Balthasar and Denis, who knew Thierry de la Courcel better than I, assured me it was not so. The prince had given his word that he would return in a year’s time. He would have turned back rather than break his oath.
At two months into our journey, we entered the farthest reaches of the Nahuatl Empire. The folk there were not native Nahuatl speakers. According to Eyahue, they had been conquered by Achcuatli’s father, and chafed under the rule of the Nahuatl. They regarded us with curiosity and suspicion, but they were willing to trade to replenish our dwindling stores, and fortunately, Eyahue and Pochotl spoke their tongue.
In the market-place of the first such city, it struck me that if our stores were running low, Thierry’s must have been, too. Travellers’ inns were becoming fewer and farther between, and it had been well over a week since we’d had confirmation.
As Temilotzin cheerfully observed, there was no way of knowing if the Dauphin’s party had succeeded in reaching Tawantinsuyo; and we had entered territory that was potentially hostile.
So I dispatched Eyahue and Pochotl to comb the market-place in search of any merchant or farmer who remembered the strangers from across the sea trading for food goods. For a mercy, they returned with an affirmative answer.
Our journey continued.
At every settlement, we repeated the same process, the pochtecas questioning the local folk.
I could not help but think of the tale of the D’Angeline Prince Imriel de la Courcel, who had tracked my ancestor Berlik all the way to the Vralian wilderness using a similar method, seeking to avenge the death of his wife and unborn child.
It was a piece of irony that it now fell to me to follow in the footsteps of Prince Imriel’s descendant on the opposite side of the world, venturing deeper into the increasingly torrid southern heat, even as he had followed Berlik into the frigid, snowy wild.
When I mentioned it to Bao during the course of a day’s journey, he shrugged. “It seems to me the gods often laugh at our expense.” He wiped one tattooed forearm across his brow, dashing away beads of sweat. “Do not torture me with talk of snow, Moirin.”
“I don’t mean to.” I paused. “Do you think the gods are mocking us?”
Bao heard the uncertainty in my voice and responded to it. “No,” he said in a firm tone, giving me his full attention. “No, I do not. Forgive me, I did but speak in jest. Moirin, I believe the gods have their own way of restoring balance in the world—or at least that the world ever seeks to return to balance, even as water seeks to return to its source.”
“All ways lead to the Way,” I murmured.
He nodded. “So Master Lo Feng always said, and he was the wisest man I have ever known.”
I sighed. “I wish he were here.”
Bao smiled wryly. “So do I. But if he were—” He touched his chest, where the spark of our shared diadh-anam flickered. “I would not be.”
“Master Lo made his choice,” I said.
“Yes.” His fingers brushed my cheek, lingering. “And I am at peace with it.”
I smiled back at him. “I’m glad.”
Temilotzin poked me from behind with the point of his spear. “Keep walking, little warrior!” he said in a jovial manner. “We have a long way to go yet.”
“How far?” I asked him.
He laughed. “Far.”
FORTY-THREE
Several days later, we passed at last beyond the ultimate boundaries of the Nahuatl Empire.
In faraway Ch’in, the border between the Celestial Empire and the Tatar territories beyond it had been marked by an immense wall. Here in Terra Nova, there was no such thing, only a careless remark by Eyahue that we had come to the end.
“Are the folk beyond hostile?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “The Cloud People? They may be, or they may not. It depends on their mood. But I have traded with them before.”
I learned that the Cloud People called themselves thusly because they built their settlements atop high mountains. Once again, I dispatched our pochtecas to query the inhabitants, this time giving them some small trinkets to trade for information, hoping it would generate goodwill among the Cloud People. On Temilotzin’s advice, we made camp on the plains below the mountain, reckoning that if the Cloud People did prove hostile, there was no point in exposing our entire party to danger.
When Eyahue and Pochotl did not return by the day’s end, I wasn’t overly worried. It was a long journey on foot to the mountaintop settlement and back, and the pochtecas knew what they were doing. But as the second day wore onward, I began to fret.
“I’m sure they will be fine, Moirin,” Bao said to me. “Anyway, we could all use a day’s respite.”
So we spent the day tending to necessary chores, bathing in the brisk river that spilled down from the mountains to meander across the plain, washing clothing and spreading it to dry, mending torn fabric and broken straps, tending to our stalwart pack-horses. The D’Angelines were grateful for the chance to shed their armor for a day, many going bare-chested beneath the bright sun, and consequently paying a price as their fair skin reddened. But even sunburn wasn’t enough to cloud their high spirits at a day of rest, and I smiled to see them acting like boys at play in the river, dunking and splashing one another.
Still, by late afternoon, I found myself wondering what in the world we would do if our pochtecas didn’t return. Now that we’d left the Nahuatl Empire, we were more reliant on them than ever.
If they had been taken prisoner or enslaved, Bao and I could enter the city cloaked in the twilight and search for them, but it would not be an easy task without having the faintest idea where they might be held.
I was mulling over the possibilities when Bao nudged me and pointed across the plain. Two familiar figures were approaching in the late amber light. When they drew near enough for me to see that Eyahue wore a gap-toothed smile, I sighed with relief and allowed myself to relax.
“You found word of them?” I asked.
The older pochteca clapped his nephew on the shoulder. “Pochotl did. Took a lot of asking. Your prince and his men passed the city by, but Pochotl finally found someone who saw the white-faced strangers on the road.”
“Thank you,” I said to the younger trader. “I am grateful.”
Pochotl went so far as to offer me a brief, unsmiling nod of acknowledgment.
Since it was too late to break camp, we resolved to pass another night on the plain. The men drew straws for sentry duty, the losers grumbling. Early on, some had questioned the necessity of posting sentries, but Temilotzin and Bao had been equally insistent. Now that we’d passed beyond the boundaries of Emperor Achcuatli’s protection, no one questioned the practice.
I retired to the small tent I shared with Bao, a concession to modesty that Balthasar Shahrizai had surprisingly insisted on. The others rolled themselves in cloaks or mantles and slept beneath the stars.
Worn out by a day of worrying, I fell asleep quickly and slept without dreams.
I awoke to the sound of someone hissing my name, and the knowledge that someone else was in our tent.
For a moment, I was disoriented, imagining myself once more in a tent high in the thin air of the Abode of the Gods, with Manil Datar bent on committing heresy on me. But Bao came out of sleep moving quick as a snake, rolling over and whipping his staff in the direction of the intruder.
The shadowy figure pulled back. “Hold, for Elua’s sake, hold! It’s me, Denis!”
“Denis?” I sat upright, rubbing my eyes. “What is it?”
From what I could make out of his expression, it was grim. “It’s happened again. Someone’s betrayed us.”
“What?” My thoughts were fuzzy. “How?”
Denis’ voice trembled a bit. “I just found Clemente DuBois with his throat slit. He was on sentry duty.”
“What?” I was fully awake now. “Why would anyone—?”
“Only one reason to kill a sentry.” Bao scrambled out of the tent, pushing past Denis, staff in hand. “We’re about to be attacked. Moirin, call your twilight and stay safely out of the way. Denis, get armed, now!”
Denis gulped and nodded.
Without waiting to see if I obeyed him, Bao raced to the center of our campsite, where the banked coals of our campfire glowed faintly beneath the silvery light of the full moon high overhead. He began banging furiously with his staff on the large iron pot resting on the ashes, sounding a clanging alarm. “Ambush!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. “Get up, get armed! Now, now, now!”
Not far away on the plain, howls of anger rose in reply.
Ah, gods! All that armor—the chain-mail shirts, the brigandines, helmets, vambraces, and greaves—that our men had labored under for so long had been removed for the night. Mayhap half of our sleeping fighters responded with alacrity, reaching to don whatever was closest at hand.
The other half blinked in stupefaction. Ignoring Bao’s order, I grabbed the nearest D’Angeline and shook him. Spotting links of chain-mail glinting in the moonlight, I hauled his armored jerkin free and threw it in his lap. “Get up, get armed, now!”
Moving sluggishly, he struggled into it.
Bao spotted me. “Moirin, call your twilight!”
“I’m doing more good this way!” I retorted, shoving a helmet on the fellow’s head.
Seeing what I was about, Septimus Rousse began to emulate me. Between the two of us, we managed to get a dozen or so of our men upright and partially armed. Those who were more alert worked at lightning speed to pull brigandines over their chain-mail and buckle valuable greaves and vambraces in place.
Temilotzin, effortlessly prepared and ready, leaned carelessly on his throwing spear and peered across the moonlit plain. “Here they come,” he remarked. In one smooth move, he fitted the butt of his spear into the throwing-tool and hurled it into the night.
There was a lone choked cry, followed by a fresh chorus of angry howls and the sound of feet pounding.
With a fierce grin, Temilotzin hefted his studded club. “And here they are!”
With that, the night erupted in chaos as our attackers fell upon us. I dashed into the tent to retrieve my bow and quiver, then retreated some distance from the fray, trying to identify a suitable target.
It was impossible. It was all hand-to-hand fighting, the combatants too closely engaged to risk a shot. It appeared our attackers outnumbered us, but not by a great many. Bao was a dervish in the thick of battle, his bamboo staff moving too quickly to track. Temilotzin was singing a war-song, his obsidian-studded club rising and falling, his sandaled feet stomping out a rhythm known only to him. Here and there, D’Angelines I couldn’t identify were acquitting themselves with skill.
But some had fallen, easily recognized by their fair skin in the moonlight. I felt sick at heart.
“Moirin!” Septimus Rousse appeared beside me, pointing across the plain. Beyond the outskirts of the battle, a pair of dark figures were racing for our picket-line. “They’re after the horses!”
“Ah, no!” Giving the battlefield a wide berth, I ran to intercept them, my heart beating in my throat. I loosed my first arrow at a dead run, and it went wide. Skidding to a halt, I nocked another. The nearest fellow was trying to grab a frightened pack-horse’s halter and had his back to me.
Swallowing hard, I loosed my bow and shot him from behind. He toppled forward and lay still. The pack-horse squealed and tossed its head, tugging at the picket-rope.
The second fellow blinked in consternation, then came at me with a roar, raising a stone-headed war-club high overhead.
Reaching into my quiver, I nocked another arrow and shot him, too.
With a look of profound surprise, he sat down hard, glanced once at his chest, then slumped sideways.
Septimus caught up with me, breathing hard. “Nice work, my lady.”
“My thanks, lord captain.” All along the picket-line, horses whickered and stamped in protest. I caught sight of a third figure, stooped and lurking beyond the horses’ shifting bodies. Nocking and drawing another arrow, I moved around the end of the line to get a clean shot at him.
The figure straightened, an obsidian dagger in one hand.
I stared at Pochotl. “You?”
He permitted himself a tight grimace and said nothing.
“Lazy, greedy, stupid, good for nothing sister-son!” Eyahue emerged from the moonlit darkness, ranting with fury. Gnarled hands extended, he flung himself on his nephew, clamping his fingers around Pochotl’s throat and attempting to throttle him. “You did this, didn’t you? No-good, cowardly, idiot excuse for a pochteca! You disgrace us!”
With an effort, Septimus Rousse pried Eyahue loose and subdued him in a firm grip. Rivulets of tears ran down the old fellow’s creased cheeks, but his expression had turned to one of traditional Nahuatl stoicism, cold and hard.
“You disgrace us,” he repeated with dignity.
“You are a fool, old man,” Pochotl muttered. “Shall we both suffer for the Emperor’s whims?”
I moved between them, keeping an arrow trained on the traitor.
Behind us, the sounds of battle were beginning to fade. A cry in an unknown tongue was raised and repeated.
“The Cloud People are retreating,” Eyahue said in a flat tone. “Tonight, we are victorious.”
I wondered at what price.
FORTY-FOUR
Six dead, several others wounded.
That was the price of our victory.
Sensing through the bond of our shared diadh-anam that I was alive and well, Bao turned toward tending the wounded. As a result, the spotted warrior Temilotzin was the first to seek me out and discover the prisoner I guarded.
“What passes here, little warrior?” he asked in an ominous tone rendered all the more ominous by the fact that he was splashed with blood from head to foot. “What has this one done?”