After a while, he said, 'You saved my life. It's the only reason I'm not throwing you out of this house. But I strongly suggest you get out, before I lose my calm and give you the thrashing you deserve.' He clenched his hand. Blood oozed from one of his wounds.
'Mihmatini strongly suggested that I talk to you, after what happened.'
I'd expected him to snort, but he didn't move. He was very angry, then. 'You dragged our sister into this.' He snorted. 'Things still haven't changed, brother, have they? She's always liked you. I just can't see why.'
'Neutemoc–'
His face contorted for a brief moment. 'Our parents were right. You bring nothing but trouble.'
'Our parents were wrong,' I snapped. 'I made my own choices.'
'Leaving me to pick up the pieces,' Neutemoc said.
'You had the means to,' I said, more nastily than I'd intended. The 'pieces' were Father and Mother, after they grew too old to support themselves.
'Yes,' Neutemoc said. 'But I don't see why I should have to pay for the choices you made. For any of your choices,' he added, in case I hadn't understood the first reference.
'Look – this time, there was no other way.'
'No other way? My wife gives herself up as a sacrifice victim, and you think this is a satisfactory outcome?'
I shook my head, wondering how I could calm him down. 'She tried to kill you.'
Wrong tactic. His face closed. 'No,' he said. 'You imagine things that aren't. She's always loved me. More than I could bear.'
You fool. 'So you destroyed your marriage just because you 'couldn't bear it'? How convenient.'
'We won't talk of my marriage here,' Neutemoc said.
'Because it's not relevant?' I asked. 'Don't you think your marriage got you here?'
Neutemoc's hand clenched again. 'No. What happened to me…' His voice trailed off. He'd always been an honest man and a terrible liar, which explained how easily I'd flushed him out in my first interrogation. 'Perhaps it had to do with my marriage,' he said, finally. 'But that still doesn't give you the right–'
'There was no choice!' I snapped. 'For what she'd done, the sentence was death. Death at the hands of the Wind of Knives, or at the hands of the Guardian's warriors – whoever found her first.'
Neutemoc spat. 'And your solution was…?'
'My solution?' I asked. 'She made her own choices, Huitzilpochtli curse you! She was the one who went to Chalchiutlicue's temple and offered herself to Her,' I said. 'I couldn't stop her.' How could he not see what Huei had got herself into: something far greater than her, which had ultimately swallowed her whole? How could he not see?
Neutemoc's hands clenched. 'So you had no part in this? How convenient. That was also your excuse for not becoming a warrior on exiting the calmecac, wasn't it: events beyond your control. Not good enough, Acatl.'
He had always known how to find the least of my weaknesses. His argument was, almost word for word, the reproaches Mother had kept addressing to me. 'Leave the calmecac out of this, will you?'
He smiled. 'Because you think this had nothing to do with the calmecac, and what you've made of yourself? The brother I used to play with would have given his life rather than harm me, or any of mine.'
It was so patently unfair it didn't shame me. All it did was infuriate me. I raised my good hand, pointed at the wounds on my chest and on my arm. 'You see these?' I asked. 'I asked the Wind of Knives to spare her, Neutemoc. I pleaded for her life – I, who'd never allowed anyone to sway me – I made a fool of myself trying to sway a divinity that cannot be swayed.'
Neutemoc's lips tightened in grim amusement. 'Yes. I know how unbending you can get.' He rubbed his face, but didn't speak further.
'I did all I could,' I said. 'But she ran away from the Wind of Knives, to the only refuge she could find.'
Neutemoc stared at me. At last he said, 'A poor refuge.' And, with a shock, I realised that the glimmer in his eyes were tears.
'I…' I started, not sure what to say. Neutemoc had always been a strong man: going on, regardless of the circumstances. Even when he'd been arrested, he'd never broken down. 'You can go to the temple, talk to her.'
'It won't bring her back to me, will it?' Neutemoc said.
I could have lied to him; but I, too, had never been a good liar. 'No,' I said. 'The temple is the only place where she's safe, both from the Wind of Knives and from the Imperial Guards.'
Neutemoc didn't speak. His eyes were closed and he breathed slowly, heavily, swallowing his tears. His hands toyed with a small, broken obsidian pendant, heedless of the thin line of blood the edge of the stone was drawing on his palm.
'Neutemoc,' I said, 'she made her own choices, and you can't go back on any of them. And one of her choices was to summon that beast.'
Neutemoc opened his eyes. 'Tell me something,' he said.
'Anything you want,' I said, and it was a lie. There were some things I would be incapable of telling him.
'Did you know she was a sorceress when we married?'
I hadn't expected this question, and it took me a while to understand what he was asking me. 'No,' I said, shocked. 'You're mistaken. Huei was never a sorceress.'
'Then how did she summon that beast?'
I sighed. 'People came to the house. They gave her the means.'
Neutemoc's face hardened. 'The same people who abducted Eleuia?'
'Yes,' I said. Possibly the same ones who were trying to kill him, although I didn't understand why anyone would take my brother as a target.
