“No,” he replies curtly. “Not the Garden. In the church. In Our Lady of the Hibiscus.”
Montoyo escorts me there. Outside, bright sunlight streams through the mesh ceiling of Ek Naab. We meander through the narrow alleyways and across the water channels. I’d forgotten how claustrophobic the city feels. The streets I can handle—it’s the mesh ceiling you see when you look up that freaks me out a bit.
When we reach the church, I see Vigores sitting on a bench in the tiny plaza outside. He’s alone. The heavy wooden church door is shut.
Montoyo doesn’t take me all the way to Vigores, but just nods at him.
“There he is. Just as you remember him, no doubt.”
I stare at Vigores. He’s wearing a cream-colored linen suit again, not Ek Naab clothes. No hat this time. “Yeah,” I say. “Pretty much the same.”
“Benicio will pick you up in a little while,” Montoyo says. He seems reluctant to leave, throws a final suspicious glance at Vigores. Then he turns to me one last time. “I hope you remember our deal, Josh. If Vigores says one single word about the Bracelet of Itzamna that your father took, you tell me about it.”
I nod. “Sure thing,” and then add hesitantly, “but why would he? He didn’t last time. Didn’t mention it once.”
Montoyo sets his mouth, hard. “He’s either forgotten, doesn’t know, or else …”
But that sentence, he doesn’t complete.
Then Montoyo leaves, and I join Vigores on the bench.
“Hello, sir,” I say quietly, touching his arm.
His face suddenly beams, and he looks up. “Young Josh! No need to call me ‘sir’!”
“It’s good to see you, Mr. Vigores. You’re looking well.”
“I’m looking decrepit, with few years left to me,” he says, brusquely. “A few critical years. Now, more importantly, how are you?”
I shrug, then remember that the old man can’t see. “I’m okay, I guess.”
“Family?”
“Mom—she’s gotten into religion, big time. But yeah, she’s okay.”
“You? Girlfriends?”
I’m surprised to have Vigores spring that on me. I thought old geezers like him didn’t even think of stuff like that anymore.
“Uh, not right now.”
“But you’ve been in love?”
“Not really. I’m only fourteen.”
Vigores smiles sadly. “My memory can be most unreliable. However, I seem to remember that fourteen is quite old enough.”
“Well, not me,” I say. Lying. “I can’t be bothered much with girls.”
“That may be for the best,” Vigores says in a grave voice. “And yet, not always possible.”
“What do you mean?”
“Only that you can’t always choose what happens, in matters of the heart.”
I look at him, trying to fathom the expression in his watery blue eyes. “Sorry, Mr. Vigores … I still don’t get you.”
He seems to consider my answer, and then begins to talk. His storytelling voice—I recognize it right away.
“There was a young man named Kan’ek Balam. A boy, more or less, like you. Destined for life as a Bakab Muluc. Kan’ek would refuse to study; instead he used to just watch the construction of the temples. Or he would disappear into the Depths, alone, and emerge many days later, half starved yet seemingly contented. And always clutching a handful of papers on which he’d written his poems. Meandering, lyrical poetry; words that touched the intellect as surely as the heart. Each poem was dedicated to the same person: Mariana K’awil, his betrothed. A young lady who, alas, was in love with another.”
“He was betrothed? How old was he?”
“He was betrothed almost from birth. As are all Bakabs, as are you. You know the trait that protects against the curse of the codex is too precious, too rare, to allow chance to intervene. The atanzahab makes the match and thus the continuation of the Bakab line is ensured.”
“Yeah,” I say, slowly. I think of Ixchel and how she was so horrified by the idea of being fixed up with me that she took off. “To be honest, that’s a bit of a problem …”
“Kan’ek was her intended, it’s true. But from early childhood he was a strange one, an outsider. Hard to love, especially for a girl like Mariana. She was from a very practical family. Everyone thought Kan’ek was an odd one. And Mariana … she fell in love with someone else.”
He stops and looks hard at me. Or more accurately, at a space about two inches to the left of my face. “She paid a high price for falling in love with the wrong boy, believe me.”