Time Travel Omnibus, page 272
His voice was suddenly deep with passion. “A treasure worth millions, lying hidden all through time, waiting for me! I can do things with that wealth—things I’ve always dreamed of. I’ve challenged time and death to learn its secret. And neither you nor Kay, nor her maundering old father, are going to ruin my plans.”
My sword came out with a rasping rush, and I stepped forward with deadly purpose.
“Kay and I are going out of here, Ullman,” I said tightly. “We’re going to the Beam. If you try to stop us, I’ll kill you.”
A low laugh came from his lips. “You haven’t a chance, Clark. The hill where the Beam is, is sacred to these people. I need only warn them that you plan to set foot upon that sacred hill, and they’ll tear you to pieces.”
For a moment, I felt baffled. Kay and I—our two minds—were trapped in the bodies of Atzala and Pedro Lopez. Only the Beam could disengage our minds from these bodies we had seized, and return us across time to our own proper forms. And we couldn’t reach the Beam.
The rage that boiled up in me was too great for logic. “You’ll not give warning to the Aztecs, Ullman,” I muttered. “I’ll make sure of that—”
He must have read my desperate resolve in my eyes. For he recoiled and flashed out his maquahuitl as I lunged at him.
MY STEEL blade rang against the flint-edged Aztec sword. I beat down his parry and stabbed with a low, quick thrust. It was Pedro Lopez’ swordsmanship, drawn from subconscious memory, that served me now.
But with a lithe movement, he darted aside the thrust. Then before our battle could go further, there was an alarm of shouting voices, and men and torches were all around and between us.
Our duel had been heard in the banquet-hall, and Spaniards and Aztecs alike had poured out. Cortez and Montezuma were both among those who had emerged.
“Enough of this, Lopez!” Cortez ordered me angrily. “Have you lost your senses?”
Guatemozin-Ullman was speaking quickly to the king. Marina rapidly translated the Aztec for us.
“Why do you brawl here with one of our guests, the tetdes?” Montezuma had demanded.
Guatemozin’s finger stabbed accusingly at me. “That teule yonder was annoying the princess Atzala. I could not brook such insolence from a foreigner to one of our royal house.”
Exclamations of anger came from the Aztec nobles as they heard. Maquahuitls and daggers appeared in their hands as they glared at me. My Spanish comrades instantly unsheathed their swords.
It looked for a moment as though a bloody conflict was to be precipitated there in the palace garden. But neither Cortez, who realized our precarious situation, nor Montezuma, who superstitiously deemed us sons of the gods, desired any such fight.
“Put down your swords, gentlemen!” thundered Cortez. “Do you wish to bring all the heathen hordes down around our ears?”
Atzala had sprung forward to Montezuma and was speaking passionately. Kay had heard and understood Ullman’s accusation.
“Guatemozin does not speak truth, father!” she cried to the king. “The teule yonder offered no insult to me.”
Montezuma’s troubled face cleared. “Then all is but a misunderstanding,” he declared. “Friends, let us return and continue the feast.”
When that was translated to him, Cortez diplomatically refused. “With your permission,” he told Montezuma politely, “we’ll retire to our own lodgings. My captains are weary from the long journey to these lands, and have already eaten and drunk overmuch. Come, gentlemen.”
I stood, torn by conflicting emotions. How could I go and leave Kay in this palace where Ullman had a chance to work her harm?
Yet there was no faintest possibility now of getting her out of the place and making a way with her to the Beam. If I tried to take Atzala out of the palace now in the face of the Aztec rulers and nobles, the certain result would be a conflict that would spell doom to us.
Atzala’s lips whispered to me as I stood desperately irresolute. “Go now, Nick. You must. When next you come to the palace, we’ll make plans. I’ll be safe till then.”
“Are you coming with us, Lopez?” Cortez demanded, frowning blackly at me over his shoulder.
I saw the triumphant expression in Guatemozin’s black eyes and knew that Burke Ullman was enjoying my predicament. But I had to turn my back on him and with my fellow-captains accompany Cortez from the palace.
AS WE followed our Aztec guides back across the causeway into dark, slumbering Tenochtitlan, Cortez was ominously silent. But Alvarado and Sandoval and the others chaffed me with rough humor.
“Diablo, I never dreamed Lopez was such a ladies’ man!” laughed Alvarado. “Two minutes alone with that princess, and he has her in his arms.”
“And a sweet armful she looked,” smiled Sandoval. He clapped me on the back. “Better have Father Olmedo baptize her, Lopez. Even if she’s a king’s daughter, she’s still a heathen.” Not until we were back in the torch-lit main hall of the Axayaca palace that had been given us for quarters, did Cortez speak to me. His face was flushed with passion as he gave me a blistering rebuke.
“Your philandering with that Aztec princess could have sent us all to the Temple of Huitzil as sacrifices, Lopez!” he accused harshly. “How in hell’s name could you have been so witless as to tamper with a woman of the royal house?”
Dully, I realized that there was no use telling him the truth. There was no use trying to make him believe that I knew the girl who really inhabited Atzala’s body, and that I was really not Lopez at all.
“I meant no harm, Don Hernando,” I muttered. “I was a little drunk and the girl was beautiful.”
“You’re a fool,” he spat. “Can’t you all realize that we are balanced on the very brink of a dreadful precipice? Four hundred odd of us, not counting our uncertain Indian allies, bivouacking here at the heart of an empire that numbers millions of fierce warriors! All that’s held them off our throats has been their superstitions about us.”
His crafty eyes gleamed. “If we make clever use of their superstitions, we can establish ourselves here and soon take over the rule of this whole vast, rich domain. Then there’ll be gold, jewels and women for all of you. But if we slip and let them realize we’re not sons of the gods, we’ll reap nothing but blood and struggle.”
“That devil Guatemozin will do everything he can to convince Montezuma that we’re only men!” I burst out. “He’d like nothing better than to have the Aztecs set upon us.”
“Aye, I marked that Guatemozin sneered when you announced that we were the sons of Quetzal,” corroborated Sandoval.
“Then you have only deepened his enmity by your actions tonight, Lopez,” accused Cortez sternly. “I forbid you under pain of death to meddle again with that Aztec princess.”
That night, I could not sleep. I lay on my mat, revolving in my mind a thousand desperate schemes for the rescue of Kay.
I must somehow get her away from this barbaric metropolis, flee with her to Iztapalapa and reach the Beam that would draw our minds back across time to our own bodies. But how was I to do it?
Burke Ullman—Guatemozin—would be watching for such an attempt. He might even seek to forestall it by having Atzala slain. Yet I could not believe even he dared lay hands on Montezuma’s daughter. My final resolution was that, despite Cortez’ prohibition, I must see and make plans with Kay the next time we went to the palace.
Next day, I found my resolution thwarted. We were not to go to the palace. Montezuma had sent word that he himself was coming to show the leaders of the teules the wonders of his city.
“Do you suppose Atzala will be with him?” I asked Sandoval anxiously.
“I hope not,” he answered emphatically, “for your sake, Lopez. Don Hernando will surely have you hanged if you try to see her again.”
WHEN Montezuma arrived in his litter, followed by an extensive train of nobles and guards, neither Atzala nor Guatemozin were with him. I felt a deepening of my desperate fears. What was Ullman doing?
Cortez left Alvarado in command of our palace-stronghold, but took most of us other captains when he accompanied Montezuma’s retinue toward the great temple.
Even in my desperate anxiety, I felt the fascination of the scenes before me. I, a man of the Twentieth Century, walking through Tenochtitlan of the Aztecs! It all still seemed dreamlike to me, the streets and canoe-crowded canals, the markets, the slaves, the warriors.
The royal party led us up the steep and dizzy stair in the side of the towering terraced pyramid. Upon the flattened summit of the temple stood the idol of the war-god Huitzilopochtli. It was a grotesquely horrible figure, sheathed in gold and wound round with golden serpents. At its feet was a pan of incense in which three human victims’ hearts burned.
In front of Huitzil’s idol stood the disk-shaped stone of sacrifice upon which the victim was stretched that his heart might be torn from his living body. Nearby hung the enormous serpent-skin drum whose throbbing we had already heard. Priests of the god, who wore blood-sprinkled black robes and had long hair matted with blood, glared at us.
“We shall offer sacrifices in honor of your coming, Malinche,” Montezuma told our leader. But Cortez made a horrified gesture.
“No, we want no such hideous sacrifices!”
Montezuma stared. “If you are really teules, you should welcome the offerings. It is strange, unless Guatemozin is right—”
When we returned to our palace, Cortez disclosed anxiety. “Gentlemen, I fear that Montezuma is beginning to doubt our supernatural origin.
The next few days deepened that disturbing impression that the Aztecs no longer considered us as godlike beings. We began to sense a difference in their attitude, a covert insolence pregnant with menace.
I, Nick Clark, realized what was going on. Burke Ullman, as Guatemozin, was assuring Montezuma and the other nobles that we were no gods but men who could be attacked and slain. Ullman was willing to precipitate such an attack to make sure that I was destroyed!
It all made me feel an increased desperation. I had not had the slightest chance to speak to Kay in these few days. Cortez had flatly refused to allow me to go along on his two visits to the royal palace.
CORTEZ returned from his second visit to the palace looking dark and grim. And that night he called a secret council of us captains.
“Gentlemen, the volcano is about to erupt under us,” he said harshly. “I’m convinced Guatemozin and others are persuading Montezuma to order an attack upon us. We may have little time before it breaks.”
Oaths went up from my comrades. Every one of them felt the same alarm at the possibility.
“Dios, we’d be outnumbered thousands to one!” swore Alvarado. “Shall we turn and march out of the city?”
“No, we can’t do that!” I exclaimed in sharp dismay. “That would mean—” I didn’t finish. What I had been about to say was that leaving Tenochtitlan would mean leaving Kay here, trapped in Atzala’s body.
“Lopez is right—we dare not attempt to march out,” Cortez admitted frowningly. “The whole howling hordes would be on us instantly.”
“But we can’t just sit penned up here and let them surround us,” Sandoval protested.
A wild inspiration suddenly came to me. It was an audacious idea that might save the situation, not only for my Spanish comrades, but for myself and Kay also.
“There’s only one thing we can do!” I exclaimed. “We can take Montezuma and his family prisoners, and hold them as hostages.”
My fellow-captains were stunned. Sandoval gave stammering voice to their incredulous amazement.
“Good God, Lopez, you can’t be serious! Whoever heard of four hundred cavaliers marching into the heart of an empire and then daring to make a prisoner of its emperor?”
But Cortez’ eyes had an eagle flash. “Lopez’ idea is good! It’s an audacious gamble, but it’s our only chance. With Montezuma our prisoner here, we can issue orders in his name and rule this whole realm.”
He continued calmly. “Tomorrow morning, six of us will visit Montezuma in his palace. If God is with us, we’ll bring back the king and his family to be our hostages.”
Sandoval and the others still seemed stunned by the daring of the plan I had proposed. Even to the fearless conquistadors, it seemed mad.
We slept on our arms that night. And my sleep was a feverish one, for my mind seethed with mingled hopes and fears. If our plan succeeded, Atzala would be brought here with the rest of Montezuma’s family. I’d have Kay safe with me, and we could somehow then reach the Beam.
Next morning, Cortez sent word to Montezuma that he would again visit the king. A little later, we set out. Beside our leader and the interpreter Marina, there were just five of us—Alvarado, Sandoval, Avila, De Leon and myself.
“Six men going to seize an emperor in his palace!” muttered Avila. “My God, we must be crazy!”
Alvarado laughed in his carefree way. “At least, if we succeed, the feat will go down in history.”
WHEN we entered Montezuma’s throne-hall in the royal palace, we all breathed more easily to discover that only a few guards and women attended the king. Guatemozin was not in evidence. I wondered fleetingly where Ullman was. Kay had said he was ceaselessly intriguing to learn the secret of the royal treasure, which only the king was permitted to know.
Montezuma greeted us with assumed friendliness, but there was an evasive quality in his manner. We had-approached his throne. Two old councillors were standing beside him, but the guards were at the outer door.
Cortez spoke to the Aztec ruler in rapid, stern tones, with Marina quickly translating. “We know everything!” Cortez told the king. “You have been plotting to attack us, your sacred guests.”
The unexpected accusation stupefied Montezuma. A look of terror came into his eyes, and a gray pallor overspread his face.
“Then you are indeed teules?” he whispered terrifiedly.
I saw that our divination of the truth seemed supernatural knowledge to him, reviving his superstitious belief that we were gods.
Cortez too saw that, and pressed the advantage. “Yes, we are teules and you can conceal nothing from us. We know every word that your lips utter, every thought that passes in your mind.”
Our leader continued firmly, to the terrified king, “It is necessary that you be protected from the evil men who have sought to turn you against us. For that reason, you and your immediate family must return with us to our palace and remain there as our honored guests.”
Crushed as he was by superstitious terror, Montezuma was still enough the monarch to object to this.
“What, Malinche! You would make me a prisoner in my own capital? This cannot be!”
“Would you rather the vengeance of the gods fall on you?” Cortez demanded.
Cringing pitifully from that threat, Montezuma still feebly resisted. “What would my nobles and people say of me if I did as you ask?”
I felt a feverish impatience at the delay. “Don Hernando, we daren’t waste more time!” I exclaimed.
De Leon cried roughly, “Why waste arguments on the heathen dog? If he does not agree instantly, let us plunge our swords in his body!”
When Marina translated that threat, Montezuma gave way. The physical threat completed the work of the superstitious terror we had sown.
“I cannot resist the will of gods,” he said hoarsely. “I and my family will go with you, Malinche.”
Cortez’ face flashed triumph. “Good! Summon your brother Cuitlahua, your nephew Guatemozin, the princess Atzala and your own servants.”
“Cuitlahua and Guatemozin are not now here,” whispered the terrified monarch. “Atzala is in the women’s wing.” He stammered an order to one of the old councillors to summon the princess, and asked the other to call together his personal servants.
“Lopez, go with the old one and bring the princess,” Cortez ordered me swiftly. “She knows you and will come more willingly, mayhap. It’s the devil’s own luck we can’t lay hands on Cuitlahua or Guatemozin, too.
ALL this tense scene had taken but minutes to enact. There had been no alarm to rouse the guards outside the throne-room.
My hopes were soaring as I hurried with the fearful old councillor through the palace halls and corridors. If we could get Montezuma and his family safe to our own quarters, then Kay would be safe from Ullman—
Two fierce-eyed Aztec warriors challenged us at the entrance to the chambers of the princess. I knew who they were. The guards that Guatemozin—Burke Ullman—had set to watch Atzala!
They were refusing us passage. Desperate, knowing that alarm might break at any moment, I drew my sword and rushed them.
I dropped one with a stab through the throat and swung fiercely toward the other. The Aztec had drawn his maquahuitl, and he thrust first.
“Tlateloco! Tlateloco!” he yelled the fierce Aztec war-cry as he struck.
The flint-edged blade slashed into me below my upraised right arm, biting deep and exploding a fiery agony in my breast. But I brought down my own blade upon his feathered headdress next moment, felling him.
I staggered, dazed by the shock and pain of the deep wound. Blood was spurting from it, but I tore a strip from a cotton hanging, thrust it inside my jerkin to staunch the flow.
“Nick!” came a sharp cry. It was Atzala whose slim figure had appeared in the doorway from the chambers beyond. “You’re hurt!”
“Not badly,” I lied hoarsely. “Quickly, Kay—come with me. We’re taking Montezuma prisoner.”
She gasped, and then spoke with feverish rapidity as we hurried back toward the throne-room. “Nick, I’ve been terrified for you! Burke Ullman—Guatemozin—has been inciting the king to attack you all. He convinced the king that I might betray the plot, that I must be guarded—”
I hardly heard her, for pain from the wound made every breath an agony. That maquahuitl had bitten deep.
In the throne-room, all was ready for departure. Montezuma’s women and personal servants and councillors were gathered, looking as terrified as the monarch himself. His litter was brought in and he entered it.
