”I… ” I managed through parched lips. I clenched my hands, felt my skin ache where Acamapichtli’s jaguar fang had seared it. “I… can… speak.” Every word was a burning stone, charring my windpipe and my lips as it came out.
”Quenami–” Tizoc-tzin snapped.
”It wasn’t meant to happen,” Quenami said. “I made sure–”
”Of what?” The She-Snake asked, but did not wait for an answer. “What do you have to answer the charges against you, Acatl?”
I had to focus. There had been a quarrel and the council had split, five days before Axayacatl-tzin’s death. On the following day, Manatzpa-tzin had gone to a priest of Quetzalcoatl the Feathered Serpent, to buy the Breath of the Precious Twin. “They’re hiding something,” I said, slowly, carefully.
”You do not have the right to speak!” Tizoc-tzin all but screamed.
”Perhaps they are,” the She-Snake said. His face swam into focus, grave and concerned. I could no longer be sure if it was an act or not. “But that has nothing to do with the accusations against you.”
”They… they’re trying to silence me,” I said. “Because I know… you did something to the council, didn’t you, Tizoctzin? Did whatever it took to be sure you’d be named Revered Speaker, even if you had to sacrifice them one by one.”
”That’s a lie,” Tizoc-tzin said, but I heard the panic in his voice, and the She-Snake must have as well.
”I was the one who ordered Xahuia arrested,” I said. I tried to stand, but my muscles wouldn’t support me. “How can you call me a supporter of Texcoco?”
There was a moment of silence, but Quenami was not about to be undone so easily. “And the boy-emperor?” he asked. “Nezahual-tzin. Will you also claim to have been investigating him?”
”He offered his help to find his sister.”
”And you took it?” Quenami said.
The note of triumph in his voice was all too evident. “Texcoco is a member of the Triple Alliance,” I said. “Our ally since the founding of Tenochtitlan.”
Quenami snorted. “With one of their princesses involved in a plot against the Mexica Empire? Texcoco is a tributepaying province, like the rest of them. It has no business meddling in our politics, and you have no business accepting Nezahual-tzin’s help.”
”For all the help you gave me–”
”I offered,” Quenami said. “I offered and you denied me. You preferred the Texcocan boy.”
“Acatl?” the She-Snake asked. “Is that true?”
It was true. At least, I couldn’t deny it without outright lying, and I refused to sink to Quenami’s level.
My moment of silence must have been all he needed. I saw the She-Snake bow down his head. “Then I’m afraid there is nothing I can do. If they are right…”
They were; and they weren’t. They were the ones endangering the Mexica Empire, the whole of the Fifth World, but there was nothing I could say. “It’s not the point,” I said.
”It’s the point of this audience.” The She-Snake’s voice was almost gentle, an apology. I had missed my chance, if I’d ever had much of one. “To determine your fitness as High Priest.”
”I stand for the Fifth World,” I said. “And for the Revered Speaker, who keeps us safe. What more do you ask for?” I bit my tongue before I could say more.
”Your loyalty.” Quenami’s voice was gleeful. “And it’s clear we don’t have that.”
”Not until the Revered Speaker is elected,” I snapped.
”The charges stand, then,” Tizoc-tzin said.
The She-Snake held my gaze for a while. In his pupils, I saw only darkness, the same yawning abyss that his goddess ruled. “I’m sorry, Acatl. But they do.”
Tizoc-tzin made a quick, peremptory gesture. “Then it’s settled. Treason carries the death penalty.”
”You can’t–” I started, but this time, one of the guards slammed the butt of his
macuahitl
sword into my back, sending me sprawling to the ground. Now that the She-Snake had joined them, they felt safe to silence me.
”By the flower garland,” Quenami said. I wished I could have smashed the smug smile from his face. “Tomorrow at dawn?”
”Better make it quick.” The corners of the She-Snake’s mouth had curled up in a disgusted smile. “Put an end to the whole sordid business as soon as possible.”
I was hauled up again, all but carried out of the room, to the central platform overlooking the courtyard. The Fifth Sun shone clear and bright on what looked to be my last day in the Fifth World.
The warriors that carried me were halfway across the platform when something leapt up from the stairs, seemingly coming out of nowhere, as black and as sleek as a fish, lifting its wrinkled head towards me, the clawed hand at the end of its tail unclenching, coming straight towards me.
An
ahuizotl.
SEVENTEEN
Ahuizotl
“What in the Fifth World is that?” one of the warriors asked, but the
ahuizotl
was moving again with supernatural speed. Its tail swept down and sent us all crashing down onto the stone floor.
Another one appeared, leapt over us. I lost it from sight, struggling to pull myself upright on shaking muscles. One of the warriors reached out for his
macuahitl
sword to stop me, but the
ahuizotl
was on him before he could react, its full weight resting on his chest. The tail uncoiled again, plunging towards the eyes.
I turned my gaze away, even as he started to scream.
The second warrior had his
macuahitl
sword, was pointing it in my direction. Given my painfully slow speed, I had no hope of avoiding it. I threw myself to the ground nevertheless.
Nothing happened. I felt the wind of something else’s passage and heard the warrior tumble to the ground.
”What is the meaning of this?” Tizoc-tzin asked, from inside.
I crawled away from the scene of the carnage. The
ahuizotls
watched me – and so did the last thing – the huge, ghostly serpent rearing in the air, drops of water and blood shining on its feathered collar – for a moment only, and then it lunged towards me. I couldn’t avoid it. I remained where I was, fully expecting something unpleasant, but it twisted at the last moment, knocking me off the ground, and before I could understand what had happened, it was under me, its body supporting me as it rose again.
The
ahuizotls
joined it, framing it like an escort. With a single powerful leap, they leapt up and hung onto the serpent’s tail; and the whole assemblage started to glide upwards at a greater speed than a boat in rapids.
Hanging on to the serpent as well as I could, I cast a glance backward. Tizoc-tzin, the She-Snake, and Quenami stood on the platform. Quenami was frantically whispering a spell, dabbing blood on the ground. But the She-Snake… He just stood, watching the serpent glide away through the courtyard. He could have done something, too. Unlike Quenami, he had come fully prepared, but he didn’t.
I could have sworn he was smiling.
The serpent flew to a deserted spot outside of the city, in the midst of the Floating Gardens, the series of island-fields that grew our crops. It landed in the middle of a patch of newlyplanted tomatoes – the green leaves just opening – and, with a great sigh, it sank back down into the earth.
The
ahuizotls
remained. They watched me with unblinking yellow eyes, as if daring me to put a step wrong. I pulled myself into an upright position, the most I could do. It wasn’t only the weakness induced by the heartland – less than an hour ago, I had been convinced this day was my last – to find a sudden reprieve was heartening, but it was the sort of unwelcome episode I’d have been glad to avoid altogether.
Four silhouettes walked towards me from the single hut on the edge of the floating garden, wading through the maize stalks. I wasn’t surprised when they turned out to be Teomitl, Nezahual-tzin, and the two Texcocan warriors I had seen earlier.
Wordlessly, Teomitl handed me a couple of obsidian knives which I put back into their sheathes.
”Impressive,” I said, slowly.
”Just a trick.” Nezahual-tzin smiled.
Teomitl looked more preoccupied. “Acatl-tzin? You don’t look–”
”I’ll be all right,” I said, raising a shaking hand. “I just need a moment to recover.”
”See?” Teomitl said, with a scornful glance at Nezahual-tzin. “I told you it would work.”
Nezahual-tzin grimaced. “I’ve heard better plans. But yes, it worked. Only because they got sloppy.”
”I thought you were confined to your rooms,” I said to Teomitl, the only thought that occurred to me.
”I broke out.” He smiled again – pure Teomitl, carelessly proud.
”Right. Right. So did I, it seems.” I stared at the ground under my feet, took a deep breath. The air was clean and crisp, nothing like that of my cell. “What now?”
They both looked at me as if it were obvious that I held the answer. The gods help me, I didn’t need another adolescent struggling with nascent responsibility, Teomitl on his own was enough trouble for a lifetime, and I had a suspicion Nezahualtzin would be even worse.
”We need to move,” I said. “We can sort out the rest later. Tizoc-tzin isn’t going to let you get away with it for long, and neither is Quenami.” I looked at Nezahual-tzin, who was currently focusing on the water lapping at the floating garden’s edge. Ah well. Lost for lost, I might as well get a chance to commit the crime they’d accused me of. “How soon can we be in Texcoco?”
Nezahual-tzin’s gaze drifted back towards me. He didn’t look surprised in the slightest. “One, two days? We have boats and supplies, but we’ll have to get past the dyke as soon as we can.”
Texcoco lay east of Tenochtitlan, across the lake of the same name, and a great dyke had been built to prevent the waters of the lake from flooding us. It was manned by a few forts, though its main purpose wasn’t military. Any invading army would come by land, which meant one of the three causeways rather than the lake.
”Two days?” I asked.
”A little less if the gods are with us.”
”Or the
ahuizotls
,” Teomitl said. “But not in Tenochtitlan, we’d stand out too much. Let’s wait until we’re out of the city.”
”And Mihmatini?” I asked.
Teomitl grimaced. “She’s gone to the Popocatepetl volcano. On a pilgrimage of, ah, indefinite length.”
And I could imagine how much she’d have protested at being taken away for her own safety. “Good,” I said. “Let’s go. We can sort out the details later.”
Nezahual-tzin’s boats were two flat-bottomed barges, a slightly larger version of the canoes fishermen steered all over the lake. They looked as if they had been specifically purchased for the rescue rather than brought with him. A Revered Speaker such as him would normally travel with more pomp, and the boats looked more utilitarian than grand and imposing.
The first boat was packed with the supplies he had mentioned – wrapped maize flatbreads and fruit, as well as cages holding owls and rabbits. The second one was packed with men – a dozen Texcocan warriors who all looked old enough to be veterans of Nezahual-tzin’s coronation war.
Nezahual-tzin caught my glance, and smiled. “It never hurts to be prepared, Acatl.”
I climbed gingerly into the boat, found myself a comfortable spot wedged against a particularly large bale, and determined not to move again in a lifetime.
Two of the warriors took the oars. Teomitl’s
ahuizotls
slid into the water with a splash, and swam by our side as we moved away from the floating garden.
We cruised through row upon row of floating gardens, a whole district on a grid pattern, like the rest of the city. Soon the floating gardens thinned away, to become streets where peasants carried cloth and maize kernels to the marketplace and where the steady clack of looms from the women’s weaving floated to us through the open entrances of their thatch houses. We were swinging around Tenochtitlan, keeping to the more populated areas in order not to stand out.
In between the houses I caught a glimpse of the Sacred Precinct’s tallest buildings – the Great Temple under which the Moon Goddess Coyolxauhqui was imprisoned, and the circular Wind Tower, where I had prayed to Quetzalcoatl for Ceyaxochitl’s life. The Feathered Serpent had not answered that prayer, but it occurred to me that perhaps He had given me something else to see me through my hour of need.
Nezahual-tzin stood near the prow, watching the houses go past. He looked much like any other nobleman’s son, his cloak of thin cotton, his jade lip-plug glinting in the sunlight, his hair pulled back and caught in the base of his feather headdress.
We swung east into ever-smaller streets. The boats wove their way through the traffic – peasants coming back from the marketplace, warriors standing tall and proud in the regalia they had earned on the battlefield, priests with bloodmatted hair on their way to the Sacred Precinct – with preternatural ease. If I didn’t have Nezahual-tzin in my sights, I could have sworn that there was more to this than the agility of two warriors.
Teomitl was a little further down our boat, his hand trailing just above the water. His face was furrowed in concentration, his eyes focused on the dark shapes trailing the boat.
We came out into an expanse of open water. Ahead of us was the bulk of Nezahualcoyotl’s Dyke, keeping back the saltwater and regulating the level of the lake during the flood season.
I had expected trouble at this juncture, but the few warriors manning the fort on the dyke looked bored, and the boats were carried over to the other side without any major incident. While Nezahual-tzin and I engaged the guards in idle conversation, the
ahuizotls
leapt over the wall and slid noiselessly back into the water, dark shapes gone past in an eye blink.
Behind the dyke were only a few boats, going either to Teotihuacan or Texcoco, merchants with goods to sell and wider barges belonging to noblemen on pilgrimages.
Teomitl moved to stand near Nezahual-tzin. “Time to go a little faster.”
The
ahuizotls
dived, two under each boat. I felt a slight jerk as they moved to bear the weight of the keel, and then we were gliding across the water at a greater speed than oars alone could have managed. Teomitl’s face shone the colour of jade, the light flickering across his features.