Nausea, harsh, unexpected, welled up in my throat. I turned my gaze away from the birds.
The Quetzal Flower was back on Her dais, smiling. In Her hand were the jade earrings: she tossed them up and down, unheeding of the stone's fragility. "An interesting display, Acatl."
The room hadn't reverted: we could still have been in the southern jungle, or in the Heaven of Tamoanchan, where all living things were born. The smell of muddy earth, mingling with the memory of copal incense, was overpowering.
I said nothing. In the face of who She was, all my words had scattered. The jade earrings went clink-clink in Xochiquetzal's hands.
"Tolerable, I might say. Certainly a step in the right direction."
It hurt to… Gather my thoughts, I had to gather my thoughts. "You promised–"
She inclined her head, gracefully. "Did I? Only in exchange for proper worship."
"It – has – been – offered," I managed to whisper.
"Has it?" the Quetzal Flower asked. Her voice was sly. "Other things are expected of a worshipper."
A wave of desire swept through me, so strong I had to bite my lips in order not to cry out. I wanted Her as I'd never wanted any woman, any of my childhood loves, there could be no refusing her.
Was this, I thought, distantly, what Eleuia had had: some power that had drawn men to her like bees to honey?
Eleuia.
Neutemoc.
There was no time, not to let myself be battered into submission. "I gave – you – your due," I said, my voice breaking on each word. I felt like a fish, swimming upriver; like a dead soul, climbing the Obsidian Mountains, shards driven in hands and feet, a burning desire to yield, to vanish into oblivion…
Too easy.
"Give me–"
"Your answer?" Xochiquetzal sounded disappointed. "You could have so much more, Acatl."
"No," I whispered. "I – haven't come – here for illusions – for bliss–"
"Bliss is My dominion, Acatl," the Quetzal Flower said. But She had shrunk, become more human, if such a term could be applied to Her. "But if you reject it…" She made a sweeping gesture with Her hands, and the room, too, seemed to shrink.
"I… am not Your servant."
"No." Her voice was angry, or perhaps bitter? "You never were. Go bury yourself with the dead, Acatl, if you can't deal with what makes us alive."
"I–" I started, slowly, wondering why her accusation cut me to the core.
Xochiquetzal smiled, a sated cat once more; but I could feel the undercurrent of frustration in her stance. Next to me, the two quetzal birds had grown still, devouring each other with their gazes.
"The baby's father?" Xochiquetzal asked.
"Give me his name," I whispered. "The proper offerings have been made. The hymn was sung, and the dance was right, every step of it."
The Quetzal Flower let go of the jade bracelets. They crashed to the ground, shattered into a thousand pieces. I could have wept at Her casual rejection; but those weren't my thoughts, they were Hers. I was – a priest, first and foremost – a man with an indicted brother. I had no desires of my own: no lovers, no children, no mark on the world.
No.
Still Her thoughts.
"Give me his name," I said, again, articulating each syllable, letting the familiar sounds anchor me to the Fifth World.
On Her chair, the Quetzal Flower hissed. But finally she spoke. "His name? He was a man who loved her. A warrior she met in the Chalca Wars, and who understood her like no one else could." She paused, rubbed at Her eyes, and She was no goddess, just a middle-aged woman with an ailment that wouldn't go away. "You never understood her, Acatl. You went right and left, and you think you can encompass her."
"No," I said, and it was the truth. "I know nothing about her. But there's no time. I need the father's name."
"There always is time," Xochiquetzal said, shaking Her head. And She went on as if I hadn't spoken. "Her parents had to sell her during the Great Famine, did you know? Because they were poor and couldn't feed her, they offered her to the first rich man who came along."
"I don't see what this has to do…" A name. I needed a name that I could give to Pinahui-tzin, so that Neutemoc would be free. A name, so that I could know the truth.
"He was a bully," the Quetzal Flower said. She shook her head. "He bought her because he needed a slave on whom to release his anger, and he beat her every time she did something out of turn."
"Slaves aren't treated that badly," I said. "She could have complained–"
"To whom? She was eight at the time, Acatl. She didn't know better."
"It's interesting, but–"
"She wanted to be safe," Xochiquetzal said. "After the Great Famine was over, and her parents bought her back, she swore to herself that her family wouldn't ever starve again, that she would have enough power to be sheltered from harm. But in this world, there's no such thing." She smiled. "She swore Herself to me, because priests never go hungry."
Safe. All that, to be hated and despised by everyone?
As if She'd read my thoughts, the Quetzal Flower said, "But a woman shouldn't grasp for power. It's unseemly, isn't it? Her superiors thought her over-ambitious. Her peers thought her obsessed. Her lovers – and she had many – thought her uncanny. Such is the price."
"Please…" I said. "There's no time…"
"In the Chalca Wars, she met a man. A warrior who made no claim on her, who didn't judge her. A good man, who would fight to see that the proper sacrifices were offered, although he was too hot-headed at times."
Neutemoc. It sounded far too much like Neutemoc. Please, Duality, no.
"She bore his child, and would have raised him, too, if he hadn't died at birth."
"Stop going around in circles. His name," I said. Her story was over. There was nothing else She could add. She had to give me his name, to banish my doubts.
She watched me, uncannily serene. "Mahuizoh of the Coatlan calpulli."
"He isn't here," the Jaguar guard said, angrily. "How many times do I have to tell you?"
The warrior of the Duality who headed my detachment – Ixtli, the same one who'd headed the unsuccessful search parties – put a hand on his macuahitl sword. "We have the right to search this house."
If the guard hadn't had both hands full, one around the shellgrip of his spear, one holding his feathered shield, he'd have thrown them in the air. "You can search all you want. What I'm telling you is that I haven't seen Mahuizoh come here. And I've been on guard duty since noon."
"So where is he?" I asked, intervening before matters turned sour.
The guard shrugged. "I'm not a calendar priest. I don't do divination. All I know is–"
"Yes. We understood that, I think." Ixtli turned to me. "Do you want us to search the House?"
I was about to nod, not caring overmuch about making enemies of the Jaguar Knights at this juncture. But someone interrupted us.
"What seems to be the problem here?" a voice asked, behind me.
I turned. My gaze met that of a Knight in Jaguar regalia, but somehow different. The plume behind the jaguar's head was made of emerald-green quetzal tail-feathers, enough to be worth a fortune; the sword at his belt was decorated with turquoise, carnelian and lapis in addition to obsidian shards. His hands, tanned and callused, bore several rings, all of good craftsmanship.
"This man wants to search the Jaguar House, Commander Quiyahuayo."
Commander Quiyahuayo, Head of the Jaguar Brotherhood, looked at me, thoughtfully. "The High Priest for the Dead?" he asked. "You'd be Neutemoc's brother, I take it."
I wasn't surprised at his shrewdness: to stay in his high position, he would need great intelligence, as well as political acumen. "Yes," I said.
The guard's face darkened. "The traitor's brother?" he asked.
Commander Quiyahuayo lifted a hand. "Not so fast, Yolyama. Guilt has not been established. What do you want?" he asked, turning back towards me.
I looked at him, trying to establish his feelings towards Neutemoc. He'd be of noble birth; how would he view the ascension of my commoner brother into the nobility?
"I'm looking for evidence," I said, non-committal.
"About your brother's case?" Commander Quiya-huayo asked. He scratched his chin. "I was given to understand that there were… complications."
"Yes." He missed nothing, and I had no time to fence. I decided to be frank with him. "Another of your Knights might be involved in this."
Commander Quiyahuayo raised an eyebrow.
"Mahuizoh of the Coatlan calpulli," I added.
Commander Quiyahuayo grimaced. "Mahuizoh," he said. His distaste was palpable. He hadn't reacted that way when I'd mentioned Neutemoc. "I see."
"You're surprised?" I asked.
Commander Quiyahuayo's face was too blank to reveal anything. "Surprise is a weapon," he said. "I try not to let it be used against me." He scratched his chin, again. "You want to search this House?"
"We're just looking for him," I said. "I need to ask him a few questions."
"We'll be discreet," the Duality warrior Ixtli added.
"I see," Commander Quiyahuayo repeated. "I have no objections. But make it fast, please. The sooner the Jaguar Knights withdraw from this sordid business, the better.
"Yolyama," he said to the guard. "Show them around, will you?" Without waiting for an answer, he turned and walked away.
The guard looked at me, then spat onto the ground. "You're lucky it was Mahuizoh you asked after," he said. "The commander's never liked him."
"Why?" Ixtli asked.
The guard's face closed. "Not your concern," he said. "The commander said you could search the House. That's all. Don't you expect more."
So there were factions, in the Jaguar Knights; and Mahuizoh was obviously not on the commander's side. I wasn't really surprised. It seemed to be the same everywhere within the Sacred Precinct. How secure was Quiyahuayo's position?
The search wasn't long, although it still felt like time wasted: by the time we exited the house, the sun was halfway down to the horizon line, and the light bathing the temples of the Sacred Precinct had turned as golden as ripe maize.
We'd seen rooms where the young Jaguar Knights – those still unmarried and without lands of their own – would spend the night; common rooms, filled with bored Knights playing patolli, focused on the rattle of the dice to the exclusion of everything else; courtyards where the recruits practised with spears and feather-shields. But no trace of Mahuizoh. Though I had never met the man, the slave Huacqui had provided me with enough a description to stop and question everyone who fitted it.
All wasn't lost, however: one of the Jaguar Knights had given us the address of Mahuizoh's house.
"I assume you'll want us to go there next," Ixtli said.
I nodded. "We have to find him." I still had no proof: just a fanciful story of a disappointed lover who might have turned to abduction and murder. It wouldn't hold before Pinahui-tzin, and certainly not before the Imperial Courts.
We had to find Mahuizoh; and we had to force him to confess where he'd hidden Priestess Eleuia.
Mahuizoh's house was a luxurious one, brimming with slaves, its roof planted with a lush carpet of marigolds and yellow tomato flowers. By its size, it must have lodged more than Mahuizoh's immediate family.
The slave at the door was certainly not expecting a dozen Duality warriors. "And you would be…?" he asked, trying to pretend unconcern. But his voice shook.
"We've come to see Mahuizoh." Duality, let him be home.
He looked doubtful. "I'll ask," he said and ducked briefly into the courtyard. I heard him call out to his fellow slaves; after a short time, he came back, and said, "The mistress will see you."
"Mistress?" Ixtli mouthed. "What in the Duality's name?"
I gestured for him to be silent. If Mahuizoh wanted to toy with us, handing us to his wife…
Ixtli and I left the warriors at the entrance, covering all possible exits, and entered the house.
The woman who received us in the house's reception room was even older than Ceyaxochitl: too old to be Mahuizoh's wife. Her seamed face had seen far more than a bundle of fifty-two years, and the stiff way she sat in her low-backed chair suggested acute rheumatism. By her side was a slightly younger woman: middleaged, with a face that had sagged too much to remain beautiful.
"I hear you've come looking for my son," the old woman said.
Mahuizoh's mother, then. I nodded – and then, unsure of whether she could see me at all, said, "We're here to ask him some questions."
The old woman cackled. "The law finally caught up with him? Doesn't surprise me, doesn't surprise me."
"Auntie Cocochi," the younger woman said, sharply. "That's not what you wanted to say."
The old woman's rheumy eyes focused on her neighbour. "Did I? I always knew he would amount to nothing, that boy."
"He's sheltering you in his house," the younger woman said, shaking her head. By her tone, it was an argument she'd tried before, to no avail.
Cocochi snapped, "He still doesn't respect his elders. It was a different matter when Xoco was alive. She knew her place as my son's wife, she wouldn't speak unless spoken to. I've always told him he should have done the proper thing by his clan, that he should have remarried–"
"Please," I interrupted. "We really have to find Mahuizoh. It's urgent."
"Urgent? Ha!" Cocochi said. "Trouble again, mark my words. That boy was trouble from the moment he exited my womb."
"Do you," I said, slowly, trying not to show my exasperation, "know where Mahuizoh might be?"