Nearby grew a small silk cotton tree: a native of the hot lands in the South, no doubt planted here as an ornament and to shade the courtyard on the far side of the wall. Iglanced speculatively up at its widespread branches. If I could climb high enough, I thought, I might be able to see what had stirred the townsfolk up without having to get too close to it.
I stripped off my cloak and passed it to Handy. ‘Give me a leg up.’
The boughs creaked and bowed alarmingly under my weight, making me thankful for my slight build and the meagre diet that kept me from accumulating much in the way of fat. I climbed as high as I thought I could, and perched there uncomfortably while I surveyed the ground around me.
‘Well?’ the steward demanded. ‘What can you see?’
‘I can see the marketplace. The sacred precinct is just beyond it. All the traders’ merchandise is still laid out on mats on the ground, but there’s hardly anyone about. Strange. All the people there are standing around in one corner. There’s a little crowd there — all men. Some of them are armed but they’re not doing anything. That’s where the trouble is, in the middle of the crowd.’
‘What trouble?’
‘I can’t see.’
Then I caught it: a telltale flash of green, vivid against the brown flesh colour of the men surrounding it. The spectators had formed a ring around two figures in their midst. I knew one of them at once, even though it was too far away to see his face. ‘It’s the captain! And he looks as if he’s caught someone!’
Then, as the implications of what I was seeing dawned on me, I cried out, unthinkingly: ‘But that’s impossible! The boy can’t have come here, he just can’t …’
Fortunately neither Handy nor the steward heard me. A new arrival had distracted them.
‘There you are! What’s the slave doing up in that tree?’
I looked down to see Fox’s face staring up at me.
‘He’s watching your captain,’ replied Handy.
‘Well, he can come down now,’ Fox said, ‘because we’ve got the bastards!’
The steward let out a whoop of joy, of relief at the thought that the search was over and he could go home.
My head swam. Despair overwhelmed me, making me feel dizzy and sick and short of breath, as if my lungs suddenly saw no point in continuing to work.
Since we had in reality been pursuing one person, not two, there could be no doubt who the warriors had laid hands on. Who else could it be but Nimble?
‘You stupid boy,’ I groaned softly. ‘Why did you have to come here? Why here, of all places?’
Starting down the tree, I groped blindly for a handhold, missed and fell.
Branches lashed my back, arms and legs as I crashed to the ground, but they broke my fall, so that instead of killing myself I ended up in a bruised, shaken, dusty heap at the foot of the tree, with the steward’s and Fox’s laughter ringing in my ears.
‘Don’t just lie there, you lazy turd! Get up!’
I took no notice of the steward. I could not bear to look at his grinning, gloating face. It would not make much difference to my fate whether I obeyed him now or not, so I kept my eyes on the earth, shaded and shielded by my forearm.
‘You didn’t fall that far!’
Someone touched me. I flinched, expecting a blow, but the touch was gentler than that: a hand under my shoulder, making as if to lift me off the ground.
‘Come on, Yaotl.’ Handy’s voice growled in my ear. ‘We’ve got to go. Here’s your cloak.’
I wanted to shrug him off, tell him to leave me alone, but then I heard the steward snarling again.
‘How sweet,’ he sneered. ‘There’s no coming between you two, is there?’
I felt the commoner’s grip on my shoulder tighten. He was about to lose his temper, which would do him no good at all. I forced myself to remember that he did not have to help me and that if he were just to stand by and watch the steward and Fox kick me to death he might save himself a deal of trouble.
I hauled myself to my feet, accepted my cloak and glowered at the steward.
Handy asked the question I could not bear to voice.
‘So which one did you get, then?’
I shut my eyes to stop the tears from flowing. I would have clapped my hands over my ears too, if I could have done it without it being obvious.
‘The older one. No sign of the boy yet.’
‘What?’
My eyes sprang open. I stared at Fox, open mouthed but mute because I could not trust myself to speak.
My son was not the man at the centre of that crowd, being dragged about by the green-suited warrior. I could only thank the gods for that, and wonder who the captain’s victim really was.
‘But … but …’ Handy stammered.
‘Come and see,’ Fox cried, turning towards the marketplace. ‘I think the captain’s enjoying himself!’
As he and the steward set off, I could see Handy’s mouth working and realized he was about to blurt something out that we would both regret. I moved swiftly to one side and planted a foot firmly on top of one of his, converting his next words into a muffled oath.
‘Quiet!’ I hissed. ‘I need to think.’ Aloud I said: ‘How did you catch him?’
‘Oh, easy,’ Fox called out over his shoulder. ‘The captain’sgood at this sort of thing. It’s just like collecting tribute from barbarians, really. You just march into the middle of the marketplace, knock over one or two pitches to get their attention — starting with the potters is best, it makes a good noise, though breaking up a few turkey pens works just as well — and tell everybody exactly what you’re looking for. Once they saw the captain’s costume they couldn’t move fast enough!’ He laughed. ‘What was really funny was how apologetic they were that they couldn’t bring us both of them. Someone produced this pathetic specimen and told us he was the only runaway Aztec they’d seen. I think the captain’s trying to make him tell us where the boy is now.’
We rounded the corner and were at the edge of the almost empty marketplace. I stared across the rows of pitches, the straw mats strewn with merchandise, obviously hastily abandoned, judging by the refuse that lay about them: small change in the form of open bags of cocoa beans, half-eaten tortillas with a couple of bewildered-looking turkeys pecking at them, a water-seller’s gourd spilling its contents on to the dusty floor. In the far corner stood the crowd: the bravest of the local youths, or at least the keenest to show off, no doubt unable to tear themselves away from the spectacle of one Aztec torturing another. Everybody with any sense had run away as soon as they thought the warriors had found what they wanted.
‘Come on!’ cried the steward. ‘We’ll miss the fun!’
He trotted forward, leaving the rest of us behind in his eagerness to watch another man suffering. I wondered whether he was hoping to pick up some tips.
Then I forgot his state of mind as an appalling thought occurred to me.
The captain and his victim were hidden from me by the backs of their spectators and at this distance I could only justhear the familiar bark of the Otomi’s battle-trained voice, but I suddenly knew who his victim was.
What Aztec had run away two nights before, presumably to seek shelter on the western side of the lake?
It could only be my master’s boatman, the one who had abandoned the Chief Minister and his canoe two nights before. He must have gone to ground in the middle of the largest nearby town — just where I had told the warriors to search.
‘The idiot,’ I muttered. ‘Why didn’t he keep running?’
How long did I have, I wondered, before the captain beat the truth out of him? How long before he learned that I had laid a false trail?
An unnaturally high-pitched wail from within the crowd seemed to be my answer.