The summer sun was setting below the horizon as Izel sunk down onto the warm waters of his bath. The lake of Ica Noyolo was blood red. Izel pressed the river soap against the paint on his skin and watched as the dried paint peeled away in little leaves. The dirt was drained away in a small hole and new, clean water replaced it. Once the sun had gone down he stood and stepped up out of the bath. A small city of artificial islands spread out from the causeway. He walked along the stone road, water lapped up against the suspended road. High above on the small plateau was his temple. The high towering pyramid stood over the landscape and bore down on all that could see it, which in this case was just Izel.
No one else that came here could see it until he performed the short quitta ritual. But he had long since found that ritual wasn't necessary and the other rituals became all the more interesting. He walked up the steps from the lake to the temple, and then climbed up the hundred and twenty steps of the temple itself. Zaniyah was always saying that he needed to do more exercise, learn the art of a warrior, but Izel would never leave the temple area until he died and besides all these steps did miracles to his psychic, even if Zaniyah refused to admit it.
The temple was always lit by large open fires fuelled by inscriptions on the copper plates but he doubted he'd need such things to find his way around the large temple. He walked into his room and faced the six costumes he'd wear in the night ahead. One day, he swore, he'd work out a way that he could spend the night actually sleeping instead of performing the duties of six men. One day, he'd find more people like him – or failing that he would wait for his replacement to arrive in twenty years. And then he'd die. Yeah. This was a great deal. The only perk of this job was the chocolate but even that Izel couldn't be really enjoyed when he knew his counterpart over the US border was enjoying the feasts of rabbit and cactus juice, topped off the electrifying poctli. Once, the arrogant High Priest of Huitzipochtli had sent a box of it with two workers in tow. If the human workers hadn't been enough, the poctli had made his rituals suffer for weeks and Zaniyah had at last thrown it out into the lake for the local cipactli to eat. They hadn't seen the monster for a year until it had at last refaced with a heavy addiction.
In Mexico the High Priest had a hundred priests and trainees to do all the actual work. Izel had a community of Chanekeh to deal with. Zaniyah was a part-Chanekeh, and therefore was forbidden to enter the actual monster city. She was half his size and was the most annoying part of his life because she could just "- Izel! You're doing it wrong."
"Xolopitli! Idiot! What have I told you, Zaniyah, about appearing in my room?" He said turning around. Zaniyah had weakened powers of air; and she had the ability to pass into air for a small period of time and basically just show up anywhere at any time. With no one else to talk to she often popped in on his life. The only time she wouldn't was during the winter solstice when the Chanekeh all came to the lake for a ceremony of their own. Zaniyah jumped up from his bed with a breeze.
"I am the Xolopitli? No, no, no." She gestured three times dismissively. He rolled his eyes and pointed to the door.
"Go. I have work." She sat down instead. Knowing he wasn't going to win this battle any time soon he gave up and began to dress. The first ritual was to Chicomecoatl, whose time it was in the calendar. He pulled on the yellow and orange neck dress, the skirt. Then he picked up the headdress. This one was special as it did not have feathers instead it had unnaturally long llama hair from the southern countries. The mask that went with it was bronze, with flowers on the edges. He pressed it against his face and instantly felt the stream of godly power.
Chicomecoatl was the goddess of argiculture, and so the power that rushed through him was that of blessing. He walked out of the room following a path that he had worked every Chicomecoatl night for thirteen years ever since his predecessor had died. The earth chamber was below all others, in the depths of the temple. Here all the walls were thick with paster patterns of corn, fish, fruits, cacti, and more. The floor represented the earth and the ceiling the ocean. Figures of the Four Earth Gods stood at one end the of the room. Chicomecoatl stood in front of the altar. There were seven plates of clay; to the south was red, the north was black, the east was white, the west was blue, the south-east was orange, the north-east was orange, and the south-west was the ultra-rare green clay which was mixed with glass and jade.
In the centre of the room was the body of a camper the Chanekeh had picked off two days ago. The elderly man was sleeping right now but he would not be soon. Izel began to chant the priestly language Nahuatlatolli. The eyes of the figures began to glow and the old man woke with a start. He began to struggle but he was infected with poison. Izel stood, still chanting, raising up his hands.
He circled the room, taking the clay from each of the plates in the correct order. Each time the earth touched his skin he felt the power of the gods enter him. It took a month of this before he could commit the final sacrifice's body to his own and then he would have another shape to form, once this had been a useful trick but Izel had never gone beyond the temple area and it only served him when campers got too close. To those people the lake was called El Vado, and they came to eat and sleep before going home to wherever they had come from. The Chanekeh captured many off them and brought them to the temple for the appropriate sacrifice.
After ten minutes he had spread the paint on himself, the green clay last. Izel leant into the altar; blessed water lay on the lowest step. He sunk the mask into the water and tasted the earth in it. Then dripped he rose and called for the gods to bear witness. He prayed for the goddess of agriculture to give the world a good harvest. He prayed for her to take the blood offering and allow the plants to grow and disease to not harm the food. He prayed for the seven snakes of the fields to be healthy in the year to come. At last he took the obsidian blade on the next tier of the altar and faced the man.
Izel chanted louder with the words of death and blood. The man's eyes fixed him and he approached. He lifted the knife and drove it into the old flesh; he speared the flesh with practiced skill. The chest was cut open in three swift strokes and he plunged his hand into the man. His life force beat, and Izel felt his own heart match that beat. He prayed for this old blood to be enough to continue the way of the world. He ripped out the beating heart and lifted it up; the hot moist red ran down his arm mixing with the clay.
He brought it over to the altar and on the highest tier and placed it. Izel held the knife high and plunged it into the heart. Then everything went wrong. The room went cold and the man gasped with new found life. He sat up from the sacrificial table and turned to Izel. The only thing Izel could think was that the earth was certainly doomed. If the dead were rising then everything would soon cease to flow and the earth would be destroyed. Izel stared in shock as the old man stood, the hole in his body was bleeding heavily. I need that blood for the rest of the ritual…
"Izel Quetzolcoatl-Tlaloc Tlamocozqui Tepiani Ilhuicac Ipatica Tlacanemilizyotl." The dead man said and Izel realised he recognised that voice. Quetzalcoatl, the Lord of the West. He prostrated himself, on the floor.
"My Lord, what brings you here?"
"The world will end if you do not do this!" Izel looked up at the god in human flesh with dread.
"Anything my lord."
"Go north to the city of New York and find a sword, it has been stolen from the grave of the first men and they begin to rise. You must find the sword again and bring it back to the underworld. Or else the time of life on this planet will cease." Izel nodded, but then heh realised something.
"I must go my Lord? I cannot leave this temple, I have rituals to follow and sacrifices to be made, if I am not back by the fourth of September the world's crops will shrivel up and die." The god nodded gravely.
"Yes, I will have the High Priest of Huitzipochtli do this work while you are away. However you have a much sooner dead line. The first men will reach the earthly realm in six days, you must be done by then or civilisation will collapse."
"I understand my lord, I will not fail you." Then the god left the body of the old man and the body fell to the floor. He shook as he stood and looked at the dead body. "Nimitznotlatlauhtilia Chicomecoatl ticcana hi-huentli, Great Goddess Chicomecoatl accept this offering." Then in horror he left the chamber of earth and ran back to his room.
Notes:
Translations
Quetzolcoatl-Tlaloc Tlamocozqui – High Priest of Tlaloc
Tepiani Ilhuicac – Guardian of the Sky
Ipatica Tlacanemilizyotl – Sustainer of Civilisation
Quitta- see
Poctli - smoke