Obsidian & Blood

  Still, it was like a man with a removed heart – he might flop and writhe for a bare moment on the sacrificial altar, but there was no doubt that he was already dead.

  Had Nezahual-tzin left the palace? He'd proved before that he came and went as he chose – sometimes in disguise, if there was need. He might have gone past the guards…

  Something stopped me – a thought that slipped into the tangle of my mind like a sharpened knife. We were all acting as if the palace was impervious, and the guarded entrance was the only one – but the truth was, it wasn't anymore. Not if you could brave the power of Chalchiuhtlicue and enter the tunnel Teomitl had created – in the women's quarters.

  And the gods knew Nezahual-tzin liked his women.

  I bit back a curse. 'Let's go.'

  'Where?'

  'Women's quarters. I'll explain later.'

• • • •

The women's quarters did not give off the same atmosphere as the rest of the palace: in the courtyards, life seemed to go on as it had always done, with the regular clacking of weaving looms as the girls learned to spin cotton and maguey fibre, and the subdued laughter of conversations drifting to us, about servants and men, and impending births. A woman I'd already seen, her belly heavy with child, was coming out of the steambath – walking slowly with her attendants, glaring at us for daring to impugn on her dominion.

  As we entered one of the more secluded courtyards, Mihmatini's head came up, as if scenting the air. 'You're right. He's here.'

  'You can feel his powers?' Neutemoc asked.

  Mihmatini laughed, briefly. 'No. I know what the place looks like when there is a man around. I always thought he had guts, but to use Tizoc-tzin's absence…'

  'He's probably visiting relatives,' I said, though I didn't really believe any of it.

  Mihmatini walked to one of the closed entrance-curtains, and wrenched it open without ceremony. A jarring, discordant sound of bells accompanied her inwards – we could hear a woman's voice, arguing but growing fainter, and then another sound of bells, followed by Mihmatini's voice again.

  Then silence.

  Neutemoc and I looked at each other uncomfortably. 'Maybe we shouldn't be here,' Neutemoc said.

  'I don't have a better plan,' I said with a sigh. 'But you can go home, you know.'

  He grinned – his face transfigured into that of a boy. 'It's more interesting here.'

  The entrance-curtain tinkled again, letting through Mihmatini and Nezahual-tzin – who looked as though a jaguar cub had just pounced on him and settled down to maul him. 'What is the meaning of this?'

  'The meaning of this is that we get you out,' Mihmatini said, with an expansive gesture of her hands. 'And then, once you're safely out of here, we can worry about explaining to Tizoc-tzin what you were doing in the women's quarters.'

  'Nothing reprehensible,' Nezahual-tzin protested – as smooth and arrogant as always.

  'You can be sure Tizoc-tzin isn't going to swallow this,' Mihmatini said, grimly amused. 'Now–'

  Something crossed the air, like the shimmering of a veil – everything seemed to ripple around us, as if we were underwater – and then it was gone, but the air was wrong.

  Mihmatini stopped; Nezahual-tzin's eyes rolled up, showing the uncanny white of pearls. 'Acatl…'

  They came into the courtyard three at a time, fluid and inhuman – their bodies the black of a starless night, their faces both ageless and wrinkled, like those of drowned children; the hand at the end of their upraised tail twitching, moving and opening as if eager to rip out eyes – moving like lizards or salamanders. They fanned out, blocking both exits to the courtyard – I could see Neutemoc's lips moving, keeping track of them all, but there must have been more than a dozen of them already, watching us with white, filmy eyes – hunger and hatred in their gazes.

  Ahuizotls.

  Teomitl…

  But the one who strode into the courtyard after them wasn't my student. Rather, it was Coatl, but he moved with a grace I'd never seen from the warrior.

  'Coatl?'

  His gaze moved from one end of the courtyard to another, watching us. 'A warrior. A Guardian. And priests. Is that all the Mexica will field, to defend the Triple Alliance? Where are your She-Snake, your Revered Speaker – your Master of the House of Darts?'

  Mihmatini's hand tightened around my wrist. 'Acatl–'

  He had died, and been brought back to life. That was what Palli had thought; what we had all thought. But what had come back – what had walked and talked, and smiled and wept – it hadn't been Coatl at all. It had been another soul. A dead soul trapped within Tlalocan.

  'I know,' I said. 'Moquihuix-tzin!' I called.

  He jerked, slightly, but his attention was still fixed on Nezahual-tzin.

  Nezahual-tzin's opal-white eyes moved towards Coatl, steadily held his gaze. 'I don't believe we've been introduced.'

  Coatl's broad, open face turned to look at him – the eyes were more deep-set than I remembered, and dark, as if he stood within a great shadow. 'You wouldn't know me, pup.'

  Teomitl would have lashed out; Nezahual-tzin merely raised an eyebrow. 'Pup? That's not setting up a felicitous acquaintance.' His hand moved, to encompass the ahuizotls gathered in the courtyard. 'Though those are hardly friendly.'

  'He's here to kill us, you fool,' Mihmatini said. Power was flowing to her – ward upon ward to defend herself, an impregnable against the ahuizotls.