Part 19 (1/2)
”Who are they?” I whispered. The man and woman shot Demetrio cautionary looks now, having heard me somehow.
”My mayordomos.”
”What does that mean?”
”Can't tell you yet,” he told me. ”Soon, though. You'll know.”
”We're ready,” the woman called out to us, as she struck a small chime with a mallet. ”You may approach the altar.”
”C'mon,” Demetrio told me, as he stood up and held a hand out for me. ”Leave Buddy.”
”But he's scared,” I said.
”He'll be fine. Ain't nothin' but love here. Just leave him on the seat.”
I did as he told me, and took his hand. Together, we walked to the table at the altar, and stood facing the man and the woman. The woman took a cane of some sort from the side of the table, and held it in her left hand, while raising her right hand to us. The man beat a small drum with a stick, in a hypnotic, monotonous rhythm, for about three straight minutes, while chanting a song in a language I couldn't make out, and stopped.
”In the name of rain and sun,” he said.
”Let us mix the corn and water,” she told the man.
The man, still scowling, removed what appeared to be corn flour from one container, and handed it to her. She murmured in that unknown language, as though saying a prayer of the flour, and placed several handfuls into a large empty pottery bowl. To this the man added water of different colors, from several of the vials, after saying a similar prayer-chant. Together the man and woman stirred the mixture with their fingers, until it made a thin batter. Then they rinsed their hands in a basin behind them, from a clay pitcher, and dried them on clean white towels.
”Demetrio,” said the woman, smiling benevolently at him now.
”Yes, Mayordomo Guadalupe?”
”Demetrio,” said the man.
”Yes, Mayordomo Diego?”
Together the man and woman chanted, ”You know what you must do now.”
As the woman began to sing in a language I didn't know, Demetrio nodded, and approached the table. From among the many items there, he selected the sharp, small knife with the turquoise hilt. As he lifted it, I saw the writing along the blade begin to move, snakelike. My heart thundered, and I gulped in horror. Was he going to kill me now?
”No worries, mami,” he said softly, over his shoulder, with a comforting smile. ”I didn't want to hurt you before, and I won't hurt you now. I won't never hurt you.”
Instead, he stood directly next to the table, placed his left hand over the pottery bowl of newly mixed gruel. With the knife in his right hand, he pierced the skin in the center of his left palm, deeply. He turned the hand sideways as he twisted the knife gently, his face grimacing with the pain. Dark red, nearly purple blood oozed from the wound, across one side of his hand, and dripped into the bowl with large, glisteningly dark drops. Together, the man and woman counted them, in Latin - a language I had studied during eighth and ninth grade.
”Unus, duo, tres, quattor, quinque, s.e.x, septum, octo.”
They stopped when eight drops had fallen. Demetrio promptly pulled the knife tip from his flesh, and the hand was quickly wrapped in a clean white cloth by the man.
All three of them had their eyes were on the bowl now, so I looked, too. A wisp of pale blue smoke rose up and twisted around. I gasped softly, as the smoke grew to the size of a small dog, twisted and turned through several disturbing shapes, each one seeming to make the others more nervous than the last. Finally, it formed itself into the likeness of a long, snakelike serpent with feathers and wings. It held that form for several moments, before glowing hot white, and evaporating away.
Demetrio smiled at me with unbridled joy, the apprehension gone from his face now.
”Quetzalcoatl,” said the woman, with relief; I a.s.sumed she was referring to the snake-thing. Next to her, the man inhaled deeply, and released the breath in guarded relaxation. They all grinned at each other, breathing a bit easier now.
”Is that good?” I asked. ”The, whatever you called it.”
”Quetzalcoatl,” said the woman again.
”Right,” I said.
”Very,” said Demetrio, ecstatically. ”It means that we've pa.s.sed the first of two tests fort the day, and I can now tell you everything you've wanted to know.”
”Good,” I said.
”But not without risk still,” intoned the man. Demetrio ignored him, so I did too.
”C'mere, mamita,” Demetrio told me. I walked to the table, facing the man and woman; Demetrio turned me to face him, staring deeply into my eyes.
”You know I'm not like you. I'm not a human being anymore. You figured a lot of that out on your own, but I helped, and for that,” he looked at the man and the woman, ”I am sorry, though as the test showed, I was correct in a.s.suming it was safe to let her know.”
”Duly noted,” said the woman. ”Your time is running out, Demetrio. Talk.”
Demetrio nodded to her, and continued to talk to me. ”I began to tell you the other day, about the Fibonacci numbers, and their relation to the realm of souls. I didn't know none of this when I died, either, Maria, so don't feel all bad or nothing. Okay? I learned it here, with them, the mayordomos. I'll tell you who they are in a minute. First, I want you to understand, and I'll put it in real simple terms...”
”Right. Because I'm an idiot,” I joked, nervously.
He smiled, gently. ”No, because it's real complicated, and I'm not sure I understand all of it myself. You're perfectly smart for a human.”
”Gee, thanks.”
He laughed. ”Okay. Here's the situation. Everyone has a soul, the same soul for all eternity.”
I interrupted him. ”I get that, but if you're dead, why do you still have a body?”
”I'll get to that. Be quiet. I know that's hard for you.” He winked at me affectionately.
”Sorry.”
”Silence, human,” said the man horribly, his eyes narrowed to slits. ”You heard the boy.”
I glared at the man and rolled my eyes. I turned my attention back to Demetrio, and he went on with his lesson.
”The soul can come back, after you die, in another body, but it's always the same soul. Some people call it reincarnation. It's not exactly how it works, though. None of the world's human faiths have gotten it all completely right, Maria. They all come close, and they are all good in their own ways. And we know a lot of this stuff instinctively, as human beings, and a lot of faiths, philosophies and science come close, but it's not until after that we learn it in a way that we fully understand.”
”Some of us,” corrected the man.
”Right. Some of us. Some of us never learn. What I'm trying to say is basically this. Each time you come back, you gain a kindred soul, or more than one, like soul mates, but not exactly like that. Souls can collect many Kindreds, on each return, according to the sacred number order of the cosmos, the Golden Ratio your friend Thomas told you about. Same as the Fibonacci series of numbers. The pattern is zero, one, one, two, three, five, eight, and so on, each time adding the previous two numbers together, always growing larger. That's the same pattern The Maker of All Things uses for almost everything. The pattern of growth in the center of a sunflower. The numbers of leaves on a branch, and their spiraling pattern as they grow. Seash.e.l.ls. The orbits of the planets. The curvature of a ram's horn. Musical harmony. It's all the same numbers, in the same order. It is everywhere, and permeates everything, including our souls. Euclid called it sacred geometry. He intuited a lot of this stuff. So did Einstein. So, your desire to be a scientist? It's holy, Maria. In the truest sense.”
He paused a moment to let this all sink in. His perfect grammar stunned me. He could turn it on and off at will, I realized. I nodded to let him know I followed what he told me.
”Your first time through life, your soul is alone. You have no kindred soul. You have to figure things out on your own. It's a testing time. This is the time most people make their biggest mistakes. Young souls. That first time around is a dangerous time to live, the most dangerous, because if you don't figure it out, you might not come back better next time; you could come back worse, and continue to worsen, until you aren't allowed to return ever again, and you might be doomed to be alone for all eternity. This is how sociopaths are made, from souls that never progress. They are given three chances at improvement, but they don't get another shot. They go directly to The Very Bad Place when they die, and any Kindreds they had are erased forever.”
”So there is a h.e.l.l,” I said.
He winced. ”Sort of, but not quite. The definition of The Maker, really, is change. It ain't a person, or some old dude in the sky with a beard. It communicates with each of us directly if we listen. We're part of it. But it's not like humans, or animals. It's much bigger than that. It is growth, and energy, with consciousness beyond our comprehension, and intent. Nothing is perfect in process, only in outcome, and then only through trial and error, and even then it is destined to change again.”