CHAPTER ONE
Villa Sara de Calakmul
Cozumel, Mexico
December 23
There they go to die.
From the glass wall of windows in his office, Jacob Calakmul watched the yacht as it left the resort for a day-long snorkeling trip off the coast of Cozumel. The two families would not be returning. By week’s end, if not sooner, one of the families would be dead.
Jacob removed his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. Memories from the previous year recalled themselves. He was not a man often surprised, but last year’s contestants in the game had surprised him. Shocked him even.
He thought of Mr. Roth often. In fact, the author’s new fantasy novel was coming out in early January. Jacob had arranged to have a copy stolen from the author’s computer. An underling, a not-so-secret fan of the author’s work, had been assigned to read it to make sure nothing incriminating had been added to the book after the Roths’ journey to the Yucatán Peninsula.
Nothing.
The book had been finished the year before, and nothing objectionable had been added to it during the editing process.
Nothing revealing the devastation the author had felt after leaving his wife behind in Mexico. She was being held hostage at the hidden Jaguar Temple in the Calakmul reserve to ensure Mr. Roth’s silence. Everything Mr. Roth had told the public matched Jacob’s orders perfectly. The public story was that Roth’s wife, Sarina, was in a diabetic coma in an advanced research facility in Singapore. That’s what he’d told her parents. His fans. Angélica had provided him with phony but convincing video footage and photographs of a woman with Sarina’s face in a hospital bed with tubes and masks and equipment. And she’d brought Sarina’s family on a fake video tour of the facility to make the story more convincing, assuring them in Spanish that everything possible was being done to care for their daughter.
They were watching the author carefully, of course, tuning in to each of his live streams, whether it was him talking or him playing video games online for his fans. Reading his blogs. He’d said that he was taking an indefinite hiatus from writing. The book coming out might be his last. He had not even hinted, in speech or writing, at what had happened to the Roth family during their trip to Mexico.
It was the eve of the one-year anniversary of Sarina’s captivity—of Mr. Roth’s realization that life was not as he’d always believed it to be and that certain events had been set into motion that would ultimately overthrow the world’s political, financial, and social order. So it felt like less of a coincidence that he would be spending this Christmas in Germany, the same country where the Dresden Codex was stored in a museum, available for viewing by the public.
Jacob didn’t like coincidences. He didn’t much believe in them.
The door to the office opened, and Jacob’s personal assistant, Angélica, entered. She offered a confident smile.
“The families are gone?” he asked her.
“Yes. They’re heading to the Palancar Reef first,” she said, hugging her tablet to her chest. “Two other sites, depending on the crowds, and then they’ll anchor off Punta Sur before sunset for ceviche and drinks.”
“And they are packed for the overnight trip to Chetumal and the visit to the ancient ‘ruins’ tomorrow?”
One family knew what the visit truly meant. The other did not. It gave one side the advantage and made them the presumptive winners. The same had been true last year—the Beasleys had known the truth; the Roths had not—only the writer and his family had surprised them all by winning a fight they’d been chosen to lose.
“Yes. They’ll be at the Calakmul reserve by tomorrow night.”
“Excellent,” Jacob said. “And everything is going according to plan?”
She nodded. “Yes. We will take the Pegasus jet to the reserve tomorrow afternoon to meet them. The pilot is rested and ready.”
“Good. What news of the Roths? When did they arrive in Germany?”
Angélica lowered her tablet and tapped on the screen. In another day, she would stow away her modern attire and wear a wardrobe more befitting a future queen of the Maya. The makeup and glasses would be gone, replaced by ancient jewelry and the painted symbols of her ancestors. There was little technology in the Calakmul reserve. They had no need for it there, for they had access to something so much more powerful.
“They landed in Frankfurt two days ago. They’re staying with Mr. Roth’s sister in Wiesbaden.”
Jacob frowned. “How far is it from Dresden?”
“Dresden is on the other side of the country. It was part of East Germany before the reunification.”
“I know that. How far?”
“Over a five-hour drive, I should think.”
Jacob picked up his glasses from the desk and turned to look at the display on the wall. There was a Maya warrior’s weapon, a macuahuitl, suspended there, along with a rubber ball from the death games and several other relics collected and protected from various dig sites.
“Remind me of his itinerary again,” he said.
Angélica was already tapping away at her tablet, having anticipated the question. “They arrived in Germany on Saturday. Over the weekend, they visited some of the tourist places in Wiesbaden, Eisenach, and Erfurt.” She tapped again. “Then they went back to Wiesbaden, where he spoke and gave a class at his sister’s school this morning at the US Army base there.”
“Where else has he been today?”
“Only in Wiesbaden. I think tomorrow they’re going south to Karlsruhe to see family.”
Jacob nodded. “Erfurt is much closer to Dresden. Could they have made a trip there without us knowing?”
“We have tracking on their phones,” Angélica said. “They’ve followed their itinerary. Trips to old castles, shopping malls, and historical sites. We even hacked his laptop, which he brought on the trip and from which he delivered the presentation at the sister’s school.”
“Our hacker accessed that network?”
“He used to work for the NSA,” Angélica reminded him. “Mr. Roth has been exactly where he’s supposed to be. The library where the codex is kept is also closed for the next three days for the Christmas holiday.” She paused, then added, “It makes sense that they’re spending Christmas away from Bozeman. There’d be a lot of difficult memories for them, with Sarina still away from home. He’s done nothing to incur your distrust, Jacob. He wouldn’t risk his children’s lives.”
Jacob believed that was true. Mr. Roth clearly cared for his kids. The family had grown even tighter since last Christmas. Jacob’s people monitored the Roths’ internet traffic and phone calls. He hadn’t gone to the press or law enforcement to report what had happened to them. He’d done exactly as Jacob had insisted. And yet . . .
“I don’t like thinking he might have access to the Jaguar Prophecies,” he said, giving her a knowing look. “The codex in Dresden is on display to the public.”
“There are other Maya codices that were sent by Cortés,” she said reasonably. “Not just the one found in Dresden. He can’t read it. He doesn’t know it’s important.”
“What about his daughter? The magic works for her.” Suki had won the death game for her family when she’d tapped into the ancient magic and sent the ball into orbit within the arena. None of the other families who’d been brought to the Jaguar Temple had been able to manage it. She was special, and someday she could be of use. So long as she didn’t use her abilities to help her father step out of line.
“She’s a teenager at a high school in Bozeman. Not a scholar of ancient hieroglyphics.”
Jacob sighed and wiped his mouth. A nagging doubt itched in his mind. One he couldn’t scratch. “Before we fly to the Jaguar Temple, have a jaguar priest in Europe go to Dresden. I want that university museum under surveillance until the Roths go back to Montana. I don’t trust him.”
“The library is closed.”
Jacob sighed. When he gave orders, he expected obedience.
“He’d be the world’s greatest fool if he went up against you,” Angélica added, coming closer and stroking his arm.
“Even so, do it. If he comes anywhere near the codex, I want someone there to warn him off.”
“Very well. I’ll see who is available.” She tapped the screen and then nodded. “Anything else?”
He thought about the cruise ship at the harbor at San Miguel. The one with the plague glyph hidden aboard. “When does the Oasis leave?”
“Tonight. It’s bound for Europe. The plague will start there. The passengers are predominantly from the UK, Spain, and several Nordic countries. The sickness will start spreading in Europe first, but there are also plenty of Asian tourists on board.”
Jacob smiled knowingly. The infection would spread to anyone who had not been given the protective glyph. Agents of the jaguar priests had been preparing for this moment, giving protection to the winners of the games and other elite who’d paid for that privilege. But Jacob had deliberately withheld it from the Roths, wanting to see how the author would react after word of the disease had begun to spread. “It will take some time before the World Health Organization can figure out that some are immune.”
“And the outbreak in Asia will draw attention away from us,” she agreed.
“This is the next step in the fulfillment of the prophecy,” Jacob said excitedly. “We will reclaim what is ours through pestilence, drought, and war, which Kukulkán prophesied to our ancestors. The ancient magic of Aztlán shall be ours to command.”
She gave him an intrigued smile. “You’ve never told me where Aztlán is. Will you share that knowledge someday? It’s worth more than gold or oil.”
“Only after I’ve made you my queen. My equal. We must fulfill the prophecy first. What was once our people’s will be ours again.” Their relationship had progressed over the last year. Her value to him as an employee had gotten tangled with his desire for her, setting his sights higher. Maybe he’d always intended for it to end that way.
“How will you start the war?” she asked him.
“The world is in turmoil,” he said, pleased she’d asked, even though they’d had this conversation before. She knew how much he enjoyed the recitation of what was to come. “They will turn against each other when people begin to die. And then I will come, just as Cortés did. With a smile on my face, leaving blood and fury in my wake."
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