A piercing sharp pain shot up and down my leg, like an electrical spasm, causing me to grimace in pain. The whole of my thigh was on fire. The microscopic spines of the maggots were making carnage of my flesh.I could feel them squirming beneath the skin like carnivorous savages eating away my flesh. My right leg twitched horribly as I tried to keep my nausea from overwhelming me, then I lost my footing.
My right leg slipped from the ledge dangling in mid air. Looking over to Cassarina, I could see she was helplessly observing my predicament.
“Fight it, Jules,” she called out.
I wavered. The sharp pain subsided, momentarily. I caught my breath. I was halfway out, about fourteen meters left to go, but at that moment it looked like fourteen kilometers. Off to my right, I could see Hornsby disappearing into the darken area where the jungle covered the trail ledge. Then, another bolt of pain ran through my body like an electric shock.
In the final moment s of my desperate situation, I wondered if the parasites were getting their revenge for cutting off their oxygen supply. I imagined them breaking through the surface of my skin, finding no escape from the smothering Vaseline dressing. I held on, frozen.
My fingers were weakening from their grip. Even though I still had my footing with my left leg, the weight of the revolver in my backpack accentuated the earth’s gravity, pulling me backwards. Cassarina was desperate to reach me, but then what could she do? Hornsby, by now, had made it to the end of the trail ledge.
“Jules!” Cassarina yelled. Her shout alerted Baltazar and Hornsby that I was in danger.
I hung there, desperately by my finger’s tips hooked into cracks in the rock wall and one foot on the ledge. As hard as I tried, I couldn’t bring up my right leg high enough to get a foothold because of the stabbing pain in my thigh muscles.
“For chrissakes, somebody do something,” I desperately shouted.
The next moment a hand gripped my right wrist. I turned my head to see the bloodshot black eyes of Baltazar. He had come back for me so quickly that I hadn’t notice his approach. Grabbing my belt, he yanked me up with one heave so I could get my right foot on the ledge.
“Despascio,” Baltazar calmly said, staring directly into my eyes, telling me to move slowly.
The Hach Winik, in his rain soaked white tunic was my savior. Now I knew why these indigenous were called, “true men.” He grasped me solidly about the waist without any effort, seeming to get some personal gratification for saving my life. I never realized how strong this man was until now. He was no taller than my shoulder, and certainly didn’t look muscular. But he had the strength of a dozen elephants, or so it seemed at the time, because I barely had to put any weight on my legs. I felt like I was levitating.
Despite the pulsing leg pain, I found the courage and strength to move on with Baltazar’s assistance. Gradually the two of us made it to Hornsby, where upon I collapsed in a heap. Hornsby, concerned about me being able to move on, paced for a few moments then turned to me with a short temper.
“Pain is inefficiency,” he said as if I was acting cowardly.
“Pain? I just about got killed out there?” I shouted trying to stand on my feet infuriated by such an accusation.
Cassarina arrived just before I was about to pounce on Hornsby with my fists flying.
“James!” she reprimanded. Hornsby retreated.
“Jules!” she scolded and immediately forced me to lie down on my back so she could inspect my wound.
Fuming, I obliged. As she unwrapped the bandage, I hardly wanted to see what grotesque creature might be protruding from my leg.
“Well, they’re trying to make their way out.” Cassarina said.
One maggot was clearly visible, wiggling half way out of my thigh, smeared in Vaseline. It had a white body about a quarter of a centimeter thick with three dark strips. In the strips were symmetrically placed spiny hooks. At its mouth were two little pincers.
“Best to get this over with,” Cassarina said taking charge of the situation. For the first time I noticed that Hornsby was beside himself.
“What will you do?” he said acquiescing to her authoritative aplomb.
Cassarina ignored Hornsby, concentrating at the task at hand.
“Jules, I need to squeeze them out. It’s going to hurt a bit.”
“Just get the bastards out of my leg,” I pleaded.
Cassarina rummaged through her pack to pull out a small first aid kit that contained some antiseptic. After liberally pouring it over my wound she went to work. The pain I had experienced before was like a pinprick compared to what Cassarina put me through.
“Baltazar, aqui,” Cassarina said instructing him to take grab my wrists behind my head.
“Ready, steady. . . .” She didn’t prepare me for what would come next. I reared back in utter agony from her vice grip. She squeezed so tightly that I thought I would pass out from the pain. Then, she released.
“There’s one,” she said breathless.
I rose up to look down at my leg to see a grotesque maggot worm laying on the surface of my thigh. Hornsby peered over her shoulder, intrigued.
“Not bad. About one centimeter long,” he quipped. “Might make for a tasty meal,” he said trying to humor me, feeling embarrassed about his pejorative comment earlier.
I brushed the maggot off my leg, cursing it for nearly causing me to fall to my death.
“Dr. Hornsby, I need you to try for the other one. My hand cramped up.” Cassarina was visibly worn out from all the excitement.
Hornsby eagerly took on the challenge. His grip was brutally painful, more so then Cassarina’s. The harder he squeezed the more the maggot tried to dig itself back down into my thigh. Seeing that Hornsby was unable to budge it, Baltazar placed his fingers next to Hornsby’s and pinched even harder. The larva gave up the struggle and squirted out, flying a few meters into the air disappearing in the jungle foliage. I nearly fainted.
“Oops, sorry to let that one go, Jules,” Hornsby quipped.
Baltazar laughed at the sight. I nearly passed out. Cassarina poured some more anti-septic on my wound and bandaged it with fresh sterile gauze dressing. Other then my leg feeling like it got kicked by a mule, the fact that those parasites were no longer harboring in my body was relief enough for me. It was mid-day by the time we finished with the extraction.
The drizzle had stopped, but the sun hadn’t burned off the cloud cover. We moved on, cutting our way through the rainforest with Baltazar leading into the depths of the gully. After about an hour of swathing a path through the tangles of dangling vines in the forest jungle, we came to an unusual small clearing that appeared to be manmade.
The clearing was in flowery bloom, normal for the summer rainy season in Chiapas. Thirsty, we stopped to rest in the shade. Baltazar foraged some vines to extract the water by filtering it through his tunic, pouring the resin water into our cupped hands. One by one, he quenched our thirst.
While I relaxed on a decaying tree trunk, my foot kicked up a partially buried stone. Curious, I knocked it free from the humus earth to inspect it. Turning it over, I discovered it had been shaped with three carved protrusions, symmetrically placed. Baltazar came over to see what it was, as well as Hornsby and Cassarina.
“Appears to be the remains of a hearthstone,” Hornsby said.
It appeared to be a well-worn slab for making corn tortilla dough. He crouched down next to me and picked up the weighted stone. In the meantime, Cassarina wondered over to inspect a clump of mushrooms.
“What a fine specimen of Agaricus bitorquis”, she said as she bent down to pick them up to put in her rucksack. The glint of a shiny substance under the mushroom roots caught her eye.
“Come here,” she called out to us in urgent voice. Kneeling down she dug her fingers into the moist soil to uncover three obsidian flint chips.
“Yatoch k'un,” Baltazar remarked upon seeing them cupped in her hand.
“Baltazar’s right. We’ve found a ceremonial god-house,” Hornsby added.
“How old do you think it is?” I said.
“Difficult to say. Maybe it was occupied in the PreHispanic epoch.”
“What’s this?” Cassarina, who picked up some more mushrooms, had unearthed a clay pot with an upturned face sculpted on one edge. She held it up proudly like a trophy.
“Lak-il k'uh,” Baltazar said. “Incensario.”
“Copal incense burner.” Hornsby added, carefully looking over the ancient clay bowl, darkened by its long use of burning incense.
“These faces do not depict Mayan deities, but rather human beings,” Hornsby said pointing out the features of the face.
The incense or pom when burned turns into tortillas for the gods to feast upon. These faint red markings about the features of the face are made from the red dye of the annatto tree. The gods are believed to enjoy its scent, called k’uxu. The red dye is symbolic of human blood and used for ceremonial tunics.
With this recent discovery, and the mention of Yaxkin at the rock art formations, I felt it was time to own up to my dream. Baltazar’s unexpected appearance also caused my imagination to run, making me wonder if he already knew of my dream.
Was he Moise, in another form? After all, Baltazar was the one that had told me to watch what I dream. Maybe now it was the cosmos’ diabolical way of causing me to face the truth and reveal what I been keeping as confidential information until this discovery of the god-house remains.
“Ah, there is something…” I started to say earnestly, staring off into space, as Cassarina and Hornsby had their backs to me. Baltazar cut me off.
“El camino,” he said, calling to us from about 10 meters away.
Baltazar followed along a faint indentation in the clearing’s grasses that led toward the rock face of the cliff we had just descended. Hornsby and Cassarina rushed over to where he was standing. Inspecting it closer by hacking away the thicket, he discovered a small opening to a cave.
Hornsby looked into the dark hole trying to penetrate the darkness with his flashlight. Baltazar peered over his shoulder. I resigned from saying anything further and caught up with them.
“Best take a look,” Hornsby decided.
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