'Was there anything else, Acatl?' Ceyaxochitl asked.
It was a dismissal: my last chance to get her help, instead of Yaotl's distant, ironic pronouncements. I said, finally, 'I need the location… of a certain house in Tenochtitlan.'
'A House of Joy?' Yaotl asked, his face falsely serious. 'Feeling lonely in your bed?'
I was too tired to rise to the jibe. 'Priestess Eleuia allegedly had a child, some years ago. I'm not sure it's significant, but I'd like to know if it's true.'
Ceyaxochitl's eyes held me, shrewd, perceptive. I lowered my gaze. I didn't wish her to read my thoughts. But she had to know; she had to have guessed what I feared. 'Yes?'
'I've heard whispers in the Sacred Precinct,' I said slowly. 'They say… they say that Xochiquetzal, the Quetzal Flower could not restrain Her lust, and charmed all the gods onto Her sleeping mat, one after the other. There is talk that the Duality expelled Her from Heaven for this sin, and that She now dwells in the mortal world, in a house which can be visited, if one knows its location.'
Ceyaxochitl didn't blink, or give any sign of surprise. 'Perhaps,' she said. 'You'd go to Her to know about the child?'
'Yes,' I said.
I couldn't read her expression. But at length she said, 'Priestess Eleuia belonged to Her. And she is Goddess of Lust and Childbirth, after all. Perhaps She'll know something useful. Go to bed, Acatl. I'll send the address to you in the morning.'
So I couldn't go to the goddess's house now. They were both treating me like a newborn infant, which was worrying. Neither of them had shown any inclination to overprotect me before.
'Very well,' I said. 'You win. I'll go find some sleep before dawn.'
'Don't worry. We'll take care of things,' Yaotl said. His eyes glinted in the darkness. For a fleeting moment I thought there was more than amusement in his gaze – something deeper and more serious – but then I dismissed the thought. Yaotl was not my enemy.
I was too tired to think properly. I bade them goodbye and walked back to my temple, praying that they'd find Eleuia alive – that they'd find something, anything, that would exonerate Neutemoc.
FOUR
My sleep was dark and dreamless. I noted, distantly, the blare of priests' trumpets that marked the return of Tonatiuh from His night-long journey – and then turned on my reed-mat, and went back to sleep.
When I woke up, sunlight flooded my house. I sat up, wincing as all the events of the previous night came back into my mind, as unforgiving as
Neutemoc.
A child.
He had a wife and children of his own, and our sister Mihmatini under his responsibility. Even if Neutemoc was later found out to be innocent, the tarnish of his arrest and his attempted adultery would hang over them all for a long time. Huitzilpochtli blind him. Could he do nothing right?
I rummaged in my wicker chest for a clean loincloth, and took my grey cloak from the reed-mat where I'd left it. As I tied it around my shoulders, I thought of the last time I'd seen Neutemoc: of Mother's face, contorted in agony and anger as she accused me of cowardice; and of Neutemoc, standing frozen by her death-bed, unable to say anything.
He hadn't said anything as I walked out, later. He'd gone back to his wife and children, and I'd staggered through the city, trying to find words I could give Mother: reasons that would convince her that by entering an obscure priesthood, I hadn't wasted my life. I was needed: I kept the balance of the world; I gave the dead their rest. But not indispensable: there were plenty of priests – while there had been no one, save Neutemoc, to pay for the schooling and the feeding of my three sisters.
Enough worries. I had to make sure, first and foremost, that Neutemoc was truly innocent. I tried to ignore the voice whispering that he might well be the murderer Ceyaxochitl thought she'd arrested.
I walked out into the courtyard, under the lone pine tree, and exited my house. Outside, the hubbub of the Sacred Precinct filled my ears: vendors hawking their amulets and charms; a crowd of freemen in loincloths, coming to offer their sacrifices to the temples; a procession of priestesses, dressed in white skirts and blouses, singing their hymns to honour Toci, Grandmother Earth; warriors in embroidered cotton cloaks, striding arrogantly ahead.
Determined to start with the most unpleasant tasks, I went to the Jaguar House first: a squat adobe adorned with lavish frescoes of Knights trampling bound enemies underfoot, and of their patron Tezcatlipoca, watching the carnage with a slight smile across His striped face.
The House itself was always a centre of activity, bustling with Jaguar Knights and sacred courtesans, but today it was oddly silent.
There was a single guard at the gates, instead of the usual pair. He stared at me levelly as I approached. 'Looking for something?' His pose and his voice exuded arrogance – not deliberately, but something that had become second nature to him. And yet he was a boy, impossibly young to have already been admitted into the ranks of the elite.
'I need to see a knight,' I said.
'I have no doubt you do.' His gaze lingered on me a little longer.
In his eyes was the familiar contempt of warriors for priests. 'That's currently impossible.'
'Currently?' I asked.
His lips curled, in what might have been amusement. 'They're at the Imperial Palace. There's a ceremony they have to practise for.'
'All of them?' I asked, my heart sinking.
'All but me.' He looked again at me, as if wondering what a shabbily dressed priest could possibly want of Jaguar Knights. Yaotl and Ceyaxochitl had been right; I should have put on my full regalia before coming here.
