Thunderhead

the kiva. But the mural and the skulls were, like almost everything else in Quivira, unique.

Nora glanced at Sloane, who had already turned away from the sights and was arranging the camera’s three flash units.

“I’m going to invite the others in,” said Nora. “There’s very little they can disturb in here if they stay away from the walls.”

Sloane nodded curtly. As she busied herself with the exposure meter, Nora thought she saw a kind of disappointment on the woman’s face. Then the first bank of flashes went off, illuminating the entire grinning company for a ghastly moment.

The others filed down the ladder in silent astonishment and gathered at the bottom. Nora found herself drawn to a curious design of two large circles at the northern end of the mural. One circle enclosed an incised disk of blue and white, showing miniature clouds and rain, done in the usual Anasazi geometric style: a miniature version of the huge circle painted on the kiva’s exterior. The second circle was painted yellow and white, and it enclosed an incised disk of the sun, surrounded by rays of light. As the beam of the lantern moved across it, the image glittered like a disk of gold. As Nora examined it closely, she could see that the effect had been created using crushed flakes of mica mixed with the pigment.

Sloane had repositioned the camera, and she now gestured for Nora to move out of the way of her shot. As Sloane bent over the ground glass screen of her camera, Nora heard a sharp intake of breath. Sloane abruptly straightened up, walked over to the small image of the sun, and began examining it intently.

“What is it?” Nora asked.

Sloane turned away and her face broke into a broad lazy smile. “Nothing in particular. Curious design. I hadn’t noticed it before.” She went back to the camera, finished photographing the design, and moved on.

“This is obviously a moiety,” said Black, approaching. He pointed at the two circles, his large, craggy face backlit by the lamp.

“A moiety?”

“Yes. Many Anasazi societies—as well as other societies—were organized into moieties. They were divided into halves. Summer and winter societies, male and female, earth and sky.” He pointed to the two circles. “This blue disk matches the one outside this kiva. That would imply that this city was divided into rain and sun societies. The first circle represents the Rain Kiva, and the second the Sun Kiva.”

“Interesting,” said Nora, surprised.

“Of course. We must be standing in the Rain Kiva itself.”

There was another blinding leap of light as Sloane took a third exposure.

“So?” said Smithback, who had been listening. “Go ahead and drop the other shoe.”

“What do you mean?” Black replied.

“If this is the Rain Kiva, then where’s the Sun Kiva?”

There was a silence, interrupted only by the soft sound of another flash. Finally Black cleared his throat. “That’s actually a very good question.”

“It must be at some other site, if it exists at all,” Nora said. “There’s only one Great Kiva here at Quivira.”

“No doubt you’re right,” Aragon murmured. “Still, the longer I am here, I, too, have this feeling of something . . . something that, for whatever reason, we’re not seeing.”

Nora turned to him. “I don’t understand.”

The older man returned the glance, his eyes looking hollow and dark in the lantern light. “Don’t you get the sense that there’s a piece of the puzzle still missing? All the riches, all the bones, all this massive construction . . . there has to be some reason for it all.” He shook his head. “I thought the answer would be in this kiva. But now, I am not so sure. I dislike making value judgments, but I feel there was an overarching purpose to all this. A sinister purpose.”

But Black was still considering Smithback’s question. “You know, Bill,” he said, “your question raises another one.”

“And what’s that?” Smithback asked.

Black smiled, and Nora saw something in his face, a kind of glittering intensity that she had not seen before. “Turquoise was the stone the Anasazi used in the rain ceremony. This was true at Chaco Canyon, and it is obviously true here. There must be hundreds of pounds of turquoise in this room. That’s quite a lot for a culture in which even a single bead had great value.”

Smithback nodded. Nora looked from one to the other, wondering where Black was headed.

“So I ask you: if turquoise was the material used in the rain ceremony, what material was used in the sun ceremony?” He pointed to the image of the Sun Kiva, its mica disk glittering in the reflected light. Both Bonarotti and Swire had come over, and were listening intently. “What does this look like to you?”

Smithback gave a low whistle. “Gold?” he ventured.

Black merely smiled.

“Come on,” Nora said impatiently, “let’s not start on that business again. This is the only Great Kiva in the city. And the thought of a Sun Kiva, or any kiva, being filled with gold is ridiculous. I’m surprised to hear this kind of wild speculation from you, of all people.”

“Is it wild speculation?” Black asked. “First,” he said, ticking the points off on his fingers, “we have legends of gold among the Indians. Then we have Coronado’s and Fray Marcos’s reports of gold, among others. And now we have this pictograph, which is a pretty remarkable imitation of gold. As Enrique will confirm, the dental modifications to these skulls are pure Aztec, and we know they had tons of gold. So I’m beginning to wonder if there isn’t some reality behind the legends.”

“Find me this Sun Kiva full of Aztec gold,” said Nora wearily. “Then I’ll revise my opinion. But until then, stifle the treasure talk, okay?”

Black grinned. “Is that a challenge?”

“It’s more like a plea for sanity.”

There was a laugh behind her, husky and sotto voce. Nora glanced over to see Sloane, looking from her to Black and back again, her amber eyes twinkling with some private amusement of her own.

31

NORA SLEPT POORLY AND AWOKE EARLY, the memory of ugly dreams receding quickly into forgetfulness. The gibbous moon was setting and the valley was heavy with moonshadows, the night just yielding to color. She sat up, immediately wide awake, and heard the distant plash of water in the creek. She glanced around. Swire was already up and gone on his wearisome daily slog through the slot canyon to check on the horses. The rest of the camp slumbered in the predawn darkness. For the second night in a row, the light had remained on in Aragon’s tent; now, in the early dawn, it was dark and silent.

She dressed quickly in the shivery cold. Shoving her flashlight into her back pocket, she walked over to the kitchen area, unbanked the coals, and tossed some twigs on to start the fire. Reaching for the blue-flecked enamel coffeepot that always stood at the ready, she filled it with water and placed it on the grill.

As she did so, she saw a form emerge from the darkness of a distant grove of cottonwoods: Sloane. Nora momentarily wondered why she had not slept in her tent. Probably likes to sleep under the stars, like me, she thought.

“Sleep well?” Sloane asked, tossing her bedroll into her tent and taking a seat beside Nora.

“Not especially,” Nora said, gazing into the fire. “You?”

“I did all right.” Sloane followed her gaze to the fire. “I can see why the ancients worshiped fire,” she went on smoothly. “It’s mesmerizing, never the same. And it sure beats watching TV. No ads.” She grinned at Nora. She seemed in high spirits, a stark contrast to Nora’s own subdued mood.

Nora smiled a little wanly, and unzipped her jacket to let in the heat of the fire. The coffeepot began to stir and shake on the grill as the water boiled. Heaving herself to her feet, Nora removed it from the fire, threw in a