I See Fire | Wattys 2021/22 Shortlist | ✔

Chapter Thirty

We skidded into the couch room to find the other gods already gathered. Tezcat crouched on the floor, and the dim walls glowed with a deep purple ward different from the one he had used last time. The night god fixed me with a glare that sent nervous tingles up my arms. 

The gods' appearances had transformed. Several had helmets with feathered headdresses on them. All were clad in stiff, quilted armour like the Centzon Huītznāuhtin wore, and all but Quet and Tlaloc had small, round shields on one arm. Tezcat's lay beside him, alongside a two-meter spear with an obsidian-edged head the length of my forearm. Xochi tested the string of a bow. Xipe twirled a rattle-staff, which became a club, then a sword-like paddle with lethal obsidian blades embedded down its edges.

"We're surrounded and tethered," said Chal to Xolotl. "But they're not firing. They want us to come out and fight."

Quet bounced on his toes. "Shall we go out and indulge them, then?"

"That's not the point," snapped Tezcat. "Twice in a week? That's not a coincidence." He finished sealing the ward behind us and stood. He had war paint on—two yellow stripes running across his face—and a forward-swept headdress. "You three," he said to Jem, Emma and I. "Against that wall."

Nobody stepped in to stand up for us. In fact, they moved away, Chal drawing Quet with her. My heart worked its way to the top of my chest and made for my throat. Was this the thing they had been hiding from us? Some suspicion they were about to let Tezcat test? Why were they all on board?

I joined my friends and pressed my back to the stone like it could protect me from whatever came next. Tezcat pointed a hand at us. I tried not to shriek as a cage of purple lightning reared around us, trapping us against the wall. Emma squashed against Jem's side, but her closeness only made my mind race faster. What spell was this? If she didn't know, it wasn't something either spellcaster used often. That didn't bode well.

I flinched back as a tendril of purple darted inwards. No zap hit me as it lunged for my wrist and held for two excruciating seconds, light like a feather's touch. Emma whimpered and clung to Jem's arm as the cage suddenly sprouted a hundred more electric fingers. I locked every muscle in my body and squeezed my eyes shut as they shot at me. Bolts of energy dashed across my skin. Nothing happened. They left me and moved to Jem, then Emma.

Everyone gasped. Bolts hissed as their tips evaporated the moment they made contact with Emma's body. Before I could scream, Tezcat's spear was at her throat. Sinew string parted, and purple light blazed down the weapon as it jerked back again. Tezcat swore and dropped Emma's severed gold-and-turquoise pendant like it had burned him.

"Don't touch it!" he shouted as Chal raised a hand. "Tlaloc. There's a tracker on it."

Emma sank down against the wall, one hand on her throat, the other clutching her remaining pendant. Her eyes were wide in shock. Jem crouched to hug her. His elbow bumped the spell-cage, which responded with an angry zap that fired his own arm back towards him. He hissed and clamped a hand over the pain.

The gods backed away, right to the edges of the room. Emma's beloved gold pendant glittered in the middle of the floor. I could not tear my eyes from it as Tlaloc began the stomp-and-clap rhythm he used to summon lightning. A tracker? I thought the pendant had only held a charm—a benign one put there by the gods when they gave her the necklace. A charm they later used as the trigger for the spells in the fire-cave that this same pendant led us to. How had nobody noticed a second spell on the same object? And why had a tracker eaten the tendrils of the spell-cage?

Tlaloc's great staff appeared in his hands, crackling with lightning. He lifted it over the pendant on the floor and brought it down. The pendant's turquoise turned a dazzling green: bright, then blinding. Louder and louder the staff crackled until an explosion shook rock chips from the ceiling. Slowly, I lowered my arms. Tlaloc was breathing hard as he stepped back. Shattered gold and turquoise littered the floor.