Nebula Awards Showcase 2012

Onalli’s gaze strayed again to the picture—to Xochitl’s face, frozen in that moment of dubious innocence. “I can’t leave her there.”

“The resistance—” Atcoatl started.

Onalli snorted. “By the time the resistance can pull the House down, it will be too late. You know it.” There had been attacks: two maglev stations bombed; political dissidents mysteriously vanishing before their arrest. She didn’t deny the existence of an underground movement, but she recognized the signs: it was still weak, still trying to organize itself.

Atcoatl said nothing; but Onalli was Jaguar Knight, and her training enabled her to read the hint of disapproval in his stance.

“Look,” she said, finally. “I’m the one taking the biggest risk. You’ll be outside the House, with plenty of time to leave if anything goes wrong.”

“If you’re caught—”

“You think I’d turn on you?” Onalli asked. “After all they’ve done to Xochitl, you think I’d help them?”

Atcoatl’s face was dark. “You know what they’re doing, inside the House.”

She didn’t—but she could imagine it, all too well. Which was why she needed to pull Xochitl out. Her friend hadn’t deserved this; any of this. “I’m Jaguar Knight,” she said, softly. “And I give you my word that I’d rather end my own life than let them worm anything out of me.”

Atcoatl looked at her. “You’re sincere, but what you believe doesn’t change anything.”

“Doesn’t it? I believe the Revered Speaker’s rule is unlawful. I believe the Jaguar House had no right to betray its own dissidents, or interrogate them. Isn’t that what we all believe in?”

Atcoatl shifted, and wouldn’t answer.

“Tell me what you believe in, then,” Onalli said.

He was silent for a while. “Black One take you,” he said, savagely. “Just this once, Onalli. Just this once.”

Onalli nodded. “Promise.” Afterward, they’d go north—into the United States or Xuya, into countries where freedom was more than a word on paper. They’d be safe.

She finished tying her hair in a neat bun—a habit she’d taken on her missions abroad—and slid her worship-thorns into her belt, smearing the blood over her skinsuit. A prayer, for whoever among the gods might be listening tonight; for Fate, the Black One, the god of the Smoking Mirror, who could always be swayed or turned away, if you had the heart and guts to seize your chance when it came.

Atcoatl waited for her at the door, holding it open with ill grace.

“Let’s go,” Onalli said.

She left the picture on the table—knowing, all the while, why she’d done so: not because it would burden her, but because of one simple thing. Fear. Fear that she’d find Xochitl and stare into her face, and see the broken mind behind the eyes—nothing like the shy, courageous girl she remembered.

Outside, the air was clear and cold, and a hundred stars shone upon the city of Tenochtitlan: a hundred demons, waiting in the darkness to descend and rend all life limb from limb. Onalli rubbed her worship-thorns, trying to remember the assurance she’d always felt on her missions—why couldn’t she remember anything, now that she was home—now that she was breaking into her own House?

The priest of the Black One sits cross-legged across the mat—facing Xochitl and pursing his lips as if contemplating a particular problem. His hair is greasy and tangled, mattered with the blood of his devotions; and the smell that emanates from him is the rank one of charnel houses—with the slight tang of bleach. He’s attempted to wash his hands before coming, and hasn’t succeeded.

Amusing, how the mind sharpens, when everything else is restrained.

Xochitl would laugh, but she’s never been much of one for laughter: that was Onalli, or perhaps Tecipiani.

No, she musn’t think of Tecipiani, not now—must remain calm and composed, her only chance at surviving this.

Mustn’t ask herself the question “for what?”

“I’m told,” the priest says, “that you started a ring of dissidents within this House.”

Xochitl remains seated against the wall, very straight. The straps cut into her arms and ankles, and the tightest one holds her at the neck. She’ll only exhaust herself trying to break them: she’s tried a dozen times already, with only bruises to show for it.

The priest goes on, as if she had answered, “I’m told you worked to undermine the loyalty of the Jaguar Knights, with the aim to topple the Revered Speaker.”

Xochitl shakes her head, grimly amused. Toppling him—as if that would work . . . The burgeoning resistance movement is small and insignificant; they have no reach within the House, not even to Xochitl’s pathetic, shattered splinter group.

But there’s right and wrong, and when Xolotl comes to take her soul, she’ll face Him with a whole face and heart, knowing which side she chose.

The priest goes on, smug, self-satisfied, “You must have known it was doomed. This House is loyal; your commander is loyal. She has given you up, rather than suffer your betrayal.”

Tecipiani—no, mustn’t think of that, mustn’t—it’s no surprise, has never been, not after everything Tecipiani has done. . . .

“Of course she has given me up,” Xochitl says, keeping her voice steady. “Jaguar Knights aren’t interrogators. We leave that to you.”

The priest shifts, unhurriedly—and, without warning, cuffs her, his obsidian rings cutting deep into her skin. She tastes blood, an acrid tingle in her mouth—raises her head, daring him to strike again.

He does—again and again, each blow sending her head reeling back, a white flash of pain resonating in the bones of her cheek, the warmth of blood running down her face.

When he stops at last, Xochitl hangs limp, staring at the floor through a growing haze—the strap digging into her windpipe, an unpleasant reminder of how close asphyxiation is.

“Let’s start again, shall we?” His voice is calm, composed. “You’ll show me proper respect, as is owed an agent of the Revered Speaker.”

He’s—not that—he’s nothing, a man of no religion, who dares use pain as a weapon, tainting it for mundane things like interrogation. But pain isn’t that, was never that. Xochitl struggles to remember the proper words; to lay them at the feet of the Black One, her song of devotion in this godless place.

“I fall before you, I throw myself before you

Offer up the precious water of my blood, offer up my pain like fire

I cast myself into the place from where none rise, from where none leave,

O lord of the near and nigh, O master of the Smoking Mirror,

O night, O wind . . .”

She must have spoken the words aloud, because he cuffs her again—a quick, violent blow she only feels when her head knocks against the wall—ringing in her mind, the whole world contracting and expanding, the colors too light and brash—

And again, and again, and everything slowly merges, folding inward like crinkling paper—pain spreading along her muscles like fire.

“With icy water I make my penance

With nettles and thorns I bare out my face, my heart

Through the land of the anguished, the land of the dying . . .”

She thinks, but she’s not sure, that he’s gone, when the door opens again, and footsteps echo under the ceiling—slow and measured, deliberate.

She’d raise her head, but she can’t muster the energy. Even focusing on the ground is almost too tiring, when all she wants is to lean back, to close her eyes and dream of a world where Tonatiuh the sun bathes her in His light, where the smell of cooking oil and chilies wafts from the stalls of food-vendors, where feather-cloaks are soft and silky against her hands. . . .