asked.
'An unbloodied pup,' Mahuizoh said. His teeth were as white and as sharp as the fangs of a jaguar. 'Anyone can see that.'
'I took a prisoner,' Teomitl said.
'What a feat,' Mahuizoh said, his voice mocking. 'One man against… how many of you untrained youths? Four, five?'
It was a deliberate insult, for Teomitl wouldn't have been a Leading Youth unless he had captured a prisoner by himself. His face paled: he couldn't tolerate such an blow to his pride.
'Leave him alone,' Neutemoc said, stepping between them with both arms extended, as if to fend off an enemy. 'We both know I'm the one you want.'
Mahuizoh laughed, bitterly. 'Do I?' he asked. I finally realised what he was doing: his anger was all that kept his grief at bay.
'She loved both of us,' Neutemoc said. Given Eleuia's propensity to take lovers, that was a singularly foolish thing to say. Mahuizoh didn't fail to rise to it.
'No,' he said. 'You're wrong.'
'Because you had her longer?' Neutemoc asked, his voice shaking in anger.
Mahuizoh smiled. 'No,' he said. 'Because she only loved one person in her life.'
'You?' Neutemoc asked, stepping closer – just as I said, 'Herself.'
Mahuizoh's gaze moved from Neutemoc to me. 'You're perceptive, for a priest,' he said, surprised.
The 'priest' carried the slight tone of contempt warriors always put on it. I said, slowly, not about to be outdone by a proud Jaguar Knight, 'But you, on the other hand, loved
Mahuizoh was silent for a while. He stared at me; and, when he spoke again, his voice shook. 'Yes,' he said. 'She was the only one who made me feel alive.'
'She could be like that.' Teomitl still had his hand on his sword. He was still glowering at Mahuizoh.
'You met her,' Mahuizoh said. 'Whenever you met her, you'd remember. Because there was so much anguish in her, so much desire to live.'
I remembered the Quetzal Flower's description of Eleuia: a woman who would do anything rather than know hunger again. I began to believe that Mahuizoh had indeed loved her. He had known her, better than Neutemoc or Teomitl.
'And you couldn't bear the thought of sharing her,' I said.
Mahuizoh laughed, a sickening sound. 'Sharing?' he asked. 'Let me tell you something,' he said, turning to Neutemoc. 'If she flirted with you, it's because you had something she wanted.'
A house of her own. Rooms filled with riches, and a status that would make most men and women envious. All she had to do was take Huei's place, or convince Neutemoc to take her as a second wife.
On the other hand… Mahuizoh himself had all of that. Why hadn't she asked him for that?
'You never married her?' I asked.
Mahuizoh shook his head. 'I asked. She didn't want to. She had ambitions, you see.'
'Higher than being the wife of a Jaguar Knight?' Teomitl asked.
Mahuizoh smiled. 'She wanted her own power, not something that was dependent on a husband.'
Hence the drive to become consort of the god Xochipilli. It explained Eleuia's life, but still not why someone was trying to do away with my brother. And not, either, why mysterious men would abduct and torture her. Eleuia's ambition had been unsuitable for a woman; but surely that offence warranted no such punishment.
'Do you know why someone would want to kill her?' I asked.
Mahuizoh shook his head.
'She had a child,' I said.
His eyes flicked. 'Possibly.'
'And you were the father.'
He looked genuinely surprised this time. 'No,' he said. 'Wherever did you get that idea?'
'From a reliable source,' I said, wondering exactly how much I could trust the Quetzal Flower. No more, I guessed, than I could trust Mahuizoh.
'I didn't father any child with her,' Mahuizoh said, curtly. 'Whoever told you this was mistaken.'
'And you didn't attempt to kill Neutemoc?'
Mahuizoh looked at Neutemoc. My brother wasn't even paying attention, absorbed in thoughts. Mahuizoh's face, for a bare moment, twisted into a mask of hatred so frightening that I recoiled. 'No,' Mahuizoh said. 'I didn't make attempts on his life.'
But he had taken far too long to answer. And his jealousy of Neutemoc, in spite of everything he had said, was obvious.
'Why did you leave the city?' I asked.
He blinked, slowly. 'Am I forbidden to go where I wish?'
'No,' I said. 'But with an investigation going on–'
'An investigation,' Mahuizoh said arrogantly, 'that I have nothing to do with.'
A patent lie. 'So you deny you had a part in this?'
'Abducting her? Torturing her? Yes.'
'How do you know she was tortured?' I asked.
He shrugged. 'I heard the rumours.'
