Hunters of Chaos (7 page)

Hola, Tio y Tia,

I'm here! The flight was great, and everyone here is so friendly. I have a ton of new friends already. We even had a slumber party. The campus is out of this world. I can see why Mom and Dad liked it here. You could have warned me about the earthquakes, though. How do you not mention that the freaking ground moves? But even the earthquakes have turned out to be cool. You might see this on the news, but after the one yesterday, they found an Anasazi temple right here at Temple. Ha! A temple at Temple. Funny, huh? Anyway, I miss you guys. Hope you're doing all right without your favorite kid around. Got to go hang out with my new friends now. They all love my jaguar necklace, by the way.

Les quiero,

Ana

I hit send before I could feel too bad about lying to my family. What good would it have done them to know what a rotten day I'd had? It's not like they could hop on a plane and come get me, and sulking wasn't my style. Besides, Lin may have been a pain, but she wasn't the only one who lived in this dorm. I cracked my door open and heard the sounds of other girls hanging out in the common room. They had turned on the TV, and I could smell the aroma of popcorn wafting up from the kitchen. Aunt Teppy always told me that the best revenge against people who are trying to make you miserable is to be happy. And that's just what I planned to be. I closed the door behind me and headed to the common room to join my new friends.

B
ACK IN MY OLD SCHOOL
, we were lucky to get waxy pizza and frozen fish sticks for lunch. Now I sat at a table stocked with spicy tuna sushi rolls and ramen soup. And there wasn't a plastic spork in sight—only real silver spoons and forks, individually wrapped in cloth napkins, and porcelain chopsticks. But none of that was as weird as the fact that I was sitting with Nicole, Lin, and the rest of their friends. They'd invited me to lunch that day as if nothing had happened the day before.

“Are you sure you want to hang out with a ‘savage' like me?” I'd said when Nicole asked.

She laughed it off like I was being silly. “Are you still on that? You've got to learn to take a joke, Ana.” She jerked her head, gesturing for me to follow her.

I wish I could say that I held out for an apology. But I was bummed that I still hadn't heard from my aunt and uncle—
Have they forgotten about me already?
—and the thought of eating alone only made me feel worse. The good news was, Lin was just as rude to the rest of her friends as she'd been to me, and none of them seemed to take it too seriously. Maybe I
had
overreacted. Still, the longer I listened to them talk, the less I felt like I'd ever truly be a part of their group.

“Are you going to spend Christmas in Aspen again this year?” Tanya asked Lin. “My parents are buying a chalet there. We could meet up over break.”

“Doubtful,” Lin answered. “Aspen has been done to death. Besides, it looks like my mother will be filming her next movie in Shanghai, so I'll be there. I'll have to spend hours on set with that awful craft-services food.” She rolled her eyes as if the whole thing was such a bother.

“I'd kill to be either one of you,” Tammy chimed in, picking up a California roll with her chopsticks. “I'll be in boring old Beverly Hills, as usual.”

“What about you, Ana?” Jessica asked, turning to me. “Where did you say you were from again?”

I hesitated, racking my brain for anything that would sound more glamorous than “Cleveland.” “Oh, um, I live on the East Coast,” I said.
Well, near it, anyway.

“I love New York City. Have you been shopping at Henri Bendel?”

I had never heard of this Henri person, let alone shopped at his store. I did my best imitation of a Lin shrug. “Who hasn't?”

Before they could ask me anything else, I excused myself to go get a bowl of red-bean ice cream from the dessert bar. I guessed chocolate chip cookies would have been too common. By the time I got back, the conversation had moved on to tennis lessons and charity balls, and of course more talk about Lin's famous mother and diplomat father—Nicole and the others listening with rapt attention. I breathed a sigh of relief. Lin's self-centered babble may have been annoying, but it also took the pressure off me. It was exhausting trying to fit in with these girls, and I wasn't sure how much longer I could keep it up.

Again I wondered how my own mom and dad had managed to do it. Had they lied their way through, pretending to be wealthy East Coast socialites? Or had Temple just been very different back then? I tried to picture them sitting in this fancy dining room together, cloth napkins folded over their laps, heavy polished silverware in their hands. But maybe when they were here it had been a normal school cafeteria with hard white benches and plastic utensils. Maybe instead of drinking tea from delicate china cups, they'd had cardboard cartons of milk with cartoony pictures of cows on them. Or maybe it hadn't been different at all, and my mother and father were just like the girls that surrounded me now—privileged, shallow, and completely alien to me. It was possible that the picture of them sharing a scarf in the falling snow was the lie. All I knew was that the harder I tried to picture my parents here, the blurrier their faces became. I thought coming to Temple Academy would bring me closer to them, but they felt further away than ever.

That afternoon, when classes were done for the day, instead of walking back to the dorm with everyone else, I told Nicole I had forgotten my book and had to go back to math class. But really I just wanted to get away and take a walk on my own. I let my mind wander as I made my way around the paths and across the athletic field until I felt my black shoes sinking into soft red earth. When I looked up I realized I'd come to the site of the Anasazi temple.

A team of archaeologists was hard at work, clearing away fallen rock and tagging objects as they pulled them from the dirt. Dr. Logan stood off to the side in a pair of jeans, the sleeves of his button-down shirt rolled up to the elbows. Though his boots were caked with dirt, his teeth were still so white, I probably could have seen them from space. When he noticed me, he smiled and waved me over. I ducked under the yellow cautionary tape and joined him at the base of the temple.

“You were one of the students from Ms. Benitez's class that came yesterday, right?” When I nodded, he said, “I knew it. I never forget a face. Couldn't stay away, huh? Well, I don't blame you. This is fascinating stuff. Just look at what we found this morning.” He bent down and picked up a clay bowl that had black interlocking diamond designs covering the surface. “When most people think of ancient civilizations, they picture simple folk whose only concern was function. Not so!” he cried, pointing his index finger toward the sky. “They were artists, too, and cared about aesthetics as well as utility.”

I nodded again, almost entranced by the intricate patterns. When I finally looked away, my eyes landed on a fat gray vase that was shaped like a teardrop. There were figures carved into the side, though I couldn't make out what they were. “What about that one?” I asked, pointing to the vase.

Dr. Logan looked at the artifact, then looked back at me with a shrewd stare. “Ah. Good eye, Miss . . .”

“Cetzal,” I supplied. “Ana Cetzal.”

He studied me for a moment, then said, “You've picked out a very important piece, Miss Cetzal.” He stooped to pick up the vase, blowing away a bit of dust at its neck. As he brought it closer, the abstract form I'd seen began to take shape.

“It's a cat,” I said, surprised to find a common household pet on such an old piece of art.

“Very good,” said Dr. Logan. “But that should be no surprise. Many cultures have worshipped cats as gods or conduits to the spirit world. Ancient Egyptians, for example, and the Ashanti people of West Africa. Like them, the Anasazi believed that cats represented enormous power.”

“Even regular house cats?”

“I believe so, yes. But notice the elongated limbs here and the thick tail,” Dr. Logan said, pointing to different parts of the drawing. “This particular piece more likely is an early rendering of one of the great wildcats—a lion, perhaps, or a jaguar.”

My hand flew to my neck, tracing the curves of the turquoise jaguar hanging right below my collarbone.

Just then a flicker of movement off to the right of the temple caught my attention. It was a sleek black cat with blazing green eyes. As I watched, it disappeared into a nearby bush. I had to follow it. I'd always loved cats, though Uncle Mec had never let me have a real one because he was allergic. But I'd heard we were allowed to keep pets here at school, so maybe this cat could be mine—at least while I was in New Mexico.

“Thanks for showing me this, Dr. Logan,” I said. “I should get going.”

He nodded. “Of course, Miss Cetzal. Come back anytime.” He gave me another big smile, then went to talk to one of the other archaeologists.

I made a beeline for the low shrubs where I had last seen the beautiful black cat. I couldn't go through the tangle of twigs and weedy branches as the cat had, so I circled around until I was on the other side of the line of bushes facing the jogging path. “Here, kitty, kitty,” I called. Then I hunched over and made kissing sounds as I walked along, scanning the bushes for a flash of green. My lips were still puckered when I ran right into someone's legs.

“Should I leave you and the bushes alone?” Jason said, giving me a curious smile.

Well, that figures,
I thought. I hadn't seen him all day, so of course he'd catch me blowing kisses to a shrub.

“Um, it's not what it looks like, I swear. I . . . I thought I saw a cat,” I said, wishing I could vanish the way the cat had.

“Uh-huh, I believe you,” he responded, then shook his head and mouthed,
No, I don't.

I chuckled. “Fine. You got me. My name is Ana Cetzal and I am in love with this plant.”

“Well, the first step is admitting you have a problem.”

I smirked at him, holding back a laugh. Why did he make me feel so giddy, even when he was making fun of me? “What are you doing here, anyway?” I asked. “Hiding out from your many admirers?”

He blushed, which I hadn't even known boys could do. “Actually, I was just jogging around the valley when I decided to come check out the Anasazi site. I hear they have a lot more of it uncovered now.”

“I just came from there,” I said, pleased to find we had a common interest.

“So you've seen it,” he said. “How cool is it that they found it right here at Temple?”

“Very cool,” I agreed. “But I was starting to think I was the only one who thought so. My class couldn't even be bothered to stop texting and check it out.”

“That's crazy,” Jason said. “Don't think I'm a total geek but . . . after the site was discovered, my mom asked me to look up some facts about the Anasazi on the Internet, and now I'm kind of obsessed.”

“Well, the first step is admitting you have a problem.” I smiled.

“No, seriously. They were awesome! Did you know that they migrated a bunch of times over hundreds of years, from here all the way down to Mexico, but all their settlements were along the exact same meridian, one hundred eight? They didn't have compasses or anything, though. No one knows how they did it.”

“Really? Is this school on that meridian?”

Jason shrugged. “Beats me, but I wouldn't be surprised. It's like they were magic or something.”

I laughed. “Come on. Magic? You don't really believe in that, do you?”

“Honestly? I don't know,” he said, scratching the top of his head. “Archaeologists have found wood in their cliff cities that could have only come from trees that were at least fifty miles away. Nobody can figure out how they did that without cars. So you tell me.”

“Well, they probably just . . . I mean, maybe they . . .” I trailed off. I had no idea. “Okay, fine. They were magic.”

“What? You believe in magic?” Jason said. “What a freak.”

I knew he was joking, but his words brought to mind what Lin had said to me the day before. “You're not the only one who thinks I'm a freak. This girl Lin said the earthquake and yesterday's thunderstorm were my fault since they arrived around the same time I did. She said maybe I was carrying around some ancient Aztec curse.”

“Lin Yang? Don't pay any attention to her. She's just jealous.”

“Of me? Why?” I asked. “Her father is a diplomat and her mother is some kind of movie star. She has everything.”

“Yeah, but she's been at this school for a while and nothing much has happened. But you show up, and things start getting interesting.”

Before those final words were even out of his mouth, the ground began to tremble beneath our feet, and the trees swayed as if they were being shaken by invisible giant hands. Another earthquake! I screamed and latched on to Jason's arm until it was over. When the rumbling finally stopped, Jason glanced down at his arm, which my hand was still clutching for dear life. He looked up, into my eyes, smiled, and said, “See what I mean? When you're around, the earth moves.”