The dog in the court of Tupaq Yupanki

I can see my breath, even in the darkness.

The cold of the Peruvian spring chills us to the bone in flimsy tents on the Inca Trail, watching the sun come up over the white glacier, Ausangate.

“Help us today Pachamama,” our guide Ricci whispers as he lays out the morning hot water in front of the tent where Jen and I have shivered through the night.

I’d been praying to the mother goddess for the past two days, particularly when we tackled Dead Woman’s Pass where the rocks seem to form the figure of a prone woman lying up and looking at the sky.

Help me put one foot in front of another, generous, benevolent Pachamama.

Let me not be the last person in the group again today. The slowcoach.

The tip, tip, tap, tap of my walking poles on the worn stones of the trail beating out Pachamama, Pachamama.

Breathe. The air’s thin.

Of course, I was the last person. Again.

So slow that Ricci stayed with me long after the others were in camp soaking their feet. Long after all the waiki carrying huge, heavy packs had run past me.

At the top of the pass, Ricci said: “Turn around…”

I sat down and looked back at just how far we’d come, the Andes breathtaking in the background.

We were so late that darkness was falling as we trod the stones laid by Incan hands, wondering if we’d see the jaguar the waiki reported had been in the area just days before.

Our head lamps threw white pools on the stones, and we picked our steps carefully. Slowly, slowly down the steps which have seen thousands of feet.

Incans, Spanish conquistadors, Quechua people, and Americans after the city’s “discovery” by Hiram Bingham.

How the Quechua people must have rolled their eyes at that, living cheek by jowl with the trail, the mountains, and the path of the jaguar.

Imagine his wonder as he saw the sun rising over the hump of Huayna Picchu, illuminating the lost city of the Incas, clouds skittering across its face.

Compare that to the seen-it-all-before reaction of the Quechua guides. Time to put down the packs and rest their feet, giving thanks to the Pachamama that they’d be back with their families soon.

Today, after saying goodbye to our new waiki family, it’s the steep steps of the Gringo Killer and the last few miles to Machu Picchu. Hummingbirds’ wings buzzing alongside the new season’s flowers, toucans calling in the cloud forest.

At the sun gate, we finally see this wonder of the world.

Our fundraising group have all brought their dead with them. Cancer took them away and meant they never got here. It meant Charlie didn’t get here with me and his sister.

Instead, we are their eyes, and we give them a panoramic view.

Green terraces, stone walls, rush roofs, the vibrant blue of the sky, white clouds, and their grey shadows. The mountains jagging into the thin air.

Pictures are kissed and memories are shared. Jen sits quietly.

Grief, relief, exhaustion.

***

The tourist stuff is done. Passports are stamped, pictures have been taken, and we queue for the bus to Aguas Calientes where there will be a meal, a few drinks, the train back to Ollantaytambo, and the bus back to Cusco.

We cross the bridge over the boiling rapids of the river and find the market, shopping for embroidered cloths and pan pipes, ‘I conquered the Inca Trail’ T-shirts.

The train journey is a blur of dancers in Quechua devil masks and traditional costumes, and a fashion show of clothes made from alpaca wool.

***

Our hotel is a welcome sight, sitting on huge, tightly fitting stones held together for 600 years by some kind of Incan magic.

It’s just as we left it. The courtyard tables and parasols, the hot pot of coca tea to help guests acclimatise to the altitude, the steps worn by countless generations of feet.

This hotel was once the court of the Incan emperor Tupaq Yupanki, where the mighty empire stretched from modern day Ecuador down the Pacific coast to cover a large section of South America.

This building was the centre of the Incan universe. The centre of the world before the slaughter of Pizzaro’s Spanish conquest.

Now, Japanese tourists take pictures of themselves wearing llama hats and the British pine for a cup of builder’s tea.

All I want to do is sleep in our dark room with foot-thick walls and a tiny window with a thick wooden shutter. I leave Jen in the courtyard with her coca tea and fall into bed.

***

I can see my breath in the cold dark of the room.

There’s something else, too. Another stream of breath. It must be Jen in the next bed…

The breath moves slowly towards me.

Two eyes glisten darkly, and I hear panting. There’s an animal in the room.

It moves slowly, claws clacking on the tiled floor. Snuffling.

I can’t move. Shallow breaths. Perhaps it doesn’t know I’m here.

What is it?

More panting, moving closer.

Has the ghost jaguar left the trail to find me?

It jumps heavily onto the bed.

I’m breathing more quickly now, starting to panic. My eyes are open, but the depth of the darkness means all I can see is an outline.

It moves forward and a paw touches my hand. I flinch and the animal stops.

It yawns.

It looks straight at me and puts down its head.

It licks my face.

I flick on the light and see a large black dog with dark eyes and a cheerful red bandana around its neck.

His tail is wagging.

I scruff his head in relief and ask him: “What are you doing here?”

His tail wags even harder.

He lies down with his head on my pillow. I look for Jen, but her bed’s not been slept in.

She’s probably enjoying some pisco sours in that nightclub we went to on our first night in the city, its walls full of Quechuan devil masks pulling grotesque faces, dancing in the near dark.

Wrapping my jacket around me, I signal to my dog visitor to get up. I pick up the key, open the door, and motion him to follow.

He jumps down obediently, panting as we walk the galleried hall and down the stone steps to the courtyard.

It’s 4am. One of the hotel’s maids is getting the breakfast area ready for an early start by the next group to tackle the Inca Trail. She sets down a candle in the window and picks up a stray coffee cup.

She looks through the glass doors and sees me with the dog.

Her face freezes and she drops the cup which smashes on the floor.

“¿Estas bien?” I ask her.

She looks horrified and waves her hands at me.

My basic Spanish isn’t good enough to pick up what she’s saying. It’s too quick, muffled by the doors.

She waves again in panic.

I walk towards her.

“¿Estas bien?” I ask again.

“Si, si…” she replies, looking down to the smashed coffee cup in embarrassment.

I squat down and pick up some of the pieces for her, a sharp edge slices a small cut in the side of my thumb.

The maid rushes off to get a plaster and I finish collecting the china shards.

I suck the cut and she arrives with a large plaster. I laugh and she pastes it on.

Thanking her, I turn to leave. She touches my arm.

“Ten cuidado,” she says.

Take care. I give her the thumbs up with my injured thumb.

The dog seems to have wandered off.

***

The next morning, Ricci is visiting to pick us up for our farewell dinner.

He looks at the thumb.

“What now?” he laughs.

I tell him what happened in the early hours and he suddenly looks serious.

“Why did she react like that,” I ask.

Ricci looks at me carefully.

“We have a lot of dogs in Cusco, you may have noticed,” he says.

“People love their dogs, but they also believe that they can see the other world. In Cusco, we believe they can see the spirits of the dead.

“She may have thought at first that you were a ghost!”

He snorts.

I can sense there’s something else, though.

Ricci sighs. “There’s a legend that dogs can also sense when someone is going to die,” he adds.

He looks at the floor.

“You may think it is superstition, but spirits are important to the Quechua people and most of us here in Cusco have Quechua parents or grandparents.”

A cold feeling washes through my body.

“So, she thinks I’m marked for death?”

Ricci shrugs.

“It’s the last day today. Let’s not think about that. One more night in Cusco and you all fly home.”

***

That last night, I’m sipping pisco sours and watching Jen dancing with the tour guides.

We stumble out of the nightclub across the cobbled main square.

Jen zips up her down jacket and coughs. Its sound echoes off the cathedral, the shops, and the restaurants, off the cold metal of the statue of Pachacuti, signalling to the mountains around the city.

“Great, a cold to go home with,” Jen sighs.

We walk through the colonnade and down the street, through the huge, green wooden doors.

“Bed for you, Mrs,” I tell her.

She nods and complies. She’s soon tucked in and snoring.

***

I can see my breath in the cold darkness.

I see someone else breathing. It must be Jen.

Then, I hear the panting…

I flick on the bedside light, but I don’t want to see it.

The black dog in the red bandana is lying next to Jen on her bed, his head on her pillow.

He opens his eyes and looks at me.

Something freezes in my blood. I don’t want to look past him, but I must.

I get out of bed and stumble over. My legs are weak.

The dog looks up at me.

Jen is lying on her back in her thermal underwear, her dark hair spread over her pillow.

I can’t see her breath.

Her blue eyes are open, fixed on the wooden ceiling of the room.

I touch her wrist to take a pulse and it’s cold. No pulse.

She’s not breathing.

It’s not Jen now.

The dog jumps down from the bed and his claws clatter against the tiles on the floor.

I stare at what used to be Jen and can’t move. I can’t turn around.

Behind me, I hear the dog scratching.

I hear him whining at the door to be let out.