CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“What?” Had I heard him right?
Then I heard Damian. “Oh, God.”
I was already up and on my way to the hallway bathroom. Once there, I started tearing the place apart looking for a small mirror.
“It’s not gone, it’s more like faded,” Lyssa said, coming in behind me.
“Just help me find a mirror, dammit!” I said.
“Here, here,” Damian said, handing me a small makeup mirror.
I turned around so I could see my neck and shoulders. I gasped. Lyssa was right. I could still make out the markings, but just barely.
“Let me by, please,” Adriana said as Selena and Matt followed her in.
Selena lifted my ponytail out of the way so she could get a better look. “Of course! I can’t believe I didn’t see this before!” She scowled and flew out the bathroom door, down the hallway, and into Lyssa’s room. She waited for us to follow her in, then she shut the door.
“What is it?” Adriana asked.
“I just figured her body was having difficulty housing so much energy. But there’s no way that would cause her mark to fade.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that the opposite is happening. Someone must be using ritual to open a portal to the Otherworld. Those two attacks on Maya were not physical. They were spiritual!”
“Wait,” I said. “Can someone do that?”
“It’s not easy, but, yes,” Selena said, “Someone has been communing with Maya’s guiding spirit, contacting her nagual and coaxing it away from her.”
“Is it Toltec?” Matt asked.
“I think it would have to be,” Adriana said.
“But it isn’t easy to work this kind of dark magic,” Selena said. “This person would have to be very close by. And they would need an altar.”
“The traitor indicated by the cards,” Adriana said.
Selena nodded. “That’s what I’m thinking.”
“Cesar,” I heard Matt mumble under his breath. And before any of us knew what was happening, he had shoved his way out the door and was flying down the hall.
“No!” Adriana yelled, “Matt, wait! We have no idea who it is!”
The whole group of us flew out the door after him.
“Matt!” I yelled. Damn, he was fast. He hadn’t even phased and he was way ahead of us. But Damian and Lyssa, our other resident athletes, were close behind and gaining. I watched as Matt barreled through the door of the log house on the left. By the time Adriana, Selena and I got there, he was ransacking Cesar’s room and the twins were yelling at him to stop.
“Nothing here,” he said, breathless. “There’s no altar. As much as it kills me, I don’t think it’s Cesar.”
“Let’s check the rest of the rooms,” Adriana said. “Everyone in this house is on duty right now.” She pulled on Matt’s arm before he could go in the next room. “But we need to do it neatly in case we don’t find what we’re looking for. We can’t afford to alert the other side.” She turned to face the rest of us. “What we’re looking for is an altar or some other ritual tools.”
“Mayan altars may have candles or copal for rituals and prayer,” Selena added. “That’s common. But if you find anything you’re not sure about, let me or Adriana know so that we can take a look at the evidence.”
Evidence. Now I was living in a cop show.
It took us about an hour to fully search the house. We found a few things, incense burners and such, but nothing suspicious. Anyone could have those things. Hell, I had those things. Adriana and I attempted to put Cesar’s room back together, but we knew it was pointless. He was going to know that someone had searched it, and he wasn’t going to be happy about it. Not that I could blame him.
“Well, it’s not too bad,” I said, surveying our handiwork.
“As long as he agrees not to tell the others until we figure this out, we should be okay,” Adriana answered. “I’m going to get Richard and have him call a meeting with the other house so we can check their rooms. Make sure you all wait in here. Quietly.” Her expression was troubled. I knew she felt like this was a betrayal of their privacy. And it was. All for the sake of—how had Matt put it? Team Maya. Rah, rah.
We watched quietly from inside the cabin as the shifters walked to the main house for their “meeting” with Richard. One by one, we searched their rooms. Again, we came up with nothing.
“This just doesn’t make any sense,” Selena said, perching on the back of the couch in the cabin’s living room.
Adriana nodded. “Well, let’s get out of here before the other shifters see us,” she said.
“Maybe we should walk around the back way,” Damian added.
Matt took my hand and we all headed out the back door of the cabin, around the back of the other cabin, and on toward the garden. Our spirits were low. I had really thought we’d figured it out. And then to have come up empty-handed? It was almost more than I could take.
“So,” Lyssa whispered as we walked, “this form of magic would definitely have to be made close by?”
“I can’t imagine anyone powerful enough to do it any other way,” Selena said.
“No one in Toltec?” Matt asked.
“No, not that I know of,” Adriana said.
“Well,” he replied, “I’m sure it’s not being done in the surrounding jungle. Not with all the protection we have in the area.”
Selena shook her head again. “I really thought we would find something.”
“Wait a minute,” Matt said, almost to himself. “We haven’t checked all the houses—”
“What?” Adriana asked as he took off. “Matt, don’t you dare!”
We all chased after him toward Alma’s little house. We followed him in, confused and panting. He was searching her living room.
“Matt, come out of there right now,” Adriana yelled.
Selena walked down the little hallway and went into one of the bedrooms.
“Selena, not you too!” Adriana said. She started toward Ana’s bedroom, then turned her head. “He’s probably already got half the shifters ready to quit,” she said. “I guess it won’t hurt to—oh, my God!”
“What is it?” I ran in behind her. I sucked in my breath. There, right on the floor of Ana’s bedroom, was an altar standing next to the far wall. From where I stood, it looked like a crate covered in some black velvety cloth.
Selena walked closer. We all followed her.
“Is this it?” Adriana asked, her voice almost inaudible.
Selena nodded. “There’s no doubt.”
Lyssa leaned forward. “But what’s different from the other stuff we found?” she asked.
We could all see candles, an incense burner, and a dish that looked like it was all stained, and a rock of some kind.
“Obsidian,” Selena said.
“You mean the volcanic rock?” Damian asked.
“Yes,” Adriana said. “It can be broken into sharp pieces, like flint. It’s used for bloodletting. Look,” she pointed at the stained dish, “she’s been offering her own blood as a sacrifice.”
“Qué pasa aquí?” I didn’t even need to turn around. It was Alma. She had caught us. She looked from Selena to Adriana and back to Selena again.
“Alma, do you know where Ana is?” Adriana asked.
“She went to the market at the village,” Alma answered. I heard her gasp. My eyes followed hers to the altar on the floor. “No, no, Ana,” she said, beginning to sob.
“Could you all leave us alone, please?” Adriana asked.
Heads nodded as we clamored out of the bedroom. We headed back to the main house.
“She’s gone,” Matt said. “We’ll never find her now.”
“Poor Alma,” I said.
“Poor Alma? How do you know she wasn’t in on it?” Matt asked.
“No,” Selena said, “There’s no way. I’m going to go find Richard. I’ll see you later.” She touched my shoulder and walke
d off.
We walked together to Damian’s room and sat down on the floor.
“I can’t believe it was Ana,” Lyssa said.
“I can,” I said, surprising myself. Somewhere on the walk back from Alma’s, I had realized that what I had mistaken for Ana’s shyness, or maybe even just an aversion to people, had actually been contempt…for me. “But I think Selena’s right,” I added. “There’s no way Alma is involved.”
Matt took my hand again. “How are you feeling?”
“She should feel gradually better,” Richard said, coming in behind us.
“I feel fine,” I said, answering them both.
“Maya, I owe you an apology,” Richard said. “We promised to protect you. I shouldn’t have allowed myself to become so convinced of the shifters’ loyalty.”
“No, you really don’t,” I said.
“I’m going to figure out how all this happened. I promise you.” He turned to Matt. “Ready for duty?”
“Yeah, let’s go.”
“Maya, make sure you rest. Selena will check on you later,” Richard said as they walked out.
Lyssa gave my hand a squeeze. “Maya, I’m gonna grab you a soda.”
“Thanks,” I mumbled.
Damian scooted closer to me and gave me a hug. “Hey, this isn’t your fault, honey.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” Lyssa came back through the door.
“What do you mean?”
“It’s just, you have this…tendency to blame yourself for things a lot.”
“I do?” I guess I’d never really thought about it before. My mind went back to what Grandma had said in the hospital. Maybe that’s what Selena had been talking about while she was doing my reading. Was I really my own worst enemy sometimes?
“Yes, you do,” Damian said. “There’s no way you could have prevented what happened with Ana.”
I gave a deep sigh. “No, you’re right. But I feel so bad for Alma.”
“Yeah. I think we all do. She must be in total shock,” Lyssa said.
“Listen, I think I’m going to hit the hay,” I said, completely forgetting about my diet Coke. (Now there’s a first.)