"There's something else, too."
Something else… I extended my senses, probing at the edge of the cloud. Something sharper, like pieces of a broken knife – corrupted almost beyond recovery. "Wards?" I asked. "Some kind of spell…"
"Yes," Ichtaca said. "I was hoping it would remind you of something."
Not that I could think of. "Wards aren't my specialty," I said, almost sheepishly. "Have you asked a priest of the Duality?"
"I tried, but they're too busy warding off the epidemic from the rest of the population."
"I've seen them somewhere, that's the trouble. Something much like it, but I can't pinpoint…"
"It'll come back to you," I said, finally. I looked at the pieces again, but they had faded too much, and unlike Ichtaca, they didn't remind me of anything at all.
What could Pochtic have done, which would require guidance from the dead? I thought back to when I'd seen him in the courtyard of the prisoners' quarters. Cuixtli, the Mextitlan prisoner, had said Pochtic had been looking for a spell.
Looking for a spell, or… or making sure everything was as it should have been?
"He cast the spell," I said, slowly. It made sense – an altogether chilling kind of sense.
But why? Why would the Master of the House of Darkness, one of the four on the war-council, seek to act against the clergy of Tlaloc? Some old rivalry I hadn't known of? Some grievance? It all sounded too extreme.
"What spell?" Ichtaca asked.
"The one in the prisoners' quarters. The one that took the lives of Tlaloc's priests."
There was silence. "He did what?"
The voice wasn't Ichtaca's; it came from behind us, from the entrance to the room. And I knew it.
I turned around, slowly, and watched Acamapichtli limp into the room. Like his priests, he was all but unrecognisable – his face scarred, his movements slow and stiff – and the eyes…
The corneas had burst, drowning the irises. "You–"
He fumbled his way into the room, tapping the floor with a wooden cane – his other hand wrapped into something I couldn't see. Behind him was a black-clad guard, not his jailer, but his only help to move, to climb stairs – to see anything at all. The steady tap of the cane against the stone floor was all I could hear as he made his way towards us. "I caught the sickness, yes. But, as you can see, it passed me by. Almost."
Almost – and it had left its mark everywhere. And it had damaged his eyes, too. I had been blind for a while, after entering Tlaloc's world – but I had recovered. For Acamapichtli, there would be no such grace.
"You–" He was alive – alive, ready to help us, to rebuild his own clergy. But the cost, oh gods – the cost…
"Always be prepared," Acamapichtli said. His voice was raw, as if he hadn't spoken for a long time – I thought of blood, dripping down his throat, of vocal chords distended as those few blood vessels within burst, and bled, and left whitish scars everywhere within. "I–" He stopped in the middle of the room, the cane finally falling still – blessed silence flowing all around us. He unclenched his hand, revealing the bone-white shape of an amulet. "Always be prepared." There was a shadow of the old, mordant sneer on his face, if not in his voice. "It's served me well, as you can see."
"You're alive," I said – stupidly, because it seemed to be the only fact filling my head. "I thought–"
"That I was dead?" He grinned, a truly frightening expression – his thin lips parting to reveal teeth, covered in the blood that had leaked from his gums. "Not such luck, I'm afraid. I'm a hard man to kill." He tapped his cane against the ground, once, twice. "Now, what were you saying about the–" he paused there, his hands shaking "the deaths of the clergy?"
"I think," I said, slowly, "that the Master of the House of Darkness was involved. I don't know if he cast the spells or made sure they were in place – but he certainly played his part in them." And that – not the deaths, those were part of the ritual – but the betrayal of the Empire and the Fifth World – that would be a sin the gods might forgive, but that Tizoc-tzin wouldn't, and he had already seen how much score Tizoc-tzin set by priests and by the gods' rules. He had to have known, even after his penance, that it wouldn't keep him safe, that nothing would ever keep him safe from Tizoc-tzin.
But why had he thought…?
Oh, of course. I had come into the prisoners' quarters and challenged him, and he had assumed I knew something. He had been wrong, of course. I ought to have felt sorry, but the memory of the priests in the courtyard made it all but impossible.
"I see," Acamapichtli said. "Can you summon his soul?"
"I don't know–" I glanced at Ichtaca, who still hadn't moved. We'd already summoned the soul of one victim, and it hadn't been of great help. "I need preparations for that; it certainly won't be until tomorrow."
"I don't care. This – rabbit-faced coward has just played his part in all but exterminating my clergy." Acamapichtli gripped his cane – he was still a blind, scarred man with a limp, but power shim mered in the air around him, a reminder the enemy underestimated him at his peril. "Anything we can do to avenge this…"
I could understand – I'd had some of the same burning hunger within me, and knew how much worse it would all be for him – but we couldn't afford anger; we couldn't afford revenge. "It's not over yet, that's the problem. The deaths were just the beginning. They're the fuel for another spell."
Acamapichtli said nothing for a while – his ruined eyes staring straight ahead. "I want revenge."
"I know. But the Fifth World–"
"–can take care of itself?" He laughed, sharp and bitter. "Probably. But they were my priests, Acatl. They will not be used for some ritual against us. Tell me how I can help."
I shook my head. "You need to find your Consort," I said. "If she's still alive. We need to understand what kind of ritual we're dealing with. Ichtaca, can you set up the summoning?" I asked.
He grimaced. It was far from a straightforward thing – the body was unwashed and unadorned, and the vigils hadn't even started. And we both knew how important procedures were, at a time like this. "I'll see what I can do," Ichtaca said. "In the meantime–"
I glanced at the darkening sky – the air as heavy as before a storm. "I have an errand to do. I'll see you afterwards."
TWENTY
The Jaguar Knight's Brother
It was late by the time I arrived at Neutemoc's house; and in the darkness, the leaping jaguars painted on the gates seemed as luminous and as threatening as haunting mothers hovering on the edges of the Fifth World. Faint voices wafted out from the courtyard, and the laughter of children – for a moment, it seemed as though I had gone back to a few years before, when there had still been a mistress of the house, and my brother had epitomised the success I'd never know as a priest without possessions.
In the reception room, Neutemoc was sitting, nibbling on a fried newt; the laughter came from Necalli and Mazatl, who sat listening to Mihmatini telling a story – though my sister herself wasn't laughing. Her eyes were red, and it was obvious her mind lay elsewhere.