leave this world for a new one.”
Efraín quoted from the Popol Vuh again in the stunned silence. “‘We are not dying, we are coming back.’”
“It’s part of the legend in Chisic that the Maya simply went into the caves,” Madelyn added, her voice rising with excitement. “And in the Yucatan, they still believe that Kukulkan is coming back.”
Jaid shared a smile with them. She loved talking with people who got this stuff, who felt the same thrill of possibilities. She’d never felt closer to her father than when they talked about Maya mythology. “Absolutely! The end of the Great Cycle isn’t an end of the world harbinger of evil, but the Return of the Maya to our world. Supposedly, Kukulkan will indeed return, along with all the Maya who followed him.”
Deep in thought, Madelyn drummed her fingers on the table. “Are you saying the gods will return, or the people who left? Their descendants?”
“Dad thinks the gods were merely the first early people who were then deified. They’ve been living somewhere in a dimension that can only be reached through their portals and isn’t touched by time. This theory is built upon many different Maya customs and beliefs, not just one region or one tribe. It’s not even just the Maya, but all of Mesoamerica. The Aztecs had many of the same beliefs and shared many of the same gods with different names. We’ve accumulated pieces from Chich’en Itza, Santiago Atitlan, Tikal, Palenque, from Guatemala to Mexico City to the Yucatan. Only by looking at all the pieces, combined with this one crucial codex, can we begin to put all the pieces together.”
Sam had his hat twisted in his hands again and jumped up to pace back and forth. “Do you think the pieces were deliberately split up at the different sites and periods?”
“Oh, definitely. This is powerful magic. The Maya didn’t want just anybody learning the secret of these portals, because then their refuge, their original home world, would be at risk.”
Slowing his frantic pacing, Sam turned to face her. “So what exactly do you think Charlie tried to do?”
She remembered the howling winds, a fierce inland storm that had blown up from nowhere and disappeared as mysteriously. “He opened the portal in Lake Atitlan.”
At the mention of his name, Madelyn looked watery-eyed again. “How did you know it was a portal?”
If she started to cry again, Jaid would too, so she quickly turned away and scanned the titles on the shelf until she found The Annals of the Kaqchikels . “From legends recorded around the time when the Kaqchikels first came to the lake. That was one of our first ties from this codex to what we already knew, an important authentication. When they came to Lake Atitlan, their king, Fire Mountain, threw himself into the lake and transformed into the Queztel Serpent. The lake became dark and a whirlpool formed. The original tribe, the Tz’utijils, was so impressed with his magic that they gave the other tribe the north side of the lake.”
“You think he passed through the portal and returned as a god.” Efraín’s voice was so flat she couldn’t tell if he was questioning or mocking her. Nothing in his face betrayed his thoughts. Between Sam’s frantic pacing and Madelyn’s volatile emotion, he remained calm and still. Was he a threat, a challenge, or an ally?
Jaid ground her teeth with mute frustration. Her father would have explained it better, surely. None of them would question his expertise. His passionate belief in his theory was undeniable. “We don’t know exactly what happened. Perhaps he went through the portal and another man returned, a Maya ‘god’ dressed in the way of high royalty. Or perhaps Fire Mountain himself returned. We have no understanding of how time might have passed on the other side of the portal or even where, exactly, it leads. And that’s what worries me.”
She stared down at the complex Maya calendar rounds and her stomach gave a queasy roll.
Efraín quoted from the Popol Vuh again in the stunned silence. “‘We are not dying, we are coming back.’”
“It’s part of the legend in Chisic that the Maya simply went into the caves,” Madelyn added, her voice rising with excitement. “And in the Yucatan, they still believe that Kukulkan is coming back.”
Jaid shared a smile with them. She loved talking with people who got this stuff, who felt the same thrill of possibilities. She’d never felt closer to her father than when they talked about Maya mythology. “Absolutely! The end of the Great Cycle isn’t an end of the world harbinger of evil, but the Return of the Maya to our world. Supposedly, Kukulkan will indeed return, along with all the Maya who followed him.”
Deep in thought, Madelyn drummed her fingers on the table. “Are you saying the gods will return, or the people who left? Their descendants?”
“Dad thinks the gods were merely the first early people who were then deified. They’ve been living somewhere in a dimension that can only be reached through their portals and isn’t touched by time. This theory is built upon many different Maya customs and beliefs, not just one region or one tribe. It’s not even just the Maya, but all of Mesoamerica. The Aztecs had many of the same beliefs and shared many of the same gods with different names. We’ve accumulated pieces from Chich’en Itza, Santiago Atitlan, Tikal, Palenque, from Guatemala to Mexico City to the Yucatan. Only by looking at all the pieces, combined with this one crucial codex, can we begin to put all the pieces together.”
Sam had his hat twisted in his hands again and jumped up to pace back and forth. “Do you think the pieces were deliberately split up at the different sites and periods?”
“Oh, definitely. This is powerful magic. The Maya didn’t want just anybody learning the secret of these portals, because then their refuge, their original home world, would be at risk.”
Slowing his frantic pacing, Sam turned to face her. “So what exactly do you think Charlie tried to do?”
She remembered the howling winds, a fierce inland storm that had blown up from nowhere and disappeared as mysteriously. “He opened the portal in Lake Atitlan.”
At the mention of his name, Madelyn looked watery-eyed again. “How did you know it was a portal?”
If she started to cry again, Jaid would too, so she quickly turned away and scanned the titles on the shelf until she found The Annals of the Kaqchikels . “From legends recorded around the time when the Kaqchikels first came to the lake. That was one of our first ties from this codex to what we already knew, an important authentication. When they came to Lake Atitlan, their king, Fire Mountain, threw himself into the lake and transformed into the Queztel Serpent. The lake became dark and a whirlpool formed. The original tribe, the Tz’utijils, was so impressed with his magic that they gave the other tribe the north side of the lake.”
“You think he passed through the portal and returned as a god.” Efraín’s voice was so flat she couldn’t tell if he was questioning or mocking her. Nothing in his face betrayed his thoughts. Between Sam’s frantic pacing and Madelyn’s volatile emotion, he remained calm and still. Was he a threat, a challenge, or an ally?
Jaid ground her teeth with mute frustration. Her father would have explained it better, surely. None of them would question his expertise. His passionate belief in his theory was undeniable. “We don’t know exactly what happened. Perhaps he went through the portal and another man returned, a Maya ‘god’ dressed in the way of high royalty. Or perhaps Fire Mountain himself returned. We have no understanding of how time might have passed on the other side of the portal or even where, exactly, it leads. And that’s what worries me.”
She stared down at the complex Maya calendar rounds and her stomach gave a queasy roll.
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