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“You said you didn’t believe the superwarrior was a sorcerer.”
“That doesn’t mean I don’t believe he existed at all.”
Gina’s gaze returned to the extremely large stick soldier. “So you think the super part of the superwarrior was his size?”
“Maybe. Or it could just relate to his personality, his essence, his spirit. In many of the codices, glyphs relating to royalty were also drawn larger than everything else. The Aztecs used size not only to mean size but also to indicate a largeness of intangible things. A largesse of being.”
Gina wasn’t exactly sure what largesse was, but she got the concept from the drawing.
“What about these?” She indicated a string of symbols beneath the great big warrior.
“We think it describes his attributes.” Teo moved his finger from icon to icon as he explained. “The wind, which also means strength. A lizard, which indicates endurance, the rabbit for speed, a dog for loyalty; the monkey symbolizes agility. No other warrior in any codex was ever described with this many superior traits.”
Gina studied the glyphs. In her opinion that dog looked far too vicious to symbolize loyalty. Perhaps he’d been viciously loyal.
“Maybe the super part of his warriorhood,” she pointed to the final image: a skull, which loomed larger than all the others, “was not just that he was a very big boy, but also that he was fabulous at killing people.”
“The skull does mean death,” Teo agreed. “But it can also indicate life force and vitality.”
“So he was either king of the killing,” Gina said, “or just larger than life.”
“Or both.”
“You said the pictures could actually mean what they represent.” He nodded. “What if the army just ran into a dog, then a rabbit, a lizard, and a lot of skulls on their trip?”
“How do you explain a monkey this far north of the border?”
“Maybe it was a pet. Were there monkeys somewhere in the Aztec empire?”
Teo nodded as he considered the row of glyphs. “If that’s the case, this could be nothing more than a travelogue.”
His eyes had lost some of their light.
“Would that be bad?” Gina murmured.
He didn’t answer for a long time, just continued to stare at the page until Gina touched his elbow. “Teo?
He came back
to the here and now with a start. “Uh … well…” He pushed his glasses up again. “It’s an interesting concept. Perhaps the large soldier merely represented a large army. Nothing earthshaking there.”
“But you said this,” she pointed to the bumblebee knife, “indicates north. And this.” She tapped the big water. “The Rio Grande.”
He sighed, and his chin lowered toward his chest. “It could mean anything.” He slapped the book shut. “It could mean nothing.”
Gina felt like she’d kicked a kitten.
“Even if the so-called superwarrior didn’t exist,” she argued, “the translation still points to the Aztecs traveling north of the Rio Grande. Isn’t that important?”
“Not if there’s no way to prove it. Without that tomb, I’ll never be able to vindicate any part of my mother’s work or my own.”
“Well, what do I know?” Gina asked. “You and your mother have been translating this stuff for decades. I never saw it before today.”
Although, strangely, she felt like she understood it. That with a little practice she could read those writings and, even more strangely, that she wanted to. Perhaps Teo’s enthusiasm was catching.
“My mother did spend her life on those translations,” he agreed.
Gina suddenly saw what she’d done. He’d been doubting himself, doubting his mission, and she wanted him to doubt. She wanted him to give up and go away. Instead, she’d managed to turn him back to the idea that what he believed about this place was true.
