Aztec Blood

by Gary Jennings

  Everywhere, always you are awaited,

  You are invoked; your are entreated,

  Your glory, your fame are sought.

  In heaven you live:

  Anáhuac is in your hand.

  Anáhuac was the heartland of the Aztec Empire, the valley now called Mexico, with its five interlocking lakes, Zumpango, Xaltocan, Xochimilco, Chalco, and Texcoco. It was in the heart-of-the-heart of Anáhuac that they built Tenochtitlan.

  Our Father the Sun,

  In plumes of fire;

  Our Mother the Moon,

  In silver night.

  Come to us,

  Bring your light.

  Wind as cold as the underworld caressed me again. I shivered down to my toes.

  "The Feathered Serpent comes to us," the Healer said. "He is with us now. We called him with our blood."

  The woman knelt behind me and put an Aztec warrior's cape of bright feathers, yellow and red and green and blue, over my shoulders. She put a warrior's helmet on my head and handed me a sword of hard wood with an obsidian edge so sharp it could split a piece of hair.

  The Healer nodded approval after I was dressed. "Your ancestors will not honor you unless you come to them as a warrior. From the moment of birth, an Aztec was trained to be a warrior. That is why his birth cord was taken into battle and buried on the battlefield by a warrior."

  He motioned for me to sit before the fire. The old woman knelt down beside me. She was holding a stone cup filled with a dark liquid.

  "She is xochimalca, a flower weaver," the Healer said. "She knows the magic potions that let the mind bloom so that it can rise to the gods."

  She spoke to me, but I did not understand what she said. I recognized the language as related to Aztec, but it was again the priestly language known only to the few. The Healer interpreted for her.

  "She will give you a potion to drink, obsidian knife water. In it are many things, octli, the drink that intoxicated the gods, the cactus bud the white faces call peyotl, the holy dust called ololiuhqui, blood scraped from the sacrificial block at the temple of Huitzilopochtli in Tenochtitlan before the Spanish destroyed it. There are other things in it, substances that are known only to the flower weaver that came not from the ground we stand upon but the stars above us.

  "Those whose hearts were ripped out at the sacrificial block were given this drink before they were sacrificed. As with warriors who die in battle and women who die in pregnancy, those sacrificed are paid the divine honor of living with the gods in the House of the Sun. Obsidian knife water takes one there, to the gods."

  Seated before the blazing fire, surrounded by the chanting of sorcerers, I drank the potion.

  ¡Ayya ouiya! My mind became a river, a dark, flowing stream that soon turned into raging rapids and then into a black maelstrom, a whirlpool of midnight fire. My mind twisted and turned until it spun out of my body. When I looked back, I was soaring in the shadowy ceiling of the cavern. Below me was the fire with the wizards and my own familiar form gathered around it.

  An owl flew by me. They were birds of evil omen, announcing death with their nocturnal hoots. I fled out of the cave to escape the death that the owl carried. Day had become night outside; a moonless, starless black shroud encased the earth.

  The Healer's voice came to me, whispered in my ear as if I still sat beside him next to the fire in the cave.

  "Your Aztec people were not born in this mother of caves in Teotihuacan but in the north, the land of winds and deserts where the Dark Place is found. They did not call themselves Aztecs. That was a name bestowed upon them by the Spanish conquerors. They called themselves Mexicas. They were driven from their northern land by bitter winds; storms of dust, because no rains fell. They were driven south by hunger and desperation, south to the land the gods favored and kept warm and wet. But there were already people in the south, people powerful enough to stop them and destroy the Mexicas. These people were blessed by the sun and rain god. They built a wondrous city called Tula. Not a place of the gods like Teotihuacan, but a city of beauty and pleasure, of great palaces and gardens that rival those of the Eastern Heaven."

  It would be in Tula that our Aztec ancestors first understood their destiny, the Healer said.

  Tula: the name was magic in my ears even as I listened to the haunted voice of the Healer. Sahagun, a Spanish priest who came to New Spain soon after the conquest, compared the legend of Tula to Troy, writing, "that great and famous city, very rich and refined, wise and powerful, suffered the fate of Troy."

  "Quetzalcóatl had been at Teotihuacan, but he left it for Tula," the Healer said. "At Tula he angered and affronted Tezcatlipoca, Smoking Mirror, the god of wizards and sorcerers, and Tezcatlipoca took his revenge. He tricked Quetzalcóatl into getting drunk on pulque; and when lost in this drunken haze, Quetzalcóatl lay with his own sister. Shamed by his sin, he fled Tula and set sail on the Eastern Sea, swearing that he would return someday to reclaim his kingdom.

  "Quetzalcóatl is one of your god-ancestors, but there are many others. The most important is Huitzilopochtli, the warrior god of the Aztecs. He took the form of a hummingbird and spoke to his tribe with the voice of a bird. Huitzilopochtli will be your guide."

  Huitzilopochtli. Warrior. God. Hummingbird Wizard.

  As I soared in the black shroud, I knew the truth.

  I am Huitzilopochtli.

  FORTY-FIVE

  The door the flower weaver's potion opened in my mind took me to a distant place and time. When I was leader of the Aztecs.

  As I lay dying I saw the Way my people must follow.

  I am Huitzilopochtli and the people called Mexicas are my tribe.

  We came from the north, the Bitter Land, where the earth was hot and dry and the wind blew dirt in our mouths. Food was scarce in the Bitter Land, and we roamed south, hearing of green valleys that were lush with maize so fat a man's arms could not fit around a single ear. In the north we must fight the hard earth to raise corn so thin it doesn't nourish a cockroach. Many years ago the rain god refused to water our lands, and our people suffered hunger until they found the way of the hunter. Now we hunt with bow and arrow for game that cannot outrun our bolts.

  We Mexicas are a small tribe, just two hundred cooking fires. Because we do not have land that can feed us, we wander in search of a home, to the green, lush south, coming into contact with the people who are already settled. All of the good land has been taken, and our tribe is not large enough to force others from their fields.

  We move continuously in search of a refuge. We have no beasts of burden except ourselves. Everything we own is carried on our backs. Before the first light we are up and walk until the sun god has fallen. Each man must go out with bow and arrow and knife and kill food for the one meal we have. Our children die of hunger in their mothers' arms. Our warriors are so weak from hunger and fatigue that a single man cannot carry back a deer when they are favored by the gods and kill one.

  We are hated everywhere we go. We must have a place of sun and water, but there are people in our path and they drive us away when we find a place where we can rest and grow maize.

  The Settled People named us the Chichimecas, the Dog People, and poke fun at our crude ways, calling us barbarians who wear animal skins instead of cotton, who hunt instead of farm, eat raw meat instead of cooked over a fire. They do not understand that what we do is necessitated by our need to survive. Blood gives us strength.

  The north is the place of the dead, the dark place feared by the people of the south, and they fear us starved barbarians who come from there. They claim we try to seize their land, and that we are wife stealers who grab their women when they are washing clothes along the riverbanks and take them as our own. Ayya, we are a lost tribe. So many have died from sickness, starvation, and war that we must replenish our people. The healthy women of the Settled People can give us children who could survive until we can find our home.

  What we ask for is just a place with sun and water to grow food. We
are not fools. We are not searching for the Eastern Heaven. We are told that in the south there are mountains that sometime roar and fill the sky and earth with smoke and fire, rivers of water that fall from the heavens and rush off of mountains to wash away everything in their path, gods who shake the ground underfoot and split the earth to swallow whole villages, and winds that howl with the ferocity of wolves. But it is also a land where food grows easily, where the fish and fowl and deer are plentiful, a place where we can survive and thrive.

  To us, everything is alive—the rocks, the wind, the volcanoes, the earth itself. Everything is controlled by spirits and gods. We live in fear of angry gods and try to appease them. The gods have driven us from the north. Some say it is Mictlantecuhtli who drives us before his wrath, that he needs our northern lands because the Dark Place is filled with the dead. But I believe we have done something to offend the gods. We are a poor people and make few offerings to them.

  I lay dying.

  We were driven from a village of the Settled People who believed we lusted after their women and their food. One of their spears found my chest in the battle.

  Fleeing their greater numbers and healthier warriors, we climbed to a hillside where it would be difficult for them to attack us. I am the tribe's high priest, wizard, king, and greatest warrior. Without me the tribe will not survive. Even as I lie dying, I can hear the victors below sacrificing Mexica prisoners that they captured. The sacrificed warriors and those who fell on the field of battle will go to the Eastern Heaven, a land filled with the honey of life, so my concern is for the survivors.

  Although we are greatly outnumbered by our enemies, they were not able to completely destroy us because we have two things they lack: arrows and desperation. The bow and arrow was new to them. They fought only with spears and swords edged with obsidian. With plentiful food and more warriors, we would be invincible.

  The Settled People celebrating their victory below were right. We sought their fields of ripe maize and their ripe women. We need the food to nourish us and the women to give us children. We have lost many warriors and need to replenish our stock.

  As I, Huitzilopochtli, chief and priest of my tribe lay dying, surrounded by the lesser priests and headmen, I watched a hummingbird sucking the nectar from a flower. The hummingbird turned and spoke to me.

  "Huitzilopochtli, your tribe suffers because it has offended the gods. You ask for food and shelter and victory over your enemies, but you offer nothing in return. The gods need food, too, and their food is the nectar of man. The Settled People are using the blood of the Mexicas to win the favor of the gods. If your people are to survive, you must offer us blood."

  We of the north were ignorant of the needs of the gods. We did not know they demanded blood for their favors. We did not know the covenant between man and god:

  Feed the Sun God blood and it shines on the land.

  Feed the Rain God blood and it wets the crops.

  I knew then the destiny of my people, and my own. My path would be to lead my people out of the wilderness to their destiny despite my mortal wounds. It had been prophesied by the high priest Tenoch, as he lay dying, that our destiny would be fulfilled at a place where an eagle fought a snake atop a cactus. Until we found that place, we would be wanderers.

  I beckoned the priests and headmen to put their heads closer to me so I might instruct them.

  "We must return and attack the Settled People. In the darkness before the dawn, when they are drunk and exhausted from their celebration, we will fall upon them and avenge ourselves."

  "We don't have the strength," a headman said.

  "We will surprise them. Our desperation will be our strength. We must attack and take prisoners. We have offended the gods because we have not offered them blood. To be strong, we must take many prisoners to sacrifice to them. Only then will the gods reward us."

  I would not let them waver. If we fought, we had a chance.

  "We must make an offering tonight in order to have victory on the morrow. We took two prisoners today. A woman and her baby. Sacrifice them. Rip out their hearts while the hearts are still beating. And let their blood soak the earth as tribute to the gods. Then cut up their bodies. Each of our strongest warriors is to get a taste."

  I told them my body was dying, but I would still be with them because my spirit would not die but would go through a transfiguration—to become a god.

  "The gods have revealed to me the true meaning of my name. Huitzilopochtli is Hummingbird Wizard. In the future I will speak to you in the voice of a hummingbird."

  The Mexicas were without a tribal god. I was to be their god, a vengeful god of war and sacrifice.

  "The heart is where the spirit dwells," I told the priest, my son, who will wear the headdress of high priest when I die, "making its presence known by the rhythmic beating. Now, before Mictlantecuhtli grabs me and drags me down to the Dark Place, take your obsidian knife and open my chest. Rip out my heart and offer my blood and flesh to our warriors."

  I instructed him as the hummingbird had me—my heart was to be put in a nest made of actual hummingbird feathers. My spirit would dwell in the feather nest, and no significant decision was to be made for the tribe without consulting me.

  "I will speak to the high priest and, through him, to the rest of the tribe."

  That night, with my heart carried high in a totem, my warriors made war upon the Settled People and captured many warriors to sacrifice and women to breed.

  We retreated to the top of our hill and cut out the hearts of the warriors. We nourished the gods with their blood, and I gave my people another instruction, spoken to my son, the high priest.

  "The blood belongs to the gods, but the flesh of the warriors belongs to the tribesman who captured him. Have a feast to celebrate the victory and the death of the warrior and feed his family and friends the flesh of the warrior."

  Thus began the blood covenant between the Mexicas and the gods. In exchange for blood, the gods give victory and food to nourish our bodies.

  There was only one way to supply the blood.

  War.

  FORTY-SIX

  I watched from the heart nest at the top of a totem as my people grew in strength and numbers. When several generations of my people had been born and died, we were no longer known as a small herd of mongrel people, but as a tribe with a name.

  Mexicas were still a tribe without land, but now we had enough strength to demand women and food from lesser tribes. We were known as quarrelsome, cruel, unfaithful to our word; women stealers, and eaters of flesh.

  Our reputation earned us more tribute than our arms because we were still a small tribe. Now four thousand campfires strong, with four different clans, we could gather a thousand warriors. Not a great number in a land where mighty kings could put a hundred times that many into battle, but we were growing.

  I, Huitzilopochtli, was carried in a totem at the head of the tribe when it moved or its warriors went into battle. The Chosen One, a witch-priestess, carried the feather nest concealed inside a larger, colorful feather nest. Behind her came four priests carrying totems of each of the four clans. All other totems were inferior to mine.

  Because of our reputation as fierce warriors, we were invited to join in war with others. Northern tribes, of which we were the smallest, had been hired by the Toltec king to make war on his enemies. To the Toltecs, we were crude barbarians, only worthy of fighting their battles—and dying for them.

  In their days of conquest and expansion, the Toltecs were mighty warriors, but now lived off the hundreds of thousands of people who pay tribute to them or work as slaves in their fields. They had grown soft and fat. Rather than risking their own lives, they hired the barbarians from the north to do battle.

  The war we came to fight was begun by Huemac, Big Hand, the Toltec king, because another tribe could not fulfill his demand that they send him a woman four hands wide in the buttocks. The tribe brought him a woman, but Huemac was not satisfied with the s
ize and made war upon them. It was said the tribe had the finest carvers of jade in the One World, and that the woman's bottom was an excuse to enslave the carvers and steal their land.

  The land of the enemy was in Anáhuac, the Heart of the One World. We were to get a share of the land after we killed the people who occupied it.

  We Mexicas proudly marched behind the larger tribes commanded by the Toltec king to Tula, where we would join his army in the war upon the jade carvers.

  Tula was not a city, but a paradise on earth. It was built after the gods had driven the people from Teotihuacan. With that great city abandoned by mortals, Tula became the queen of cities of the One World. Although its king ruled Anáhuac, the Heart of the One World, the fabled valley that we Mexicas had yet to set our eyes upon, Tula was not in the valley. It lay just outside the valley to the north, in the path of the tribes that for ten generations had been pushing south to escape the angry gods that were turning the northern region into a lifeless desert.

  The Toltec kings of Tula were the richest and most powerful in the One World. They built Tula to resemble Teotihuacan, but they also populated the city with fabulous palaces as majestic as temples and lush gardens that flowed along the streets like rivers of flowers.

  It was said that all the wealth of the One World came to Tula. From the tribute paid by those conquered or frightened by the bristling power of Tula's spears, came a portion of everything made or grown by the other Settled People. Common peasants lived in the city in more luxury than the high priest of our tribe.

  Tula was so beautiful that Quetzalcóatl, the Plumed Serpent, left Teotihuacan to reside there. And it was from Tula that Quetzalcóatl left, shamed by having known his sister, promising to return one day to reclaim the kingdom.

  The Song of Quetzalcóatl, related by even our barbarian storytellers, speaks of the wonders of Tula, a paradise on earth where cotton grows in bright colors—red and yellow, green and azure—and the earth is a horn of plenty yielding food and fruit that could feed giants: Mangos and melons the size of a man's head, ears of maize so fat a grown man could not put his arms around one, cocoa beans for chocolate so plentiful that one just reached down and picked them off the ground.