Obsidian & Blood

ELEVEN

Servant of the Gods

In the canal before Neutemoc's house, Oyohuaca, a slave-girl clad in a rough maguey-fibre shift, was waiting for me in a long, pointed reed boat. I climbed in, wincing as my bandages shifted.

"Where to?" Oyohuaca asked, straightening up the lantern at the boat's bow.

I closed my eyes, feeling for the Wind's presence. He was a few streets away from us. He had slowed down, oddly enough, and was going in a slow, wide circle towards the south-western edge of the Moyotlan district.

"Left," I said.

She rowed in silence, with the easy mastery of one who had lived all her life at the water's edge. With each gesture, she whispered the same words, over and over like a litany for the dead. It took me a while to realise that the words were those of a prayer asking for the blessing of Tlaloc, the Storm Lord, God of Rain, and of His wife Chalchiutlicue, the Jade Skirt, Goddess of Lakes and Streams.

"O Lord, Our Lord,

The people, the subjects – the led, the guided, the governed,

Their flesh and bones are stricken with want and privation

They are worn, spent and in torment–"

There was something eerie about the sound of Oyohuaca's voice, floating over the canals in counterpoint to the splash of her oars. As we moved into deserted canal after deserted canal, it seemed to call up the mist, to trail after us. And something else trailed too, something dark and quiet that swam after the boat, biding its time.

Under the splash of the oars – in, out of the water, in, out – was its song: a quiet, hypnotic air that wove itself within my mind, melding with Oyohuaca's prayers until I no longer knew what belonged to whom.

"In Tlalocan, the verdant house,

The Blessed Land of the Drowned

The dead men play at balls, they cast the reeds

Go forth, go forth to the place of many clouds

To where the thick mists mark the Blessed Land

The verdant house, the house of Tlaloc and Chalchiutlicue"

For too long, it had bided its time at night, quieting its hunger with fish, with newts, with algae: the sustenance of the poor, the abandoned. But now it smelled blood: a living heart, so tantalisingly close. Soon, it would feast until satiation…

"Let the people be blessed with fullness and abundance

Let them behold, let them enjoy the jade and the turquoise – the precious vegetation

The flesh of Your servants, the Providers, the Gods of Rain

Let the plants and animals be blessed with fullness and abundance–"

The song stopped; the oars fell against the boat's frame with a dull sound that resonated in my bones. "Acatl-tzin," Oyohuaca said, urgently.

With some difficulty, I tore myself from my reverie. "What?"

"Don't," Oyohuaca said. The slave-girl sounded frightened.

"I don't understand." The Wind was moving again, picking up speed, straight towards the edge of Tenochtitlan.

"An ahuizotl," I said, aloud. A hundred memories came welling up from my childhood. The water-beasts were Chalchiutlicue's creatures; they lived in the depths of Lake Texcoco, and would drag a man to the bottom, feasting on his eyes and fingernails.

Oyohuaca's face in the moonlight was drained of all colours. "Don't listen to its song."

"I didn't know they sang."

Oyohuaca shook her head. "They don't. Not unless they truly want you. Don't listen," she said, picking up her oars again.

I thought of Huei's spell, which had so bewildered the Wind. It certainly was possible she'd summoned the beast to cover her tracks, in case some more mundane agency attempted to follow her.

How in the Fifth World had she become proficient enough to know all of this?

Oyohuaca and I followed the Wind's trail across the canals of Moyotlan. As the night became older, the houses had become silent and dark, their thatch-roofs wavering in the light of the torch; and the only sounds that came to us were the distant shell-blasts from the Sacred Precinct.

Oyohuaca kept singing her hymn, but now I could discern its urgency: it was her only protection against the ahuizotl. It didn't cover its song, though. That kept insinuating itself in my mind, whispering promises of happiness below the water – easy, it would be so easy to lean over the edge of the boat, lose myself in the Blessed Land of the Drowned…

I came to with a snap, sharply aware of how close I'd come to yielding. The smell of churned mud – and a faint, faint one of rotten flesh – filled my nostrils.

Don't listen, Oyohuaca had said. They don't sing. Not unless they truly want you.

The ahuizotls, like any magical creatures, would be drawn to power: to my own magic, embedded within the obsidian knives in my belt.

Focus. I needed to focus. I closed my eyes and thought of the Wind of Knives, of the dry emptiness of Mictlan, and how it would fill my skin and bones.

The song receded, fading to an insinuating whisper.

I opened my eyes. We were in one of the last canals in the district of Moyotlan. Beyond the houses on the right lay the open expanse of Lake Texcoco. There was no place to hide. Water wouldn't stop the Wind of Knives. Where in the Fifth World had Huei gone?

"Turn right," I told Oyohuaca.

We squeezed through a small canal between darkened houses, and emerged from the maze of Tenochtitlan's waterways onto open water. On the left was the Tlacopan causeway, its broad stone path snaking into the distance; on the right were more Floating Gardens: rows of fields bearing the crops that fed the city.

"And now?" Oyohuaca asked.

The Wind of Knives wasn't far away. No, not far at all. On the nearby bank was the familiar glimmer of obsidian. He wasn't moving. Was He waiting for something? I couldn't see Huei anywhere.

I pointed to the bank. "Leave me here," I said.

The slave Oyohuaca didn't look reassured. In fact, as soon as I'd managed to disembark, she rowed away from the bank, and waited in the midst of the water, away from us.

The Wind of Knives didn't move. Mud squelched over my sandalled feet as I climbed the muddy rise – as cold, I imagined, as the touch of the ahuizotl would have been on my skin.

"Acatl," the Wind of Knives said when I came near him.

I tensed, one hand closing on the hilt of an obsidian knife.

He did not move. He watched something below, in the Floating Gardens: a flickering light on one of the islands. "No need," He said.

"You–" I started.

"She is out of my reach."

"I don't understand–"

"It is a simple thing," He said, without irony.

"You are justice," I said, slowly, not yet daring to believe that Huei was safe. "You cannot be swayed, or set aside."

"Not by you," the Wind of Knives said. "But there are higher powers than I. Goodbye, Acatl. We shall meet again." He was fading even as He spoke, the obsidian shards receding into the darkness until shadows extinguished their polished reflections.

"Wait!" I said. "You haven't told me–" He hadn't told me anything. But He was gone, or perhaps would not answer to me.

I could summon him again, but I didn't have any of the proper offerings at hand. It would take time: more time than walking down the rise, towards the light that He had been watching.

I signalled to the boat again. After a while, the slave Oyohuaca rowed back. No doubt she had ascertained that the Wind of Knives was truly gone before she would approach again. She was a cautious girl.

"Can you row me to that Floating Garden?" I asked.

Oyohuaca spoke as I painstakingly climbed into the boat. "It's not a Floating Garden," she said.

But… "Then what is it?"

"A temple," Oyohuaca said, picking up her oars again. "To Chalchiutlicue, Our Lady of Lakes and Streams. It's where they host the sacrifices for Her festivals."

The flickering light turned out to be a torch, held by a priestess who kept watch over the temple complex.

It was a simple affair: a long building of adobe, firmly set onto a terrace of stone. Part of it appeared to be a calmecac for hosting the priestesses and the students; and another part of it – the part that hummed with a coiled power I could feel – had to be the shrine to the goddess.

There are higher powers than I, the Wind of Knives had said. It must have taken quick thinking on Huei's part to see that here, under the gaze of the goddess, was a place the Wind couldn't enter, and to reach it in time.

The priestess of Chalchiutlicue raised the torch when I approached. Her severe gaze swept up and down, taking in the whole of who I was. For the second time that night, I found myself wishing I had dressed better. Neutemoc's slaves and Mihmatini had done their best, but maguey-soaked bandages were nothing like the full regalia of a High Priest.

"Yes?" the priestess asked.

"I'm looking for my brother's wife," I said.

Her face shut, as if a veil had been drawn across it. "At this time of the night, the temple is closed to visitors."

"I don't think you understand," I said, slowly, although I suspected she did. "She isn't a student. She came here, about half an hour ago at most."

Her eyes didn't move. "No one came."

A lie. But I wouldn't disconcert her that easily.

"I am Acatl, High Priest for the Dead, and I speak for my temple and my clergy. Do you think it wise to stand against me?" I closed my good hand on the strongest obsidian knife, letting the emptiness of Mictlan well up to fill me.

Her face remained expressionless, though she had to see the power coursing to me. "I will talk to the Fire Priest. Wait here."

I did so. A breeze had risen over the lake, cold on my exposed skin. The mist would not dissipate. Was it just my fancy, or was something swimming in the water, near the bottom of the rise?

Two lights surfaced, briefly: yellow eyes, I realised with a shock. They were watching me with undisguised malice. The ahuizotl. It hadn't been there while Teomitl and I were on the lake, although Teomitl's warding magic might have kept it away. But it was the first time a water-beast had ever swum after me. Why wouldn't it go away?

I was wounded, smelling of blood, and reeking of the underworld magic I had been consorting with all night. To any magical creature, I would be a beacon.

But there was still something about it that made me uneasy. The ahuizotls belonged to Chalchiutlicue, and surely it was more than a coincidence that Huei had summoned them, and then found refuge in a temple to the goddess?

"Acatl-tzin," someone said.

Startled, I turned around. The priestess had come back with a man: a priest of far higher rank, judging by his diadem of heron feathers and the drops of melted rubber that darkened his face.

"I am Eliztac, Fire Priest of this modest temple. I'm told that you seek someone." He exuded the same coiled power as the walls of his temple: a rippling light that seemed to be an extension of the starlight over the lake.

"My brother's wife, Huei," I said, giving him a brief description. Although, by the gleam in his eyes, he had no need of it.

"I see," Eliztac said, but ventured no comment.

"Understand this," I said, exasperated by yet another delay – by the knowledge that Huei was alive, so close to me – and yet out of my reach. "I know she came here, and I know she hasn't left. We can talk all night, or you can save some time and admit to having seen her."

Eliztac pursed his lips, thoughtfully.

"She has transgressed against Mictlan," I added, for good measure.

His gaze was disturbingly shrewd. "But is no longer, I think, your rightful prey."

"Why would you prevent me from entering?" I asked. I tightened my grip on the obsidian knife. The emptiness rising in my chest was almost comforting, a shield against all I couldn't face.

He sighed. "You're right. It's late. Let's not dance around each other like warriors on the gladiator stone. The person you want did come here – but you cannot see her."

"I still don't see–"

Eliztac raised a hand. "She has given herself to the goddess."

There could only be one meaning for this. But I still had to ask, to be sure. I might have misunderstood. "As a sacrifice?"

Eliztac nodded. "She is Chalchiutlicue's now. She's removed herself from the Fifth World. Neither you nor anyone else has a claim on her."

"When?" I asked plainly.

"When the proper stars are aligned and the proper omens have happened," Eliztac said. "It will take time. One, two years? Only the goddess knows."

One, two years. Huei still had time. But, as she learnt the dance, and the proper rituals for the sacrifice, she would never forget what was to come: the knowledge of her death would mingle with every moment she spent in the temple.

The Southern Hummingbird cut her down! How could she…? But, of course, once she had summoned the beast of shadows, she wouldn't have had a choice, not any more.

"I have to speak to her," I said.

Eliztac shook his head, forcefully. The heron feathers swayed to and fro, like white flags in the darkness. "She no longer belongs in this world."

"There are some things I need to know…"

"She fled from you," Eliztac said. "What makes you think she would talk to you?"

I said, "She's still family." In spite of everything, she was still the gangly girl my brother had brought home, all those years ago: the one who'd smile and shake her head whenever Neutemoc and I tried to make her take sides. The one who would die, drowned by the priests in order to bring the Jade Skirt's favour to the Empire.

Eliztac looked away from me, for a moment. "If you were her husband, it would be a different matter. But as it is, I can't allow it."

"Please," I said.

But he shook his head. "Forget her, Acatl-tzin. The goddess will take her as Her own, and lead her into the Blessed Land of the Drowned."

It was, I supposed, preferable to what would happen to Huei if the Wind of Knives took her. Lord Death dealt harshly with those who sought to use His powers.

I could have begged and pleaded with Eliztac, but it would only have demeaned me. He had made his decision, and I would gain nothing by attempting to make him go back on it.

Entering the temple without his permission was tantamount to suicide: in my present state, I didn't have the power to hide myself from Chalchiutlicue's magic, and I didn't want to know the fate the temple reserved to trespassers.

"Thank you," I said, and walked back to Oyohuaca's boat.

The ahuizotl watched me from the water, a dark, lean shape whispering its seducing song. It followed us all the way home.

Neutemoc's house was bathed in the grey light before dawn; and the slaves were already getting up to grind the maize flour. I found my sister, Mihmatini, in the reception room, playing patolli with one of the slaves. She was sitting on a reed mat, listlessly throwing the white bean dice on the board and picking them up again, but clearly making no effort to focus on the moves of her pebbles.

Mihmatini looked up when I entered. "Acatl!" Her gaze moved beyond me, focusing on Oyohuaca, who was waiting respectfully by the entrance.

"You didn't find her then," she said. Her disappointment was palpable.

I wondered what I could tell her. But if I started lying to my own sister, I had fallen very low indeed. "She's in Chalchiutlicue's temple."

Mihmatini frowned. She gestured for the slave to get out. He picked up the patolli board, dice and pebbles as he exited. "And you can't arrest her?" she asked.

I saw the instant the inescapable conclusion dawned in her mind. Her face, for a bare moment, froze into an expressionless mask. "Acatl," she whispered. "Please tell me she didn't–"

I couldn't lie to her. "I'm sorry. It was the only way she'd be safe."

"Safe for a month or so, until they drown her?"

I sat on the mat where her patolli partner had been, facing her. "The priests said a year or two. But yes. They'll drown her in the lake." I tried to tell it as simply, as emotionlessly as I could, but I couldn't quite hide the turmoil inside me. In just a handful of days, my comfortable world had shattered. But I, at least, was alive: not in a cage like Neutemoc, not awaiting death like Huei. "They won't let me see her," I said.

Mihmatini closed her eyes and bent her head backwards, in a gesture eerily reminiscent of Father when I'd displeased him. "I don't understand why she summoned the beast," she said.

"Do you think I do?"

She snorted. "You're the investigator."

"A poor kind of investigator," I said. "It seems I can't even get hold of my suspects."

Mihmatini said nothing for a while. Her eyes were on the empty place between both our mats, and her thoughts obviously further away. Finally, she said, "What about Neutemoc?"

What about him indeed. I'd been pondering the matter on the way home, and had some ideas, but nothing definite. "The judges will hear him today. Huei would have proved his innocence," I said.

"Chalchiutlicue's temple won't even let Imperial Investigators in?" Mihmatini asked. But she knew, as I did, that the investigators could drag the priests and priestesses out and do with them as they pleased, but that someone destined for sacrifice had already removed themselves from the flow of our lives.

I asked her, carefully, "Will you bear witness for me?"

"For Neutemoc?" she asked.

"He's in an Imperial Audience, and I need evidence to get him freed."

"I'm his sister," she pointed out. "They won't believe me."

"The slaves will support you," I said.

"A slave's testimony–"

"Is receivable before the courts, unless the rules have changed." Any man could become a slave; any one could fall so low they had no choice but to sell their freedom.

Mihmatini puffed her cheeks, thoughtfully. "But the rules have changed, haven't they? No one gets so quickly moved to an Imperial Audience."

"There are complications," I admitted. "Political matters."

Mihmatini snorted. "Politics. That alone makes me glad I'm a woman."

"Women take part in politics too," I said, thinking of Eleuia.

"Less often," Mihmatini said. "Anyway." She ran a hand on her jade necklace. "I'll say what needs to be said, but I don't think it's going to be enough."

I bit my lip, thoughtfully. "Huei received two men, two days ago, in the afternoon. Can you ask the slaves if they remember them?"

Mihmatini shrugged. "I can try. But I think they were all intelligent enough to make sure they wouldn't be witnessed."

"Maybe." It was a risk we'd have to take.

"Have you found the priestess?" Mihmatini asked.

"No," I said. I should have thought of sending to Ixtli, letting him try to find a trail from the Floating Garden. Duality curse me, I'd been too obsessed with what I'd learnt about Huei to even think of using Teomitl as a messenger.

It was too late now. I'd stop at the Duality House on my way to the temple, to see what could be done. "But I don't think she's alive any more," I said to Mihmatini.

"Then you'll never find her," Mihmatini said. "Few things are as anonymous as corpses."

She'd changed. She spoke like an adult, sure of herself. And yet her face was still that of the baby sister whose first steps I'd watched. It was unsettling. Had time passed so quickly, leaving me with nothing but my sterile priest's calling as my own?

"I know," I said, quietly, unwilling to delve deeper into the subject. "But at this moment, all I need to prove is that Neutemoc didn't summon that beast of shadows. We'll see about the rest later." Such as explaining to Neutemoc what his wife had done.

"Very well," Mihmatini said. "I'll come tomorrow. At your temple?"

"Tomorrow, at midday," I said.

She nodded. "You could stay here to get some sleep, you know. You're in no state to traipse through the streets."

I heard what she wasn't telling me: that the house without either Neutemoc or Huei would be huge, filled with slaves who barely knew Mihmatini. I wished I could comfort her; but I had to go back to my temple and gather all I could to get Neutemoc freed.

"I can't," I said. "Not tonight."

Tomorrow… tomorrow, if things went well and the High Priest of Tlaloc didn't have his way, Neutemoc would be home. He'd take care of her: she was blameless in the whole matter.

Mihmatini shook her head. "You're not walking home in this state. I'll get Oyohuaca to row you back to the Sacred Precinct."

I would have protested, but in truth I felt too tired for that. I rose, now used to the sharp pain that accompanied every one of my movements, and bade her goodnight. "See you tomorrow then."

"You fool," she said as I limped into the courtyard. But her voice was more amused than angry. "Give those wounds a chance to heal."

I did not answer, and left Neutemoc's house without giving her further incentive to tease me.

Oyohuaca rowed me back to the Sacred Precinct in silence and left me by the western docks. Flotillas of reed boats, each bearing the insignia of the temple to which they belonged, bobbed in the darkness. Somewhere at the back would be the large ceremonial barge reserved for the High Priest for the Dead, its prow painted the colour of bone, its oars carved with owls and spiders.

From the docks, it was but a short walk to the Duality House; but this left me so exhausted I was thankful to Mihmatini for insisting I take a boat back to the Sacred Precinct.

The Duality House was still bustling at this hour of the night, and Ixtli still wasn't sleeping. Did he ever sleep? He listened to my account, cocking his head from time to time. "Very well," he said when I was done. "I'll take some men and go to the Floating Garden. But–"

"I know," I said. The trail was old by now, and it was mundane, not magical. Whoever had come for Eleuia – whoever had instigated the whole affair – had had the intelligence never to handle magic themselves. Even if they did find a trail, I wouldn't have results by the next afternoon. "Do what you can," I said.

I was about to leave the house when I saw a familiar figure ahead of me: Yaotl, Ceyaxochitl's messenger. He was striding ahead, not looking at me; but he did turn back when I called his name.

"Acatl," he said. "What a surprise. How goes your investigation?"

"As well as I can be," I said, tartly. "Where are you off to so fast?"

Yaotl shook his head, wryly amused. "To an interesting place, no doubt."

Huitzilpochtli blind him. He was as unhelpful as ever. "Let me guess," I said, more angrily than I'd intended. "The Imperial Palace."

He grew thoughtful. "I might. But it doesn't concern you, does it?"

"It might," I said. "I'm planning to attend an Imperial Audience tomorrow."

"For your investigation?" Yaotl looked at me for a moment. Finally, he laid a hand on my shoulder, in a mock-brotherly gesture that made me uncomfortable. "I don't think there will be one."

My heart sank. "The Emperor is that ill?"

"I can't tell you more. But don't expect the Audience."

"What happens to the cases he was reviewing?" I asked, my heart sinking.

Yaotl shrugged. "Justice still has to move forward, doesn't it? I assume the High Priests will take care of them."

The High Priests. The twin powers at the head of the Empire's religious structure. The High Priest of Huitzilpochtli was theoretically the most important one; but Ocelocueitl was an old man, tired by decades of overseeing the worship of the God of War.

Which left the other one: Acamapichtli, High Priest of Tlaloc: the same man who had been in such a hurry to have Neutemoc convicted.