Chapter Sixty-One: The Child Hunt

Chapter Sixty-One: The Child Hunt

I came to the hunt dressed for war.

Iztacoatl had me clothed in the emperor’s fabled scarlet Tlahuiztli, as if I were about to lead my armies to glory rather than to attend an unjust execution. This lightweight armor put those worn by my warrior lodges to shame. Its laminate layers of cotton, leather, and scales formed an impressive protection coating my chest, legs, and arms. Each of them had been bathed in secret spices and sacrificial blood to give them a crimson coloration. I sensed the latter’s viscous texture on my skin, though this costume did not reduce my speed in the slightest.

The higher-ranked a warrior, the more ornate his equipment; and none should look more fearsome and ostentatious than Yohuachanca’s emperor. A small cloak of flayed skin belonging to ancient warriors slain by my predecessors adorned my shoulders, alongside shining rubies and pitch-black obsidian crystals. The damn jade bat mask that I had worn when the First Emperor last spoke through me served as my helmet, its back adorned with a crown of quetzal feathers.

I’d heard tales that enemy warriors often fell to an emperor’s feet in fear when they took the field of battle, and I understood why when I took a look at myself in a mirror. I had become the very image of a bat warrior god rising to claim a tribute of blood and fear.

Wearing the mask unsettled me too. Iztacoatl no doubt forced me to wear it because she disguised this cruel execution as a religious ritual, but it also possessed a strong connection to her dreadful sire. The thought of that monster speaking through me again did not enchant me in the slightest.

Did Iztacoatl intend to study how it would impact me? Or how much her father dearest influences me? Or was she playing a larger game that I couldn’t see yet?

Whatever the case, Iztacoatl had selected a halfway intact forest spared by the eruption for her hunting grounds. Smoke Mountain loomed in the distance under the glow of crimson moonlight like a great black fang. Lightning wracked the skies in blood-curdling bouts of thunder as dreadful clouds began to blanket the stars.

A host of at least twenty Nightkin and over a hundred red-eyed priests gathered in these dark woods for the cruel ceremony, with the latter wearing sinister wooden serpent masks and scaled cloaks. They welcomed me with a maddened dance to the tune of wailing obsidian flutes, hunting horns, and war drums. Each and every one of them carried a weapon themed after their patron: scythes shaped like a snake’s fangs, barbed lashes, serpentine bows... The dulled edge of some blades told me that this hunt wasn’t a one-time occasion.

How often did these madmen gather in the dark to hunt down their own citizens?

Tayatzin and my four consorts were gently ‘invited’ to witness the hunt’s grand opening. Ingrid was weeping in fear and had to be restrained from embracing her sister by a Nightkin in full bat form. Nenetl covered her mouth in horror and powerlessness. Chikal alone appeared to retain a cool head in this situation; she had come dressed for battle, like myself.

As for Eztli, she glared at the Nightkin with malice and hatred that rivaled mine.

The sight gave me a little measure of hope in this dark moment. No matter how much my love had changed under the ritual’s influence, her heart remained true to itself.

However, it was poor Astrid who retained most of my attention. The poor girl had been dragged to this awful site with her hands bound, her mouth gagged, and her legs forced to kneel in submission. I would have loved to say that she stayed brave in this awful moment, but life didn’t work that way. Tears of panic poured down her cheeks instead. Her emerald eyes, so much like her mother’s, pleaded with her sister to come and save her.

The cultists’ song grew in volume into a maddened cacophony, while the Nightkin settled on hushed meditations. A mighty thunderbolt struck a tree near the congregation’s center and set it ablaze. A female figure appeared in the midst of the blinding flash in all of her terrible beauty, her magnificent feather dress fluttering before the pyre’s light.

I had to give it to Iztacoatl; she had a sense of theatrics that her sisters lacked. Even the wind had grown awfully silent, offering neither taunts nor support.

“Welcome to this year’s Hunter’s Moon!” Iztacoatl declared to her congregation. A priest gave her a goblet of fresh blood to dine upon, and she soon beckoned me to join her. “Please acclaim tonight's champion, our very own emperor!”

The cultists’ maddened cacophony of cheers and claps filled me with revulsion. I silently prayed for a second eruption to bury this lot under fire and smoke, or for the thunderbolts above to strike them all dead. Nonetheless, I confidently walked up to Iztacoatl with all the confidence my hatred could inspire in me. I wouldn’t let her rattle me.

“I want you to know, songbird,” Iztacoatl said as she sipped from her bloody cup. “That everything happening tonight shall be on your head.”

Was she too much of a coward to take responsibility for her own cruelty? She would have run this hunt whether or not Mother escaped her clutches. Only the quarry’s identity would have changed.

“Are you that frustrated about my mother’s escape?” I taunted her back, the cultists’ song muffling my words. “Or is this about Cipetl? Your scheme was painfully obvious.”

“Cipetl?” Iztacoatl raised an eyebrow at me. “What are you talking about, songbird?”

Did she think playing coy would throw me off my game?

Ingrid’s voice cut through the cacophony. “Take me! Take me instead!”

Her panicked words, fueled by desperation, drew both of my and Iztacoatl’s attention. Ingrid had collapsed to her knees, her forehead hitting the grass so intensely that I thought she might start bleeding.

“Please...” she begged Iztacoatl with trembling hands. “Not again...”

She had already seen a parent die before her eyes. Her heart wouldn’t survive the loss of her last sibling.

“Take me instead...” Ingrid looked up at Iztacoatl, her tearful eyes full of despair. “I will give you my life.”

“Ingrid, Ingrid... I already own your life...” Iztacoatl wagged her finger at her chosen consort. “Could you be under the misconception that I will execute your sister? Do you mistake me for Ocelocihuatl?”

I clenched my jaw. Those two sisters were equally matched when it came to awfulness.Visitt novelbin(.)co/m for the latest updates

“Unlike my dear elder, I do not believe in taking lives without giving them a chance,” Iztacoatl said. “Where’s the sport in a foregone conclusion? The uncertainty? The challenge?”

The challenge in what, hunting a child not even a decade old? My eyes lingered on Astrid, who had run out of tears and was now covered in the shadow of a Nightkin clutching her. That one felt vaguely familiar to me, though I couldn’t tell why. I have to take her to safety somehow.

But how? Revealing my powers now would be suicide. I wasn’t yet strong enough to take Iztacoatl in battle, let alone her Nightkin hunting party. No distraction would last long enough for the girl to escape, and even if she did, there was nowhere in Yohuachanca for her to hide.

“I am giving your sister a way out...” Iztacoatl smiled at me, her fangs flashing under the moonlight. “If our emperor proves a good enough protector.”

Here it was, the true reason for this sick game. It was yet another way to torment me and gauge my abilities. Iztacoatl had slowly increased the pressure since last night until it led to this moment.

“Be honored, for the grandest of rites is now upon you!” Iztacoatl declared to the crowd. “Our great emperor will now put his warrior skills to the test before the heavens and earth! Should he succeed, the gods above and below shall bless his campaign with eternal glory!”

The maddened crowd of cultists roared in religious frenzy like the beastly fanatics they truly were. The Nightkin, however, were as silent as tombs. Their eyes oozed hunger and bloodlust.

“And should he fail...” Iztacoatl chuckled to herself. “Well, he will learn the cost of not giving his all!”

I will not settle on half-measures the night I slay you, snake, I thought, my teeth biting my tongue so I keep my venom to myself. That, I promise you.

“Six hours separate us from dawn,” she explained, her gaze lingering on Astrid and me. “I will give our quarry and her champion a two-hour head start, after which I will send my pets to chase her; first my red-eyed flock, then my spawn. Finally, I shall join the hunt myself two hours before sunrise. That should keep the chase interesting.”

Of course the coward would go last.

“If dear Astrid survives until dawn, I shall not only spare her, but reward our emperor’s persistence with a gift of my own,” Iztacoatl said, though I didn’t believe in her promises in the slightest. “If one of my pets catches her though...”

The Nightlord relinquished her bloody goblet to a priest and then moved to grab Astrid with her inhumanly strong hands. She examined the poor girl the way a buyer would check out a prospective turkey to eat.

“First, she’ll be raped.” Iztacoatl’s words were cruel on their own, but they sounded even more awful when coming out of an adult woman’s mouth addressing a child. “It would be a shame for the daughter of an esteemed concubine of Sigrun’s standing to die a virgin. If our emperor performs well, I shall let him do the honors; otherwise, my pets shall take turns first.”

I didn’t think the Nightlords could inspire more disgust in me after I’d witnessed so many of their cruelties. I stood corrected. I struggled to suppress the wave of fury and nausea that overwhelmed me. More color drained from Ingrid’s face; tears of horror formed in gentle Nenetl’s gaze; Chikal clenched her jaw, her eyes radiating with disdain; and Eztli glared at Iztacoatl with undisguised loathing. Even Tayatzin of all people looked appalled by his mistress’ words.

I suddenly realized that Iztacoatl had been right about one thing. She and the Jaguar Woman were indeed different. The latter’s cruelty was guided by her ruthlessness and served as a tool to strengthen her control over others; Iztacoatl’s malice was wild, wanton, and freely shared. Unlike her colder sister, she enjoyed hurting mortals for its own sake rather than for any productive purpose.

I swore to myself that I would give Iztacoatl a taste of her own medicine before I killed her. I imagined bending that whore of a false goddess over a stone altar as I strangled her to death. How sweet our final kiss would be...

“Then whoever catches her will earn the privilege to drink her blood,” Iztacoatl continued. “Finally, I will have her head mounted on a wall inside our emperor’s bedchamber, so he never forgets the price of failure.”

Ingrid’s fear and sorrow suddenly turned to intense anger. When she realized that begging and pleading wouldn’t work, she must have remembered the Jaguar Woman’s warning when she had Lady Sigrun murdered; that obedience was expected and service would go unrewarded. The Nightlords saw all life as their playthings, to toy with and dispose of as they choose.

It was said that the failure of diplomacy always resulted in war; and when reason went unheard, anger always swelled back to take the lead.

“Your heart is more rotten than a festering corpse!” Ingrid spat at the Nightlord in full defiance of her congregation. “You are nothing but a soulless monster!”

“Are you doubting my generosity, Ingrid? After all the kindness I’ve shown you?” Iztacoatl dismissively trimmed her nails. “In that case, I will lower your sister’s head-start to one hour instead of two.”

That cruel response was meant to break Ingrid’s spirit, but Iztacoatl had miscalculated. My consort didn’t fall back weeping in prostration, nor did she beg for forgiveness; she had realized nothing she would say could save her sister. Even if she were to reveal our secrets, Iztacoatl would still kill Astrid sooner or later.

So when a false goddess failed her, she prayed to me for salvation.

Her fists instead clenched so tightly that blood began to drip between her fingers. Her eyes turned to Astrid in concern, then to me. I raised my head ever so slightly in response to her silent demand.

Ingrid had made me promise to protect her sister; and though this would be a heavy oath to keep tonight, I would do everything in my power to carry it through.

Iztacoatl hadn’t missed our short exchange though. This exercise was meant to torment me as much as it was about breaking Ingrid’s spirit, so the Nightlord quickly decided to double down further.

“Tayatzin,” Iztacoatl said softly. “Strip our quarry naked.”

It said something about Iztacoatl’s cruelty that even Tayatzin appeared shaken by her suggestion. He failed to obey her order on the spot, and mustered the courage to argue with his mistress.

“Goddess, she is...” Tayatzin gulped and carefully chose his next words. “She is the child of an emperor, and a consort’s sister... certainly her august birth and age afford her a measure of dignity...”

“Have you ever seen a hunted animal wearing clothes, Tayatzin?” Iztacoatl’s tone harshened noticeably. “Strip her naked. Now.”

Though I considered Tayatzin my enemy, the fact he remained silent a few seconds instead of immediately following through earned him a sliver of my respect. When he obeyed the loathsome order, it was with a scowl of shame and efficient speed. He cut through the back of Astrid’s dress in a single stroke with an obsidian dagger, revealing her pale skin and underdeveloped body. The poor girl tried to cover herself with her bound arms in shame and humiliation. Ingrid tried to reach out to her sister, but a Nightkin quickly grabbed her by the shoulder before she could reach out to her.

I contained my anger, waited for Tayatzin to step back and Iztacoatl to smirk in cruel triumph... and then dramatically grabbed my cloak and draped it on Astrid to warm her up without a word. She immediately clutched its fabric tightly and covered herself with it.

Iztacoatl’s unbearable smile quickly faded away, and the cultists’ song grew quieter. I didn’t care. Ingrid’s look of gratitude more than made up for it.

“Emperor Iztac, have you not heard my order?” Iztacoatl asked with a dangerous edge to her tone. “I asked that this girl be stripped naked.”

We fled into the forest without another word. Eztli flew between the zapote trees with Nenetl while the rest of us followed on foot. Astrid clung to Itzili with all of her strength. My loyal pet didn’t seem to mind, and in fact slightly adjusted his posture so she wouldn’t fall off his back.

The canopy grew thick with intertwining branches and thick foliage the further we advanced. The pale moonlight struggled to pierce through the dry blanket of leaves. The cultists’ music faded into the background while the noise of cicadas and frogs grew slightly louder. I took the latter as good news: frogs meant water and, hopefully, a stream or a river.

More ominous signs followed though. I heard the flutter of bat wings as they darted between the trees and the glow of animal eyes observing us in the shadows of towering ceiba trees. Thick moss and red vines smothered the noise of my footsteps, and I saw that Chikal briefly paused at some point to cover our shallow tracks with leaves.

The wind rustled between the leaves, but it remained eerily silent. Itzili was tense, as was Eztli above us. We’d all sensed it the further we progressed through uneven ground.

Something sinister prowled the night. I could feel it in my bones. I recognized the familiar miasma of evil alongside the rusty smell of dried blood. My thoughts were confirmed when Itzili began to bay and led us to a deer’s carcass. The beast had been exsanguinated until nothing but a dried husk remained. Chikal had us briefly stop to better examine it.

“Nightkin?” I asked Chikal, though I knew better. The smell of blood remained strong around this carrion.

“Bats,” Chikal replied while pointing at the countless biting marks on the animal’s back. They were too small for Nightkin, and too numerous too. That beast had been slain by a swarm’s worth of killers. “You know which kind, Iztac.”

Yes, I did. I sensed them around us, always out of sight yet forever present. My mask tightened slightly each time I sensed their gaze on my back. There was only one force in this world that could compel the wind’s silence.

The First Emperor’s servants haunted these woods. Bats and Nightchildren both.

It didn’t reassure me in the slightest. I could compel the latter to obey my orders, but these malevolent creatures hungered for life and feared no man. I suspected that the only reason a swarm hadn’t attacked Astrid and the others yet was because of my presence among them.

“Stay close,” I warned everyone. “They will strike the moment you leave my protection.”

“Can you order them to strike our pursuers?” Chikal asked.

“They won’t need an order to do so.” Not that it would offer us too much respite. “They will kill the cultists, but the Nightkin won’t have anything to fear from them.”

“That should at least impair them,” Eztli said as she landed near us with Nenetl, the latter immediately rushing to console Astrid. We had put enough space between us and our pursuers to discuss our options. “How do we proceed? I helped my mother gather herbs in this forest once in a while, so I know of a shallow river to the west. The water will smother our scent.”

“After we make decoys,” Chikal replied. My consort quickly browsed through nearby plants, then searched for something hidden under her cotton armor. “Cut that carrion to pieces and disperse them away from our trail, Eztli.”

“Why?” I asked curiously.

“The smell of blood coming from it will distract them,” Chikal replied. “We need to split up too. One group is too easy to track, and forcing our enemies to disperse will increase our chances of success.”

“This will invite attacks from the bats,” I warned her.

“Hence why we will split into two groups once we reach the stream,” Chikal replied after she found what she was looking for: a hidden obsidian knife, which she used to cut leaves off a plant. “One led by you, and another by Eztli, who can fly away from them.”

Nenetl paled at the sight of the blade. “Y-you brought a weapon? But the rules–”

“This is no weapon,” Chikal replied with a snort. “This is jewelry.”

I couldn’t help but scoff at her response. I supposed that from an amazon’s perspective, a knife was no different from a necklace. Besides, we could always lie and say that we found it on a corpse or stole it from one of our pursuers.

Eztli completed her task first, severing the deer to pieces and dropping its severed limbs in multiple directions. Chikal collected a collection of leaves and swiftly cut parts of Nenetl’s dress to use the linen as an improvised pooch.

“What’sthat?” Nenetl asked as she pinched her nose at the pungent smell. Itzili let out an annoyed noise. “It smells awful.”

“Allspice,” Eztli recognized. “Clever. The smell is strong enough to mask our scent from hounds.”

“They won’t use hounds,” Chikal replied confidently. “I didn’t see any dogs with the cultists, and the smell of Nightkin drives most animals mad with fear. Nor do they need them. Nightkin have excellent senses and can catch a whiff of blood from leagues away.”

“Hence the carrion,” I guessed.

“We’ll need more than a dead deer to trick them.” Chikal tossed me her knife. “We’ll need your blood, Iztac.”

I blinked in surprise, my eyes settling on the knife. Chikal didn’t wait for me to respond. She immediately had Nenetl help her crush the leaves and apply the resulting paste to both Eztli and Astrid.

“This should cover your scents for a while,” Chikal replied before addressing Eztli. “You’ll go into that stream of yours with Astrid, swim downstream, then exit it and fly away while we flee in the other direction.”

“Just the two of them?” I asked in surprise. “We won’t come with them?”

“If you want to save that young girl, no, you won’t,” Chikal confirmed. “Our pursuers will hunt Astrid’s scent first and yours second, Iztac, because they will assume that you will try to personally ensure her safety. Iztacoatl will never expect you to entrust to another, since you swore to Ingrid that you would protect her, and she’ll be confident that her agents can recover Eztli once she’s forced to hide from the daylight. She won’t be a priority.”

She’s right, I thought as Chikal’s plan dawned upon me. Iztacoatl was clever, but she didn’t think I fully trusted anyone with something so important, and the whole hunt’s goal was to torment me personally. Her followers would prioritize hunting me, and by the time they realized their mistake, Eztli might have covered enough ground to win us the dawn. She knew these woods, and she was fast enough to outpace the bats should they track her down. It’s risky, but doable.

However, that plan relied on us acting as decoys long enough for Astrid and Eztli to fly away. We would have to run for our lives, hope our pursuers would fall for the trick, and buy enough time.

I stared at the knife for a moment and then exchanged a knowing glance with Eztli. Following Chikal’s plan meant shedding blood to create a false trail for the Nightkin to follow. Iztacoatl already suspected something was wrong with it, but this would expose its true nature without a doubt.

As much as I loathed it, I briefly weighed the worth of Astrid’s life against the loss of that particular bit of information. Revealing the secret of my blood would lose me a surprise weapon once I turned against the Nightlords, but backing out now would lose me the trust of my consorts and Ingrid. Moreover, it was only a matter of time before Iztacoatl found out anyway; either by herself or when I would fight in the Flower War.

The best I could do was to play the discovery as an accident.

“There is something you must know about my blood,” I said as I raised the knife over my palm. “Observe.”

I slashed my own hand and let my blood burn. Without any Veil to hide its true nature, my veins erupted with a burst of golden flames lit with sunlight. Nenetl let out a startled noise, while Chikal’s eyes widened in genuine shock. Astrid alone stared at the fire with what could pass for genuine wonder; the reassuring glow and surprise strong enough to briefly overpower her fear.

“What...” Nenetl coughed in astonishment. “Are these... flames? Iztac, you’re burning!”

“My blood runs with sulfur flames by the First Emperor’s grace,” I lied. “When Eztli and I survived Smoke Mountain, we realized that my bodily fluids could harm her.”

Chikal immediately understood the implications. “How much?” she asked, ever the tactician ready to seize any advantage. “How long will it burn?”

“Not enough to kill a Nightkin by itself,” I warned her. “But my blood will burn their flesh so long as it doesn’t dry.”

Chikal crossed her arms, her expression thoughtful. “I’ve fought Nightkin in the past,” Chikal informed us. “Short of sunlight, the best way to kill one is to either behead them or bleed them to death. They will recover from almost anything else, no matter how severe the injury.”

“Interesting,” Eztli noted with a flicker of amusement. She clearly relished the thought of killing other vampires as much as I did. “Good to know.”

“To think that you turned what vampires desire most into a lethal poison, Iztac...” Chikal rarely smiled, and when she did, it always had a ferocious edge to it. “The irony is not lost on me.”

“This will light the way to victory,” I replied with confidence, mostly to help motivate them. I coated the knife with my blood until it became a blade of sunlight. “We shall not wait for the dawn, no. We shall bring it to our enemies instead.”

My bold words inspired my more forlorn allies. Nenetl’s eyes sparked up with hope, and Chikal quickly proceeded to grab stones off the ground and coat them in my holy blood. We would drop them off on our trail to make it look to our pursuers that we were trying to divert their attention. This ought to make them focus on my personal trail and lose track of Eztli’s.

“Stay downwind as much as possible,” Chikal advised Eztli once we reached the stream and prepared to split up. “Cover the two of you with mud once you exit the water, then fly without looking back. It doesn’t matter where, so long as it’s away from here.”

“Those fools will never catch me,” Eztli replied with vampiric confidence. “Kill a few of them for me, if you can.”

Chikal smirked in anticipation as she took back her knife. My blood had dried up and stopped smoking, but the obsidian’s surface had grown terribly hot. “With pleasure.”

Once we were ready, I took a moment to reassure Astrid. Nenetl managed to calm her down enough for her to stop crying, though her eyes were red and her skin pale. The poor child continued to tremble like a leaf, but when I knelt to better face her, her expression briefly warmed up.

I had shown her light in the darkness.

“Eztli will take you to safety,” I said. I hoped. “You must do everything she tells you to do. Obey her, and you will see your sister again. Can you promise me this?”

Astrid gulped, but bravery ran in her blood. “Y... yes,” she whispered after wiping away her tears. “I... promise.”

I kissed her on the forehead, her skin smooth and warm, then entrusted her to Eztli. My consort draped Astrid in my cloak like a babe about to be delivered, then entered the stream and swam away westward.

I’ve gathered capable allies and advisors, I thought once Eztli and Astrid vanished into the darkness, leaving me with Chikal, Nenetl, and Itzili. I would never have thought of this plan alone, let alone been able to pull it off. I am no longer fighting alone.

“Let us leave now,” Chikal advised. “The more ground we can cover, the better.”

I nodded sharply and then glanced at my pet. “Itzili, let’s go.”

My feathered tyrant ignored me. His gaze remained focused on the dark woods, his tail straight as an arrow. His reptilian legs were tense and his claws ready for battle. He looked the same as when...

When we met Cipetl.

A shiver traveled down my spine. I couldn’t see anything in the canopy’s darkness, but I knew what to expect.

The headstart’s hour had yet to run out, and yet something was already stalking us.