I was only half-listening. I knew she'd said the so-called air tines were at El Silvato del Diablo.
“Where are they?”
She seemed to know what was on my mind. “The air tines?” She pointed directly across the chasm. “They're over there . . . around a bend to the left of that ledge.”
I scanned the far wall, found the ledge, and made out a line of shadow where the volcanic wall seemed to fold around.
“Now how in the world do I get there? Crawl along the rim?”
“No. This is the only part of the rim that will support our weight. The rest is very thin and crumbly.”
“Do we go around the far side and climb over?”
“No. The walls are very steep and smooth and hundreds of feet high.”
“So what the hell am I supposed do—fly over?”
“Yes!” she said, smiling and nodding enthusiastically. “That is exactly what you must do! How do you know this?”
I thought she was putting me on until we returned to the Jeep and I learned what Ambrosio had been making with those palm leaves: wings. Even then, I wasn't completely convinced. I stared at the crude construction of leaves, branches, and vines and shook my head in disbelief.
“You don't really expect me to strap that on and jump over the edge, do you?”
“Si!” Ambrosio said. “I make these before. They fly plenty fine.” I turned to Maya, intending to say, You're joking, right? But then
I realized that Maya didn't joke. Now I was truly perturbed.
“I can't do this.”
“You must.”
“It won't work.”
“It has worked for others, it can work for you.”
“You?” I said.
She nodded.
Here it was again: Maya had done it, so why couldn't I?
I felt shaky. Maybe it was from lack of solid food, maybe it was fear, or perhaps a combination of the two. I stepped over to the Jeep and swigged some of the milk mix, swallowing as fast as my throat would allow. After a few moments I began to feel better . . . less shaky, but far from relaxed.
I looked up and noticed Maya and Ambrosio watching me expectantly. I sighed. I'd already been almost buried alive in sand, almost roasted alive in molten lava, almost drowned. I supposed I could risk almost plummeting to my death . . . as long as we didn't forget the almost part.
“What the hell,” I said as bravely as I could. “Let's give it a shot.”
Ambrosio's response was a big grin. From Maya . . . a lingering look and a slow nod. What was she thinking? What was going on behind those jade eyes? Was all this necessary, or was she merely testing my limits, seeing how far she could push me before I'd dig in my heels and go no further?
I had to admit the wings were pretty ingenious—more like a kite, actually. Slim, flexible tree branches formed the frame, thickly layered palm leaves the skin, all bound together by tough green vines. Thicker vines strapped the frame to my body and formed handholds on the wings. The narrow V-shaped end of the kite was tethered to my left ankle; my right leg remained free.
“When you begin to fly,” Ambrosio said as he tied the last knot, “hook your right foot over the left.”
“When I begin to fly . . .” I said, grinning. “Now there's a prime example of positive thinking.”
Where was the terror? For some reason, I wasn't nearly as afraid as I should have been. After the initial alarm, my self-preservation instincts seemed oddly muted this time. A side-effect of Captain Carcinoma's relentless assault, perhaps? Or were the rational parts of my brain overriding them? After all, if I went into a nose dive, what was the cost? I'd have advanced the inevitable by only a couple of days. A few dizzy seconds of tailspinning terror, and then instant, merciful oblivion, quicker than my Kevorkian kit.
I found an odd sort of peace in that.
Ambrosio started tying the rope around my waist.
“What's that for?”
“There are two dangers here,” Maya said.
“You mean besides dropping like a stone?”
“Yes. The other is flying too high. If you get too far above the rim, the crosswind will push you out of the updraft—”
“And I'll go sailing down into the jungle.”
She nodded. “Yes. We will try to prevent that with the rope.”
“I'd appreciate that.”
Ambrosio finished securing the rope, then checked all the fittings. Finally satisfied, he slapped my chest.
“You are ready to fly, señor.”
I nodded and stepped up to the edge. I couldn't believe how cocky and reckless I felt. Looking across the windy chasm, it seemed damn near impossible for this flimsy contraption to carry me to that far ledge. But I didn't care. Was this how you felt when you've got nothing to lose? Whatever it was, it pumped me full with an exhilarating, untethered feeling: I'll try anything . . . the sky's the limit.
Was this how Icarus felt?
And I wondered how Maya had felt when she'd stepped off the edge with her own set of wings. She'd had everything to lose—but she'd had her beliefs to buoy her. I, on the other hand, was buoyed by the imminence of death.
I inched the toes of my boots over the edge and felt the moaning updraft whip my hair and tug at my face. I looked into the abyss, and damned if I didn't sense it looking into me.
Now I was afraid. And I knew if I stood here much longer I might change my mind. So I clenched my teeth, tightened my grip on the handholds, leaned forward, and leaped off the edge.
I screamed in terror at the initial seconds of freefall, then the vertical hurricane of the updraft caught my wings and I thought my arms would dislocate from my shoulders. But I held on. The descent slowed, then stopped as I wheeled in a wide slow circle.
Good lord, I was flying!
I began to laugh and shout and whoop, and might have sounded like some rodeo cowboy if I'd had a voice that worked. I was giddy, I was wild, I was crazy and goddammit I was really flying!
I couldn't see Maya and Ambrosio above me on the rim, but I could hear Ambrosio calling to me about my right leg, so I hooked my trailing right foot over my left ankle and tried to gain some control over my flight. I was gliding in a slow clockwise circle. I pulled down on my right handle, dipping my right wing. This brought me closer to the center where the updraft seemed stronger. I began to rise.
Now I could see Maya and Ambrosio on the rim—Ambrosio held onto the rope with one hand and waved with the other, but Maya seemed to have the fingers of both hands crammed into her mouth. I remembered what Ambrosio had said about the crosswinds and didn't allow myself to rise too high. I pulled down on my left wing handle and widened my gyre, moving outward toward the wall where the ledge waited. But as the wall raced toward me I realized almost too late that I'd pulled down too far. Just in time I let up on the left and pulled hard on the right and barely avoided splatting myself on the lava like a bug on a windshield.
I wheeled around again and gained altitude, then took it slow, easing myself toward the periphery. The ledge hove into view like a landing field. Luckily it was large enough to forgive the many errors in my ungainly approach. I unhooked my right foot and stuck it out, looking to make a one-point landing. I thought I was going to bring it off until my boot caught on a chunk of lava and I wound up skidding to a halt on my knees.
But I'd made it! I was here!
I stayed on my knees and sagged with relief. I let my pounding heart slow as I realized that I was nowhere near as cavalier as I'd seemed. I wanted to live more than I'd thought. That I'd just done something completely insane struck home with full force.
Finally I struggled to my feet and turned. I gave Maya and Ambrosio a thumbs up, then turned to the wall. I hobbled along the ledge, following it into a recess where I found another giant geode set into the rear wall. Four blue-hued tines nestled in its core. I plucked one free and put it in my pocket where it clinked against the other two. That was the easy part.
Now all I had to do was get back.
/>
I found myself quaking at the thought. What had changed? I'd already done it. I knew now beyond a doubt that Ambrosio's wingkite contraption worked, and that I could handle it. I'd done it once, I could do it again . . . couldn't I?
Not that I had a choice. Take another great leap or stay here and rot.
And then I noticed the wind-tossed rope trailing from my waist to Maya and Ambrosio on the other side. What if . . . ?
I visualized them tying their end to the Jeep, myself finding a place to secure my end over here, and then crossing the chasm hand over hand along the rope.
Who was I kidding? My failing muscles wouldn't carry me ten feet before giving out and sending me down the Devil's Whistle right into his gullet.
But I also knew if I stepped up to the edge and looked down again, I'd have one hell of a time taking that giant step. So I ran for the edge—ran as best I could with one leg tethered to the wing assembly—and took a flying leap into the void.
Again that initial sensation of freefall, and then being buoyed by the wind. I headed directly across. Circling seemed dangerous now, what with the possibility of slamming into the sides. The central updraft seemed stronger, or perhaps I hadn't been in the core of it before. It caught me full blast when I was halfway across and lifted me to rim level, then higher. I dipped a wing to take me out of the blast but I seemed to be caught. I was looking down on Maya and Ambrosio and saw them hauling on the rope, reeling me in. Yes. Do that. Reel me in like a kite. Get me back to solid ground. Now. Please!
It was working. They were pulling me out of the gale, and I was losing altitude—but losing too much altitude too fast. The rope was slack now and I was in a dive toward Maya and Ambrosio. I let out a hoarse, cracked, anguished cry of terror as I swooped toward them. I pulled madly on the handles in a clumsy attempt to flap my wings, trying anything to slow my descent.
Ambrosio leaped and somehow got hold of me. He did his best to break my fall, but as we both tumbled to the ground I landed half on him and half on a rocky protrusion. Pain lanced through my left chest wall as I heard the dull crack of a breaking rib.
Maya rushed over. “Are you all right?”
I couldn't speak. The fall had knocked the wind out of me and a knife stabbed my chest every time I tried to take a deep breath. Finally the spasms eased and I managed a few shallow breaths.
“No,” I wheezed, clutching my side. “I'm not. I've got a broken rib.”
“But you are alive,” she said, kneeling beside me and taking my face between her hands. “That is what is most important. And you have your air tine. Now all you need is the water tine to complete your set.”
I hated to kill the bright light of hope in Maya's eyes, but she'd find out sooner or later.
“You don't understand,” I said. “If I couldn't hold enough air to reach the tines before, I'll never do it with a broken rib. It's over. I'm finished.”
When I saw her crushed expression, I didn't know who I felt sorrier for: me or her.
12
An agonizing trip back to the coast. Every bump shot pain through my chest wall.
Night was falling when we reached the village. By the time we finished dinner—if sweetened milk from various plants and animals can be called dinner—the pain in my ribs had eased, but try as I might I could not draw a full breath.
Which meant my initial assessment had been on the money: the odds of my making a dive to thirty feet tomorrow had been slim without a broken rib; now they'd moved into the million-to-one neighborhood.
So I sat inside the door of my hut feeling miserable as I watched moonshadows migrate across the sand. Then a shadow stopped in my doorway.
Maya. She stood silhouetted in the moonlight. She wore a simple cotton shift and carried what looked like a large jar.
“I have something for you,” she said, holding it up.
“Does it allow you to breathe underwater?”
“It is a healing unguent,” she said, her voice soft as she came toward me. “An old Mayan formula.”
“‘Unguent.’ There's a word you don't hear much these days. But no salve can heal a broken bone.”
“One never knows. Take off your shirt and lie back on that blanket.”
I did as I was told and she knelt beside me.
“Show me where it hurts.”
I laid my hand across the bruised, tender swelling of my left sixth rib. “Right here.”
Maya moved my hand away and began gently applying the unguent. It had a warm, creamy feel, slightly oily, redolent of rich soil and growing things. The inside of the hut began to smell like the jungle. Her fingers moved in slow circles, sliding over my ribs, leaving to dip into the jar, then returning to spread the unguent over a wider and wider area.
She hovered over me and brought her other hand into play. Now she was massaging my pectorals and shoulders, then my abdomen. Tiny electric shocks ran from her fingertips down to my groin. I felt myself becoming aroused.
“Turn over,” she said, her voice husky.
I winced with the jab of pain from my rib as I rolled onto my belly, but it subsided quickly as her hands ran over my back, kneading the shrinking, wasting muscles and massaging the unguent into my skin.
When her fingers reached my belt line she whispered, “Loosen your belt.”
More pain as I complied, but I didn't care. I was afloat, enveloped in a warm wet haze. Maya's hands slipped immediately under the waistband to massage my buttocks. Then she was tugging on the pants themselves. I lifted my hips to let her slide them off. And then I was naked and she was coating the backs of my thighs, behind my knees, then down to my ankles, an ancient priestess anointing a corpse for burial.
“Onto your back again,” she said.
I hesitated—I was fully erect against the blanket beneath me— but then I figured she had to be expecting that. So I turned over and felt myself become even harder as I jutted into the air.
Maya began working her way up from my shins, to my knees, up my thighs. Then her hands trailed away and I wanted to cry out, to beg her to touch me, please, just once. I didn't have to. She returned and gripped me with both unguent-laden hands, coating my aching erection.
I moaned, a low, almost pained sound bursting from the deepest part of me. I couldn't help it. It had been so long and her hands felt so good.
And then Maya was lifting her shift and straddling me. She was hot and wet inside, and I was greased like a Channel swimmer. I dove into her and began stroking, clutching the tops of her thighs and arching against her in a mad, frenzied rhythm while she held still, leaning on me with her hands on my upper arms. I was wildly out of control, completely at the mercy of the ecstatic pressure building in my groin and perineum. I erupted within her, my legs kicking and spasming as I released a hot, rapturous, pulsating stream that seemed to flow forever.
It took me a moment to catch my breath. I looked up at her, still astride me. She couldn't have gotten much out of that. Probably next to nothing.
Then she released a sigh, almost like a sob, and gently pounded her fists against the sand on either side of me—twice . . . three times.
I sensed her frustration. “I'm sorry. It's been so long since—”
“It is not that.”
“Then what—?”
She pressed a finger against my lips. “Hush. Never mind. And it is not over yet.”
Maya lifted her shift over her head and tossed it aside. She took my hands and placed them over her breasts. Then she began moving her hips. I was still inside her, but a lot smaller and flabbier than when I'd entered. The feel of her nipples hardening under my fingers, and the almost ceremonial way she was rotating and thrusting her hips began working their magic, however, and I was soon back to full tumescence.
And now it was Maya's turn. She leaned forward and gripped my shoulders, digging her nails into my flesh and moaning as she rode me. Finally she gasped and stiffened, rising and arching her back. I could hear her breath hissing through her teeth. As she
made a highpitched keening sound I thrust further into her and detonated for the second time. We hovered there, not quite on the ground, yet not fully off it, for I don't know how long before collapsing into a sweaty, panting tangle.
I took Maya's face between my hands and kissed her.
“You just fulfilled a condemned man's last request.”
I kissed her again and tasted salt on her cheeks.
“You are not going to die,” she whispered. “I will not allow it.”
I wrapped my arms around her bare back and held her as tightly as I dared without jostling the splintered ends of my fractured rib. I felt rather than heard her sob, and I wanted to cry myself.
Oh, Maya, I thought. I wish you had the power to offer me a reprieve. Because now that I've found you, I don't want to leave you.
Never had I met a woman so antipodal to me and yet so like me. We seemed to disagree on everything, and yet never in my life could I remember feeling more sympatico with another human being, not even Annie.
The tumor itself was unfair, but to find a soulmate who could make life so worth living just when I was riding an express train to death's door was unbearably depressing.
I wanted to say more, but my eyelids were drifting closed, and suddenly I was dropping like a stone into sleep's ocean . . .
. . . dropping like a stone . . .
. . . seeing the stone hit the surface . . . watching a slow-motion splash, seeing the ripples spread as the stone sinks into the clear depths . . .
. . . sinks . . .
. . . like a stone . . .
13
Air hunger tore me from sleep.
Gasping and hacking, I levered to a sitting position, which should have sent a shock of pain through my chest wall but didn't. When the choking spasms eased, I touched the broken rib. Still tender but not nearly so much as last night. That unguent Maya had applied seemed to have worked. I'd have to find out what was in it and—
Listen to me, I thought. As if I'm ever going to have a chance to put it to use.