You’ll find out soon enough.
The flames died, and the first thing I saw was Monster Cab. Her face was melting off in waxy-looking chunks. I jumped back, watching in stunned silence as columns of shadowy smoke rose into the air.
“¿Qué es eso?” Mr. O breathed. “Where is mi amor?”
“An imposter,” Brooks hissed. “I knew it.”
The thing’s skin dripped to the ground in a sizzling heap of goop that smelled like canned spinach and burning hair. All that was left of Monster Cab was a lumpy statue made of hard, cracked mud, its expression frozen with terrified eyes and a wide contorted mouth.
My head was spinning. My ears rang, and my bones vibrated. Who was that guy talking to me? You’ll find out soon enough? I already didn’t like him.
Brooks rushed over and socked me in the arm. “I told you not to come here!”
A loud racket came from inside the house, like someone had knocked over a whole shelf of encyclopedias. We all rushed in. The small sala was quiet. Muddy footprints led us around the stacks of books and into the sunny blue kitchen, where the refrigerator was lying on its side. And behind it? Ren and the real Ms. Cab were sitting on the floor, tied back-to-back. Their hands and feet were bound, and their mouths were gagged with dishcloths.
“Ren!” I blurted.
“¡Mi amor!” Mr. O cried.
We freed them quickly and helped them up. Ren rubbed her wrists. “It’s all my fault…. I should have waited—”
“For us!” Brooks grumbled.
Mr. O put his arm around Ms. Cab. “Antonia…Gracias a Dios.”
Ms. Cab looked like she might hug him, but then she scowled and marched back outside to take a look at the burned statue. “First I’m turned into a chicken, then I’m gagged and tied up by a mud person who left tracks all over my house!”
Ren stared at what was left of the creepy version of Ms. Cab. “I even tried to get the shadows to untie us, but nothing worked,” she said. She was wearing some of Brooks’s clothes: a plain green T-shirt and a pair of jean shorts that were too big and hung loosely on her small frame.
“What happened to you anyways, Zane?” Brooks said with a huff.
“I…It…poisoned me!” My mind was still spinning.
“That thing could’ve killed you guys,” Brooks said, looking from me to Ren and Ms. Cab.
“Why didn’t it kill you, Ms. Cab?” I hated to be so blunt, but that was usually the way things happened in the Maya world.
“When a mud person impersonates someone,” Ms. Cab said, “they need to keep that human alive and close by.” She shook her head. “Really, Zane! How could you not notice it wasn’t me?”
Maybe because it looked just like you! I wanted to shout. Except for the brown makeup and cracking skin. Okay, maybe I should’ve noticed sooner. “Uh, sorry?”
“That fake Ms. Cab,” Ren groaned. “She tricked me, too. Told me she had information to help me.”
“Yeah, well get used to it,” Brooks warned. “Maya supernaturals can be wicked cunning.”
Rosie sniffed around, her ears pricking and her muscles flexing.
I leaned against Fuego, feeling a little weak. “Anyone want to tell me what the heck a mud person is and where this one came from?”
Brooks said, “Do you remember the Maya gods’ first creation?”
“They made humans from mud,” I said. “But the people ended up being dumb and weak, so the gods destroyed them.” Then it clicked. “Are you saying…this was some ancient mud person?”
“No,” Brooks said. “This one was freshly made, but the question is, who created it and why?”
“Obviously, the gods,” I said, because they were usually behind evil stuff.
Ms. Cab shook her head. “This work is too sloppy for the gods,” she said. “Definitely a supernatural, though, because that thing was coated with so much raw magic, it rattled my very bones.” Rubbing her forehead, she added, “I haven’t heard of an attempt at a mud person in over a century, mostly because they’re so unreliable—which tells me that whoever sent this one is an amateur.”