“Which left the jaguars with the question of what to do with the rest of the serpents. So they sent them north as a ‘reward’”—Reese finger-quoted the word—“for their loyalty.” It fit. It played. And she wished it didn’t, because she could seriously use a break from thinking about the serpents and their ambitions.
Over the next couple of hours, they used the new info to narrow down the list of possible sites for Iago’s mountain temple. With Strike’s ability to teleport severely limited, the magi would be able to check out only five or six of the most likely sites. But even selecting for mountains with Mayan or Aztec connections plus a snake legend left them with fifty-two possibles and nothing more to go on, really. Reese’s temper sharpened as her rumbling stomach escalated from twinges to a bad-tempered mutter.
“There’s bread in the bowl over there.” Without looking up from the codex he was translating, which had a slim chance of being able to help Strike, Lucius made a vague gesture behind him. There, a carved stone jaguar fountained water from its mouth to gather in a bowl between its paws, while a second bowl held maize cakes. Both were always fresh and fully replenished.
“The magical bread-and-water deal is cool, but I was thinking more along the lines of a decent doughnut.” She hadn’t had a really great doughnut—plain, with just a little crunch around the edges—since arriving at Skywatch.
“Would Belgian waffles count?”
She jumped at the sound of Dez’s voice, and her edginess smoothed out some when she saw him standing in the doorway with a picnic cooler. “With whipped cream?”
“Freshly made, plus strawberries. Not to bring down the room, but apparently, Sasha cooks up a storm when she’s upset.”
Reese sobered. “I wish we had something that would help.”
“That wasn’t a complaint.” He crossed to her and kissed her cheek.
She leaned into him, closing her eyes for a second, then realizing that was a bad idea when fatigue washed through her. He was warm and solid, and smelled like breakfast and the outdoor air. In another lifetime, they would have woken up together and made leisurely love, then made breakfast together, sneaking kisses and copping feels in the process. But it wasn’t reality, she knew—she was pretty sure neither of them could cook. Not to mention that they had a world to save, and she was stuck. Sighing, she straightened away from him. “Let’s eat.”
They cleared a section of the stone table and laid out the feast he had brought—not just the waffles, but fluffy eggs, toast, and a thermos of coffee for Lucius and one of tea for her, along with a two-liter of Diet Mountain Dew and a plate of brownies that he left in the cooler with a mock-stern glare. “Those are for later. Or at least wait until I’m out the door before you dig in.”
She flipped him a salute, and made do with a waffle piled with enough whipped cream and syrupy strawberries to make him wince.
Breakfast was a brief but lively meal, with Jade and Natalie joining in halfway through. Dez caught the researchers up on the battle preparations, including the welcome news that Rabbit had gotten in contact with an older brother of his makol-abducted friend, Cheech. The older brother, who worked in Mexico City and was far more mainstream than his relatives, had heard about the village and was frantic for his family. When Rabbit, posing as a member of a secret U.S. government agency, had “recruited” him as a local asset to help locate the guerilla group responsible for the village raids, he had jumped at the chance. With the help of several trusted friends, he was redistributing the magic sensors throughout Mexico City; built atop the Aztec’s capital city, the backfilled lake region was where Iago typically hung out. “It won’t give us much warning,” Dez finished, “but that’s better than none.”
Reese squelched her instinctive bristle, well aware that her pissiness wasn’t aimed at him. She hated that the patterns weren’t coming this time, when it mattered so damn much. When they figured out the connection between the serpents and the Xibalbans, she had been so sure it would point them toward Iago’s hideout. And maybe it would, but not fast enough . . . and they were running out of time.
Lucius outlined what they had so far, finishing with, “If Strike could ’port us—”
“He can’t,” Dez said flatly. “As it is, Rabbit’s going to have to ride shotgun inside his head to get us down south when we figure out where we need to be.” He said “when” but Reese heard “if.”
“Then I should get back to work on this.” Lucius tapped the codex he’d been translating. “We need our teleporter back in action.”
“We need to find the mountain,” Dez corrected.
“Exactly,” Reese agreed, chasing a last forkful of waffle. “Which means that we need to get some magi down to the potential sites to sniff around.”
But as Lucius moved to the other end of the table, where he’d been working, Dez said, “No, I mean that I need you to stop dividing your efforts and focus on the mountain. Not Lord Vulture, the serpents, or Strike’s illness. Find. Me. That. Mountain.”
Reese’s stomach knotted and the breath backed up in her lungs. His eyes held regret . . . but she thought she saw something else there too, something hard and implacable, almost daring her to argue, as if he would welcome the fight, the excuse to push her away. She knew that look, though she hadn’t seen it in a long time. Don’t overreact, she told herself. You’re tired and frustrated. What was more, like a cheater’s wife imagining another woman’s perfume or a junkie’s mother searching her kid’s room, she was primed to see problems where they may not exist. “We need Strike’s help,” she said carefully. “He’s our best bet of narrowing down the search.”
Dez shook his head. “Find another way.” Impatience tightened his face. “There’s a difference between exploring all the avenues and getting stuck in a dead end. And—” He broke off. “Shit. Sorry.” He leaned back, exhaling. “This sucks. I hate having to make this call, but someone has to. We need that mountain, guys. We’ve got to get to Iago before he activates the serpent staff.”
It was a good apology, good logic. But was it the whole story or only the tip of a lurking iceberg? Stop it, she told herself.
“You’re right.” Lucius sat heavily. “I know you’re right. It’s just . . . Shit.” He scrubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. “No. You’re right. I’ll stop buzzing around. Damn it to hell.” He hadn’t said it, but Reese knew he was hoping that curing Strike might somehow help Anna, who still lay unconscious—not getting any worse, but not getting better, either.
Dez nodded. “Thanks. I hate having to make the call, but . . . thanks.” He paused. “We okay?” He directed the question at both of them, but he was looking at Reese.
She hesitated, then nodded. “We’re okay,” she said softly, and told herself to believe it. But as he collected the trash and cooler—leaving the soda and brownies behind—and headed out, her stomach stayed uneasy, her instincts prickling.
Ten minutes after he left, though, they got the break they needed.
“Got it,” Lucius hissed triumphantly, eyes gleaming. “I’ve fucking got it.”
Reese’s heart jolted. She had been running scenarios while waiting on hold for the past ten minutes—way longer than it should have taken her contact to check an order for the one rare ingredient found in the makol amulet: a certain type of snub-nosed snake. Now she hung up and crowded in beside him as relief spiraled through her. “Show me.”
His laptop showed a photo of an ancient ruined city with a main street, offshoots, a shit ton of building footprints, a few more complete structures, and two huge rubble mounds that had been partly restored back to pyramids. A modern suburb sprawled in the near distance—was that a Wal-Mart behind the pyramid?—and mountains loomed in the background.
“That’s Mexico City,” he said. “And this”—he indicated the ruin—“is Teotihuacan. It’s not Aztec or Maya, which is why it wasn’t a primary focus of our search. It was a sort of spiritual tourist attraction for the Aztec, though, kind of the way we treat their ruins now. And you see these mountains?” He highlighted the distant peaks. “Moctezuma built temples on them. When you draw lines connecting the temples with the pyramids of Teotihuacan, it measures out the Long Count.”
“Aztec temples that refer to the Mayan calendar predicting the end date.” Reese nodded. “That fits with what we’re looking for.”
“So does this.” Lucius did the tap-tap thing and brought up a line drawing of a temple made of upright pillars carved into gape-mouthed serpents. “Got this from a Spanish missionary’s journal. These are the same three
