Free The Demon of the Air by Simon Levack Page B

me along the next day to question them.”
    â€œWhat did you find out?”
    â€œNothing! All they’d tell me was that whatever was going to happen would happen and that a great mystery would come to pass—not exactly helpful. Montezuma was so angry that he kept them in here on starvation rations and then sent me back to interrogate them again. But that was when …”
    The majordomo licked his lips. His voice seemed to have dried up and he had to clear his throat before continuing.
    â€œWe had a double guard on the place, because the Emperor was so troubled about these men. The guards were all men I’d known for years, men I’d trust with my children’s lives, and none of them saw a thing. They’d all gone—flown away like … well, like bloody birds!”
    â€œHow did you explain that to the Emperor?”
    â€œHow do you think? I had to go and tell him his most important prisoners, the ones he’d taken a particular interest in, had vanished into thin air. What would you have done?”
    â€œI suppose I would have either run very far away or groveled a lot.”
    â€œYes, well, I just told him he might as well have me cut to pieces there and then, because there was no sign of his prisoners and none of my guards had seen or heard a thing. I thought I was a dead man. He’s had people disemboweled and their wives and children strangled for less, but I got away with it somehow.” He paused thoughtfully. “It’s not as if he wasn’t angry, mind you. If he ever catches those men, he’s going to make them suffer—and anyone else who gets the blame for their disappearance. But I was lucky. It never seemed to occur to him that it might be my fault—not that it was, of course!”
    I eyed him skeptically. “So what did the Emperor think had happened?”

    â€œThat they’d used magic to escape, of course.”
    So the Emperor had done as any Aztec would in his position. If you needed the favor of the gods, you might go to a priest, but sometimes that was not enough. Perhaps the war-god and the rain-god at the summits of their pyramids seemed too remote from the affairs of men. Perhaps what troubled you was the work of some malignant spirit whose name you did not even know. Then, if you had a dream that needed interpreting, or were about to set off on a long journey or try planting your beans too late in the season, you would go to a sorcerer.
    Sorcery came at a price, however. It meant dealing with strange, unnerving creatures who could easily do you more harm than good. If the sorcerers Montezuma had questioned were genuine then they may have been able to tell him what the future held. Obviously he believed they had not dared to and had used their powers to escape him.
    And the more convinced he was that they had seen his future, the more desperate he would be to get them back.
    I examined the nearest empty cage. “Let’s leave magic aside, for the moment. If I were shut up in here, how would I get out?”
    â€œYou wouldn’t!”
    â€œNo, but just suppose I were to try it.”
    He sighed. “Oh, all right. To begin with, there’s no door. You’d have been dropped in through the trapdoor on the roof—see it? Once you were inside we’d have weighed it down with a stone slab and no way would you get it open. Don’t even think about pushing it out of the way—we won’t stop you, but trust me, it won’t budge.” He gave me a nasty grin. “Shall I shut you in and let you try it for yourself?”
    â€œNo!” I stepped hastily away from the cage. I could still remember the wood creaking under the weight of that stone slab. “I’ll take your word for it. So I’d have to have someone open the trapdoor from outside.”
    The majordomo looked suspiciously at his inmates, a couple of whom had lifted their heads and seemed to be taking an unwelcome