Page 64 of The Lost Guardian

Santiago’s thighs clenched underneath the table. He didn’t want to believe it. Curses didn’t exist.

But then again, a week ago, he would have said secret Incan societies that protected the lost tombs of fallen Incan emperors didn’t exist, either. Since then, he had seen a lot of inexplicable things, but he wasn’t sure he was ready to believe Atahualpa and his army would somehow rise from the dead to exact their revenge on those who had betrayed them.

Still…

“We should probably find the tomb before noon on Inti Raymi,” he conceded. “Just in case.”

“That gives us five days,” Ali reminded him.

A server approached their table with the Inca Kolas they’d asked for, ready to take their food order. Santiago hastily closed his book and placed it back in his pack.

“Why don’t you choose?” he asked Ali, folding his menu and pushing it away from himself. He was wary of having another misstep.

“We are in a city now, Rios,” Ali reminded him, quirking up a dark brow. “You can have the ceviche here if you want it.”

Santiago sat on his hands, tapping his feet on the ground. “You choose,” he repeated.

Ali chuckled and ordered their lunches in Spanish. Once the server left, she leaned in closer to him.

“The first line of the new clue has me worried,” she said, chewing on her lower lip. Santiago pulled his gaze away from the flash of white dragging over plump flesh.

“The narrow river demands a sacrifice?” she continued. “The Inca were well known for their sacrifices, animal and human alike.”

“I doubt it means that to find the tomb, we need to commit murder,” Santiago joked, but the words tasted like sand in his mouth.

It couldn’t, right?

“So it’s not literal,” she said, sounding skeptical. “I hope not. I don’t want to have to kill a chicken or something.”

Santiago grimaced. He was no vegetarian, but cooking up nicely packaged chicken breasts from his fridge and having to actually kill the bird himself were two very different things.

“I think we need to figure out what, or where, the narrow river is,” she said. “If we are hoping that the sacrifice isn’t literal, maybe the river isn’t, either.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, the Inca believed that the Milky Way was actually a celestial river, right?” she ventured. “Two, in fact, with one branch of the river more visible around the June solstice and the other during the December solstice.”

He couldn’t help but feel impressed. And it must have shown on his face, because Ali glanced down and gave him a half-hearted shrug.

“I just really like the stars,” she admitted. “And space, you know.” She waved her arm dismissively.

But Santiago did not dismiss it. He filed it away.

“So when is the June solstice this year?” he asked her, and she frowned, making mental calculations.

“Two days from now,” she answered. “June twenty-first.”

“Three days before Inti Raymi,” Santiago realized. A flicker of excitement lit in his chest. “The dates are close enough to be promising, right?”

“Definitely.” Ali nodded, pursing her lips.

Stop staring at her lips! Santiago chided himself.

“What?’ he asked, dragging his gaze up. “You’re not convinced?”

“I’m just not sure yet how the Milky Way would lead us where we need to go. Do we follow its axis?” she wondered aloud. “We know that it cuts across our skies at a diagonal, twenty-six degrees from the poles. Do we start at the Ransom Room and head northeast to southwest, following its path?”

“I don’t know,” Santiago answered, his head swimming “Maybe?”