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The sun glinting off the snow at this altitude was blinding. Puriq shielded his eyes and searched everywhere for something to orient him, an exposed rock, a shadow behind a drift, the edge of the mountain peak rising above them against the brilliant blue sky. How would they know where to commit the sacrifice? He looked at the young girl: Urma, the one who drops good things in her path. How could he bring himself to kill her?

Before they began the long trek with her from Cuzco at the heart of the Inka empire, Sariri, the older priest had told him, “You cannot think of her as a person, or you will not be able to carry it out. You must separate yourself from the act. You are merely a servant in the ritual. This is not something that you chose. This is something you were chosen for.”

Sariri had instructed him carefully about each step that must be taken – the prayers, the offerings, the rituals – and about the act itself. Sariri had shown him how to do it and reassured him the girl would feel no pain.

“She will not know what is happening.”

As long as Puriq had been trained – his whole life it seemed – he knew it needed to be done, he understood why – for the people, for survival. If he did not, the snows would not fall, the rains would not come, and the people would starve – millions and millions would die – and it would all be his fault. The necessity of the act was indisputable. But how could he live with himself afterwards? How would he not think of himself as a murderer? Oh, he knew people who had killed – plenty and for good reasons – but how did they not wake up haunted by nightmares? How would he not become a monster?

“The qhapaq hucha is the only way. The mountain demands a sacrifice,” Sariri had said. “We will make all the preparations. We need to make the offering acceptable. It will take four days to climb to the summit. We will look for the signs, and when it is time, we will commit the act. It is all we can do.”

 A shadow passed over the snow, and Puriq looked up. A condor craned its naked neck and eyed the small party trekking up the mountain – the two priests, the pack animals with their shepherds, and the girl of course. They had to match their pace to hers, but she was a sturdy girl, and she did not slow them down much. If not for the ceremonial clothing, she would not have hampered them at all. The kuntur banked and swirled – its mighty wingspan, its hooked beak, the caustic juices spurting into its esophagus, preparing to retch on the carcass of its next meal.

Oh Kunturi, envoy of the ancestral spirits, carry my prayers to Inti, the Sun. Guide my hand. Let me not hesitate. Give me strength, immortal one, ruler of the upper world.

 The wind howled and Puriq shook. Why was he the one who needed to do this? In spite of the prayers and songs and rituals, it was still – at the heart of it – a cruel act. A child nonetheless. A young girl. Of course, there would be boys, often a boy and girl at the same time dressed in all their finery – a tiny groom and a tiny bride who would be buried with all the possessions they would need to start a new life together in the upper realm of Hanan Pacha.

He thought of the prayers Sariri invoked in the village before they started climbing the mountain before they reached this treacherous ascent to the peak. He remembered the weight of Sariri’s hands on his shoulders, the sound of the rattle and drum, the smell of burning cloth, the crackle of flames licking around the edges as the alpaca fibers singed and curled.

Sariri talked him through the steps of the act one more time. “It is natural to have doubts. You have never done this before. Humans have an instinctive resistance to killing. It is an abhorrent act, but you must overcome your revulsion. Do not think about how cruel it is to the child, but about how cruel it would be to the people to unleash the wrath of the gods upon them. Make no mistake, that will happen if you do not do this. Do not stay your hand. Do it quickly and mercifully. I have shown you how. The child will not see it coming. It will be a kindness. Afterwards, we will prepare her body and surround her with offerings, everything she will need in the afterlife.”

The kuntur swooped around again, feathers splayed at the tips of its wings. Red eyes, a female. Puriq took a moment to regain his strength. He turned around. The view was breathtaking. Below them, he could make out the entire swath of the glacier, the choppy broken slabs at its edges, the rifts and crevasses they had skirted because of the danger and instability of the snow there. They did not dare to tread into the ice field but traipsed near enough to hear the meltwater roaring beneath them. It seemed as if the whole mountain were coming alive. As unbelievable as he found it, the spring thaw reached even these heights. That is why they picked this time of year – they needed to find a patch of earth, a place to dig. They had to bury the girl in the ground. She had to be tucked into Pachamama. Would Earth Mother yield? How hard would the ground be? He thought about the shovels and foot plows they had brought. How would they find such a place in the snow and ice and frozen ground? It seemed impossible.

“Apu will clear a place and guide us there,” Sariri had said. The older man’s face was weathered and firm. He had a distant look in his eyes, as if he could see the upper world where the gods dwelled with those who had lived a good life – Hanan Pacha – as if it were a part of him. Would that happen to Puriq? He wanted to achieve the ability to see both worlds at once. People would admire him for that, he thought, or if not admire him, at least they would listen to him. Puriq recalled Sariri’s words: “People need to listen to you, but you cannot make them. They only will if they want to. You must make them want to, that’s the trick of it.” Sariri laughed when he said this. His laughter was a dry guttural sound at the back of his throat.

“But what if they don’t want to? How will I make them?” Puriq said.

Sariri put his hand up and silenced him. “You must stop questioning and listen. You cannot learn if you do not listen.”

Puriq sucked in a deep breath. He knew when to be silent.

The wind seared his cheeks. In these heights it was frigid and ferocious. A drift of snow collapsed and Puriq trudged on. He thought of everything he had given up – a simple life tied to the land, his family, his friends, his village, his cousins and uncles and aunts. He had left all of that behind. He was a young man, and the loneliness was unbearable. Would he ever get used to it? He missed his friends. Would he ever find new ones?

His foot broke through the crusty surface of snow as he veered away from the trail of footprints left by the others before him.

He thought of the burden he had taken on: that he had to extend the boundary of his care to encompass the people as a whole. Everything he did – every breath he took, every word he uttered, every step he took – must be with them in mind. He had to listen to what the gods were telling him, and he had to speak to them for the people. He was a conduit for the gods and the people: he had to tell the people what the gods wanted.

It was so ironic – Puriq shook his head – how did he end up becoming a priest? He did not learn how to speak until he was three years old. He never felt good at communicating. He always felt like he had to choose his words before he spoke – the risk was too great otherwise. He had to know the words ahead of time. He had to put them in the right order, had to give them the correct inflection. His mother laughed when he told her about his vocation.

“Look at you, spokesman for the people. How will you know what to say?”

She knew him well. Better than anyone else in the world, except perhaps for his youngest sister, the sibling he was most fond of, the one he would chinpachiy – hold his hand out for to help cross a gully or a stream. Sweet Achirana, always thinking about other people, always putting someone else ahead of her. He felt a particular honor in being her guardian. This was probably the quality that most qualified him to become a priest: this protectiveness from being the eldest child, of looking out for others, of seeking out danger and warning them to be careful, of protecting them from those who would harm them, from those who would bully them…

Oh, the calling was real. He need not question it.

He remembered the moment he received his vocation – the fox running past him, Atuq, the clever one, the trickster, the joker – his laughing smile, the tongue lolling out of his mouth. Atuq stopped in his tracks and stared at him. Dropping his laughing mask, he said, You, yes you. To be a protector of the people. For this you are chosen. Puriq knew it to be true for Atuq had never spoken to him like that before.

A shout went up. Sariri pointed up to a dark spot in the snow and headed toward it.

Puriq called out, “What if it is just a rock?”

“Where there is rock, there is earth!” Sariri roared. The girl followed him.

Puriq watched the way she held herself, the way she moved. Urma climbed with an awareness of how her body occupied space, of the way her limbs moved, of how she placed her feet in the snow. He wondered about her upbringing, about the dynamics within her family, about how her parents spoke to her. He knew she was the oldest of four children. She had a sister and two brothers. Before she was selected and sent to Cuzco, he had seen how she looked after them, had seen her leading the oldest boy by the hand, had seen her fondness for him. Their mother carried a baby strapped to her back while they tended alpacas in the highlands. They grew potatoes and lived in an earthen house. A ramshackle stone wall surrounded the fields where tufts of grass poked through snow. He had walked in the muddy fields, had smelled the dried dung burning in their hut, had seen the rosy cheeks of the boy and the baby’s big eyes as it peered over the blanket on his mother’s back. Was Urma thinking about her mother and siblings now, or was she thinking about her father and how proud he was that she had been chosen? Was she thinking about the home she left behind? Did she miss the spindle he had seen her with, absently twining the woolen fibers with nimble fingers? Did she miss her sister? Did she understand what was going to happen to her? Did she know how important this was?

She did not seem to be afraid. It was quite remarkable. If this were him, he would be terrified. Look how frightened he was now! He was so embarrassed for this did not comport with the image he wanted to convey…of a man, of a priest. How would he overcome this trepidation? He wanted to run away – from this responsibility, this burden – but he could not stray from this path now. The duty was sacred. He felt the gravity, the weight of it – it was such a heavy load – but he had no choice. Puriq had started down this path as a child himself.

Puriq plodded on. His shoes squeaked as he placed his feet in the holes made by the others before him. He thought about snow, how it came in many forms – flakes and drifts, corncobs and crevasses, avalanches and glaciers. He thought of its many colors, blinding white as it was now in the sunlight, the dirty black edges of slabs in a glacier field, the piercing blue of an ice cave. He thought of all these things except for the task at hand. How could he do this? It was too horrible to contemplate. How could he kill this girl? He was not a murderer.

“Do not think of it that way,” Sariri had told him. “You will not be judged by this. It is not an act of wanton disregard for life, quite the contrary. It is an acknowledgement of how precious life is. If life were not precious, would the act not be meaningless? This is the most important thing you will ever do. If not for this one act, the people would starve. What is one life compared to millions? Besides, we do not have a choice. We have been ordained by the gods.” Puriq thought about Wiraqucha the Creator, about Inti the Sun, and Mama Killa, his wife the Moon, about Pachamama Earth Mother, and Illapa the Thunder.   

He thought about the words for the sacrifice – qhapaq hucha – qhapaq – royal, noble, powerful – hucha – crime, sin, fault. How did the first person come up with the idea? Why not a llama or an alpaca? Why did it have to be a girl? Why did it have to be this one? He had not questioned this before – the necessity of it had been perfectly obvious – but now he wondered. What was the sense of it? What if he refused? What would Sariri do? Surely, he would denounce him, or worse, banish him from the province. Would he kill him? Puriq shuddered. Perhaps. At the very least, Sariri would curse him, and Puriq would have to walk alone. In some ways that would be a relief to him. What if Puriq offered himself instead of the girl? Would his sacrifice be acceptable to the gods? He knew that he was too old, and he had not been chosen for that. He had been chosen for something else. Despite his most fervent wish that this not be so, it was too late. He could not renounce his calling.

The wind whistled in his ears. The kuntur banked and circled. Puriq looked up at the sun. Oh Inti, lord over all of us, steady my hand. Do not let the child suffer. Forgive me for what I am about to do. Let me live with myself afterwards.

He thought of the years he had heard about when rainfall had been scarce, when supplies in the qulqa storehouses ran out and the people starved. If he did not do this, that would happen again and it would be his fault. He thought of all the reasons he had to do this – for the grandmothers and grandfathers, the mothers and aunts, the brothers and uncles, the fathers and children – all the lives, so many lives that would be lost. What if, he wondered, despite the sacrifice, the gods were not satisfied? What if Illapa refused to crack his thunder and the clouds did not drop their rain? What if the snows refused to melt and roar down the mountains and fill up the reservoirs? What if the maize shoots burned up before they tasseled, if gourds shriveled on the vine, and potatoes desiccated in the ground? Would that all be his fault?

He looked up at the sky. The sun had nearly traveled to the zenith of its arc. They did not have much more time. He looked ahead at the dark spot. Seeing it more clearly now, he could make out that it might actually be suitable. Snow had melted from where it overhung a rock, and beside the boulder lay a patch of exposed earth large enough to excavate the pit. It was quite miraculous, he thought. He pondered the power of the mountain god, how he had anticipated them, how he had prepared the ground, how he had guided them to the holy place.

They approached the patch of dirt with more urgency. The shepherds stopped the llamas and began to unload the packs, lowering sacks of the red earth they had carried there, and pulling out the flat stone they would lay at the bottom of the pit. Sariri grabbed a jug of aqha corn beer, poured some into one of a pair of carved wooden cups for the girl to drink. He gave her coca leaves to chew to numb pain and alleviate altitude sickness, and he handed her strips of ch’arki. She hunkered down and nibbled at the dried meat. They pulled out shovels and foot plows and began to dig. Beating out a rhythm, they sang a working song as if they were cultivating or digging an irrigation canal.

Soft, precious Earth Mother

Accept our plows

Guide our feet

Chakitahlla, do your work

Dig our furrows

Yield, yield

They dug and dug. Puriq sweat so much that despite the cold, he took off his coat. Sariri gave the girl several drafts of aqha. They dug until the pit was completed. By that time, the girl had become dull from the corn beer. Sariri handed Puriq the polished rock that must be used for the sacrifice. Urma was seated on the ground. While Sariri chanted, Puriq crept up to her from behind.

She was unaware of his closeness. Should he do it now? Puriq looked for a sign, some signal from the mountain. He listened for a shift in the wind, for a pause, a break, or a change in its direction, for something, anything to tell him it was time, but in these heights, the wind snarled steadily. He looked at the mountain peak. “Apu, speak to me,” he whispered, but the mountain kept his silence.

How long would Puriq have to wait? The waiting was agony. Perhaps he should do it now. He lifted the rock over his head. He wanted to do it now, he wanted to get it over with. But he could not do this just to relieve his own anxiety. He had to do it for the mountain. He had to do it for the people. He laid the rock carefully on the ground.

He was neither murderer nor victim. He was merely the instrument of the sacrifice, the hand holding the stone. He was not the decider nor the decision. It must be done. He had no question about this anymore. He picked up the stone and struck the girl on the crown. She slumped forward. Her lips parted and emitted a slow hiss.

Done at last. Puriq placed the stone on the ground. Urma’s bowels emptied and urine soaked through her dress. Puriq looked down at the girl. In the end it was peaceful. She did not suffer, and he was relieved. It looked like she was sleeping.

They folded her knees, wrapped the red lliklla covered with royal t’uqapu squares tightly around her, and cinched it with silver tupu pins. Sariri tied down her braid with a black thread. Puriq wrapped her in one cloth and then another. Sariri instructed Puriq to position her in the tomb facing the mountain peak, a tiny bundle wrapped in the finest of textiles, spun from the innermost fibers of alpaca. They placed all the other objects in the tomb – a feather-covered bag of coca leaves for the girl to chew on her journey to stave off hunger and pain, a pair of stoppered bottles of aqha to sprinkle on the ground in honor of Pachamama, a sack full of maize kernels and a tiny corncob, a silver llama figurine, a pair of llamas carved in red stone, a necklace with polished pendants of fiery red spondylus shell, a handful of llama bones, a coil of looped rope with smooth round stones for hunting, a pair of decorated ceramic plates, a narrow-necked jar with two handles, a pair of figures, one gold, dressed in textile wraps and feather headdresses, an extra pair of sandals for the girl to wear as she traveled in the afterlife.

They worked quickly but deliberately. There were only a few more hours of daylight left for them to make it down the exposed face of the mountain and find shelter. They tucked the objects around the girl, blessed the tomb, and implored Apu to accept their sacrifice.

May you accept this child. May her death not be in vain. May all the children she would bear, and all the children her children would bear be enough to bring us rain for another year, so we may feed our families. So the snows may come, and the rains may fall, and the streams pouring down the mountains fill our reservoirs and irrigate the fields and terraces. May the male forces of the water wash over Pachamama, that she may bring forth maize, quinoa, and potatoes, beans, squash and uqa.

They shoveled the red dirt on top of the girl and tamped it down with stones. They sang and prayed while they worked. Puriq held his hand open, and Sariri slashed his palm with a sharp knife. Puriq smeared blood on the side of the boulder. They placed strips of ch’arki on top of the mound, so Kunturi the immortal would come and feast on the strips of llama flesh and carry their supplications to Inti in the upper world, to Hanan Pacha – the world of sky and future.

Sariri droned while Puriq followed him in a chant:

 May the snows fall high in the mountains

May the rains wash down in the springtime

May the glaciers melt, may the rivers flow…

Over and over, their words spiraled up and up over the mountain, around the peaks, winding around and around, spiraling into the sky, seeding the clouds.

Puriq sent up prayers for himself – that he would recover and gather his strength until this time next year when he would have to do this again, and for all the rest of his years until he could no longer walk, until he could no longer climb. He knew then more clearly than he had known anything before that he could never father children because they would inherit the blood taint of his murdering. He would walk alone. Although this filled him with indescribable sadness, he knew it to be true. This was his destiny.

They trudged down the mountain, and below them the valley opened like a mother spreading her arms. Puriq contemplated all these sensations at the top of the mountain – the searing wind, the blinding snow, the dazzling blue sky. He thought of clouds gathering in a storm. He thought of snow. He thought of rain. He heard a whoosh and a strange sound – a kind of rippling, like the pattering of rain on leaves when drops first begin to fall. He looked around in confusion because he kept hearing the sound even though it was not raining. It must be some trick of the wind, he thought. He cupped his ears and swiveled about. He stopped and listened. It sounded like children, he thought. It was definitely children. They were laughing and frolicking around him, Puriq marveled. And he knew they were dancing.