Aztec - Jennings Gary - Страница 224

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So I left the palace that day feeling rather pleased that a Mixtli, even if it was not myself, had achieved the noble name of Mixtzin. As things turned out, Motecuzoma complied in full with my suggestions. The visitor left our city bearing the resounding title of Azteca Tlani-Tlatoani, or Lesser Speaker of the Azteca. He also took with him a considerable troop of armed soldiers and a number of colonist families selected for their skill at building and fortifying.

I had the opportunity for only one brief conversation with my namesake while he was in Tenochtitlan. He thanked me effusively for my part in his having been welcomed and ennobled and made a partner in The Triple Alliance, and he added:

"Having the -tzin suffixed to my name puts it also on the names of all my family and descendants, even those of slightly indirect descent and divergent lineage. You must come again to Aztlan, Brother, for a small surprise. You will find more than a new and improved city."

At the time, I supposed he meant that he would arrange a ceremony to make me some sort of honorary lord of the Azteca. But I have never been again to Aztlan, and I do not know what it became in the years after Mixtzin's return there. As for the magnificent Moon Stone, Motecuzoma dithered as usual, unable to decide where in The Heart of the One World it might best be displayed. So the last time I remember seeing it, the Moon Stone was still lying flat on the plaza pavement, and it is now as buried and lost as the Sun Stone.

The fact is that something else happened, to make me and most other people speedily forget the visit of the Azteca, their bringing of the Moon Stone, and their plans for making Aztlan into a great seaside city. What happened was that a messenger came across the lake from Texcoco, wearing the white mantle of mourning. The news was not shockingly unexpected, since the Revered Speaker Nezahualpili was by then a very old man, but it desolated me to hear that my earliest patron and protector was dead.

I could have gone to Texcoco with the rest of the Eagle Knights, in the company of all the other Mexica nobles and courtiers who crossed the lake to attend the funeral of Nezahualpili, and who would either stay there or cross the lake again, some while later, to attend the coronation of the Crown Prince Ixtlil-Xochitl as new Revered Speaker of the Acolhua nation. But I chose to go without pomp and ceremony, in plain mourning dress, as a private citizen. I went as a friend of the family, and I was received by my old schoolmate, the Prince Huexotl, who greeted me as cordially as he had first done thirty and three years before, and greeted me with the name I had worn then: "Welcome, Head Nodder!" I could not help noticing that my old schoolmate Willow was old; I tried not to let my expression show what I felt when I saw his graying hair and lined visage; I had remembered his as a lithe young prince strolling with his pet deer in a verdant garden. But then I thought, uncomfortably: he is no older than I am.

The Uey-Tlatoani Nezahualpili was buried in the grounds of his city palace, not at the more expansive country estate near Texcotzinco Hill. So the smaller palace's lawns fairly overflowed with those come to say farewell to that much loved and respected man. There were rulers and lords and ladies from the nations of The Triple Alliance, and from other lands both friendly and not so. Those emissaries of farther countries who could not arrive in time for Nezahualpili's funeral were nevertheless on their way to Texcoco at that moment, hurrying to be in time to salute his son as the new ruler. Of all who should have been at the graveside, the most conspicuously absent was Motecuzoma, who had sent in his place his Snake Woman Tlacotzin and his brother Cuitlahuac, chief commander of the Mexica armies.

Prince Willow and I stood side by side at the grave, and we stood not far from his half brother, Ixtlil-Xochitl, heir to the Acolhua throne. He still somewhat resembled his name of Black Flower, since he still had the merged black eyebrows that made him appear always to be scowling. But he had lost most of what other hair he had had, and I thought: he must be ten years older than his father was when I first came to school in Texcoco. After the interment, the crown repaired to the palace ballrooms, to feast and chant and grieve aloud and loudly recount the deeds and merits of the late Nezahualpili. But Willow and I secured several jars of prime octli, and we went to the privacy of his chambers, and we gradually got very drunk as we relived the old days and contemplated the days to come.

I remember saying at one point, "I heard much muttering about Motecuzoma's rude absence today. He has never forgiven your father's aloofness in these past years, particularly his refusal to help in fighting petty wars."

The prince shrugged. "Motecuzoma's bad manners will win him no concessions from my half brother. Black Flower is our father's son, and believes as he did—that The One World will someday soon be invaded by outlanders, and that our only security is in unity. He will continue our father's policy; that we Acolhua must conserve our energies for a war that will be anything but petty."

"The right course, perhaps," I said, "But Motecuzoma will love your brother no better than he loved your father."

The next thing I remember was looking at the window and exclaiming, "Where has the time gone? It is late at night—and I am woefully inebriated."

"Take the guest chamber yonder," said the prince. "We must be up tomorrow to hear all the palace poets read their eulogies."

"If I sleep now I shall have a horrendous head in the morning," I said. "With your leave, I will first go for a walk in the city and let Night Wind blow some of the vapors from my brain."

My mode of walking was probably a sight to see, but there was nobody to see it. The night streets were even emptier than usual, for every resident of Texcoco was in mourning and indoors. And the priests had evidently sprinkled copper filings in the pine-splint torches on the street corner poles, for their flames burned blue, and the light they cast was dim and somber. In my muddled state, I somehow got the impression that I was repeating a walk I had walked once before, long ago. The impression was heightened when I saw ahead of me a stone bench under a red-flowering tapachini tree. I sank down on it gratefully, and sat for a while, enjoying being showered by the tree's scarlet petals blown loose by the wind. Then I became aware that on either side of me was seated another man.

I turned left and squinted through my topaz, and saw the same shriveled, ragged, cacao-colored man I had seen so often in my life. I turned to my right, and saw the better-dressed but dusty and weary man I had seen not quite so often before. I suppose I should have started up with a loud cry, but I only chuckled drunkenly, aware that they were illusions induced by all the octli I had imbibed. Still chuckling, I addressed them both:

"Venerable lords, should you not have gone underground with your impersonator?"

The cacao man grinned, showing the few teeth he had. "There was a time when you believed us to be gods. You supposed that I was Huehueteotl, Oldest of Old Gods, he who was venerated in these lands long before all others."

"And that I was the god Yoali Ehecatl," said the dusty man. "The Night Wind, who can abduct unwary walkers by night, or reward them, according to his whim."

I nodded, deciding to humor them even if they were only hallucinations. "It is true, my lords, I was once young and credulous. But then I learned of Nezahualpili's pastime of wandering the world in disguise."

"And that made you disbelieve in the gods?" asked the cacao man.

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