Diving into the crevice between two adjacent walls and the blissful shadow it provided, he shook his head, elated for no reason. He couldn’t possibly sneak away for the duration of another evening, not after the dressing down he and Axolin had to endure, first by the priest responsible for the evening rites they had missed, then by the veteran who came to teach morning lessons, having been told tales of their transgressions but in a light enough manner, so it seemed. They could have been disciplined more severely than by being made to work in the kitchen house when the others were out there practicing with atlatls. They had certainly gotten away lightly. Still, to push it by going missing again and on the very next evening was unwise. Nothing was said about the demand to stay in school this afternoon, but nothing was said to the contrary either.
She was easy to spot in the lively clamor of the afternoon alley, the simplicity of her plain, barely decorated dress and the loosely tied braids setting her apart, making her stand out in the busily walking noble crowds. Even the servants and the Royal Enclosure’s slaves were dressed better, more richly, with more flair. And yet, somehow, she was the most pleasing sight, keeping his eyes glued to her along with some others, he noticed, pursing his lips while hastening his step. Ahuitzotl was there already, talking lively and waving his hands, reinforcing his words, or so it seemed, a vigorous beast. It wouldn’t be easy to get rid of this one, damn it.
Her face lit like a temple’s hall through the days of great ceremonies as she turned to greet him, her smile one of the widest. It took his breath away, the radiance of it.
“Niltze,” she shouted, not waiting for him to close the distance, waving both hands as she did.
He felt his grin spreading wide. “Niltze, Chantli.”
“It’s nice to see you in a better state. Refreshed. Not beaten up like last night.” Her laughter trilled the air, pleasing Necalli’s ear but leaving him uncomfortable. What was one to offer in response to this? She did have the manners of a boy, that one. “You should have seen him yesterday,” she added, turning toward her royal company, still beaming. “Quite a sight.”
Ahuitzotl just snorted, not interested in any of it. “Tell him about that boy, the one who is missing.” And this time, Necalli didn’t feel like shooing the annoying thing away. Maybe it was better to have someone who knew how to handle her. For the first time, he wondered how they came to know each other, the royal pilli and the workshop girl.
“Yes, tell me what happened.”
“Oh.” Her smile faded at once. “I, yes, I came here looking for you, because… You see, Miztli, he didn’t return. Not through the night and not in the morning. He has been missing all day!”
“Miztli? You mean the workshop boy?” he asked, taken aback. “I thought it was Patli who got in trouble.”
“No, no!” She shook her head vigorously, making her nicely thick braids jump. “Patli is at school. Well, I suppose that he is. He should be coming home for the evening meal soon, so we’ll know.” Her delicate eyebrows knitted worriedly. “You don’t think anything happened to him, do you?”
“To Patli?” He couldn’t help snorting disdainfully. “Nothing, not to that one. He is good and healthy, out and away from danger.” A shrug seemed to be in order. “But tell me about the workshop boy. He didn’t come back at night?”
“No.” Her frown deepened, banishing the remnants of playful lightness. “He sleeps in the workshop, so I didn’t know if he came back or not during the night. But in the morning, Father was very put out. He likes to start working early, with the break of dawn, and he expects the braziers to be lit by the time he comes in, and the tools arranged and ready. But this morning, not only were the braziers off, but even the firewood wasn’t there, not gathered or brought in, as he does in the evenings. Well, obviously, as through the previous evening he was out there, with us, you see?” He liked the way her eyes clung to him, pleading for help, so huge and wide-open, delightfully trustful. Such pretty sight. “Father was so furious. Oh, I never saw him like that before. So I wished that Miztli would not appear just yet. Maybe later, after Father calmed down. But then,” her shoulders lifted in a shrug, “then, when he didn’t come back at all, I wished he would return, even if to get punished. Something bad must have happened to him. Something terrible, maybe. These people, you know, the ones that you thought were after you all…”
“Is he your father’s slave?”
She shook her head. “Not formally, no. But I imagine Father does have a right to punish him, or at least to throw him out, and then he won’t have a place to sleep even. And it’s not his fault. Patli said it was his idea to go to that tunnel. He told me all about it on our way back.”
“Patli should talk less and do more,” muttered Necalli, in no forgiving mood whatsoever. But what might have happened to the workshop boy? He said that some of the smugglers from the tunnel saw him and went after him, yes, when on his way back from the terrible island of the monster, but how had those people tracked him afterwards, with all their wandering and the time spent at the temple? And why weren’t they all attacked, if so? Didn’t the smugglers know that they had been sniffing around? They must have left plenty of stupid marks. Or did the workshop boy go back there to take another look, instead of heading back home? He, Necalli, did suggest that he should do that, didn’t he? And if so, it was his responsibility to try and find him, to help him out, maybe. That boy was too good to go down like that, either killed by the smugglers or beaten by the lowly copper-melting scum, Chantli’s father. How to go about it and with his own troublesome situation at school? Even now, as they stood there, he was chancing being noticed as missing from the ball court. Damn it!
“Who was after you all?” Ahuitzotl’s voice brought him back from his uneasy dilemmas, made him concentrate on both pair of eyes – hers prettily large and shaded by the thickest eyelashes he had ever seen, and the boy’s, narrowed into slits, suspicious.
“It’s not of your interest, pilli-boy –” he began, but Chantli’s frown deepened again.
“Maybe Ahuitzotl could help somehow.”
He rolled his eyes. “How?”
“I can be of help more than you are!” called out their royal company hotly. “I can help her and I want to!”
Chantli was eyeing him almost pleadingly. “He knows things. About Tlatelolco and the trouble it makes. It might be connected to what happened. Think about it. The weapons you saw, and the tunnel leading into the piece of land that can’t be seen from the causeway but comfortable for reaching it by canoe. And Tlatelolco wharves are famous for their smugglers, eh? Everyone knows that.”
“Who are these ‘everyone’?” he grunted, not pleased with the shady knowledge she displayed, let alone her readiness to spill their dubious adventures in front of the royal brat busy pushing himself in. “I see Patli was busy retelling you our every step, stupid blabber that he is.”
She shrugged, not offended. “He needed to talk. He looked badly shaken. You have been through plenty of trouble. Just look at your arm!”
Her gaze shot toward the dirtied bandage, so openly concerned it mollified him, to a degree.
“It’s good now. It’ll be all right.” Pursing his lips, he shrugged in his turn. “Out of all of us, nothing happened to your Patli, so he is the last one to complain. That Miztli boy sounds as though he is in trouble and he was the braver of the two, not like the cowardly telpochcalli boy.” He shook his head, trying to get rid of his rage. “We must find him, yes. Maybe he is in that tunnel, caught or held prisoner or something.”
Her small even teeth were making a mess out of her lower lip. “Will you go there and look?”
He nodded gravely, pleased with the way she gazed at him, all trust and expectation. It made him feel powerful. “Yes, I’ll go there. We’ll wait until they stop playing, get Axolin, and go to that tunnel right away.” Warming to this idea, encouraged by that same nearly adoring gaze of hers, he narrowed his eyes, thinking hard. “A torch. This time, we’ll need a torch, at
least one such thing. To wander there in the darkness won’t help.” The memory of the furry creatures, rats and whatnot, made him shudder, but he brushed it aside, determined. “I must think of something.”
“I know where to get a good torch,” said the royal boy readily, without his usual challenging scowl. “A good torch, with the best quality cloths and oil.”
“Where?”
“In the temple. I know where they store those things.”
For the first time, he found himself eyeing this unasked-for company with a measure of interest and no disdain. “Can you get it for us?”
The boy nodded smugly, pleased with himself. “I’ll bring it, maybe even two. But I carry it.” The scowl was back, more challenging than ever. “I carry the torch, or I won’t be getting you any.”
“You are not coming with us!” cried out Necalli, taken aback by such a wild idea.
“Yes, I am.” Spreading his legs wide, as though readying for the attempt to dislodge him or throw him away by force, the little beast glared at him, set on fighting for his rights. “She said I can be of help, and I want to help. And you can’t stop me anyway. You can’t tell me what to do!”
“If you ran away from school, the entire city would be on our heels before we so much as managed to reach that causeway. Are you insane? You are the Emperor’s brother, for all the mighty deities’ sake!”
“No one will be running after us. They won’t even notice. I sneak away all the time!”
“He does,” confirmed Chantli readily, taking the little brat’s side. “Yesterday, we met out there, not even in the temple. He knows plenty of passageways and corridors. He is good at those things.”
Necalli exhaled loudly, cornered by their united front, not appreciating the sensation. They were just a commoner girl and a little boy!
“You run away from school?”
“Oh yes. All the time!” That came out plain victorious. The boy’s eyes sparkled. “And you do need this torch, and other things too. I can bring weapons as well. I know how to get into the room where they store training swords and spears.”
“Another corridor, eh?” purred Chantli, conspiratorial and as though proud of her charge.
“Oh yes. Straight into the storage of weapons and shields.”
“The training swords won’t help us,” grunted Necalli. “With no obsidian, they are nothing but clubs.”
They both glared at him, clearly offended.
“Oh well, if you can get a torch and you promise that no one will be looking for you…” He scowled at the cheeky cub as direfully as he could. “Also that you will not be crying for your mother if we are attacked or something.” He thrust his bandaged arm closer to the boy’s face, noting with grudging admiration that the little beast did not take a step back. “See that thing? It looks ugly and it still hurts like the Underworld’s middle levels. So if you are afraid of things like that, don’t bother to follow, torches or not.”
“I don’t care,” muttered the little beast stubbornly, now clearly fighting to stay where he was. “I’m not afraid of those things.”
Hiding a grin, Necalli shook his head. “Then go and get the torches and maybe a training sword or two. Be as quick as you can. I’ll get Axolin, and you…” He looked at Chantli, not trying to hide his smile, not this time. It was inappropriate to bring a girl on such an adventure, but it was good that she was coming, whatever the convention said. Maybe the commoner girls did behave differently. Not the serving maids in the noble houses like in his and his friends’ families, all of them humble slaves, bought and paid for, and not like uncouth loudmouthed fowls from the wharves and the marketplace, but the true commoners, children of craftsmen and such. She was certainly most pleasant company, even if delightfully unpredictable.
“What?” Her eyebrows knitted again, this time in a question.
“Nothing. You better go back to your house, see if Patli is there. If so, bring him along, make him take you to that temple near the causeway and meet us there. If he isn’t, then just come to the causeway and we’ll find you there.”
This time, she nodded readily, offering no argument, her smile as victorious as Ahuitzotl’s. Was she afraid to be denied the participation too? The thought made him laugh.
“You.” He turned back to the royal pilli. “Bring two torches if you can. They are preferable to the clubs, if you have to choose between the two.”
Another eager nod made him wish to chuckle. But it was wild, this entire thing, the wildest and not even a little bit prudent, but he didn’t mind. Not this time.
Chapter 11
The slivers of light were still there, painting the earthen floor into playful patterns, not in a hurry to dim, or better yet, to disappear for good. Miztli hated the sight of them.
To curl in the filthy corner, pretending that his ties were still intact, was challenging, stretching his nerves to their limits. The darkness, would it never come? Since the first light, since being dumped here, in this filth-covered rectangular building full of crates and cases aplenty, he had spent so much time pretending to be unconscious or asleep. Or drifting somewhere, anxious to draw as little attention as possible, to make his captors forget his very existence.
Which was not such a difficult task, as the people who entered this shed during the day did so rarely; busy, preoccupied types, in a hurry to fetch things and be gone. His ears informed him that there was much activity outside the roughly fixed planks, but this particular shed was not the center of it. Thanks all the deities, each and every one of them. After the terrible night, he knew that only his ability to bluff his way through might keep him alive, this and the willingness of the dusk to come faster.
Shifting to better his position, his limbs stiff and hurting, every single move, he remembered the night, shuddering badly against his will. Those people in the deserted alley, pouncing like jaguars from the shadows, lethal and vicious, set on capturing him. No simple robbers those, no marketplace types the calmecac boy Necalli warned him against. Terribly strong and determined, impossible to fight or escape. It was difficult to remember what occurred back in this alley, but the mere fragments were enough to make the terrible waves of panic return, to send his mind into the depths of uncontrollable fear. Not to mention what came next!
Grinding his teeth against the intensified shaking, he remembered coming around for the first time, climbing out of the pitch-black suffocating depths, opening his eyes to more darkness dotted with flickering lights. The stench of rancid wood and rotten fish attacked his nostrils, bringing his nausea to the point where it was beyond his power to hold it in, bursting out in an agonizing spasm, as though the clubs hammering inside his head or the claws tearing at his chest were not enough. He retched and retched, curled upon the wet gravel, terrified beyond reason, sensing the darkness groping, wishing to find him and drag him back under.
When finally able to breathe again, he felt nothing but relief, the ridiculous sensation of safety. The darkness could not snatch him, not anymore. However, the good feeling didn’t last. In another heartbeat, rough hands pulled him over, or maybe kicked him onto his back, to stare at the dimly lit sky and the grotesque faces peering at him from above, dark holes for eyes and mouths, terrifying outlines, like in the worst of nightmares. A renewed wave of terror gave him the power to roll away, or to try to do that, an attempt frustrated quite easily by a vicious kick that brought him back where he was, to be studied thoughtfully for another heartbeat, then hauled to his feet violently, with much force.
“Bring him in and let Nexcoatl know,” tossed a curt voice, digging into his elbow, pulling as though determined to tear it out. “Bring a torch too.”
“Why don’t we drop him into the lake and be done with him?” inquired another, calmer voice. “Why question the little piece of dirt? He knows nothing, that one. A barefoot commoner; what do you think he would know?”
“We’ll see in a little while,” insisted the first voice, his hurtful grip supporting, enabling Miztli to st
ay upright despite the terrible dizziness and the shudders. The nausea was back, assaulting his entire being with vicious strength.
His willpower dedicated to holding it in, he didn’t resist the pull that directed him toward one of the darker shades, its low uneven shape somehow familiar, sparking a memory. Pushed through the narrow opening, he stumbled and was busy fighting for balance and against the unrelenting pull when the realization dawned, making his limbs lose their power again. The temple with the tunnel! Oh yes, the low half broken wall that they had passed by, with the calmecac boys asking Patli if he couldn’t find a more presentable place to drag them into, a better looking temple than this ruin. Oh mighty deities, but they were back in the tunnel or heading there!
The struggle to free himself ensued with renewed desperation, resulting with him being kicked in rather than pushed through, sprawling on the stone floor, paralyzed with all-encompassing fear. The memory of the underground room with rats and the stakes of weaponry, the mysterious monster of the lake with terrible claws, the smugglers he had escaped on his way out earlier, the temple with priests and the marketplace riffraff; all mixing in his mind, united against him, managing to get him somehow.
He fought the attempt to drag him back up, struggling wildly, pushing and kicking, biting someone’s fist that brushed past his mouth, frenetic with fear. Even when pinned to the stones too firmly to move a limb, he kept wriggling and twisting, desperate to break free, oblivious of reason, until the blow on the side of his head softened the reality, turned everything into a foggy mist-covered haze, not frightening but delightfully light, floating, reassuring. It was good to escape the nightmare at last.