"Paititi?" He asked, brows furrowed as if considering something, "El Dorado?"
I arched an eyebrow behind my mask. That wasn't quite true. Paititi wasn't anything like El Dorado. Even though both were mystical and semi-mythical lost cities. Only Paititi had turned out to be a real city while El Dorado was still lost to the annals of time.
"Close enough," I grunted, scooping up the Key again with one hand. The burns had mostly faded, unnaturally quickly, even with the stalwart assistance of my precious berry stock.
"That dagger?" The Warden asked, shielding his eyes again as the light seemed to grow by an order of magnitude the longer my hands touched it. I was honestly just a little discomfited by it. I really hadn't had good experiences with the supernatural, at all. For the moment, however, this light was proving benign. I really didn't savour the idea of some Mayan god eavesdropping on my life.
I was comfortable in maintaining an Anglican approach to God. For all that I didn't attend church often. It was mostly my mother who pushed me to go, and after her death, I didn't have the heart to break away completely. Nevertheless, the idea that Kukulkan was real, meant I would really have to sit down and think about religion and my immortal soul at some point. However, that would certainly not be today.
"...what is it?" The Warden finished his question.
I regarded him out of the corner of my eyes, considering whether this needed to be answered or not. It was unlikely he would even understand exactly what the Key of Chak Chel was. In the event that he did, that would be further confirmation that he somehow worked with Trinity.
I got to my feet limberly, bare now, I had an urge that needed satisfaction. As usual, now seemed the best place to see it fulfilled.
"It is the Key of Chak Chel," I nodded to the Warden stepping towards the water. I was loathe to re-enter the cesspool I had only just crawled out of, but that throne…
I just had to touch it.
"Chac Chel?" The Warden stuttered. I could instantly tell he actually did recognize something about it. My free hand drifted down to caress my River Hawk. If he tried anything, I'd be ready. I had already mostly disregarded the idea that these two were connected to Trinity, both weren't the usual bruisers. Contemplacance kills, though, so I remained ready.
The Warden seeming to be rather oblivious to my internal murder drive, continued to speak, "I assume you mean the Mayan creation goddess?"
"Correct," I replied, almost absentmindedly. I barely stopped myself from launching into the connection I saw between Chak Chel and Kukulkan. Both were serpent gods, one of creation, one of rebirth. They fit together neatly, contemplating. The silver box of Ix Chel further contemplated the two. For Ix Chel was a goddess of childbirth. The box and the key were both symbolic, and so was their connection to Kukulkan.
I stepped forward, and the water steamed, blood seeming to boil under the effects of the light. I could hear a hiss from behind me, as the Warden scooted away from the water. The floating bodies seemed to warp, further deforming. Where before they seemed merely mostly inhuman, with various bat features. Under the light, their corpses deformed, twisting, becoming more animalistic.
I paused there at the edge eyeing the changes. Carefully, very carefully I toed the water, testing the temperature. There was something strange at work here, so I figured I'd forgive myself in the water was actually boiling and scalded my big toe.
To my shock, the water seemed quite pleasant, a perfect temperature, not too cold and not too hot. I stepped into the water, and pushed forward, ignoring the Warden behind me, who shuffled into a sitting position to watch what I was doing.
I heard him mutter, "What is it doing now?"
Part of me was kind of annoyed at being relegated to an 'it.' After all, couldn't he see I had breasts? The other part of me considered the whole vampire question. The whole chamber was filled with the floating corpses of what appeared to be vampires, leaking blood from over-bloated bellies and leaking pale yellow bile from mouths stuck in a rictus of pain.
In some ways, it was less disgusting than swimming through actual human bodies since these were clearly covered in hair and smell different. Still rotting, still rancid, but remarkably different. The scent of a human body is difficult to describe, and uniquely unsettling. It just gnaws at a growing sense of unease the longer you're around it, at least that was supposed to be the experience for most people.
I didn't enjoy the smell of human bodies by no means, but by the time I got out of Yamatai, and its literal mountains of offal and flesh, I had smelled all the dead bodies I ever needed to take care of any lingering hang-ups. I shoved a vampire's head with my free hand, slithering over the top of it like a snake. There was plenty of slime and water here to make my passage easy. Enough that I worried about not having enough pull and just sitting impotently, unable to get a grip until I died of hunger.
Actually, I looked at the bodies and water around me, I'd probably die of sickness first. Or becoming a human prune in the water, something like that.
The red carvings in the throne seemed to gleam as I approached, and I studied them more closely. The implications were disturbing. It showed what I assumed to be some kind of serpent god, and a related pantheon ruling over man. At least that's what I assumed it stood for. Another part, by the feet, showed something bat-like crouched over the body of a woman, teeth at her throat. More disturbingly, there was a small figure carved within the carving of the woman, over her stomach. It was a creature with bat-like features.
That imagery was clear and seemed to explain, maybe, where vampires came from. The rest of the imagery's symbolism was more unclear, there was a gate and humans. Rays coming down from the gods, illuminating man. Then below them animals, and below even them, more humans, but misshapen and distorted. One of these was the vampire carving, but there were others.
More perverted. Generally, I considered myself to have a strong stomach. I could crawl through sewage, refuse, and literal piles of dismembered human flesh. Some of these images, despite being mere carving, made bile gather in my throat. This was an effigy to some kind of depravity, beyond what even I had seen before.
Almost unbidden my hand reached up and grasped the carved steps of the throne pulling me up its front. The blood flowed over my fingers, up from the water, and into neat grooves in the chair. The desiccated mummy's face was locked in a rictus of horror, and as I peered at it I noticed traces of inhumanity. This had been one of the vampires as well, perhaps.
My eyes jumped again, and above it all, above all the gods, the carven image of a bat's face. Its eyes were red rubies and seemed to stare down at me, almost challenging.
Dimly I was aware I could hear screams and wails, shouts and the sound of blood being spilled. Animalistic grunting, and the sound of passion being fulfilled. Stone on bone, my pulse rushed in my ears.
The Key of Chak Chel burned in my hand. I snapped back to myself just in time to stop myself from drinking from the steps of the statue. From the fetid blood that flowed upwards, laced with green slime. I shuddered, avoiding locking gazes with the red ruby eyes again. I did not know exactly what it had just tried to force me to do, but I doubt it would've resulted in a good end for me.
I raised myself further out of the water, one hand now resting on the seat, the other held the glowing Key of Chak Chel. Its light shone down upon the corpse there, withered and secluded upon the seat. Its neck was girded in fine gold, and red silk bands around its waist. Various bits of fine gold, inlaid with precious gems were placed both on it and looked like they might've been inside it, beneath its skin.
The body twitched, sunken black eyes, moving to meet my own. This thing was alive. For a moment I did not move, merely waiting, almost unwilling to make the nest move, and then I slammed the Key of Chak Chel down into the thing's chest.
This might've been a bit of an overreaction was my first sheepish thought, as my athame pierced into the wrinkled emaciated flesh of the vampire.
It shrieked, as the glowing dagger slid between its ribs and continued downwards, carving its belly open.
"KUKULK-!" It screamed, and by screamed, I mean it screamed. I would never have expected such a withered looking creature to cause such a loud noise. Blood sprayed free from it, splashing into my eyes, my face, and my open mouth, over gritted teeth.
It clawed at my crown with withered claws, scraping over the gold, but finding no purchase. I wrenched the dagger sideways, carving another rent in the thing. May as well kill it now that I was committed. It was not lost on me, that the thing had literally screamed the name of the deity I was currently blaming for whatever translocation I was experiencing.
I smelled the musky smell of reptilian scales. The hot breath of some great monster. The flutter of feathers, viridian, and incarnadine. I both saw them and did not see them. They were both in the physical world and before my mind's eye. I could not distinguish between them.
The Key of Chak Chel clicked against the center of the throne's seat and slid easily into the interior with one smooth motion. There was a final wailing shriek, the mummified thing clutching at my throat, snapping rotting fangs before it seemed to unravel under the harsh glare of the Key, which suddenly burned with light.
The brilliant light seared the flesh from its bones, and I could see the great bloody rivulets gleam. The throne came undone next, unraveling into bloody fibers, flesh, bone and writhing sinew seemed to fall away from it in impossible forms.
Then all was still, the throne was empty, only withered and pitted bones remained. I spared a glance around the pool, spotting crystal clear water, and unnumbered bones littering the bottom of the cenote.
So be it, Kukulkan, I murmured in my mind, so be it.