Page 276 of Caelum

As we headed over a bridge, we saw clusters of men gathering at oneend of the street and I felt the car quicken up as we crossed onto the other side of the riverbank.

“What were they doing?” I asked Eren, who was at my side.

He curved his arm around my shoulder. “They looked like they were going to start looting.”

“People, no matter where you go, are bastards,” Frazer stated, his tone condemning as he over-revved the engine in his agitation. “They’ll take advantage of the chaos the world over to try to make a quick buck.”

“They’re going to steal?” I theorized.

“Yeah. Knock down doors and break windows to get inside stores.” He grunted. “The bitch of it is, we’ve killed one source of evil but humans… there’s just no helping them.”

His words, though they’d been throwaway, affected me as we carried on driving toward the ancient site. The bridge had let me see the colorful houses up ahead, which shone in bright jewel-like colors amid gray brick frontages that had spray paint on them. Not as graffiti, but for advertising a business, and I could only assume that the business belonged to the house owner.

When we finally parked the car, aware that we’d have to walk the rest of the way to the site, it amused me to see a Catholic church opposite one of the smaller trails we were taking.

Either they were trying to spare the souls of those who dared to believe in ancient deities or were looking to pick up donations from visitors, I wasn’t sure which. Just knew that today was going to be a slow day for them considering most of the world’s population was concerned more with hiding out than heading to church.

It was hitting four o’clock in the afternoon, and the sun was high in the sky. My skin felt slick from the heat, and the last thing I wanted was to be walking toward a temple that might or might not be the place of our deaths, but sometimes, ya just had to suck it up and get on with shit.

At least, that was what Nestor said.

I didn’t necessarily agree, but it wasn’t like I had a choice.

“I hope this is the right fucking place,” Frazer mumbled as he grabbed a backpack that was loaded with water and other stuff. ‘Stuff’ because I hadn’t been there when he’d packed it after we’d made it into Mexico City and had hit a camping store.

I had a feeling he thought we were going to have to camp out here, and that was the last thing I wanted.

To be honest, I needed to be in and out of this place as soon as we could.

After last night, and then just that short glimpse that showed me howhumans were exploiting the situation for their own gain, I wanted to get on with things. Move ahead if that was an option for us.

Maybe our death lay at the end of this journey, I wasn’t sure. But I knew we had no say in the matter. Not now. I was acting as God’s hand, for whatever reason, and as crazy as that made me sound, it was the truth.

We were ridding the world of a scourge, and yet…

I sighed.

Not all humans were like those looters, and maybe they were poor and starving. Not all humans were like those in my cult who could kill innocents because they were ill. Not all humans were like the men who’d taken advantage of a young Stefan, paying him for sex so he could fill his belly. They weren’t like the man whom Dre’s parents had paid to help them cross into America, only for him to kill them on the way there. They weren’t like Nestor’s parents who’d abandoned him to a priest because he was sick, nor were they like Eren’s brother-in-law who’d abused a mentally disturbed child…

Or were they?

Six examples of humans at their finest.

Why were we trying to save them again?

Stomach churning, and not from the blanket of heat that hit me as we began to trudge toward the complex, I grabbed Frazer’s hand. Even he had been affected by evil humans. Hadn’t his cousin been raped? Hadn’t his parents locked him in a mental asylum?

It seemed like only Samuel and Reed hadn’t been touched by the evilness of mankind.

“What is it?”

Frazer’s low voice had me shaking my head. “Nerves,” I lied, because I wasn’t nervous, just unsure if the people we were saving deserved our sacrifice.

“God, this would normally be crowded at this time of the day,” Dre stated gruffly as he eyed the empty site.

The ruins were massive, and even from this distance, the figures atop the temple were visible for all to see. Those four soldiers, made from basalt and carved so they stood thirteen feet tall, were the reason we were here and not in another part of the country.

The Toltec warriors were why Bartlett had suggested we come to this temple and not the Pyramid dedicated to Quetzalcoatl.

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