Harbinger of the Storm

by Aliette de Bodard

  If nothing else, things were starting to get ugly here, with factions openly declaring themselves.

  Teomitl, oblivious, strode into a smaller courtyard, a mirror image of the House of Animals, loaded with exotic trees and bushes. It seemed as though we had stepped into another world altogether, a land to the south where the heat was stifling and quetzal-birds flew in the wild, raucously calling to each other. Cages dotted the landscape at regular intervals, huge, empty, their wooden bars almost merging with the foliage of the trees. The air smelled of churned mud, with the faint, heady fragrance of flowers. What was not expected, however, was the reek of magic, so strong it burnt my lungs.

  "Something is wrong," I said, but did not have time to go further.

  She stepped out of the caged wilderness as if She belonged within it; tall, Her skin as black as the night sky, and stars scattered at Her elbows and knees, stars that were also the eyes of monsters. Her cloak spread behind Her – no, it was not a cloak, but wings made of a thousand shards of obsidian, glinting in sunlight – and her face was pale skin, stretched over the hint of a skull, with bright, malevolent eyes that held me until I fell to my knees, shaking.

  "Priest. Warrior. Slave." Her gaze swept through us all. I clenched my hands to stop my fingers from shaking. "You're too late," She said.

  Something shone clung to Her wings, a light that was neither sunlight nor starlight; the memory of something that had once belonged in the Fifth World. A soul, ripped from its body.

  Manatzpa.

  She threw me a last searing glance, and leapt over me with an agility I wouldn't have expected from something so monstrous.

  And then She was gone, with only the reek of magic to remind us of Her presence.

  My obsidian knives were warm, quivering under my touch, as if She had affected them too. I looked around. The air smelled of charnel and blood, and the single cage ahead of us had its bars broken.

  We'd arrived too late.

  Both Yaotl and Teomitl had gone down. Yaotl was still shaking, and Teomitl was pulling himself up, with the wrath of Chalchiuhtlicue filling his face.

  "What was that?" he asked.

  "I–" She had looked like a star-demon; but different, too: not a mindless thing, but a goddess in Her own right, unmistakably female. "Itzpapalotl," I said, fighting past the constriction in my chest. "The Obsidian Butterfly, Goddess of War and Sacrifice." Leader of the star-demons, She who would take us all into Her embrace, when the time came.

  "That's impossible," Yaotl remained sitting in the mud, oblivious to the growing stain on his cloak. "She's–"

  "I know." Imprisoned, like Coyolxauhqui of the Silver Bells, like the star-demons.

  "Why now, Acatl-tzin?"

  "Because someone did not want Manatzpa to talk." A chill had descended into my stomach and would not be banished. Because he had known something, because he would, indeed, have revealed it to me?

  Whoever it was they were in the palace, and aware of what was happening in Tizoc-tzin's closest circle. Either Xahuia still had agents inside, or…

  Or it was someone else entirely.

  "Acatl-tzin!" Teomitl's voice was impatient. "Come on."

  I must have looked blank, for he shook his head impatiently, the whites of his eyes shifting from jade to white and back again as he did so, an eerie effect.

  "It's still in the city. We have a chance to catch up to it. Come on!"

  Still in the city? Why hadn't it–

  No time to think. I picked up my cloak from the ground, shook some of the mud loose, and ran after Teomitl.

  As we exited the palace, running down the stairs leading up to the Serpent Wall and the Sacred Precinct, the ahuizotls came, slithering out of the canal besides the palace. Their faces wrinkled like those of a child underwater for too long, their tails curling up into a single clawed hand, which opened and closed as they moved.

  On ground, they looked wrong, as black and sleek as fish out of the water, crawling on their four clawed legs like salamanders or lizards, and yet still moving with a fluid, inhuman speed that seemed to surprise even Teomitl.

  The star-demon was ahead of us, moving through the Sacred Precinct. The crowd fought to avoid Her, the pilgrims elbowing each other, sacrificial victims being pulled aside by their keepers, the priests hastily kneeling on the cleared-out grounds, fighting to trace quincunxes and circles in a vain attempt to slow Her down or banish Her.

  Teomitl, who was younger and much fitter than me, was already ahead, the ahuizotls fanning around him in a grisly escort. He moved in the trail left by the star-demon, widening the circle of emptiness she had left around Her.

  I cast my mind out, trying to summon the Wind of Knives. Up and up it went, over the crowded plaza, over the houses of noblemen, past the canals and the islands on the outskirts, into the cenote, until His presence went up my spine, straightening it with one cold touch.

  Acatl. I am coming.

  I ran after the star-demon as fast as I could, my lungs burning, my chest itching, the presence of the Wind of Knives in my mind growing larger and larger…

  For all of Teomitl's speed, he never quite managed to catch up to the star-demon. She strode through the plaza of the Sacred Precinct without pause, Her gaze stubbornly fixed ahead.

  There was only one place She could be heading. "Teomitl!" I called in the eerie hush that had spread over the Sacred Precinct.

  He flicked me a quick backward glance; I pointed towards the bulk of the Great Temple, yelling at the top of my voice. Teomitl nodded, and resumed the chase.

  The presence in my mind grew to a spike and suddenly the Wind of Knives was there, standing by my side. "Acatl."

  He threw one glance at the situation, and moved, fluid and inhuman, towards the Great Temple, with barely a glance backwards in my direction. Where He passed, the air seemed darker, and even the sunlight, catching the thousand obsidian shards of His body, became dimmer, shadowed by His presence.

  Priests had already gathered on the steps of the Great Temple; two cohorts, one on each of the twin stairs, their obsidian knives at the ready. Magic clung to them, shimmering in their blood-matted hair, on their dusty skins, in the very structure of the temple, sunk as deep as blood into limestone. Here was our strength; here was the heart of our Empire.

  The wind of Her passage brushed the priests as She headed up the stairs. Everything shattered.

  The priests' hair became dull and rank, like that of filthy animals; the stone lost its lustre and became the grey of ash and dust. The veil of magic over the temple tore open like a stretched spider's web, with a sound as stilling and as deafening of that of the earth splitting itself apart.

  Itzpapalotl ran, one clawed hand scattering the priests across the stairs, sending them tumbling down, as bloodied as sacrificed victims. Teomitl followed, the ahuizotls sliding upwards like fish through water; the Wind of Knives overtook Teomitl on the stairs, but did not quite manage to catch up with Itzpapalotl.

  I reached the bottom of the stairs, and paused for a moment to catch my breath.

  One of the priests lay beside me, his blood shimmering in the sunlight, a source of power calling out to me. His eyes were open, already glazing over.

  "Forgive me," I whispered, dipping my hand in the warmth of his blood. "She has to be stopped."

  He must have nodded: I couldn't be sure, but the blood under my fingers became warmer, beating like a living heart, like that used for a penance or daily offering.

  There was little time. Itzpapalotl was almost at the top of the stairs, and Teomitl lagged behind Her. I hastily traced a quincunx around myself, and said the shortest prayer I knew, one to my patron Mictlantecuhtli.

  "We all must die

  We all must go down into darkness

  Leaving behind the marigolds and the cedar trees

  Nothing is hidden from Your gaze."

  A thin layer of light shimmered into existence, an overlay over reality, nowhere near the level of detail of the true sight, but sti
ll more than I would have got from my priest-senses. The stairs of the temple turned a reddish black, like clotted blood, and every step I took sent a little jolt through my body – I could feel the magic bleeding out of the temple with every passing moment, like water draining out of a sieve.

  At the top of the stairs, Ceyaxochitl's wards, once a shimmering blue, had also darkened, and the ragged hole in their centre marked the place Itzpapalotl had crossed them. Priests lay on the stairs, some dead, most unconscious.

  I couldn't see Teomitl anywhere, but I assumed he'd have gone on without waiting for me. I hoped he was still alive, and in a state to fight.

  I'd have had the same thought about the Wind of Knives; but I very much doubted anything could stop or incapacitate Him for long.

  The stairs leading down to the temple's heart were silent, magic lazily bleeding out of them, a widening stain that was spreading within the Fifth World. The air was stale, driedout, as if Itzpapalotl had drained everything out of it while descending.

  I found Teomitl in the room near the foundations, the ahuizotls curled up at his feet like pet monkeys. He was watching the central disk with a scowl on his face. The Wind of Knives stood a little to the side, His head turned towards me when I arrived, a glimmer of obsidian that pierced me to the core.

  "I arrived too late," the Wind of Knives said.

  Storm-Lord blind me, She was fast. "Is there anything–"

  He shook His head in a shivering of dark light. "Not until She breaches the boundaries again." He seemed almost disappointed – unusual for Him. "Call me if you have need, Acatl." And then He faded away, the monstrous head slowly shimmering out of existence, the welter of obsidian shards receding into nothingness, until nothing was left but the faint memory of a lament.

  Teomitl pursed his lips. "She just crossed to the centre, laughed at me and vanished."

  I could tell that it was the laughter that bothered him most. Contempt, even coming from a star-demon, would have hurt him more than claw-swipes. But that wasn't what we needed to focus on now.

  "Vanished," I repeated. I knelt by the side of the disk, cautiously extending one hand across it. The stone was warm, angry. Such anger, that of a caged being hurling itself against the walls of its prison, again and again until something yielded… Something had to yield, something had to crack, and She would be free to walk the world again, to watch humans scatter like insects, to drink our blood like stream-water…

  I pulled my hand away, coming back to the Fifth World with a start. "Still imprisoned," I said aloud. Itzpapalotl had been summoned, like the rest of the star-demons. She hadn't spontaneously moved out of the stone disk; she hadn't been under any orders from Her mistress, She of the Silver Bells…

  But I did not move. I crouched, watching the stone disk. The blood in the grooves had dimmed and dulled, too, as if its potency had been absorbed. And I couldn't be sure, but I could make out a hand and an arm, and a headdress with crooked edges – more details than before, as if everything were re-knitting itself together.

  She of the Silver Bells was still imprisoned, but the Duality knew for how long.

  I got up. Teomitl was still watching me with that peculiar intensity. "I should have known," he said, finally. "If I'd guessed Her destination earlier–"

  "You can't rewrite the past," I said. "And if you hadn't launched in pursuit, we wouldn't even have known where She was going."

  The stone disk lay at our feet, huge and monstrous, a gate to another country, a world waiting only to tear us apart and consume us. And Manatzpa was the only one who could have shed some light on how and when it was going to happen.

  "I'm going to need something from you," I said.

  He pulled himself straight, like a warrior standing to attention. "Acatl-tzin."

  "You were the last person to see Manatzpa alive. I need you to tell me everything that he said when you interviewed him."

  "Uh." Teomitl's face fell. "I don't exactly–" He shook himself and frowned. "A lot of things that didn't seem relevant."

  I lifted my chin in the direction of the disk. "At this stage, it's safe to assume that anything might be relevant. We've had three deaths in the palace in a matter of days. At this rate, we'll be lucky to still have a council by the end of the week."

  Teomitl shifted. One of the ahuizotls did the same, lazily raking its clawed hands on the stone. Nausea welled up in my throat, harsh and uncontrollable. I kept telling myself that, one day, I was going to get used to the creatures moving as though they were part of him; but it had been a year since Teomitl had acquired their services, and it still didn't get any better.

  "He liked me." Teomitl appeared halfway between embarrassment and anger. "I thought it was a façade, but he didn't really need to pretend anymore, did he?"

  "He might have hoped for your mercy."

  "No." Teomitl shook his head, quick and fierce. "I've seen that happen, too, and it wasn't anything like that. More," he spread his hands, frustrated, "more like having someone you admire fighting for the other side. You know you'll never stop trying to capture each other, but still…"

  I thought of Manatzpa's face when he had admitted Teomitl was the candidate he favoured above all others. I had assumed it to be a lie after he had revealed himself as a worshipper of She of the Silver Bells, but perhaps it had been more complex than that. "I see. What else?"

  Teomitl grimaced. "He was unhappy about Echichilli's death."

  I wanted to say it was obvious, but stopped. I couldn't possibly hope to get anything out of Teomitl if I was putting my own words in his mouth. "How so?"

  "He…" Teomitl floundered for a while, before collecting himself. "I tried to tell him allying with star-demons was a foolish thing to do, that this needed to stop before the whole Fifth World crumbled. And he said something about duty. About how I was being so impressively dutiful, but that duty had killed Echichilli, and that he was done with duty himself."

  Echichilli? I tried to remember who he had favoured. No one, as far as I could recall. He had been the oldest member of the council, aggrieved that no arrangement could be reached. "Duty to whom?"

  "He didn't say," Teomitl said. "I'd guess either the She-Snake or…" He paused for a moment, and went on, "My brother. They're the only two to whom Echichilli could possibly have a duty."

  Xahuia did seem like a pretty unlikely candidate. But we would gain nothing by being too hasty. And I had yet to understand how duty to anyone could have led to a star-demon killing Echichilli.

  Unless he had been doing someone else's dirty work?

  But no, he couldn't be the summoner of the star-demons, or, like Manatzpa, he would have been able to banish the one that had killed him. Instead, he had bowed to the inevitable…

  "He knew something, too," I said. "Whatever it was. And he was killed for it."

  "That doesn't really help, does it?"

  "It might," I said. So far, I'd assumed the killings of the council had been random, intended to throw us all into chaos. But if both Manatzpa and Echichilli had been killed to silence them, then something else was going on. It was no longer exclusively a matter of making sure the council wouldn't select a Revered Speaker. There was something else going on; something much larger. "There has to be a reason behind the sequence of the killings. Something we're missing."

  Teomitl grimaced again. "And?"

  "I don't know." I was feeling increasingly frustrated. "All the dead men have been taken by star-demons. They're out of Mictlantecuhtli's dominion. I can't even hope to summon them and make them talk."

  The usual way to get the ghosts of people who did not belong to Lord Death was to go into the lands of the god to whom they belonged, either Tlaloc the Storm Lord, or Tonatiuh the Fifth Sun. However, with star-demons, that was the epitome of foolhardiness. There was no way in the Fifth World I would elect to go into the empty spaces of the Heavens where they roamed, or into the prison the Southern Hummingbird had fashioned for His sister.

  "Anything else?" I asked.
It looked as though Itzpapalotl had done Her work well, we would not find any evidence left behind by Manatzpa.

  "He said he wasn't the one summoning the star-demons, but that one seems obvious," Teomitl said, biting his lips to the blood. "No, not much else." He paused, his face unreadable. "He said other things, too."

  He would not look at me; and given how Manatzpa had felt about Tizoc-tzin, I could guess what he had told Teomitl; something about being his own man, about stopping listening to his brother's voice.

  To be honest, I doubted it would work. Teomitl might be thrown off for a while, bewildered by what appeared sincere admiration, but the fact remained that Manatzpa had been trying to take apart the Mexica Empire. Teomitl loved his country, and he would never forgive Manatzpa for that.