Conquistador

INTERLUDE

Lord Seven Flower held the meeting in the ruins of Zaachila, for the sacredness that dwelt in the stones of the lost city. No living men had made their homes here for a long time; what the plagues that swept through in his grandfather’s day had begun, the wars and chaos that followed in their wake had finished. He kept his own seat of power in the great city of Tututepec, much closer to the coast and the foreign trade that had helped make him overlord of half the Zapotec peoples. Yet once this had been the place of the Vuijato, the Great Seer, the Speaker to the Gods—he whose hand conferred sovereignty on kings.

That would help to overawe turbulent nobles, and even his closest advisers could turn back into such, if his grip wavered. The setting was the more numinous because it was night, and because of the day—Eight Deer—in the holy calendar. The trees had gone far in their reconquest of the sacred city and loomed about like living green walls, but he had had this courtyard kept clear of the encroaching bush and vines. Except where staircases ascended at the four corners, the great courtyard was flanked by walls higher than a man, carved in bass-relief from hard limestone and still vividly colored despite years of weathering. They showed the story of the first Eight Deer, the great leader who seized power in the War of Heaven—showed it in long pictures, and word-glyphs. The rise of the rival cities of Tilantongo and Red-White Bundle, the feuds and marriages of their lords, the suicide of one such forced by the machinations of Lady Six Monkey, the blood sacrifice of the defeated king of Red-White Bundle by the victorious warlord whose naming day this was…

Eight Deer had no royal ancestors, Lord Seven Flower thought. Like me, he was the son of a priest, and a great warrior. Like me, he seized power in a time of chaos. Like his, my name will live forever, and my dynasty rule for a thousand years!

Torches burned at the staircases, torches of aromatic wood that added a heavy, spicy scent to the odors of damp and growth and ancient stone, heavier than the mouthwatering scents of roasting dog and brewing cacao from the cooking-fires nearby. Around the courtyard shone the kerosene lanterns he gained in trade, brighter than any torch. The guards at the staircases bore bronze-headed spears and wooden swords set with bronze shark-tooth edges on both sides, the weapons of his grandfather’s day, before the Deathwalkers came from the northern sea.

The guards who stood about the walls in the courtyard below bore modern steel machetes and flintlock muskets. The lesson was one he wanted driven home frequently and hard.

Lord Seven Flower himself was in the traditional costume: silver armbands and greaves, a loincloth intricately folded so that a long flap of snowy cotton edged with embroidery hung to his knees before and behind, gold chains and a gold pectoral across his chest, and a headdress made in the form of a snarling silver jaguar’s head with golden spots, eyes of turquoise and ivory teeth, sporting a huge torrent of colored plumes from its rear in gaudy crimson and green and mauve.

The face that looked out between the jaguar’s jaws was square and hard, dark brown save where white scars seamed it, his narrow eyes a black so deep the pupil merged with the iris. It was pitted with the marks of the Great Sickness—as were those of most men and women of his generation.

Those who lived, he thought mordantly.

The priests and generals and high nobles who sat on cushions before him numbered twelve, dressed only slightly less gorgeously than himself. They also looked a little surprised that the feast had not begun; in the holy city one ate to bursting, drank to drunkenness, ate of certain mushrooms, and then the idols of the gods would speak—or the mummified bodies of one’s ancestors, in the old days. Like him, few of the men before him came from families of sufficient ancient rank to have their forefathers preserved. The idols were present—great Bezelao with his cup of wisdom, Xochipilli with his crest of macaw feathers, and many more.

Also present were twenty men tied to upright wooden posts: common men, naked, slaves or peasants—men of no account, unlikely to be missed, as he had specified to the officials in charge of such matters.

Lord Seven Flower raised the ceremonial sword he bore in his hand; it was so old and holy that the blades were edged with bits of obsidian instead of bronze, like a priest’s sacrificial knife.

“Stand forth, Five Deer,” he called.

A man stepped forward, plainly dressed in cotton loincloth and sandals, but bearing himself proudly. He carried a weapon. There were gasps as the grandees recognized it; not an ordinary musket, although shaped much like it—this one had a projecting box in front of the trigger guard, and no hammer at all, but a complex of metal shapes in roughly the same position.

“These men offend me. Slay them,” he went on, pointing to the stakes with his stone-edged sword.

The strange musket leaped to Five Deer’s shoulder. Crack!

The sound was not like the boom of a musket: harder, sharper, quicker, the flash a brief jet of hot flame in the darkness. A brass cartridge jumped out of the odd metal shapes, and the leftmost of the captives jerked and then slumped, a red spot appearing on his breast.

Crack!

Again, and again: twenty times, as fast as Five Deer could shift his aim and pull the trigger. Lord Seven Flower’s generals and priests were watching with fullest attention, swearing and pounding their fists on the mats that covered the stone pavement, some giving high yelping cries of excitement. There were screams from some of the captives, too; not every shot killed at once, though some did so dramatically—one took the whole top off a captive’s head, and spattered his brains across a mural of human sacrifice. At Lord Seven Flower’s nod, one of the guards stepped forward and silenced the wounded with a knife across the throat. Thick straw mats kept the blood from flowing too far and inconveniencing the great men.

“A rifle of the Deathwalkers!” a general said. “But Lord Seven Flower, always they have refused to trade such with us. Not for silver, or gold, or turquoise, or cacao or hummingbird feathers will they trade such!”

“A rifle of the Deathwalkers,” Lord Seven Flower agreed. “And for one thing will they trade such—some of them, at least. Fighting men. They too have their factions.”

“Ahhhh!”

All of his chief followers were survivors of the long struggles between the Zapotec cities, and within them. The land had heaved and shifted like bubbling cornmeal in a pot for three generations now, brought to a boil by the plagues and the new weapons and goods. Intrigue and assassination, war and battle and sudden revolt were in their blood. None of them had to be told how useful foreign mercenaries could be in a faction fight. All of them bowed their heads to the ground in a wave of colorful feathers and fur, silver and jade and gold. Several were smiling as they rose to a sitting position again; they also knew how useful foreign mercenaries could make themselves useful in ways not intended by their employers.

The general who’d spoken before added: “How difficult are these weapons to learn to use, o man made in the image of the gods?”

“Easier than a musket,” Lord Seven Deer replied. “As a musket is easier than a bow. In any case, the lords of the Deathwalkers will provide instruction; when the instruction is complete, the men will be used for their purposes, then returned to us for ours. Ammunition and spare parts will also be sold, though not cheaply.” His gaze sharpened on his supporters. “Each of you will find fifty warriors. Tried and tested men, but young. Cunning, but obedient and loyal. And none of such note or name that they will be missed. This must remain a secret of secrets.”

He rose and clapped his hands. The slaves filed in, bearing trays of carved wood heaped high with steaming food; others carried golden vessels of cacao and fermented fruits and northern brandy.

Only the king and the nobles, priests and the most trusted guards would return from this meeting, of course. The others would serve to buy the favor of the gods.