The Seven Serpents Trilogy Read Online Free PDF

went down. But Don Luis forbade the
lancha
to be put in the water, and when men began to strip, making ready to set off for the beach, he threatened them with the lash.
    â€œWe go tomorrow,” he said. “In daylight, when we have taken precautions against an ambush. Remember that we are now in the land of savages. We’re not at home on the quiet banks of the Guadalquivir.”
    Esteban, standing beside Don Luis, backed up his master’s warning not by anything he said, but by the grim look on his face. I felt that even in daylight, with soldiers on guard, he would prefer to stay on the ship.
    To be truthful, I felt somewhat that way myself. The sight of the Indian captives bound hand and foot and piled in the bottom of the Carib canoe was still with me. As was the sight of Juan Sosa, struck by a flight of arrows, falling from the mainmast into the sea. Before me now was a black jungle where anything might lurk.
    The fear that grips the heart when you are in God’s presence, be it in the quiet of the night or upon your knees in prayer, this I know. But it was the first time in my life that I had felt the twinge of physical fear, raised as I had been in a place where one day was much like the next. Once, in a boyhood fight with the village bully, who had large hairy fists, I had received a flattened nose (signs of which, incidentally, I bear to this day). But the altercation had come about so surprisingly and the blow was so sudden that I had no time at all to be fearful.
    In the dusk, with a wan moon rising over a myste rious island, I didn’t blame Esteban for his silence.
    After supper that night Baltasar Guzmán fell to talk ing about the golden cities the Carib chieftain had men tioned to us. He had sailed with Captain Roa on the last voyage Columbus made, and during this time, when they anchored at a place the admiral named Costa Rica, he had heard tales about these cities, or so he claimed, and about a golden man who was the emperor of a place far to the south of Costa Rica.
    â€œThis man,” Guzmán said, “rules a large country that is very mountainous. It has a seacoast where large ca noes come and go, but mostly it is a country of high peaks and deep valleys and rushing waters. There is gold everywhere in this land. Everywhere you go you will find gold.”
    Pacheco, the barber, broke in, “This country is how far away?”
    â€œFar. Very far. My understanding is that it would take many months to arrive there. By sea, through mountains and jungles and rivers. A long time, Pacheco.”
    â€œBut worth it,” said the ship’s carpenter, Maldonado.
    â€œYes,” said Guzmán. “The houses have gold floors and walls of gold, those of the poor as well as the rich. The streets that lead to these houses are paved with gold, blocks so heavy that it requires four men to lift just one.”
    The men sat with their mouths ajar. The armorer said, “But the golden man? What of him?”
    â€œFrom the stories I have heard,” said Guzmán, “he is called Lope Luzir, which means Lord of Great Lords. He is a young man still unable to grow a beard but tall and handsome with blue eyes, which seems a singular occurrence since he is Indian by birth.
    â€œThis lord has many strange habits. He begins his day at dawn, when his attendants carry him on a golden lit ter to a small lake among the reeds. There he strips away his night clothing, and two priests cover him with sweet oils. Then two more priests come and from head to foot cover him, even his face, with gold dust.
    â€œAs dawn breaks, he stands there with his arms raised to the sun in prayer. Then he walks into the lake, and his attendants wash the gold from his body and dress him. This happens every day of the year. It happened to his father and to his grandfather. The bottom of the lake, it’s said, is paved with dust, gold dust lying deep as the golden lord is tall.”
    The crew was