The two goddesses undressed and began to bathe with the water stored in the small cistern inside the room.
Tul stared in wonder at the enormous scar across Tania’s abdomen.
“What happened to you, ch’úupal?” the rabbit goddess asked curiously.
“This?” Tania said, touching the scar. “Just something that reminds me of my own weakness.”
“Do you want me to make that scar go away?” Tul asked brightly.
“You can do something like that?” the Punic goddess asked in surprise.
“Of course! Want me to use my ointment on it?” Tul asked.
Tania thought for a moment, but in the end she refused the offer.
“This scar reminds me that I must grow stronger to protect my family,” the goddess said, smiling at Tul.
The rabbit goddess nodded with a smile as well.
While Tania washed her leporine companion’s hair, Tul lowered her head and asked, “Ch’úupal... can I go with you on your adventure? I promise I won’t get in the way, and I’ll try to help you in any way I can.”
Tania had not considered taking Tul out of Cahokia when they escaped, but she was delighted at the thought of keeping her by her side. She felt certain repressed maternal instincts awakening within her, and it became impossible for her to refuse. The Punic goddess embraced Tul’s naked body and rested her head against the back of her neck.
“I could never leave you behind,” she said.
Tul smiled and thanked her.
“But don’t you have family? Parents? Wouldn’t the goddess Ixchel you mentioned miss you?” Tania asked. “If one of my daughters had been missing for months, I would be worried sick, searching everywhere for her.”
“I don’t think the great Ixchel would miss me all that much. Besides, I’m not the only rabbit in her service,” Tul said.
“And... no, I don’t have parents. I’m more like a machine made to serve the moon goddess. I wasn’t born. I was created.”
Those words pained Tania’s heart, and she could tell they pained her rabbit companion as well.
“Do not worry, Tul. I will not see you differently because of that,” Tania said.
Tul nodded and thanked her new friend for those words.
When they came out of the bath, they noticed two dresses hanging there. They were long, sleeveless garments in red and ochre, decorated in front with geometric patterns that looked like stairways.
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“Well, at least we’ll be able to wear clean clothes. I suppose I should thank them for that much,” Tania said as she put on the dress. Tul dressed herself in the garments as well.
Tania turned to look at the enormous pyramid once more and saw that the sky was beginning to turn red.
“I suppose the hour of sacrifice is drawing near. We need to figure out how to get out of here as quickly as possible,” she said.
“I have another one of my super-great ideas, ch’úupal!” Tul cried excitedly again.
“Don’t raise your voice so much, Tul. What is it now?” Tania asked.
The rabbit goddess picked up the curtain Tania had torn down from the window, then pulled a white liquid from her bag and smeared it over the cloth. After that, she removed the sheet from the bed, took one of the palm branches from it, and wrapped the top of the branch with the soaked curtain.
“Ta-dah!” the rabbit goddess sang proudly, showing off her invention.
“Is that a torch?” Tania asked.
“Yes, ch’úupal,” Tul replied. “Use your fire power to light the tip, and then we can get rid of the seal without touching the window frame.”
At that moment, the sound of drums and wind instruments echoed through the air. Tania turned to look at the pyramid again and saw three figures with the lower halves of their faces painted red, wearing elaborate ceremonial headdresses of gold and copper. They wore only red loincloths, and each carried a sort of hammer made of copper and wood.
Then dozens upon dozens of prisoners began marching toward the pyramid, all bound by ropes around their necks and driven forward by soldiers. Tania then saw that among those prisoners were Anpiel and Susanoo, both dressed only in simple loincloths just like all the other men.
One of the men began to chant something, though neither Tul nor Tania could understand it. Even so, they knew that the sacrifices of the day were about to begin. The Punic goddess quickly seized the torch Tul had made and lit its tip. The fire immediately spread across the entire sheet.
“It’s a really, really strong fire-feeder, ch’úupal. That way the flame won’t go out,” Tul said proudly.
Tania then brought the improvised torch toward the window frame, where she could see the anti-divinity seal, and tried to burn it away. But the moment the torch touched the seal, Tania felt her strength draining from her, and the torch slipped from her hands, falling to the ground below the great structure.
“Sorry! I couldn’t do it!” Tania said nervously.
The guards saw the torch and pointed toward the window where Tania and Tul stood, then immediately ran off.
“They noticed right away,” Tania said anxiously, as she watched the first men begin climbing the stairs of the great pyramid.
“What do we do?” the rabbit goddess asked in alarm. But then she noticed that Tania was staring fixedly at the first human sacrifice. One of the priests seized the man by the hair and, with his knife, tore off his head and raised it toward the sun.
The soldiers began pounding on the door and shouting for them to open it, but Tul gave no answer, while Tania kept staring at the horrific spectacle as though she had forgotten everything else.
“No. I told Rodrigo not long ago that one must not interfere in the customs of other peoples,” Tania said to herself. “But the souls within me cannot allow this perversion to continue—not today, not ever.”
Then Tania’s hair began to change from red to a blazing yellow-red, just as it did when she wore her totema. Her eyes also began to glow, and an intense heat started spreading everywhere.
“What power! And we’re still inside an anti-divinity chamber!” Tul said in amazement.
At that moment, the soldiers smashed the door open and rushed inside armed with clubs and knives, ready to attack the foreign women. But the heat had become so intense that the soldiers, despite being protected by Heshuka’s blessing—which raised their strength to divine levels—were forced to stagger backward as they watched the room explode into fragments.
Tul then looked on in amazement and realized that the blaze unleashed by Tania had not touched either her or the soldiers, all of whom were frozen with fear before the sight of her. Tania now wore her totema, and wings of fire spread from her back, while her hair blazed like a bonfire. At last, in the New World, the Punic goddess had finally attained her manticore transformation.