“You wouldn’t have any ideas about how to get past it, would you?” she asked the snake. “I need to reach the World Tree.”
The snake thought for a minute. “My sisters and I could distract it. But you’d have to be fast.”
“You’d help me?” Casiopea said. “That’s very generous of you.”
“Yes, for we are both daughters of the earth,” the snake said loftily. “Besides, I like the silver bracelet you wear on your arm. You could give it to us, to seal the bargain. One must give, after all, in quests like this.”
Casiopea touched her wrist, looking at the silver circle she wore. Hun-Kamé’s gift, the only piece of jewelry she’d ever owned, and the one item she’d expected to keep, a reminder of her journey. And of him. She bit her lip.
“Here, then,” Casiopea said, shaking her head and setting the bracelet on the ground next to the snake.
The snake looked happy. It blinked, rubbing both of its heads against Casiopea’s hand, like a cat. Then it called to its sisters. There were three of them, jade green, also possessing two heads each, and when they saw the silver bracelet they were pleased, since all snakes appreciate jewels, precious metals, and mirrors. Their vanity causes them to spend many minutes chasing their reflection in their surfaces, but one must not think poorly of snakes for this reason, since they are kind, thoughtful creatures.
Once they had looked at the bracelet, the snakes turned their attention to Casiopea, whispering among themselves.
“We will scatter in different directions,” the snake told her, “and when the road is clear, run away. But be quick about it.”
“I have no desire to remain here,” Casiopea said. “Thank you.”
She stood up and readied herself. The snakes slithered away, following the road. At first the bat paid them no heed. It slept on, its arms resting across its chest, its eyes closed. But as the snakes shifted sand and dirt, making the tufts of grass bordering the road shiver, the bat stirred. It raised its head and spread its wings with one thunderous movement that resembled the sound of a whip, and it pushed itself into the air, flapping it wings and attempting to find the source of the noise.
It seemed to be even bigger in flight, and for a few startled heartbeats Casiopea did not move. Then, regaining her wits, she dashed forward.
She ran, attempting to find the shadow gaps in the road, but there were none. The Black Road did not cease, no matter how hard she looked.
The bat, which was chasing a snake, turned its massive head and changed its mind, deciding to follow instead this new sound. It flapped its wings, gaining speed, and Casiopea attempted to run faster. She’d had plenty of chances to go down and up stairs, run to and fro around her house, and she was a nimble girl, but the bat fast approached her.
Casiopea began to run in a zigzag, hoping this might throw the creature off. She’d seen moths do this in the late hours of the day, to trick bats and avoid becoming their dinner, but although it bought her a few moments, Kamazotz loomed closer. She spotted two columns that had collapsed at an angle, tangling together, leaving a space beneath them. Casiopea threw herself to the ground and rolled under the columns.
The bat dove down, attempting to snatch her head like it had snatched the heads of heroes in ages past, and instead it struck a column. The claws hit the column with such force they left gouges on the rock. The bat flew up and down, striking the column again and again. In her hiding place Casiopea felt the stone shiver as it was incessantly pummeled. She undid the cord of the gourd and waited until the bat rose, ready to come swooping down against the column, then she tossed the gourd away with all her might. The gourd rolled upon the road, the water inside it sloshing. The bat, attracted by the noise, moved in its direction.
Casiopea stood up and began running. Again, the sound of her shoes hitting the road made the bat turn around and seek her out. In no time it had found her.
The Black Road extended solid and firm before Casiopea, no chink in it, and behind her, above her, the bat flapped its wings, readying to snatch her head away with its razor-sharp claws.
I’ll die, she thought. Horribly, I’ll die.
But she shook her head, shook the thought away.
She saw it then, wavering, the shadow that indicated a gap, and leaped forward.
She did not name her destination—there was no time for a sound to leave her throat—and she tumbled into a perfect darkness and tumbled out onto the Black Road again.
She raised her head, but above her there was nothing except the strange non-sky of the Underworld. Behind her the road was quiet. No columns, broken or intact, bordered the road. She’d left the bat behind.
Casiopea lay on the ground until her heart had regained its regular rhythm. Then she stood up and began walking again.
* * *
—
Martín reached a river filled with blood. The sight of it was disgusting, and he was forced to turn back, find another gap in the road, and jump forward again, because the trick in Xibalba was that although the road seemed a straight line, it branched and moved. It constantly changed. However, once Martín jumped forward again, he found himself by a river of pus, impassable.
“Damn you!” he yelled. He turned back a third time and finally was able to keep moving forward. At this point the road was not sticky anymore, so he moved with more ease, but he had bruises on his arms from the monkeys, and although his cheek had stopped bleeding, it ached mightily. More than that, his pride had been injured, and he was disheveled, a scared miscreant stumbling down the Black Road.
* * *
—
Bones protruded from the earth, like broken teeth. Some were white, some were yellow, and some were a rotting black, with pale pink or vermillion meat clinging in strings to them. They varied in size, as small as a clump of daisies, and others as tall as a person. And they carried a foul stench that made Casiopea press her shawl against her face.
The stench attracted black vultures, which perched atop the bones. Their wrinkled, featherless, dark heads turned in Casiopea’s direction, and their eyes, made of opals, reflected the young woman, but they left her alone and did not attempt to impede her path. More unpleasant were the flies, which swarmed around the bones. These came in greens of different shades, the delicate green of bottles and glasses, and the milky green of jade, and finally the dark green of the jungle. Clouds and clouds of flies flew up in the air when she walked by, buzzing noxiously. She pressed her shawl against her face and held her breath, the perfume of carrion making her eyes water, until the flies were thick against the bones, like a cloud. But then, slowly, the flies and the stench faded.
The bones that greeted Casiopea were now pecked clean, pale, naked, rising very high. No longer did they clump like tiny daisies, the smallest bones reached her shoulder; they extended as tall as trees, and where before they had bordered the road, now bones erupted in the middle of the black path she followed. First it was a bone or two, until she was walking by four large bones, then five, all in a row.