The Xibalba Murders

PROLOGUE

I am called smoking frog, named for one of the greatest warriors in the annals of my people, the conqueror of Uaxactun.

I am not a warrior, I am only a scribe, and many, many transits of Venus separate my time from his. But perhaps it is fitting that I bear his name. For while the great Smoking Frog’s brave exploits ushered in the most glorious age of our people, I believe that I may be witness to its end.

The pale bearded men from across the waters are not gods, as we first believed. They are instead human emissaries of the Lords of Xibalba, the Lords of Death.

Soon they will have conquered us not by arms, not by their terrible diseases, but by eliminating our words, our history, and our gods, and replacing them with theirs.

I have seen how they throw down our kulche, the images of our gods, and only four nights ago I watched from my great canoe as a glow lit the sky over Ix Chel’s island, fueled by the pyre on which they threw our sacred texts.

But the Ancient Word is eternal. I carry it with me, though it means death if I am found. I will travel to the sacred rivers of the Itza, even to the jaws of Xibalba, and hide it there. If I survive this time, I will return for it, and remind my people of its teachings. If I do not, then I pray that in a better time it will be found, and the power of our words will once again ring across the land.