Master of the House of Darts

by Aliette de Bodard

  We set out from the courtyard. I was still leaning on the cane for support, but I found it much easier to breathe. The familiar magic of the underworld wrapped around me, as intoxicating as peyotl or teonanacatl – stretched, dry emptiness I'd known all my life, the hollow taste of grief, the sharp tang of our own mortality, a gulf in my stomach.

  Even so, the pressure remained: a thickening of the air, a slight buzzing in my ears that got worse as we approached the prisoners' quarters.

  Within, the atmosphere – reverent, distant – remained the same; the prisoners watched us warily, as if our mere presence was enough to shatter the peace. One of them was playing the flute, a simple, haunting sound which climbed higher and higher like a cry of devotion.

  All of this lasted for no more than a handful of breaths – and then the peace was shattered by loud voices. A man and a woman – the woman was Xiloxoch, but I couldn't place the second voice, though I knew I'd heard it before. They both came from within a building – in fact, the very building that had hosted the unfortunate Zoquitl; the conversation sounded… animated, to say the least.

  "I know my rights." Xiloxoch's voice was low and almost toneless. "You should go away."

  "And why would I do that?" The man's voice whipped through the air like a sword's blade.

  If there was an answer, I didn't wait to hear it. I flung open the entrance-curtain with as much force as I could muster – gods, I hated melodramatic entrances, but I had to concede they weren't without effect.

  They both turned, then, to look at me. One, as I had known, was Xiloxoch, wearing a drab tunic and skirt like a demure housewife; the other was Pochtic – Master of the House of Darkness, his face still swathed in bandages, his skin sallow against the vibrant colours of his feather headdress.

  "Well, well." His voice was deeply mocking. "Our High Priest for the Dead. You're too late; they've taken the corpse away."

  "I was aware of that," I said, but didn't elaborate. "What are you doing here?"

  Xiloxoch shook her head. "I know my rights," she said, again. In her hands was a golden trinket, shaped in the likeness of the Fifth Sun.

  The things of the dead man: taken by the courtesan who had ministered to him and thus customary for sacrifices. "Only if you slept with him," I said. "Did you?"

  "I brought him comfort," Xiloxoch said. Her hands tightened around the trinket. What was so important about it?

  And, more pressingly, what was Pochtic doing here? "The work of the Master of the House of Darkness," I said, very slowly, "doesn't include the care of prisoners."

  Pochtic threw me a pitying glance. "A prisoner died, and both I and Coatl were attacked."

  "Coatl is ill," I said, slowly. "It's not quite the same."

  "He's right." Xiloxoch's voice was malicious – the trickster, closing people's eyes with burning coals, stirring up filth and ashes. "You shouldn't be here. Neither you nor Coatl." She spat the word. "Not after what you did."

  "I can't speak for Coatl, but you're mistaken–"

  "Am I?" Xiloxoch opened her hands, angling them so that the light coming in through the entrance curtain glimmered on the gold, so that, for a moment, everything shone as yellow as the Fifth Sun. "Gold and jade; precious stones, precious stones. Was that all it took, my Lord?"

  Pochtic's bandages shifted; his lips tightened in pain. "You will not speak to me like this."

  "Why not?" Her voice was mocking. "Will you call me a whore and despise me, like they all do? I am a priestess, too." She threw her head back, her long hair shifting like a cascade of crows' feathers; for a moment, she was bathed in a warm, pulsing radiance that wasn't hers – something that smelled of the jungle, humid and primal, the odour of churned earth, of rutting beasts, and of jaguars slithering in the shadows, just out of sight.

  Even through the bandages, I saw Pochtic's eyes narrow. "Your… goddess…" he spoke the term as if it were an insult, "doesn't frighten me."

  Xiloxoch smiled, licking her lips, her teeth wide, and as black as obsidian. "Pity. Try another god, then. Itztlacoliuhqui."

  The Curved Point of Obsidian, god of frost and ice, and of blind justice – of victims lashing out in pain, back at their tormentors. "You have nothing," Pochtic said. He brushed off some invisible dust from his clothes, and walked out without a word for either of us.

  Xiloxoch spat on the ground. "As wily as a beast."

  I watched Pochtic's back – remembered the tense set of his hands, the false assurance in his voice. He might have been no better than an animal, as uncultivated as fallow fields, following the roads of the deer and the rabbit, but he was something else, too: scared.

  Because of the plague? But he had not been among its victims. And why come here, to see the prisoners? Was he hoping to find an explanation into deaths that shouldn't have been concerning him?

  Huitzilpochtli strike me down, why was everyone running scared?

  "I need to talk to you," I said to Xiloxoch.

  She sighed, raising her eyebrows as if it were a performance within her temple. "If you must."

  I opened my hand – the one that wasn't clenched around the cane – to reveal the twisted feather stem, still wrapped in a cotton cloth.

  Xiloxoch looked at the feather for a while. Her face was expressionless – remote, as distant as if she were the goddess herself. "What of it?"

  "You know what this is."

  She shrugged. "Not in so many words."

  "Then you're a liar," I said. "Because I knew what this was as soon as I saw it, and I'm not that knowledgeable."

  Xiloxoch's lips turned downwards, a small, dainty grimace. "Fine. It's a broken feather stem, like the ones that hold gold dust. It was used as the vector for a spell."

  "And you had nothing to do with this?" I asked.

  "Why should I have anything to do with it?"

  "Money. Bribes. What Eptli gave to the judges. It would have been poetic, wouldn't it, if he had died by touching tainted money? Worthy of flowers and songs, all the way to the underworld."

  Xiloxoch's face shifted – reducing itself to a single, powerful emotion that was gone in an instant. Anger, or fear? "I can tell you what I see, not how to interpret it."

  Still evading me? "I need interpretations," I said, dryly. "That's what we thrive on. For instance, tell me what kind of illness would kill Eptli and Zoquitl – and then spread to all our warriors?"

  "You're mistaken."

  "I see," I said. "You protect your goddess's interests, but I don't know what She wants."

  Xiloxoch's lips were curled in anger. "I can swear this to you: I have nothing to do with this."

  "As Pochtic had nothing to do with the bribe."

  That, if nothing else did, went straight to her guts. "Pochtic is an arrogant fool, and one day he'll get what he deserves."

  Not while Tizoc-tzin was Revered Speaker. Something of what I thought must have shown on my face, for Xiloxoch said, "Tizoc-tzin isn't eternal."

  I surely hoped so – no one was, even those returned from the world of the gods – but… I watched her face, the carefully blank expression. Something wasn't quite right. "Are you saying he's vulnerable to the plague, like everyone else?"

  Her eyes narrowed – a fraction too long – before she shook her head. "Just that he's mortal, like the rest of us. You, of all people, should know."

  I did know – all too well. But that wasn't the point. She'd said that he wasn't eternal with a definite tone – as if Tizoc-tzin's death were weeks or days away, not years ahead of us.

  As if… "Where is Teomitl?" I asked. The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

  Xiloxoch shook her head. "Teomitl? I don't know, Acatl-tzin. I haven't seen him since the tribunal." And her voice sounded utterly sincere – curious, even, I could see her mind working, wondering how she could take the best advantage of this.

  "You haven't," I said, flatly. Then who had Teomitl teamed up with? What in the gods' name did he think he was doing?

  Xi
loxoch smiled. "No. Did you have any other questions, Acatl-tzin?"

  I didn't. I toyed with seizing her, there and then, but whatever was going on was obviously bigger than a single courtesan; if I'd started to arrest everyone who seemed to have a connection with the plague, I'd never have stopped.

  "Till we meet again." Her voice was low, mocking, as she walked away.

  I stood for a while, breathing in the atmosphere of the courtyard, which was as thick as tar, and filled my lungs with hot, dusty wind. The feeling of being observed and weighed had diminished, but only because I was protected. Something – something was wrong here. And either Xiloxoch or Pochtic – or both – had known it.

  I walked among the prisoners until I found Cuixtli, the Mextitlan man who had given us Xiloxoch's name. He was sitting cross-legged on the ground, in an attitude of meditation, hands outstretched, eyes open but looking at nothing in the Fifth World.

  Cuixtli didn't look up as I approached, but when my skin brushed a little too close to him, the magic of my protections hissed like a snake about to strike, and Cuixtli shook his head, annoyed. His eyes slowly focused on me. "Priest."

  "I have this privilege, yes."

  "Why are you here?" Cuixtli unfolded his lanky body, and stood, looking up at the sky. The Fifth Sun had set, and only a glimmer of His light remained in the world; in the courtyard, servants moved to light up the braziers, filling the air with the scent of smoke. "Why are any of you here?"

  I shrugged. "We're trying to help you. Find out what's going on."

  His smile was pitying. "You help yourself, priest. I – or the others for that matter – have no interest in solving mysteries."

  Of course not – to one who would be with the Fifth Sun soon, honoured as a god, why should any of the Fifth World matter? "I'm not sure," I said, slowly. "Something is wrong in this courtyard, You might not be safe here."

  "Do Mexica not respect those who offer their lives?"

  "I don't know." As Teomitl had said, they were the worthiest men – the ones selfless and brave enough to give their lives for the continuation of the Fifth World. And yet – yet they were captured foreigners, not from Tenochtitlan, not even from Tlatelolco. Many would see them as nothing more than tools, faceless sacrifices, living witnesses to the greatness and glory of the Mexica Empire. "The Duality curse me, I don't know. Why were they here, Cuixtli?"

  His face was contemplative. "The official and the courtesan?" He pursed his lips. "Much for the same reason, I should imagine."

  "What, to gather Zoquitl's things?"

  "The official obsessively searched every corner of this courtyard for something he wouldn't name. But I think he was checking spells."

  Spells. Spells to do what? "What do you mean?" I asked, as a fist of ice tightened around my heart.

  "You are High Priest, are you not? One of the three who determine the destiny of your Empire, of your Alliance."

  If only. "Perhaps."

  "Then you should see it." He rose, fluid and silent, almost inhuman, like a bird gliding through the air – and before I could stop him he had laid his hand on mine, at the level of the scars from my blood offerings. When he touched me, they pulsed, and my skin crinkled and reddened like copper in the fire. But there was no pain. Only a distant hiss in my ears, and then the sense of the world falling away from me, as I stood high above the earth, held by some impossibly distant star, except I hadn't moved, I was still standing in the courtyard, still looking at the adobe walls with their rich frescoes, the gods shifting and turning until even I could no longer recognise them – their coloured faces merging with one another's, the rich backgrounds running like raindrops until the walls were once more blank, leaving nothing but a couple of glyphs, stark red against the paleness of the adobe.

  A pyramid temple, with flames coming out of its shrine; a slave's wooden collar and paper clothes; a heart struck in four bleeding pieces…

  May your reign not last: may the cities you hold fall one after the other. May everything you start turn against you, wither into dust, into filth. May you be left without faces or hearts, thrown in the mud with the god's shackles weighing you down…

  And it all shone green, the green of algae, of jade – the same light that filled Teomitl's eyes from corner to corner when he got angry.

  Jade Skirt's magic.

  My hand hadn't left the cane; but I held it so tight my fingers hurt. "How long has that been in the courtyard?"

  Cuixtli shrugged. "I don't know."

  "But you could see it."

  "No." He smiled. "I can see you, priest. I can see the way the magic pushes against you, looking for another way in. It's touched you before, hasn't it?"

  The plague. The night of fever, the squirming bodies pressed against mine – the pain like nails scraping corn from my belly. "I'm not entirely sure I see what you mean." What was I doing, taking advice from a foreign warrior – one of our sworn enemies?

  No. I was being ridiculous. That he was a warrior or a foreigner had ceased to matter: days before his sacrifice, he stood above us, below us – closer to the world of the gods than any priest or sorcerer.

  I walked, slowly, painfully to the walls, ran my hands on them – felt the magic deep within, quivering with anger and rage, like waves in a stormy lake – felt it shiver at my touch as though it recognised me – like a jaguar scenting a wounded prey. "And you think they were here for the spells."

  Cuixtli didn't answer for a while. "The official was clearly looking for them, though they didn't affect him as badly as they did you."

  Spells of rage and anger, to unseat the Mexica Empire – to unseat Tizoc-tzin. Who hated us enough for this?

  Xiloxoch, or Yayauhqui. I didn't think Itamatl had had enough rage in him for this.

  "And the courtesan?" Cuixtli had disapproved of Xiloxoch.

  "I don't know. She might just be what she seems, picking up Zoquitl's things."

  "But–?" I asked, hearing the scepticism in his voice.

  Cuixtli shrugged. "She brims with magic, too – and she's far too curious."

  I nodded. "Do you think she has something to do with the spell?"

  Cuixtli's hands pointed, briefly, towards the wall. "I don't know. Whoever drew this is angry. They want justice."

  Justice for what? For the Empire? For Eptli's transgression? The Duality take me, I had even fewer answers than before.

  SIXTEEN

  The Gates of the Fifth World

  On the way out of the palace, I met Yayauhqui, the Tlatelolca merchant. He was at the head of a group of similarly-clad men, carrying heavy baskets bulging with clothes.

  "Acatl-tzin, what a surprise."

  I wasn't altogether sure it was a coincidence; I was uncomfortably reminded of Nezahual-tzin's warnings about the Tlatelolca. "What are you doing here?"

  Yayauhqui shrugged. "Paying tribute."

  "I didn't know you did that."

  "Ordinarily, no. But our governor has had… an accident."

  "What kind of accident?"

  Yayauhqui gestured at the palace. "The same kind of incident you have within, I'd guess. He's very ill."

  That didn't seem to fit in with the Tlatelolca plot – unless they were punishing the governor for collaborating with the Mexica? "You know more about this than you're telling us."

  Yayauhqui looked surprised. "No. Why would I?"

  "I'm told you were far more than an ordinary warrior of Tlatelolco."

  Yayauhqui's face didn't move, save for a slight tightening around the eyes – it was uncanny to see the amount of control he could exert on his own emotions; or, rather, the effort it took him to display any strong feeling. "What if I was?"

  "You were of imperial blood," I said, slowly. "And your own family was cast down."

  His lips quirked up in a smile. "My family had given up on me long before that, Acatl-tzin. Any branch that bore no flower was pruned at the roots."

  "And you'll still pretend to me Tlatelolco's defeat meant nothing to you?"r />
  Yayauhqui's face did not move. "Of course not. I've already told you what I think about that. But, really, what does it change whether I was of imperial blood or not? Do you think it's no less the city of merchants and peasants than it was that of the Imperial Family?"

  My own parents had been the first to praise the wars we waged – and to feel proud of what our warriors achieved. "You're right," I said, slowly. "But still – you had more of a stake in the existence of Tlatelolco as an independent city-state."