Текст книги "Aztec"

Автор книги: Gary Jennings

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"Perhaps war has outlasted some of its usefulness, Lord Speaker," I said, braving his scowl. "I truly believe that our traveling merchants nowadays do more than all our armies to extend the influence of the Mexíca and to bring wealth to Tenochtítlan. They provide commerce with nations too far distant to be easily subjugated, but rich in goods and commodities they will readily barter or sell."

"You make the trade sound easy," Ahuítzotl interrupted. "Let us tell you, it has often been as hazardous as soldiering. The expeditions of pochtéa leave here laden with cargoes of considerable value. They have been raided by savages or bandits before they ever arrived at their intended destinations. When they did reach them, their wares were often simply confiscated and nothing given in return. For those reasons, we are obliged to send a sizable army troop along to protect every such expedition. Now you tell us: why should we continue to dispatch armies of nursemaids and not armies of plunderers?"

"With all respect, I believe the Revered Speaker already knows why," I said. "For a so-called nursemaid troop, Tenochtítlan supplies only the armed men themselves. The pochtéa carry, besides their trade goods, the food and provisions for each journey, or purchase them along the way. Unlike an army, they do not have to forage and pillage and make new enemies as they go. So they arrive safely at their destination, they do their profitable trading, they march themselves and your armed men home again, and they pay a lavish tax into your Snake Woman's treasury. The predators along the route learn a painful lesson and they cease to haunt the trade roads. The people of the far lands learn that a peaceable commerce is to their advantage as well as ours. Every expedition which returns makes that journey easier for the next one. In time, I think, the pochtéa will be able entirely to dispense with your supportive troops."

Ahuítzotl demanded testily, "And what then becomes of our fighting men, when Tenochtítlan ceases to extend its domain? When the Mexíca no longer strive to grow in might and power, but simply sit and grow fat on commerce? When the once respected and feared Mexíca have become a swarm of peddlers haggling over weights and measures?"

"My lord exaggerates, to put this upstart in his place," I said, purposely exaggerating my own humility. "Let your fighters fight and your traders trade. Let the armies subjugate the nations easily within their reach, like Michihuácan nearby. Let the merchants bind the farther nations to us with ties of trade. Between them, Lord Speaker, there need never be any limit set to the world won and held by the Mexíca."

Ahuítzotl regarded me again, through an even longer silence. So, it seemed, did the ferocious bear's head above his throne. Then he said, "Very well. You have told us the reasons why you admire the profession of traveling merchants. Can you tell us some reasons why the profession would benefit from your joining it?"

"The profession, no," I said frankly. "But I can suggest some reasons why the Uey-Tlatoani and his Speaking Council might thus benefit."

He raised his bushy eyebrows. "Tell us, then."

"I am a trained scribe, which most traveling merchants are not. They know only numbers and the keeping of accounts. As the Revered Speaker has seen, I am capable of setting down accurate maps and detailed descriptions in word pictures. I can come back from my travels with entire books telling of other nations, their arsenals and storehouses, their defenses and vulnerabilities—" His eyebrows had lowered again during that speech. I thought it best to trail off humbly, "Of course, I realize that I must first persuade the pochtéa themselves that I qualify for acceptance into their select society..."

Ahuítzotl said drily, "We doubt that they would long remain obdurate toward a candidate proposed by their Uey-Tlatoani. Is that all you ask, then? That we sponsor you as a pochtéatl?"

"If it pleases my lord, I should like to take two companions. I ask that I be assigned not a troop of soldiers, but the Cuáchic Extli-Quani, as our military support. Just the one man, but I know him of old, and I believe he will be adequate. I ask also that I may take the boy Cozcatl. He should be ready to travel when I am."

Ahuítzotl shrugged. "The cuáchic we shall order detached from active army duty. He is overage for anything more useful than nursemaiding, anyway. As for the slave, he is already yours, and yours to command."

"I would rather he were not, my lord. I should like to offer him his freedom as a small restitution for the accident he suffered yesterday. I ask that the Revered Speaker officially elevate him from the status of tlacotli to that of a free macehuali. He will accompany me not as a slave, but with a free partner's share in the enterprise."

"We will have a scribe prepare the paper of manumission," said Ahuítzotl. "Meanwhile, we cannot refrain from remarking that this will be the most quaintly composed trading expedition ever to set out from Tenochtítlan. Whither are you bound on your first journey?"

"All the way to the Maya lands, Lord Speaker, and back again, if the gods allow. Extli-Quani has been there before, which is one reason I want him along. I hope we will return with a considerable profit to be shared with my lord's treasury. I am certain we will return with much information of interest and value to my lord."

What I did not say was that I fervently hoped also to return with my vision restored. The reputation of the Maya physicians was my overriding reason for choosing the Maya country as our destination.

"Your requests are granted," said Ahuítzotl. "You will await a summons to appear at The House of Pochtéa for examination." He stood up from his grizzled-bear throne, to indicate that the interview was terminated. "We shall be interested to talk to you again, Pochtéatl Mixtli, when you return. If you return."

I went upstairs again, to my apartment, to find Cozcatl awake, sitting up in the bed, hands over his face, crying as if his life were finished. Well, a good part of it was. But when I entered and he looked up and saw me, his face showed first bewildered shock, then delighted recognition, then a radiant smile beaming through his tears.

"I thought you were dead!" he wailed, scrambling out from the quilts and hobbling painfully toward me.

"Get back in that bed!" I commanded, scooping him up and carrying him there, while he insisted on telling me:

"Someone seized me from behind, before I could flee or cry out. When I woke later, and the doctor said you had not returned to the palace, I supposed you must be dead. I thought I had been wounded only so I could not warn you. And then, when I woke in your bed a little while ago, and you still were not here, I knew you must—"

"Hush, boy," I said, as I tucked him back under the quilt.

"But I failed you, master," he whimpered. "I let your enemy get past me."

"No, you did not. Chimali was satisfied to injure you instead of me, this time. I owe you much, and I will see that the debt is paid. This I promise: when the time comes that I again have Chimali in my power, you will decide the fitting punishment for him. Now," I said uncomfortably, "are you aware—in what manner he wounded you?"

"Yes," said the boy, biting his lip to stop its quivering. "When it happened, I knew only that I was in frightful pain, and I fainted. The good doctor let me stay in my faint while he—while he did what he could. But then he held something of a piercing smell under my nose, and I woke up sneezing. And I saw—where he had sewn me together."

"I am sorry," I said. It was all I could think to say.

Cozcatl ran a hand down the quilt, cautiously feeling himself, and he asked shyly, "Does this mean I am a girl now, master?"

"What a ridiculous idea!" I said. "Of course not."

"I must be," he said sniffling. "I have seen between the legs of only one female undressed, the lady who was late our mistress in Texcóco. When I saw myself—down there—before the doctor put on the bandage—it looked just the way her private parts looked."

"You are not a girl," I said firmly. "You are far less so than the scoundrel Chimali, who knifes from behind, in the way only a woman would fight. Why, there have been many warriors who have suffered that same wound in combat, Cozcatl, and they have gone on being warriors of manly strength and ferocity. Some have become more mighty and famous heroes afterward than they were before."

He persisted, "Then why did the doctor—and why do you, master—look so long-faced about it?"

"Well," I said, "it does mean that you will never father any children."

"Oh?" he said, and, to my surprise, seemed to brighten. "That is no great matter. I have never liked being a child myself. I hardly care to make any others. But... does it also mean that I can never be a husband?"

"No... not necessarily," I said hesitantly. "You will just have to seek the proper sort of wife. An understanding woman. One who will accept what kind of husbandly pleasure you can give. And you did give pleasure to that unmentionable lady in Texcóco, did you not?"

"She said I did." He began to smile again. "Thank you for your reassuring me, master. Since I am a slave, and therefore cannot own a slave, I would like to have a wife someday."

"From this moment, Cozcatl, you are not a slave, and I am no longer your master."

The smile went, and alarm came into his face. "What has happened?"

"Nothing, except that now you are my friend and I am yours."

He said, his voice tremulous, "But a slave without a master is a poor thing, master. A rootless and a helpless thing."

I said, "Not when he has a friend whose life and fortunes he shares. I do have some small fortune now, Cozcatl. You have seen it. And I have plans for increasing it, as soon as you are fit to travel. We are going south, into the alien lands, as pochtéa. What do you think of that? We will prosper together, and you will never be poor or rootless or helpless. I have just come from asking the Revered Speaker's sanction of the enterprise. I have also asked him for the official paper which says that Cozcatl is no longer my slave but my partner and friend."

Again there were tears and a smile on his face at the same time. He laid one of his small hands on my arm, the first time he had ever touched me without command or permission, and he said. "Friends do not need papers to tell them they are friends."

* * *

Tenochtítlan's community of merchants had, not many years before, erected its own building to serve as a combined warehouse for the trading stock of all the members, as their meeting hall, accounting offices, archival libraries, and the like. The House of Pochtéa was situated not far from The Heart of the One World and, though smaller than a palace, it was quite palatial in its appointments. There was a kitchen and a dining room for the serving of refreshments to members and visiting tradesmen, and sleeping apartments upstairs for those visitors who came from afar and stayed overnight or longer. There were many servants, one of whom, rather superciliously, admitted me on the day of my appointment and led me to the luxurious chamber where three elderly pochtéa sat waiting to interview me.

I had come prepared to be properly deferential toward the august company, but not to be intimidated by them. Though I made the gesture of kissing the earth to the examiners, I then straightened and, without looking behind me, undid my mantle's clasp and sat down. Neither the mantle nor I hit the floor. The servant, however surprised he may have been by this commoner's magisterial air, somehow simultaneously caught my garment and whisked an icpali chair under me.

One of the men returned my salute with the merest movement of a hand, and told the servant to bring chocolate for us all. Then the three sat and regarded me for some time, as if taking my measure with their eyes. The men wore the plainest of mantles, and no ornaments at all, in the pochtéa tradition of being inconspicuous, unostentatious, even secretive about their wealth and station. However, their constraint in dress was a bit belied by their all three being almost oilily fat from good eating and easy living. And two of them smoked poquieltin in holders of chased gold.

"You come with excellent references," one of the men said acidly, as if he resented not being able to reject my candidacy forthwith.

"But you must have adequate capital," said another. "What is your worth?"

I handed over the list I had made of the various goods and currencies I possessed. As we sipped our frothy chocolate, on that occasion flavored and scented with the flower of magnolia, they passed the list from hand to hand.

"Estimable," said one.

"But not opulent," said another.

"How old are you?" the other asked me.

"Twenty and one, my lords."

"That is very young."

"But no handicap, I hope," I said. "The great Fasting Coyote was only sixteen when he became the Revered Speaker of Texcóco."

"Assuming you do not aspire to a throne, young Mixtli, what are your plans?"

"Well, my lords, I believe my richer cloth goods, the embroidered mantles and such, could hardly be afforded by any country people. I shall sell them to the nobles of the city here, who can pay the prices they are worth. Then I shall invest the proceeds in plainer and more practical fabrics, in rabbit-hair blankets, in cosmetics and medicinal preparations, in those manufactured things procurable only here. I shall carry them south and trade for things procurable only from other nations."

"That is what we have all been doing for years," said one of the men, unimpressed. "You make no mention of travel expenses. For example, a part of your investment must go to hire a train of tamémime."

"I do not intend to hire porters," I said.

"Indeed? You have a sufficient company to do all the hauling and toiling yourselves? That is a foolish economy, young man. A hired tamémi is paid a set daily wage. With companions you must share out your profits."

I said, "There will be only two others besides myself sharing in the venture."

"Three men?" the elder said scoffingly. He tapped my list. "With just the obsidian to carry, you and your two friends will collapse before you get across the southern causeway."

I patiently explained, "I do not intend to do any carrying or to hire any porters, because I will buy slaves for that work."

All three men shook their heads pityingly. "For the price of one husky slave, you could afford a whole troop of tamémime."

"And then," I pointed out, "have to keep them fed and shod and clothed. All the way south and back."

"But your slaves will go empty-bellied and barefooted? Really, young man..."

"As I dispose of the goods carried by the slaves, I will sell off the slaves. They should command a good price in those lands from which we have captured or conscripted so many of the native workers."

The elders looked slightly surprised, as if that was an idea new to them. But one said, "And there you are, deep in the southern wilds, with no porters or slaves to carry home your acquisitions."

I said, "I plan to trade only for those goods that are of great worth in little bulk or weight. I will not, as so many pochtéa do, seek jadestone or tortoiseshell or heavy animal skins. Other traders buy everything offered them, simply because they have the porters to pay and feed, and they might as well load them down. I will barter for nothing but items like the red dyes and the rarest feathers. It may require more circuitous traveling and more time to find such specialized things. But even I alone can carry home a bag full of the precious dye or a compacted bale of quetzal tototl plumes, and that one bundle would repay my entire investment a thousandfold."

The three men looked at me with a new if perhaps grudging respect. One of them conceded, "You have given this enterprise some thought."

I said, "Well, I am young. I have the strength for an arduous journey. And I have plenty of time."

One of the men laughed wryly. "You think, then, that we have always been old and obese and sedentary." He pulled aside his mantle to show four puckered scars in the flesh of his right side. "The arrows of the Huichol, when I ventured into their mountains of the northwest, seeking to buy their Eye-of-God talismans."

Another lifted his mantle from the floor to show that he had but one foot. "A nauyaka snake in the Chiapa jungles. The venom kills before you can take ten breaths. I had to amputate immediately, with my own maquahuitl in my own hand."

The third man bent so that I could see the top of his head. What I had taken for a full crop of white hair was really only a fringe around a dome that was a red and crinkled scar. "I went into the northern desert, seeking the dream-giving peyotl cactus buds. I made my way through the Chichimeca dog people, through the Teochichimeca wild dog people, even through the Zacachichimeca rabid dog people. But at last I fell among the Yaki, and, compared to those barbarians, all the dog people are as rabbits. I escaped with my life, but some Yaki savage is now wearing my scalp on a belt festooned with the hair of many other men."

Chastened, I said, "My lords, I marvel at your adventures, and I am awed by your courage, and I only hope I can someday approach your stature as pochtéa of achievement. I would be honored to be counted among the least of your society, and I would be grateful to partake of your hard-won knowledge and experience."

The three men exchanged another look. One of them murmured, "What say you?" and the other two nodded. The scalped old man said to me:

"Your first trading journey will necessarily be the real test of your acceptability. For know this: not all novice pochtéa come back from even that first foray. We will do everything possible to help you prepare properly. The rest is up to you."

I said, "Thank you, my lords. I will do whatever you suggest and heed whatever you care to speak. If you disapprove of my intended plan—"

"No, no," said one of them. "It has commendable originality and audacity. Let some of the merchandise carry the rest of the merchandise. Heh heh."

"We would amend your plan only to this extent," said another. "You are right, that your luxury goods would best be sold here in Tenochtítlan. But you should not waste the time necessary to sell them piece by piece."

"No, do not waste time," said the third. "Through long experience and through counsel with the seers and sayers, we have determined that the most auspicious date to set out upon an expedition is the day One Serpent. Today is Five House, so—let me see—a One Serpent day is coming up on the calendar in just twenty and three days. It will be the only One Serpent day in this year's dry season, which—believe me—is the only season for traveling south."

The first man spoke again. "Bring to us here your stock of those rich clothes and fabrics. We will calculate their worth and give you fair exchange in more suitable trade goods. We can dispose of the luxury items locally, and in our own good time. We will deduct only a small fraction on the exchange, as your initiatory contribution to our god Yacatectitli and to the maintenance of the society's facilities."

Perhaps I hesitated for a moment. He raised his eyebrows and said, "Young Mixtli, do not distrust your colleagues. Unless each of us is scrupulously honest, none of us profits or even survives. Our philosophy is as simple as that. And know this, too: you are to deal equally honestly with even the most ignorant savages of the most backward lands. Because, wherever you travel, some other pochtéatl has gone before or will come after. Only if every one trades fairly will the next be allowed into a community—or leave it alive."

I approached old Blood Glutton with some caution, half expecting him to erupt in profanity at the proposal that he play "nursemaid" to a fogbound first-time pochtéatl and a convalescent young boy. But, to my surprise, he was more than enthusiastic.

"Me? Your only armed escort? You would trust your lives and fortune to this old bag of wind and bones?" He blinked several times, snorted, and blew his nose into his hand. "Why, how could I decline such a vote of confidence?"

I said, "I would not propose it if I did not know you to be considerably more than wind and bones."

"Well, the war god knows I want no part of another farcical campaign like that one in Texcala. And my alternative—ayya!—is to teach again in a House of Building Strength. But ayyo!—to see those far lands again..." He gazed off toward the southern horizon. "By the war god's granite balls, yes! I thank you for the offer and I accept with gladness, young Fog—" He coughed. "Er—master?"

"Partner," I said. "You and I and Cozcatl will share equally in whatever we bring back. And I hope you will call me Mixtli."

"Then, Mixtli, allow me to take on the first task of preparation. Let me go to Azcapotzálco and do the buying of the slaves. I am an old hand at judging man-flesh, and I have known those dealers to pull some cheating tricks. Like tamping melted beeswax under the skin of a scrawny chest."

I exclaimed, "Whatever for?"

"The wax hardens and gives a man the bulging pectoral muscles of a tocotini flyer, or gives a woman breasts like those of the legendary pearl divers who inhabit The Islands of the Women. Of course, come a hot day, the woman's teats droop to her knees. Oh, do not worry; I will not buy any female slaves. Unless things down south have changed drastically, we will not lack for willing cooks, laundresses—bed warmers as well."

So Blood Glutton took my quills of gold dust and went off to the slave market in Azcapotzálco on the mainland and, after some days of culling and bargaining, came back with twelve good husky men. No two were of the same tribe or from the same dealer's slave pen; that was Blood Glutton's precaution against any of them being friends or cuilóntin lovers who might conspire in mutiny or escape. They came already supplied with names, but we could not trouble to memorize all of those, and simply redubbed the men Ce, Ome, Yeyi, and so on; that is, numbers One, Two, Three, through Twelve.

During those days of preparation, Ahuítzotl's palace physician was allowing Cozcatl out of bed for longer and longer periods at a time, and finally removed the stitches and bandages, and prescribed exercises for him to perform. Soon the boy was as healthy and spirited as before, and the only thing remindful of his injury was that he had to squat like a female to urinate.

I made the exchange of goods at The House of Pochtéa, turning in my high-quality wares and getting in return about sixteen times their quantity in more practical cheap trade goods. Then I had to select and purchase the equipment and provisions for our expedition, and the three elders who had conducted my examination were only too pleased to help me. I suspect they enjoyed a sense of reliving old times, in arguing over the comparative strength of maguey-fiber versus hemp-rope tumplines, in debating the respective advantages of deerskin water bags (which lose none of their contents) and clay water jars (which lose some to evaporation, but thereby keep the water cool), in acquainting me with the rather crude and imprecise maps they lent me, and in imparting all manner of old-expert advice:

"The one food that transports itself is the techíchi dog. Take along a goodly pack of them, Mixtli. They will forage for their own food and water, but they are too pudgy and timid to run wild. Dog is not the tastiest of meats, of course, but you will be glad to have it handy when wild game is scarce."

"When you do kill a wild animal, Mixtli, you need not carry and age the meat until it loses it toughness and gamy flavor. Wrap the meat in the leaves of a papaya tree and it will be rendered tender and savory overnight."

"Be wary of the women in lands where Mexíca armies have raided. Some of those women were so maltreated by our soldiers, and bear such a grudge, that they have deliberately let their parts become infected with the dread disease nanaua. Such a woman will couple with any passing Mexícatl to get her revenge, so that he will eventually suffer the rotting away of his tepúli and his brain."

"If you should run out of bark paper for keeping your accounts, simply pluck the leaves of any grapevine. Write on them with a sharp twig, and the white scratches on the green leaves are as enduring as paint on paper."

Very early in the morning of the day One Serpent, we left Tenochtítlan: Cozcatl, Blood Glutton, and I—and our twelve slaves under their tumplined burdens, and the pack of plump little dogs frisking about our feet. We set off along the causeway that leads southward across the lake. To our right, to the west, on the nearest point of the mainland, rose the mount of Chapultepec. On its rock face, the first Motecuzóma had caused his likeness to be carved in giant size, and every subsequent Uey-Tlatoani had cumulated his example. According to report, Ahuítzotl's immense portrait there was almost finished, but we could make out no detail of any of the sculptured reliefs, because that hill was not yet in daylight. The month was our Panquetzaliztli, when the sun rises late and well to the southeast, from directly behind the peak of Popocatepetl.

When we first stepped onto the causeway, there was nothing to be seen in that direction but the usual morning fog glowing with the opal light of imminent dawn. But slowly the fog thinned, and gradually the massive but shapely volcano became discernible, as if it were moving forward from its eternal place and coming toward us. When the veil of mist all dissipated, the mountain was visible in its entirety. The snow-covered cone radiated a glorious halo from the sun behind it. Then, seemingly from the crater itself, Tonatíu bounded upward and the day came, the lake glittering, the lands all around washed with pale gold light and pale purple shadows. At the same instant, the incense-burning volcano exhaled a gout of blue smoke which rose and billowed into the form of a gigantic mushroom.

It had to be a good omen for our journey: the sun blazing on Popocatepetl's snowy crest and making it gleam like white onyx encrusted with all the jewels of the world, while the mountain itself saluted with that lazily climbing smoke, saying:

"You depart, my people, but I remain, as I always have and always will, a beacon to guide your safe return."

I H S

S.C.C.M.

Sanctified, Caesarean, Catholic Majesty, the Emperor Don Carlos, Our Lord King:

Royal and Imperial Majesty, our Revered Ruler: from the City of Mexíco, capital of New Spain, this second day after Rogation Sunday in the year of Our Lord one thousand five hundred thirty, greeting.

Regarding the query in Your Esteemed Majesty's most recent letter, we must confess ourselves unable to report to Your Majesty the exact number of Indian prisoners sacrificed by the Aztecs on that occasion of "dedicating" their Great Pyramid, more than forty years ago. The pyramid is long gone now, and so are any records of that day's victims, if indeed any count was ever kept.

Our Aztec chronicler of that occasion, present on that occasion, is himself unable to set the number closer than "thousands"—but it is possible that the old charlatan exaggerates the figure in order to make that day (and that edifice) seem more historically important. Our precursors here, the Franciscan missionary friars, have variously estimated the number of that day's sacrifices at anywhere from four thousand to eightythousand. But those good brothers, too, may have inflated the figure, perhaps unconsciously influenced by their sheer revulsion at such an occurrence, or perhaps to impress upon us, their new-come Bishop, the inherent bestiality of the native population.

We hardly require any exaggeration to persuade us of the Indians' inborn savagery and depravity. We readily believe it, for we have the daily evidence of this storyteller whose presence we endure at Your Most Magnificent Majesty's behest. Over these past months, his few utterances of any value or interest have been woefully outweighed by his vile and venereous maunderings. He has nauseated us by interrupting his accounts of solemnly intended ceremonies, significant travels, and momentous events, simply to dwell on some transient lust—his own or anybody else's—and minutely to describe the gratification of it, in all the physically possible ways, in preferably infructuous ways, in often disgusting and defiling ways, including that perversion of which St. Paul said, "Let it not so much as be named among you."

Given what we have learned from him of the Aztec character, we can readily believe that the Aztecs wouldwillingly have slaughtered eighty thousand of their fellows at the Great Pyramid, and in one day, except that the feat would have been impossible. Even if the executing priests had worked unceasingly around the clock, they would have to kill fifty and five men every minute during those twenty and four hours, a rate of nearly one per second. And even the lesser estimates of the number of victims are hard to credit. Having ourself had some experience of mass executions, we find it difficult to believe that such primitive people as these could have managed the disposal of many thousands of corpses before they putrefied and engendered a citywide pestilence.

However, whether the number butchered that day had been eighty thousand, or a tenth of that figure, a hundredth, a thousandth of that figure, it still would be execrable to any Christian and a horror to any civilized person, that so many should have died in the name of a false religion and to the glory of demonic idols. Wherefore, at our instigation and command, Sire, in the seventeen months since our arrival here, there have been destroyed five hundred thirty and two temples of various sizes, from elaborate structures on high pyramids to simple altars erected inside natural caves. There have been destroyed in excess of twenty and one thousand idols of various sizes, from monstrous carved monoliths to small clay household figurines. To none of those will there ever again be a human sacrificed, and we will continue to seek out and cast down others as the borders of New Spain expand.