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notapaladin1 (acatl – autistic)
His tutors all said the same things about him—what a smart boy, what a studious boy, he'll go far in the priesthood.
Acatl supposed they were probably correct about that; he was smart, he was studious, and he threw himself into the rituals with a fervor that annoyed the nobles' sons who were only there for power. They didn't understand how he could ponder the codices for hours, how he could sit silent as the statue of Lord Death and watch the funeral pyres burn.
He didn't understand it himself, really; all he knew, in those moments when he contemplated the inside of his own mind, was that having it consumed by devotion to the gods felt right.
-
2 (teomitl & chalchiuhnenetl – a deal with the devil)"I can give you the crown you deserve," his elder sister says.
Teomitl thinks of their brother on the throne, twisted and craven; he is no fit warrior, no fit Emperor, no fit conduit of Huitzilopochtli's power in the Fifth World, but to slay him and take the crown by force of arms would be treason, would no doubt sever the ties between Teomitl and the people who, somehow, love him.
But if he doesn't, Tizoc will twist and twist until he tears the Empire apart, and Teomitl's loved ones will not be alive to hate him...so he meets his sister's eyes, and nods his assent.
-3 (acatl/teomitl - someone has to be the first to trust)They sit on the steps of the Great Temple and watch the sun go down, and Acatl looks sidelong at him (golden in the sunlight, gold as the imperial regalia) and thinks, There is my future Emperor.
Teomitl's promised to be patient, to bide his time—to let Tizoc-tzin reign a few more years, no matter how cruel and craven the man is—and Acatl wonders, even now, if he can trust him or if he'll spend those years looking over his shoulder, praying that his former student's ambition doesn't break the Empire apart.
Then Teomitl turns and smiles at him—turns and, gods, takes his hand—and he decides that, for once in his life, he'll take the risk.
-
4 (acatl – awkward formal dinners)
There are many reasons for Acatl, High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli, to hate formal banquets—the heavy formal regalia, the noblemen not-so-subtly sneering at the jumped-up peasant in their midst, the certain knowledge that there is political scheming going on somewhere and it's sure to bite him in the ass just when he least expects it—but top of the list has to be the seating arrangements, because he is sharing a mat with the high priests of Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc and he hates both of them to a depth unplumbed by any line.
When Quenami smiles his oily smile and asks how he's been lately, as though Acatl's forgiven him for the time he almost had him executed for treason, Acatl has to resist the urge to drown him in his own soup bowl. No matter how satisfying it would be, it won't help for long.
Acamapichtli sighs heavily as he meets his eye—Quenami is still talking, Southern Hummingbird blind him—and for a split second there is understanding between them. Though I loathe you and everything you stand for, that look says, I’ll at least credit you with not being Quenami.
-
5 teomitl/acatl - cold hands
No matter how much he loves Acatl (gods, more than he thought it was even possible to love anyone), Teomitl has to admit there are...certain downsides to being intimately acquainted with the High Priest for the Dead.
"You know," he grumbles, "just because you deal with corpses all day doesn't mean your hands have to be as cold as the grave.”
“Sorry,” Acatl mutters with a wince—they’ve only just seen each other after too long a time apart, and now Teomitl supposes he’s sort of ruined the mood.
Well, if he’s ruined it, it’s his responsibility to fix it. “Come here, love. I'll warm them for you."
-
6 (teomitl & acatl – well seasoned)
It's simple food—tamales stuffed with duck and chilies—but Acatl made it, so when he offers some to Teomitl...well, of course he'll eat it and be happy even if it turns out to be terrible, because he knows for a fact that it's been made with love instead of poison which therefore puts it miles ahead of anything the palace kitchen gives him.
"This is delici—"
And that's how he finds out that Acatl, unlike everyone else in Tenochtitlan and probably the world, has absolutely no upper limit on how hot he likes his chili peppers.
-
7 (acatl – relaxing)
His nieces and nephews are splashing in the pool, water spraying the air, as Teomitl and Mihmatini chase after them; Acatl doesn't worry, because he knows they'll be safe with those two looking after them. He knows the world will be safe, too; for the moment, he has nothing to do but relax and occasionally nibble a piece of fruit from the tray by his knee. It’s almost a foreign sensation, but not an unwelcome one.
Feeling warm in every limb—feeling, for once, content—Acatl closes his eyes and tilts his face to the sun.
-
8 acatl/teomitl - nicknames
“If anyone’s earned the right to keep calling me by my name, it’s you.”
Acatl blinks, and blushes, and has to avert his eyes. “You are my Emperor now,” he manages.
Ahuitzotl—no, no, he is Teomitl, he will always be Teomitl to him—smiles, radiant in gold and turquoise and jade, and takes his hand. “But you still love me, don’t you?”
“...I do...Teomitl-tzin.”
As he knew it would, the honorific makes his beloved flop theatrically backwards on his mat with a groan, and the tension breaks. One day, he muses, he really should ask why Teomitl hates when he calls him that, but for the moment he’ll pull him close, and kiss him, and reassure him that yes, he is loved very much.
-
9 (teomitl & acatl – if I didn’t have you)
Sometimes, Teomitl thinks about the man he might have become if he'd never met Acatl—proud to the point of arrogance, bravery turned to recklessness, no fit inheritor to even be considered for the throne—and he has to shudder in horror. One look at Tizoc (at his brother, gods, the thought sickens him now that they came from the same parents), at his excesses and paranoia, reminds him how close he could have come to falling. (It would have been easy. It terrifies him to think how easy it would have been.)
"You were the greatest teacher I could have ever had," he tells Acatl, and means it with all his heart.
-
10 (mihmatini & acatl – saying I love you without words)
"I ate," her older brother tells her, and Mihmatini sighs and rolls her eyes. She knows Acatl too well by now not to also know that his last meal was probably a full day ago, half stale, and not nearly filling enough for a man whose day job involves running across half of Tenochtitlan slaying monsters and dealing with the magical strain of keeping the world in one piece.
She sets a hand on his shoulder, keeping him firmly in place, and fills his bowl with a serving of the spicy grilled newts she knows he likes. "Eat something anyway."
-
11 (quenami – is that the hill you’re going to die on?)
The really funny thing, Quenami reflects idly, isn't that Acatl is still protesting his innocence—he's always been stubborn to a fault, and far too principled for his own good.
No, the funny thing is that Acatl, for some reason (probably because he, as a principled man, thinks others can be swayed by things like reason and logic) thinks they actually care, as though the results of the upcoming trial will be anything other than a foregone conclusion. Of course he'll die claiming his unwavering loyalty to the Empire, but it doesn't matter—he'll be dead anyway, and Quenami will never have to deal with him again.
The trial is in the morning. He can barely wait.
-
12 (teomitl – shadow of the crown)
He turns the Turquoise-and-Gold Crown over and over in his hands, tracing the intricate mosaic of blue stones with remarkably steady fingers. He thinks, distantly, that there should be blood on it—that his brother's passing should have stained it irreparably, even though Teomitl had, in the end, nothing at all to do with his demise. (He’s not sure who did. It might have been the She-Snake. It might have been any one of Tizoc’s enemies. It might even be Acatl, for all he knows—not that he’d mind if it was.)
The sun gleams on the metal, but when he finally sets it on his head he still feels cold.
-
13 (acatl – too tired to sleep)
He was tired down to his bones—no, past his bones, tired all the way down to every part of his soul—but sleep stubbornly refused to come. No matter how much he tossed and turned on his mat, no matter how much he desperately wished for unconsciousness, the room was too warm or his neck hurt or, for all he knew, the stars weren't in position for him to succumb.
Fighting the urge to beat his head against the ground—it wouldn't help, and would just make him sore in addition to his rising ill-temper—he rolled over again and buried his head in the crook of his arm until sunrise.
-
14 (teomitl & mihmatini – almost beyond repair)
He's standing in front of his wife, sword in the dirt between them, and he knows this can't ever be fixed—that he was too greedy, reached too far, foolishly thought it would all come together when the people he loved knew, knew, that it was falling apart.
Mihmatini meets his eyes, her own gaze absolutely furious, and asks, "Why? Why did—what in the gods' names possessed you to think this was all a good idea? Tizoc-tzin is unfit to be Emperor, that's true, we all know it—but for you to think to kill him—"
"He was going to kill Acatl." It comes out in a rush, without any prior planning or thought on his part, but it's the truth. Tizoc might be his Emperor, his brother, but he tried to execute Acatl for treason and that's not something Teomitl will ever forgive.
And Mihmatini, who loves her older brother as much as Teomitl does, stares at him for a long, long moment...and then she nods. "Understandable."
Maybe, Teomitl thinks, this can be salvaged after all.
-
15 (acatl – a moment’s peace)
The funeral was officially over, but the pyre still burned hot; it would keep burning until Coyolli of the Atempan calpulli was reduced to ashes, and then he and his fellow priests would see her remains interred. Acatl sat by the pyre, upwind from the smoke, and finally took a long, deep breath.
His work was not done, but the drums had stopped and the wailing of the dead woman's relatives no longer rang in his ears, and so—for the moment—he could rest.
“Acatl-tzin?”
Ah. One of his priests with a question. He closed his eyes, permitted himself a small sigh, and got to his feet again.
-
16 (teomitl & acatl – doing math in your head)
"Hmmm...let me see...our suspect was born on the third day of Izcalli in the year Five Rabbit, which makes him an…"
"Eight Monkey."
Teomitl lifted his head from the sheet of bark paper on which he was carefully and laboriously calculating the interactions between the civil and liturgical calendars, staring incredulously at his teacher—his teacher who, quite plainly, had just done some very complicated math in his head. "Acatl-tzin. How in the fuck."
"Language," he said, but he was smiling. "And practice. I can teach you that as well, if you'd like."
"Most people can't do math in their heads!"
-
17 acatl/acamapichtli - frenemies with benefits
"Well," Acamapichtli pants against his shoulderblades, "that was...invigorating."
Acatl growls, and if he wasn't still pinned against the wall—the High Priest of Tlaloc is quite a bit heavier than his own deer-slender frame—he'd shove him away and send him sprawling on the floor. With lust ebbing away rapidly, he's left with a hot, sick feeling of humiliated rage and only the slimmest of slim defenses that it had all seemed like an excellent idea at the time—it had seemed like an excellent idea the last time, too, but then they'd been facing each other and his nails down Acamapichtli's back had drawn blood.
"Fuck you," he snaps, and the man has the nerve to chuckle.
"Well, if you insist..."
-
18 (teomitl – unexpected forgiveness)
The cup of chocolate is bitter and spicy in his hands, and Teomitl doesn't drink. He can't—they're not safe, not really, not with Tizoc undying on his throne and him awaiting his chance to topple him. Even if it risks breaking their Empire, it will save them in the long run, he knows this...but he promised Acatl, he promised to give Tizoc time for his reign to stabilize, and he won't go back on his word. (He won't disappoint him, not again; he never, ever wants to see that look of heartbroken fury in Acatl's eyes.)
But when he smiles at Acatl...oh, Acatl smiles back, even now, even after he's fucked up so comprehensively that he's amazed the man has forgiven him, and suddenly the world seems just that little bit brighter.
-
19 (tizoc – from the pov of the villain)
He is the Revered Speaker of Tenochtitlan, like his brother and grandfather were before him—cities as far away as the Maya lands pay him tribute, and at his command armies rise and kingdoms fall. All should fall before him, for is he not Tizoc-tzin? Is he not the man who channels Huitzilopochtli's power in the Fifth World? The sun rises at the edge of his blade!
But he lifts the sacrificial knife and there is barely even a glimmer, while his brother—reckless, foolhardy Teomitl, who's too soft, who's gone and married that peasant's daughter and raised her brother above his rightful place as the lowest of the three High Priests—shines like Tonatiuh Himself by his side.
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20 (reference: sharp and pointy obsidian dragon thingie!)
The carved obsidian takes the form of one of Quetzalcoatl's feathered serpents, with its fanged head swallowing the hilt and the feathers picked out in delicate spines along the edges; it was dug up from Teotihuacan centuries ago, and it's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. He can't imagine ever using it in combat.
Teomitl presses it into his hands, face red, and mutters, "You said you wanted practical gifts, didn't you? I thought you'd—well. I thought this would please you—unless it doesn't, and you want something else—"
He stops his lover's mouth with a long, sweet kiss, and when they pull apart they're both smiling. "I love it."
-
21 teomitl - murder walk
Teomitl is not yet Master of the House of Darts, not yet keeper of Tenochtitlan's armory—he's just another one of the dead Emperor's dozens of brothers, with only a few prisoners to his name and no great claims to glory—but when he strides through the palace halls, the courtiers and servants and slaves scatter out of his way like quail before the hunter's footsteps. He does not look around. His limbs do not tremble. His eyes are clear, though they burn with rage.
(The smart thing to do would be to run—to rescue Acatl-tzin and Nezahual-tzin and his valuables, to flee somewhere they can take refuge until Tizoc's paranoid rage subsides. But Acatl-tzin is not here, and he's not feeling especially smart at the moment.)
His brother—the man who will be Emperor, once their brother's funeral is over—has the nerve to look surprised to see him. He rises from his mat, eyes narrowed, and demands, "What are you doing—"
"Acatl isn't the one you should worry about betraying you," Teomitl says.
Tizoc's blood splatters his hands, his cloak, his face—and he smiles. And thinks, with some relief, There. Now we're safe.
-
22 teomitl & acatl - kintsugi
"I'll think of something," Teomitl says with confidence he doesn't quite feel (gods, he fucked up, he fucked up, and how Acatl can stand before him and offer him food and say there's no need for apologies he doesn't know—he'd worn his full battle dress on the distinct chance of his former teacher just punching him in the teeth—), but then he smiles, and Acatl smiles back, and it's so hesitant and genuine and real that he has to look away and make some comment on how the city looks stretched out below them.
Honestly, he barely even sees the city, only registering the canals by the glare of the sunset on the water. His mind is too full of all the ways he'd erred (he'd been so arrogant, so impatient, so sure that he knew best and that this was the only way for him to earn respect even when Mihmatini and Acatl tried to warn him, and it had taken his wife all but holding a knife to his throat to realize he was about to do something irreparable—gods, gods, his sister Chalchiuhnenetl had wanted him to kill her, kill them all) and all he can think is that he must have broken things, that he can't understand how Acatl could forgive him (could respect him even when he wasn't Emperor—as one man to another, he'd said, and it had made Teomitl's stone heart melt) when he can barely forgive himself.
But he turns his face back to the temple steps and Acatl’s looking at him like he’s the dawn on the first morning of the Fifth World, and sometimes when things break they heal stronger.
-
23 (acatl – good night, midnight)
The conch shells blare once at the turn of the night, the hour that separates one day from the next, and Acatl rises from his mat alone and in silence.
Alone and in silence he eats a meal of thin flatbread and (cold) roasted peppers, savoring the bite and the burn of them as they fill his belly. Alone and in silence, he bathes himself in cold water (cold as the peppers had been) and forces a comb through the tangles in his long, wet hair.
He doesn't let himself remember hot meals with his family, doesn't let himself imagine gentle hands rubbing his shoulders or tilting his head back to comb his hair for him. He is High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli, and here under the shroud of midnight that is all he'll ever be.
-
24 acatl/teomitl - soulmate au
Your soulmate's birth day is on your wrist, laying against the vein that leads to your heart, but that doesn't mean anything—hundreds of infants are born on a day Six Reed or Eight Death or Ten Rabbit, and so it could be any one of them. And besides Acatl is a priest, and priests give up all claim to their soulmates when they take their vows; he shouldn't be lonely, shouldn't look at his wrist and wonder about the person whose sign appeared on his arm when he was twelve. It doesn't stop him.
So, of course, he finds his soulmate in the worst way possible. A priestess has been kidnapped and a warrior sent to assist him in his investigation; the young man, arrogant in the bright orange-and-black of a youth who's taken a prisoner unassisted, is halfway up the temple steps and meeting his eyes before the mark on his wrist starts to burn.
"You would be...Acatl-tzin?"
His name on the man's lips resounds like a bell in his heart, and it's all he can do to remain standing.
(That's bad enough. But then a week later he finds out young Teomitl is the Emperor's brother, and all he can think is Fuck.)
-
25 (teomitl – victory song)
They cheer louder than they ever did for his brothers, and that should please him; he's certainly a greater Emperor than both of them put together, adding new territories to the Empire with every campaign. It does please him, but…
But instead he looks over the heads of his war council and out into the crowd below, where his wife and Acatl are standing, and he feels his other brother-in-law Neutemoc's presence solid as a wall in the army behind him. They are silent, but he doesn't need them to sing his praises. He can see it in their faces, in Mihmatini's little nod and Acatl's soft smile at seeing him unhurt and victorious.
He is Emperor, and the priests and warriors sing their victory songs for him—but his greatest accomplishment is to look at his family and know he's made them proud.
-
26 teomitl/acatl - a strange compulsion
Acatl's hair is wavy. It's unusual, in a place where most people's hair is stick-straight, and it's attracted Teomitl's attention from the very first time they met.
...Well. Alright. Honestly, it's not the only thing that attracted his attention on first meeting; Acatl hadn't been wearing a cloak then, and his bare chest had been a little distracting. But the hair had been the main thing, and even now that Acatl's his teacher and he's gotten used to it, he finds his fingers twitch with the urge to touch it.
"Ah, you've got—" There's something in Acatl's hair; before Teomitl can think about all the (many) reasons why it would be a bad idea, he reaches to pluck it out and smooth an errant curl behind his ear.
And then they're both blushing, and he manages by sheer effort of will not to run away.
-
27 (acatl – are you gonna eat that?)
There are eyes on him. He makes a show of ignoring them, instead picking at the remains of his peppers and deliberately ignoring the honey-roasted agave worms that are his usual favorite snack. He isn't that hungry anymore, anyway.
One bite. Another. He keeps his eyes on his plate, not looking to either side. Any minute now…
A small hand tugs at his cloak, and a sweet and desperate-sounding voice that's clearly doing its best to sound polite pipes up, "Uncle Acatl, are you going to eat those?"
He chuckles and slides the rest of the plate over to his niece. "All yours."
-
28 (teomitl – water lilies)
Teomitl's patron goddess is She of the Jade Skirt, she who reigns over lakes and rivers and streams, and even though he can hear Acatl's and Mihmatini's voices in his head chiding him for his recklessness, it would be a terrible shame if he didn't sometimes take advantage of that fact. He can still drown, of course, so he has to come up for air sometimes, but that doesn't stop him.
He swims among the stems of water lilies like an otter, like the ahuitzotls that are his formal name, and marvels at how something so beautiful can come from mud.
-
29 (nezahual – jade green and ruby red)
There is jade in his ears and at his fingers, garlands of crimson flowers and coral around his neck, and Nezahual should be pleased. After all, is he not Revered Speaker of Texcoco? Is he not ruler of all he surveys? (Well, all he is presently surveying, at any rate—his fellow rules of Tenochtitlan and Tlacopan likely would not be impressed by him throwing his weight around.)
But he is frowning, and his messenger is quietly terrified. Moreso when he raises his voice and asks, "And you can swear to the accuracy of this information?"
"I can, my lord--"
"Great," he mutters, and then in a louder voice adds, "Bring me paper and a writing reed."
As much as he hates it, he has to draft a letter to Acatl—and where Acatl goes, Teomitl is sure to follow. There's nothing for it, though; if there are ghosts roaming his streets trying to eat people, his own city's High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli simply isn't up to the task.
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30 mihmatini/teomitl - the stupidest thing we've ever done
"...This," Teomitl announces from underneath their capsized canoe, "is probably the stupidest thing we've ever done."
Mihmatini, currently clinging to the packed reeds that make up the small craft, glares at him and hopes her husband can feel the fire of her anger. She is soaking wet, freezing, can just about feel squidgy lake mud between her toes, and is acutely aware of how her blouse is sticking to her skin. "I'm sorry? Considering the time you—"
"I said the stupidest thing we've done," he snaps. "I'll own up to the time I tried to overthrow my brother being incredibly ill-advised, but that was all my own fault. You were the one who talked me into having sex out here."
"It didn't take much talking," she says dryly, and she can just about hear his long-suffering sigh.
"Yes, you are beautiful and desirable and I love you very much, now will you please help me flip this thing right-side up before a newt climbs into my loincloth?"
-
31 teomitl/acatl - soup
In his defense, it really had seemed like a much better (and easier) idea when he'd started out. Acatl loves food and Teomitl wants him to love him, so therefore he will learn how to make food. Soup should be easy enough, never mind that he's always had his meals provided by the palace kitchens because his own culinary skills only extend as far as "put ingredients on fire until done" (and that only because he's responsible for his own meals on campaign) and Acatl deserves the best.
It turns out that clay pots explode if they're sealed too tightly and left on the fire for too long.
Mihmatini finds him crouched over the remains and favors him with a single raised eyebrow. "Do I want to know?"
He feels his face burn. "I was—uh. Soup. For Acatl. Except I...uh..." Grandmother Earth has not, so far, obliged him by swallowing him whole. Damn it.
His wife is smiling at him, but there's no trace of mockery in it. "Soup, huh? Let's get this cleaned up, and I'll show you how to make my brother's favorite."
-
32 (teomitl – learning from his mistakes)
His second attempt at the throne went much better, all things considered. He had waited. He had been patient. He had let Tizoc's reign stabilize, ignoring the deep cracks that threatened to shatter it each time his craven brother raged at another innocent he suspected of some plot (but he never suspected Teomitl, oh no, not his loyal little brother, his most skilled general). He had clenched his fist each time his fingers strayed towards a knife, each time he thought End it, end it here and now before he breaks our Empire apart—
And when Tizoc died choking on the fluids in his lungs (surprisingly not his fault, though he wouldn't rule out Mihmatini or Acamapichtli having gotten in some long-awaited revenge), he was ready to take the crown, and Tenochtitlan was ready for him.
(He wasn't ready for the first time one of the family members he actually liked called him Ahuitzotl, though. Hearing it from his subordinates? Fine. Hearing it from Acatl's lips? Not fine. To his loved ones, he'd rather be Teomitl until the day he died.)
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33 acatl/teomitl - getting it out of our systems
When Teomitl kissed him (softly, shyly, as though he couldn't believe he was doing this, as though he thought Acatl would reject him), Acatl didn't think twice. He'd done his thinking already, many times over, haunted in the dead of night or staring in blank, twisting horror at the contents of his own mind in midafternoon sunlight, and every track had led him past his objections (he is my student—I'm too old for him—my sister loves him—I am sworn to the gods, and what of my vows?) to the same conclusion—that if Teomitl offered, if Teomitl so much as looked as though he might want him the same way, he'd accept, and gladly.
Just this once, he thought desperately. Gods, let me be selfish just this once, let me purge this desire from my veins.
So he kissed back hungrily, clumsily—he had no idea what he was doing but that didn't matter, Teomitl was offering himself up on a golden platter and for once in his life all he had to do was take it. They barely made it to his sleeping mat, fumbled with each other's loincloths until fabric ripped under their hands, tore at each other's skin the same way (he would have bruises; he welcomed them), left teeth marks in throats and collarbones and shoulders, and only when they were both sweaty and sticky and spent and Teomitl was catching his breath against his chest did Acatl realize he'd made a fatal error.
Closing his eyes didn't help. He was still far too acutely aware of the solid weight of Teomitl in his arms, the pleasantly ebbing ache of his own body under him.
Teomitl shifted against him, quirking up a hopeful, wicked grin and sliding a hand down over his chest. "Mmm, that was wonderful. Are you satisfied?"
He'd never lied to him. He didn't intend to start now, even if it made the good, moral, upright part of his conscience scream in defeat. (The selfishly hedonistic part, long-buried, was radiating smug satisfaction. He ignored it.)
"...No," he muttered. "Not yet."
"Well." Teomitl's grin only widened, eyes gleaming in a way that said he had a great many ideas on how to fix that. "Let me handle that for you."
-
34 acatl/teomitl - like a bonfire burning
Falling in love was like stepping into an inferno. He'd seen warriors sacrificed that way, and now he thought he knew how they must have felt. You spend too much time with the dead, Xochiquetzal had told him. You miss what makes humans alive. At the time he'd been unsettled; later, he'd thought that she had to be wrong, that he was fulfilled with his temple and the chants and bodies that made it up. But now…
He let his gaze slide to Teomitl again. The man was smiling, laughing at something one of Acatl's nephews had said (and which he hadn't caught, too busy having his world upturned by this revelation over a quiet family dinner), and he realized with a slow surge of emotion that he and the goddess has both been wrong. It was possible, after all, to feel safe and—and alive at the same time. To feel his heart race as though he stood at the edge of the staircase, at the edge of the fire, and yet feel no fear, because he knew he'd be safe. That it would be terrifying (exhilarating) but he'd be safe.
Teomitl's fingers just barely brushed his own.
Sparks caught in his skin, danced along his spine. He leaned in and let himself burn.
-
35 (teomitl – an unusual phobia)
They were passing through the markets when Teomitl stopped, shuddering so expressively that his cloak rustled with it. By his side, Acatl paused. The trips to Tenochtitlan’s various markets served a dual purpose—making sure Teomitl could correctly identify needed spell materials as well as teaching him to haggle. While the first was something his student regularly passed with flying colors, the second...well, Teomitl was the Emperor’s brother, and nothing Acatl could try and impart regarding the value of frugality would change that no matter how hard he tried. Still, he’d never seen a reaction like that. Curious, he followed his student’s gaze.
And found his head turned away, every line of his body broadcasting that there was something he very much did not want to see in the other direction. But when Acatl turned to look, all he saw was an animal vendor hawking cages of monkeys.
Teomitl was still shuddering, and now that he studied him a bit closer he could see disgust and fear in his face.
“...Really?” It slipped out before he could stop himself.
Teomitl flinched and mumbled something. Acatl waited. He wasn’t disappointed.
“It’s the hands,” he muttered. “And the faces. They’re like—like little people, it’s creepy. Don’t you dare laugh!”
Acatl blinked at him. “I wasn’t going to.” In fact, he rather wanted to set a reassuring hand on his shoulder, but he refrained. He wasn’t sure how Teomitl would take that. “It was only a surprise.”
Teomitl’s eyes narrowed. Of course he’d take offense anyway. “Because I’m a warrior and Tizoc’s brother?”
He managed, somehow, not to smile. “Neutemoc is terrified of grasshoppers, so no. I would have thought nothing could be creepier than the ahuitzotls.”
“Ahuitzotls aren’t creepy!” Teomitl huffed. And then, at his raised eyebrow, amended it to, “...Not that creepy. At least they just mostly look like otters.”
“Terrifying giant otters with clawed hands on their tails that drown people.”
“...Fair point.” They walked on in silence, but Acatl didn’t miss the way Teomitl drew a little closer to him, as though his presence was a comfort. As though they were friends. It made something go warm in his chest.
After a moment he asked, “But really, grasshoppers? Why grasshoppers? They’re delicious.”
And that was a story Acatl had to tell, complete with hand gestures, and by the time they found the vendors they’d come for, Teomitl seemed to have quite forgotten his fear.
-
36 (acatl & acamapichtli – an unlikely friendship)
“You said you had no intentions of interfering!”
Acamapichtli barely dodges another of the creatures they’re fighting. He’s still not sure what they are—some horrible sorcerous creation, no doubt—but they’ve descended upon the house of Acatl’s brother Neutemoc before, and this time it’s while his children are at home. They’re gone now; he’s successfully covered their retreat. He dispatches the thing with a blow of his sword and takes a deep breath.
For the moment, they are safe. He looks over at Acatl—bloodstained, lightly wounded, and catching his breath over a creature’s corpse—and comments, “Because we are only temporary allies, and you’ve made it clear you trust me about as far as you can throw me.” And probably a good deal less.
Acatl straightens up, glaring at him. “After what you tried to do to my brother? Yes.”
He sighs, shaking his head. “Well, I’ve thought about that, and after...a significant amount of soul-searching, I came to the most wretched of realizations. One that might—no, probably will—curdle your very blood. You may wish to sit down.”
Acatl’s eyes narrow. “Get on with it.”
“You...are my friend.”
-
37 (acatl – performing an autopsy)
This is his favorite part of the job, honestly. Just him, an empty room, and a corpse.
Well. Not just a corpse. Nobody is ever just a corpse, even when their spirit’s gone on to whichever afterlife awaits them. The woman he’s currently leaning over, knife in hand, had in life been forty-year-old Ayotochtli of the Atempan calpulli, dead a few weeks after delivering her fifteenth child. Fifteenth. Her husband suspects foul play—she is his only wife, but his cousin has been angling for her spot in his life and might resort to poison to remove a rival—but Acatl wonders if it hadn’t just been exhaustion. He knows he’d see a lot fewer dead women if the priestesses of Xochiquetzal bothered to share their methods of avoiding childbirth with the common folk, and sometimes he hates them for it.
He closes his eyes and breathes out. Right. This is no place for anger. Ayotochtli died of something that made her tongue swell up and turn purple, made her leave her children and husband behind as she choked on her own blood, and he’s going to find out what. There’s only one way to discover the answer.
He lifts his knife and makes the first incision.
-
38 (mihmatini – the life of a guardian)
The magic of the Duality does not feel like fire. It looks as though it should—it’s hot and flickering, and it moves over her hands like flames. It doesn’t feel like water, either, for all that it’s a deep and cool and soothing shade of blue and ripples where the sun hits it.
No, she closes her eyes and draws the magic down and what she feels—what fills her from the inside out, surging like the tide until it threatens to drown her (but it won’t, because she is the Guardian now and the power of Ometeotl resides in her own skin)—is light. Pure, blessed light.
It’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever felt, and the most terrifying.
She’d wanted to be a housewife. She’d wanted to marry, to raise her own children. But fate has intervened (and gods, part of her hates Teomitl for it, for being the perfectly-placed virgin of Imperial blood they’d needed for the ritual to take place) and so this, instead, is to be her role. To guard the Sacred Precinct and the imperial family, keep the invisible boundaries, chant and lift her hands and call down this raging torrent of azure brilliance for the rest of her life.
She closes her eyes. Breathes in. Breathes out.
Mihmatini. A peasant’s daughter. Sister to Acatl, High Priest for the Dead, the Jaguar Knight Neutemoc, and the entirely ordinary women Icnoyotl, Yoltzin, Nelli, and Nematiliztli. Wife of Teomitl, the future Master of the House of Darts.
And Guardian of the Duality.
She opens her eyes, and the world around her is blue, pulsing light. And she smiles.
She can work with this.
-
39 (teomitl & acatl – a good influence)
In another world, he loses his temper. Tzutzumatzin tells him the springs of Coyoacan are unpredictable at best and dangerous at worse, and he sees only disrespect. How dare anyone tell him what to do? Is he not Emperor? And so he has the lord strangled and goes ahead with his plan, knowing none will gainsay him save for the gods themselves.
And they do. The aqueducts burst, the city floods, and Ahuitzotl—the man whose name signifies a terrifying, thorny water beast, the man chosen to rule Tenochtitlan, the man who led the Triple Alliance from one end of the sea-ringed world to the other—Ahuitzotl drowns. They say it is the wrath of the gods, but his own prickly nature led the way.
In this world, he stops. Waits. Breathes, the way Acatl is always telling him. And makes himself listen, really listen, to what the other man is saying about the springs that will fuel his aqueducts. Now he sees that no offense is meant, that he is truly trying to help and is merely somewhat less than courteous about it—and since he’s quite often been accused of the same, even by Mihmatini who loves him, he can’t be too angry. He’s sworn that he’ll never follow his brother’s hypocrisy.
He still can’t make himself be happy about it, but he sits back on his mat and meets Tzutzumatzin’s eyes. “What do you suggest instead? We must have that water.”
“...Well, Ahuitzotl-tzin…”
The floods still come. A different source for the city’s water helps, but Jade Skirt and the Storm Lord are still not in a helpful or even pleasant mood and there are always sorcerers who want to see him dead. Half of Tenochtitlan goes under, sparing not even his palace, and many die. But it isn’t as bad as it could be—thank the gods, that it isn’t as bad as it could be—and when he’s pulled from the water, it’s only three days until he opens his eyes. Battered, half-drowned, three-quarters lame, and with holes in his memory that will never close, but alive.
Acatl and Mihmatini don’t question why he keeps thanking them. They’re too busy clasping his hands in utter, wordless relief.
-
40 (acatl – noir au)
The office was dark. It was almost always dark—he hadn’t been able to afford anything better than this building, and the surrounding skyscrapers blocked all the natural light—but today was worse, because it had been raining for so long he couldn’t even remember how sunlight felt on his skin. Throwing wide the shades and guzzling cup after cup of cheap, terrible black coffee had woken him up earlier, but that had been earlier. The sun had gone down since then, and the flickering gas threw deep shadows. Acatl propped his chin on his hand, stared down at his blotter, and fought to keep his eyes open.
Christ, but he was tired. He thought he’d been born tired. His latest case had angered some very powerful people in the upper echelons of the mayor’s office, and Ceyaxochitl—who’d set him on it in the first place, shamelessly using her power as the unofficial boss of the city’s underworld—had been unwilling to throw him a line as the bigwigs went from simply unhelpful to actively threatening overnight. The viciously angry part of him hoped that Acamapichtli himself would stop by for a chat. Alone. It would give him an excuse to show the bastard why you didn’t threaten his family, no matter who you worked for.
He’d just picked up his notebook—maybe he’d go over the facts of Elueia’s disappearance one more time—when the bell over his door rang.
He set the notebook down.
The young man sidling in was tall and wiry and dark, hair buzzed almost unfashionably short. His eyes were dark too, filled with a nervous energy, and Acatl quickly swept his gaze over him. Brown trenchcoat, the shoulders wet from the rain. Equally brown hat. No visible bulges that could be hidden weapons, but he kept the desk between them anyway as he rose. “What can I do for you?”
The man—more of a boy, really—met his gaze head-on, unafraid. “My name is Teomitl. Ceyaxochitl sent me to help.”
-
41 (acatl/teomitl – sea of jade)
Teomitl's patron goddess is Chalchiuhtlicue, She Whose Skirt Is Jade, and sometimes that doesn't matter. Sometimes Teomitl's eyes and skin are just brown, his skin gleaming only with his own good health, and when he bleeds it is only an ordinary shade of red. (He is still beautiful, of course, but it's a beauty Acatl's grown accustomed to. Not that it doesn't still take his breath away! But when you've been loving the same man for so long, at some point you stop being completely dumbstruck when you wake up next to him in the morning.)
This is not one of those times. Teomitl's eyes are jade from end to end, his skin rippling with the green reflections of sunlight seen from the bottom of the lake, and the air is filled with the stench of churned mud and blood and algae. The ahuitzotls he commands are coiled savagery by his side, the clawed hands at the ends of their tails clenching rhythmically as they await his command to go for the eyes of their foes.
He's the most beautiful thing Acatl's ever seen, and it frightens him more than he can put into words.
(And then the battle is joined, and he has just enough time to be thankful that the goddess's power is on their side. He has none at all for fear.)
-
42 (acatl & teomitl – modern au: not answering the phone)
"You left me. On. Read."
Teomitl wondered if it was too late to hang up. Claim he'd wandered somewhere with no service. Throw his phone into the street to get crushed by a semi. Anything would be better than this conversation with the man who'd once been his mentor—this conversation he hadn't even intended to have, except that when he'd seen Acatl's name on the caller ID he'd picked it up without thinking, forgetting all the very good and logical reasons why that was a bad idea. "Look, Acatl—"
"You tried to get your brother removed from office and the department closed down, and you left me on read! You left my sister on read! Do you know what that plot of yours would have done to her degree credits?!"
Right. Mihmatini was going to kill him too. He shuddered, but then he remembered why. Through gritted teeth, he snapped back, "My brother is a paranoid megalomaniac who tried to have you fired! If he's left in charge of the city coroner's office, can you imagine the damage he'll do?"
"Yes." Acatl's voice on the other end was a snarl. "But if you'd told me—"
"You would have disapproved. You would have tried to stop me." Acatl was always cautious, never liked taking risks. Teomitl hadn't seen a single way forward that didn't go through him, so he'd removed him from consideration. No matter how much the thought hurt.
"I would have shown you some better ways to get what you want!" He'd never heard Acatl raise his voice before. It made him feel about an inch tall. "You could have confided in me, and I would have tried to help you."
He swallowed once. Twice. He wouldn't start crying now. "I thought…"
Acatl must have picked up on it—damn him—because his voice softened. "You can't run for his office in a few years if you have a criminal record, Teomitl."
He sucked in a long, slow breath. "...I'm going to hang up now. I'll be at that coffee place on your corner in half an hour."
That was probably enough time for a minor breakdown.
-
43 (acatl – a nice day where things go well)
The sun is shining, and for once he has time to enjoy it. He’s been up for a long time—there was a vigil the night before, and they’d needed their High Priest—but he’s not tired. Not enough to pass out yet, at any rate. No, now he’s going to make his devotions to the gods, grab a bite to eat, and...well. There’s nowhere in particular he has to be this morning. Maybe he’ll take a walk.
The temple kitchens furnish him with a delicious tamale. The breeze kicks up as he leaves the gates behind, cooling his skin and providing some measure of protection from what promises to be a warm day. He eats as he walks; he’s picking his way through the crowd with no real destination in mind, but somehow it isn’t surprising when he winds up in front of the Duality House.
He pauses. Mihmatini’s always telling him he should visit more often. But he hates to drop in unannounced, in case she’s sleeping or busy or simply doesn’t wish to see him—
“Acatl!”
His sister is beaming at him, bouncing up and down on her toes as though he could possibly miss her. “Come in!” she calls. “Come and eat breakfast with us!”
Even if he was full—he isn’t—he wouldn’t turn her down. Smiling, he walks in for a second breakfast and a wonderful, peaceful morning.
-
44 (teomitl/acatl – laughter)
Teomitl’s not sure how it happened, how their day went so bad so quickly—they’re both exhausted, both bleeding from a dozen please-gods-please-be-minor wounds, and even the monster that inflicted them laying dead at their feet doesn’t make it better—but he huffs out, “Well, that wasn’t the birthday present I’d had planned for you,” and Acatl—
Acatl stares at him for the space of one heartbeat, two, and then bursts out laughing.
He stares back. He’s sure he’s blushing, knows for a fact that his jaw’s just gone slack with shock, and both of those are reactions he needs to get better at controlling, but he can’t. He’s heard Acatl chuckle before, half-disbelieving little huffs of air that say he’s surprised at himself for finding amusement in something. He’s never heard him laugh. It’s not attractive, not really; it’s breathless and a little wheezy and turns his whole face red, and even when he pauses it’s only to suck in a long gasp of air and choke out, “A birthday present—” in a way that suggests he’s about to be set off again.
Oh no, comes Teomitl’s next conscious thought. Oh no, I love him.
Acatl, still wheezing, has to sit down to catch his breath. There are actual tears in his eyes when he looks up. “Ah...hah, forgive me...it was just...the battle, and the way you said it—“
He’s grinning like a fool and doesn’t care. “It’s more than alright. Come on, let’s—” Go back to my rooms. Have our wounds dressed. Join me in my private baths. Let me show you all the ways I can make your day better.
But then the Jaguar Knights are pounding along the streets towards them because they’ve finally heard the sounds of battle from the men they’re supposed to be guarding—he knows who’s next on his demotion lists—and he never gets a chance to finish the sentence.
-
45 (ollin – reflecting on his uncles)
The High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli is lighting incense for a funeral. He’s been doing little else for days; the men from across the sea have sent far, far too many of his people to a warrior’s death. But this one is not like the others, because tonight he stands vigil over the men who saved the rest of them. He closes his eyes, exhales, and remembers.
Uncle Acatl had never trusted the pale men in their shiny metal armor from the start. He’d hated their languages, their foul manners, the way they could barely go a sentence without trying to push their god on their listeners even though an interpreter. But he’d also been old and crotchety, and so Aunt Mihmatini and Uncle Teomitl had given the foreigners enough benefit of the doubt (and, as they’d pointed out, respect for the army of Tlaxcalans they’d brought with them) to allow their leaders into the city. Even their strange weapons couldn’t stand against a city blessed by the gods, could they?
Oh, how wrong they’d been. The clash of their cannons and horses against Huitzilopochtli’s righteous fury had nearly levelled the city itself, and then their leader—Cortes—had taken advantage of the chaos to break through Aunt Mihmatini’s guard and hold a blade to her throat to force a surrender.
And that had been his fatal mistake, because it had bought them—his uncles, the other High Priests, the Guardian herself—time to strike back. He’ll never forget the moment they had. That single, terrible moment when he’d dropped to his knees and watched the sky split open, watched his captors screaming and writhing in agony as their bones turned to obsidian and their skin to jade, their blood spilling to earth like juice from an overripe fruit.
Tenochtitlan was safe again, and all it had cost them was their connections to the gods. Oh, he can still feel them; souls are being ushered to their proper places, and Mictlan’s presence coils in his gut like a serpent. But the serpent is sleeping, its fangs tucked away, and none of them know when—or if—it will wake again. The new High Priest of Huitzilopochtli has not yet been able to offer the proper sacrifices, but the sun has risen anyway.
He inhales, feeling his eyes prickle in a way he can’t blame on the smoke. His uncles died as heroes, their names destined to live forever, but he wishes they were here. At least they’ll be burned on the same pyre, together in death as they were in life.
“Ollin-tzin?”
Ollin rises, brushes off his hands, and heads into the sunlight that they purchased for him.
-
46 acatl/teomitl – soup, pt 2 (“I love you. I want us both to eat well.”)
The temple accounts don't care for mortal frailty or the need for sustenance. They will loom there on the table, unyielding, until they are dealt with properly—and in his temple, he's going to be the one to do them. Of course Ichtaca could handle it for him—of course! the man is endlessly competent—but Duality curse him, this is his temple and his responsibility, and so Acatl sits down with a reed pen, several folded codices' worth of ledgers, and all his considerable stubbornness until he realizes—reluctantly—that he can't focus with his stomach trying to glue itself to his spine.
There are approaching footsteps—slow and measured, but still somehow familiar. He looks up just as Teomitl draws aside the entrance curtain. "Acatl-tzin," he says, and smiles, and Acatl feels himself blush.
"What brings you here?" It's a stupid question—he can smell the hot, spicy soup through the clay jug Teomitl's holding—but he has to say something to cover the rush of warmth at the realization that Teomitl's brought him dinner.
At least he's not the only one blushing. "I made you this," Teomitl mutters, and doesn't look at him as he sets it down. "I thought you'd be hungry—you never remember to eat—Mihmatini said this was your favorite, so..." He trails off in an inarticulate little murmur and adds, "I brought spoons."
It's delicious. It's even better when Acatl asks, "What on earth made you think of this?" and Teomitl—spoon halfway to his mouth—blurts out with absolutely no forethought whatsoever, "I love you, so—"
And then of course he drops the spoon, but neither of them care about that.
-
47 (acatl/teomitl, ezamahual – no accounting for taste)
"Literally, why?"
Ezamahual and Palli were not exactly best friends, but they were close as only two fellow Priests of the Dead could be—servants of the least popular god of the three supporting Tenochtitlan's throne, and the ones generally responsible for running around after their High Priest and making sure he didn't get himself killed dealing with beasts of the underworld (or worse, politics). Therefore, when Ezamahual leaned on his broom and gestured futilely towards the heavens, Palli knew exactly who and what he was talking about.
Accordingly, he reached over and patted the man's shoulder. "There's no accounting for taste."
Another gesture, this time accompanied by a sad shake of his head. "Acatl-tzin is kind. Patient. Even-tempered. Intelligent. I can see why the boy's interested. Anyone with sense would be. But to walk around looking at him like that in public…"
"I thought you liked Teomitl-tzin."
"Not when he and Acatl-tzin—" Ezamahual clamped his mouth shut, but by the way he was turning red Palli already knew what he was going to say.
He couldn't help but remark—after stepping out of range—"Guess we know our teachers were definitely lying about what happens if you break your vow of chastity, at least!"
-
48 (acatl/teomitl – a cache of jewels)
Teomitl loves him. He's not shy about showing it.
He also loves giving him gifts. He's not shy about that, either. Acatl sits by the carved stone chest that holds his valuables, sighing at the gold and silver and jade within. There are pieces of carved coral as big as duck eggs, a gleaming emerald heart the size of his two fists, ropes of turquoise and jade to weave through his hair. This latest present—a silver spider-and-owl pectoral, the symbol of his order in a form emperors would envy—might not even fit in the box.
"What's that look for?"
He can't help but smile fondly at his lover's voice, shaking his head. "Love…"
"What?"
"Do you remember when I recommended subtlety?"
"That was before I was Emperor," Teomitl says dryly, and...well, he can't argue with that.
-
49 (acatl/teomitl – mine, all mine)
Logic said that he couldn't lay claim to Teomitl; that he might be the man's lover, but that meant nothing when he couldn't be acknowledged as such in public, when Teomitl would take wives and concubines that could all wear pieces of his heart on their sleeves. Logic said that to be jealous was utter folly, and he should hate himself for it.
Logic had absolutely nothing on the slow, simmering rage of watching another man (some ambassador from another province, all gold and quetzal feathers and arrogance) flirt with the one he loved. Finally, he couldn't take it any more (there was a hand on Teomitl's arm and he was blushing) and before he knew it, he was at Teomitl's side.
He didn't say anything. He didn't need to. Teomitl's newly radiant smile was only for him, and as they were introduced he locked eyes with the interloper and thought, dark and vicious, Mine.
-
50 (ceyaxochitl & acatl – behind the mask)
People don't like her, but that's fine. She's not here to be liked. She is here to defend the invisible boundaries between the Fifth World, the heavens, and the underworld. To keep the imperial family safe from magical harm. To ensure that the Duality, that sacred two-in-one force underpinning all the other gods, continues to bless them with life.
So no, it doesn't bother her that young Acatl distrusts and dislikes her. She's trying to push him to greater things, from the life of a poor and humble priest to the skull-mask of a High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli where she knows he'll excel. She's not trying to be his friend.
...But sometimes, when he is being particularly stubborn and self-deprecating, she really thinks he needs one.
-
51 (teomitl – my dreams are red)
All his dreams of the courtyard are different, but in some ways they're very much the same. He stands in the middle of the dusty, bloodstained space with his warriors, a desiccated corpse at his feet, far too late to help Acatl and Mihmatini with their own battle—but then, helping isn't why he's here. He is selfish and greedy and ambitious, and he wants the crown.
And he asks them to support him, and they say no.
And he tells them to stand aside, and they say no.
And he doesn't ask at all.
And they ask him to stop, to think about what he's doing to the world, to the Empire he wants to rule, and he refuses.
And they tell him to stop, that they'll fight him if he takes one step closer, and he doesn't listen.
And then there is so much blood.
(Sometimes it's Mihmatini who falls first, who meets him when he takes that one step and is cut down by his warriors before she can scream. Sometimes it's Acatl, who steps forward with sad eyes and says I'm sorry, Teomitl, I can't let you do this—and falls with a shocked grunt when Teomitl guts him. Sometimes he can't tell which of them dies first; between one blink and the next he is standing in a field of gore, their pieces unidentifiable, and his sister is smiling and congratulating him on his ascension. Sometimes Acatl doesn't die immediately; when Teomitl kneels to hear his final words, they are a snarl of I thought better of you. Those ones are the worst.)
When Mihmatini asks why he's woken with tears in his eyes, he can't tell her.
-
52 (teomitl/acatl – ivory and alabaster)
The High Priest for the Dead wears white sandals. The cotton is the color of milk and the leather is smooth and pale as alabaster; the decorations keeping the ends of the straps from unraveling are carved human bone.
He is talking, but Teomitl isn't really listening. He's cursing himself for seven different kinds of a fool, for Acatl is as far beyond his reach as the stars in the sky and he is distracted even by the crossing straps of his sandals. Against all that white, Acatl’s dark skin gleams like polished wood, and they sit close enough that—if he was bold, if he was not such a coward—he could reach out and trace the arch of his foot under the straps, the delicate curve of the ankle above it.
He clenches his fist and stays his hand. White is for death, for the separation between earthly filth and higher things, and his touch will stain.
-
53 (acatl & teomitl – unorthodox ways of cutting through the red tape)
Acatl will never complain out loud. Such things are a waste of breath, and besides it's both stupid and pointless to rail against the vagaries of fate when doing so won't change anything. But he's leaving a meeting with the Emperor and the other High Priests with a face like stone, and when he only nods a greeting to Teomitl falling into step besides him, Teomitl knows why.
There are times I really hate my brother. He breaks the silence with a nearly-careless shrug. "You know, I could still kill him."
"No, Teomitl."
"I'm only reminding you that the offer's still open!"
"And the answer is still no."
"...Quenami, then?" The High Priest of Huitzilopochtli tried to have Acatl killed, and if there's an option to remove him that won't require waiting for his brother's death, Teomitl's willing to take it. He's always wanted to know if he can get the bastard to roll all the way down the steps of his own temple.
"No!"
-
54 (teomitl – narnia crossover pt 1)
Jadis had expected two Sons of Adam and two Daughters of Eve. She had expected the Lion. She had expected a knife, and a willing sacrifice, and victory.
She hadn't expected Teomitl, who came with his own gods and his own magic. And she really hadn't expected the ahuitzotls. (They had hands on their tails. What divine force had authorized that?
As she bled out, she saw the first sunflowers bloom.
