Pezotic. "And you don't know why," I said, carefully. If that wasn't what she wanted to tell me… "But you know what happened to him."
"I know where he went. Pezotic," Xahuia said, with a quick, fierce shake of her head. "For all I know, it isn't where he is now. But still–"
"Go on."
"I had him followed because he was a coward, and a weakling. A man who could be bought." Her lips curled up, halfway between a sneer and a smile. "He bought passage on a boat headed east."
"East?" I asked. "Into Texcoco?" It would have been convenient, but I was reasonably sure luck was not with us. From the start, it had never been.
"No," Xahuia said. "To Teotihuacan."
Of course. Teotihuacan, the Birthplace of the Gods, a sacred place where the gods had made the sacrifice that had led to the birth of the Fifth Sun, a place of pilgrimage and of worship, a place of safety, the bastion of Their strength.
"He might have moved," I said.
"He might," Xahuia agreed. "But it's all I can give you, Acatl-tzin. Take it and use however you wish."
"Thank you," I said. I rose and bowed to her, in the same fashion as if she still had been imperial consort. Her gaze rested, for a moment, on me; that of a weak, broken woman, grounded by her brother's magic and utterly at his mercy. "I'm sorry," I said.
"Don't be." She did that peculiar half-smile, with no hint of joy in it. "It's a game, Acatl-tzin. That's what you never understood. You have to be ready to gamble it all in order to win. And sometimes, you lose."
"I can't play that kind of game," I said.
"I know. But you'll find that all Revered Speakers can."
Xahuia's words still echoed in my mind as I walked back to Nezahual-tzin, who stood waiting next to a scowling Teomitl with a half-amused smile on his face.
"So, did you find out anything?"
"What you expected me to find. It's all a game to you, isn't it?" I asked.
He watched me, as dispassionately as one might watch a mouse or an ant. "Perhaps. Perhaps nothing is real, after all… just the gods, putting us on the board with the other patolli pieces."
"You're the one putting us on the board," I said.
"Why so much anger?"
"Because we've wasted time," I said. "Because we're here in Texcoco, indulging your taste for mysteries while Tizoc-tzin is getting elected."
Nezahual-tzin's shoulders moved in a gesture I couldn't read. "There was nothing you could have done about it, Acatl."
I knew. And the Southern Hummingbird strike me, it hurt, as much as obsidian shards, as much as salt in wounds. He'd disgraced me, sent Teomitl fleeing away from his own city, insulted my sister, who, unlike us all, had no means of defending herself. I hoped she was safe, that Tizoc-tzin hadn't thought to follow her out of the city. "Still," I said, as we walked away from the basin, "still, there was another way."
"Not that I could see." Nezahual-tzin's face was serene.
"And now what?" Teomitl asked.
Nezahual-tzin stopped, looked at us, pondering for a while. His eyes rolled up again, becoming the uncanny white of pearls, of milk and the looming Moon in the Heavens. "It depends."
"On how much we're worth to you?" I asked.
He smiled. "You're learning."
"Not what I wish to learn."
"All knowledge is good." He smiled again.
"You want to sell us?" Teomitl's hand strayed to his macuahitl sword. "You'd dare to–"
"Teomitl," I said, warningly. The palace wasn't ours and it was full of warriors, not to mention whatever sorcerers Nezahual-tzin might have in his service. "He'd sell his own sister." He already had, unless I was grievously mistaken.
"Of course," Nezahual-tzin said. "But she'd understand."
"You lie." Teomitl's face was all harsh angles, his skin slowly whitening to the pallor of jade.
The worst was, I didn't think he was lying. He and Xahuia – and Tizoc-tzin, and Quenami, and even the She-Snake – seemed to operate by a different set of standards, as alien to me as the ways of the southern tribes.
"Of course not," Nezahual-tzin said. "You're a fool, pup. I'm ruler of Texcoco. I do what is best for my city, and that includes not going to war against Tenochtitlan. Making, how would you call them, peace offerings to the new Revered Speaker?" His teeth, when he smiled, were the same uncanny white as his eyes.
"Why help me escape then?" I asked, and then realised that he had been caught in the same accusation as I. "Of course. You weren't welcome in Tenochtitlan either, after my arrest."
"No," Nezahual-tzin said. "But it will change, when I come back."
"As long as Tizoc-tzin doesn't find out you helped me."
Nezahual-tzin smiled, in that smug way I was coming to hate. "I'll explain to him it was the only way to get his brother to reveal his true allegiances. And he'll have both of you back; and that will matter more to him than alienating a valuable ally. The forms will have been respected. I will have made my amends for dealing in magic on his territory."
"We're not bundles to be passed on!" Teomitl snapped.
I noticed, from the corner of my eye, the warriors getting closer, circling us like vultures hoping for an easy kill. Teomitl's skin shone with sweat, and with something else – the otherworldly light of Chalchiuhtlicue, Jade Skirt.
"Everyone is a tool, at one point or another. Better get used to it, pup, or your life will be brief." Nezahual-tzin watched the warriors converging on us with the distracted interest of a man pondering the words of a poem. "Briefer than it could have been, at any rate."
Above us were the stars, an oppressive reminder of the stakes if I ever needed one. "You're intelligent enough to know what is upon us," I said.
"Of course I am. As you said, Tizoc-tzin will claim the Turquoiseand-Gold Crown. The Southern Hummingbird's power will once more flow into the Fifth World, and that will be the end of this incident. Meanwhile, I'll have worked my way back into favour at the Mexica Court."
"With our deaths." Teomitl's face was frozen, halfway to divine light. Sweat dripped on his cheeks.
Nezahual-tzin laughed. "Don't bother. The ground you're on is blessed by the Storm Lord, and your goddess won't have any hold here."
He might have been right – and it was my duty to see the Fifth World preserved, beyond any selfish grievances I might have. No, the Storm Lord's lightning strike me, I couldn't do this. "You do know how I escaped."
"With our help." Nezahual-tzin shook his head, contemptuously.
I snorted. "You do have tremendous faith in your abilities."
"I serve a god."
"So does the She-Snake," I said.
"The She-Snake? I don't see what he has to do with anything."
"The She-Snake said…" I swallowed, remembering darkness all around us, the rustle of something large and malevolent which hated all life, all movement, all sound, and wouldn't rest until everything was silent and dark. "He said that Tizoc-tzin wouldn't be able to channel the Southern Hummingbird's favour into the Fifth World." He'd said, too, that Quenami might have a trick, a way of bending the rules to his advantage. But Quenami had miscalculated before.