“The Lords of the Underworld cannot walk Middleworld freely. They must use messengers to speak with mortals or else manifest during the nights, and then only for the briefest of periods. A single hour.”
“But we traveled in the daytime.”
“Because Hun-Kamé is not entirely a god. Because your human blood mixes with his immortal essence, cloaking him from the sun. It nourishes him too. Without it he would be lost, weakened as he is.”
She closed her hand into a fist and felt the shard there. It was like a living thing, hidden beneath the murmur of her blood.
“He said it would kill me, the bone shard.”
“It will. If it is not removed. But of course he cannot remove it, nor would he wish to in his state. And yet he must. The more life he absorbs from you, the more human he must become. It is a bad bargain for both of you, but there is no other way,” Loray said, his face serious.
The raven nodded his head, as if emphasizing this point.
“Yet this bargain may also be our salvation, if the tide turns and Hun-Kamé fails in his quest.” A smile formed on his lips.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Should he be unable to recover his missing elements, should his brother catch up with you and the situation be dire, cut your hand,” Loray said simply.
“What?”
He made a motion, as if he were holding a machete and slicing off his own arm.
“Cut it. It will sever the link to Hun-Kamé.”
“How will that solve anything?”
“It will help us. He will be thoroughly weakened.”
How easily he said “us,” as if they were old acquaintances. Any mortal would have been dazzled by the demon’s voice, the smile, his looks. Casiopea had enough common sense to be wary. Life had taught her to be untrusting. Dreamers and romantics like her father did not fare well, and though she had dreamed in Uukumil, she’d done so quietly, in secret. If someone chanced by, she closed the book she was looking at. She hid desires inside an old tin can. She never told anyone what she hoped for.
“The reigning Lord of Xibalba will look kindly at the woman who helped defeat his brother,” Loray said.
“And I will be without a hand,” she replied.
“Sacrifices have to be made at times. If it comes to it, cut your hand, not a big deal.”
“And injure him.”
“That is the point.”
“Why aren’t you trying to cut my hand?” she asked.
Bold, the question. She grew brazen, and quickly.
“Dear girl, if I pressed a blade against your skin, it would accomplish nothing. You’d be right as rain in a heartbeat,” he said, brushing past her, brushing her arm for a second, as if to emphasize his point. “No enemy can wound you, nor coerce you into wounding yourself, not when a Lord of Xibalba walks beside you. Not even one who has lost his throne. It must be by your hand and your hand alone. Free will.”
“Nothing of this makes sense.”
“Only know this final option is available to you. It might save you, and me,” he said.
There was amusement in the demon’s face, as if he enjoyed speaking these words. Under his politeness she detected a quiet malice.
“Vucub-Kamé would forgive you if you tell him you advised me to do this?”
She said the name to test his boundaries, since Loray was afraid of uttering it. And when she said it the demon did not seem amused.
“Perhaps,” he muttered.
