Aztlan: The Courts of Heaven (17 page)

Finally she replied, with an unmistakable hurt in her voice, “You think I had something to do with Coyotl’s murder . . . ?”

“It’s my job to ask.”

More silence. “All right. I’ll tell you why I showed up on Pactonal’s buzzer list. But I need you to keep it between us.”

“I can’t make any promises,” I said, “until I know what
it
is.”

I knew that wasn’t the answer she was looking for, but it was the best I could do. Gods’ mercy, I was conducting a
murder
Investigation.

“Fine, Maxtla. I’ll trust you—even though the feeling doesn’t seem mutual.” Her voice softened almost to a whisper, even though no one else could hear us. “I told you that I went to Europe looking for commercial opportunities, right?”

“Right.”

“I also told you the Euros love everything about the Empire. Well, it seems one of the things they love most is the ball court. They couldn’t stop asking me about it, even when I wanted to talk about other business.”

I understood their fascination.

“So,” Calli said, “I talked to some of their wealthier citizens about building courts and setting up a league over
there.
Twelve teams, one or two in each country. A full schedule of games, just like here in Mexica.”

“A ball court league? In Europe?” It sounded crazy. And vaguely disrespectful, though I couldn’t say exactly why.

“The only thing I needed was players. And since no one in Europe knew how to play the game, I needed players from the Empire. With the help of my associates back here, I got the Emperor’s approval. He had only two concerns. One was that none of the players I recruited would live outside Mexica for more than a single season. The other was that some healthy fees be placed in the Imperial coffers.”

I didn’t care about the details. I was still wrestling with the idea of the game—
my
game—being played for people who hadn’t grown up with it, who had no idea what it was about.

I recalled what Meztli had said about the Emperor financing the Spaniard’s law suit. It was starting to sound a little less ridiculous in light of what Calli had told me.

“As soon as I came home,” she said, “I started buzzing players who were approaching the end of their contracts, and might make the move to extend their careers. Pactonal was just one of them.”

I got it. “So it was a business call. Nothing more.”

“Nothing more,” she echoed.

I was relieved.

Of course, she might have been lying to me. But if she were, it would be easy enough to prove. After all, there would be records of the other calls she had made.

Still, I had no intention of checking those records. I believed her. Lands of the Dead, I
had
to believe her.

“One more question. Did you call Tecocol, Zincicha, and Cacamatzin about your league?”

“Zincicha,” Calli said, “but not the other two. They were a bit
too
old.”

“I see.”

“Satisfied?” she asked.

“Satisfied.”

“Good,” she said, and ended the connection.

I was thinking so hard about Calli that I didn’t see Takun cross the office and stand over me.

He was a big guy, as I’ve said, and he seemed even bigger when he got up close. I wondered if he was going to take a poke at me then and there—and if he did, how my wound would hold up.

“What’s going on?” I asked, forcing the issue.

He made a sound halfway between a laugh and a snarl. “You pleased with yourself? And don’t pretend it was someone else.”

I didn’t. “Pleased has nothing to do with it. I did what I had to do.”

“Ratted on your fellow officers?”

“I took criminals off the street. That’s our job, isn’t it?”

“That’s what they tell me.” He scowled. “The fact is . . . and it’s not easy for me to say this . . . you did the right thing. Matter of fact, I would have done it myself under the same circumstances.”

It wasn’t at all what I had expected him to say. “Well . . . good then.”

“Of course, not everybody is going to feel that way. You’re going to find yourself with a few less friends. Just remember I’m one of them.”

Then he walked away.

Takun taking my side? You could have knocked me over with a quetzal feather.

As I’d expected, it didn’t take long for Pactonal’s judge to find him guilty. I went to visit him as soon as he was settled in his cell in the Prison House in District One.

He didn’t look happy. But then, he’d been making a hill of beans in the ball court, living a life of luxury compared to the average citizen. In prison, he was just another sad clump of flesh and bone awaiting his sentence.

“Anything you’d like to tell me?” I asked.

“Nothing,” he said.

Pactonal was sitting on his bed, dressed in his pristine, white prison clothes. His eyes found everything in the room but me.

“You attacked me,” I said. “The least you can do is tell me why.”

He didn’t say anything in response. He just frowned.

“You know what kind of time you’re facing?”

He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter.”

“A lot of guys say that. Then they spend a few cycles in prison and they beat a different drum.”

Again Pactonal said, “Doesn’t matter.”

Prison House inmates seldom passed up a chance to reduce their sentences by offering information. So why wasn’t Pactonal doing that?

What was he scared of? Or more to the point,
who
?

Pactonal chuckled. “You never gave up in the ball court either. You just put your head down and kept attacking, no matter how many goals we were behind. But no matter how hard you try, I’m not going to answer your questions. So make it easy on both of us and leave me alone.”

He was right. I didn’t like to give up.

“I’ll be back,” I said.

“See you then,” said Pactonal.

I didn’t have nearly enough evidence to pin a guilty verdict on Tecocol, Zincicha, or Cacamatzin, but I was doing my best to make them think I did. That’s why they were sitting in separate cells in the Aztlan Detention Center, supposedly waiting for the next available judge.

After I saw Pactonal, I went to visit his buzzer buddies.

“Why were you going back and forth with Pactonal?” I asked Tecocol, considered a big man in his day but less so compared to the centers coming up in recent cycles.

Tecocol didn’t answer my question. Instead he said, “You can get me immunity, right?”

Inwardly, I smiled. I hadn’t expected it to be so easy. But then, the specter of prison had a way of loosening men’s tongues.

“It’s possible,” I said. Certainly, I had done such a thing in the past. “But you’ve got to give me something big enough to warrant it.”

“What if I tell you and you decide it’s not big enough?” he asked.

“You’ll have to take that chance.”

The muscles worked in his jaw. “You could just take the information and put me away anyway.”

“I could,” I conceded. “But I’m an Investigator. To most people, that means I can be trusted.”

“What if you make me a deal and your chief says no to it? Then what?”

“He wouldn’t do that,” I said. I chuckled. “Unless, of course, there was a nobleman involved.”

It was a joke—but Tecocol didn’t laugh. In fact, all the color drained from his face.

But why? All I had said was—

Suddenly I got it, and the blood drained from
my
face as well.

“Forget about it,” said Tecocol, and looked away from me.

• • •

“We’re aware there’s a noble involved,” I said.

Cacamatzin, who was beloved by his fans in Zempoala for his gap-toothed grin, wasn’t smiling at the moment. He was sitting on his bed in the Detention Center looking scared to death. “How do you know that?”

I didn’t, of course, until I talked to Tecocol. And now Cacamatzin was confirming it for me, whether he knew it or not.

“We’re not stupid,” I told him, hoping that would do in lieu of an explanation.

Part of me knew I was taking a chance, and a big one. If I ran up too hard against a nobleman, I could easily wind up in a cell next to Pactonal. But another part of me had to see this thing through to its conclusion, wherever that led me.

Cacamatzin closed his eyes and laid the back of his head against the wall behind him. “You know what he’d do to me if I opened my mouth to an Investigator?”

“Sure,” I said. “Of course, if you
don’t
open your mouth, I’ll tell him that you
did
.”

His eyes widened. “You wouldn’t do that.”

“Why?” I asked. “Because we’re all brothers between the stone walls? You stopped being my brother when you got involved in this.”

He eyed me a moment longer. Then he said, “Do what you have to do. I’m not talking.”

Crap, I thought.

“I’m offering you a way out, Cacamatzin. You want to pass it up, that’s your decision . . . brother.”

I hoped he would stop me on my way down the corridor. He didn’t.

That left Zincicha.

As I had done with Cacamatzin, I let Zincicha, the blade-thin attacker for Yautepec, know that I knew about the nobleman.

It didn’t seem to faze him. “I’m not talking. Period.”

“Even if it means you’ll be spending the next fifty cycles in prison?”

He laughed softly. “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

I was reminded of what the guy in the pet store told me:
I’ll be protected
.

“I’ve heard
that
before,” I said, and walked out.

I knew the type. None of my arguments were going to have any effect on him. The best thing I could do was leave him there and let him argue with himself.

So that’s what I did.

I was headed for the nearest rail station when my radio buzzed. I took it out of my pouch and saw it was Calli.

“I’m glad you called,” I said.

“Listen, Maxtla,” she began, “I want to—”

“No need,” I told her.

“Yes, there is. You were just doing your job, and I made it difficult for you because I was so focused on my own.”

It was good to hear her admit it, but there was more to say. If she wasn’t going to do it, I would. “And you wanted me to trust you. Right?”

She sighed. “That too.”

“I don’t blame you. I’d want to be trusted too.”

“I
do
trust you,” she said.

“Then we trust each other. Now what?”

That was the bigger question. “I don’t know,” she said. “But I’d like the chance to find out.”

“So would I.”

“Then we’re good?” she asked, suddenly sounding as young as she looked.

I had to laugh. “
Very
good.”

Calli laughed too. “That was too easy.”

“Want to try it again? I’ll give you a hard time, I promise.”

“No, thanks,” she said, “if it’s all right with you, I’ll quit while I’ve still got all my beans.”

Neither of us spoke for a moment. Then I said, “Listen, I’m in a place I’ve never been before. I don’t know if I’m going to come out of it.”

“Are you in trouble?” she asked, concern in her voice. “Does this have to do with what happened in District Two?”

“No trouble,” I said. “At least, not the kind most people get into. And yes, it does have something to do with what happened in District Two. The thing is—”

I stopped myself. If I told her anything more, I’d be placing her in danger as well.

“You don’t have to tell me,” she said. “I trust you, remember?”

“Thanks. See you soon.”

I hope
.

• • •

I was still thinking about what Calli had said when my radio went off. It was the administrator of the Detention Center calling.

“It seems one of your friends wants to talk with you,” he said.

“Which one?” I asked.

“Zincicha. And I should tell you that you’re not the only one he’s been speaking to.”

“Who else?”

“You’ll have to ask Zincicha that question.”

In other words, he’d been talking with a nobleman. The one behind Pactonal?

“I’ll be right there,” I said, and made my way back to the Detention Center.

“I hear you’re ready to answer questions,” I told Zincicha.