Master of the House of Darts

by Aliette de Bodard

  "No," I said. "You're right. There is nothing more I can do here."

  I did go to see Mihmatini – after dropping off Palli at my temple. I had no idea what he'd seen or heard while I was away, but he wouldn't stop shivering, and every time his eyes strayed to the ground he would give a little start, as if waking from a nightmare.

  I found the Duality House much like the air before a storm: very little activity, but every gesture charged with a meaning and import I couldn't decipher – and, throughout, a leaden weight, a sense of something large and unpleasant about to happen, lodged in my throat and chest. Mihmatini was in her rooms with Yaotl. She was staring at a divination book, impatiently turning pages as if each of the hollow-eyed deities had offended her.

  "Acatl." She looked up, a smile starting to tease the corners of her eyes, and then her face fell. "You haven't found him."

  I took the coward's way out, and said nothing; it must have been answer enough for her. "You look tired," I said, sitting by her side.

  She waved a hand – in a gesture eerily reminiscent of Teomitl. "I've been busy." She stabbed the paper. "I have to do something, or I'll burst. So I've been looking into matters. It's not good, Acatl."

  "Not good?" I hadn't thought my stomach could be colder.

  "Chalchiuhtlicue's power has been increasing these past weeks," Mihmatini said. "It is the Ceasing of the Waters: a time for propitious sacrifices."

  "You think–"

  "Something is going to happen. Something bad."

  "The prisoners," I said.

  "The She-Snake moved them to different quarters; we've warded them pretty tightly." Mihmatini puffed her cheeks, thoughtfully. "I don't think they'll go that way. It's like water – they'll find the path of least resistance."

  Which, by definition, we wouldn't have considered. Great.

  Mihmatini tapped the book again. "I just wish – there's something about this that should be obvious."

  "The date?" I asked, a tad too sceptically.

  "Most priests consider dates important. And I'm pretty sure most High Priests, too."

  "What can I say; I've never been a good candidate for the position."

  "We'd got that," Yaotl said – mocking and sarcastic, as always.

  Mihmatini looked up again, frowned. "You're the one who looks tired. Don't get me started again on the skeletal look."

  It was a running joke between us – usually when I hadn't got enough sleep or food: I was High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli, not Lord Death himself.

  I could just shake my head, pretext fatigue after the illness – and take the coward's way out. It would be so easy – just a few words, a nod in the right place…

  And I'd never dare to look her in the face again, if I did that.

  "I found Teomitl."

  In the silence that followed, you could have heard maize bloom.

  Mihmatini's face had gone as flat as polished obsidian. "And it didn't occur to you to tell me before?"

  "I'm telling you now." If you'd told me, a year ago, that Yaotl, always so ready with a jest, would be coming to my rescue…

  "Where is he?"

  I picked my words carefully. "There are some things you need to hear first."

  "No. I need to see him first," Mihmatini said.

  "Look," I said, slowly, aware that every new word was another weapon I handed her. "You know he's never liked Tizoc-tzin – and with the failure of the coronation war…"

  Mihmatini's face had gone as brittle as obsidian. "He wouldn't. Teomitl wouldn't…"

  I spread my hands, wishing I could make another answer – heard her breathe, slow and even, her face growing more still and unmoving each time, as if someone were leeching all humanity from her. "Where is he?" she said at length.

  "A house in Zoquipan," I said. Mihmatini was still watching me, with an odd expression in her eyes – anger, tenderness? Something halfway between the two. "Look." I took a deep breath. "Promise me something?"

  She cocked her head, like a bird about to fly – an eagle, not a timid sparrow or a harmless turkey. "It depends."

  "Take Yaotl," I said. "And two priests."

  "Why?" And then she worked it out. "Acatl, you're a fool. He wouldn't harm me."

  "He wouldn't, no," I said, finally – though he had changed much. "But he's not alone in this." The old woman, whoever she was, the warriors of his entourage, and whoever else in court might be supporting this little power-grab, or whatever else he might have planned.

  The Duality curse me, I should have asked him for more information – no, I couldn't have done that, not manipulating my own student into admitting the truth.

  Mihmatini folded the calendar, carefully. "Right. I'll see him," she said. She took a deep breath and for a moment, an achingly familiar moment, she seemed to loom larger, her arms spread wide enough to hold the Fifth World – no longer my younger sister, but a reflection of the gods she served – a living reminder of her predecessor Ceyaxochitl, who had been small and frail, except in moments such as these.

  It wasn't until Mihmatini took a step forward that I became aware of the burning sensation in my throat. Ceyaxochitl had been dead a few months, and grief still caught me at odd times, hooking me like a barbed spear. "Be careful," I said.

  "Thank you for the advice, but I don't think I need it," Mihmatini said. She cast a glance around the room and picked up a vivid blue shawl, which she held against her chest, thoughtfully, then folded it back again on top of the reed chest. "Let's go."

  Yaotl followed his mistress out of the room without demur – which left me alone in my sister's deserted apartments, with a folded calendar and nothing useful to do.

  I took a look at the calendar out of sheer conscientiousness. I was no calendar priest, but I could see the same things as Mihmatini. Jade Skirt's influence was rising throughout the month, and it was culminating today, on the Feast of the Sun.

  Something bad was going to happen, but I couldn't see what. Something to do with the prisoners – neither the She-Snake nor I were infallible, and there had to be something we hadn't thought of. Another outbreak of the epidemic? We couldn't afford to sacrifice a life for a life. If more people fell ill in the palace, what would we do?

  No, I knew what they would do. Both Tizoc-tzin and Quenami, who thought themselves so much above the common folks – they would order us to heal the sick noblemen, not the peasants or the merchants. That wasn't the question. The real question was, what would I do?

  And I didn't have any answer. The death of officials would send the Empire into chaos, but to buy our salvation by trading one death for another…

  At length, I rose and went back to my temple. I barely had time to check the shrine and our registers before a commotion in the courtyard brought me out. From above, I could see the grey cloaks of my priests, arguing with what looked like a nobleman – quail-feathers' headdress, richly embroidered cloak – and another man in grey clothes.

  As I descended, though, they swam into focus – Quenami, looking harried and wan, and Ichtaca, whose round face was grim. By their frantic breaths, they had run all the way there.

  My heart tightened in a clench of ice.

  Quenami all but grabbed me as I came down the final stairs, his hands scrabbling at my cloak with the coordination of a drunken man. "Acatl." He drew a shuddering breath, but for once he seemed at a loss for words.

  "What happened? The prisoners…"

  It was Ichtaca who answered, his eyes as hard as cut stones. "No, not the prisoners, Acatl-tzin. The priests."

  The priests? The clergy within the Sacred Precinct? But surely that was impossible? "I don't understand."

  Quenami took a step backward – and, with an effort akin to wrenching a sacrifice's heart from his chest, pulled himself together to look once more stern and arrogant. "Of course you wouldn't. We mean the clergy of Tlaloc."

  Acamapichtli. Tapalcayotl. All of them, cooped up in their cages, stripped of their finery and of their powers. Perfect targets. "How
many?" I asked, but Ichtaca shook his head. "You have to come, Acatl-tzin."

  How many priests had been in that courtyard? A hundred, perhaps more? I'd talked to Tapalcayotl, and had barely paid enough attention to the others caught in this sordid power-play. But surely there had been dozens of cages: the clergy of Tlaloc was the second most numerous, after that of Huitzilpochtli the Southern Hummingbird.

  Say two dozen. That was already too much. Every death would have increased the powers of our sorcerer, and brought their plans this much closer to fruition.

  I thought of Mihmatini's calendar, and of the sense in the air of the calm before the storm. Well, lightning had struck, and we were, if not lost, dancing on the edge of the chasm already.

  NINETEEN

  The Water's Influence

  It was carnage. Granted, I wasn't a warrior and hadn't walked the battlefields, but I imagined it couldn't get much worse than this. It wasn't the blood scattered on the ground: I had seen enough of it in devotions or large spells. It wasn't the body parts, either: again, I was no stranger to violence.

  What made my stomach heave was the sheer scale. The courtyard had been lined with cages, and all of them had been hit at the same time, by what seemed to be a much faster variant of the plague. The bodies lay contorted on the ground, blackened with internal bleeding – and I remembered from the autopsy how much it had hurt, every organ breaking down and leaking into the body. The faces were turned upwards, the nostrils and mouths ringed with blood; the eyes, wiped clean by the blankness of death, had red corneas, and scarlet tears ran down the cheeks.

  Near the back, under the pillars, I found the cage where Tapalcayotl had been. He lay still, almost unrecognisable with the flow of blood that had puffed up his cheeks, all his haughtiness and aggressiveness gone for ever – one arm still extended outwards, with a carved amulet that had rolled away on the stone floor.

  So much blood; so much magic, shimmering in the air, so much raw power devoted to Chalchiuhtlicue. The sorcerer would be gorged with it, ready to move against the Empire if necessary.

  I knelt, and said the words, the ones I always said – the litany for the Dead – even though they'd died for Jade Skirt, and would be in Her land now, rowing boats among the eternal canals, harvesting always-ripe maize. But I couldn't leave them without a guide, and there were no priests of Tlaloc left, not in the whole of Tenochtitlan.

  "We leave this earth, we leave this world,

  Into the darkness we must descend,

  Leaving behind the precious jade, the precious feathers,

  The marigolds and the cedar trees…"

  Footsteps echoed behind me. I'd expected Tizoc-tzin, but it was the She-Snake, his face grave. "I trust you've seen enough."

  No, I hadn't. "How did this happen?"

  "I don't know," the She-Snake said. "But I'm not surprised. They were jailed pending trial, not kept under a magical watch." His gaze was dryly amused. "No one is going to care if malfeasants fail to survive until they appear before the judges, after all."

  Of course he was lying, and of course he knew what I'd think of this. I bit back on an angry remark – he hadn't been the one to arrest the clergy, after all – and said, instead, "I trust that's made Tizoc-tzin realise that the clergy wasn't involved with any of this."

  The She-Snake raised a mocking eyebrow. "It might have. I wouldn't know. We've all advised him to remain in his quarters for the moment. If whoever has done this is moving against the Mexica Empire, then they'll target its head, sooner or later."

  "That's not enough," I said. I tasted bile on my tongue. "You've seen what they can do. Tizoc-tzin has to leave Tenochtitlan." I didn't like this; among other things, it would leave Teomitl a freer rein than I liked, but it had to be done. We couldn't afford to lose the Revered Speaker – never mind that most of this was his fault, that Tapalcayotl and Acamapichtli were dead, the clergy of Tlaloc all but reduced to small, unimportant priests in far-flung cities, and that it would take years for it to rebuild itself, if it was rebuilt at all…

  No. I was High Priest. I'd let my feelings and my urge for justice distract me once, and the results had been disastrous. The truth was, there was as much justice as we could make, but preserving the balance of the Fifth World was more important than even that.

  It was a thought that hurt like a knife between my ribs, but I had to hold it. I had to believe it.

  "He can't–" The She-Snake considered for a while. "I can't be the one to suggest this. In his absence, I would represent him in the city, and he knows it. He'll see this as an attempt to seize power." His face was unreadable; I'd never really understood what motivated him; if he didn't, deep down, yearn to be more than viceroy, more than a substitute for the Revered Speaker.

  "Then ask Quenami." Given his state, I didn't think he would protest, for once.

  I didn't look to see if he was following. He could deal with the politics, as if he had been born to. I, in turn, would deal with the magic.

  I stood in the centre of the courtyard, breathing in the rank smell of blood – it had started to change already in the sunlight, like butchered meat going bad. So much of it, such a sickening waste…

  Cuixtli wasn't here: there was no other power to show me the way. But I knew what to look for, now. I slashed the back of my hand, letting the blood drip onto the ground, and said a hymn to Lord Death, feeling the cold of the underworld rise up, the keening lament of the Dead become the only sound in the courtyard. Everything seemed to recede into insignificance, save the corpses in the cages, limned with green light, the eyes bleeding and weeping, as if they could still see anything in the Fifth World. Faint traces of light hovered over the bodies: the remnants of the teyolia and tonalli souls, gathering their scattered pieces before entering the world of the gods – close enough to touch, if I were so minded. But their words would be garbled and confused – their selves incomplete – and I would learn nothing.

  Instead, I focused my attention on the pillars. Magic pulsed from them, an angry, steady beat – as I walked closer, the frescoes mingled and merged with each other, receding away until all that remained were the red glyphs, their contours bent like maize stalks in strong sunlight: a pyramid surrounded by smoke, a temple pierced by arrows, a body lying on the ground, torn into four hundred pieces…

  May everything you start turn against you, wither into dust, into filth. May your priests lose the black and red of the ancients – their codices, their memories of knowledge and ritual. May you be left without faces or hearts, thrown in the mud with the god's shackles weighing you down…

  Jade Skirt's magic, washing over me like waves in a stormy lake – flashes of writhing bodies, contorting in the agony of drowning, of ahuizotls feasting on the eyes and fingernails of bloated corpses…

  Enough.

  I drew a shuddering breath and stepped away from the wall.

  Ichtaca was waiting for me at the courtyard's entrance. "I need to know who came here."

  He raised an eyebrow. "Half the palace. They were on trial, and I'm sure neither Tizoc-tzin nor the court would have deprived themselves of the opportunity to mock them."

  "You don't understand. Someone engraved a spell within this courtyard, and they had to have done it after the cages were set up."

  His face set in a grimace. "Acatl-tzin–"

  "I'm sure of it."

  Xiloxoch. Yayauhqui. Which of them had it been? I had been weak, and ineffective. For once, Teomitl had the right of it: we had to act. "You need to arrest people," I said to the She-Snake.

  "You know who is responsible for this?"

  "No," I said. "But it's too late for those considerations."

  The She-Snake grimaced; I could tell he didn't entirely agree. But, like me, he had to bow to necessity. "Who?"

  "A courtesan named Xiloxoch, and a Tlatelolca merchant. Yayauhqui."

  Which, of course, might stop nothing, even if it was one of them. If they had accomplices, the plague would go on.

  No, not on
ly the plague. They'd made a deliberate sacrifice to Jade Skirt, gathering up power with those deaths packed so close by. The plague wasn't the finality: our sorcerer was preparing for something much, much worse.

  "I'll try to locate them. But you must know–"

  That the palace was large, and in utter chaos; that they might not want to be found. "I know." But it had to be tried, all the same.

  "I'll inquire," Ichtaca said. He looked at the She-Snake, who still stood near the empty cages, looking at the corpses as if it could all make sense. But of course it would all make sense, once we caught the culprit. Once the Mexica Empire was safe. "One more thing, Acatltzin. About the Master of the House of Darkness."