Naamah's Blessing - Jacqueline Carey [172]
She looked away, her chin trembling. “I am afraid.”
“I know,” I repeated. “Nonetheless, you must choose.”
SIXTY
Islept, and dreamed of falling. Downward and downward, as though I’d leapt into an immense chasm, until at last I struck bottom and woke with a violent jerk, unsure if I was awake or dreaming, alive or dead.
There was a hand clamped over my mouth.
For a moment, I was confused, once again imagining myself in a tent in the Abode of the Gods with Manil Datar assaulting me; but there was no knife at my throat, no scent of his cloying perfume. I squinted in the faint moonlight filtering into my bedchamber and made out the face of the old woman Ocllo above me.
“Be still!” she hissed.
I nodded my understanding. Ocllo withdrew her hand and straightened. I sat upright to see the shadowy figures of several other women in my chamber, Cusi among them, her pretty face somber. Ocllo beckoned imperiously to her.
“Pampachayuway, lady,” Cusi whispered to me, taking a seat beside me. “I do not wish to pain you, but I must do this thing. Give me your hand.”
I hesitated.
Her dark eyes were grave, and older than her years. “You put the lives of your Nahuatl men in my hands. Will you not put your own?”
Slowly, I extended my right hand. Wrapping her fingers around my wrist, Cusi pressed the tip of her little bronze knife against the heel of my palm. With one surprisingly powerful thrust, she sliced open my palm.
Bronze does not take a point or hold an edge like steel, and it hurt a great deal more than I would have reckoned. I bit back a cry and breathed the Breath of Wind’s Sigh, willing my mind to distance itself from the pain while my cupped palm filled slowly with blood, dark and shiny in the faint light. Releasing my wrist, Cusi administered the same treatment to her own right hand, opening a gash without flinching.
“Now.” She held out her hand to me, blood dripping from it. On their sisal rope, the ball of ants stirred with interest. The other women in the chamber watched with silent concentration.
I clasped Cusi’s wounded hand with my own. It was slippery with warm blood. She returned my grip firmly. I could feel my pulse beating in my palm, and imagined I could feel hers, too, every beat a throb of dull agony.
It went on for a long time, until at last Ocllo nodded in approval and beckoned to two more women. Cusi relinquished her grip. One of the women came forward with a golden bowl full of water, kneeling and gently bathing Cusi’s and my injured hands, after which the other woman bandaged them gently.
“Now you are of one blood,” Ocllo murmured. “Now you are as sisters. Now you may enter the Temple of the Maidens of the Sun, lady.” She beckoned to me. “Come.”
After exchanging my thin sleeping-shift for a gown, I exited the palace and followed the Maidens of the Sun through the streets of Vilcabamba, accompanied by the ever-present stream of ants.
The city was quiet and sleeping, for Lord Pachacuti had no need to post sentries. His ants would respond to any intruder, or anyone seeking to flee. We were neither, and there was no one to take notice of us. We passed through the city like silent ghosts. My hand continued to throb, slow blood seeping through the bandages.
I daresay the Temple of the Maidens of the Sun was a glorious place in daylight, when the sun was meant to be worshipped. By night, it was a vast, eerie space. Low flames flickered in a firepit in the center of the main temple chamber, shedding enough light to illuminate a massive golden disk depicting the Quechua sun god Inti on the far wall, not enough to chase the shadows from the corners or the high ceilings.
More silent women awaited us, many of them young and pretty.
After the black stream of ants had finished pouring over the threshold, the doors to the temple were closed.
“So!” Ocllo’s voice echoed in the vast chamber. “You say Lord Pachacuti is not a god!”
There was a soft, murmuring echo as someone translated her words from D’Angeline into Quechua.
“I do,” I said.
She gestured at