The boat ran aground in a spectacular fashion, scattering dried, slashing pieces of reeds over my legs. Teomitl leapt on the shore and snatched the torch from me. He stared at me, once more daring me to mock him.
I wasn't in a mood to reproach him, for the heartbeat under my fingers was faster than it had been on shore. "It's close," I whispered.
"Where?" Teomitl asked.
"On this island." I suddenly wondered why we were whispering. A beast of shadows would have hearing much keener than that of any jaguar on the prowl, and a sense of smell to match. It would sense me, a priest for the Dead, as it would sense the heart I carried in my hands. "Come."
This Floating Garden was, like most of them, a huge maize field. Dry husks crackled under my sandals, no matter how hard I strove to be silent.
The torchlight illuminated the small maize plants, poking out of the ground: it was the end of the dry season, and the maize had barely been replanted. In the night, the field seemed eerily desolate: every insect song echoed as if in the Great Temple, and every maize sapling rustle made me startle, and wonder if the beast wasn't going to leap at us.
The heartbeat grew faster still as we approached the hut at the end of the Floating Garden.
"In there?" Teomitl asked. "Can't we draw it out?"
I wished we could. "It's too canny for that. We'd just be wasting our time."
"I see," Teomitl said. "What an adventure." He didn't sound keen. I didn't feel so enthusiastic either. Inside the hut, we would have neither starlight nor moonlight, and fighting by torchlight was messy and ineffective. I looked up at the sky. The moon would rise soon, but we would be inside while it climbed into the sky. I didn't like that, but there wasn't much of a choice.
The heart went wild as I crossed the threshold. My hand dropped to the largest of my obsidian knives, and drew it from its sheath.
Nothing. No beast, leaping from the darkness to swipe at my chest. I released my hold on the knife; the hollow feeling in my stomach receded.
Teomitl stood on the threshold, his torch briefly illuminating the contents of the hut: walls of wattle-and-daub, embers dying on the hearth. And three bodies, face down on the ground, the sickening smell of rot and spilled entrails underlying that of churned mud.
The beat of the jade heart was frantic now, as if it didn't know where to start pointing.
I knelt by one of the bodies, lifted it to the wavering light: a man, his chest slashed open, and the heart missing. Of course. The beast of shadows had feasted on its preferred meal.
The other corpses were much the same, save that one of them was a woman. She could have been Eleuia. But I soon disabused myself: this woman was older than thirty-five, and wearing a rough cactus-fibre blouse and skirts, nothing like the clothes a priestess of high rank would have chosen.
"Acatl-tzin," Teomitl said, sharply. "There's something outside."
The heart was still madly beating, but it was useless at such close quarters. The beast could be anywhere. I rose from my crouch, drawing one of my three obsidian knives from its sheath.
"Stay where you are," I said.
A shadow passed across the threshold, knocking Teomitl offbalance. The torch fell: a brief, fiery arc before it was utterly extinguished. And in the interval before I gained my night vision, something huge bore me to the ground. Claws scrabbled at the clasp of my cloak – moving downwards, aiming for my heart.
NINE
Shadows and Summoners
I tried to roll aside, but the beast was too heavy. It breathed into my face the nauseous smell of rotting bodies, of pus and bleeding wounds. I wanted to retch. But I couldn't. I was pinned to the ground, my lungs all but crushed by the weight on my chest.
I'd dropped the jade heart, but my hand was still clenched around the obsidian knife. I tried to raise it, but the beast was blocking me. Its claws had shredded my cloak and were now digging into my chest, where the jade pendant was obviously giving it some trouble.
Good.
I heaved, felt the beast slide a fraction of a measure, enough for me to wedge the knife upwards and sink it into flesh.
The beast roared, but remained where it was, weighing down on my chest.
The Duality curse me. The jade amulet would slow it down, but at some point it would be entirely blackened – and thus useless.
I heaved again, to little avail.
Footsteps sounded in the hut. "Acatl-tzin!"
The beast roared, and turned away from me. I heaved again, sending it to the ground. As quickly as I could, I rolled upright.
My night vision was a little better, but not clear enough. Presumably, the two silhouettes hacking at each other in the hut were Teomitl, armed with his sword, and the beast, hissing like a frustrated ocelot. Teomitl's breath came in quick, heavy gasps, and he circled the thing in an awkward way: a wound, taken as he'd been struck down by the beast, must have hampered him.
Obviously, the beast had the upper hand. It didn't have the problem of inadequate night vision, and Teomitl's reflexes were no match for its rapid strikes.
But we had one advantage over it: because it was made of the deepest shadows of Mictlan, it hated light. Any kind of light. And outside the hut would be starlight, and the rising moon, steadily climbing into the sky. And a dense network of maize seedlings, which would betray the slightest movement.
I unsheathed both my remaining obsidian knives, feeling Mictlantecuhtli's power pulse deep within, and made my way to the door as fast as I could.
I closed my eyes, briefly, extending my priest-senses – and felt the beast, a black patch of raw anger and hatred, mixed with the deeper darkness of Mictlan. Not stopping to dwell on the consequences of failure, I took aim, and threw one knife at the combatants.
A howl informed me I'd hit the right target; I threw myself to the ground, and not a moment too soon. The beast leapt right over me, and landed in the maize with a dry, rustling sound.
The starlight limned its shape: a body half as large again as a jaguar's, a narrow snout, glittering fangs; and yellow, malevolent eyes that seemed to see right into my soul. That had to be what a deer felt, in the moment before the hunter closed on it.
No.
I had to–
I threw myself aside again, and the leap which had been meant for my chest caught my left arm instead. Claws sank deep into my skin. I stifled a scream as the searing pain spread through the bones of my upper arm. My hand opened, out of its own volition, and the obsidian knife, the only one I had left, fell to the ground.
The beast withdrew its claws. Its muscles bunched up, to snatch me and bring me closer to it. I did the only possible thing: I let myself fall to the ground. The beast's claws went wide. Frustrated, it shook its head, growling in a decidedly unpleasant manner.
I flicked my eyes upwards, glancing at the sky: the moon was steadily rising higher and higher, but it would be a while before its light fell on the Floating Garden.
Huitzilpochtli strike me down.
At the threshold of the hut, a shaking Teomitl had hauled himself upwards. He was attempting to raise his sword, but I didn't think he'd arrive in time.
There was no point in discreetly retrieving my obsidian knife. I simply dived for it, as the beast braced itself for another jump, straight in the direction I was going in.
The shock of its weight sent me sprawling to the ground, fighting not to scream as my left arm became a mass of fiery pain. Its claws scrabbled at my jade pendant and the thread holding it around my neck parted. The pendant fell to the ground with a clink. The beast roared in triumph and reared, both paws held high above my chest – with all their claws unsheathed.
"Acatl-tzin!" Teomitl bellowed.
The world turned to thick honey; everything seemed to happen more slowly than needed: the claws descending to slash open my chest; Teomitl's unsteady footsteps, rushing towards me, but too late, it was already too late; the glimmer of the obsidian knife, lying in the mud inches from my left hand.
My left hand.
I had to–
Focus. I had to focus.
I clenched the fingers of my left hand – I think I screamed, then, as the pain became stronger than anything I had endured in my noviciate at the calmecac – closed them around the hilt of the knife. The weapon felt alive under my touch, beating like a living heart. Power pulsed deep within: a smell of sick-houses and rotting bodies, hovering on the edge of becoming something far greater.
I didn't think. I couldn't afford to. In a quick, stabbing motion, I raised the knife, intending to sink it into the beast's chest before it opened mine.
The claws raked into my flesh before I could complete my motion. My hand clenched, convulsively, but I didn't let go. I screamed and writhed, but I still raised the knife. And, scrabbling for some thing, for anything that could save me, I instinctively opened myself wide to the power within the knife.
For a brief, timeless moment, the power of Mictlan seared through my flesh: the decay of every living thing, the loneliness and sadness of the dead, the dry smell of bleached bones and dust. For a brief, timeless moment, the pain was blasted away by emptiness. It was my hand and yet not my hand which pushed upwards, at an angle I would have been incapable of reaching with my wounded arm.
The beast, completing its downward motion, fell upon the blade I held up, and grew still. Its weight crushed my chest, slowly emptying my lungs.
The power of Mictlan slowly receded, leaving me exhausted: drained of joy, of hope. I had never had cause to draw on it that way. I had not even been sure it could be done.
I hoped never to do it again.
I lay, hardly daring to breathe. Every movement of my chest sent fresh waves of pain through my ribcage. My left arm would never be the same, either.
The moon's light struck the Floating Garden, throwing into stark contrast the bed of maize shoots, and the blood that was pouring onto it. My blood.
Someone – Teomitl – hauled the beast's corpse off me. "Acatl-tzin?"
I didn't move, just stared at him, watching him blur in and out of focus. His left leg sported an ugly gash, and he leant on his sword – but the spell around him was still tight, and his upright bearing was undiminished.
"I've been better," I whispered.
He pulled me upright, into a seated position. "Good thing we came well-prepared," he said, searching in the herb pouch he'd taken from the temple.
He pulled out a pad of dayflower and applied it to my chest wound. It turned dark; with a curse, he threw it away, and applied another one.
"Don't move," he said, when the bleeding had slowed down. "I think there were things in that hut that might help us…"
He was soon back, with a covered jar of clay that stank of alcohol. "Pulque," he said. "Unfermented maguey sap would have been better, but it will have to do."
When he poured it over the wounds, I thought I would scream again. But I'd had my fill of screaming. I clenched my teeth, and attempted to bring the world back into focus.
Teomitl tore my cloak into strips to make bandages; his gestures as he dressed my wound were cool, professional. "You're not – a – healer," I said.
He shook his head. "But I've seen my share of wounds, and my share of warriors whose wounds filled with pus and turned black. Stupid. Those things are easily cured, if you take them at the beginning."
"Your own wounds," I said, struggling to come up with something significant. My thoughts seemed to have scattered.
He shrugged. "Damaging, but not serious. I'll splint my leg after I'm done with you."
"Thank you," I said, when he was finished. My left arm was wrapped in maize leaves; my chest was covered in an array of cotton bandages soaked in pulque. The smell of alcohol was starting to go to my head, making me feel dizzy. I shook myself, and winced at the pain.
"Don't overexert yourself!" Teomitl snapped. He looked at his own wound, critically. "Mm."
I laughed, more sharply than I'd intended to. "The night isn't over. We still have to find who summoned the beast, not to mention Priestess Eleuia."
"Do you think I don't know?" Teomitl's voice was low, angry. "I'm telling you those wounds won't heal if you keep running around the city."
I rose, carefully. Even breathing hurt. Teomitl was pouring the rest of the pulque on his own wound, with an efficiency that made me suspect he didn't need my help.
"I'll go and search the hut," I said. I still needed to access the beast's memories, but that would be best done a little later, when I'd had time to catch my breath.
"By the way," Teomitl said, without raising his eyes. "You've got some nerve, throwing knives at me."
I shrugged. I hadn't liked doing it, but there had been no other choice. "I wasn't throwing it at you. I used my priest's senses to target the beast. Anyway, it missed you."
"It might not have."
"You'd rather have lost?" I asked, pointedly. "If you want to exchange wounds…"
He shook his head, sharply. "No. But I'd rather you didn't do it again."
"If it had been me fighting, and you outside, I'd rather take my chances with a thrown knife than with the beast's claws. But I'll remember."
Inside the hut, I carefully rekindled the dying fire, offering a brief prayer to Huehueteotl, God of the Hearth. The flames that rose between the three stones illuminated the walls, magnifying my shadow like that of a monster. The shards of the jade heart crunched under my feet.
With some difficulty, I turned the three corpses on their backs. In the sweltering heat of the marshes, they had already decomposed, flesh sloughing off, revealing the bones beneath. I'd seen too many dead people to be unsettled by the half-visible skulls, or by the strong smell of putrescence that hung in the air.