War God (58 page)

‘Me, sir?’ Pepillo asked in a small voice.

‘Do you see any other boys here?’ snapped La Serna.

Pepillo turned to Díaz and Mibiercas but there was no give in their eyes. Feeling sick, he joined Melchior by the body, knelt and raised the hatchet but at first couldn’t bring himself to strike a blow. ‘Do it!’ Melchior snarled, his face so livid with violence and fury that Pepillo started back in shock. ‘Do it if you’re my friend!’

Suddenly something broke inside Pepillo and he chopped the hatchet down into Muñoz’s shoulder, then again – hack! hack! – into his neck, feeling the vertebrae separate, and finally, in a frenzy himself now, into the back of the friar’s head until the bones of his skull splintered.

‘Good enough,’ said Díaz. He stood behind Pepillo and Melchior, put his big, strong hands under their arms and lifted them to their feet. As he did so the swordsman Mibiercas favoured them both with a grim smile. ‘Well done, lads!’ he said. ‘We’re all in this together now.’

The world spun. Pepillo doubled over, clutching his stomach, and vomited.

A few moments later, still feeling faint, Pepillo sat on the trunk of the fallen tree where Muñoz had perched triumphantly not long before, and watched as Melchior helped the three soldiers tidy various items away into a knotted canvas sack lying empty and open on the ground. When he’d waded naked through the sea from the
San Sebastián
, it was presumably inside this sack that the friar had bundled his habit, his sandals, his bone-handled razor, his Bible, several coils of rope of different lengths and the two altar candles he’d used to illuminate the scene. Now one by one, with the exception of his slashed and blood-sodden habit, which was left to cover his body, they all went back into the sack.

‘Did he know you were going to follow him up here?’ Díaz asked.

Pepillo and Melchior both shook their heads. ‘He couldn’t have known. We didn’t tell anyone what we were planning.’

‘He must have been onto you,’ said Díaz, coiling away the last of the lengths of rope, ‘because he came prepared – right down to candles so he could see what he was doing.’

Pepillo felt a shiver run down his spine. ‘How did
you
know we’d be here?’ he asked.

‘We didn’t,’ said La Serna. ‘We were waiting for our chance and tonight was it – which was good luck for you boys.’

‘We were with Córdoba,’ explained Mibiercas. ‘A lot of good men died because of Muñoz. He had this coming to him.’

‘And more good men would have died if we’d let him live,’ added Díaz. ‘At least now Cortés can run this expedition the way it should be run, and make us all rich, without having to take a meddling Inquisitor into account.’

‘Does Cortés know about this?’ Pepillo asked.

‘No, lad, he knows nothing,’ said Díaz. ‘And he must not learn of it. What happened tonight didn’t happen. You will never speak of it again and we will never speak of it again.’

Mibiercas, his great sword now slung in its scabbard across his back, was more emphatic. ‘If word of this gets out,’ he said, glaring at Melchior then shifting his gaze to Pepillo, ‘I’ll have your heads. Remember that.’

‘Word won’t get out, sir,’ said Pepillo. ‘We’re truly grateful to you for saving our lives and we’ll keep our mouths shut.’

Melchior nodded his agreement: ‘It’s like you said, Mibiercas. We’re all in this together and we all have to watch each other’s backs.’

Pepillo was impressed by Díaz and his friends, and not only because of the rescue. They could have left Muñoz in the clearing but they wouldn’t do so because the Indians of Cozumel would certainly be blamed if he was found, and another bloodbath might result. Instead they’d decided to dump the corpse in the sea off a remote headland they’d reconnoitred more than a mile away from the fleet’s anchorage. ‘It’s better we have a mystery than a murder,’ La Serna explained with a lopsided grin.

Most of the night had passed and dawn was beginning to lighten the sky in the east by the time they reached the headland. Gulls wheeled and squawked, waves crashed and burst against jagged rocks with a strange booming echo, and a strong wind was blowing as the soldiers gathered heavy stones and used the ropes from the canvas sack to tie them securely to Muñoz’s body.

‘Anyone want to say a few words on behalf of the deceased?’ asked Díaz.

‘He was a wicked man,’ said La Serna. ‘May his soul rot in Hell.’

‘He asked for mercy,’ said Mibiercas, ‘that he never showed to others.’

‘We gave him a bad death,’ said Díaz, ‘and he must account for himself before his maker now. When we’re judged for what we’ve done, as we surely will be when our own time comes, I pray the Lord does not deal too harshly with us.’

Just before they rolled the corpse into the deep water, Pepillo caught a glimpse of Muñoz’s broken skull and pale, blood-smeared face.

The friar’s black eyes were wide open and they seemed to glare back at him with a fierce and living hunger.

‘I’ve had a report from my informant in Cuitláhuac’s household,’ Huicton said. ‘It seems Guatemoc makes daily offerings to the goddess Temaz for her miraculous intervention. Would you consider paying the prince another visit?’

Tozi’s heart raced at the thought. She could not forget poor, lost Coyotl but she had ceased her fruitless search for him and during the twenty days since the dramatic events in the royal hospital, Guatemoc had been more on her mind than she cared to admit. ‘Pay the prince another visit?’ she asked, feigning nonchalance. ‘What would be the purpose? We achieved our goal of disturbing Moctezuma’s household. Suspicion is everywhere now. A rift has opened between him and his brother that can never be mended.’

‘We must think ahead to when Moctezuma is gone … We must look to his successor.’

‘Quetzalcoatl will succeed him.’

‘So you believe. But we must live in the real world of men where gods do not descend from the sky every day. I pray you’re right, but I must plan for the possibility that you’re wrong.’

‘I’m not wrong, Huicton! You’ll see.’

‘Very well, Tozi. You’re not wrong. But humour me. Imagine for a moment that Quetzalcoatl does not return but that we succeed in driving Moctezuma mad – and so far we have done rather well – and bring about his downfall anyway. His son Chimalpopoca is sickly and, even if he lives, will be too young to take the throne for many years. There will be a struggle for power …’

‘And surely Cuitláhuac will win it,’ Tozi said begrudgingly. She disliked any line of thought that didn’t involve Quetzalcoatl.

‘Cuitláhuac may not
want
power. He’s not a natural leader and there’s every sign he knows his own limitations. If Moctezuma falls, Guatemoc will become a contender. Let’s take this opportunity to make him our man …’

‘Guatemoc? Our man? That puffed-up Mexica bully? You must be even crazier than Moctezuma if you think we can do that!’

‘Far from it, Tozi!’ Huicton rested a gnarled hand on her shoulder. ‘Recent events have put us – you! – in a unique position of influence. Not only did you foil Moctezuma’s plot but also my informant tells me that the prince holds you responsible for the healing he has experienced. After the goddess Temaz warned him of the poison, it seems she placed her hands on the battle wounds Guatemoc received fighting the Tlascalans. He felt a warm glow suffuse his body. At once his injuries, which were of the utmost seriousness, began to close up, as though by magic, and within days the sepsis had vanished. He is still in a great deal of pain, I am told, but his doctors say he will make a complete recovery and he attributes all of this to you—’

‘To Temaz you mean!’

‘There’s no difference. You
are
Temaz in his eyes! Go to him again in the regalia of the goddess. Appear to him. Work your way deeper into his affections and into his trust so we can use him for our own ends when the right time comes.’

‘That all sounds very clever,’ Tozi said, ‘but it could easily go wrong. Suppose Guatemoc sees through my disguise? Catches me out in some way? Then instead of making an ally we’ll make an even worse enemy.’

‘I don’t see why you should get caught,’ the old spy said. ‘You’re confident of your invisibility now?’

‘Yes, completely confident!’

‘More to the point,
I’m
confident of it after what you did with Guatemoc, Mecatl and the poison. When you make yourself invisible no one can see you, no one can seize you. So if anything does go wrong you simply slip into invisibility and escape.’

Seeing her chance, Tozi admitted: ‘There’s something I haven’t told you.’

‘Oh?’ Despite their milky opacity, Huicton’s eyes could sometimes be very expressive and now was one of those times.

‘It isn’t just what I was able to do at the hospital that’s made me confident,’ Tozi said. ‘I’ve been going into Moctezuma’s palace as well.’ She giggled. ‘I’ve watched him a few times while he’s been eating his meals. I’ve even been in his bedchamber!’

‘You’ve what?’ Huicton looked startled, and genuinely angry. ‘I told you to stay away from the palace. It’s too dangerous there.’

‘Well you were wrong.’ Tozi stuck out her lower lip. ‘And I was right. You said Moctezuma had sorcerers who might magic me but they’re useless. I’ve slipped past them and they haven’t noticed a thing and I’ve been there with him, right beside him without anyone knowing – and I’ve been
torturing
him, Huicton!’

‘Torturing him? Whatever do you mean?’

‘The gift Hummingbird gave me. To magnify my enemies’ fears? I’ve been using it on Moctezuma the same way I used it that night on the great pyramid.’ Tozi giggled again. ‘He’s troubled by his bowels and I’ve been working on that. Quite a lot actually. His stomach never gives him peace. Oh, and I’ve stopped his
tepulli
working …’

‘His
tepulli
?’ Huicton was choking with surprise. ‘What do you know of
tepullis
, young lady?’

‘What do you mean, “young lady”?’ Tozi asked scornfully. ‘Girls of my age are married with children. Of course I know what a
tepulli
is!’ Another giggle: ‘And I know what they have to do if they’re going to work!’

Huicton just looked at her through his cloudy eyes.

‘They have to stand up!’ Tozi shrieked, ‘and I’ve made Moctezuma’s
tepulli
as limp as a little worm so he can’t enjoy his wives and mistresses. They mock him behind his back. He’s
very
upset about it.’

Huicton was laughing now, a great rumbling, rolling guffaw of sheer pleasure. ‘Oh Tozi,’ he said, wiping a tear from his eye, ‘you are a prodigy.’

She didn’t want to admit she didn’t know what a prodigy was so she said: ‘About Guatemoc? When do you want me to start?’

It was the auspicious morning of the Vernal Equinox, Sunday 21 March 1519, when Alaminos piloted the
Santa María
into the wide bay at the mouth of the Tabasco river and Cortés gave the order for the fleet to drop anchor. He would require no work of the men today, only prayer. Tomorrow, Monday 22 March, they would sally forth against the town of Potonchan to punish the Chontal Maya as Saint Peter required.

Not that the men knew of Cortés’s dreams! He’d kept his real motive secret, even from Alvarado, and sold the planned attack on Potonchan as a reprisal for the humiliation of the Córdoba expedition the year before. Most of the survivors of that debacle were here, after all, and itching for revenge; many others who’d lost friends and relatives were equally enthusiastic; for the rest, the pride and honour of Spain and the hope of treasure provided ample incentives.

Much had happened in the twenty days since young Gonzalo de Sandoval had returned in triumph to Cozumel with the shipwrecked Spaniard Jerónimo de Aguilar. After eight years spent amongst the Maya, the castaway knew their language with complete fluency and quickly began to prove his worth as an interpreter. Even his skills, however, which allowed a thorough interrogation of the chief and notables of Cozumel – and in due course almost the entire population of the island – could not solve the mystery of the sudden disappearance of Father Gaspar Muñoz.