Three Princes

by Ramona Wheeler

  “What is he named, this one?” Oken said quietly to Viracocha. “The Quetzal.”

  “In Trade he is named Snatcher.”

  “How do they stop the tree-pirates when they snatch them?”

  “Fire.”

  They watched in silence as the messenger macaw flew toward them from Snatcher. The bird emerged onto the bridge, returning to his perch on the captain’s seat. His message to Hanaq Pacha was more involved this time, including a number of sudden head rolls.

  Apparently Viracocha also understood the bird’s message. He gave clipped orders in Quechua. Hanaq Pacha spoke to the messenger, who then flung himself into the air, soared up to the exit, and was gone. They watched him return to Snatcher, emerge onto the bridge, and flutter down to the captain, who listened closely, then looked directly out at Viracocha. He signaled with both fists touching the eye on his forehead; then he returned to his command seat.

  Viracocha unfolded his arms and strolled back to the lounge.

  Oken watched as Snatcher returned to his pirate hunt, melting down into the clouds.

  “Most interesting!” Mabruke said. “Most interesting, indeed.”

  “The captain lost his prey in the cloud cover,” Viracocha said. “He wanted to know if we had seen them. We may see them yet. I have told Hanaq Pacha to take us farther from the Mayan borderlands. I do not care to deal with pirates on this trip.”

  “Do they catch many pirates?” Oken said, settling back into his chair. He picked up his choclatl cup and sipped at it.

  “More every year. The market for Mayan wood grows faster than the trees.”

  “Tawantinsuyu is smart to grow money on their trees instead of selling them as lumber,” Mabruke said amiably.

  Viracocha saluted Mabruke with his choclatl cup.

  OKEN AWOKE to the surging throb of Mixcomitl’s engines running at a burst of full speed. He sat up and saw Mabruke sitting on the edge of his bed, robe and slippers on. He was freshly shaved, his makeup in place.

  “Good morning,” Mabruke said pleasantly. “That was only a change in the engines.”

  “Actually, it was the music.” Oken stretched luxuriously, then reached for his robe and pulled it on. “It got louder. You are up and dressed early.”

  “I promised myself that today I would watch the Sun as he clears the horizon from this vantage point. I have been awake for some time.”

  “HOY, GENTLEMEN!” Viracocha was standing behind the captain’s seat, arms folded over his chest. His suit was moss green, with a simple geometric embroidered in gold thread. The pattern gleamed in the morning sunshine, emphasizing his superb physique even more than the impeccable fit. He did not change his stance, looking out at the skies ahead as he spoke. “Runa will bring your breakfast if you wish.”

  Oken went over to stand beside the prince. “Quite a view, isn’t it? I never get tired of it myself.”

  Oken noticed then that a panel in the hull between the nose windows had been pulled aside, revealing what had seemed, at first glance, to be another window. The view, however, was different. The clouds were thicker and something oddly angular moved among them. Oken realized all at once what he was seeing. “Is thatSnatcher following us?” he said to Viracocha.

  “No. The birds say he will not name himself.”

  “Is that unusual?” Oken said.

  “This is Mixcomitl. Everyone talks to Mixcomitl. We can lie to each other—birds cannot.”

  “Pirates?”

  “Pirates paint themselves to be invisible among the treetops. Border patrols are the only fleet allowed to use sky paint. A patrol ship would have identified himself to Mixcomitl at once. A Mayan patrol ship would never follow me this far into Tawantinsuyu territory.”

  Mabruke had come over to join them. He stood listening, looking more at their faces than at the mirror-view.

  The macaw to Hanaq Pacha’s left rolled his head around and looked at the captain from this upside-down view, then muttered at him. He straightened with a shake of his feathers, ruffling his neck up and smoothing it down.

  Hanaq Pacha turned and spoke in rapid Quechua to the prince.

  Viracocha’s brow drew down in consternation. “That is curious.” He put his hands on his hips, tilting his head as he looked at the mirror. “Senga has just asked why the Quetzal behind us stinks like a swamp-brew.”

  Mabruke gave a terrible start and put his hand on Viracocha’s shoulder, leaning close to his face. The restrained calm as he spoke was more alarming than his words. “Tell the captain to get Mixcomitl as far away from that Quetzal as he can—quickly! Quickly! We may already be too late!”

  The urgency in Mabruke’s command was clear.

  Viracocha responded at once, barking out an order. Hanaq Pacha whistled sharply, clapped his hands, then waved them upward. The macaws disappeared in a flash of color, reappearing outside in swift flight toward the albatrosses ahead.

  The musicians changed the hara’wi to a fierce and driving beat, and the cyclers leaned into their task. The whirr of the gears growled and rose in a song of power. The pilots’ hands were a near-blur on the controls, resetting the sails.

  “Can Mixcomitl outrun alchemy?” Mabruke said. He was nearly shouting. “Our lives are the prize for winning or losing this race!”

  “When I inherited him, my great-uncle told me that Mixcomitl could outrun anything but lightning and hate— and I have doubled his speed since then.”

  The macaws returned, fluttering down to their perches. They shifted their feet from side to side, clicking their beaks at the captain. He gave orders to the pilots, and a moment later, they could feel Mixcomitl bank to starboard.

  Mabruke was watching the rearview mirror as intently as Viracocha. After long minutes had passed and the image continued to fade into the clouds, more difficult to discern, he said, “How far behind would you estimate him to be?”

  Viracocha repeated the question to Hanaq Pacha in Quechua. The captain answered with calm certainty.

  “A quarter-league, and falling behind.”

  “Then likely we are safe,” Mabruke said. “At this range, wind dispersal would make them as vulnerable as we.”

  Even Hanaq Pacha looked at Mabruke, curious.

  “Kaebshon,” Mabruke said matter-of-factly, expecting this to explain.

  “Farts?” Oken translated the Egyptian. “You mean methane?”

  Mabruke nodded. “Thank you. Just at that moment I could not recall the Trade term.”

  Viracocha did not look amused.

  “Explaining will take some talking,” Mabruke said to the prince. “When it’s quieter.”

  Viracocha shook his head. He gave lengthy instructions to Hanaq Pacha, then gestured for Mabruke and Oken to follow him. He led them to the spiral stair opposite their guest quarters. The entry was covered with a curtain of faceted crystal beads on golden chains. Viracocha held this aside for them, letting them enter ahead of him.

  The parlor was big, fitted comfortably for conversation and bright with morning sunshine from a pair of large portholes. “Make yourselves comfortable, gentlemen.” Viracocha strode past them to a desk between the windows. He pulled a series of small levers set in the bamboo trim above the desk, and a door of solid bamboo panels slid across the entry, immediately cutting the sound from the bridge.

  Oken let Mabruke settle first, on a lounge chair similar to the ones below. Viracocha’s chair was larger, more sturdily built, and embossed with the imperial seal of Tawantinsuyu.

  Oken chose a seat that let him see both men’s faces, Mabruke and Viracocha.

  “Explain,” Viracocha said as he sat down. “How did you recognize that Quetzal, and what is methane?”

  “I did not recognize the Quetzal,” Mabruke said.

  “Then how did you know they were a threat?”

  “The bird said he smelled like a swamp-brew. You said the Mayan patrols fight with fire. That could only have been methane, which is produced in vats called ‘swamp-brew.’ ”


  Oken heard the professor in Mabruke’s voice. He settled back to watch.

  Viracocha said nothing, waiting for more.

  “Ah,” Mabruke said thoughtfully. “Let me retrace my thoughts for you. The patrol fights pirates with fire, is that correct?”

  The prince nodded.

  “Do Mayans power their Quetzals with methane?”

  “No. I don’t know. I have never heard of methane. Quetzals fly with Tlaocene.”

  “Indeed,” Mabruke said. He sat forward. “Methane is related to Tlaocene, which is named ‘hydrogen’ in Trade. Methane, however, is far more volatile.”

  “Tlalocene will explode if not treated with proper respect,” Viracocha said.

  Oken was amused to see these two transform so completely into happy teacher and eager student. He was getting an interesting impression of this foreign prince.

  “Indeed, but Tlalocene honors your respect more resolutely than methane,” Mabruke said.

  “You are saying that the patrol uses methane to destroy pirate Quetzals?” the prince said.

  “There is only one reason a Quetzal would reek of methane at this altitude. It is the source of their fire-attack.”

  “A patrol Quetzal would also stink of methane.”

  “If they were preparing to attack, yes. Methane is too volatile in storage. They would generate it as needed in the same fashion that Tlalocene is produced for flotation, but only during the final stage of preparing that fire for attack—swamp- brew.”

  Viracocha said nothing. His expression made it clear that he understood.

  A chime over the door rang. When the door slid open, Mixcomitl’s song was suddenly loud behind Runa, standing at the threshold. Viracocha signaled her with brisk hand gestures. She bowed and turned away, disappearing down the spiral stair. The door closed again.

  “Hanaq Pacha will take us directly to my mother’s estates,” Viracocha said. “I can be more certain of your security there than if we go to Qusqo as I had planned.” He shook his head slowly, with a look of great sadness. “That was a killer Quetzal. There is no other explanation. I did not know I had such enemies.”

  “You don’t,” Mabruke said. “You were not the target.”

  “An attack on Mixcomitl is a declaration of war against Tawantinsuyu,” Viracocha said matter-of-factly. “To protect themselves in such a situation, Maya Land would have to ally with Tawantinsuyu against Egypt.”

  The prince sat, forward, looking back at Mabruke’s steady gaze. “Let us then be glad we have outrun them.”

  “Indeed.”

  Viracocha’s face became even more thoughtful. “There is a drinking song of the Mayan Air Patrolman,” he said quietly. “I translated it into Trade when I was a boy.” He then recited, in a gentle tone:

  The Eagle and the Dragonfly Met in the sky one day.

  Said the Eagle to the Dragonfly, “How can you fly that way?”

  The Dragonfly flew silently,

  Her shining wings a-blur.

  She did not care to speak to things With feathers or with fur.

  The Eagle followed eagerly. He could not comprehend The hard and shiny promise Of that Dragonfly’s rear end.

  The Dragonfly flew faster.

  The Eagle followed after—

  Ah! I see by your sad laughter That you know how this must end!

  When he had finished this recitation, his expression was most serious.

  “I see your point,” Mabruke said.

  “I determined as a child that I would never be the Dragonfly,” Viracocha said. “That is why I had Mixcomitl’s jets improved.”

  “I like a man who knows how to plan ahead,” Oken said with genuine feeling.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  MIXCOMITL DRIFTED slowly, as though reluctant, toward the mooring tower at the imperial family’s private aerodrome on the Queen Mother’s estates in Quillabamba Valley.

  “It’s called Xochicacahuatl, that is, ‘Flowery Cacao,’ ” Viracocha said to Mabruke. “For the cacao orchards here.” He was standing in his usual pose behind the captain, watching the approach. “This is my home,” he added, sounding both pleased and troubled.

  “My mother is here,” he went on, “but I do not think we will see her.”

  “I hope she is well.” Mabruke, standing next to him, leaned closer to be heard.

  “She does not approve of my interest in Egypt, in the world beyond Tawantinsuyu.”

  They were descending into a lush green valley set between rocky mountains, a short distance around the river bend from a city of white stucco walls and red tile roofs in the next valley. A single white tower stood between the river and the rock wall of the mountain behind. The windows were dark and still. Cacao orchards climbed the mountainsides in orderly rows, with stone huts among the trees. Herds of goats and llamas and sacred vicuña grazed on the mountainsides above the river, tended by men wearing ponchos and black hats. Beyond the little city of small, square buildings, greening fields climbed in neatly staggered steps up the slopes. Young women with brilliantly colored skirts hoisted up around their waists tended these fields like patient birds, bending and picking. The narrow streets were busy with people coming and going from the open market in the main square.

  The estate itself was on a slope out of sight from the city. Within a high stone wall was a compound of buildings, gardens, yards, barns, and stables around an imposing, three- story manor of gray blocks. No block of stone in these walls was the same size or shape as another, yet each was larger than those in temple walls in Memphis, fitted together with a mastery of the masonry art that defied logic. The purpose, however, was quite logical. The irregular shapes withstood the stresses of the earth groaning and shifting far better than buildings built neatly of blocks. Stacking blocks of identical size and shape seemed child’s play next to this intricate fabric woven of solid stone.

  The mooring tower was a pyramid painted red with designs in green, yellow, and black, set back from the river and to one side of the estate. A paved yard around it also enclosed a ball court and viewing stands. Young men were at practice, with some people watching them. When Mixcomitl reached the tower, the game stopped and everyone stood, arms raised in salute.

  The birds had informed the staff that the prince was arriving. Apparently, this was an event. Guards stood between the stone pumas on the sides of the boarding ramp. In the center of the ramp was a group of men in the Inca’s livery attire, red kilts and black sandals, with black feathers as stiff headdress. Late-afternoon breezes were cooling and the light was turning gold. The captain of the guards, at the head of this group, had red gloves and a single red feather. Each man had the imperial seal tattooed on his forehead in red. They went to one knee, heads bowed, when Viracocha stepped out of the golden Quetzal.

  Viracocha greeted the captain of the guard with a salute and a grim smile; then he bade the kneeling men to rise. They stood as one and shouted a welcome to their prince that struck Oken as similar to the chorus in the opera. Verdi had caught the nuance of the native voice.

  The passageway between the mooring tower and the manor went down in zigzag staircases through the interior of the pyramid to an underground corridor lit by Egyptian spinglass lamps and carpeted with rugs of the same red, black, and gold of Mixcomitl’s lounge. Incense had been lit along the way ahead of them, in censers shaped as various demons and gods of Xibalba, the Im Duat, the inner world of the people here. Each little statue held up the censer bowl in its hands as if offering it in temple.

  A pair of guards stood on either side of the entry and saluted as the prince’s party went past. Oken, lagging slightly behind, noted that many of these guards seemed to have pleased expressions behind their soldierly calm. The prince’s arrival was genuinely welcome here.

  They emerged in a paved courtyard, walled in with the same complex stonework. Arched entries led to side corridors and gardens. Guards stood waiting at each entry. Viracocha went directly to the largest archway across the courtyard to another close
d corridor, identical to the first. This led to tall doors that swung inward as the prince strode toward them, and a high-ceilinged entry hall, larger than the entire common room at Oken’s family castle. On one long side were glass doors on brass hinges, standing open at that moment, letting in the fresh breezes and the light of the Sun sinking behind the mountains.

  Obsidian censers, shaped as warriors holding fire in their fists, stood against the side walls. Furniture of semiprecious minerals and golden fittings lined the wall opposite the opened glass doors. Couches and chairs were set on either side of a large receiving throne of porphyry carved as a reed raft, supported by a pair of snarling pumas.

  No one sat on the porphyry throne or waited for them in the hall except the guards at the side doors. Viracocha led them past the glass doorway to a smaller side door that opened onto a perfectly groomed terraced garden, with dozens of flowering plants in ceramic pots and little pools, walled in by a solid hedge cut in staggered waves. The pots were of various sizes, shaped and painted as fat frogs seated on toadstools. Living frogs leaped off moss beds and splashed into thepools.

  Oken glanced up. Mixcomitl floated high above, gleaming with hard, gold light against the blue sky. Stony mountainsides, misted in mauve, enclosed the view on both hands.

  The bamboo gate in the hedge opened to the rear door of the manor proper. The door was an ancient carving in deep relief, of masterful design and work. The found er ofTawantinsuyu, Manco Capac, was shown in ecstatic communion with Inty, the divine Sun, rising from the mound of first creation in the sacred lake, Titikaka.

  Oken was reminded of a similar image, half a world away, in the Temple of Rae in Memphis, where the Sun rises over the mound of first creation, newly emerged from the waters of Nun, wakened by the cry of Geb, the Great Cackler.

  This back door to the manor opened on another long corridor, extending equally to their left and right. These side corridors were not lit. Their depths were revealed only by reflected gleams on golden fittings.