He said the last words facetiously, as if of course he disbelieved them, though we were both aware that they were not entirely beyond belief. The idea was breathtaking: that I might be the first man ever to talk—not harangue, as the priests did, or confer by some mystic means—but really talk with beings who perhaps were not human, who perhaps were something eminently greater than human. That I might speak words to and hear words spoken by... yes... the gods—
But at that moment I could not speak at all, and Motecuzóma laughed again, at my speechlessness. He got to his feet, upright on the pyramid summit, and he leaned down to clap me on the shoulder, and he said cheerfully, "Too weak to say yes or no, Knight Mixtli? Well, my servants should have a hearty meal ready by now. Come be my guest and let me feed your resolve."
So we cautiously picked our way down a moonlit side of The Pyramid of the Sun, a descent almost as difficult as the climb, and we walked south along The Avenue of the Dead to the campground—overlooked by the third and least of Teotihuacan's pyramids—where fires were burning, cooking was being done, and mosquito-netted pallets were being laid out by the hundred or so servants, priests, knights, and other courtiers who had accompanied Motecuzóma. We were met there by the high priest whom I remembered as having officiated at the New Fire ceremony some five years before. He gave me only a passing glance, and started to say, with pompous importance:
"Lord Speaker, for tomorrow's petitions to the old gods of this place, I suggest first a ritual of—"
"Do not bother," Motecuzóma interrupted him. "There is now no need for pretentious petitions. We will return to Tenochtítlan as soon as we wake tomorrow."
"But, my lord," the priest protested. "After coming all the way out here, with all your retinue and august guests..."
"Sometimes the gods volunteer their blessing before it is even asked," said Motecuzóma, and he threw an equivocal look at me. "Of course, we may never be sure if it is given seriously or only in mocking jest."
So he and I sat down to eat, among a circle of his palace guardsmen and other knights, many of whom recognized and greeted me. Although I was disreputably ragged, dirty, and out of place in that gaudily feathered and jeweled assemblage, the Uey-Tlatoani directed me to the pillowed seat of honor on the ground at his right. While we ate, and while I tried heroically to moderate my voracity, the Lord Speaker spoke at some length about my forthcoming "mission to the gods." He suggested questions I should ask of them, when I had mastered their language, and what questions of theirs I might prudently avoid answering. I waited for him to be silenced by a mouthful of grilled quail, and then I ventured to say:
"My lord, I would make one request. May I rest at home for at least a short time before I set out traveling again? I started this last journey in all the vigor of my manhood's prime, but I confess that I feel as if I have come home in the age of never."
"Ah, yes," the Lord Speaker said understandingly. "No need to apologize; it is the common fate of man. We all come at last to the ueyquin ayquic."
From your expressions, reverend scribes, I take it that you do not comprehend the meaning of the ueyquin ayquic, "the age of never." No, no, my lords, it does not signify an age of any specific number of years. It comes early to some people, later to others. Considering that I was then forty and five years old, well into my middle years, I had eluded its clutch for longer than most men. The ueyquin ayquic is the age when a man beings to mutter to himself, "Ayya, the hills never seemed so steep before..." or "Ayya, my back never used to give me these twinges of pain..." or "Ayya, I never found a gray hair in my head before now...."
That is the age of never.
Motecuzóma went on, "By all means, Knight Mixtli, take time to recover your strength before you go south. And this time you will not go afoot or alone. An appointed emissary of the Mexíca must go in pomp, especially when he is to confer with gods. I will provide for you a stately litter and strong bearers and an armed escort, and you will wear your richest Eagle Knight regalia."
As we prepared to bed down, by the combined light of the setting moon and the dying campfires, Motecuzóma called for one of his swift-messengers. He gave instructions to the man, and the runner immediately set off for Tenochtítlan, to take word to my household of my impending return. It was thoughtful of the Speaker to do that, and it was well intentioned, so that my servants and my wife Béu Ribé should have time to prepare a fitting reception for my homecoming. But the actual effect of that reception was nearly to kill me, and then to make me nearly kill Béu.
I made my way through the streets of Tenochtítlan at the next midday. Because I was as unprepossessing as any beggar leper, and almost as immodestly exposed as a genital-proud Huaxtecatl, the passing people either made a wide circuit around me or ostentatiously drew their mantles close to avoid brushing against me. But when I reached my home quarter of Ixacualco I began to meet remembered neighbors, and they greeted me civilly enough. Then I saw my own house, and its mistress standing in the open door at the top of the street stairs, and I raised my topaz for a look at her, and I almost fell at that moment, right there in the street. It was Zyanya waiting for me.
She stood in the bright light of day, dressed only in blouse and skirt, her lovely head bare—and the unique, the beautiful white streak was clearly visible in her flowing black hair. The shock of the illusion was like the shock of a blow that deranged all my body's senses and organs. I suddenly seemed to be looking out from underwater, from inside a whirlpool; the street's houses and people moved in circles about me. My throat constricted, and my breath would go neither in nor out. My heart bounded first in joy, then in frenzied protest at the strain; it hammered even harder than it had lately done during strenuous hill climbs. I tottered and groped for the support of a nearby torch-lamp post.
"Záa!" she cried, catching hold of me. I had not seen her come running. "Are you wounded? Are you ill?"
"Are you really Zyanya?" I managed to say, in a thin voice squeezed out through my tightened throat. The street had darkened in my sight, but I could still see the gleam of that strand of her hair.
"My dear!" was all she replied. "My dear... old... Záa..." and she held me close against her soft, warm bosom.
I said what seemed obvious to my addled mind, "Then you are not here. I am there." I laughed for sheer happiness at being dead. "You have waited for me all this time... on the nearmost border of the far country..."
"No, no, you are not dead," she crooned. "You are only weary. And I was thoughtless. I should have saved the surprise."
"Surprise?" I said. My vision was clearing and steadying, and I lifted my eyes from her breast to her face. It was Zyanya's face, and it was beautiful beyond the beauty of all other women, but it was not my remembered Zyanya at twenty. The face was as old as mine, and the dead do not age. Somewhere Zyanya was still young, and Cozcatl was younger yet, and old Blood Glutton was still lustily ageless, and my daughter Nochipa would forever be a child of twelve. Only I, Dark Cloud, was left in this world, to endure the ever darker and cloudier age of never.