Casca 2: God of Death by Barry Sadler Page A

to carry their prayers and messages to the gods. The native captives obviously knew their fate and were reconciled to it. The eldest priest, in a great feathered rendition of a monstrous serpent in emerald and cobalt blue feathers, selected one of the brown-skinned captives with a quick motion of his wrist. The man began to sob. Casca guessed that something unpleasant was about to happen. Perhaps they had the same thing here as in the Roman arenas where he had fought. The elderly priest spoke quietly and gently to the man and motioned to the top of the pyramid and to the skies. The man gained control of himself and was led away by two guards. The guards' treatment was firm but full of respect.
    A chill ran up Casca's spine, a feeling of premonition....
    The priests went one by one until they had faced and spoken with each prisoner. The prisoners were then taken and lodged in separate huts.
    Then it was Casca's turn.
    The old priest, with his escort of lesser holy men, slowly faced this stranger from the sea. Smiling a toothless grin, the old man said in gentle tones, “Xiteohua uotec, Chmpe xaoca huacn?” Then he pointed to himself and said, "Tezmec" He thumped his meager chest and repeated, "Tezmec." Placing his ancient hand over Casca's heart, he thumped the chest and said."Chicxa ?"
    Casca didn't know what the hell the words themselves meant, but he got the general idea. He nodded as if he understood and said, "I am called Casca."
    The old man backed away from him. There was puzzlement in the ancient eyes. "Chicxa?" he asked, tentatively.
    "Casca. I am Casca."
    Disbelief was in the old priest's eyes. He turned quickly to the Jaguar man who had been in charge of the capturing force and fired a stream of rapid questions at him in a staccato voice. One word was repeated so much that Casca could identify it. It sounded like " quetza." Shit. That must be my name he's trying to say. Must be the way they say Casca.
    But that was the only word he could make out. While the priest and the leader were talking, Casca took a better look at the pyramid. It was a big thing. A series of stairs led to the top. Whatever was up there was not visible from where he stood, but carved all along the steps was a continuous line of serpent heads, flanking the staircase all the way to the top. Casca looked back at the priest.
    The Jaguar leader was now on his knees, drawing a picture in the dust. Obviously he was trying to get across to the high priest how the strangers had come to this land and how they were captured, and either drawing a picture in the dust did the job better than words – or maybe there were no words to explain easily in this language what he had seen. He drew what even Casca could tell was a rough sketch of the Viking longships. Then the leader drew a larger sketch of the figureheads on the long-ships. Then the leader drew a larger sketch of the figureheads on the longships, the dragon heads. At this the old priest became extremely agitated. Looking back and forth between Casca and the sketches, he pressed his questioning of the leader. And again and again the word quetza was repeated.
    The thing that seemed to excite the old priest the most was the dragon head of the longship. He kept pointing at its rude drawing in the dust.
    I don't know what the hell he's getting so worked up about over a piece of carving , Casca thought. They certainly have plenty of carvings here . Again he took in the imposing pyramid. In addition to the painted stuccoed facings, much of the structure was heavily decorated with carvings…. heads of the great serpent ... and the likeness of another ugly bastard that Casca knew nothing about. Further, the body of a great serpent was intertwined in high relief between carvings of sea shells and snails. Casca raised his eyes higher. He saw that there were six levels to the pyramid, each decreasing in size toward the top. At the very top there was what appeared to be a temple constructed of dark wood. He