Hunger's Brides by W. Paul Anderson Read Free Book Online Page A

lava and rough as a file. Inside, it was dark and cold, with just a few candles shimmering on altars beneath shocks of fresh-cut flowers. As our eyes adjusted in the gloom, I saw the font where I was baptized. Above it a painting of John the Baptist.
    We got as far as the
crucero
† when Amanda tugged hard at my sleeve—
    â€œCinteotl …” she whispered, backing away and pulling me with her. Seated on a rough wooden throne, not crucified but bleeding from scores of wounds—as from volleys of arrows—was a black Christ. Not black—the blood was black, the skin stained a deep mahogany like Xochitl’s. His head was lowered, and in a gesture of great weariness the fingers of his left hand ran through a dust-brown wig of what must have been human hair.
    But what Amanda stared at—almost
through
—was the ear of corn held upright in his other hand: as of a king, bloodied, with a sceptre of corn.
    I let her drag me back up the aisle, and once she knew I would follow she ran like a deer. Only the stone wall at the west end of the churchyard made her stop and wait for me. The moment passed like the shadow of a cloud, and we burst into nervous laughter. Later we helped Father Juan plant some pine seedlings along the fence. One day, he said, they would grow and shelter the church from the wind. As we worked he told us of his plans to raise funds for a statue of Our Mother Coatlalocpeuh to stand guard at the church entrance.
    Later that afternoon as Father Juan continued to work in the churchyard, Xochitl told us Cinteotl was the son of the Mother of the Corn. So was that Cinteotl or Christ all bloody in there?
    â€œMaybe a double,” she said, the triangles of her eyes narrowing as she watched Father Juan still digging in the churchyard. “Maybe ask
him.”

    We set out again the next day. From Chimalhuacan the road got smoother and rose only gradually. We were moving across the lowerslopes of Popocatepetl and heading north towards Iztaccihuatl. The air was cooler, and we travelled mostly in the shade of the enormous pines and cedars that flanked the road, thicker at the base than our little cart was long. We persuaded Xochitl to let us take down the awning.
    Leaning back against the corn sacks, Amanda and I rode quietly for a while, a little stunned by the great white peaks leaning in over the trees. From Nepantla they had been actors alone up on the stage of the horizon. Now they loomed like enormous attendants bent over three small creatures in a crate, or so it felt as we rolled along.
    We had crossed over into a land of giants. Everything towered far above. The axis of this new country was the two volcanoes, so still as to make the sky around them race with clouds and wheeling birds. There were more birds here. Hawks and vultures, as there were back in Nepantla, but also falcons and eagles. Xochitl said we were just big enough now not to be carried off by one. She looked into my wide eyes and laughed. “And tomorrow, Ixpetz, you will have a sunburn on your chin from so much looking up.” Her laugh—hup!—came out in a little swoop, pulling up. It made you want to laugh too. She was almost chatty, a real swallow’s beak, maybe because the road was smoother, less painful for her hip.
    Did I know the story about the volcanoes as lovers?
    â€œMuchi oquicac in nacel!”
I said.
Every one of my nits knows that one!
Even this earned a smile, and she looked younger by years. Amanda was just as wide-eyed as I was at the change in her. But this was Xochitl’s land.
    â€œIs it true, Xochita, what Grandfather said about Cortés sending men up there for ice?”
    â€œThe Speaker himself sent relays of runners every day.”
    â€œThe Speaker?”
    â€œLord Moctezuma.”
    â€œDid they see each other, you think?”
    â€œWho?”
    â€œCortés’s men and Moctezuma’s. Going for ice.”
    â€œOur people saw
them
. The Speaker