Excerpt

The Army's Return

The day dawned clear and bright on the city: as the Fifth Sun emerged from His night journey, He was welcomed by the drumrolls and conch-blasts of His priests – a noise that reverberated in my small house until it seemed to fill my lungs. I rolled to my feet from my sleeping mat, and made my daily offerings of blood – both to Tonatiuth the Fifth Sun, and to my patron Lord Death, the Fleshless One, ruler of the underworld.

This done, I put on a simple grey cloak, and headed to my temple – more for the sake of form, for I suspected I wouldn't remain there long, not if the army were indeed coming back today.

As I walked, I felt the slight resistance to the air, the familiar nausea in my gut – a feeling that everything wasn't quite right, that there was a gaping hole beneath the layers of reality that undercut the Fifth World. I'd been living with it for over three months, ever since the previous Revered Speaker had died. His successor, Tizoc-tzin, had been crowned leader of the Mexica Empire; but a Revered Speaker wasn't confirmed in the sight of the gods until his successful coronation war.

Today, I guessed, was the day I found out if the hole would ever close.

The Sacred Precinct, the religious heart of Tenochtitlan, was already bustling even at this early hour: groups of novice priests were sweeping the courtyards of the temple complexes; pilgrims, from noblemen in magnificent cloaks to peasants in loincloths, brought offerings of incense and blood-stained grass-balls; and the murmur of the crowd, from dozens of low-voiced conversations, enfolded me like a mother's arms. But there was something more in the air – a tautness in the faces of the pilgrims, a palpable atmosphere of expectation shared by the cotton-draped matrons and the priests with blood-matted hair.

The Temple for the Dead was but a short distance from my house, at the northern end of the Sacred Precinct. It was a low, sprawling complex with a pyramid shrine at its centre, from which the smoke of copal incense was already rising like a prayer to the Heavens. I wasn't surprised to find my second-in-command, Ichtaca, in deep conversation with another man in a light-blue cloak embroidered with seashells and frogs, and a headdress of heron feathers: Acamapichtli, High Priest of the Storm Lord. Together with Quenami, High Priest of the Mexica patron god Southern Hummingbird, we formed the religious head of the Empire. I didn't get on with Quenami, who was arrogant and condescending – and as to Acamapichtli… Not that I liked him any more than Quenami, but we'd reached an uneasy understanding the year before.

"Acatl." Acamapichtli looked amused, but then he always did. His gaze went up and down, taking in my simple grey tunic.

He didn't need to say anything, really. I could hardly welcome back the Revered Speaker of the Empire dressed like a low-ranking priest. "I'll change," I said, curtly. "I presume you're not here to enquire after my health."

For a moment, I thought he was going to play one of his little games with me again – but then his lips tightened, and he simply said, "A messenger arrived two days ago at the palace, and was welcomed with all due form by the She-Snake."

"You know this–"

"Through Quenami, of course. How else?" Acamapichtli's voice was sardonic. After the events of the previous year, we were both… in disgrace, I guessed. Not that I'd ever been in much of a state of grace, but I'd spoken out against the election of the current Revered Speaker, and Acamapichtli had plotted against him with foreigners, making us both outcasts at the current court. The She-Snake, who deputised for the Revered Speaker, wouldn't have wanted to countermand his master.

"And?" I asked. I wouldn't have been surprised if Quenami had given us only part of the information, to keep us as much in the dark as the pilgrims milling in the Sacred Precinct.

"Other messengers went out yesterday morning," Acamapichtli said. "With drums and trumpets, and incense-burners."

I let out a breath I hadn't been conscious of holding. "It's a victory, then."

Acamapichtli's face was a careful blank. "Or considered as such."

What did he know that he wasn't telling me? It would be just like him: serving his own interests best, playing a game of handing out and withholding information like the master he was.

"You know it's not a game."

Acamapichtli stared at me for a while, as if mulling over some withering response. "And you take everything far too seriously, Acatl. As I said: the Fifth World can survive."

I had my doubts, especially given that the death of the previous Revered Speaker had resulted in city-wide chaos – which we'd survived only by a hair's breadth. "What else did Quenami tell you?"

Acamapichtli grimaced. "Quenami didn't tell me anything. But I have… other sources. They're saying we only won the coronation war because the Revered Speaker called it a victory."

I fought the growing nausea in my gut. A coronation war was proof of the Revered Speaker's valour, proving him worthy of the Southern Hummingbird's favour, and bringing enough sacrifices and treasures for the coronation ceremony itself. The gods wouldn't be pleased by Tizoc-tzin's sleight of hand, and I very much doubted they'd make their displeasure felt merely through angry words. "And prisoners?"

"Forty or so," Acamapichtli said.

It was pitiful. Without enough human sacrifices, how were we going to appease the Fifth Sun, or Grandmother Earth? How were we to have light, and maize in fertile fields? "I hope it suffices," I said.

"I said it before: you worry too much. Come, now. Let's welcome them home."

I pressed my lips together to fight the nausea, and stole a glance at the sky above us: it was the clear, impossible blue of turquoise, with no clouds in sight. Calm Heavens, and no ill-omens. Perhaps Acamapichtli was right.

And perhaps I was going to grow fangs and turn into a coyote, too.

* * * *

Sometime later, the Sacred Precinct was transformed – packed with a throng of people in their best clothes, a riot of colours – of cotton, of cactus fibres and feathers, with circular feather insignias bobbing up and down as if stirred by an unseen breath.

Everyone was there: the officials who kept the city running, accompanied by their wood-collared slaves; the matrons with their hair brought up in two horns, in the fashion of married women, carrying children on their shoulders; the peasants too old to go to war, bare-chested and tanned by the sun, wearing a single ornament of gold on their chests; the noblemen, resplendent in their cotton clothes and standing with the ease and arrogance of those used to ceremony.

I stood with the She-Snake, Quenami and Acamapichtli at the foot of the Great Temple, surrounded by an entourage of noblemen and priests. Everyone's earlobes still dripped with blood, and the combined shimmer of magical protections was making my eyes hurt. I stole another glance at the sky – which remained stubbornly blue.

"There they are," Quenami said.

I could barely see over the heads of the crowd, but Quenami was taller. A cry went up from the assembled throng, a litany repeated over and over until the words merged with each other.

"O Mexica,

O Texcocans

O Tepanecs,

People of the Eagle, People of the Jaguar,

Our sons have come back as men!"

And then the crowd parted, and Tizoc-tzin was standing in front of us.

He wasn't a tall man either, though he held himself with the casual arrogance of warriors. His hawkish face could not have been called handsome, even if he'd been in good health. As it was, his usually sallow skin was so taut it was almost transparent, and the shape of a skull glistened beneath his cheeks.

So the war hadn't improved him – I hid a grimace. We'd made the decision to heal him three months ago, as High Priests; but clearly some things couldn't be healed.

Behind him was his war-council: two deputies, his Master of the House of Darkness, and his Master of the House of Darts – Teomitl, imperial prince and my student.

"She-Snake," Tizoc-tzin said. "Priests." He said the last with a growl: he'd never been fond of the clergy, but lately his opposition had become palpable. "Tonatiuh the Fifth Sun has taken us up, shown us the way to glory. Tezcatlipoca the Smoking Mirror has smiled upon us, enfolded us in His hands."

The She-Snake bowed, holding the position slightly longer than necessary – he was a canny man, and knew how susceptible to flattery Tizoc-tzin was. "Be welcome, my Lord. You have graciously approached your water, your high place of Tenochtitlan, you have come to your mat, your throne, which I have briefly kept for you. The roads have been swept clean, the mats have been spread out; come, enter into your palace, rest your weary limbs."

Tizoc-tzin's face darkened, but he stuck to ritual, starting a lengthy hymn to the glory of the Southern Hummingbird.

I'd have been listening, even though I wasn't particularly fond of the Southern Hummingbird – a warrior god who had little time for the non-combatant clergy – but something caught my attention on the edge of the crowd. A movement, in those massed colours? No, that wasn't it. Something else…

The nausea in my gut flared again. Gently, carefully, I reached out to my earlobes, and rubbed the scabs of my blood-offerings until they came loose. Blood spurted on my hands, warm with the promise of magic.

My movements hadn't been lost on everyone: my student Teomitl was staring at me intently under his quetzal-feather headdress. He made a small, stabbing gesture with his hand, as if bringing down a macuahitl sword, and mouthed a question.

I shook my head. The spell I had in mind required a quincunx traced on the ground – hardly appropriate, given the circumstances. I rubbed the blood on my hands and said the prayers nevertheless:

* * * *

"We all must die

We all must go down into darkness

Leaving behind the marigolds and the cedar trees

Nothing is hidden from Your gaze."

* * * *

The air seemed to grow thinner, and my nausea got worse – but nothing else happened. The spell wasn't working. I should have guessed. I'd made a fool of myself for nothing.

Tizoc-tzin had finished speaking; now he took a step backwards, and said, "Welcome back your children made men, O Mexica."

The war-council stepped aside as well, to reveal three rows of warriors in quilted cotton armour and colourful cloaks, the feather insignia over their heads bobbing in the wind.

There were so few of them – so few warriors who had taken prisoners. It looked like Acamapichtli's sources were right: there couldn't be more than forty of them before us, and many of them were injured, their cloaks and quilted armour torn and bloody. Many of them were veterans, with the characteristic black cloaks with a border of yellow eyes; many held themselves upright with a visible effort, the knuckles of their hands white, the muscles of their legs quivering. Here and there, a younger face with a childhood-lock broke the monotony of the line.

"Beloved fathers, you have come at last, you have returned

To the place of high waters, the place where the serpent is crushed

Possessors of a heart, possessors of a face,

Sons of jaguars and eagles…"

There was something… My gaze went left and right, and finally settled on a warrior in the front row, near the end of the line – not among the youngest, but not grizzled either. He wore the orange and black cloak of a four-captive warrior and the obsidian shards on his sword were chipped, some of them cleanly broken off at the base. His face was paler than his neighbours, and his hands shook.

But it wasn't that which had caught my attention: rather, it was the faint, pulsing aura around him, the dark shadows gathered over his face.

Magic. A curse – or something else?

The warrior was swaying, his face twisted in pain. It wouldn't be long until–

"My Lord," I said, urgently, my voice cutting through Tizoc-tzin's speech.

Tizoc-tzin threw me a murderous glance. He looked as though he were going to go back to what he was saying before. "My Lord," I said. "We need to–"

The shadows grew deeper, and something seemed to leap from the air into the warrior's face – his skin darkened for a bare moment, and his eyes opened wide, as if he had seen something utterly terrifying. And then they went expressionless and blank – a blankness I knew all too well.

He collapsed like a felled cactus: legs first, and then the torso, and finally the head, coming to rest on the ground with a dull thud.

Teomitl moved fastest, heading towards the line and flipping the body over onto its back – but even before I saw the slack muscles and empty eyes, I knew that the man was dead.

* * * *

I made to move, but a hand on my shoulder restrained me: Quenami, looking grimly serious. "Let go," I whispered, but he shook his head.

Ahead of us, two warriors were pulling the body of their comrade out of the crowd. Teomitl stood, uncertainly, eyeing Tizoc-tzin – who pulled himself up with a quick shake of his head, and went on as if nothing were wrong.

Something crossed Teomitl's face – anger, contempt? – but it was gone too fast – and, in any case, Tizoc-tzin was moving, his elaborate cape and feather headdress hiding my student from sight.

"To the place where the eagle slays the serpent

O Mexica, O Texcocans, O Tepanecs…"

Surely he couldn't mean to…

Behind me, Quenami was taking up the chant again, his lean face suffused with his customary arrogance and a hint of contempt, as if I'd been utterly unable to understand the stakes.

The other officials and the warriors had looked dubious at first, but who could not be swayed by the will of the Revered Speaker, and of the leader of High Priests? They took up the hymn, hesitantly at first, then more fiercely.

"To the place of the waters, the island of the seven caves

You come back, o beloved sons, o beloved fathers…"

"A man is dead," I whispered as the hymn wound to a close, and Tizoc-tzin approached the warriors, bestowing on them, one by one, the ornate mantles appropriate to their new status. "Do you think this is a joke?"

Quenami smiled. "Yes. But the war has been won, Acatl. Shall we not celebrate, and laugh in the face of Lord Death?"

Having met Him numerous times, I very much doubted Lord Death was going to care much either way – He well knew that everyone came to Him in the end, no matter what they did.

"It's a lie," I said, fiercely, but other hymns had started, and Quenami wasn't listening anymore.

* * * *

The morning dragged on, interminable. There were chants, and intricate dances where sacred courtesans and warriors formally courted each other, reminding us of the eternal cycle of life and the order of the Fifth World. There were drum beats and the distribution of maize flatbreads to the crowd, and songs and dances, and elaborate speeches by officials. And through it all presided Tizoc-tzin, insufferably smug, as puffed up as if he'd been one of the captive-takers.

I stood on the edge, mouthing the hymns with little conviction – my mind on the warrior and on his fall. People did collapse naturally: from weak hearts, or pressure within the brain that couldn't be relieved; reacting to something they'd eaten, or the sting of some insect. But there had been magic around him, strong enough for me to feel it.

I doubted, very much, that it had been a natural death.

* * * *

After the ceremony, the officials of the city went into the palace, where a formal banquet was served: elaborate maize cakes, roast deer, white fish with red pepper and tomatoes, newts with sweet potatoes… Tizoc-tzin, as usual, ate behind a golden screen; Teomitl was sitting with the other members of the war-council, around the reed mat of the highest-ranked, the closest one to the window and the humid air of the gardens. Beside him was Mihmatini, my younger sister – as his wife, she should have been sitting at a separate mat, but she was also Guardian of the Sacred Precinct, agent of the Duality in the Fifth World and keeper of the invisible boundaries, enough to give a headache to any protocol master. Beneath her elaborate makeup, her eyes were distant: she didn't like banquets anymore than I did, though she could hardly afford to ignore them. Between them was a thin line I could barely see – a remnant of a spell they'd done together, a magic which kept them tied even though the spell had ended.

Though Teomitl was obviously glad to see Mihmatini, I could see him fidget even from where I sat between Quenami and Acamapichtli, doing my best to avoid speaking to either of them. I could feel his impatience – which mirrored my own.

Further down, several Jaguar Knights were sitting around their own reed mats – among them was my elder brother Neutemoc, smiling gravely at some joke of his neighbour. It looked as though the campaign had enabled him to re-establish ties with his comrades, and other things besides. He looked plumper, and the jaguar body-suit no longer hung loosely on his slender frame: perhaps he was finally getting over his wife's death.

I let my gaze roam through the room, waiting for the banquet to finish. Amidst the colourful costumes, the faces flushed with warmth and the easy laughter there was something else, the same undercurrent of unease tightening in my belly. The atmosphere was tense: the laughing and smiling Jaguar Knights carefully avoided looking at the golden screen, while the warriors clustering around Tizoc-tzin – richly dressed noblemen, with barely a scar on their smooth legs – huddled together, talking as if they were in the midst of enemy territory.

All was not right with the world.

As soon as the last course of the banquet was served, I got up.

"Leaving so soon?" Quenami asked.

"I want to see the body," I said.

Quenami raised a perfectly-plucked eyebrow. "Always the High Priest, I see. Forget it, Acatl. The man had a sunstroke."

I shook my head. "Magical sunstrokes don't exist, Quenami. Someone cast a spell on him."

I expected Acamapichtli to say something, but he had remained worryingly silent – as if lost in thought. Probably thinking of how he could turn the situation to his advantage.

Quenami smiled. "Look at you. Such wonderful dedication." His voice took on a hard edge. "Nevertheless… today we celebrate our victory, Acatl – the return of the army, and the confirmation of our Revered Speaker. Tizoc-tzin needs his High Priests here."

An unmistakable, utterly unsubtle threat. But I'd had enough. "This isn't the confirmation," I said. "As you said – today we celebrate our victory. I don't think the absence of one person is going to make a difference." Especially not one High Priest with dubious loyalties, as far as Tizoc-tzin was concerned. "I don't stop being High Priest for the Dead when we celebrate."

Quenami made a slow, expansive gesture – one I knew all too well, the one which suggested there were going to be unpleasant consequence and that he'd done all he could to warn me.

And, of course, the moment I had my back turned, he was going to go to his master and denounce us.

At least I knew where I stood with him.

* * * *

The dead warrior had been taken deep within the Imperial palace – on the outskirts of Tizoc-tzin's private apartments. The sky above us had the uncanny blue of noon, with Tonatiuth the Fifth Sun at his highest.

A slave took me to a small, dusty courtyard with a dry well – I'd expected it to be deserted, but to my surprise two people were waiting for me there. The first was Teomitl, still in full finery, looking far older than his eighteen years. Next to him was a middle-aged man, whom I recognised as another member of the war-council. Though he wore rich finery, the lower part of his legs was uncovered, revealing skin pockmarked with whitish scars. He nodded curtly to me – as an equal to an equal.

"I didn't see you leave," I said to Teomitl.

He grinned – fast and careless – before his face arranged itself once more in a sober expression, more appropriate to the Master of the House of Darts. "We were right behind you."

"Tizoc-tzin–" I said, slowly.

"Tizoc-tzin can say what he wants," the other man interrupted. "I have no intention of abandoning one of my own warriors."

"This is Coatl," Teomitl said, shaking his head in a dazzling movement of feathers. "Deputy for the Master of Raining Blood."

And, as such, in command of one quarter of the army. "I see," I said. I pulled open the entrance-curtain in a tinkle of bells, and slipped inside.

It was dark and cold, in spite of the noon hour: the braziers hadn't been lit, and the dead man lay huddled on the packed earth, abandoned like offal – an ironic end for one who had worshipped Huitzilpochtli, our protector god: the eternally youthful and virile Southern Hummingbird.

Automatically, I whispered the words of a prayer, wishing his soul safe passage into the underworld, for his hadn't been the glorious death of a warrior, the ascent into the Heaven of the Fifth Sun, but rather small and ignominious, a sickness that doomed him to the dark, to the dryness of Mictlan.

"You knew him," I said to Coatl.

He made a curious gesture – half-exasperation, half-contempt. "Eptli. Yes. I knew him."

"Did he have any enemies?"

"Eptli was one of the forty honoured warriors, out of an army of eight thousand men. I'd say there would be strong resentment against him."

"Yes," I said. "But why single him out? Why not any of the others?"

Coatl spread his hands. "I knew Eptli because he was under my orders, but no more than that. His clan-leader was responsible for his unit."

There was something – not quite right in the tone of his voice, as if he was going to say more, but had stopped himself just in time. What could it possibly be?

Eptli had been a four-captive warrior: with this, his fifth capture, he could aspire to membership of the Jaguar or Eagle Knights, the prestigious elite of the army.

I was about to press Coatl further, when the entrance-curtain tinkled again. I started – surely Tizoc-tzin wouldn't search for us that soon – but instead a covered cage landed on the floor with a dull thud, startling whatever was inside so it gave a piercing, instantly recognisable cry.

I knelt and lifted the cover – to stare into the bleary, murderous eyes of a huge white owl, who looked as though only the wooden bars prevented it from terminally messing up my face. It screeched once more, disdainfully.

Acamapichtli strode into the room, rubbing his hands together as if to wash away dust. "There you go. Living blood. You can use it." It wasn't a question.

"We're–"

"– certainly not going to wait for Tizoc-tzin to find us," Acamapichtli said. "He died of magic, didn't he? That's something serious."

"It might be," I said, carefully. I searched for a diplomatic way to say the words on my mind, and gave up. "What in the Fifth World are you doing here, Acamapichtli?"

"Why," his smile was sarcastic. "The same thing as you. Investigating a suspicious death."

Which, in and of itself was suspicious. Was this another court intrigue? I'd have thought that with the disaster of the previous one, Acamapichtli would have known better than to try causing another. "I don't think curiosity is enough to justify your presence here. Quenami made it quite clear we were angering Tizoc-tzin."

"You forget." He smiled, revealing rows of blackened teeth. "We're in disgrace. It can't really get worse."

I rubbed the mark on the back of my hand: the whitish trace of a fang, a reminder of a prison where it had been a struggle to think, a struggle to even breathe – a cage of beaten earth and adobe where Tizoc-tzin's enemies were reduced to drooling idiots. I'd spent only a few hours within, four months previously, accused of treason by Quenami – a handy excuse to keep me out of the way. I didn't want to go back there. "With all respect… I think it can."

Teomitl snorted. "You sound like an old couple." He didn't sound amused. "You have our permission." His voice made it clear it was the imperial "we", the one that put him on an almost equal footing with his brother Tizoc-tzin. As Master of the House of Darts, he was not only responsible for the armouries and for his quarter of the army, but also heir-designate – the one with the best chance of ascending to the Gold-and-Turquoise Crown, should Tizoc-tzin die.

Which, Smoking Mirror willing, wouldn't be happening for quite some time yet. There had been enough fire and blood in the streets with the death of the previous Revered Speaker.

Acamapichtli bowed. "As you wish, my Lord." Of course, he knew the lay of the land.

Teomitl was looking at the dead warrior, with an expression I couldn't place. Regret? The dead man hadn't perished in battle or on the sacrifice stone; his fate would be the same as anyone else's, the same as any priest or peasant: the long, winding road into the underworld, until he reached the throne of Lord Death and found oblivion.

Coatl, more pragmatic than any of us, was already kneeling by the dead man's side, examining him with the expertise of a man who had seen the aftermath of too many battles. "No wounds," he muttered, and set to removing the elaborate costume the man had worn.

In the meantime, I took the cage with the owl to a corner of the room, next to one of the huge braziers. Acamapichtli, I couldn't help but notice, hadn't brought back anything of his own – but he was watching the corpse as if considering his next best move.

I took one of my obsidian knives from my belt – even in full regalia, I never neglected to arm myself – and glanced at the owl, which looked even more ill-tempered than before. Why in the Fifth World hadn't Acamapichtli brought back spiders or rabbits?

Bracing myself, I opened the cage, grasped the owl by the head – and, ignoring the flurry of wings and claws, slit its neck just above the line of my hands.

Blood pooled out, red and warm, staining the tip of the knife, spreading to my fingers. I moved the knife against the ground, and drew a quincunx: the five-armed cross, symbol of the Fifth World, of its centre and four points leading outwards – of the Fifth Age, and the four ages that had come before it. Then I chanted a hymn to my patron god Mictlantecuhtli, Lord Death:

"All paths lead to You

To the land of the Flensed, to the land of the Fleshless

No quetzal feathers, no scattered flowers

Just songs dwindling, just trees withering

Noble or peasant, merchant or goldsmith,

Death takes us all through four hundred paths

To the mystery of Your presence."

A veil shimmered and danced into existence; a faint green light that seemed to make the room larger. I felt as if I were standing on the verge of a chasm – at the cenote north of the city, where glistening waters turned into the river that separated the living from the dead. A wind rose in the room, but the tinkle of the bells on the entrance-curtain seemed muffled and distant. The skin on my neck and wrists felt loose, and my bones ached within the depths of my body as if I were already a doddering old man. Gently, carefully, I turned back towards the room – moving as through layers of cotton.

In the gloom, Teomitl shone with a bright green light the colour of jade – not surprising, as his patron goddess was Chalchiuhtlicue, Jade Skirt, Goddess of Rivers and Streams. Acamapichtli was surrounded by the blue-and-white aura of his own patron god. Around Coatl and the dead warrior though, the room pulsed with the same shadows I'd caught a glimpse of earlier. I saw faces, distorted in pain… and flailing arms and legs, all clinging to each other in an obscene tangle of limbs… and hands, their fingers engorged out of shape, and everything was merging into a final, deep darkness which flowed over the face of the dead warrior and into his body, like blood through veins.

It was like no curse or illness I had ever seen.

I closed my eyes, and broke the quincunx by rubbing a foot against its boundary. "I'd step away from the body, if I were you," I said.

Coatl leapt as if bitten by a snake. "You think it's contagious?"

"It's a possibility," I said, carefully.

Acamapichtli was leaning against the wall, his hand wrapped around something I couldn't see. Another of his little amulets, no doubt: he was in the habit of carving ivory and filling its grooves with the blood of sacrifices to make powerful charms. My hand still bore a whitish mark where one of them had touched me, the year before.

"So?" Teomitl asked.

Coatl shook his head. He'd stepped away from Eptli's body, letting us see quite clearly that although the warrior was covered with scars, there was indeed no wound whatsoever. Eptli had shaved his head, an odd affectation for a warrior, but it did mean we could see there was no wound there either.

Not that it surprised me. "It's some kind of illness," I said. I thought of the shadows again, and shivered. "Brought on by magic."

"Can you recognise the source?" Acamapichtli asked.

I shook my head. Every magical spell was the power of a god, called down into the Fifth World by a devotee, and it should have had a signature as recognisable as the light of Jade Skirt on Teomitl's face. "It's decaying." I would have knelt by the corpse, but what I'd seen of the light made me wary. "Breaking down into pieces, as if the Fifth World itself were anathema to it."

"That's not magic," Acamapichtli said, sharply.

"Star-demons?" Coatl asked. The star-demons were the enemies of the gods, destined to end the Fifth World by consuming us all in a great earthquake.

"I've seen star-demons," I said, slowly – my hands seized up at the thought, even though the event had been more than four months before. "This doesn't look anything like their handiwork."

Acamapichtli's grip on his amulet didn't waver. His eyes were cruel; amused. "I've seen it before."

"And?" Teomitl asked, when it was obvious Acamapichtli wasn't going to add anything further.

Acamapichtli had a gesture halfway between exasperation and pity. "If I remembered, don't you think I'd be telling you?"

"No," I said.

Acamapichtli shook his head, as if to clear out a persistent annoyance. "Let old grudges lie, Acatl. We're allies in this."

By necessity – and I still wasn't sure why. "Why the interest?" I asked.

The ghost of a smile. "Because I don't think you understand Tizoc-tzin. When his banquet is over and he wakes up and realises someone deliberately spoiled his wonderful ceremony, he is going to want explanations. And right now, neither of us can afford to fail at giving them."

Footsteps echoed from the courtyard: the slow, steady march of guards. It looked as though our time alone with the corpse was drawing to a close. I hoped it wasn't Tizoc-tzin, but I didn't think we'd be so lucky.

Before leaving, I took a last glance at the body, lying forlorn and abandoned in the middle of the room, its rich clothes discarded at its side. One moment honoured by the Revered Speaker himself, on the verge of becoming a member of the elite – and the next moment this: cooling flesh in a deserted room, probed openly by strangers. From glory to nothingness in just a few moments… a cause for regret, if there ever was one.

But then again, I was a priest for the Dead and I knew we would all come to this… in the end.