said, ribbing him again.

Ignoring her a second time, Randy added, "Just between the four of us, if I had to come up with yet another a crackpot theory I'd say the jaguar was the reincarnation of the Jaguar King of Caracol, and that it was looking out for us since we somehow turned out to be the instruments of his revenge on El Pilar. Too bad it wasn't around at Caracol when I needed it the second time."

Trisia took the bait at this, "Hey, lucky for all of us it wasn't there then. Though if your crackpot theory is right it wouldn't have tried to stop me from successfully stabbing you the second time. I mean if I hadn't thrown your blood on the altar to complete the ceremony, we'd all be dead!"

"I've been meaning to ask you about that. What was it that made you think to stab him in his, umm, you-know-what so hard it bled, and then throw the blood on the altar?" Kevin said to Trisia.

"When I saw the incantation wasn't having any effect I realized we had to be missing something. I remembered that the Mask was of the Maize God, the god of death and resurrection. The wording of the ceremony spoke of death and creation but I recalled the Maize God as also being associated with fertility rituals. In both their fertility rituals and sacrificial ceremonies the Maya always included blood as part of the offering. Sometimes the blood was from a sacrificial victim, but more frequently it came from the king or priest who performed the ceremony, specifically from their, um, their whatchamacallit."

"But why from there?" Kevin said grimacing.

"I read somewhere that the Maya believed blood shed from the male organ in bloodletting rituals was the most creative, fertile, and powerful substance in the universe," Trisia replied, then she added jokingly, "Can't argue with the results."

"Guess not," Kevin said. Then he turned to Randy and said, "So how's it healing?"

"I tried to convince him that since I already had pierced the hole for him he should put a stud in it, but he wasn't buying it," Trisia said, the others recoiling slightly at her comment.

Ignoring her comment, Randy leaned over, kissed Trisia on the cheek, then responded to Kevin "Remember when she said I'd owe her big for being the one to climb into Smoke Serpent's tomb at El Pilar? Let's just say we called it even for what she did to me on top of the Canaa."

They all laughed, and as they did the reporters returned to take Randy up on his promise to talk to them again later. As he turned his attentions to them, Trisia, Kevin, and Julie strode up the stairs and into the new visitor's center to view the exhibits made possible by their role in the restoration of the Jaguar King's Mask to the place it rightly belonged.
Chapter 16 - End Notes

Or "How'd you figure all this junk out?" When one sets out to write a novel based in history one obviously has to do some research. A fictional work based on history, such as this is, would not have been possible without the work of real serious scientists. Among those whose work was used as a reference in this book are:

Michael D. Coe

Erik Boot

Mark Van Stone

Mary Miller

Karl Taube

Susan Milbrath

Michael John Finley

Anabel Ford

Joel Skidmore

Karen Bassie-Sweet

Of course history is great, but it's not always convenient to a good plot, or at least to the plot I wanted to write. While my intent was to use historical places, people, events, and culture wherever possible, sometimes you have to take liberties when you create a story. This work is, after all, historical fiction and not actually history. However, in the interest of trying to help accurately popularize the culture of the Maya and honor the work of the above scientists I've tried to document where I've made the true history malleable to suit my needs as much as possible. There are more instances of this than I might have liked, but since what is known about the Maya is still very much in flux, and in a lot of cases the true picture is murky, I often used that to my advantage or to simply work past what would otherwise have been a plot hole. So, in no particular order here are my notes on where reality and true history have concurred or diverged.

Caracol, Buenavista, El Pilar and other Mayan Cities

Caracol is a real place. You should visit it, I have and it's very cool. The Canaa structure at Caracol is 43.5 meters (over 130 feet) in height. It was inhabited by the Maya during the Classic Period. According to Coe [1] it was in fact a vassal city to Kalak'mul for a period of time. It was not however, at least as far as is known, built by a king of Kalak'mul but seems instead to have actually existed before it, or at least stelae with the records of Caracol's rulers predate records of those documenting the rulers of Kalak'mul.

Coe [1] also documents the lineage of kings of Caracol. There is a gap between a ruler named Smoking Skull, who ruled from 658-685AD, and Ruler VII who ruled circa 702AD. It was into this time frame I chose to insert my story. The timeframe of the rule of the Jaguar King in my tale is based on the timeframe of the rule of Smoking Skull, but other than that the Jaguar King is fictional. I simply decided to take advantage of the gap after Smoking Skull's rule as a plot device to help tie things up at the end of the story.

Despite my having the defeat of Caracol's Jaguar King result in its demise, Caracol was apparently very successful at warfare. It defeated Tikal in 562 AD, and Naranjo in 631 AD. Its recorded lineage of rulers runs from 331 to 859 AD.

Buenavista is also a real place in Belize. It is actually a pretty small site off the Western Road. I rode through it on horseback once. Based on its location I decided to choose it for the site of the mislabeled ruins and to make the "real" ruins where the Jade Mask does get discovered be based on another actual location just north of it named El Pilar. El Pilar is also a real place in Belize, near the Guatemala border, north of the ruins at Xunantunich and the town of San Ignacio. I've never been to this site, but learned a little about it from http://www.mayabelize.ca/maya/el-pilar.shtml.

Excavation at El Pilar was only begun in 1995 and while it appears to be pretty important, less is known about it than other places. It does have a sacbe, and it is surrounded by other sites which are connected to it by one of the sacbe. No records of the names of the kings of El Pilar exist at this time, so I made one up (see the section on Names below).

You can check out the work on El Pilar which is being done by Professor Anabel Ford of University of California at Santa Barbara and the BRASS Project at <http://www.marc.ucsb.edu/elpilar/index.html>

To create the city of our heroes' enemy I combined some of what is known about a nearby site called Naranjo (actually just over the border in Guatemala) and also an ancient city of the Maya civilization, with the location of the real El Pilar to devise my lost city. Apparently Naranjo did engage in frequent wars against other states of the region, such as Tikal and Caracol. There is evidence according to [1] that Naranjo was a vassal city to Kalak'mul for a period of time. It wasn't built by a king of Kalak'mul, but, judging by the stelae with the records of its rulers and the rulers of Kalak'mul, its existence was contemporaneous with Kalak'mul. So it isn't a stretch to think El Pilar also probably engaged in similar wars with its neighbors.

In Chapter Three I use the name Bital to refer to the lost city. Bital is a place name found on some stones located at Caracol. This name is not connected with any presently known site so I chose to use it for the lost city I placed at El Pilar. Who knows? Maybe some day an archeologist will turn up something showing I guessed correctly and El Pilar may prove to be the place referred to as Bital in the glyphs at Caracol. It is certainly close enough for this to be plausible.

In Chapter Nine the stuff about the quarry in the clearing near El Pilar is made up, as is the stela they find which leads them to locate it. Also the layout of El Pilar as I presented it doesn't match that of the real site. You can check out the real layout of El Pilar at the website for it mentioned above.

With regard to the geographic arrangement of cities subordinate to Kalak'mul, as far as I know I'm the first to speculate there might be some type of archeo-astronomic significance to the layout. For the record I made that up because it was really convenient to the plot for Chapter Six. However, when I printed out the map of Maya Classic sites from [1] there was a fortuitous coincidence in that several of the sites mentioned on page 227 of [1] falling really close to being on a circular arc whose center is at Kalak'mul. The cities which fall on the arc are Caracol, Yaxchilan, and Piedras Negras. Dos Pilas is pretty close. El Pilar unfortunately is not, but it's not too far off, so I fudged it a little. If this theory does pan out to anything I'm taking credit for it . Otherwise, it was just incredibly lucky that something I made up looked plausibly close. If conspiracy theorists latch onto this please forgive me.

Names of Mayan Kings

I came up with the name Smoke Serpent based on names of known rulers at other Mayan sites, and what appeared to be a loose Mayan convention of compounding animals and attributes. For example there are records of kings at other sites with names like Smoking Skull, Jaguar Paw, Bird Claw, Feather Skull, Smoke Monkey, Water-Lily Jaguar, etc. (see pg. 247-248 of [1]). So Smoke Serpent and Lily Jaguar weren't a real stretch as a plausible names.

Astronomy, Gods, Jade Masks & Calendars

All the astronomical stuff on the cycle of Venus is actually true including the timing. Also, Venus is, in fact, a very important astronomical object in the Mayan belief system. The Mayan belief system was a type of astrology, and Venus does serve as a portent of war in it. There are recorded instances of Mayans timing the waging of a war dependent on Venus. Also it seems there was some dependency on which day of the two hundred and sixty day calendar Venus was at, especially with regard to certain important stages (like first appearing as the morning star), for determining the type of individual who might be used as a sacrifice. Frequently the "wars" waged were really more like raids in which a nobleman or ruler of a neighboring city might be kidnapped to be used as a sacrifice.

Chak Ek' is the actual name the Maya used for the Venus God. I almost used a different name, Kukulkan. This is found in the Dresden Codex and dates from the Post Classic Period. It appears to be a late Mayan name for the same deity also referred to as Quetzalcoatl, which itself is the name of the mythical feathered serpent creature found in other Mexican mythology.

If you have a look at [3] as well as the other references you'll see there are a plethora of gods associated with Venus, even in the Dresden Codex. It seems the association of Venus with various gods depended on the position of Venus in its cycle as well as what time of year it was in the standard three hundred and sixty-five day calendar. If you look at [4] you'll read:

In the Classic Period (200-900 AD), Venus and the sun were identified with Hun Ahaw and Yax Balam, the "hero twins" who defeated the Lords of the Underworld, making creation of the present world possible.(3) Their tale remained part of Maya mythology. It is recounted in detail in the post-conquest Quiche Popul Vuh, which names them Hunaphu and Xbalanque.

I probably could have stuck with the classic naming and chosen Hun Ahaw or Hunaphu, but I thought Chak Ek' sounded more ominous.

Jade masks did actually exist in Mayan culture and more than one has been found. The sarcophagus of a king named Hanab Pakal of Palenque, whose tomb was found by Alberto Ruz in 1952 (more on this later), did contain a jade mask. Many photos of the mask of Hanab Pakal can be found on the web.

There really was one (as referred to in the story) found at Santa Rita in Corozal District, Belize. I have included a photo of the one found at Santa Rita in the gallery of my website at www.jaguarking.com.

Jade was a very precious material to the Maya and a jade mask would have been an incredibly valuable artifact to them. There is no evidence anywhere in the archeological record that jade masks convey the power to command armies of the dead. There is evidence jade masks were sometimes associated with the Corn God. The Corn God is associated with death and rebirth in that, in Mayan mythology, when the corn seed is put into the ground it is sent to the underworld where it is reborn when it sprouts as a plant.

The notion referred to in Chapter Twelve about the Maize God is from [11] and reads as follows:

It has been noted that when humans donned the costume of a deity, they assumed the traits and power of the deity or were temporarily transformed into the deity

Other representations of the maize god can be found in the Peabody Museum collection. Go to http://www.peabody.harvard.edu to learn more about this collection.

All the stuff about the calendar systems (the Long Count, the Haab, and the Tzolk'in) is true. You think I could make up something so complicated? I hope I did a good job explaining it and that the diagrams help. If not see one of the references as there are some good visual depictions of how these things work which make much more sense.

Incantations and the Maya Language

Enormous thanks are due to Erik Boot of Leiden University, the Netherlands, author of the Mayan/English Dictionary (ref [6]). I made up the sacrificial "incantation" poem for the stela buried with the Jaguar King (as mentioned in Chapter Five and again in Chapter Twelve) using two methods. One method was via reference to Erik's work (which constitutes the basis of his Ph.D. thesis), the other is by nicking some lines from lintels 24 & 25 from Yaxchilan, and another lintel from Tikal.

These lines are from the Yaxchilan lintels are as noted in the translations accompanying their casts on display in Harvard University's Peabody Museum:

he is in the act of creating [Ubah ti Ch'abil]

The fire is the divine conjuring [Al K'ak Uk'uhul tzahk]

he conjures the spirit of warfare [Utzakaw Uk'awiilil utok'pakal]

The following line is from a lintel found at Tikal as noted in the translations accompanying its cast on display in Harvard University's Peabody Museum:

he conjured the gods with his creation and his darkness [Utzak K'uh tuch'ab tiyak'ab'il]

Although there is no such stela, thanks to help from Erik, the Mayan translation of the sacrificial incantation is sort of accurate. Erik was kind enough to read my poor translation and comment on it. This doesn't mean reading this incantation on the steps of the Canaa at Caracol will defeat the armies of your enemy, but it does mean the book contains what may be one of the few modern passages translated into a long dead language.

The Mayan Ball Game

Most of the stuff about the Mayan ball game is real, but I did make up some stuff where things weren't known and had to choose what was convenient for my story when multiple theories existed. I based what I put in the book about the ball game from a few different sources [namely 7-10]. There are probably some others I've forgotten. There are several accounts of the Aztecs and Maya playing the ball game at the time of the Spanish conquest. The ball game was an important part of Mayan culture and appears to have represented a ritual re-enactment of their creation myth. Some sources also indicate that at some locations the losers may, in fact, have been sacrificed (more on this later).

The ball courts were rectangular, with an angled "bench" that runs the longest length of the court. A vertical wall is positioned behind these benches and the court's two goals are positioned out of this vertical wall. The goals or "rings" were usually richly carved with glyphs and religious images. It is believed a goal was scored by passing the ball through the ring, and that this ring may have represented a portal into the Otherworld. In some cases, human eyes peer out between the bodies of entwined serpents so that the rings are also "seeing" instruments used by the gods to view the games.

The court itself was intended to represent the place of occurrence of the act of creation. The Maya constructed the angled shape of the benches to represent the crack in the top of Creation Mountain. The Popal Vuh shows the Mayan word "hom" or crevice is also the word for ball court. As a symbolic crevice in the surface of the earth, playing the game granted access into the Otherworld, where the Mayan ancestors and gods lived. So choosing to make the marker stone in the center of the ball court as the place of emergence of the "undead" Mayan soldiers wasn't too far fetched.

As far as I could find, no record exists of the rules of the game or the manner in which it was scored. No surviving pictures or carvings ever show the ball being touched with the hands. As a result archeologists have deduced that the ball could not be caught or kicked. In one depiction what looks to be a referee holds a large conch shell that he seems to use to initiate and/or halt play.

I had a choice about how many turns they should play. I figured the number of turns should be based on a sacred Mayan number. Thirteen and twenty come up a lot as the most sacred numbers to the Maya but I decided these would be too long and the chapter could get drawn out. Based on indications in Gutierrez [10] and other places regarding the connections between the Mayan ball court and the underworld and the fact that there are nine levels to the underworld, I chose to set the number of turns played at nine.

There is, at present, no firm evidence regarding the number of players. Some sources indicate eleven players are depicted, while others say twelve. Since I decided to leave Trisia out of the ball game play and cast her in the role of the Mayan princess I went with twelve.

Most sources indicate the size of the ball itself could vary. Sizes of the ball are described from as small as an American softball to larger than a basketball. Speculations on size mostly correspond with the observed size ranges of balls portrayed in iconography or the sizes of the goals observed at places like Chichen Itza, Copan, Palenque, etc. The ball is usually described as being made of solid rubber and being quite heavy, hence the need for protective padding, although I have also seen descriptions of it as being hollow and possibly even containing a human skull at the center.

The "uniform" worn for the game is also a subject of speculation and conflicting accounts. There appears to have been both ceremonial garb worn before and/or after the game, as well as padding and equipment worn during the game. Depictions of these in various iconography (vases, stelae, etc.) differ with place and time. What seems to be common is use of a knee-pad indicating they may have dropped to their knees during play, or played the ball with their knees. Padding which protected their arms also appeared to be in use. A protective yoke-belt may also have been worn around the waist to protect the player from the dense rubber ball. Headdresses may have been only ceremonial or worn during play.

Returning to the question of sacrifice, some postulate that human sacrifices mentioned or depicted in regard to the ball game and/or court could have been associated with dedication events and not individual episodes of the game being played. The jury is definitely still out on this, and it makes a much better story to have the losers of the game face the threat of sacrifice.

That being the case there is a lot of imagery regarding sacrifice related to the Mayan ball game. A panel from Chichen Itza shows a decapitation sacrifice made at the conclusion of a game. It shows a large game ball with an image of a skull in the center. To the left of the ball is the captain of the victorious team wearing a sorcerer headband and wielding a flint knife that he has used to sever his opponent's head. The neck of the kneeling loser spurts seven streams of blood, six of them in the form of snakes. "Six Snake" or Wak-Kan was the Mayan name for the great tree at the center of the world. The center, and seventh "blood spurt" is described by some sources as being in the form of a squash vine and represents this tree. This is just one example. There are others which indicate sacrifice may have occurred as part of the post ballgame ritual, so I went with those.

Who's a Donut?

Regarding the "Jack's a Donut there you are" line muttered by Kevin in Chapter Four, I don't for the life of me recall where I read this. I'm told by my wife it comes from a piece by the humorist Dave Barry who was relating a story about travels in England and the differences between Americans and Brits as being "two people separated by a common language." Apparently this phrase is somewhat commonly used there. Given Belize's British Colonial past and the presence of many British vacationers down there, it seemed a fun little thing to toss in. So if it wasn't Dave Barry I picked this up off of my apologies to whomever it's attributable to. If it was Dave Barry, thanks Dave for making fun of the British in a way that stuck in my mind.

She stabbed him in the what?

In my climactic scene, the power of the Jade Mask is unleashed when Trisia stabs Randy in his privates with a stingray spine in order to release the blood that was needed to complete the ritual. For those of you who think this is a racy bit I must have made up in order to sell more books, think again.

Davletshin [12], in his study of the Mayan hieroglyph for the stingray spine, notes:

It has long been noted that the stingray spine appears in scenes depicting bloodletting rites (Joralemon 1974). For example, on Lintel 24 from Yaxchilan 'Ix-K'abal-Xook, kneeling in front of her husband the king 'Itzamnaah-B'ahlam the Great, pulls a thorn-lined rope through her mutilated tongue. The rope falls into a woven basket, which holds blood-spotted paper and a stingray spine (Schele and Miller 1986: 186)

and:

They considered the blood shed from the male organ in bloodletting rituals to be the most creative, fertile and powerful substance in the universe.

More detail is seen where Rachel DeSerisy [13] quotes Foster [14] saying:

Bloodletting tools held their own special powers. A favorite was the spine of the stingray because it had convenient features that aided in the completion of the ritual....Because their spines were naturally angled in one direction, stingray spines forced a ritual participant to complete the act of piercing; once the stingray spine had already begun to sever the flesh, a reversal in direction would have resulted in more severe and drastic cuts than if the stingray spine were pressed all the way through the flesh in the same direction" (Foster 2002: 191-192).

and:

it was believed that altered state brought on by losing blood allowed the Maya ruler to breach the boundaries between cosmic worlds (Foster 2002: 191). In this state, he was believed to be able to see and communicate with ancestors and gods.

Ricardo Agurcia Fasquelle [15] of the Copan Association is quoted, in speaking about the Rosalila temple built at Copan in the year 571 A.D. by Moon Jaguar (10th ruler of Copan), as saying:

the king would walk into the Rosalila Temple, ... entering the realm of the supernatural. This was a sacred cave, a passageway to ... the world of the dead... It required the king to pierce himself with a stingray spine, either in the genitals, the tongue or in his ears. This sacred blood was then placed on paper or on cloth and was put inside of an incense burner. From this smoke the king would have his vision... In Rosalila we have found archaeological evidence for these rituals. ... incense burners, the stingray spines, jade flowers and the incense itself

Others such as Coe [1], Badinelli [16], Van Cleve [17], Fash and Fash [18] discuss this in less detail.

Perhaps one of the best, and most recent, pieces of evidence in support of this can be seen in the January 2006 issue of National Geographic [19] in which murals found at the Guatemalan site of San Bartolo clearly depict this ritual practice being done not once, but an astounding four times by four different gods. Even more important is that this recently discovered mural is dated back 2000 years, clearly establishing both the importance and extremely long duration of this self sacrifice ritual.

So Trisia's actions in Chapter Thirteen, in which she pierces Randy's private parts to release the blood completing the ritual, are well established as being an accurate part of Mayan culture. My choice for the wording of her defense of her actions (in Chapter Fourteen) comes from Davletshin's paper itself, but it seemed a bit much to have had Trisia quoting Davletshin in the story.

To those who still must ask the question I confess the answer is, yes, of course I made the choice to put this in there not just because it is historically justifiable, but also because it will hopefully sell more copies of the book. 

Other Miscellaneous Details

Castings in the collection of the Peabody Museum at Harvard bear references to a king born aloft by his subjects in a litter sculpted in the form of a jaguar. Another one shows pillows made from stuffed jaguar skins. So I didn't have to make that stuff up, although I actually didn't know this when I initially wrote the chapter, and only later (fortuitously) found out things like this had actually existed.

There is a zoo in Belize (http://www.belizezoo.org/), and it "keeps animals which were either orphaned, born at the zoo, rehabilitated animals, or sent to The Belize Zoo as gifts from other zoological institutions." It's a cool place, check it out when you're in Belize.

There are snakes called leaping vipers in Belize and they are very poisonous.

Belize does license its nature/tourist guides and requires they take training and a test.

Sacbes do exist connecting some Mayan sites to each other, and interconnecting sections of particular sites. Whether they were commercial or ceremonial in nature is still a point of debate, although with regard to Caracol, Arlen and Diane Chase [5] state:

the primary role of its sacbes lay in facilitating the administrative control of people, goods, and services. An estimated 75 km of roads not only served intrasite communication and transport; they also affected the political and economic integration of this huge center.

So contrary to what I put in Chapter Seven that there were no known causeways leading out of Caracol, there are in fact quite a lot of them. Based on Landsat images analyzed by the Chases one of them apparently connects Caracol to Naranjo.

I decided not to use this as a means to guide our heroes in finding the lost city since it seemed too easy. I thought it more compelling to have them work out a theory for an approximate location, then search through rough terrain to find their lost city rather than relying on sacbe or satellite imagery to guide them right to it.

When Alberto Ruz found the tomb of Hanab Pakal in 1952 it was because he made an observation about a slab in the floor of the Temple of The Inscriptions at Palenque. The observation Ruz made was that the slab had several holes in it which appeared to exist so ropes could be fitted through them in order to lift the slab into, or out of, its location. This gave him the idea to lift the stone. When he did, he discovered a stairway underneath it filled with dirt and rubble.

In much the same way, I chose to have our heroes locate a stairway hidden underneath a stone slab in the floor at the top of a temple. Of course it took Ruz a whole lot longer to dig out the stairway he found than it took my heroes to dig theirs, but in my defense the one Ruz found was longer, and Ruz didn't have poetic license working in his favor.

One other factual tidbit from Palenque is the nature of Hanab Pakal's rule. In Chapter Fourteen, when I resolve the lineage of the previously unknown king I called Lily Jaguar, I made his mother Lady Feather Lily his regent until he came of age and assumed the throne. At the time I wrote this I based it on a common European practice not knowing there was evidence for it in Mayan history as well. I later learned that Hanab Pakal's mother did, in fact, serve as regent for him for ten years until he came of age and assumed his throne.

There are several other details in the book which are based on fact, but I think it best to stop here and conclude by saying that truth is often stranger than fiction.

Bibliography

[1] The Maya, Michael D. Coe, copyright 1999, ISBN 0-500-28066-5

[2[ An Illustrated Dictionary of The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya, Mary Miller and Karl Taube, copyright 1993 ISBN 0-500-27928-4

[3] Star Gods of the Maya, Susan Milbrath, copyright 1999, ISBN 0-292-75226-1

[4] <http://members.shaw.ca/mjfinley/4VENUS.htm> Michael John Finley Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada May 2002 (revised Dec 2002)

[5] ANCIENT MAYA CAUSEWAYS AND SITE ORGANIZATION AT CARACOL, BELIZE, Ancient Mesoamerica, **12** (2001), 273–281

[6] A Preliminary Classic MAYA-ENGLISH / ENGLISH-Classic MAYA Vocabulary of Hieroglyphic Readings compiled by Erik Boot (Leiden University, the Netherlands)

[7] <http://www.mayavase.com/alex/alexballgame.html>

[8] <http://www.isourcecom.com/maya/cities/uxmal/ballcourt.htm> and

<http://www.isourcecom.com/maya/cities/chichenitza/ballcour.htm>

[9] <http://www.ballgame.org/>

[10] "Ballcourts: The Chasm of Creation" by Mary Ellen Gutierrez, May 1993

<http://www.utmesoamerica.org/texas_notes/TN-53.pdf>

[11] "Corn Deities and the Complementary Male/Female Principle", Karen Bassie-Sweet, Sept 2000

[12] Glyph for Stingray Spine", Albert Davletshin, Institute for Oriental Studies, Russian State University for the Humanities (Moscow) at <http://www.mesoweb.com/features/davletshin/Spine.pdf>

[13] http://www.plu.edu/~deserira/page5.html

[14]"Handbook to Life in the Ancient Mayan World.", Foster, Lynn V., 2002, Facts on File, Inc., New York.

[15] Ricardo Agurcia Fasquelle (Copan Association), Transcript from ""Lost King of the Maya", PBS Airdate: February 13, 2001, <http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2804maya.html>

[16] "A Piercing Look at Maya Bloodletting Rituals"

M. Badinelli, 2003,  http://www.focusanthro.org/Archive2002-03/essays/badinelli--02-03.html

[17] Janice Van Cleve, Who was Eighteen Rabbit? A Life Revealed in Stone, <http://www.famsi.org/research/van_cleve/section11.htm>

[18] Saving the Mayan Past for the Future: Fash, Barbara W. & Fash, William L., <http://www.peabody.harvard.edu/profiles/fash.html>

[19] "The Dawn of Maya Gods and Kings", Saturno, William, National Geographic Magazine, Jan. 2006, pg 68

[20] Alfred Maudslay and the Maya: A Biography, Ian Graham, copyright 2002, ISBN 0-8061-3450-X

Mundo Maya: Revenge of The Jaguar King Official Website

http://www.jaguarking.com/

Other cool Maya related links to check out

<http://members.shaw.ca/mjfinley/4VENUS.htm>

<http://members.shaw.ca/mjfinley/calnote.htm>

<http://www.belizereport.com/sites/elpilar.html>

<http://www.marc.ucsb.edu/elpilar/index.html>

<http://www.peabody.harvard.edu/arch/CentralAmerica.htm>

<http://www.mesoweb.com/>

http://www.caracol.org/

<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/maya/copan.html>

