his eyes – and hers – following me all the way out of the women's quarters.
Ceyaxochitl might have been able to fight him; I could not. Even rested and refreshed, and even with the whole of my order behind me, I would not be able to even dent his protection. Nettoni had accrued enough power to leave us looking like ineffectual fools.
And, if Ceyaxochitl, agent of the Duality on earth and vessel for Their power, was his only adversary, wouldn't he want to remove her from the board?
I'd said it to Teomitl already, but now I
And, so far, for forces, we had two high priests more obsessed with placing their own pawns than with the approaching star-demons and a distant She-Snake, whose guards could barely maintain the order in the palace.
Not to mention a dying Guardian.
The day felt markedly darker as I made my way deeper into the palace.
Palli's messenger found me in the kitchens, where I was examining some of the maize porridge Ceyaxochitl had consumed.
'Acatl-tzin?' It was Ezamahual, a lean, dour-faced novice priest, a son of peasants who moved through the vast rooms as though he trespassed.
'Here,' I said.
The porridge was set in a beautiful blue-and-black ceramic bowl, with golden trimmings. Clearly, Quenami had spared no expense. A brief invocation to Xolotl, Bearer of the Dead, had confirmed that, sadly, it was as innocuous as it was beautiful. Whatever Ceyaxochitl had been poisoned with, it wasn't that.
Ezamahual bowed. 'Palli sent me to tell you the ritual is almost complete.'
I looked up from the courtyard. The sky was still the brilliant blue of late afternoon. 'Tonight, then,' I said. Passages into the underworld took place at sunset or at night, when the Fifth Sun itself was underground. 'Tell him I'll be there. I have a few things to take care of first.'
The first thing I took care of was dinner. I'd had a sparse lunch, but given how long the night was going to be, I didn't hesitate to ask the kitchen slaves for the best they had. I consumed a whole fish with crushed calabash-seeds, and a handful of maize cakes.
Then I went back to the council room, where I found Manatzpa in discussion with the old man Echichilli, the magician of the council. Their servants lounged nearby on a stone bench, watching the courtyard, bored.
'Ah, Acatl-tzin,' Manatzpa said. 'We have taken the security measures you asked for.'
I stilled the shaking of my hands. 'I fear it's too late for that.'
'Oh?' His eyebrows rose.
'We have no Guardian at present.' I thought I could say this with the same calm I'd pronounced the previous sentence; that Xahuia and Nettoni together would have drained me of all fears. But my voice still shook.
Manatzpa's face darkened. 'What happened?'
'Poison,' I said, curtly.
'Is she…' He paused, letting me fill in the rest.
'Not dead,' I said. 'But very ill.'
'It's dangerous business,' Echichilli said, querulously. 'The world has changed too much. The young just don't remember how fragile the balance is.'
'Did she come to see you yesterday?' I liked Manatzpa, but that did not mean I was going to act as a fool where he was concerned.
'He and the rest of the council.' His voice was thoughtful. 'She asked us many questions. A canny one, that Guardian. Her heart and soul were in the right place. A pity.'
Not so much a pity as a crime, and one that I was going to make sure was punished. 'I see.' I remembered the question I'd failed to ask Quenami. 'Does the name Pezotic mean anything to either of you?'
They shared a glance, a distinctly uncomfortable one. For the first time, Echichilli looked angry, a slight tightening of his wrinkled, sun-tanned face, but an expression that was almost shocking coming from him.
'Yes,' Echichilli said, looking me in the eye all the while. 'He had a disagreement.'
'With whom?' I asked. Manatzpa, too, looked distinctly exasperated, as if some boundary had been breached. What bees' nest had I sunk my hands into?
Echichilli shook his head. 'With the council. He was dismissed.'
'I thought you couldn't dismiss anyone,' I said, very slowly. But it was Quenami who had told us that. Quenami, who wasn't a member of the council, who interfered where he wasn't needed.
'There are exceptions. What he did was unforgivable.'
Manatzpa shook his head. 'You know it wasn't.'
'Wasn't it?' Echichilli looked him in the eye, until Manatzpa's glance slid away, towards the painted floor at our feet.
'What in the Fifth World are you talking about?'
Manatzpa shrugged, but the taut set of his shoulders made it all too clear how angry he was. 'Pezotic was worse than Ocome – or more honest, depending on how you view matters. He couldn't stomach the threats, the constant intimidations.'
'He ran away?' I asked. It seemed too simple, too innocent. Or was I becoming as paranoid as Tizoc?
'Yes,' Echichilli said. 'Rather than face his responsibilities.' It had the ring of absolute truth – no evasion, no attempt to look aside, or to look me too much in the eye – a simple fact, and one that both saddened and angered him. 'I had thought him a better man.'
'He was a clever man.' Manatzpa's voice was bitter. 'He knew where this would lead us.'
Echichilli said nothing. Both he and Manatzpa looked drained, their skin as paper-thin and as dry as that of corpses, their stances slightly too aggressive. I assumed there had been further threats, further attempts to bring them to support one candidate or another. But that was one area I couldn't help with. My hands were full enough as
