‘Think about it,’ I replied. ‘You told me yourself, Mother of Light has some way of flitting in and out through the palace walls that Maize Ear himself doesn’t know about. It just occurred to me, back at Hare’s house, that you might be exactly right.’
‘You mean she and her old man are sorcerers after all,’ he groaned. ‘In that case, we’re wasting our time!’
‘No, I don’t mean that. Where was I when I saw Mother of Light the second time?’
‘The Council of Music,’ the old man responded promptly.
‘Not quite,’ Nimble pointed out. ‘I think he said he was in a courtyard near the council’s meeting place.’
‘Close,’ I told him. ‘That’s where I found her. But where I left her was somewhere different — a little audience room that Maize Ear never uses.’
‘So?’ asked Kindly.
‘So, it was tucked away in a quiet corner of the palace — against an outer wall.’
Nimble’s eyes suddenly widened. ‘You said the walls were covered with hangings! You think there was a secret doorway behind one of them — in the outer wall!’
‘Someone would have noticed a draught,’ Kindly said sceptically.
‘Maybe nothing so crude as that. I think whatever’s there must be covered up, most of the time, by something more than just a featherwork wall-hanging — but yes, that’s about it. And the reason Mother of Light can turn up at the Council of Music from time to time and never get caught by Maize Ear’s men is that by the time anybody finds out she’s there — apart from her own little circle of admirers, who probably aren’t all that eager to let on — she’s had time to walk a little way into her bolt-hole and vanish without trace.’
Kindly stopped walking and frowned while he tried to make sense of what I was telling him. ‘Very well,’ he said slowly. ‘I see that — I think. But it doesn’t tell us where she goes, does it? How come no one’s ever seen her coming out on the other side of the wall? And what about that old man — the one you say isn’t her father? Where does he disappear off to?’
‘I thought about that,’ I told him, ‘especially about the old man. You remember he ran away from that fight I had with the pedlars who’d been molesting them outside the market-place? His daughter didn’t seem at all concerned about his going astray, and looking back on it that seemed odd — shouldn’t she have been worried about the guards at the palace entrance picking him up when he went in? Both of them must have somewhere to go that they can get into whether they’re inside the palace or outside, without anybody else ever catching them at it. Now, I don’t know Tetzcoco at all, but I can think of one place that would suit their purpose admirably. And there it is!’
We had almost reached Kindly’s and my old lodgings, but we were not going there. The building I was gesturing towards stood a little behind them, half hidden by wild plants and neglected bushes and fruit trees, alone, dark and silent.
Kindly let out a long, low breath. ‘Ooooh!’
‘I don’t understand,’ Nimble said.
The old man chuckled. ‘Your father is a clever bugger, after all! It’s the deserted palace, the one that belonged to Hungry Child’s son, the one they strangled — Prince of Willows!’
The unfortunate young man’s residence was as modest and nondescript as a palace could be. It bore no resemblance to the sprawling labyrinth that his father and grandfather had occupied, whose upper storey loomed over its roof. It seemed to cling to the ground, as though trying to hide in the tangled foliage that surrounded it. What I could see of its stuccoed walls and the carved and painted friezes that topped them was not impressive, the whitewash turned a dirty grey, the plaster cracked and peeling, the paint faded and chipped.
We slunk across the overgrown ground surrounding the Palace, all keeping low to avoid being noticed, and crouched or squatted by the main entrance.
‘Well, we’re not going in this way,’ observed Kindly in a whisper. The wide gateway was filled in and piled higher than a tall man’s head with rubble.
‘More to the point, neither would Mother of Light,’ I said. There has to be a way in and out, but it’s bound to be well hidden. We’ll have to feel our way around the walls. The back of this place abuts straight on to the King’s palace, so it’s only the front and sides we need to bother with. It shouldn’t take long.’
I was wrong about that. Leaving Nimble to guard Little Hen, who had come with us this far but could not be made to understand what we were now up to. Kindly and I worked our way twice around the small palace’s walls to no avail. The only other entrance we saw was as choked with masonry as the first, and apart from that there was no sign of anything that looked like a doorway or a secret passage. Kindly took to cursing and striking the wall beside him with his staff, sending dust and flakes of plaster through the air, but even that did no good.
‘So much for that brilliant idea!’ he complained.
‘I don’t understand it.’ I stared at the obstinately blank wall in front of me. ‘There has to be a way in. Let’s go and talk to Nimble. We must be missing something obvious.’
‘Like a big carved glyph saying “Secret Entrance Over Here”,’ muttered the old man as we wandered back towards our starting point.
Nimble was standing, looking about him with an air of desperation and calling something over and over again. I realized what
