Aztec

by Colin Falconer

  She reached down, pulled the huipitl over head, removed her skirt and undergarment and stepped into the cave.

  "You put yourself in danger," he said to her.

  She knelt down in front of him, licked the blood from his maquauhuitl, gently sucking on the wound. She heard him groan. Mali had whispered to her of this; caressing a man with flowers. She had never done this before, tasting that which had been intended for the gods. The organ grew huge in her hands, richly engorged with the blood he had held back from Feathered Serpent.

  Now he dropped to his knees also. There was blood on her lips and he licked it away with his tongue. She turned away from him, placed her hands on the cool, slippery rock of the shrine. He held her by the hips, penetrating her slowly, moment by golden moment, like a hummingbird dipping its tongue into a flower, quick, tiny, darting movements. His final possession of her evinced a gasp of pain and pleasure. My death will be this way, she thought. When she opened her eyes again she saw Quetzalcóatl watching her, his beaked face and scaled body mute in the shadows, as their bodies coiled and intertwined like serpents above the dusty floor.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  A chill and violet sunset. They sat at the mouth of the cave, watching the jungle turn dark, listening to the symphony of the night, the rhythm of insects, the snarl of a jaguar somewhere in the mountains. Rain Flower shivered, and he drew her closer. They could make out the glow of the camp fires at Vera Cruz.

  "We must go back," he whispered.

  She kissed him once more, then dressed quickly and ran ahead alone. They danced with death now. She must keep this secret even from Little Mother.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  Flickering shadows, the smell of wood smoke. Cortés toured the guard posts, shared a jest with those gambling with dice around the fires, reprimanded a sentry he found dozing at his post. He found Puertocarrero standing alone on the parapet, watching the moon rise over the black slopes of Orizaba.

  "Dreaming of Cuba?" Cortés said.

  "Of Spain."

  Spain. But which Spain? For Cortés it was the few sparse groves of cork oaks and olives of Extremadura, the baking heat of summer with its intense light that hurt the eyes, and in winter the biting winds that hissed across the plains and almost froze you to the saddle of your horse. Spain was the genteel poverty of his father's hacienda, great oak doors with bolts of iron that could not keep out the draughts, cavernous halls without furniture, a vast kitchen with few servants and no food.

  "You have been talking with the men?" Puertocarrero said.

  "I played the hale and hearty commander. I was hoping to gauge their mood."

  "Some of them are frightened."

  What you mean, Cortés thought, is that you are frightened. He saw a woman hurry across the courtyard below. Her face was illuminated for a moment by a pine torch. Doña Marina.

  "You are happy with the services of the Lady Marina?" Cortés said.

  "Of course, caudillo."

  "What is she like?"

  Puertocarrero was embarrassed by the indelicacy of the question. "She is very beautiful to look at. But she has no passion."

  No passion? Cortés thought. That has not been my impression. Perhaps she simply has no passion for you, my friend.

  "She has been very useful to us an interpreter."

  "Yes," Cortés agreed, "very useful." More than useful! Without her I could not have secured so much gold from Montezuma's lords or manipulated the Totonacs. She is the key in the lock, and I have only just begun to turn it.

  He thought again about the lacustrine city she had spoken of and wondered. "Do you think the men will follow us willingly to Tenochtitlán?" he said.

  Puertocarrero thought about this for a long time. “No,” he said, finally.”But I somehow think that you will find a way to persuade them.”

  Chapter 28

  Aguilar wanted to conduct his lessons in the church but the noise of the carpenters’ hammers as was deafening. Instead he took his charges a little way off and sat them down in the shade of a jacaranda tree. He sweated heavily in his heavy brown robes. He kept his Book of Hours clutched to his breast. His audience, the cross-eyed beauties from Potonchan, sat on the ground at his feet staring at him, slack-jawed. The Totonáca women had been excluded from his Bible classes, as he called them, as none of them could speak Chontal Maya.

  Rain Flower listened, but sat apart from the others.

  What Aguilar had to say bewildered her, as if often did. It took the form of a long harangue about religion. He said that the Spaniards had just one god, but there were three gods in this one god. These three gods who made up one god had a son who was also a god. There was also another man called a Pope who was also a god, but wasn't.

  As far as she could make out, none of these gods were as powerful as the Spaniard's own king.

  Aguilar finished his lesson by making the women recite a prayer praising their own fathers.

  When the Potonchan girls had all drifted away he seemed surprised to find Rain Flower still there, watching him. "Doña Isabel," he said, calling her by the name he had given her on her baptismal day, "I am pleased to see you have discovered a thirst for God."

  "I listened to your speech. There is something I do not understand. When you spoke of your gods you did not mention my lord Cortés."

  "Cortés?"

  "Is he not one of your gods?"

  "Of course not!"

  "Then I was right. He is just a man, like the rest of you."

  "I do not know where you learn such blasphemies. Cortés is our leader, and his mission is blessed by Pope and by Almighty God. But he himself is just a man."

  "You are not from the Cloud Lands?"

  "We were born in a great and powerful country called Spain. But we came here from Cuba, an island across the ocean."

  Well, Rain Flower thought, that makes as much sense as anything else you have to say. "Why did you come?"

  "We came here to teach you about God. We want you to be saved."

  "From what?"

  "From the devil."

  The devil. Perhaps he meant the Mexica's god, Hummingbird of the Left. Well, we should all like to be saved from him.

  But I was right about this Cortés then. Poor Malinali. But what was the point of trying to convince her of the truth? She must have asked these same questions. She clearly did not want to believe that Cortés was just a man like all the rest.

  But what did it matter? Let her dream. Their future was out of their hands anyway. Unlike the Totonáca women they were far from home and could not slip away in the night if they wanted to.

  Montezuma's sacrificial altars were waiting for all them at the end of this journey, no matter what they believed. Life was just a dream, a short postponement of death.

  She stood up and started to walk away.

  "Wait," Aguilar called breathlessly after her, "I can read to you from my holy book!"

  Rain Flower ignored him. She was planning when she might next steal away to the pool with Gonzalo Norte.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  “We must send a deputation back to Spain to petition the king for the right to establish our own colony here. Alonso, as my most trusted friend and ally, I want you to return to Spain to plead the case on our behalf."

  Puertocarrero did not seem unhappy with this news. He does not have the stomach for soldiering, Cortés thought, or the temperament to survive long in these fevered lands. His breeding and manners are more suited to the royal court, which was why Cortés had chosen him for this errand.

  Well, perhaps not the only reason.

  But his officers would find his logic irrefutable. To obtain official recognition from the king they would need to send someone who knew the ways of the court. Puertocarrero was by far the best candidate, the nephew of a prominent justice of Sevilla and related to the Count of Medellín, one of Charles' most powerful and influential grandees.

  Cortés passed across the table his carte de relación, sealed with wax. "In my letter I have
described to the king all that has happened here since our arrival three months ago. I have informed His Majesty how we have been forced into our recent drastic actions because of the arrogance and greed of Governor Velásquez in Cuba. It also relates the enthusiasm of all members of our new colony to serve the king."

  "I will return as soon as I can, with royal endorsement for our endeavours."

  Cortés would miss Puertocarrero; he was a loyal and trustworthy comrade. But he would still rather have Alvarado with him if it came to a fight. "To help the king arrive at his decision I am sending with you all the treasure we have won so far." Well almost, Cortés thought. Not the gold that Gordo’s niece was wearing the day he gave her to me, nor certain items of dress Tendile's lords hung on me. They are rightfully mine. "The value of the gold and jewels alone I place at two thousand castellanos."

  "I am sure His Majesty cannot fail to be impressed."

  "We will leave in the morning for the coast. You will take my flagship from San Juan de Ulúa. Alaminos will be your pilot."

  Puertocarrero rose to leave, hesitated. "About the girl," he said.

  Cortés strived to appear puzzled.

  "Doña Marina," Puertocarrero said.

  "What about her?"

  He smiled. "Treat her kindly."

  Malinali

  The sun is just risen on the water and the great war canoes of the thunder gods roll on a gentle tide, A smaller canoe waits at the beach, to take my husband away. A few of my lord's soldiers stand around, watching me. I hear them mutter and spit in the sand.

  My husband strides down to the strand in high leather boots. The morning sun brings out the gold in his hair and his beard. He says something to Aguilar, who then turns to me.

  "He says he does not know when he will be back."

  "Tell my lord I wish him well and thank him for his kindness." I am almost too excited to play my role this morning. I know that Feathered Serpent has arranged this. It is not unknown for a person to have his own brother instruct his bride in the ways of the cave before he takes her to his own bed and I am sure this is what my lord intended. Now his task is completed, my violet-eyed husband is returning to the Cloud Lands.

  Still, he looks sad.

  "He wishes you well," Aguilar yawns.

  "I wish him well also. Tell him my cave of joy will be a place of great emptiness without him."

  Aguilar gasps. "I cannot tell him that."

  "You cannot tell him that I wish him well?"

  "I cannot ... the rest of it."

  "Then tell him may the God of Wind hurry onwards the great canoe bearing him to heaven."

  "Castile is not heaven," Aguilar mutters. He speaks a few curt sentences to my husband who smiles and answers in his own language.

  "You did not tell him what I said," I say to Aguilar.

  "How can you know what I said? I said that you would miss him and that you wished him well.”

  "And he wished me well also."

  "That much you may have guessed."

  "And the rest?"

  "That was all."

  "There was more."

  Aguilar is about to debate further with me, but then he shrugs his shoulders and admits: "He also asked that you do the best you can for his friend, Cortés."

  "I would do anything for my lord."

  Aguilar snorts with derision and walks back up the beach, leaving us to complete our farewells without him.

  My husband kisses my hand and gets in the canoe. Some moles push the boat through the shallows. He waves to me once, then takes his position at the stern. I know I shall never see him again.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  The Feathered Serpent comes to me in the night, slipping and hissing through the darkness. Like I knew he would, as he knows he must.

  He whispers to me: my sacred one, my sweet one, the one desire of my heart. The heat of our bodies fills the little room where I sleep. He ignites me. I am like cold water thrown against a hot wall.

  I whisper to him also in the elegant tongue: my lover, my lord, my destiny here on this earth.

  What our bodies do is a mirror of our minds. I wish desperately to be a part of him. He takes possession of me quickly, striking like a serpent, in a rush. I am left breathless, woken from sleep, and he is lying between my legs, his breath hot and laboured on my cheek, my body tender and bruised from his onslaught.

  “I have wanted this from the moment I saw you,” he murmurs.

  He thinks I do not understand him. He does not know that from that very first day I have been learning the language of the gods. I wonder when I will tell him how much I hear, how much I know.

  But not yet. It suits my purpose, for the moment, to be a shadow on the wall.

  By the light of a single candle I make out the chiselled lines of his face, even the flecks of grey in his beard.

  “I wish I knew what you were thinking. Such liquid eyes I have never seen on a woman.” He laughs. “Alonso said you were cold.”

  The candle dances in the draught.

  “You don’t understand a word I’m saying, do you?” he says and looks disappointed. His hand cups my breast. “I wonder if we are all the same to you?”

  He is gone before dawn, and the sunrise is still, without a murmur of breeze. I lie awake, I have not slept. I am planning to capture the wind. I am laying schemes, weaving dreams, my life is pregnant with possibilities now, a squealing litter of hopes, blind and thrusting.

  Chapter 29

  Guzman was standing in the doorway. Cortés looked up from the dice. One by one the officers gathered around the table grew silent.

  "What is it?"

  "The woman, Doña Marina. She is outside, caudillo."

  Alvarado grinned. "Perhaps without Puertocarrero she has an itch to scratch," he said and the others laughed.

  Cortés silenced them with a glance. "Bring her in," he said.

  Guzman went back outside and moments later re-appeared with Malinali.

  "Get Aguilar," Cortés said to Guzman.

  "No," Malinali said, in Castilian. "No Aguilar."

  The Spaniards stared at her in astonishment.

  "Leave us," Cortés said to Guzman. He turned back to the girl. Well. "You can speak Castilian?"

  "Speak slowly ... for me ... please. Then ... I understand."

  Cortés laughed. What a wonder. But of course, she had been with them for nearly three months now, living with Alonso, as well as nursing their sick and wounded. A bright girl like this, she would have paid attention. He wondered how long she had been able to understand all that was said around her, and why she had only now decided to reveal her secret.

  "You are to be commended," he said, delighted.

  "They will steal ... your canoe. Tomorrow."

  Cortés stopped laughing. "Steal?" He realised that by "canoe" she meant one of the Naos or brigantines in the anchorage. "Who plans to steal from me?"

  "Leon ... Ordaz ... Diaz ... Escudero ... Umbral."

  Alvarado cursed under his breath as she recited the names of the conspirators.

  "How do you know this?" Cortés said.

  "They talk .... they do not take care ... what they say. They think ... I do not understand."

  "Traitors!" Sandoval hissed.

  “Fortunately, God has sent an angel to watch over us,” Cortés said.

  "What are we to do?" Alvarado asked him.

  "We have been patient long enough. It is time we removed our velvet gloves and showed them the iron beneath." He turned to Jaramillo. "Get Escalante and a dozen men. Arrest all of the conspirators now. No, wait. Leave Father Diaz. Just the other four. Bring them to Alvarado in the stockade. We shall learn the truth of this matter."

  Alvarado jumped to his feet. "It will be my pleasure, caudillo."

  His captains rushed from the room, eager for the chance to finally revenge themselves on the Velásquistas. Cortés was left alone with Malinali. Once again you have saved me! he thought. And once again I have underestimated you.
<
br />   "Thank you," he said.

  This time she did not lower her eyes. Instead she spoke some words in Nahuatl that he did not understand: You do not have to thank me. You are Feathered Serpent. My destiny is with you.

  Chapter 30

  Alvarado's shirt was stained with sweat and there was blood on the cuffs. He looked fatigued from his night's work. Cortés had not slept either. He sat behind the great table, his face dark with anger, his decisions already made.

  Outside the first grey light of dawn stained the sky.

  "What did you discover?" Cortés said.

  "Escudero proved to be stubborn."

  "How stubborn?"

  "Oh, he talked," Alvarado said. "Finally." There was a jar of Cuban wine on the table. He poured some into a pewter mug and slated his thirst. The red wine stained the corners of his mouth and soaked into his beard. "They all talk eventually. A piece of sail canvas and a few buckets of water and they all talk."

  "Who was with him in the conspiracy?"

  Alvarado appeared reluctant. The news cannot be good, Cortés thought. Alvarado pushed a list of names across the table. Cortés ucked in his breath. He was shocked. He had not realised the Velásquistas had so many sympathisers. He must keep this knowledge private or risk the loyalty of the rest. Besides, if his future plans were to come to anything he would need every man he had.

  Well, almost every man. One or two must be sacrificed in the name of discipline. "So many?"

  Alvarado picked at the dried candle grease on the table. "They planned to seize one of the brigantines and make their way back to Cuba under full sail. They hoped to warn Velásquez of Puertocarrero's mission and have him intercepted."

  A vein swelled at Cortés' temple. "Who was to be their pilot?"

  "Juan Cermeño."

  "Cermeño," he muttered. Pilots, at least, were expendable for he had no plans to sail anywhere. "We must not allow the other men to know the extent of the mutiny. We will make an example of the ringleaders and pretend Escudero kept silent for the rest. Those who are not punished will give thanks to God for their good fortune and be especially diligent with their loyalty in the future." He considered a moment, scanning the list. "Hang the pilot, Cermeño. I can spare a few sailors on a land campaign. And of course this dog, Escudero."