‘Please take care,’ Aleta said.
‘Already he means something to you,’ Arana observed with a gentle smile after O’Connor had left.
‘More than I thought, even if it is like living on the run with Indiana Jones. You’re the one who said I should trust him with my life.’
‘And now you’re going to have to trust me. Do you recall me telling you about the need to replenish your inner spirit?’
Aleta nodded.
‘Tonight, we’re going to cleanse that inner spirit, which will also relieve your depression. I want you to lie over here,’ Arana said, indicating a garden bench covered with big soft cushions. ‘Have you ever been hypnotised?’
‘No. Is it safe?’
‘I did say you will have to trust me. The mind has different states, Aleta. When we’re awake, we’re in what is known as the beta state, the state in which we’re alert: we’re thinking and our brainwaves are pulsing at somewhere between fifteen and thirty cycles per second. At eight to fifteen cycles per second we fall into the more relaxed alpha state, usually when we’re drifting in and out of sleep, or even absorbed in a movie.’ He paused, allowing Aleta to make herself comfortable.
‘You’re becoming more relaxed,’ Arana said softly, passing his hand above Aleta’s eyes. ‘Close your eyes and we will move towards the theta state, when your brainwaves slow… slow… slower… to just four or five cycles per second. The state we reach when entering a deep sleep; a state that you will enter softly and quietly. At the end of this,’ the shaman continued even more softly, ‘I will count to three, and you will gently awake.’
Aleta could feel herself drifting, partly because she was deeply tired, and partly because she was back in her home village under the care of a man in whom she had complete trust. The pillows were soft and comfortable and she drifted further. Her eyelids were heavy, and she had neither the strength nor the energy to open them.
‘You are walking into a deep tunnel now. You are descending stone steps that lead deeper and deeper into this tunnel. Deeper… and deeper… and deeper. The steps keep going down… and down… and down. You’ve reached a dimly lit stone corridor. It smells dank and musty down here.’ Arana waved a wild orchid in front of Aleta’s face but she wrinkled her nose distastefully. It was a test that his patient had entered a deep trance. Aleta was now open to the power of suggestion. To cleanse her spirit Arana would have to take her back in time. It was a technique the ancients had been using for centuries, a technique that modern psychiatry and hypnotherapy had only recently explained, coining the phrase ‘past-life regression’ therapy. Though each individual was different, the shaman knew every human being had lived through past lives; it was just that the memories were inaccessible in the present life. Arana also knew well that hypnosis could remove those barriers.
‘As you walk along this tunnel, you will see doors to your left and right, Aleta,’ he continued, still speaking in soft, even tones. ‘I want you to choose a door and open it.’
‘There is a brightly coloured door on my left… I’m opening it now.’
Aleta began to sway to the rhythm of the drums.
‘Where are you?’
‘I’m in Tikal. My name is Princess Akhushtal.’ Aleta had gone back to 790 AD, to the great city-state of Tikal, one of several very powerful cities in the jungles of the Yucatan Peninsula. Calakmul and Naranjo, controlled by a warrior queen, Lady Six Sky, lay further to the north. The peace between the cities was fragile.
‘What do you see?’
‘Tikal is very busy today,’ Princess Akhushtal said excitedly. ‘It’s the winter solstice tomorrow, and at dawn the High Priest will be conducting a ceremony with the jade statues to determine the resting place for the Maya Codex. But the High Priest is very worried.’
From the viewing platform where she was sitting with her father, King Yax Ain II, Princess Akhushtal surveyed the great ball court below. The muscled warriors wore thick rolls of padding to protect their ribs from a massive black leather ball over a metre in diameter as they jostled for position. The rules of the ball game prevented them kicking the ball or touching it with their hands; instead they used their heavily padded forearms and occasionally their foreheads. Headdresses of horns and quetzal and macaw feathers identified the different sides.
Princess Akhushtal’s gaze shifted from the ball court to the towering salmon-coloured pyramids at either end of the main plaza – the Temple of the Great Jaguar and the Temple of the Mask. The soaring monuments had been built fifty years before and contained the tombs of royal members of the Great Jaguar clan: King Hasaw Chan K’awil and his queen, Lady Twelve Macaw. Further to the east of the plaza, the Tikal markets were bustling with traders. The stores were shaded with sackcloth awnings. Racks of exquisitely woven cloth were suspended beneath. Rugs, pottery and baskets of spices, nuts and fruits spilled on to the main thoroughfares. The women, dressed in multicoloured blouses, balanced their purchases in wicker baskets on their heads. Noblemen in feathered headdresses reclined on wicker lounges that were carried aloft amongst the crowds by their servants. Beyond the marketplace, Akhushtal could see the sentries on top of Temple IV and Temple V, the ‘skyscraper pyramids’, the tallest structures in the Meso-American world. Below them, the gates on the causeways that connected the great city with the jungle were heavily guarded by the King’s warriors.
‘The drums are beating louder now and the game is coming to an end. My father is getting to his feet and the ball players have all turned and bowed in our direction.’
Aleta shifted restlessly on her pillows but Arana remained silent and waited.
‘My father is meeting with the High Priest now. The High Priest is warning of a great catastrophe for the Maya if we don’t change course.’
‘You must find a way to make peace with Calakmul and Naranjo,’ the High Priest informed the King in grave tones. The respected Mayan elder was tall and dressed in a white sackcloth robe and hood, his brown weathered face etched with lines of wisdom. He maintained a commanding presence, even in the company of King Yax Ain II. ‘If these wars continue, not only will there be more casualties on both sides, but the entire Mayan civilisation will come under threat. The wars are destroying the environment on which your people depend for their very existence.’
‘The people of Calakmul and Naranjo are very stubborn,’ the King complained. ‘I have a duty to maintain our way of life. We are the pre-eminent city, and they must conform to our customs and traditions. If necessary, we will force them to adopt our way of living.’ The muscled, well-built warrior King was seated on a low stool, resplendent in a headdress of red, blue and green feathers from the prized quetzal bird, his protective leather battle-dress fastened at the belt by a huge jade emblem.
‘The dominant society and culture must take the lead, but that does not mean we should not accept other cultures,’ the High Priest persisted. ‘It’s not a weakness to sit down and reach agreement. It’s a strength.’
‘It will be perceived as a weakness, especially by the council of advisors,’ the King grumbled.
‘We are coming to the end of the tenth baktun. It will be a time of great upheaval and loss,’ the High Priest warned, reminding King Yax Ain II that the current baktun, a cycle of 394 years, was coming to its conclusion. ‘The destruction we experienced at the end of the last baktun will repeat itself.’
The King looked thoughtful.
‘The signs will keep repeating until we take notice of the warnings – or sow the seeds of our own destruction, and eventually the destruction of the entire planet.’
‘The entire planet?’
‘The destruction at the end of this baktun will be widespread, particularly amongst your own people, but the destruction of the entire planet is not scheduled to occur until the end of the thirteenth baktun: in the year 2012.’