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“Its ritual value is too much, for us to let it fall into the hands of Atahualpa it is the symbol of the Huáscar's family, I will NOT let him have it even if he has our blood he will NOT have that symbol of purity.” “What of Huascar? Do you think Atahualpa has captured him? “
“All I know is what I saw, him in the thick of the fighting. It would be to the death. Huascar would not give in easily to his enemy, besides, unknown to Pqua, her brother had seen her sloping away with her lover.
Others too had seen her escaping and had gone to pursue them, not for long, cut down by Huascar!
It was during that bloodbath that Atahualpa spotted him. Without the gem, the rage, the fury in his eyes, he moved to seize Huascar. Pqua and her lover, wasted no time in taking the path, towards some of the deities they knew were still loyal to them and would hide them.
At least the path led downwards! Problem is, what goes down inevitably leads to paths that climb up the next mountain! Stopping some distance away they looked across to the mountain they had left behind them to climb up this one! .
It would be slow progress. Lacking the enthusiasm of the moment, they were in a place that overlooked the valley below, a magnificent panorama. . They sat down to sip some refreshment and chew on some leaves.
“Is it not beautiful this land of ours” He nodded. “If it were not for those like Atahaulpa who spill our peoples blood so freely. “ Clinging to him, he kissed her, then they held each other. “We see the sun rise, the sun set and yet we know, our days are growing short” She moved closer to him.
“Promise me, you will NEVER leave me ?” “I would die for you” “That I already knew, but I will never grow tired of hearing you say it !” “Lets rest!” Minutes later their eyes closed, they fell asleep.
They had not seen the soldiers. An hour later, creeping towards them, surrounding them. Prodding them to wake them. Forced to march back, to where they had come from.
The sight was one of total devastation. She wept again when she saw how his soldiers had ransacked their home, burning, looting and killing without mercy. Yet deep within her heart, did she not know, did she not expect anything less from Atahualpa? They were now stood pushed down onto their knees in front of HIM !
Atahaulpa was ecstatic, an insane delight at seeing them both! The news that she had a lover, had violated the sacred code! A perfect reason to sacrifice her, to butcher others who would be revealed as having known of the heresy committed, executed! First he had to find out what had happened to the gem!
He lashed out at her lover, kicking him hard, “Tell me, where it is, or you will both die SLOWLY”
His words? To no avail, the fury coming to the fore, his insanity in full force. “Hold him! “ He glared at Pqua.
“If he will not tell me, then I, will loosen his tongue. Perhaps seeing your lover suffer will loosen yours to tell me where the gem is! “ The blade flashed in his hands. Her lovers tongue pulled hard out of his mouth?
Stretched almost torn out! Held in his hand, the sound of his voice, the garbled scream, as the blade cut into his tongue. the blood pouring out across his face down his cheek.
The sound of his scream fading as he became unconscious. Atahualpa was laughing. That insane howl of delight at the look on her face of sheer terror. He shoved her lover towards her the blood still pouring as she grabbed a rag to place it against it within his mouth.
“Take them both away and prepare them for the sacrifice tomorrow” He leaned close to her.
“ My sister, I will give you time, to tell me where the gem is, if you do not tell me before the sun rises I will have much pleasure in sending you to join Huáscar and his family !
As for your lover and his family!” He turned to one of his advisors “How many hearts have we from them so far ?” “At least two hundred “ Another screech of laughter from Atahualpa.
The thick stone walls of the chamber, the small opening, the heat, the stench of death.
Thrown in onto the stone floor, his guards, went to slam the door shut on them. One of them let a female slide past him for the female to give Pqua some water and some clean cloths. Hauled out and cursed at by the guard as now the door slammed shut.
She was trying to stop his bleeding and packed his mouth with material, almost at one point choking him!
He spluttered as she tried again to contain the bleeding, this time with some success as he slumped back.
Weak from the masive loss of blood. Holding him she laid back against the wall of her prison, and wept.
Later that night one of the guards entered with food.Helping her, to rest her lover, against the wall, propped up.
He pointed to the food. Taking some root from his hand, he passed it to her. “Grind it, get him to swallow it, it will ease the pain, he may not know you. Its properties are very strong.
Huascar is dead, several of the families, have been slaughtered and the rest of them, those that could, have escaped into the mountains. I will try and see if I can help you escape. For now eat! “ He left.
After eating, Helping her lover to take some food, with great difficulty in swallowing, she sipped some water then grabbed a piece of cloth. A plain piece with a little design on it, the middle being a place, she would now write on using ancient writing to illustrate the place where the gem could be found ? Her blood. Tearing the material in half she concealed the pieces on her.
The next morning, before the sun rose, they were dragged out of the cold stone room. He was barely alive, totally drugged and no sense of pain, his body almost numb.
To the point he could not walk! Two of them carried him. On the way up, the vast number of stone ledges, pretending to be short of breath and almost fainting, she had stopped twice.
Each time, she sought somewhere to secrete the material, with the map and the code.
The second time, the warrior had gotten suspicious, but she had pretended to stumble, the palm of her hand resting against a crack in the rocks.. The material now pushed between the crack in the stones, to slide behind, now out of sight.
At the top, the sight of thirty or more males, five of them in costume with him in the middle.
Clothing torn off them until they were both naked. Thrown across the sacrificial stone, she was forced to watch as he took the ceremonial semi circular blade and shoved it into the chest of her lover.
Reaching in to grab at his still beating heart, he tore it from the body the blood pouring out to be caught within the sacred Jagwa cup. She had fainted, only to be brought back, to see her lovers body thrown to one side.
Pinned down on the stone, the force they used to hold her down had started to crush her spine.
Now losing sensation in her lower limbs spreading up her body she had started to panic, shaking trying to break free? The sneering sound of his voice as he moved closer to her to hiss.
“Tell me where the gem is and I will let you live.” Summoning all her courage, no longer fighting, she spat at him as his fist slammed into her face slapping her head as it jerked hard against the stone.
Her head had turned towards him, her lips moved as the blood ran from between them..
“A curse on you and all of your blood!” The flash of the blade, plunged into her chest. He ripped at her, the blade cutting in to slice her open, until his hand could reach in and grab at her heart.
She had taken the drug, could feel nothing. Yet she was still breathing, her heart still pounding as he tore at it screaming at her. Torn from her, held high, her eyes rested on it before she sank back, dead.
Raising the Jagwa cup he stepped towards the front of the high walls of the temple looking down on the
crowd below. “Let no one dispute who is GOD here! “ The blood ran over his face, between his lips as he drank back the lifeforce of his enemies.
The crowd had seen, had witnessed the slaying, knew from now on, his word was not to be questioned, unless you wanted a quick journey to the afterlife! There could be no argument as to his status. Surely his people reasoned, if he had been wrong to butcher his sister, those heavenly deities would have cut him down !
They all did it, the warriors drank the blood of their enemy. TO seize their power, their lifeforce.
Taking their heart was the ultimate prize. Eating it as he was now doing? Several of those who had opposed him and lived, fell to their knees, bowing their heads before him.
Those that had not, were not to be missing anything of what was to follow. It would be recorded to be remembered. The murmur from the crowd. Overhead they saw a giant eagle, as it hovered then suddenly plummeted to earth DEAD!
The priests were murmuring to themselves, those below also muttering amongst themselves..
“This is not good!” “I feel her words have truly cursed him! “ “He has angered the Immortal ones.”
Within weeks, Atahaulpa had become even more insane. His barbaric cruelty reached new heights as he took the children and performed sacrifical rites, one after another. Word was spreading of a stranger, of strangers in the land that rode such beasts never seen before and laid waste to all before them.
Appeasement was gold! If you gave them gold, you lived! Those who dared to challenge them were soon dead, the thunderous roar of a musket or the slicing of the blade and death followed. Killing the children, sacrficing them was Atahaulpa’s way of trying to secure power to defeat the strangers.
By the time that the Spaniards arrived in 1532, the Empire extended some 1,860 kilometers along the Andean spine--north to southern Colombia and south to northern Chile, between the Pacific Ocean in the
west and the Amazonian rain forest in the east.
It had been some five years before the Spanish invasion, that this vast empire was rocked by a civil war that, combined with diseases imported by the Spaniards, and the sheer cruelty of Atahaulpa that would ultimately weaken its ability to confront the European invaders.
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