Jaguar Child — Catherine Mintz

A vortex of flecks of fire, a fuego fantasma, forms in the street beyond me and drifts toward the noise of the plaza, trailing glittering debris. Through the cloth of my dress, I touch the copper sun hanging at my breast and stand, shivering, shoulders against the quinta wall, one cheek pressed against the fine shuck-work of the basket on my shoulder. The sweet scent of death-fragrant oils, wine, spices, and precious woods-eddies up our street. I shiver, and draw my veil over my face with my free hand. Tonight a fortune will be burned so it may go to the dead lands with the alcalde, Leon Ildefonso, the ruler of our town. In the distance, I can hear the funeral crowd roar, then roar again. They have lighted the pyre, its smoke and sparks turn the sky into glowing lizard skin. Drifting against the wind, a cloud of fantasmas, brighter than the dull red moons, speckles everything below them with lurid light.... No one is interested in me: time to go.