Obsidian & Blood

featurelessness – they whispered and sang, and prayed to Lord and Lady Death to grant them oblivion, at the very last. 'I came with some people–'

  Mihmatini. Nezahual-tzin. Where were they?

  A sound, from Lord Death's throne, echoing amongst the skulls and femurs that made up His chair: laughter, coming from His vestigial lungs, lifting up his prominent rib-cage. 'You come here for Our favour?'

  Amongst the massed dead, a space was clearing up – silhouettes flickering in and out of focus, moving like shadows in the background of a fresco. Coatl – no, not Coatl anymore, but a tall, stately man with a feather headdress, and a cloak of turquoise, who wielded not only a sword, but a flint cutting axe, its blade shimmering with all the colours of oil on water.

  Moquihuix-tzin.

  The scene was, for a single moment, mercilessly clear – it wasn't Nezahual-tzin that Moquihuix-tzin was facing, for the Revered Speaker of Texcoco lay unconscious at the feet of the combatants.

  It was my sister.

  She moved slowly and a touch awkwardly, but somehow she always managed to be there when he struck. She didn't have a sword, but both her hands held daggers – mismatched ones, the one in her left hand small and mundane, looking more like an everyday knife for cutting maize and tomatoes than a real weapon; the other was a longer knife, and a translucent snake curled up from the hilt to the point of the blade, shimmering with the radiance of the Feathered Serpent's magic – she must have picked it up from Nezahual-tzin's body.

  She fought better than I'd expected, but it was clear that they were mismatched. Her opponent was a war- chief and a sorcerer; Mihmatini's only experience with weapons must have been in the Duality House. Her stance was purely defensive – it was a dance to her, I realised, and she sidestepped the blades, but couldn't bring herself to break the pattern by stabbing her partner – surely she had to realise she couldn't hold – surely she had to shift her stance?

  Neither of them looked up to the dais – they flickered in and out of existence, and I was beginning to suspect that they couldn't see us at all. Within a god's world, the gods made the rules – and Lord Death could alter reality as it suited His whim.

  The Storm Lord's Lightning strike me, where was Neutemoc when you needed him?

  'Guests,' Mictlantecuhtli said, behind me. 'What an odd thing to bring here.' He sounded genuinely puzzled.

  I needed – I needed Nezahual-tzin awake, to complete his part of the ritual – if Mihmatini had managed to speak with him at all, before they tumbled into Mictlan. I needed Acamapichtli – as I thought this, the scene in front of me wavered, and I stood once more in a dusty courtyard, watching an ahuizotl leapt straight for me. With an effort, I shifted – making the beast vanish as if into smoke – and shifted again.

  The courtyard was shrouded in greenish mist, but as I stood within the gate, I saw Acamapichtli standing within the circle, hefting his blade thoughtfully. Besides him, Neutemoc and the Consort Cozolli were fighting two ahuizotls, albeit with difficulty. 'Acatl!' Acamapichtli said.

  I made a gesture with my left hand. 'I'm working on it.'

  'You'd better work fast.'

  I didn't brother to protest. Instead, I banished the scene again, and turned back to Mictlantecuhtli – who stood watching me as if nothing had happened.

  'You warned me the boundary was broken,' I said, slowly.

  'A favour.' He smiled – revealing teeth as yellow as corn, and stars caught within his throat. 'For you, who never asked for any.'

  'I don't understand.'

  'You're our High Priest,' Mictecacihuatl said. She stretched out a bony hand, to point at the dead. 'Most people in your place would scheme and intrigue.'

  Why was She telling me this? 'But that's not what you need,' I said, slowly.

  'That's not what you can give us, either.' Mictlantecuhtli waved a dismissive hand. 'We don't ask worship. We ask for you, as our High Priest, to keep the boundaries. Do you know why?'

  Was this really the time for childish questions? 'Because the Fifth Word will end if they're not maintained.'

  I heard a sound, then, a clicking like bones rubbing together, and it was a while before I realised He was laughing. 'Oh, Acatl. Have you learned nothing? We ask you to keep the boundaries because there is no life without death, and no death, either, without life. What is Our dominion, if the dead can come back into the Fifth World when they will it?'

  'Then…' I said, slowly, 'then… you don't approve of this, either.'

  The combatants flickered into existence again – Mihmatini had lost the shorter blade; she clung to the other one in bleeding hands, holding it in front of her like a shield.

  'Of the plague?' Mictecacihuatl asked.

  Of what I had done, bringing Tizoc-tzin back, I thought, but could not voice the sentence aloud. Mictlantecuhtli's face was turned towards me, but I wouldn't look at the shadowed eye-sockets.

  'Acatl,' He said gently. 'Do not torment yourself. We do not stand against the will of the Southern Hummingbird.'

  'But–' But that wasn't what I wanted to know. I realised I'd meant to ask Him if we'd made the right decision, but stopped myself in time. He would have had words, and they would have been wise and detached. But the truth was, it was past time to be selfish and worry about my conscience, or dwell on things I could not take back. A course had been set, and we would not turn back.

  Mihmatini blocked a strike that would have decapitated her; her eyes were wild, looking right and left, as if she expected to see me.

  Time to end this. I took a deep breath. Even if Nezahual-tzin woke up, he wouldn't be able to do his part in the ritual, not while Mihmatini was still pressed by the fight.

  The fight needed to end, first. Moquihuix-tzin needed to die. And for that…

  'My Lord,' I said, slowly. 'I ask for no favours; merely for things to take their course. I want what should happen here, on the ninth level of the underworld, to happen.' For the dead – the defeated – to find oblivion at Mictlantecuhtli's feet.