Shadow of the Lords

by Simon Levack

  My elder sister Quetzalchalchihuitl, ‘Precious Jade’, had come looking for her child. I noted with some amusement that she had obviously run out of the courtyard in a hurry, and in the middle of washing her hair, since it was still plastered wetly to the back and sides of her head and her blouse was sodden where she had pulled it hastily back on.

  ‘Hello, Jade,’ I said wearily. ‘Meet my friend Handy He’s working for my master. Aren’t you supposed to be fasting before the festival? How come you washed your hair?’

  Those households that had the means and the inclination to set up a pole and make offerings for the festival of the Coming Down of Water also committed themselves to a fast over the four days preceding it. During the fast it was permitted to wash your face and neck but nothing else, and no soap was allowed.

  My sister looked at me as if I had just asked her why tortoises could not fly ‘Because obviously there won’t be time tomorrow before everyone gets here,’ she said shortly, before turning her attention to my companion. The modest angle of her head belied the blush that darkened her face and the hint of a sparkle in her eyes as she greeted him formally: ‘You have come a long way, you are tired. Please come and rest. I am sorry we can’t offer you anything to eat …’

  I felt a grin creeping unbidden across my face as I stepped carefully around my sister and the child who was now clinging to her skirt. ‘I’ll leave you to it,’ I said, knowing they would be quite safe. Jade did her best not to act her age, but she would not be able to keep the pretence up for long with her own grandson by her side. Besides, Jade’s husband, Amaxtli, would be in the house somewhere. And I felt sure Handy would jump in the canal rather than have to endure whatever Citlalli would have to say to him if he misbehaved.

  ‘That can’t be the musicians already? It’s too early! The Sun hasn’t set yet, we’re not ready, where’s Jade got to? One of you … Tlacazolli, stop staring at that pole like a cretin, go and fetch your father! Are those paper streamers ready? Neuctli, the streamers, I said … Oh.’ The old woman’s head had been swinging sharply from side to side as she rapped out orders to her children as if they were eight-year-olds. When it finally came to rest, with her clear eyes narrowing as they finally took in the appearance of the man standing in front of her, the squawking tailed off into a kind of nasal drone comprised of disappointment, chagrin and something like resignation. ‘It’s you.’

  ‘Hello, Mother.’

  ‘What are you doing back here?’

  My mother’s piety ran deeper than my elder sister’s: either that, or she had not had time to wash yet. She was dressed in a plain blouse and skirt of coarse, undyed maguey cloth, and although her grey hair was bound in the manner of a respectable Aztec matron, swept up and gathered into two long tufts that projected over her forehead like horns, it had a greasy, frayed look that told me it had not been washed for a while.

  ‘I am your son, you know,’ I said, reproachfully.

  ‘I suppose so.’ She sighed heavily. ‘But I wasn’t expecting you. I thought you were from the House of Song. Oh well. What with it being a fast, it’s not as if you’re another mouth to feed. What your father will say, I’ve no idea.’ She glanced over her shoulder at my brother Tlacazolli, or ‘Glutton’, who had been shambling across the courtyard in response to her order. For a moment I thought she was going to call him back before he reached the room where my father evidently was, but she was just too late. My parents had named the elder of my two younger brothers Glutton for a reason, and his speed matched his bulk. On a good day he could just about beat a snail, provided he stayed awake long enough to finish the race, but he had managed to cover the distance and was disappearing through the doorway to deliver my mother’s summons.

  I followed my mother’s glance nervously. ‘How is my father?’

  ‘Same as ever,’ she said shortly. ‘I take it you are here for the vigil?’

  ‘Um, yes.’

  I took the opportunity to survey the courtyard. Piled up beside the pole that dominated it was the wood and kindling that would keep the household warm during the long winter’s night to come, and in front of the bonfire, sitting in a circle on tiny reed mats, were the dolls that would be the focus of the vigil and the next day’s festivities.

  ‘You’ve made a real effort,’ I said. ‘That looks like the full set.’

  ‘It is.’ My mother could not keep the note of pride out of her voice as she recounted their names: ‘Popocatepetl, Iztaccihuatl, Tlaloc, Yoaltecatl, Quauhtepetl, Cocotl, Yiauhqueme, Tepetzintli, Huixachtecail – that’s all the mountains, then there’s Xiuhtecuhtli, Chicomecoatl, Chalchihuitlicue and Ehecatl.’ I imagined the labour that she and my sisters would have lavished on these figurines, these images of the mountains that surrounded the city and the gods that protected it, fashioning each one out of amaranth seed dough and giving it beans for eyes and pumpkin seeds for teeth. Of course, it was a wonderful excuse for them to sit around and gossip and it made a pleasant change from weaving, making tortillas and beating bark into paper, but I could still admire their handiwork.

  One of the workers came up to me now.

  ‘Yaotl?’

  I stared dumbly at a slim, lively-looking young woman, trying to work out who she was. She would be about twenty, I thought, but I could not remember any female relative of mine who was that age. Jade was a year older than I, and my other sister so much younger that when I had last seen her she was still too young for the House of Youth, still at home, being taught by her mother to cook and spin maguey fibre into thread.

  I stared from her to our mother.

  ‘Neuctli?’ I said, incredulously.

  ‘Honey’ was her name, and as far as I remembered it reflected the little girl’s nature. She smiled sweetly at me now. ‘You didn’t recognize me, did you?’

  I continued staring stupidly at her. ‘You, er, you weren’t here last time I came,’ was all I could manage to say.

  ‘Why should she have been?’ snapped my mother. ‘You chose to drop in unannounced for the first time in I don’t know how many years, so what did you expect? The whole family lined up to greet you? You were lucky any of us remembered your name!’

  ‘But I’m back again now,’ I replied defensively. I looked around once more, concentrating this time on my family. I recognized Jade’s husband Amaxtli, a short, wiry man in a one-captive warrior’s multi-coloured breechcloth and a cloak embroidered with scorpions, squatting against the wall with his sons around him; and kneeling near by, Glutton’s wife, Elehuiloni, a plain-looking woman with a weeping infant on her knee and a harassed look. Other children of varying ages milled about, filling the courtyard with their voices, but I could not have said whom any of them belonged to because I could not remember having seen any of them before. I saw no sign of my youngest brother, Copactecolotl, or ‘Sparrowhawk’, but that was no surprise. I would never have looked for him in a household that was fasting. Fasting included abstaining from women, and from what I remembered, that would not suit Sparrowhawk at all.

  ‘Besides, I really had no choice.’

  ‘Nonsense! You had a home here. And all I told you to do was go to the market and sell some paper, not drown yourself in sacred wine and get yourself thrown into prison!’

  ‘I didn’t mean …’

  ‘Anyway, I’m not going to argue with you.’ My mother stepped aside, and I saw my father, standing about four paces away, glaring at me with his arms folded and his teeth bared like an angry dog’s.

  He looked like an older, heavier version of my elder brother Lion, thicker around the waist and neck and with most of his hair long since turned ash-grey, but still hard and strong. He still proudly wore the orange cloak and piled-up hair of a two-captive warrior. Had he been as lucky on the battlefield as his first son was to be, no doubt I would have grown up as the child of an exalted commoner, not exactly a great lord or a noble but the next best thing, and my precarious and ultimately doomed existence among the nobles’ offspring in the Priest House might
have been very different. In the event, each of us had had to make his own way in the world, and if I were ever tempted to hold that against my father, I only had to look at the jagged white scar left by the javelin that had shattered his left knee to remind myself that he was as much the victim of his fate as I was.

  Unfortunately he was less philosophical about it.

  ‘I heard you’d been here. What are you doing back again? Have you come to pay your mother back for the paper you stole? Fine. Pay her and go.’ He lurched towards me, balancing himself on his good leg. ‘If it’s food and shelter you want you can forget it. I’ll throw you in the canal first, and don’t think my knee will stop me!’

  I glanced at my mother. She looked down, her face darkening, although whether this was from embarrassment or anger I could not tell.

  ‘All I’ve got,’ I started to say, ‘is what I’m wearing. I’m sorry …’

  My father almost fell on me, stumbling forward and striking me on the chest with both hands. Surprised, I staggered back, almost losing my footing. The old man followed me and screamed in my face.

  ‘You’re sorry! You useless, lying, drunken, filthy, thieving, whore-mongering little excuse for a shit-smeared dog’s arse!’

  ‘Mihmatcatlacatl!’ my mother cried, reproachfully.

  He ignored her. He hit me again, but this time it was a real punch, aimed at my shoulder and with all the force of his strong right arm and a decade or more of bitterness behind it, and the numbing force of the blow sent me crashing to the floor with my cloak flapping around me in a tangle of billowing cloth.

  ‘How dare you show your face here! I’ll give you “sorry”! If you knew what I gave up for you!’

  He aimed a kick between my sprawled legs. Fortunately kicking was no longer one of his strengths. His wounded knee gave way and he stumbled, momentarily off balance, and I took the chance to roll to one side and get on my hands and knees.

  I scuttled away. A small circle of spectators, mainly my curious nieces and nephews, had gathered around us, and I made for its edge. He caught me before I got there, grabbing the hem of my cloak and jerking at it until I heard the cloth tear. ‘Come back here, you coward! I’ve not finished with you yet!’

  I let him have the cloak. I managed to undo the knot with one hand and help myself to my feet with the other. I whirled around, just in time to see my father collapse, screaming with rage as the cloak fell away in his hands.

  My mother called his name again as she ran to help him up. She shot me a reproachful look.

  ‘Get him away from me.’ The old man was suddenly in tears. ‘I can’t bear to see him here. Just get him out!’

  I watched and listened, mystified. ‘I don’t understand you,’ I gasped. ‘You won’t even let me tell you why I came.’

  ‘He’s probably looking for me.’

  The newcomer spoke in a self-confident drawl that I knew very well. I turned in time to see him stepping forward from among the spectators, the red border of his rich yellow cotton cloak swirling about his feet and the white ribbons at the nape of his neck flowing behind him. His sandals had big loose straps which slapped the ground as he walked.

  The Guardian of the Waterfront stopped to survey the scene in front of him, a knowing smile spreading across his face as he watched my mother helping my father to his feet and me rubbing my sore shoulder.

  ‘Looks as if I got here in time. I see you two have met at last!’

  ‘Lion!’ My father limped towards my brother with his arms outstretched and his eyes sparkling with joy. ‘I didn’t think you’d come! Are you here for the festival?’

  Lion’s reception could not have been more different from mine. While they embraced, clapping each other on the back, I looked around. The little children and their parents were beginning to move away to resume their seats at the edges of the courtyard. I saw Handy among them, looking self-conscious. I hoped my elder sister had not teased him too much.

  When he had managed to disengage himself Lion said: ‘I can’t stay. I’m sorry, I’m needed at home.’ Lion’s family was housed in a mansion near the city centre, and if he intended to celebrate the festival he would have a pole of his own standing in the biggest of his courtyards. ‘I came to find him.’ He looked at me.

  ‘How’d you know to look here?’ I asked suspiciously.

  ‘Just a lucky guess. I gathered from that evil little scorpion of a steward your master employs that you’d gone out. He claimed to have no idea where you’d gone, so I thought I’d try here first. It’s where I found you last time, if you remember. You seem to be making these reunions a habit!’

  My father gave me a disgusted look. ‘Well, you’ve found him,’ he snapped. ‘Now will you please take him away with you’.

  I groaned, realizing that I was about to get the blame for my brother’s not being able to stay. ‘Look,’ I began, ‘I only wanted to say …’

  ‘Come on, then,’ said Lion briskly. ‘Don’t forget your cloak.’ He turned to my mother. ‘I’m sorry about this. Duty calls – for both of us. But I’ll send him back later.’

  My mother said nothing. My father stepped towards me, then turned on my brother. ‘Bring him back? That’s the last thing I want. I don’t want to see him again!’

  Lion had started towards the doorway, gently brushing away the small crowd of admiring children who were trying to feel the hem of their hero’s cloak. Now he stopped and looked back.

  ‘I’ll send him back,’ he repeated coolly. ‘What you do with him then is up to you. But it looked to me as if you two had some unfinished business and I would hate to interfere!’

  He walked away. The only sound was the flapping of his sandal straps.

  I looked at my parents. My mother looked back at me. Her face looked as if it had been carved in stone. My father merely stared wistfully after his favourite son.

  ‘Well?’ my mother said eventually, in a cracked voice.

  ‘You heard what he said, Mother. I’d better go.’ I turned away.

  ‘Do you want your cloak?’

  ‘No,’ I said, without looking around. ‘Keep it. In return for the paper!’

  4

  I left Handy in the midst of my family. If my father could forgive him for being associated with me, I knew they would make him feel welcome.

  I ran down to the canal and caught up with Lion just as he was about to climb into a canoe. There were three of them, moored in a line: one for Lion and me and two for his escort of powerful warriors.

  ‘I’ve learned from experience that whenever you’re involved I’ve got to be ready for anything,’ he explained. ‘Now, in you get!’

  ‘Aren’t you going to tell me where we’re going?’

  ‘When you’re in the canoe, yes.’ By which time, of course, I would not be able to bolt. Ignoring my misgivings, I climbed into the canoe. It was either that or go home again and get beaten up by an old man.

  ‘I have to hand it to you, Yaotl,’ Lion continued as he settled himself behind me, ‘when you get yourself into trouble, you do it in style. After all, if you’re going to piss people off, why not go straight to the top?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  He chuckled. ‘Can’t you guess? This is the second time in a matter of days you’ve managed to earn yourself something most people don’t get once in their entire lives.’ He leaned forward to add, murmuring into my ear in a confiding tone: ‘Your very own private audience with the Emperor himself!’

  Night was falling. The canals and streets around us were almost empty. The evening rush home from the city’s places of business, its marketplaces, courts, palaces and temples, was largely over, and it was too early yet for the merchants and their secretive, nocturnal traffic, or for any revellers on their way to dances or banquets, which usually began at midnight. The trumpet calls that announced sunset had faded and there was little sound other than the lapping of water against the sides of my brother’s boat.

  ‘My favourite time of day,’
Lion mused.

  ‘Me too,’ I said eagerly. ‘I liked watching the Sun go down over the mountains when I was a priest. I used to tend the temple fire on top of Tezcatlipoca’s pyramid sometimes, even when I didn’t have to, to get the best view. On a good evening it would make the surface of the lake shine like gold.’

  My brother stared at me. ‘What are you on about? I just like the fact that the canals are empty and I don’t have complete strangers bumping into me!’

  ‘What does the Emperor want?’ I asked.

  ‘Don’t know, but I guess it has something to do with whatever you’ve been up to in Tlatelolco. Are you going to tell me about that?’

  He listened to my account in grave silence. In the gathering gloom it was hard to read his features, but I thought I could see a frown forming and deepening as I neared the end of my tale.

  ‘So what actually happened to you last night, at Skinny’s house?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ I confessed. ‘I thought it was all a dream, brought on by the Morning Glory seeds, but now … well, some of it must have happened. I mean, there really was a woman there. I found signs of her when I woke up this morning. And I had been tied up and someone had come and cut my ropes. But the rest I don’t know about.’

  ‘I never get dreams like that,’ my brother remarked ruefully. ‘Still, if you’re telling me it was another case of you not being able to keep your breechcloth on, I can believe that!’

  ‘That’s not fair! I was drugged!’

  ‘So you say. Still,’ Lion went on soberly, ‘your problem right now comes down to this, doesn’t it? Old Black Feathers wants to tear Nimble limb from limb. He’s given you until tomorrow to produce him, failing which you’ll suffer the same fate, but you don’t even know where he is.’

  ‘I thought that if I found the featherwork, I’d find him. That’s what Kindly as good as told me.’

  Mention of the old man’s name drew a derisive snort from my brother. ‘From what little I’ve seen of Kindly, I wouldn’t place too much reliance on that!’ He sighed regretfully ‘But as for your master … I don’t know, brother. I’d do what I could, you know that.’ I believed him. At one time, not so long ago, it would not have surprised me to see him in the audience at my own execution, visibly gloating over my fate, but a good deal had happened to both of us recently. ‘It’s not as if old Black Feathers is any friend of mine! The trouble is that he’s the Chief Minister and I’m just an officer. So long as the Emperor is minded to let him, he can do pretty much what he likes.’ He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. ‘I could probably stop him from doing anything too flagrantly illegal. Even for a man in his position it would be awkward if the Guardian of the Waterfront started asking what had become of his brother, and he couldn’t come up with some sort of explanation. But he has a perfect right to admonish you, especially since you’ve run away twice already, and no power in Mexico can prevent him. And we both know what’s likely to follow if it happens a third time.’