Xibalba

CHAPTER 32

Maddock batted the first ball away again, timing his strike so that it sent the skull-ball sailing back down the length of the court and hopefully out of play. He recalled that the ball game could be won by getting the ball through a hoop, a virtual impossibility given the rules which did not permit the use of hands or feet, and the fact that the ball typically weighed about eight pounds. This ball didn’t seem quite that heavy which was something at least. The Lords of Death might have been cheaters, but surely the game was still winnable.

He looked around quickly, searching the walls for a hoop, and instead found a hole in the wall right behind him, just below the balcony. It was the right size for a goal, but trying to deflect the ball coming straight at him into it would require precise timing and position. He doubted he would be able to get it right on the first try, and with an unknown number of Serpent Brothers swarming down from above, he wasn’t going to get too many more chances.

He knocked the second pitch back, trying for a high pop-fly, but even as he made contact, he heard a second sound, the muffled noise of the other ball being struck by something solid.

Still in play, he thought.

Angel appeared on the floor of the ball court, with Kasey and Isabella right behind her. Miranda and Bell were there a second later, and Bones brought up the rear, looking like he was contemplating giving the ailing archaeologist another ride.

“What’s going to happen if we make a run for it?” he called out, hoping that either Bell or Isabella would have an answer.

There was another loud crack as a third ball was launched across the court to join the other two, which were careening back and forth, rebounding off of walls. The stelae were also moving, swinging out to deflect the balls whenever they got close. Something was triggering that action, probably pressure plates in the floor. The same thing would probably happen to them if they got too close and triggered that mechanism.

“Rabbits!” Bell shouted.

“Outstanding,” Bones growled. “Now we’ve got to worry about killer rabbits. Kasey, I hope you’ve got the Holy Hand Grenade in that pack of yours.”

Bell shook his head and pointed to one of the nearby stelae. “That’s a rabbit.”

Maddock didn’t ask how he could tell the difference. The carvings were stylized and grotesque; Maya artisans were not exactly known for their realism. But he thought he grasped Bell’s meaning. “A rabbit helped the Hero Twins in the final game. How?”

“The rabbit distracted the Lords of Xibalba so they could switch out a gourd for the ball,” Bell explained quickly. “But I think the solution is much simpler. The rabbit stelae are safe. The others aren’t. If we stay close to the rabbits, we should be able to make our way across the ball court.”

Maddock hoped the archaeologist was right. There wasn’t time to test the hypothesis with a weighted stand-in. He charged to the towering stelae that Bell had indicated, bracing himself for the hit if he was wrong, but nothing happened. He stopped just short of actually touching the carving, and looked back. “Doc, get up here. I need you to show us the way.”

Bell advanced, shuffling more than jogging. Kasey dropped back, her pistol now unholstered and at the ready. Bones had his weapon drawn as well. Behind and above them, the serpent warriors were scattered up and down the staircase, brandishing war clubs and blowguns. He counted at least six, but more were emerging from the passage to Bat House. If it came to a fight, their primitive weapons would be no match for the firepower Maddock and his friends were carrying, but the ball court was not the place to make their stand.

He turned back, keeping an eye on the skull-balls — four of them now — caroming around the ball court. “Doc!”

“There!” Bell pointed to another column, fifty feet away near the left edge of the court.

“Let’s move,” Maddock called.

The court was now alive with noise and movement as multiple balls were batted back and forth all around them. Maddock gave up trying to track them all, and simply kept his head on a swivel, checking in all directions for incoming projectiles that might pose a threat to himself or the others. By the time they reached the halfway point, there were at least six balls in play. He wondered if there was a limited supply of them, or if the unseen mechanisms that controlled the game would run out of steam, figuratively, if not also literally. Twice, he had to stop to deflect a ball away.

He also kept track of the serpent warriors, some of whom had already ventured out onto the ball court. He wondered if they knew about the rabbits, too.

As they neared the far end, Maddock realized that the Lords of Xibalba had one final test for them. There was a gap at the bottom of the twenty-foot high back wall where it met the sloping floor, an opening just wide enough to let the balls roll through. It reminded Maddock of the goal slot on a foosball table, and it probably served the same purpose, allowing the system to retrieve balls and put them back in play. Higher up on the wall were three openings just like the one at the far end, but unlike that hole, these were not for scoring goals. As if to confirm this supposition, a few seconds after they reached the wall, another ball shot out of the center hole and sailed out over the court.

Conspicuously absent, however, was a staircase to take them out of the arena.

Maddock intuitively realized that they were probably supposed to beat the game, maybe by scoring a goal, or maybe more than one, but he also knew that doing so wasn’t really an option. There probably was a staircase there somewhere, hidden in the floor or walls, just waiting for them to pass the final test.

From further down the court he heard a truncated scream and a loud crunch, the sound of breaking bones, as one of the Serpent Brothers went down. The rest were still coming.

“Buddy system,” Maddock shouted, turning to face the others and putting his back against the wall. “Human ladder.”

Bones understood immediately. He stuffed his pistol into his waistband and ran forward to take a similar stance alongside Maddock. He leaned over slightly, hands coming together to form a step. “Kasey. Angel. You’re next.”

Kasey, who had no doubt gone through the same kind of team-building exercises as the two former SEALs, ran to them and without a moment’s hesitation, planted her right foot in the cradle formed by Bones’ fingers, and vaulted up onto their shoulders. She repositioned herself so that she was also facing out, one foot on Maddock’s shoulder and one on Bones’, and extended her hand to Angel, who was already starting up.

Angel had watched enough Spartan Races on television to grasp what was expected of her. She scrambled up Bones’ chest and caught Kasey’s hand. Though Angel was a little heavier, her momentum was going the right direction, and Kasey was able to launch her even higher. High enough to grasp the stone lip. She used her feet to push even higher and then, with a final heave, pulled herself to safety.

Isabella went next, a little more tentatively, but with Angel reaching down from above to catch her, the final part of the ascent was considerably easier.

Miranda also seemed to know exactly what to do. “Dad, I’m going next. When I get to the top, you go up. Kasey will boost you, and the rest of us will pull you up. Don’t think about it, just do it.”

She didn’t wait for him to acknowledge, but ran forward and scaled the human ladder like an old pro, joining the others at the top.

“Move it, Doc!” Maddock yelled, a lot more forcefully than was his custom, partly because he hoped to jolt Bell into motion, and partly because two Serpent Brothers were emerging from behind the last line of stelae, just fifty feet away.

As Bell closed the distance separating them, a skull-ball bounced into view and struck one of the snake warriors. The blow knocked him flat, spilling him into the path of his comrade, but when the ball struck, it ricocheted away at a right-angle that put it on a collision course with Bell.

“Kasey!” Maddock yelled. “Shift!”

As soon as he felt her weight leave his shoulder, he pushed off the wall, leaping toward the uncomprehending archaeologist.

Bell stopped in his tracks, eyes wide in disbelief as Maddock barreled toward him. It was absolutely the worst thing he could have done, but Maddock poured on the speed, reaching Bell a fraction of a second ahead of the ball. Tackling the older man to save him would probably have been just as dangerous to both of them, so instead he grabbed ahold of Bell’s arm and spun around on his heel, whipping the other man around and out of the way. The ball bounced past both of them, and disappeared into the gap at the bottom of the wall, missing Bones, with Kasey standing on his shoulders, by scant inches.

Now Maddock and Bell were out in the open, with more Serpent Brothers emerging from the shadows. Maddock, still in mid-pivot, propelled the other man ahead of him, toward the wall. “Bones! Take care of him.”

He kept turning until he was facing the ball court again, drawing his SIG Sauer as he moved. He dropped the nearest Serpent Brother with a controlled pair, took a step back, found another target. Fired.

The reports echoed throughout Xibalba.

The Serpent Brothers were scattering now, but behind the elaborately tattooed warriors, a pair of figures in street clothes — a dark-haired man and a woman with red hair — were urging the warriors to press their attack. The woman had to be Carina, the renegade acolyte from the Serpent Brotherhood. The man could only be Alex Scano.

If you want to kill the snake, Maddock thought, cut off the head.

But as he put Scano in his sights, he heard Bones call out. “Uh, Maddock, we’ve got a problem.”

“Deal with—”

There was another report, but it hadn’t come from Maddock’s pistol. He ducked as a round sizzled through the air above his head.

“Drop the gun, Dane!”

A chill went through Maddock. The voice, like the shot, had come from behind him, and both had come from Charles Bell. “I’m sorry, but I can’t let you kill him. Drop the gun.”