“What have you done?” screamed Lola. “You’ve killed him!”
“It was just a sleeping dart,” said the woman with the headset witheringly. “Get it out of here, boys.”
One security guard took the howler’s hands, another took his feet, and between them, they carried Lord 6-Dog out of the tent. Lola and Max tried to follow, but the remaining two guards blocked their way.
“You two are coming with me,” said the woman.
Lola was still trying to push past the guards and go after Lord 6-Dog. “Where are they taking him?” she demanded.
“Just do as you’re told and the beast will be fine. Now follow me, both of you.”
Outside the tent, a golf cart was driving away, presumably with Lord 6-Dog inside it, while another one waited for Max and Lola. The carts had the Birdman logo painted on the side.
As they emerged from the tent, Max and Lola were greeted by the shocked faces of the line waiting outside.
“What’s up with The Dawg?” called a voice.
“Is he dead?” called another.
With two security guards trying to push her into the golf cart, Lola called back: “You’re all witnesses. If we don’t come back, call the police.”
As the line began to murmur in protest, the woman stood on the footplate of the cart, her mic now somehow linked into the public address system. “Do not be alarmed. These criminals have been detained for your safety. Rest assured that Great Sun is unharmed and will appear as usual at tonight’s Sunset Ceremony. Until then, please concentrate on freeing yourselves from material possessions. Collection centers can be found throughout the park.”
With that, she ducked behind the wheel and they took off at speed, squashing bananas and scattering flowers in their wake. When they reached the paved road, they turned left, and left again, until they were behind the great pyramid. They drove through a security checkpoint into the media village, where the world’s press were busily interviewing each other, on through several more checkpoints, and up to a pair of tall gates made out of wooden logs like a stockade.
“Incoming,” barked the woman into her headset microphone. The rough-hewn gates were slowly opened to reveal the slick, shimmering nerve center of Great Sun’s operations: a settlement of double-wide silver trailers with smoked black windows like the ones movie stars use on location.
After more shouting into her headset, the woman pulled up outside the biggest trailer.
“Out!” snarled the woman to her passengers.
She punched a security code into the trailer door.
“Follow me,” she said when it clicked open. The security guards followed behind as she led them down a black spiral staircase into a warren of corridors.
“Those trailers are just a smokescreen,” whispered Max. “There’s a whole underground city down here.”
Lola nodded grimly. “I just hope it doesn’t lead to the Maya underworld like the Grand Hotel Xibalba.”
Max groaned. He hadn’t even considered that possibility.
The woman ushered them into a large meeting room. The walls were lined with video screens, control panels, and important-looking technology. In the center of the room was a long, polished wood table surrounded by leather office chairs. The red lights of security cameras glowed silently in the corners.
“Wait here,” she commanded. “Don’t touch anything.”
As soon as she’d gone, Max started panicking. “We’ve got to get out of here! Help me find a way out! In a few minutes’ time, Tzelek is going to walk through that door! We’re toast!”
Lola stayed calm. “We don’t know for sure that it’s Tzelek. And why would anyone go to all the trouble of setting up this place, just to start killing off the tourists?”
“Because we’re not tourists, are we?” Max pointed out. “Tzelek has a history with us. A history of trying to kill us.”
“One thing’s for sure,” said Lola, stroking the polished wood of the table. “This is exactly the kind of table Tzelek would choose. It’s mahogany. That’s an endangered species in the rainforest. I’ll bet these trees were cut down illegally.”
“Who cares about the furniture? We’re about to be cut down illegally.”
“I’m just saying.” Lola looked around at all the high-tech equipment. “I wish Blue and his friends could see how Great Sun spends their offerings.”
“Shame we won’t live to tell them.”
“Stop it, Hoop. We’re the good guys. We’ll find a way out. We always do.”
“I wish I could be sure about that.”
“So what are you sure about?” asked Lord Kuy, his owl face suddenly filling every video screen. “What have you found out? Anything to report? How’s the mission going?”
“Very badly,” said Max. “Did you come to watch us die?”
Lord Kuy blinked at him. “What are you prattling about?”
“Where’s Lord 6-Dog’s scepter?” Lola yelled at the screen. “He needs it to fight Tzelek.”
“Tzelek?” Lord Kuy’s head spun around in surprise. “What does Tzelek have to do with anything? Have you two lost your minds?”
“He’s Great Sun,” said Max. “As if you didn’t know.”
Lord Kuy looked confused. “Where’s 6-Dog? Perhaps I can get some sense out of him.”
“He was shot,” said Lola accusingly.
“This is most unexpected,” said Lord Kuy, his feathers ruffling uneasily. “I must consult with Ah Pukuh.”
“But Tzelek is on his way here right now!” Max yelled. “What are we supposed to do?”
“My advice,” said Lord Kuy, “would be to try not to make him angry.”
They heard numbers being punched into the security pad outside the door.
Lord Kuy vanished as the door flew open and the two security guards marched back in. They stood behind the two empty seats at the head of the table, arms folded, looking ready for a fight. They were followed by the woman with the headphone mic, this time carrying an important-looking executive case.
“Sit!” she barked at Max and Lola, in a voice so loud it slammed them into their seats. She placed the case on her chair, went back to the door, and held it open for the two people who entered last.
The first was a small, thin man in a black tracksuit with a towel rolled around his neck, like a rap star who’d just come offstage. He wore his hood up, and big black sunglasses covered half his face. His companion was a glamorous Maya woman with long black hair, wearing a ton of makeup, high heels, and a glittering green evening dress.
They took their seats at the head of the table.
“You are now in the presence of Great Sun,” said the headset woman. “You may speak only when spoken to.”
Max and Lola stared at the man in the tracksuit. Could he be Tzelek? They watched carefully as he put down his hood and took off his sunglasses.
He had traces of face paint on his skin.
Lola gasped loudly.
“Buenos días, Señorita Lola,” lisped Count Antonio de Landa, the cape-twirling, trigger-happy Spanish aristocrat who’d been paid by Lola’s grandfather, Chan Kan, to kidnap her from her parents when she was a baby.
“It’s you? You’re Great Sun?” Lola looked like she’d seen a ghost.
“Y buenos días to you, Señor Murphy,” added Landa to Max.
Max was too stunned to respond.
“You know these people, Toto?” the Maya woman in green asked suspiciously. “Who are they? Are you going to introduce me?”
“But of course, mi amor. They are cousins. Their names are Lola Murphy and Max Murphy. I did some business with their family in San Xavier.” He smiled at Max and Lola, showing his little rodent teeth. “It is my honor to present to you my wife and queen, Lady Koo.”
Now Max was staring at Landa’s wife. “Your name is Koo?”
“Lady Koo,” she corrected him.
“Didn’t you used to work in the beauty salon at the Grand Hotel Xibalba?”
Lady Koo gave a little shudder. “You are mistaken.”
Max tried to jog her memory. “I was waiting for Lola one day.… You were bored.… You tried to give me a tattoo …?”
Lady Koo pursed her lips. “A tattoo? How vulgar.”
“No, it was amazing. You were going to use a stingray spine. You had charts showing ancient Maya tattoos and all the ways they used to decorate their teeth. Don’t you remember?”
Lady Koo smiled wistfully. “Cosmetic dentistry was my specialty.”
“So you did work at the hotel?”
She nodded. “But I have tried to put those dark days behind me. The only good thing to come out of that place was meeting my husband.” She put her hand over Landa’s and squeezed it. He winced in pain.
“You must remember me,” Max insisted. “You helped me after the ball game against the Death Lords. You threw me a stingray spine to cut myself free.”
“That was you?” Lady Koo looked delighted. “And you were the girl?” she asked Lola. “You two were the Hero Twins?”
They nodded.
“This is amazing!” she said. “What a stroke of good luck! The Hero Twins right here at Cahokia!”
“We’re not actually the Hero Twins,” Lola pointed out.
Lady Koo was excited. “You’re the modern-day Hero Twins. Not many people can say they’ve fought the Death Lords face-to-face! This could go viral!” She saw Lola’s stony face. “I’m so sorry if my guards were a little rough with you, my dear. All I knew was that someone was operating an unlicensed fortune-telling concession. Oh, Toto, why didn’t you tell me it was them?”
“I wasn’t sure myself,” said Landa. “I wondered when I heard about the howler monkey. But we attract so many strange people, I could not be sure.”
“There’s a monkey?” Lady Koo clapped her hands. “This gets better and better!”
“There was a monkey,” said Lola. “Until your thugs shot him.”
“Is this true?” Lady Koo looked angrily at the headset woman.
“The brute tried to bite me. It was just a sleeping dart, your majesty. No harm done.”
“No harm done? I will be the judge of that! What about the harm to our image? You didn’t think about that, did you, before you went around jabbing needles into cuddly animals?”
“But, your majesty—”
“I’ll deal with you later,” snapped Lady Koo. “Why do I have to do everything myself?” She rubbed her temples as if she had a headache. “Is there anything else you haven’t told me, Toto?”
Max wondered if Toto had mentioned how he’d kidnapped Lola as a baby. Or how he’d once chased Max and Lola down an underground river in San Xavier, taking potshots at them, in pursuit of a Jaguar Stone. Or how he’d once dreamed of marrying Lola for her royal Maya blood. Or how his brain had once been invaded by Tzelek, and his palatial home in Spain had been invaded by his pig-herding ancestors. Or how he’d once ended up swinging upside down from the cathedral ceiling on his wedding day.
As if he could read the boy’s mind, Landa gave Max a warning look. Then he smiled his rat smile at his wife. “I have told you everything, mi amor. You are the queen of my heart.”
“I am the queen of Cahokia,” she said haughtily. “I run this place and don’t you forget it!”
“Sí, mi amor,” lisped Landa meekly.
“I would be Great Sun if I could,” said Lady Koo to Lola, “but tradition demands a man for the role. Apparently, people are unaware of the great warrior queens in Maya history.”
“But who is Great Sun supposed to be?” asked Lola. “A Maya king, a Cahokian, a spaceman—or what?”
Landa opened his mouth to answer, but Lady Koo cut in. “That kind of detail is unimportant to our followers. They seek merely to be led. And we seek merely to divest them of their riches.”
Lola tried to hide her disgust. “But why? Your husband is already one of the richest men in Spain.”
“There is no such thing as too much money. Besides, we make a good team, Toto and I. He had his money and the altar from the Yellow Pyramid. I had my Maya blood and my creative talent. I suggested that we pool our resources, and here we are.”
“Why Cahokia?” asked Lola. “Why not a Maya pyramid?”
Lady Koo sniffed. “With all those archaeologists poking around? Impossible. But this place is perfect. Cahokia is a lost city. It’s as if it was sitting here waiting for us to find it. With Toto’s money, we soon made the necessary renovations.”
“And your Jaguar Stones?” asked Max.
“We excavated them here at Cahokia,” said Lady Koo.
“No, you didn’t,” said Lola.
“Yes, we did. The Birdman told us where to dig.”
“No, he didn’t,” said Lola.
Lady Koo smiled. “No one else has questioned that story.”
“Well, no one else knows as much about the Jaguar Stones. I’m pretty sure there are only five in existence. Your husband used to own one. He bought it from my father. But now they’re all in Xibalba.”
“Or are they?” countered Lady Koo.
There was a dramatic pause as she and Lola stared at each other.
Lady Koo giggled. “I’ll tell you if you sign the confidentiality agreement.”
The headset woman opened her case and fished out a sheaf of papers. “Sign on the dotted line,” she said, pointing with her pen to a place on the last page.
Lola flicked through the pages. “It would take me days to read this. The type is tiny.” She peered more closely. “Wait, this gives you the right to all my possessions and my firstborn child. I’m not signing this.”
Lady Koo shrugged. “You’d be surprised how many people sign it without reading. It was worth a try. So, where were we?”
“You were telling us if your stones are fakes,” Max reminded her.
“You tell me.” Lady Koo clicked her fingers and the headset woman extracted a long, thin, wooden box from her briefcase. Lady Koo’s eyes shone excitedly as she flicked open the catches and lifted the lid.
Max and Lola watched, unimpressed. There was no way a Jaguar Stone would fit in such a slim box. Then Lady Koo turned the box around so they could see its contents, and suddenly they sat up straight.
Inside the box was a necklet of yellow stones.
To Max, it looked exactly like the necklet worn by Inez, the ghostly princess he’d met in Spain—the necklet that was made out of the Yellow Jaguar to disguise it.
Landa got up and came and stood behind Lola. “You wore it,” he whispered, “at our betrothal. And then you stole it from me.”
“What are you saying, Toto?” asked Lady Koo.
“Nada, mi amor.”
“Then come back here and sit down immediately!”
He flinched at her voice, like a dog that has been mistreated, and slunk back to his chair.
Lola’s face was bathed in yellow light. She stared at the necklet, mesmerized. “This can’t be the same one,” she murmured.
“It is the same,” said Lady Koo. “I dare you to find a difference.”
“But Princess Inez took it down to Xibalba. How could it end up here?”
“Perhaps Toto stole it back from Xibalba?” suggested Lady Koo.
“He’s not brave enough,” said Lola flatly.
Lady Koo snorted with laughter. “It seems she knows you well, Toto.”
“But here’s the thing,” said Max. “I’d always assumed that the necklet turned back into a Jaguar Stone when it went to Xibalba. And you held up a yellow stone onstage this morning.”
“Did you also assume that anyone cares what you think?” snarled Landa.
“He’s joking,” said Lady Koo. “He knows very well that we made both, just in case.”
You could almost hear all the necks in the room swivel toward her.
She put her hands up. “Yes, I admit it, we made them. We used technology, like the Maya kings used technology.”
“But they look so real,” said Lola admiringly.
“It’s called 3-D printing,” said Lady Koo. “It was practically invented by archaeologists. But we don’t use plastic, like they do. We melt down real stone: black obsidian, red fire opal, white alabaster, yellow amber, green jadeite.” She couldn’t hide the pride in her voice as she counted off the minerals on her fingers. “All the colors of the Jaguar Stones.”
“But the shape …?”
“Toto had always thought he might try his hand at—” She groped for the word.
“Forgery?” suggested Max.
“Sculpture,” said Lady Koo. “So, by chance, he had a mold made of the Black Jaguar when it was in his possession.”
“And how do you make them glow like that?” asked Lola. “I assume they don’t need blood like the real ones.”
Lady Koo put on a mystical voice. “We connect them to a source of pure energy—otherwise known as batteries. Sometimes we use a little theatrical blood for effect. It’s so much easier to wash out than the real thing.”
“Your stones are amazing. You certainly had me fooled,” said Lola.
Lady Koo slammed the table. “Fooled? No! Do not use that word. I do not fool people. I share my dreams with them. People believe what they want to believe. It is not my fault if others lack the ambition to make their dreams a reality! I have suffered enough. Now it is my time to shine!”
They all sat slightly stunned as Lady Koo tossed her hair and pouted.
It was Lola who broke the silence. “So, where’s Tzelek?”
“Tzelek?” Landa looked around terrified. He motioned to his guards to come closer. Having once had Tzelek occupy his brain, it was obviously not an experience he cared to repeat. “Why do you ask about Tzelek?”
“You were wearing his costume this morning,” said Max. “That black-and-white headdress. It’s his.”
“It is?” Landa turned to his wife in horror.
She laughed. “Of course, it’s not Tzelek’s. Don’t be ridiculous. It came from our wardrobe department like all our costumes.” She leaned forward to Max and Lola conspiratorially. “But if you want to talk about show business, let me just say that was quite a performance you put on at the Grand Hotel Xibalba. The Hero Twins were the talk of the hotel. Or what was left of it, anyway. So how would you feel about reprising your roles?”
“What do you mean?” asked Lola.
“Perform tonight as our guest stars. Be our Hero Twins. It will be easy money for you, and the publicity for us will be huge. Name your fee.”
Max shook his head. “I don’t think—”
“We’ll do it,” said Lola. “But our fee is your Jaguar Stones.”
“That is out of the question,” said Lady Koo.
“You can always make more,” said Lola.
“Absolutely not.”
“We’ll put on a fantastic show. Plus we won’t sue you for animal cruelty.”
“Do you understand how long it took to make these stones?”
“Do you understand how quickly I can spread the word that you shot our monkey?”
Lady Koo thought about it. “Why do you want our stones? Are you setting up a rival attraction?”
“I’ll tell you the truth,” said Lola. “We were sent here by Ah Pukuh, the Maya god of violent and unnatural death. He’s jealous of all your followers and he’s holding our parents ransom until we get your stones.”
“How did Ah Pukuh hear about this place?” Lady Koo sounded flattered.
“I think he saw you on cable news. Old Cahokia is very famous—even in Xibalba.”
Lady Koo slapped Landa on the back, possibly harder than she’d meant to. “What did I tell you? It’s a new age of social media. If you want to stay on top, you’ve got to stay online.” She checked her phone. “One thousand new followers in the last hour. Yay, me!”
“You’ll lose all your followers if they hear about the monkey,” Lola pointed out.
“Can the monkey dance?” asked Lady Koo.
“No!” said Lola indignantly.
“Por favor, mi amor, don’t do this,” begged Landa.
“Oh, loosen up, Toto. I think this could work for us. We’ll announce that our stones have been stolen and then they will be miraculously returned. It’s a win-win! Think of the publicity! Perhaps we could even get Ah Pukuh to put in an appearance. It’s genius.”
“So, do we have a deal?” asked Lola.
“We have a deal,” confirmed Lady Koo.
“Por favor, mi amor,” Landa begged her. “We should not tangle with the Maya gods.”
Lady Koo turned on him. “Don’t tell me what to do. I am the brains behind this operation—and don’t you forget it!”
Lola almost felt sorry for Landa, the way he cowered in the shadow of his wife.
“You are a little out of sorts today, mi amor. Perhaps you should take a siesta before the Sunset Ceremony?”
“There is no time for a siesta!” snarled Lady Koo. “I have a show to put on!”