The Secret At Chichen Itza
LandisAdventures
Published by Casey Grace at Smashwords
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Copyright 2012 Casey Grace
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Hi – HELLO EVERYONE!
Before we start our adventure, you might like to know a little bit about me and how I came to write this story...
My name is Landis and I was born in Canada but I am growing up on the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico, in a land where long ago the Mayans lived and ruled and way before the Europeans and North Americans came.
Over a thousand years ago the Mayans called it this incredibly long name - 'Ulumil lilly cuzzy wuzzy' or something like that.
The Spanish changed it to the ‘Yucatan’ when they got here; good thing because the other name was way too long and I can’t imagine the airports announcing that ‘We are boarding at Gate 5 all tourei going to Ulumil lilly cuzy wuzzy’….
Tourei (my short-form scientific name for more than one tourist) like to visit here because the Yucatan is full of history, jungles, ruins, tropical animals, alternative health spas, orchids, jungles, beaches, islands, cenotes, dolphins, monkeys, jungles, did I mention jungles?
We moved here when I was just a year old. My mum makes documentaries which basically means she
has a lot of camera equipment and stuff and makes a lot of huffing and puffing and arm movements at her new mac and editing program.
She even has a small video camera in her purse (‘in case something really exciting happens right in front of me’, she says) She makes documentaries about the Mayan way of life. (…she also follows me around EVERYWHERE with a camera, it drives me kind of crazy… but don’t tell her I said so…)
My mum says I am very sociable, and that means I like to be with people and talk. She said when I was a year and a half old I ran up to a little girl on ‘Avenida Primera’, that’s ‘First Avenue’, and threw my arms around her. That’s when my mum decided it was time to bring me to a ‘guarderia’ that’s nursery school, where I think I must have been shocked the first day because I didn’t understand one word anyone was saying!
I didn’t know that they were all speaking Spanish! It was really weird... but my mum said that after two weeks the teacher told her that I finally didn’t have that funny look on my face most of the time and seemed to understand what they were saying to me… but it took another three months for me to actually say something back to them!
I remember my mum was very happy the first day I spoke Spanish, because she said that was my first day
I was bilingual… that means speaking two languages… so that was when I began speaking and Spanish !
My dad’s old job in Canada wanted him back so he went back to live, but he comes every 6 weeks to visit… so my mum and I have a pretty good life living in the land of the Mayans.
My mum’s Spanish isn’t very good; she says that she started learning Spanish when she was too old, and it is hard to teach an old dog new tricks, she says - but it was so easy for me I can’t even understand her problem ! … She brings me to see her accountant so I can translate, because she said the Spanish gets too fast and too technical!
When she was little she read all the Nancy Drew books and she even organized the Nancy Drew Mystery Club with her friends. She loved all the adventures Nancy and her friends Bess and George got into...
When she finished all the books she founded the 'Casey Grace Detective Agency' and she even made her own homemade business cards (every one!).
She solved a couple of mysteries like ‘The Mystery Of Finding My Sisters Stolen Bike’, and ‘The Mystery Of The Runaway Sister’; stuff like that.
Now everything is a mystery to her … things like, ‘The Secret Of What Is that Policeman Saying To Me,
Landis?’ and ‘The Quest To Pay The Electricity Bill After Hours’… all that kind of stuff…
Before she was a Videographer she worked in television and she was so happy to get a job as the Art Director on the Nancy Drew Detective Series, only two years before I arrived on the scene, or should I say, the set!
We have fun here on the weekends – even though where we live on googlemaps it just looks like alotta green; a long white line; and then alotta blue; we find a lot to do, and this place is full of mystery - I have a lot more exciting ones than my mother has!
There are no rivers here in the Yucatan because we are all just sitting on a limestone shelf almost as big as Lake Ontario, and it is really just like a really hard sponge that the water runs through.
All the water that rains here since the beginning of time has hit the limestone and made bigger and bigger puddle indents until they finally made tunnels underground taking the rain water out to the Caribbean Sea!
So really, all our rivers are underground! When they form big huge puddles either above the ground or under it, they are called cenotes and they are really cool to swim in, and I mean REALLY cool!, like sometimes FREEZING! Which feels really good on a super hot day.
We have our favorite cenote to swim and snorkel in, and the braver people can jump from the cliffs or the even braver ones jump from the tree branches into the water from way, up high.
Mum says the water feels magical and she feels refreshed for days after a good swim in a cenote. She says it is full of life-force-energy.
There are all kinds of fish in cenotes, mainly of the catfish kind, but in the cenotes without light there are even fish with no eyes! They seem to know when we are there, because they can’t see the flashlights and I have never bumped into one, I am SOOO glad!
We go on a lot of jungle hikes, too. My mum said my first story I told over and over happened when we went to AkTunChen when I was a year and a half old. It is a huge cenote system that you can walk through, because some parts are dry! The caves are filled with stalagmites and stalactites.
Mum and dad heard there were a lot of spider monkeys living semi-wild there that the tourei could interact with. They thought I could have a memorable experience with the monkeys, and boy, were they right on THAT one!
We entered the jungle from the parking lot and dad asked a lady where the monkeys were. She pointed straight ahead, and you should watch out, some of them are a little… like wild still… 'Okay thank you', said my dad and we cautiously proceeded, my father leading the way through the unknown wilds of the jungle.
We saw the monkeys and my dad approached this one monkey quietly sitting on a lady’s hip just like I was sitting on my mum’s hip but unlike him, I was sucking on my bottle.
Remembering the lady’s warning my dad slowly approached the gathering to investigate the monkey’s reception to more people when all of a sudden it exploded off the ladies hip and flew towards my dad, who was very surprised when it landed on his chest – BUT – that wasn’t the end of it!
As it was in the air flying towards my dad it looked over and saw me and my bottle sitting on my mums hip, so midair it decided that my dad wasn’t going to be a landing pad after all, but a springboard!
After it barely touched my father’s alarmed chest it springboarded into the air, but I guess it decided it couldn’t clear the distance to us even flailing its arms like a helicopter so it decided another springboard was necessary. It landed in front of us for a split second and then exploded upwards.
I think this is when my actual memory-brain-cells kicked in, because I remember everything very exactly from this moment on. I think up until that moment I was still in that two-year old blurry life-daze… I saw this huge, spider-y black thing-y monkey – thing-y, coming flying through the air at me and my mum…. It seems to have planned beforehand where all its long
tentacle-y like limbs and tail were going to land because it touched down perfectly in the same position as I was but on my mother’s other hip!
In one split-second-slow-motion movement it must have assessed my age times strength divided by surprise factor and determined that it had a pretty good chance of grabbing the bottle out of my hand and taking off into the jungle, which it did all in pretty well one fluid motion!
My mum tells me my empty-but-still cupped hand stayed cupped for a long time as she told me she watched my face register first the time warp factor, then the surprise, shock, a glimmer of grief, then finally landing on one big wail that had everyone, from tourei to tourei guides alike chasing that darn monkey all over the place.
The other monkeys must have enjoyed the game a lot because there was a lot of cheering and chattering going on from monkeys on trees, tourei’s heads, and boards with rock samples wired to them as “Mighty Mouse” sped with great dexterity and alarming speed up and down and around the terrariums of snakes displayed near the entrance.
Mum said she’s sure he was doing it for the sport of it, because he could have easily taken off up a tree and into the jungle to be a big hit with the wild lady monkeys deep inland and then never to be seen again…
But no, this guy was more of a sportsman at heart, so he circumnavigated the immediate zone, maybe secretly enjoying the wailing coming from the victim… but soon either his zest must have run out for the game or he moved a notch up the evolutionary ladder and a sense of guilt overcame him because he took off up a tree and from the sanctity of its branches he checked out his spoils and then threw the bottle down.
So a really nice tourist brought me back my bottle which of course with the way I was feeling needed to be sucked especially hard, but unfortunately my mother wouldn’t let me enjoy its security and I continued my wailing until a clean bottle could be given to me… bwaaaah….
Mum said that was the first day I started to talk - a LOT, because for weeks and weeks everyone we met everywhere – in school of course, her friends, strangers in the grocery store, gas station attendants - all got my second by second rendition of what transpired that fateful, monkey day….
I do of course remember imparting this, my first tale, with a great eloquent measure, walking in the footsteps of the great literary painters of our time, exercising the use of embellished yet significant adverbs and adjectives indulging only occasionally in a taste of exaggerated hyperbole, but when my mother tells the story I told it goes more like this:
“ Monkey…
bottle…(gibberish only a baby and mother can understand)
Mon
key...Bot tle…(gibberish only a baby and mother can
understand)
...mOn KeY…BoTtLe…(gibberish only a
baby and mother can understand)
…MON-KEY…BOT-TLE!!!!”
She said my first storytelling was a huge success, really, because I achieved the first rule of telling a story – get the POINT across!!! And she also says it’s okay to resort to the occasional arm waving to emphasize your story (which I do – a LOT!)
She calls it the 'Charades Method of Storytelling’ - if by the looks on your audience’s faces they are registering nothing and you begin to suspect that something coming out of your mouth doesn’t make sense, start waving your arms and speaking with an accent to divert their attention until you get your thoughts straight again!
She said it was funny to watch the unfolding of my literary palette, as the gibberish slowly got replaced by real live words… now I don’t stop, she says!
She bought me this computer so I can think, organize and write, think organize and write…
I love to tell stories and I like to solve mysteries like Nancy and my mum… So - here is my second story I have, about a mystery I solved in a Mayan town called Ek Balam and I promise it won’t go anything like this:
“ Ek Balam…
Jaguar…. TREASURE…
(gibberish only a baby and mother
can understand)…
…Ek Balam…. SECRET…
TREASURE…!!!”
I PINKY PROMISE!
Signed.
Landis
LANDiS
ADVENTURES
and
The
SECRET AT
CHiCHEN iTZA!
Welcome !
Join Landis and her best friend Maya
as they begin an exciting adventure
at one of the most interesting
Wonders Of The World, Chichen Itza,
and the little town beside it,
Ek Balam, Mexico!
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 2 The Legend of Chichen Itza 520 A.D.
Chapter 3 DiSCOVERiNG THE GLYPHS
Chapter 5 A Letter Dated 1517 A.D.
Chapter 6 The CODEX TRANSLATOR
Chapter 7 Once Upon A Time 1191 A.D.
Chapter 9 ViSiTiNG ABUELiTA'S PALAPA
Chapter 10 The Bat Caves 1191 A.D.
Chapter 12 PiCNiC AT THE Xtoloc CENOTE
Chapter 13 A Time For Marriage 1191 A.D.
Chapter 16 BaChoKo Gets Defensive 1191 A.D.
Chapter 17 THiNGS AREN`T WHAT THEY SEEM 1
Chapter 18 ViSiTiNG EL CARACOL
Chapter 19 BaChoKo Wants To Fight! 1191 A.D.
Chapter 20 The SECRET CONTRACT
Chapter 21 ABUELO HOLDS A SECRET
Chapter 22 The Disappearing Writer... 1191 A.D.
Chapter 23 THiNGS AREN`T WHAT THEY SEEM 2
Chapter 25 The Coronation Begins 1191 A.D.
Chapter 27 A Dark Shadow 1191 A.D.
Chapter 29 A Wonderful Discovery... 1191 A.D.
Chapter 32 DAY OF THE EQUiNOX!
Chapter 35 A Love Letter 1192 A.D.
CHAPTER 1
FLYiNG TO EK BALAM
It was winter, but still pretty hot, as Landis was flying beside her mum Casey, who was piloting their Cessna over the jungle canopy of the Yucatan. Landis’ chihuahua Chaya was on her lap excitedly looking out the window and shivering, which was what chihuahuas do a lot.
Landis was very excited because not only was it the first day of the March Spring break but she had just finished a book in school called ‘The Legend of Chichen Itza’ when her mum announced that Landis would be going to Ek Balam, the village right beside Chichen Itza, the home of the world famous Grand Pyramid!
And that meant, too, that Landis would be visiting her friend Maya and her brother, Ray!
Ray knew that Casey had a plane, so he had called Casey yesterday to help him on a very important mission! He said he couldn’t tell her more than that until she arrived in Ek Balam. Casey and Landis were ready the next day and were now flying very close to Ek Balam.
“It says the legend is two thousand years old and talks about how on the spring and fall equinox, one of the serpent sisters slither down the sides of the ‘La gran pirámide’, the Grand Pyramid. Can you believe that Maya’s village is two thousand years old, mum?” asked Landis.
“And can you believe the spring equinox is tomorrow?” replied her Mum. “It will be very busy here. Travellers from all over come to see one of the most spectacular displays of imagination, architecture and astronomy in the world!”
“The Mayan culture goes all the way back to 2600 years B.C.”, described her Mum. “And as you know from your friend Maya, they are still here today. That makes some their villages over 4600 years old!”
“Wow, and some things really haven’t changed much, either, Mum - Maya told me her grandmother still cooks over a fire and lives in a palapa, which is a wood log and stick house with palm leaves for the roof! And – sometimes when it’s time to harvest chicle in the jungle Maya’s grandfather lives in a CAVE!” exclaimed Landis.
“There are cacao trees here that grow chocolate and zapote trees to make chewing gum. So this is the real, live candyland, too!” laughed Mum. “Or more like, it WAS a candyland - a terrible fire has ripped through some of the area, luckily not hitting the village, but making a mess of the trees and palms that were just about to be harvested.”
“So that’s why we also loaded up the plane with the clothes I don’t wear anymore. And you bought some blankets and huge bags of masa flour that the villagers use for tortillas,” said Landis.
Landis’ mum pointed ahead and they saw where the fire had burned through a large section of the jungle, coming dangerously close to the village.
“How sad,” stated Landis. “I am glad it didn’t get near the village, but it’s sad to think of the animals losing their homes. I hope they all got out.”
“Oh yes, I am sure they did,” her mum assured her. “They would smell and sense the fire long before humans did!”
“Hey, there’s Chichen Itza Park. We can’t get too close to scare everyone, but we can see the Grand Pyramid. Just think it is over two thousand years old! Back then this town was so big it went as far as the eye could see.”
Her mum tilted the plane to give Landis a good look.
Landis looked but all she saw now was a little village on one side of the Grand Pyramid and a big parking lot for tourei buses on the other. The rest was jungle.
“I know the pyramid is huge but from up here it looks like a little building block with ants all over it,” said Landis.
“It has 91 steps on all four sides,” Landis continued. “And if you add those up on each side that totals 364, plus one step at the top into the sanctuary where the Princess Itza Emerald must have been kept makes 365, which is the number of days in a year.”
“The Mayans were very clever putting interesting facts like that in the architecture of their buildings,” added her mum. “Okay, let’s buzz Ray’s house so he knows to come and pick us up when we land.”
She pushed in the steering column to lower the nose and the plane swooped down towards the little rows of streets and houses. Landis saw the town square – the ‘zocolo’ in Spanish – where she saw a bunch of teenagers playing the ancient Mayan game PokTaPok.
“I know the game because we studied it in school,” Landis said pointing to the zocolo. “It is the oldest team sport in the world. It is halfway between basketball and soccer. Instead of a soccer net, it has a basketball hoop on its side.”
“The ball is hard Indian rubber so the players can’t use their hands; they have to propel it around the court with their hips, which are covered in padding,” she added smartly.
As they buzzed the game, the teenagers stopped to watch the plane go over their heads.
“Hey, there’s Maya’s house,” pointed Mum, taking one hand off the steering column to show Landis. Mum knew it was there because she worked with Ray, Maya’s older brother, on special documentaries about his job. Ray used to be a tour guide in Chichen Itza but when the animal ranger retired, Ray got the best job in the world - to care for the descendants of ancient Mayan royal jaguars!
While they flew past the pyramid to the landing strip Casey explained that she and Ray had to fly to Mexico City to bring a very important package to the federal government and Landis would stay with Maya. Landis was thrilled!
But now Ray couldn’t go because one of the royal jaguars still hadn’t had her litter of cubs and Ray needed to stay with her after all.
“Don’t worry about me,” Landis’ mum declared. “I will be back just before dark tonight.”
“Hey – look!” Landis shouted. “I see Maya – that is so cool to BE Mayan, and be called Maya!” Maya was so excited to hear the plane she ran out of her palapa with her arms flapping!
Landis’ mum pulled the steering column towards her and brought the nose of the plane up, causing them to start climbing a little. They flew out over more jungle and her mum said that when they land at an uncontrolled airport - which meant there were no people in a control tower helping the planes land - that they should fly over the runway first to make sure everything was okay.
They flew over the runway and her mum saw that everything was clear. They made a steep turn and joined the downwind leg of the circuit.
Her mum prepared the plane for landing and Landis had fun watching their shadow on the treetops fly right up underneath them. She loved to watch the shadow come closer and closer to them as they approached the runway until – WHAM! But -
“Whoa!” shouted her mum as she abruptly pulled the steering column back, raised the wing flaps and pushed the throttle in full force so the plane screamed off again without ever touching the ground.
“Phew, that was a close call,” she shouted as she levelled the plane out again and turned to make another circuit.
“What happened?” cried Landis. “We’ve never done that before!”
“We were just about to land and there was a huge green iguana sitting in the middle of the runway,” her mum looked over her shoulder to try to see the runway from the downwind leg. “I can’t believe I didn’t see her in the flyby, she just appeared out of nowhere! Did you see how big she was?”
Her mum had been flying a long time so it was difficult to rattle her, but this time she seemed a little anxious. She composed herself quickly though.
Landis strained to look and see the iguana but there was nothing but empty tarmac. What she did see however was the rooftop of a white building off to one side of the open grassy arena of the pyramid. It was peeking out from some tall trees and appeared to have writing on it, but as they flew over, Landis realized it looked more like a symbol or something. And it wasn’t painted on, it seemed to be a different color of stone. ‘Interesting,’ thought Landis.
They made a short field landing and taxied off the runway to the parking lot. Just as her mum shut off the engines Ray’s pickup truck with Maya standing in the back squealed out of the gap in the jungle.
“I don’t think her arms have stopped waving since we saw her running out of her palapa!” Landis said to her mother. “I wonder if she is tired yet?”
Maya flew out of the truck before Ray came to a complete stop.
“Maya, careful,” he laughingly warned her, but Maya didn’t even hear him.
“Hey Landis – I am so happy to see you!” Maya was very exuberant and gave big bear hugs, so Landis braced herself.
“I think you might take all the wind out of me when you get bigger,” Landis remarked to Maya. “I am so happy to see you, too, Maya, this is going to be SO much fun!”
“Hi again, Casey!” Maya also squeezed Landis’ mum just as tight, but Landis’ mum was bigger and could take it.
Ray and Casey hugged hello too, and everyone helped to unload the bags of clothes and some presents they brought from the city. Casey brought Landis’ bike and Ray unloaded it last and placed it in the back of the pickup.
Maya saw it and squealed in delight. “It’s great you brought your bike, too, Landis, Ray gave me his old one. Now we can ride all over the place because there are tons of adventures here. Hey and you have a new basket on your bike now, too!”
“That’s a seat for Chaya,” explained Landis. “So when we are going somewhere fast she can sit in it. Her legs can’t keep up like a big dog!”
Casey was anxious to move on to her long flight to Mexico City but she wanted to see the momma jaguar first. “Hey I really should get going, Ray, but please, can you take me to see the royal sanctuary?” asked Casey. “I would love to meet your jaguar mother-to-be!”
Ray put the specially wrapped parcel he was going to give her back behind the seat in the truck and said, “Why sure, of course, let’s go! Everyone aboard!”
Maya and Landis sat in the back of the pickup on top of the soft bags of clothes. They had a lot of fun bouncing on them over the bumps. They laughed a lot but overheard Casey and Ray talking through the little window, which Landis passed Chaya through when it got too bumpy.
Maya asked Landis if she had ever eaten Chicken Pizza.
“Actually, no, I don’t think I have,” smiled Landis as she sensed one of Maya’s silly jokes coming on.
“That’s good because it’s Chichen Itza,” Maya shrieked with laughter at the joke and then so did Landis.
CHAPTER 2
The Legend of Chichen Itza 520 A.D.
Once upon a time deep in the tropical jungles of many lands far away called ‘Ulumil Cuz Yetel Ceh’, which means ‘land of the turkey and deer’ in Mayan, there were two green iguana sisters named 'B’u' and 'M’u', which are both Mayan for 'iguana'.
B’u and M’u were beautiful gigantic iguanas with soft scales and in the sun it seemed they were encrusted with beautiful pearls around their necks. They had shiny spines on their backs, which they used to show their happiness or unhappiness by putting them up or down to their friends.
They had no school because there was nothing to learn, except what their parents told them about how to live in the jungle with their friends the monkeys, toucans and the coatimundis. Their best friend was a white jaguar named 'Chilam Balam', which means ‘wise one’ and ‘jaguar’ in Mayan. Chilam Balam played with them and protected them because sometimes they could get themselves into trouble.
B’u and M’u grew up swimming every day with their friends in the sparkling water of the 'Xtoloc Cenote'; a deep sinkhole filled with refreshing underground water, jumping from the cliff walls, racing up and down the rocks with sticky suckered feet, eating juicy mangos and ripe bananas right off the trees!
They ate chocolate all day long and believe it or not, they chewed a lot of gum because it oozed out of the trees where they lived!
The sun shone hotly most of the time, and B’u and M’u loved to bask on the rocks and watch the clouds make fluffy animal faces and they would laugh with glee. It hardly ever rained, but when it did, B’u, M’u and Chilam Balam would run around enjoying the outdoor shower because it was always warm water falling from heaven!
The sisters were a little bit exasperating sometimes, because they did not like rules very much. If the old scary shaman guarding the revered Chichen Itza Pyramid did not see them the iguanas with their sturdy legs would bolt up the 91 steps to the top of the pyramid and see far out over the tops of the trees.
Chilam Balam never went up with them; he said it was wrong because it went against the rules of the village. And besides, if he went up they would all be seen and get caught for sure, he said.
B’u and M’u watched the monkey bands run across the tops of the tall trees, and depending upon the season the colorful orchids atop the jungle would sway back and forth like a meadow of daisies. They could see how big the land was that they lived in and how it went on and on forever.
If they were especially careful, they would enter the sanctuary temple at the top of Chichen Itza and gaze upon the Princess Itza Emerald, which was the most beautiful treasure the land had ever known, and which had to stay right where it was, or it could mean a big curse on the whole village of Ek Balam.
One fateful day when the shaman looked like he was sleeping B’u and M’u clambered to the top to look at the emerald.
The emerald case hasp was not fastened so when her sister wasn’t looking M’u quietly stole the emerald and hid it in her rolled up tongue. When she got home she could brag and show Chilam Balam what she had done. However, as she turned to leave the shaman sprang out and caught her!
When he suddenly appeared, she jumped and her sucker claws hooked on and broke her pearly scale necklace and all the little beads started bouncing over the edge of the steep pyramid bobbing and snaking downwards until they were out of sight.
The shaman ignored M’u’s necklace; he was clasping his shrunken head cane with his gnarly fingers and waving it at the girls.
The shaman demanded that M’u give him the emerald, as it must never leave the altar at the top of the pyramid.
M’u slowly uncurled her tongue and produced the emerald for the shaman.
He snatched it in his claw-like hand and thanked her for helping him to get the emerald. Another shaman had put protection on the emerald’s case to stop a human from stealing it, but not to stop an iguana!
M’u was horrified that she had helped the dreadful shaman steal the emerald and bring a curse down on the people of her village!
As he turned to leave he told them that as witnesses to his crime they would both have to stay on the Grand Pyramid. He said he would turn both the beautiful iguanas into feathered serpents and they would take the place of the Princess Itza Emerald forever.
B’u and M’u started to cry as the evil shaman fled the Grand Pyramid.
When their crying stopped they heard a voice and it was their friend Chilam Balam the jaguar, and he told them that he was their protector.
Even though he couldn’t remove the punishment the shaman gave them he could give them the chance to go out one time each per year to search for the missing emerald.
The girls agreed and chose the days of the equinox, when the days would be the longest to search for the emerald.
And so it was.
The Legend of Chichen Itza told the people of the village two important days of the year.
When it was time for the sun to leave the village B’u slithered down the side of the pyramid and told her friend Chilam Balam to tell the villagers to harvest all their crops and make their roofs stronger because the winds and the rains were coming.
When the sun returned to the village her sister M’u slithered down the side of the pyramid to look for her fallen pearls, so Chilam Balam tells the villagers to hide anything that looks like a pearl, and that is when all the people hide their seeds in the ground. M’u told the people of the village the beginning of planting time.
CHAPTER 3
DiSCOVERiNG THE GLYPHS
On the way to the royal sanctuary, they stopped at Gracie’s palapa where Ray and Casey dropped off the bags of clothing. Gracie was a missionary from the United States who was living in Ek Balam and sharing some of her first world knowledge with anyone wanting to learn new skills.
She was very happy to receive the clothes and knew they would be of good use for the village people. Gracie was teaching a business course to some women who wanted to learn how to own and manage their own clothing shop.
They climbed back in the truck and took off again on the dirt road, and this time Landis and Maya’s bottoms got a little sore without their convenient bouncing bags to sit on. Chaya decided to stay in front again protected from the bouncing in Casey’s lap.
Casey and Ray started catching up with news about his family. “How is Reina? She’s due next week, isn’t she?” Casey asked Ray in the truck cab and Landis overheard through the window.
“Yes she is,” grinned Ray. “We are very excited. The midwife said since it is a full moon tomorrow night it could move her date forward so she could have our daughter any day.”
“You know it’s a girl, how exciting! Did you have an ultrasound?” asked Casey.
“No, we didn’t,” answered Ray. “We have a ‘Mayan tabla’ which tells us when the baby is coming based on the age of the mother and month of conception. So we are fairly certain.”
“How wonderful, so many babies at one time!” Casey exclaimed happily. “How is the rest of the family?”
“Well things are fine now, but we had a terrible shock yesterday morning when grandfather collapsed miles out in the jungle. He is a ‘chiclero’, which is someone who taps and collects the chicle latex for gum.”
“Luckily he remembered how to use the cell phone we had just given him and managed to call our mum. She found someone to drive them to the hospital in Merida. Mum called last night from the hospital and said the doctors were releasing him this morning. They are on the bus home right now,” Ray said.
“Oh my goodness,” exclaimed Casey. “So much in one week,” she said. “Did they find out what caused his collapse?”
“No, the doctors couldn’t understand it. He seemed to have symptoms of poisoning, but he hadn’t eaten anything funny and there is basically nothing around to poison him,” Ray continued. “They have taken blood and will do some more testing.”
“Well I am glad he is okay - so what is happening with our secret mission?” Casey asked and lowered her voice.
Ray suddenly appeared worried as he updated Casey on his news. “Salamanca’s security force is camping just outside the limits of the jaguar sanctuary. We will pass their encampment up ahead. They are getting ready to move in and claim ownership of the sanctuary in three days. I am sure we will have no problems beforehand with them.” He shifted nervously in his seat.
“So in three days they can legally squat on the property until the sanctuary is reclaimed into the federal zone again?” asked Casey.
“Yes, and while they squat on the property they can do anything they want. And we know what they want to do with it,” Ray sighed.
At that moment, their pickup truck passed an entrance recently carved from the jungle. Hanging around the entrance was a throng of shabbily dressed athletes in uniforms that Landis recognized from the PokTaPok game they had just flown over.
As their truck hurried past, the youths scrutinized them and a dark luxury sedan pulled to a stop beside the tallest teen. Landis looked back just in time to see the window slide down and a hand holding an envelope come out.
“That’s Malo, my middle brother and his gang,” spat Maya. “They are the PokTaPok players for the tourist show at the pyramid,” she said.
Their truck bumped along the gravel road for a few more minutes while everyone caught up with their stories.
Ray’s truck turned off onto a narrow driveway and after a few minutes came to a stop in a small clearing where a mass of rocks in piles without any apparent order surrounded them.
‘It was kind of like being an ant standing at the foot of a gigantic pile of Lego building blocks,’ thought Landis. These blocks had been there a long time though, because hanging vines and wet moss covered most of them.
They all piled out of the truck including Chaya, who immediately ran around and started sniffing everywhere.
“Let’s take the short cut then,” Ray hustled the group through a small door in a wooden building that was sticking out between two of the large blocks. The door was marked ‘For Authorized Personnel Only’ on an old rusty sign hung from a nail.
The room had a sliver of light entering from a small window opposite the door they came in, and it was dark, dank and smelled of hay mostly. In a wooden pen on one side of the space lay a large black shiny jaguar stretched out on one side, panting.
Even though she was in a defenseless position, she was still very majestic. Most jaguars were spotted, but some rare ones were black and even rarer ones were white. Even though she was very scary looking it was obvious she trusted and loved Ray, because her tail flicked and she roared a soft rumble of hello as he entered her nest.
Casey and the girls were thrilled at the wonderful reception of the beast to the man and suddenly she did not seem as frightening as Landis first felt.
The girls started firing questions at Ray.
“How many babies will she have?”
“When are they expected?”
“What will they look like?”
“Where is the father?”
“That’s a lot of questions, girls, but I will tell you some really interesting facts about the jaguars who lived with our ancestors,” grinned Ray as he bent down to scratch the momma behind the ears.
He started with “Jaguars are nocturnal.”
“They sleep all day and prowl around all night,” interrupted Maya quickly.
“Yes, Maya, they do, and since the ancient Mayans were very suspicious people they felt that jaguars possessed wisdom because they were not afraid of the dark.”
“Like me,” stated Maya proudly.
Ray continued, “Because they are noble creatures that that are ferociously powerful, they were invited into the palaces and estates of the royalty and trained to protect the family. There are some really great legends about that.”
“But, listen girls, why don’t I get your mum back to her plane Landis and then when I get back you two can ask me as many questions as you like!”
Casey kissed and hugged the girls before she got into Ray’s truck. Ray said they could look around the Royal Sanctuary without disturbing anything, he waved his finger - much - and he would be back soon.
“Maya why don’t you show Landis the front entrance of the sanctuary, she will like that!” he said out of the window as he and Casey roared off along the jungle driveway.
Even though Chaya was just a small dog Landis felt safer with her sniffing around the perimeter protecting them from any wild jaguars or huge snakes.
“Come on, it’s this way,” Maya abruptly skipped off along the stone walkway that went beside the side of the wooden building. Landis set off after her.
As Landis rounded the corner of the building, she saw that Maya had already bounced under a tall archway carved out of limestone and made to look like two gigantic snakes rising out of the ground.
It stood in front of a dark cave-like opening between the blocks on the wall. ‘It looked more ornate than the rest of the building, so probably was younger, with less time to wear out the beautiful details,’ thought Landis.
She paused and studied the huge arch. It had a huge disgusting snake with large rounded scales on one side and another huge ghastly snake with more pointed scales on the other side. They met to complete the arch very high up.
At the top of the arch, their plumed necks twisted around each other once, and after that their fanged heads came together nose to nose at the very top. The whole effect was like an appalling kiss between two gruesome creatures.
To make the effect even more amusing the space left between their necks and chins formed a charming heart shape!
As Landis looked more carefully halfway up the writhing snake bodies she gasped when she noticed that one snake was winding around a man on one side while the other snake contained a woman in its winding clench on the other.
But, in contradiction to the unpleasant snake faces above, the faces of the man and woman were smiling and showed complete compliance of their position of being forever suspended in both time and in position.
Maya re-emerged out of the dark cave opening.
Landis approached the opening. On the left side of the doorway the wall had a huge variety of glyph symbols. There were jaguars, people, a book, and many bird like glyphs with both happy and unhappy faces.
And, without any apparent pattern to them, there were raised square sections sticking out about two inches that had a carving like a doodled footprint on it, complete with five little round toes.
“Look at all the little feet,” chuckled Landis.
“Yeah,” grinned Maya. “That is a Mayan symbol, believe it or not. For roadway.”
“I wonder why there is symbol for roadway all over this wall,” questioned Landis. “Curious.”
On the other side of the entrance where a window should be was another carving, this one was not scattered, it was more like a big mural from astronomy class.
Taking up of most of the carving was a huge sun with long fireballs reaching out and touching a semi-circle along the bottom that might have been the earth, like one would see looking up to the sky if the sun was really close.
There appeared to be a long crack down the entire middle of this window from top to bottom, but when Landis looked closer it was really part of the carving. In the middle of the crack-line was a large hole that went right through to the interior room. The hole was large enough to fit Landis’ hand in a fist.
Between the sun and the earth there were a lot of different looking planets; the ones Landis learned in school – Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter - Landis remembered how her English teacher taught her to remember the planets in order. She said it out loud.
“My Very Elegant Mother Just Sat Upon Nine Porcupines!” she said and Maya looked at her completely puzzled.
“Que?” Maya asked.
“Look,” demonstrated Landis while pointing to the stars laid out from the sun outwards. “My - Mercury, Very – Venus, Elegant – that’s us Earth, Mother – Mars, Just – Jupiter, Sat – that’s Saturn, Upon – Uranus, Nine – Neptune, Porcupines – Pluto!”
“Wow, what a cool way to remember the order of the planets!” exclaimed Maya.
“Whoa, look at that!” Landis pointed at the top of cave entrance.
“Yeah, kind of gross, I think my ancestors had a really grim sense of humor,” moaned Maya. She reached out to touch the rock of the wall and remarked “And even though they call this flat carving a frieze, its’ not very FREE-ZING!” she laughed.
Landis started laughing too, and said, “Well grim or just not funny at least you have a sense of humor!” they were both laughing.
“But I agree with you, THAT is pretty grim,” said Landis as she pointed above the doorway.
It was a famous carving from many Mayan archaeological sites. It was a jaguar sitting down on three legs, and in his fourth paw he held what experts said was a heart. Landis had a difficult time picturing a mother leaving her child in the care of such a ferocious animal.
With a nervous flutter in her heart she entered the dark chasm in the side of the mountain of white building blocks and instantly felt the temperature drop.
“It’s freezing in here,” shuddered Landis, hugging herself. Maya laughed.
“The Mayans didn’t have air conditioners or refrigerators so they had to get smart about how to use walls, wind direction and shade to make their houses cold,” Maya explained.
Landis grew accustomed to the coolness in the darkness and looked around. The rock building did not look so big from the outside, but now, inside, the space felt like a huge dark gymnasium.
There were rows of columns around the outside holding the ceiling which was very high up. There were long benches of stone equally spaced around the outside wall.
The only source of light fell in from the arched doorway and the hand size hole Landis saw beside the entrance.
Both shone onto the floor, which was not like the limestone rock of the walls; this floor was a beautiful black and white marble checkerboard with golden veins running through each tile.
On all the walls were rows of friezes carved in the wall. 'Each jaguar frieze must represent a jaguar that lived in the royal sanctuary when the carver or carvers were there', thought Landis.
There must have been so many jaguars over the years! Each jaguar was a little different, by the pose, or the head shape or body shape. Also by the spot patterns on their fur.
Some jaguars protected from the outside weather entering the archway still had paint on them. There were flecks of blue paint mainly.
The Mayans made their own paint colors from minerals, including ‘Mayan azul’ that’s ‘Mayan blue’ which modern day scientists called magic because it lasted a thousand years without fading!
The entire effect radiated royalty and elegance but Landis still felt creepy and she shuddered again.
Unexpectedly a strong gust of wind came up and the girls heard a grating sound then a humongous crash on the roof above them!
CHAPTER 4
RAY TELLS A SECRET
Ray’s silhouette suddenly filled the archway and as he darkened the room both girls jumped.
“Wow, you scared us,” squealed both the girls at the same time.
“What was that noise?” they asked, and then trooped outside to survey the damage with Ray.
“Oh I thought that might happen eventually,” he lamented that with everything going on it was maybe a bit too soon though.
“There is a part of the cupola there on the roof that was loose, and that tree branch just knocked it off.”
He continued, “I will have to get someone up there with some cement, but we have to match the whole thing pretty well so we don’t interrupt the integrity of the building.”
“We will also have to cut down the rest of the branch that knocked it down, too.” “Well, Landis, what do you think of our beautiful jaguar sanctuary?” asked Ray.
Landis replied, “I love it so much! The royal jaguar sanctuary is so beautiful and so old – and so cold! With so many interesting carvings and glyphs! Can you explain to me about the carvings around the door?” she asked.
“Well let me start by explaining a little bit about how jaguars and Mayans became so special to each other.” Ray walked them outside and turned around to look at the door. The girls followed him.
“As you can see by the frieze on this side of the door the Mayans were very interested in the stars and the sky and they had a lot of information for a culture without satellites and rockets to go out into space with!”
“The Mayans wrote with symbols and two of the most powerful symbols were for the sun, ‘k’in’, and the moon, ‘ja’, you can see them right here along the edge of the frieze with the solar system carved on it,” Ray pointed to them.
“The sun represented clarity and awareness of all things outside yourself. Starting at you and going all the way to outer space and the stars. The glow of sunlight in your life brings enlightenment and awareness of yourself and your relationship to those around you and God,” beamed Ray. “It is the energy of action.”
“On the other hand, the moon represents balance and getting peace within us. Night represents our unconscious, the part of our minds that works while we sleep. The physical actions of the sun must be rested while this inner wellbeing work takes place!”
Just then Chaya who was sniffing inside the gymnasium started barking her head off and ran out past them. They all jumped.
She darted around the corner and Ray followed the barking chihuahua.
The girls chased Ray and got to the corner just in time to see a tall dark figure disappear around the next corner of the building.
Ray said, “Girls, I will be back in a second,” and he strode off in the direction of the shadow.
When Chaya saw that Ray had the situation under control she stopped her barking and returned to the girls and they went inside the sanctuary to sit down on the cool benches.
“Did you know who that was?” asked Landis.
“I have no idea,” stated Maya.
“There is something strange going on,” declared Landis. “Did you hear your brother and my mother talking about their secret mission when we were in the truck?” asked Landis.
“Well I know that there is something going on between the elders of the ejido, the Chichen Itza Park and the government. I heard Ray telling my mother something the other day, and they all looked pretty upset. Nobody told me anything. I think I like it better that way anyways,” grinned Maya nonchalantly.
They heard the two men’s voices get louder and then a car door slammed. Almost immediately, they heard the spray of spitting gravel as the car sped out. The dust followed Ray back around the corner and he came in to sit with them.
“Okay, girls, where were we?” asked Ray. But he looked preoccupied and very worried.
“What’s wrong?” asked Landis and Maya together.
Ray looked at them for a few seconds then made up his mind to tell them. “Well I guess you girls are old enough to know what is going on,” uttered Ray as he slumped back on the bench.
“A lot of our villagers work in the Chichen Itza Park as tour guides, bus drivers, groundskeepers, cashiers, waitresses, chefs, cooks, you name it – every job.” The girls nodded yes.
“And this is the second year tourism is really down so the federal government is trying to find ways to reduce their costs until this recession is over. They started laying people off, which isn’t very good for the villagers.” The girls nodded.
“Plus, we had that fire in the jungle recently which destroyed a lot of our important trees and plants so a lot of the palapa builders and chicle farmers are feeling the curse of Chichen Itza, too.”
Landis was to learn that the Mayans of Ek Balam are very suspicious people, and still held the thought that until the Princess Itza Emerald is returned to the pyramid the punishment imposed on the young iguana sisters thousands of years ago still cursed the village. That meant that if basically anything bad things happened, they blamed it on the curse.
Ray continued. “Just when things can’t seem to get any worse, a high profile lawyer from Merida named Salamanca shows up with a signed original contract his farmer client found in a cave on his property.”
“It was signed by a Mayan king giving one of the ancestors of this farmer the royal sanctuary and the castle that was there. The castle was made of wood so is gone, but the jaguar sanctuary is still here,” he said. The girls gasped!
Ray continued.
“Normally important ruins like Chichen Itza come under the federal government in Mexico City, but there are very strict rules about taking native people’s land from them. There has to be a legal investigation before the federal government can get it back. And then they will probably have to buy it back for a lot of money.”
“So, what is the problem with that?” asked Maya. “You can just keep working here and looking after the jaguars until they work it all out.”
“Ah, Maya, it isn’t that easy,” objected Ray sadly. “Since business is slow the past two seasons Chichen Itza Park was talking about moving the jaguars to the Merida Zoo and closing the sanctuary anyways, turning it into a small museum.”
The girls gasped at the same time. “NO!” they wailed.
“So – in three days the farmer and his lawyer have the legal right to move into the jaguar sanctuary.”
“What about poor momma jaguar and her babies?” asked the girls.
“Chichen Itza Park has already asked me to prepare momma to be moved to the zoo in Merida as soon as the cubs are born,” said Ray sadly.
“Oh no, Ray, does that mean you will have to move to Merida and take Reina and the baby away?” Maya started to cry at the thought of losing her big brother and his family to the city far away.
“Oh, princess, you and my family are the most important things in my life. Don’t worry about these things now,” Ray consoled Maya.
“Why can’t she just stay here until it is all worked out? Why can’t you just keep looking after her here while the farmer owns it?” Maya cried.
“That would be a wonderful solution if he wanted to keep the sanctuary for its history, but he doesn’t. Salamanca and the farmer have heard of the Princess Itza Emerald and they know its value.”
“The whole of Chichen Itza Park has been searched with very expensive sonar and magnetic equipment and has never been found. The rocks of the sanctuary are too thick and deep for the equipment to work. Salamanca and the farmer can legally destroy this sanctuary looking for it.
They will come in here with bulldozers and tear this place apart rock by rock looking for the emerald.
“Oh no,” squealed both the girls. “There must be something we can DO?”
“Have you seen the contract the farmer found?” asked Landis.
“Not yet. A copy is being fed-exed to me from Mexico City, where it was filed,” he said.
Ray bit his lip and was reluctant to tell them more but he finally decided that maybe they might just help.
He lowered his voice so the girls had to strain to listen to him.
“We have three days to find a way to keep them out of here legally.”
“What can we do in three days?” said Landis.
“Well - two days ago Abuelo, that’s Maya’s grandpa, was tapping trees for chicle latex up in a remote section of the ‘cuevas’ caves and when it started to rain his dog found a small cave opening and they crawled in.”
“While he was waiting for the storm to end he saw something unusual and started digging with a stick. He discovered the entrance to an underground cave that was inhabited a long time ago!”
“There was a straw bed, some chewed animal bones and there were markings on the wall, like someone was counting the days for something,” explained Ray. “The best part was discovering the documents.”
The girl’s eyes were as wide as saucers at what Ray was telling them.
“Can we go? Where is it?” they began to holler excitedly, getting Chaya in a pickle of circles, too.
“Okay. First things first. After a lot of thought of what this discovery could do in the wrong hands I decided to block up the entrance so no one would know I had found it. I cemented it in and then put lots of earth and vegetation around it. We can find it and dig it out again after the federal government gets the property back.”
“Oh – NO!” both girls wailed in unison.
“I am a qualified to remove these things and in light of the takeover in three days the federal government allowed me to bag, photograph the artefacts and have them sent to Mexico City. I took alot of photos and have printed them – they are on my computer, but I have a set of prints of the contents here in my pocket.”
“What contents?” the girls squealed.
“The most important find in the cave was a package containing three very old documents; one is called a Mayan ‘codex’. It is called 'pik hu'un' in Mayan. The other is it’s translation. There is also a letter. All three were written on tree bark paper the Mayans started making a thousand years ago.”
“The codex is written in Mayan symbols and according to the translation is dated around 1191. That makes it almost a thousand years old! The translation of it and the letter are written in Spanish and they are dated 1517 so that makes those documents almost 500 years old!”
“They are all written in maya blue ink which is made from a pulverized rock mined very near here. It doesn’t fade or deteriorate.”
The girls practically snatched the prints out of Ray’s hands. “Whoa - careful!” he cried.
Landis and Maya took turns passing the photos back and forth. Other than the straw bed and the animal bones of animals that Ray had mentioned, there did not appear to be much more of interest although it was good to see how the codex was positioned when he found it.