by Vic Connor
A grim, brooding look spreads across her face, while she keeps her eyes fixed on her hands. “It is…” She seems to search for words.
Abe’s voice sounds like he’s trying hard to keep an earthquake from going off. “If ya knows how t’ save our sweet lil’ angel, witch,” he rumbles, “if ya knows, yet ya does nothin’, Beelzebub helps ya because…”
“I… swore.” Juanita looks at me as if begging for help, or maybe for forgiveness. “I—I…”
I grab her calloused hands. “Can you help the little girl?” I whisper. “Can you heal her? Or at least give her a chance of healing?”
Our witch nods, slowly.
“Then whatever you swore,” I tell her, “whatever oath you took, it’s not as important as saving one person’s life. And in this case, you’d save Uitzli’s life too.”
“It will be … costly, my child.”
We have to do this, Juanita.
All right, we’ll find some other way.
Aw, c’mon! What kind of silly choice is this!?
“We have to do this, Juanita,” I say, “Nothing, I mean nothing costs more dearly than doing nothing when a child is about to die.”
23
Killing Time
But, holy crap, it is frigging costly.
Juanita haggles back and forth with Yolotl, the stern middle-aged woman who runs the apothecary. “Her name means ‘heart,’” Juanita tells me, “but I believe a cold, hard rock lives inside her chest.”
The two women bargain on and on.
“She has the reagents I seek,” Juanita informs us at last, “but she will charge outrageous prices, and she will take none of our possessions in exchange. She shall only accept gold or onyx beads.”
We cross the plaza under the heavy afternoon sun. A group of Spanish traders have arrived, and soon, flocks of Aztecs surround them to gawk and barter. The Spaniards have brought fine dresses and suits, the latest in fashion at European courts. We have nothing to interest them, and they’re keen to get gold, not give it.
Following Axolotl’s suggestion, we return to Radimir’s shop. The muscular Muscovite twirls his imperial mustache while appraising our ragtag bunch. I can almost hear the clinking of coins in his head as he calculates how much he can squeeze us for.
I stop him before he even suggests buying Miyu’s naginata, because I suspect this offer will end in bloodshed. Abe’s cutlass is off limits, too, which leaves us only the musket we looted after our last fight and my flintlock pistols.
“Only somebody drunk or crazy would think your guns are worth the amount of gold you are asking.” Radimir sneers. “But this cursed tropical heat is driving me crazy, melting my cold heart. Give me that rusty musket, the crude pistolón, and five of the other pieces of junk you flatter by calling them pistols, and I will give you the gold you need.”
“Not a snowball’s chance in hell,” I argue.
“Then let us say that crude musket, the pistolón, and three of your other guns. Or, you can leave my shop and follow that snowball of yours into hell and back.”
“You must’ve gone mad, friend,” I tell him. “This tropical heat seems to affect the good judgement of those born and raised in the land of snow. The musket and two pistols—that’s it.”
He nods grimly. “I admit, I have made a mistake. After you entered my shop, even against my better instincts, I said to myself, ‘Don’t be so quick to judge by appearances, Radimir. Even if they wear filthy clothes, maybe they’re gentlemen fallen on hard times.’ I was sorely mistaken: You’re nothing more than a pack of filthy pirates and thieves, all of you—not just the tall one with the dirty headband.”
Abe and the Muscovite nearly come to blows on matters of personal hygiene, and Hendricks needs to stand between them before things get out of hand.
Eventually, we all cool off and reach an agreement. Musket, four of my pistols, and the dagger that Miyu had looted from our second encounter and that she now produces from inside one of her sleeves.
We trek across the square with Radimir’s gold in our pockets, myself feeling exposed without four of my pistols. While Juanita buys the herbs, powders, and animal body parts she needs from Yolotl’s apothecary, I stand around outside, pretending not to look at a bunch of pretty Aztec girls trying out French dresses at the Spanish trading stalls.
At some stage, Axolotl’s enraged growls sound from inside the apothecary—mixed with Yolotl’s defiant screams—but just before I rush inside, Juanita storms out carrying a heavy bundle.
“Let’s go, child,” she says to me. “We have what we need.”
We trudge through the square yet once more; the pretty girls have disappeared, replaced by three grave-looking men who, their plumed headdresses on the side, are testing how tricorne hats blend with their traditional Aztec attire.
At first, Kokumo has no issues with letting Juanita into her kitchen, where our witch starts brewing. When the concoction begins to stink, though—and it smells like all hell rotting loose—our jovial host changes her mind. But after Axolotl drops a few quiet words to Kokumo, Juanita carries on unmolested. I have to wonder how our new friend holds so much sway.
“Would I be wrong in suspecting,” I ask him, “that you stand to gain if we heal the little girl?”
He smiles. “Do you mean, if the High Priest of Rain God would be thankful not just to whoever cures his beloved child, but also to the humble servant who found the healer? While I wouldn’t even pretend to know the mind of such a man… Yes, I believe he would.”
Ah, right. Golden rule, my ass. Still… I see nothing wrong with Axolotl coming out of this ahead, as long as we get Uitzli back—and as long as it doesn’t cost us more weapons, because I’m already having second thoughts about losing half my firepower. But what’s done is done.
Juanita returns from the kitchen with a steaming bowl of what has to be…
…I don’t know, really: Dung stew with sauce made of feces, judging from the way it smells. Maneesh and Co. have really dialed this one up to eleven; I can think of nothing in real life that might smell as bad as what our witch has conjured up.
Miyu’s hand covers her mask’s nose. Ayelén and Torunn run out to the street, giggling and making gagging sounds, with Hendricks in tow. Iku, in his corner, looks at us as if we have all gone mad, and I can’t blame him for his judgment.
“Do I want to know what that is, or what it is for?” I ask.
In reply, the witch offers the steaming bowl to the pirate.
He wrinkles his nose and furrows his brow. “What this be for, witch?”
“Your oath, pirate.”
“What oath ya yaps about, woman?”
“Did you not swear to protect her?” she asks. “To protect Uitzli to the last drop of your blood?”
He nods. “Ol’ Abe did. But what in hell does yarr bloody stew has t’ do with Ol’ Abe bleedin’?”
“Drink,” she commands. “Or our beloved Uitzli dies tonight.”
The way the words come out of her mouth sends a chilly tremor down my spine. And, judging by how the pirate stiffens, he appears to feel the same.
“If yarr foolin’ with Ol’ Abe, witch, ya soon be sorry ya ever lived.” He grabs the bowl with one of his huge hands and empties it in a single, long gulp. He swallows, and puts the bowl down. “Oh, bugger.” He looks at the witch, narrowing his eyes. “Now what?”
“You feel sleepy,” says Juanita, staring straight in his eyes.
“Nay,” he argues, staring back.
“You feel very sleepy,” she insists.
He yawns. “Naaay. Nuh-huh.”
“Your eyelids grow heavy…”
So does his head, it seems. So heavy, in fact, that it knocks loudly against the wooden table as the pirate slumps forward before I can even try to stop him.
Juanita shouts a few words in Nahuatl. Axolotl shows up with two burly Jaguar warriors behind him.
“I will be back tomorrow, after sunrise,” Juanita tells me.
“What the…”
> She interrupts, raising a hand. “You said nothing costs more than the child’s life, young Jake.” Inch by inch, the warriors drag the unconscious Abe out of the inn. “I will be back after sunrise tomorrow,” Juanita repeats, following them. “Lord of Here and Now willing, with both Uitzli and the pirate.”
Hendricks watches the scene from outside the inn’s entrance, apparently unsure of what to do. Miyu’s onyx-like eyes stay fixed on me.
“Both of them,” Juanita vows. “By the Smoking Mirror, I swear.” She follows Axolotl and the Jaguar warriors, who drag Abe across the plaza, through the western gate, and into the city.
To say that the mood in the inn has darkened would be an understatement. After complaining about the lingering reek, the Spanish traders order food and attempt to strike up a conversation with Miyu, Hendricks, and me. They seem good-natured and pleased with their garment sales, but neither the Dutchman nor I feel like talking, and our samurai isn’t the greatest conversationalist, anyway.
“Kom, mijn vriend,” says Hendricks. “We have time to kill. Let’s schooten at it.”
We leave the inn and walk across the plaza—almost empty, now that the early afternoon’s heat is at its worst—and leave Tepetlacotli through the broad main gate. The Jaguar and Eagle warriors guarding it appear more bored than stern now, and they don’t give us so much as a glance.
It’s cooler on the other side of the wall, out in the open and among the rows of orderly furrows full of blooming maize seedlings and young stalks. The sun is as merciless as ever, but a breeze coming from the jungle and spreading across the fields makes the heat a bit more tolerable than it had been from inside the walled square.
Hendricks wasn’t kidding about killing time by shooting. While it would be unwise to actually open fire so close to the city (and who knows what the Maize God would do or say should we hit a plant), Hendricks is eager to share some tricks about Quick Drawing my pistols and shooting Point Blank.
I’m not sure it’s the optimal way to spend VPs, but screw optimal: It’s obvious by now the opportunity to skill up doesn’t come often in Istoria, so hoarding points looks more and more like the inferior strategy to spending them on skills that may save my life in the next fight.
“I’d be delighted to, my friend, and most grateful,” I say.
During the next three hours…
Skills Upgraded!
Quick Draw
Promising Apprentice
Aim: Point Blank
Proficient Apprentice.
-4VPs; 3 hours spent
…he keeps me drawing my pistol over and over and over and over, correcting a detail here and sharing a subtle tip there, until my right hand seems to acquire a mind of its own.
“Now, if ye really wilt to schooten fast…” He goes into the mode where he seems to grow extra arms and draws guns non-stop, tossing them aside and pulling out the next pistol before the previous one hits the ground.
“Dual-wielding isn’t something I’ll be doing anytime soon, I don’t think.” I smile.
“Ye do much with just one handen, mijn vriend,” he tells me. My heart warms at hearing the genuine respect in his voice.
Miyu is also honing her skills. About twenty steps from us, she swirls and whirls and turns in circles, as though immune to dizziness.
The Dutchman winks to me. “Mind if Ik aask de dame foor een dance?”
I can’t help laughing. “By all means, please do! I’d love to see that.”
I collect my pistols and crutches, and wobble to the foot of the wall. Now that the afternoon sun is on the opposite side of the city, the wall produces a nice, cool shade. I sit down, happy to notice my arms are sore from the drawing exercises rather than the crutches. I lean against the wall and do my best to put Juanita, Abe, and Uitzli’s fate out of my mind while I watch the Lowlander ask the onna-bugeisha for a dance.
She accepts the offer with her trademark eerie, crystal-shattering giggle, and they begin.
When using sword and pistols—the Dutchman only draws his pistols and mimics shooting them—their sparring looks like Hendricks would have the upper hand in a real fight. He can wield his rapier with his left or right hand equally well, all the while drawing and aiming pistols at inhuman speed with the other.
They swirl around each other. Miyu takes the initiative to strike, whereas the Dutchman keeps his distance and uses his blade to block and parry, waiting for the split second in which the naginata gives him an opening to draw and mock-shoot. He then clacks his tongue to simulate gunfire whenever he can get a clean shot at the whirling samurai, although whether the bullet would actually hit the spinning silk flower isn’t clear.
Hendricks finally runs out of pistols to draw and pulls out a dagger, and at this point, there’s nothing the Lowlander can do other than gracefully accept defeat. Not that he’s someone to scoff at when he fights with two blades: His moves are lightning-quick, and by the speed of his rapier and dagger, you’d still think he has grown a few extra arms. But despite his fast moves, he might as well be trying to slash the wind. Miyu’s flowery silks are always an inch out of his sword’s reach, while the naginata’s blade finds Hendricks head, neck, wrists, and thighs again and again and again.
And her precision—the sharp steel unfailingly stopping just a hair’s breadth from drawing blood—is otherworldly.
To his credit, Hendricks is the poster child of the graceful loser. He chuckles good-heartedly when one of his thrusts bites nothing but air and he finds Miyu’s blade at his throat. He laughs while he regains his breath after the tip of the naginata’s shaft sweeps his feet from under him, making him land on his back with a soft thud.
“Ik surrender,” he announces after he gets back to his feet, then bows deeply. “Excuses foor being such clumsy dance partner, mijn dame.”
Miyu stands with her weapon vertical by her side, a pronounced backward tilt on her mask. She rewards Hendricks with a gracious nod.
Engrossed with their fight, I’ve failed to notice that we have gathered something of a crowd: the two girls from the Durojaiye Inn, Ayelén and Torunn; a few Spanish traders, who seem a little tipsy and yell to each other in what they obviously think are discreet whispers; a handful of Aztec citizens, common folks by the look of their plain clothes; the tight-fisted Muscovite with his imperial mustache; and the gate guards, who have been following the sparring between samurai and gunslinger with some interest from behind their Jaguar and Eagle masks.
Ayelén whispers something to Torunn, and the Viking girl runs back into town, past the guards and through the gates.
Hendricks collects his pistols from the ground. Ayelén approaches with a shy smile and, as she helps him, she tells him something in a conspiratorial tone, glancing over at Miyu who stands still as a statue with her blade pointing to the sky. The Dutchman breaks into laughter again and tells me, loudly enough for anybody in the crowd to hear, “De show is niet over.”
The Viking girl comes back, panting from the run. Her pale cheeks are now as bright as red apples. “Ja!” she calls to Hendricks, while Ayelén cheers.
“It means ‘yes,’ mijn vriend,” Hendricks tells me.
“I understand that much Dutch, my friend,” I reply. “But yes to what, if I may ask?”
He points at the main gate.
What I see there isn’t a normal man, but a veritable walking tower: Iku. The dude would make any tall NBA player look like a pygmy. The spear he carries has to be the proverbial ten-foot pole, with a nasty obsidian-looking tip; if used as a roof, his oval-shaped shield would cover a small house.
Cheers for both Iku and Miyu surge from the crowd as onlookers choose a favorite. People exchange bets and wagers, the majority putting their money on the African warrior. Hendricks and the Spaniards launch into a heated discussion of their odds and stakes.
Iku has brought an odd companion: a woman who, weirdly, looks like a mixture of Juanita and me. There has to be something wrong with her legs, since she wobbles from side to side like
I do on my crutches. She wears a poncho similar to Juanita’s, but in bright white, green, and orange colors, and the lines seem gentler than the sharp zig-zags on our witch’s garb. The woman looks old enough to have been around when Aztec and Spaniards first met; her face a mass of wrinkles and her flappy mouth must have lost its last tooth a century ago. She commands great respect from all the locals, though, from the inn girls to the Jaguar and Eagle warriors.
“A great healer,” Torunn informs me. She has a pleasant voice and, seen from up close, her eyes are more teal than watery blue.
“Tepatiki,” Ayelén says.
Ah. So that’s how this will play out.
Gloves are off, in a manner of speaking.
Iku bangs his spear against his shield while Miyu bows slightly. They circle around each other as spear and naginata poke and probe—slowly at first, then increasingly fast.
Iku’s reach is phenomenal, and he’s fast for somebody of his size and mass. With a single leap, he’s able to either pounce on top of the onna-bugeisha or evade her blade’s reach, which seems to shatter the samurai’s usual strategy. She’s now the one who needs to shorten the distance to strike, while her foe uses his longer weapon to stay away.
Yet Miyu does the opposite. Rather than advancing and trying to get her naginata into striking range, she pulls back, widening the gap between them.
“She’ll never hit him!” exclaims Torunn. “Why is she so far away?”
“Just watch,” Hendricks says.
Iku leaps forward, strikes, and misses Miyu by an inch. He bounces back to make sure the naginata cannot reach him; again, he vaults forward, strikes, and, having once more missed by a finger, dashes back. Somebody in the crowd laughs; somebody else curses. The warrior attacks…
…lighting-quick, Miyu leaps forward, too. Iku strikes in a hurry, misses, and tries to step back, but Miyu keeps charging and slashes downward, below Iku’s shield.
Blood pours from Iku’s left shin. He stands still as the old woman draws closer and caresses the wound with her fingertips as dark, smoky tendrils rise from the slash to her hand…
