Beautiful Sacrifice by Elizabeth Lowell Read Free Book Online Page A

the pulse beating rapidly at the base of her neck.
    “So, this represents the god’s mouth?” he asked, pointing to the shallow bowl that was the reason for the Chacmool’s existence.
    “Are you sure you need me?”
    “Very sure.”
    Lina told herself there was no double meaning in his words. She couldn’t quite believe it. But then, she’d never been flirted with in such a bold yet indirect way.
    “If you already know the purpose of the Chacmool…” she began.
    “Your course work covered it—a reclining man-god figure with knees bent and head raised, providing a rest for a shallow bowl.”
    “You missed half the classes.”
    “The syllabus was excellent.”
    Lina gave up and concentrated on the photo. “The glyphs I can see are what I would expect on a ceremonial object. The date. The royal hierarchy. Man’s reverence. The gods’ awful power.”
    “Is Kawa’il a part of the Chacmool and its ritual?”
    “Without seeing the entire rim, I can’t answer that.”
    “Is it possible?”
    “I’m told anything is possible, including the Maya millennium,” she said dryly. “Ask Melodee.”
    “Pass. I prefer women who haven’t been cut-and-pasted.”
    Lina shook her head, smiling. Hunter Johnston was very much to her taste. Too bad he was little better than a blackmailer.
    “You still mad that I twisted your arm to help me?” he asked.
    “Are you a mind reader?”
    “No. You were smiling, then you looked like someone had asked you to eat a bug. Since I’m the only insect-eating SOB here, it was a logical connection.”
    Hunter was entirely too quick, or she was too easy to read. Or both.
    “The fifth photo fits with the time frame and ceremonial theme,” Lina said, sticking to what she knew rather than what she feared or desired. “The censer appears to be clay, beautifully crafted so that the incense smoke would seem to be pouring from the mouths of gods.”
    “Looks like snakes to me.”
    “The feathered serpent was a common Maya theme. If the censer was originally found with the other objects—”
    “Unknown.”
    “—the assumption would be that you have the trove of a high priest or a king.”
    “You keep saying priest or king,” Hunter said.
    “The English language makes the distinction. There is no proof that the Mayan language did. From all we have learned, it appears that nobility supplied the priest-kings. The duties, if they were separate at all, overlapped so heavily as to make a distinction meaningless.”
    “I love it when you go all academic on me. Such a contrast to your—” Abruptly Hunter closed his runaway mouth.
    Lina raised one dark, wing-shaped eyebrow.
    “Off the subject,” he said. “I’m a man. My thoughts sometimes wander.”
    She didn’t ask where they went. She knew. And she liked it, which confused her. He had strong-armed her into helping him, but she wasn’t as mad as she should be. He was flirting with her, and she liked it way too much. She’d slapped down less aggressive males without a thought.
    Hunter took thought.
    “The Maya believed that a god’s words could be seen in smoke, in dreams,” she said.
    “Drug-induced?”
    “Perhaps. Peyote enemas are a documented archaeological reality, as are mushroom and other psychotropic substances. But there are other ways to induce visions.”
    “Such as?”
    “Pain. Enough pain, enough self-bloodletting, can cause what Western people label hallucinations and Maya called communication with the gods.”
    The part of herself that was instinctive, bone-deep, knew that the censer in the photo had been used in just such rituals.
    “I wonder what the gods told him,” she said softly.
    “Him? What about women?”
    “Maya weren’t, and aren’t, much for equal opportunity between sexes. A Maya queen could never ascend the throne unless she was pregnant and her husband was recently dead.”
    “So women weren’t part of ritual ceremonies?” Hunter asked.
    “The queen was, and perhaps the wives of the