Angélica rubbed the back of her neck, grimacing at the dirt on her fingers when she finished. “We had a little incident on the other side of the wall.”
Quint offered her his water. “Anybody get hurt?”
“Just a few scratches, but my backside probably has some bruising.” She took his canteen and gulped some water.
“Icould rub those bruises better tonight after lights-out.”
“Don’t forget about Dad.”
“I don’t think he’d enjoy the backside rub near as much as you. Now, explain how you got this wild and dusty look you’re sporting this afternoon. Maybe I should take a picture of you for the INAH writeup. What do you think?”
She smiled. “Try it and I’ll toss your fancy camera in theaguadafor the alligators to eat.” She handed the canteen back to him. “I look like this because Dr. Fernel is a bit clumsy.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.”
“And so is Esteban.”
He grimaced. “But the boy means well.”
“Tell that to his feet.” Angélica frowned at the collection from the cache laid out before them. “I stand by my previous statement—this is a lot of weaponry. Did you finish with inventory?”
He nodded. “The counts are written in my notes. Turns out the cache Daisy found yesterday on the inside of the wall held more weapons, especially the short-range sort like daggers and leftover obsidian blades frommacuahuitl.”
She squatted next to the collection of arrowheads, touching one of the pointed tips. “How much more?”
Quint took another sip of water before answering. “Not quite twice as many, but they were definitely more fortified inside of the wall for up-close fighting than here on the outside. Arrows were more popular out here.” He capped his canteen. “Do you think Structure I was an outpost of some sort, used to try to stop the enemy from climbing the wall?”
Although he still couldn’t make sense of why the wall would be shorter here on the outside than inside. It seemed like that should be reversed. Unless having the enemy fall to their death while trying to climb down on the inside was the goal.
“Maybe.” She picked up one of the dagger blades, hefting the weight in her hand, and then carefully set it back down. “We’ll know more soon. At least that’s what Dr. Fernel told me a bit ago. He’s over there checking on his GPS data points right now so that he can do some final calculations—or something—for his mapping software.”
“Meaning we’ll be able to see more clearly what’s actually hiddenunder the jungle throughout the rest of Site 5?”
“That’s the idea.” She stood up, glancing at where Pedro and Bronko were now hacking their way through a dense cluster of scrub brush, cursing with every step forward. “Come here,” she said, taking him by the wrist. “We need some privacy for a moment.”
“I like the sound of that,” he joked, letting her lead him around the side of Structure I until they were shielded from the others by not only the building, but also some small trees that were growing out of a mound of ferns.
After another check on the others, Angélica moved in close enough that he could smell the layer of dirt on her. “I think I figured out what Daisy called you yesterday. What she meant.”
“You mean ‘key-me’?”
“Yeah. I should have realized right away, but I was a little distracted with Daisy finding that cache and then Fernando and Raul discovering the stairway beside Structure II.”
“Don’t forget about Fernel digging in before you’d given the green light and your dad finding the second cache on our way back to camp,” Quint told her.
“Right. It was a busy day, but I should have added one and one together after what KuTu had said about you that day with the vultures.” She glanced behind her before adding in an even lower voice, “It’s spelled k-i-m-i.”
“ ‘Kimi’?” he repeated, planting the proper spelling in his head. “So what does it mean?”
“It’s the name of your Maya spirit companion—yournahual.”
That sounded like “gnaw-wall” and didn’t ring any bells. “I’m still in the dark here. Explain, please.”
“Both ancient and contemporary Maya people believe that we all have spirit companions of some sort based on our date of birth.”
“Like astrological signs?”
“Somewhat. These spirit companions hint of your character traits. For example, mynahualis an awk.”
