The Final Prophecy: Nightkeepers by Jessica Andersen

Striking Jaguar, better known as Strike, is the last king of his people. His father, Scarred Jaguar, led a ritual twenty four years ago that cut off his people's access to the Barrier. and also from their magic. The ritual was succesful, but most of the people, and the children died under the demons known as boluntiku.Now, Strike and his winikin, both servants and mentors, Red-Boar and Jox, and Red-Boar's half blood son Rabbit, are the only ones left of the Nightkeepers, a secret society from the Mayan people meant to stave off the Apocalypse that will come in 2012,

Though they live in 2008, Strike is not the last of his people. After the failure of his father's desperate plan, the winikin took the children and disappeared. But the time will be coming to call his people back and take up the fight once more against the forces that will lead to the death of not only the earth, but the entire universe.

Leah Daniels is a Detective with the Miami Police Force. But despite her dedication to the job, she was unable to prevent the person she loved most, her brother, from joining the Survivor2012 cult and being killed by its leader, Zipacna. Now, she seeks to bring down Zipacna and the cult. But an ambush when meeting a snitch named Itchy leads to her partner's death and her kidnapping and imprisonment by Zipacna... in the sewers under Mexico City.

Even with the powers Zipacna is capable of wielding, Leah manages to get free and fight him. She is about to die before Strike teleports himself into the ritual chamber and take down Zipacna long enough for them to get away... and become lovers. After they have made love, she suddenly returns to herself and thinks Strike, with his many Mayan marks, is a member of the cult. She is determined to get away from him, but he uses magic to put her to sleep until they are safe and in a safe house. Then, he lets her wake, but another attempt to escape makes him put her back to sleep again. He calls Jox and Red-Boar, who leave the gardening store they run to come help him, leaving Rabbit in charge, over his objections.

Red-Boar wipes Leah's memory and returns her to Miami, but Rabbit, angry over being left behind, throws a party and comes into his powers as a Pyrokeine. Inadvertantly triggering his powers, he burns down the store with them. Meanwhile, Leah awakes in the hospital, not remembering anything after her partner died. She is soon released, her wounds from Mexico City having healed with amazing swiftness, and is back on the hunt for the 2012 cult.

Strike has been told about the survival of a mere 13 children from the massacre 24 years ago. Now that it is certain that the prophecy about the end times is coming true, it is time to gather them back and set them to fighting the makol who seek to bring about the end of the world. The other children are widely scattered, watched over by winikin of their own, and all of them have led very different lives, from a surfer dude to a martial arts teacher to a computer game programmer. But now it is time for them to join together at a training compound located near Chaco Canyon. Not all of them are willing, and two of them, female twins, are dead. Nevertheless, the rest come together to fight the forces of the makol and Zipacna, who has discovered how to turn other evil-hearted humans into makol like himself.

Leah, meanwhile, attends a party given by the 2012 cult and meets a programmer who is also against the cult. But she is once again ambushed, only to break free once more and recover a strange package that, to her, glows with red light. Running into Strike once more, he puts down Itchy, who has been turned makol and is surprisingly hard to kill, unless you cut off his head and cut out his heart, which Strike does. Leah doesn't recognize Strike, but he hasn't been able to stop thinking about her, as he has been dreaming about her for most of his life. She also seems to have some kind of Nightkeeper-related power, but despite having made love to her on the summer solstice, which should have brought out her power, her powers seem to be growing weaker. But he still can't stop wanting her, thinking about her. And the spirit of his father told him to save her, which was how he saved her from Itchymakol.

Restored to her memories by Red-Boar at Strike's command, Leah gives Strike the package she found, which is a codex containing a spell. Summoning up a servant of the Mayan Gods by a spell, Strike asks about her and learns she is to be a Godkeeper, a conduit to the power of the Gods. Her God is Kukulkan, and she was infused with the power of his light half many years ago, when she wandered into a ruin with her younger brother and found a door that should not have been there. Her brother was infused with the power of the God's dark half. But now that her brother is dead, Kukulkan is unable to manifest, stuck on the Sky-Road between earth and the dwelling place of the Gods. The only way to free him and save the Sky Road is to let Leah die, which will free Kukulkan and allow him to return to his fellow gods.

Strike doesn't want Leah to die. He has fallen in love with her and wants her to marry him. But how can he choose between his love and his duty to the Nightkeepers and the Earth? Perhaps the spell in the Mayan Grimoire she found can provide a way out! Strike sends the piece of bark to his sister, Anna, an anthropology professor and translator of Mayan writing. But as Anna struggles with the power of the artifact and her own grad-student, partly transformed into a makol by the power of the spell contained within, Strike will have to learn to step up and lead his people as a real King, and if he wants to save Leah without dooming the earth, he and his untried warriors will have to go up against the Survivor2012 cult and their makol leader, Zipacna, himself a demon who can only be taken out by a God.

This book is deeply immersive and while I was reading it, made me really believe that such things could be true and be happening. Lots of Mayan language and words are used in the book, but I don't know how accurate they are. They do sound authentic, of course, or look, considering this is a book.

The story itself is immersive, right from the first page. The story of Strike, the story of Leah, and the stories of the other Nightkeepers meld seamlessly, the many separate threads combining into a thick and beautiful braid that promises to continue into other books in the series. The book is also incredibly well-written and I would find myself lost in the pages. Even if I only had a short time to read, I could almost guarantee I'd find myself reading another page or three because I couldn't tear myself away from the story.

Although I felt only meh about the sex scenes, the rest of the book more than made up for it. The romance is not bad, and I did get the feeling that the characters truly felt affection and love for each other, and their despair at the thought of Leah dying felt genuine and was genuinely moving. Both characters also come across as real and well-rounded, with their own reasons for doing things. I will definitely be reading more in this series. It's just too good not to.