Master of the House of Darts

by Aliette de Bodard

  "Well, fancy meeting you here." His face was creased in a sarcastic smile.

  He looked much as he always had: his face lean and haughty, his eyes deep-set, his lips curved in sardonic joy. Save, of course, that he no longer wore the headdress of heron feathers that had marked him as the slave of his god, the loyal servant of the city – and that his cloak was of maguey fibres, more suitable for a commoner than for a High Priest. His hair, unbound, fell down to his feet, black and lanky, stiff with the blood of his offerings. Deprived of the black paint on his face, he looked curiously effeminate, the aggression all but smoothed out of his features.

  "So it was you. How in the Fifth World–?"

  He raised a hand. "Later. There isn't much time. Come in, will you?"

  "You mean they'll be looking for you?"

  Acamapichtli grimaced. "Of course. I used the chaos, but it won't last forever. Don't make me waste my time, Acatl."

  "Are you telling me the truth?"

  Acamapichtli frowned. "I'll swear it on Tlaloc, if that's what it takes. On the Provider, the Ruler of the Blessed Drowned, the Lord of the Sweet-Scented Marigold, He who holds the jars of rain."

  My doubt must have shown on my face, for he added, with the same old impatience, "Don't be a fool. I have mocked you and schemed against you, but have you ever known me to lie to you?"

  The worst thing was, I couldn't remember if he had. Unlike Tizoc-tzin, I didn't keep a tally of who had offended me, and when. "Not under oath," I admitted, grudgingly.

  I stepped into the room, and Acamapichtli let the entrance-curtain fall. It appeared to be an artisan's workshop: fragments of feathers and precious stones were still spread out on reed mats, and a half-completed shield, showing the outline of a coyote in red feathers, lay in a corner, against the brazier.

  I laid the cane down, and leant against the wall, trying to appear casual – in spite of the rapid beat of my heart. Acamapichtli watched me, smiling sardonically; I doubted he was much taken in by my pretence of calm.

  "Fine," I said. "If you're here, you might as well tell me about this." I reached into the small bag I carried with me, and fished out the distorted black thing I'd taken out of Teomitl's body.

  "Is that–?"

  "Taken from the body of a sick man," I said, unwilling to admit Teomitl had been sick. "You said you only had a few hours–"

  "Yes, yes." Acamapichtli waved a dismissive hand. "But this is more important. Give me one of your blades, will you?" He gestured at his clothing with a sharp, joyless laugh. "I'm not quite as well-equipped as I should be."

  "It's been dedicated to Mictlantecuhtli," I said, slowly. And the magic of Mictlantecuhtli Lord Death would be anathema to that of Tlaloc – but Acamapichtli shook his head. "It should do. I just need it to draw blood."

  If, a year ago, someone had told me I would be standing in a deserted room helping the High Priest of Tlaloc safeguard us against an epidemic… I might have laughed, or railed, or done four hundred other things, but I wouldn't have believed it.

  Acamapichtli laid the creature on the floor, with an almost reverent care. Muttering under his breath, he slashed his earlobes and the back of his left hand, and let the blood drip down onto the ground.

  "By Your will, O, Our Lord,

  May bounty and good fortune be unleashed,

  May the sweet-scented marigold shake,

  May the rattleboards of the mist clatter…"

  Mist pooled out from the place the blood had struck the ground, spreading fast, as if someone had pierced a hole in the wall of a steam house. It climbed up, clinging to the back of Acamapichtli's hand where he had cut himself, and the air itself became tight, hard to breathe, tinged with the characteristic, marshy smell of Tlaloc's magic.

  "With a sprinkle, with a few drops of dew,

  Let us be blessed with fullness and abundance,

  May it be in Your heart to grant, to give, to bring comfort…"

  At length, Acamapichtli looked up. "It's what I thought," he said. He made a single, dismissive gesture with his hands – as if sending away an underling who had displeased – and the mist fell away, sinking back into the ground as if it had never been. It became easier to breathe once again.

  "What you thought?" I asked.

  He smiled – a thoroughly unpleasant expression. "The magic does look similar to that of Tlaloc, but it doesn't belong to Him. It's Chalchiuhtlicue's."

  "That's not possible," I said, sharply. Chalchiuhtlicue, Jade Skirt; Tlaloc's wife, Teomitl's protector. Goddess of Lakes and Streams – patron of women in labour, She who washed away the sins of newborn children.

  "Because you're the expert on the water gods?"

  "No," I said. "But I'd thought…" My voice trailed off. "You said it was Tlaloc's magic earlier."

  "I was wrong." Acamapichtli didn't look ashamed at all. "A mistake easily made. The spell was an unusual mess, and already decaying."

  I couldn't resist. "You're the expert on the water gods."

  "Don't push me."

  Much as I would have liked to, this served no purpose. "I won't. But I still don't understand why She would…"

  "I don't know," Acamapichtli said. His voice was grim. "That was the other thing I wanted to ask you."

  "About Jade Skirt? Why do you need to ask?"

  "She's your student's protector," Acamapichtli said.

  "I don't have any loyalty to Her."

  "Teomitl-tzin might, though."

  "I–" I started, and then found myself, to my surprise, telling the bare truth. "I don't want to think about this, not now."

  I'd expected him to mock me straight away, but instead he cocked his head, and watched me for a while, not saying anything. "Fine. It doesn't have much bearing on this anyway – not yet. Keep your unpleasant revelations cooped up, until they rise up to gobble you up like coyotes."

  Still as pleasant a man as ever. "What did you want?"

  "It's time we got a better grip on where this is coming from, and why."

  "And your idea–"

  "You had me summon a dead man, and it didn't work. There is someone much better informed, though."

  "Someone?" I asked, already suspecting the answer.

  "Tlaloc," Acamapichtli said.

  "You – you can't mean to do this." One did not, could not summon gods into the Fifth World. For one thing, They would not be inclined to answer the call of a single mortal; for another, the Fifth World, which was not Their essence, made them weak and helpless, and gods seldom enjoyed being either. Instead, in the (unlikely) event one wanted to speak to gods directly, one went into their country. In my entire life, I had talked to Mictlantecuhtli perhaps a handful of times, and my last journey into another god's land had left me wounded and sick.

  That was, of course, discounting the fact that when Tlaloc had tried to seize power in the Fifth World, Teomitl and I had been the ones to stop Him. I would hardly be welcomed into Tlalocan, the Land of the Blessed Drowned. "You can't mean–?" I said, again.

  "You want to know what's going on."

  "Yes, but calling on the gods–"

  "At least we'd be certain."

  And I'd certainly be dead. I wasn't keen for that kind of assurance. "It's a great risk."

  "Not so great." His voice was sarcastic. "Haven't you noticed rituals have become easier?"

  "I don't understand–"

  "When I summoned the dead warrior, Eptli, the sacrifice of a single jaguar shouldn't have brought him back for so long."

  "Then you knew." He'd intended to cheat me all along; to pretend nothing had worked, that he'd done his best. How typical.

  "That's not the point," Acamapichtli said, sharply. "The point is that something is interfering with the boundaries."

  "The plague?" I asked.

  "I don't know. But it makes going into Tlalocan easier."

  I grimaced. "Less dangerous doesn't mean it will be a walk in the Sacred Precinct. You haven't convinced me it's absolutely necessary for the good of the
Empire."

  "And if it were?" His voice was sharp, probing in all the fragile, vulnerable places of my being as if by instinct, but this time I didn't need to hesitate.

  "If you proved to me it were necessary, I would go." To say I wouldn't like it would be an understatement, but I knew where my duty lay.

  Acamapichtli watched me for a while. At length he shook his head. "I can't see any other solution. And before you ask – no, I can't go alone. You're the one who has the most information about who died and when. I'm going to need you." He didn't look as if he liked the idea much – more as if he'd swallowed something unpleasantly bitter, like unsweetened cacao.

  "And that's meant to be enough? Am I just meant to trust your word?"

  His eyes narrowed. "Again? I thought we'd moved past that. I'm no fool, and neither should you be. I know the cost of strolling around a god's country as much as you do – and I don't suggest this lightly. But we're desperate."

  "You are desperate. I'm not." And then realised what I'd said. "Sorry. I know the cost of angering Tizoc-tzin."

  That stopped him; he looked at me through darkened eyes. "Yes. You do. As I pointed out earlier – I don't have much time."

  "You haven't told me–"

  "How I got out of the cell? Let's just say I have – unexpected resources." He grimaced; something about his escape had obviously been a source of unpleasantness. Had he ended up pledging a favour to someone? "But that's still dancing around the point."

  "Like a warrior at the gladiator-stone," I said, wearily.

  "Well?" Acamapichtli took a step away from me, and stood, wreathed in the dimming light of the sun. "If you're not coming with me, I'll be going alone. Just decide, Acatl."

  I – I leant on the cane, feeling the ache in every one of my muscles. Going into the country of another god was dangerous enough; it would be worse in my weakened state – the epitome of foolishness.

  But still…

  Still, what if he was right and this was our only chance? "Fine," I said. The wood of the cane was warm under my fingers. "Let's go see Tlaloc."

  FOURTEEN

  Lord Death's Gift

  The back of the room held a couple of rush brooms: Acamapichtli picked up one, and handed the other back to me.

  Under other circumstances I would have protested, but we had already made clear the necessity of the journey.

  "You want to dedicate this place to Tlaloc?"

  "As small a space as I can." He grimaced. His eyes kept slipping to the entrance-curtain, as if he expected someone to interrupt us at any time. "Because of the plague, it's been touched by Chalchiuhtlicue, which should help. But still, if I can avoid Her…"

  "She's your god's wife," I said, though I wasn't entirely surprised. Tlaloc and Chalchiuhtlicue formed a… tense couple, always ready to oppose one another. He had ended the Third Age, the one ruled by Chalchiuhtlicue; She had opposed Him when He'd attempted to rule the Fifth World.

  I swept the room in silence – I hadn't swept anything since the days of my novitiate, and the dust, pushed back to each corner of the room, brought back memories of the month of Drought, Toxcatl, with everything cleansed for the arrival of the gods, and the palpable tension in the air, like moments before the storm…

  "Aya! Paper flags stand in the four directions,

  In the place of weeping, the place of mists,

  I bring water to the temple courtyard…"

  Acamapichtli knelt, and started tracing two glyphs in the beaten earth – Four Rain, the Second Age, the one ruled by Tlaloc. Then, with a swift, decisive movement, he raised the knife, and slit his wrist – not a superficial cut that would have nicked both veins, but deep enough to hit the artery. It happened so suddenly the blood was already spilling on the ground before I could even so much as move.

  "You're mad," I said.

  "Desperate," he grated, keeping a wary eye on the entrance-curtain. "Get inside that glyph, Acatl."

  "But–" The blood pooled, lazily, at his feet, spreading into the furrows of the glyphs – shimmering with layer after layer of raw magic. Bright red blood, coming from the heart instead of going to it – pressing against the edge of the wound with every passing moment, pumping itself out of the body in great spurts. Acamapichtli was already pale, and swaying.

  He was chanting as the blood pooled – not slowly and stately, but a staccato of words, the beat of frenzied drums before the battle was joined – a series of knife stabs into a corpse's chest.

  "You destroyed the Third World,

  The Age of Rain, the Age of Mist and Weeping,

  The Age of your unending bounty,

  Drought swept across the earth,

  The fruit of the earth lay panting, covered with dust."

  And, as the blood hit the floor in great spurts, it turned to mist and smoke – with a faint hint of the stale odour of marshes – sweeping across the room, subsuming everything, until it seemed that nothing of the Fifth World was left. The glyphs shone blue and white for a bare moment, painful across my field of vision, and then faded, and when I looked up again, we were standing in churned mud, at the foot of a verdant hill.

  Acamapichtli, however, had lost consciousness – his blood still spurting out from the open wound. Suppressing a curse against ill-prepared fools, I retrieved my obsidian knife from his limp hand, and slashed the bottom of his cloak into shreds – it was either that or my cloak, and I had no wish to argue with Ichtaca about damaging the High Priest's regalia. I worked quickly – there was no time – pressing my fingers against the nearby muscles to stem the flow of blood. He'd lose the hand – there was no way this would heal gracefully, not after he'd spent so much time bleeding.

  At last, I was done, and looked critically at my handiwork – I was no priest of Patecatl, and the gods knew it showed. At least he was no longer bleeding, though it felt I'd spent an eternity with my fingers pressed against his cold skin. Now to make a rudimentary bandage…

  I–

  Was it just me, or was his wound no longer bleeding – the edges far closer together than they should have been?

  The air was crisp and clear; I breathed it in, feeling it burning in my lungs, tingling against the mark in my hand. I'd expected to be down on my knees, struggling to remain conscious – as I had the last time I had visited a god's country.

  But nothing happened: the land around me was verdant, endless marshes cut through with canals and streams. In the distance, I could barely make out ghostly silhouettes engaged in a ball-game: the dead who had drowned or died of suffocation, or of water-linked diseases, and who had found their final destination in Tlalocan.

  Among the myriad destinations for the Dead, the land of the Blessed Drowned was a pleasant paradise – never lacking food or rain, the maize always blossoming on time, the reeds abundant. A warrior would have chafed, but for me, the son of peasants, the wet air reminded me of my faraway childhood spent on the edge of the lake, and even the ghostly boats passing each other in the canals brought familiar memories of rowing at night – when the sky darkened to two red lips above and below the horizon, and everything seemed to hang suspended on the edge of the Fifth World.

  A hand shot out, and grabbed my ankle – I all but jumped up, before realising it was merely Acamapichtli, using me as a leverage to stand up. His face was still pale, but the wound I'd tied off was closed, sinking to nothing against his skin.

  "You're lucky," I said. "Opening up an artery tends to be more fraught with consequences."

  He shrugged – characteristically careless and arrogant. "Different rules."

  I shifted my cane in a squelch of mud. "If you say so." He had still spent the blood, regardless, and I very much doubted he would get that back. "And those different rules also explain why I can breathe here? Last time, in the Southern Hummingbird's heartland–"

  Acamapichtli grinned, unveiling teeth that seemed much sharper and yellower than before. "We're not interlopers here, Acatl. I asked the god for His permission, and He has grante
d it to us."

  "Great," I said. Even with the god's permission, I still felt drained. I leant on the cane, watching the hill. It rippled under the wind, and…

  Wait a moment. "That's not grass," I said. It rippled and flexed in the breeze, as green as the tail feathers of quetzal birds – pockmarked with thousands of raised dots, swept through with yellow and brown marbling.

  Lizard skin.

  Acamapichtli grinned again, an expression I was starting to thoroughly dislike. "Of course not. Come on. The god is up there."