Doctor Who_ Left-Handed Hummingbird - Kate Orman [27]
And in 1519, Fernando Cortés and six hundred Spaniards had destroyed them almost completely.
‘How completely?’ said Bernice aloud. Had something survived? Something from Tenochtitlan, crushed beneath the weight of Mexico City, that was still alive, still here?
* * *
Achtli found himself slumped against the wall of the party room. The Doctor was standing over him, holding his knife. The young priest closed his eyes, seeing colours snake before him in the darkness, and waited to feel the bite of the blade.
He heard the warrior maid say, ‘Why’d he try to kill you?’
‘Tlotoxl tried to test Barbara’s divinity with poison,’ said the Ticitl. His voice sounded like a conch‐shell inside Achtli’s head. ‘The gods can’t be killed.’
Achtli opened his eyes, squinting, as the warrior knelt down beside him. Cold sweat broke out on his forehead, and he realized that his shoulders were trembling. He gulped a breath.
‘Doctor,’ said the warrior, ‘this guy’s comfortably numb.’
‘Mmm.’ Achtli felt the rim of his eye gripped. Tears pooled as the Doctor peered into his dilated pupil. ‘Have you been eating mushrooms, Achtli?’
The priest pulled his head away from that atlaca gaze and nodded sharply. Everything about the stranger was so… strange: the clothes, the pale skin, the foreign voice, the eyes. If he were not a god himself, he was a manifestation, a splash of sacred colour spilled into the picture‐book of the ordinary world. ‘He’s marginally telepathic,’ the Ticitl told his warrior, incomprehensibly.
‘Like Cristián?’
‘Apparently psychic sensitivity is floating around in the Aztec gene pool.’
‘But drugs normally suppress psychic ability,’ said Ace.
‘Yes, as does anything which interferes with the normal activity of the brain – in this case, with the serotonin metabolism. But the native Americans have a long tradition of using hallucinogens for religious revelation. Who told you to come here with your knife, Achtli? Was it one of the priests?’
‘The Blue,’ said Achtli. ‘Xiuitl. The mushroom told me.’
‘It’s no use talking to him while he’s got his reindeers hooked up, Doctor.’
The Ticitl was shaking his head. ‘What did the mushroom tell you?’
‘I hear it singing,’ said Achtli. ‘Always singing. In the temple, in the mountains. The gods let flowers fall onto the earth, they’re our songs, lasting only as long as a blossom.’ He giggled. ‘On snake mountain, on the way to Tifla…’
‘What’s that?’
* * *
There were all sorts of records and rumours of lost Aztec treasures: mostly gold and precious stones, things that had been stolen by conquistadors or archaeological poachers. Many of Cortés’ men had drowned in the marsh, weighed down by their plate mail and the gold they were carrying.
Bernice flipped through a photo album of the Institute’s collection: earrings, lip and nose plugs, statues, obsidian clubs and arrow‐tips. From time to time, Mesoamerican treasures turned up on the black market. When the Institute could, it quietly bought them. How many works of art had ended up as gold bars?
Among the many items said to exist were half a dozen codices that would more clearly explain the Aztecs’ religion; human‐sized golden statues with gems for eyes; whole warrior costumes preserved intact; mysterious weapons of war. There was never any specific evidence, no location or seller mentioned – just the rumours.
Bernice closed the photo album and rubbed her weary eyes. She hadn’t come much closer to solving the mystery. Now all she could do was wait for the Doctor and Ace to return.
And if they didn’t?
She wondered if Spanish were easy to learn.
* * *
‘Coatlicue became magically pregnant when a ball of hummingbird feathers fell out of the sky near her,’ Achtli was chanting, almost inaudibly. ‘She was sweeping, cleaning the temple, and she tucked the feathers into her skirt. When she looked again, they had vanished. When Coyolxauhqui learned that her mother was pregnant, she became so jealous that she gathered together her brothers, the stars of the southern sky, and