The Obsidian Butterfly

Atzi didn’t believe in the gods. The all-powerful beings believed to be hovering above the grey clouds and moon, somewhere in the heavens, causing floods and fires and storms when forgotten or ignored. The beings that her people slit palms and splattered copper blood on the stairs of temples for and sacrificed the hearts of animals and slaves to keep their own hearts beating one more day. The beings that stayed quiet through it all.

Her parents and the world forced their beliefs down her throat, as the constant of each new year was a silver blade calling out for her blood to ensure her people another thriving year on Tlalticpac. She offered three drops of it to the temple of their creator god, Ometeotl, the dirt soaking it up like a tongue licking its lips. She ground her teeth to nubs each time, digging the blade sharply into her skin until fat, red drops streamed over the edge of her hand and satisfied the hungry earth. A mangled, silver scar branded her palm now, a reminder of the tight strings the gods wound around her legs and arms.

Nothing ever happened afterwards. No rumble or groan from deep beneath the ground. No lightning cutting across the sky or moan of thunder to follow. Only a solemn nod from her parents and her mother’s shoulders sinking in ease from her ears to her chin. She praised the silent gods as often as she breathed, eyes always flicking to the sky searching for judgement or guidance and always receiving none. Atzi wondered if it was tiring, praying and waiting for something that was never going to come. The gods disappeared before she was born and like others her age or younger, she found it hard to still believe, hard to find the faith that possessed the others so blindly.

Tonight was the New Fire Ceremony and the night of her crowning of Huey Tlatoani. It was also a ceremonial tribute to the gods, a way to catch their attention and maybe get a sign. Atzi wondered how much longer this could go on before everyone snapped out of it before they could finally reclaim their lives as something more than human blood bags and personal assassins.

A slim, silver blade extended towards her, the shriveled hand of a short priest holding it out. Atzi recoiled, gathering up the fabric of her tilma, letting it drag across the dirt as she stepped past her. It was the same shade of red as her blood, the hem woven with gold thread.

“Atzi!” her mother, Nenetl, hissed, grabbing her shoulder. “If you want the gods to accept you tonight, you must respect the ceremony’s traditions!” The rushing blood in her veins slowly froze over.

“The gods have to accept me,” she said bitterly. “I am the only living heir to the throne now.” Her mother stepped back, hand falling away from Atzi’s shoulder. Her lips pursed and brown eyes bulged as they always did when Nenetl was flabbergasted.

“Atzi-”

“I do not owe the gods anything, let alone my blood.” A fiery tongue lashed around Atzi’s stomach, charring flesh and melting the ice in her veins. Suddenly a priest was at her side, snowy head bowed as he held out an arm for her. He was a plump, old man with brown skin deeply creased like old leather. His robes were red and gold, patterns of circles and squares woven into the fabric.

“Cihuapilli,” he said, voice scratchy with age. “It is time to ascend the mountain.”

Atzi said nothing, only nodded and bunched her skirts up into her fists. The crowds became dense and loud behind her, their energy shaking the ground at her feet as she followed the priest to the base of the mountain. She was unsure why they called it a mountain. It was more of a tall hill, the sides covered in parched patches of grass and the very top a rough cut of grey rock. Behind it, the evening sky ate away the remains of blue day and droplets of starlight broke through the growing darkness, faint but bright against the yellow haze of the moon. Her back hunched forward as the moon crept higher across the sky, the burden already slamming into her. But Atzi let out a shaky breath and straightened her spine, following the priest up the narrow, dirt path of the mountain, hoping she was strong enough to bear it all.

---

They hiked up the mountain in silence, the priest in front of her in his colorful robes and an ensemble of warriors behind her. Their faces were streaked in red and gold paint, their dark eyes dousing the glow of the torches that lined the path’s side. Only two didn’t wear face paint. Instead, black masks with pointed snouts and slits for eyes covered their entire faces, the masks of Merdina’s royal army, the Wolves. Warriors of the Wolves were sent off to fight enemy city-states, dragging back prisoners to be beaten into slaves and whatever else they could smuggle back. Merdina was a massive and ruthless city-state, the capital of the Aztec Empire, and because of that, the Wolves never lost. They basked in glory with their masks of bared white teeth painted with the red blood of their enemies, always fresh and dripping.

“You did not give your blood to the gods,” the priest said after several minutes of silent climbing, only the crunch of rocks and dirt beneath sandals to fight the howling winds. “Your brother did willingly but you refused to. Why is that?” Of course, Zolin did. He was perfect. That’s why. The perfect son, the perfect brother, the perfect Huey Tlatoani. The priest glanced at her over his shoulder as if he could hear her thoughts, but his dark eyes were bright with curiosity rather than the sizzling flame of anger. Atzi bit the inside of her cheek.

“The gods have been silent for twenty years,” Atzi said, eyes flicking between the path and the cliff’s edge as they climbed. Sweat clung to her tilma of maguey, the plant material suffocating her, stretching across her ribs with each heavy breath. The priest scaled the path with ease and grace despite his heavier weight, hands clutched in the fabric of his robe to keep it from getting dirty while Atzi stumbled and gasped.

“Twenty-two years to be precise, cihuapilli,” the priest offered and Atzi ground her teeth together.

“Yes, thank you. Twenty-two years but, nonetheless, they disappeared before I was even born. I’ve grown up in a world where the gods are silent yet still spoken about and praised. And for what reason? In my eighteen years of life, I have never been aided by the gods or even shown a sign that they are still here. So, where are they?” Atzi let out a breath. “Where were they when my brother disappeared? When he was ripped away from his empire?” And me. Her eyes blurred, blending darkness with light. She had never spat so much poison to someone about the gods, always keeping it locked away inside a little vile, and she wasn’t sure she was dropping it onto the right person. The priest, after all, was a servant to the gods, but the shadows ripped out of her, their darkness clawing through her with jagged talons and out her lips.

“You are wrong. What about your …,” the priest hesitated, “… your curse? Only the gods could give a human something as powerful as that.”

“I never said I didn’t believe they weren’t once here, but I believe my curse is what is leftover of them. Now, they’re gone. Even so, the gods have given me nothing but a curse that taints me with the deadliest of poisons, and because of that, I doubt they would want my blood anyways. I am doing them and myself a favour by defying the tradition my mother speaks so highly of.”

Silence fell between them in heavy folds, and Atzi wiped a hand across her forehead. Her stomach was in tight knots, and suddenly, she was thankful that she didn’t stuff her face at the feast before. The heaps of steaming meats and vegetables made her mouth water, but her stomach was as unpredictable as a storm in summer.

“The New Fire Ceremony has been a tradition for four eras,” the priest explained, taking a torch from its place along the path. The light stretched out in front of him, warm and soft against the cold, brown path. “Still, the gods were around long before that. They granted us life and gave us the place we call home. For that, we will never be able to repay them. We sacrifice captured enemies to ensure our coming years on Tlalticpac and spill our own blood to show how appreciative we are. Refusing to do so is disrespecting the gods, Atzi, and the gods do not like to be disrespected.” He paused, scratching his chin. “The gods are still here, watching us, but they are tired after eras of fighting for humans. They will return only when they are desperately needed, or if we somehow pay off our debt.”

“Exactly. They left us,” she argued, swallowing against the lump in her throat. “A long time ago too. The New Fire Ceremony this year is more of a crowning ceremony for me rather than worshipping of th-the gods.”

The air was thin up here, the cliff leading off into a black, gaping mouth. Past that, the clusters of houses and temples of Merdina glowed warmly in the distance, connecting in flickers of fire.

Swarms of dark herds that were people broke through blankets of darkness below with bright torches, the echoes of laughter and voices shaking the mountain to its core. As they climbed higher, Atzi felt responsibility and fear press down on her with the heel of its palm, crushing her head into her neck and her neck into her back. Yet, she kept climbing, knowing that she was too high to turn back now.

“It will always be about the gods,” the priest said. “It was created in honour of Xiuhtecuhtli, the fire god, along with the other gods, and that is how it will remain. You are being crowned tonight because it happens to be your eighteenth birthday today and Merdina is without a leader. Even when quiet, the gods must bless and approve of each new heir before we can continue living in peace and harmony. Merdina is the biggest city-state of our empire, thus making you the closest thing to a god on Tlalticpac, but before that, the gods must accept you.” Accept you. Atzi despised the fact that ghosts had such a stronghold on her life and her future, their grip tight like their fingers was still made of flesh and bone.

“A god?” she laughed to keep her teeth from sawing together, heat brewing inside her.

Atzi thought of all the times people saw her coming towards them and skirted down a different path, eyes like saucers and faces blanched; all the times her parents ushered her to her room and locked the door to hide their monster away from the noblemen and women who came for the feasts and celebrations of her brother, the first heir before he disappeared; all the times slaves refused to dress, bathe and feed her, choosing the fate of being drained of blood as sacrifices instead. When she was fourteen, two years after her curse made its first appearance, a young boy told her that she should be burned at the stake. They never did or even tried. They soon realized they would rather kill her with isolation and hatred than with fire. It was more painful, more deserving for a monster like her.

To call her a god was a cruel joke.

Atzi could barely carry the power she already had, which was now curling its tentacles around her neck and waist, strangling her. Like her shadows, there was no way to break free of this new power’s hold. Not even the sharpest of blades could cut through the burden of the throne.

“Yes, well, a human version I suppose,” he said hesitantly as if regretting his choice of words. “Some might be jealous, but others will pity you. It’s no easy task carrying so much power. I am sure your brother could….” He cleared his throat and Atzi ignored the squeeze of her heart.

“Nobody will be jealous of me,” Atzi laughed. “Nobody pities me either.”

“Just remember that tonight the gods will be watching. It is best to make sure you are ready for that.” Atzi wanted to ask what she had to be ready for. This ceremony may be for the gods but if they had kept silent through all the festivals and ceremonies in their name, they would stay silent for this. Instead, she kept her lips shut, watching as the end of the path neared. Tension from the cold tightened around her shoulders, and an uncomfortable pinch scraped her lungs with each breath. Tonight, her life was going to change, and it wasn’t a matter of for better or for worse but of how many things could go wrong in a single night.

---

By the time they reached the top of the mountain, night had consumed whatever specks of the day were left, encasing them in inky darkness. Atzi panted up the last stretch, fingers trembling at her sides as the shadows of the night drew around her like a second skin, sinking into her pores and strengthening the pounding drum in her chest. The shadows yanked at her core and hissed in her ears, parting the howls of the wind that numbed her ears with their own cold tongues.

She kept moving until they reached the top, the snapping winds the only thing to greet her as she stepped off the path. In the centre of the mountaintop, a massive bonfire crackled and hissed, orange flames flailing in the wind. She gathered up her tilma, lifting the hem as she followed the priest across the jagged rocks and towards it. The wind tore at her bare skin with each step, yanking her dark waves of hair and throwing them around her head. It made her eyes water and lips dry, but she struggled forward, wishing for the warm, summer sun but only getting the merciless, winter moon. The fire, however, was like liquid honey against her skin as they neared it, snug and soothing. She rubbed her hands up and down her arms though, still shivering.

“Soon this will be the last fire burning in Merdina.”

The priest stood to her left, staring off the edge of the mountain, the wind whisking his robes back like a flag rippling in the wind. His eyes watched the crowds below and the tiny dots of light that were fires and hearths, still blazing with life. From her studies, Atzi knew this was part of the ceremony. All the lights were put out across the empire until the land was suffocated in darkness, and after a sacrifice made at the top of the mountain, the fires could be relit as a new era began. Once all the fires were doused, Atzi would be the one to steal the last light from the night and spill blood for the gods.

“And then I must make the sacrifice,” said Atzi, watching as her parents reached the top with three warriors right behind them who quickly moved to their spots around the edges of the mountain. Her mother rubbed her arms, the sleeves of her tilma as thin as Atzi’s but the color of the deep sea in winter instead. Beside her, Atzi’s father caught Atzi’s stare and led them slowly towards her, faces taut and pale.

“Yes, and hope that when you light the sacrifice’s empty chest, the fire will catch.” The priest strode away from the edge and towards her parents, leaving Atzi’s stomach twisting.

“Wait. What?”

But the priest was already gone, standing with her parents who were both stiff with faces cloaked in shadows, but Atzi could still feel their stares. The weight of them and the night ahead coated her lungs, making each breath a painful wheeze as she huddled closer to the fire, clinging to the last scraps of warmth left in the bitter night.

People arrived like showers of rain; clusters of anywhere from three to eight filled up the mountaintop and Atzi desperately searched their faces. She sighed as women with grey-streaked hair and men with full beards were welcomed by her parents and the priest before dispersing and mingling with the other noblemen and women. She rocked back and forth on her heels, waiting, hoping she would see his face. She hated him, but her chest ached and her eyes strained to see his face tonight.

“The fires across Merdina are now out!” the priest announced, hands raised to the sky as if cradling the weight of it himself. Atzi’s head whipped towards him, heart pounding against its ice case in her chest. “Now the cihuapilli will douse this last fire, and the ceremony will begin!” Somehow his voice boomed, reaching across a space that even those below could hear. The faint echo of cheers chorused from the darkness of Merdina, mixing in with the ones blaring behind her.

“Your pail, cihuapilli,” shouted a warrior, face shielded by the black wolf mask. He thrust something heavy into her arms, its cool metal biting and ice water splashing her skin.

“Ugh,” she said, shuddering as ice water soaked her front.

Two warriors escorted her to the fire where a ring of at least thirty people stood. Some kept their eyes on the fire, its tendrils jarring the black sky, but others watched her until her skin crawled. Fear hid beneath each of their faces though, a sudden paleness with her every move and the absent-minded step back as she joined the circle. The priest caught her eye and held up a hand to her. Suddenly she realized what it meant. Atzi struggled with the heavy pail, trying to lift it above her head to be ready, but her arms trembled and fingers slipped against the wet metal. Her face was on fire as everyone watched her with drawn eyebrows and suppressed smirks while a faint sheen of sweat broke out above her lip.

“Having some trouble? Here, let me hold it for a second.” Atzi jumped, almost dropping the pail, but a pair of hands grabbed it from her. She looked up, seeing a young man with curls that looked black in the night but Atzi knew were brown, threads of gold woven in when the sunlight caught them in its glare. He towered over her in height but was slender and lanky as if he still hadn’t quite filled out yet. His skin was like his hair, a warm, light brown that was soft to the touch. Atzi only let her eyes wander as far as his shoulders, tearing them away before they could sneak a glance at his beautiful face, brown eyes flecked with hints of deep green and a childish grin that was the only remedy for the ice around her heart.

“I’m fine,” croaked Atzi but she wasn’t. Standing next to him was the equivalent of a hand punching through her chest, yanking her heart straight from it. She watched it bleed in his golden hand, the blood running between his fingers before dropping it to the ground. Suddenly each breath was jarred, tinted with shards that were the leftover bits of her heart.

“Are you sure? It’s no problem.” He spoke so easily like it was nothing to talk to her. No leftover traces of emotions or memories were painted across his face when he looked at her.

“Yes, I’m sure,” she snapped, snatching back the pail. The weight of it had suddenly disappeared, lifted by the strength of the shadows inside her. They fed on the anger boiling in her stomach before curling around the muscles of her arms.

“I know you weren’t expecting me to be here, Atzi,” he said quietly, eyes searching her face, “but I had to. I had to see you become Huey Tlatoani…after everything, I owed you this at least.” Ha.

“Thank you for being so thoughtful,” she hissed, catching the eye of her mother. Immediately Nenetl’s dark brows drew together, a stress crease already folding between them. “However, you do not owe me anything. You chose to walk out of my life and now that’s a choice you can deal with for the rest of yours.”

Meca’s face plummeted, lips parting but Atzi just set back her shoulders. “Now, excuse me. I have a fire to put out.” Without waiting, Atzi thrust the pail upwards, sending the water in floods onto the fire. Flames sputtered and spat as they were smothered into glowing embers, but it wasn’t enough. The other side of the fire was still roaring with flames, stopping where the wood was damp. She stared at the surviving fire, breathing hard, just as it suddenly winked out, darkness finally settling on them. Atzi glanced beside her, dropping the pail to the ground with a loud clang. Meca was gone. When she squinted across the dead fire and through the shadows, she saw a tall figure clambering over it and towards her. She sighed.

“You’re welcome.” He dropped a second pail at her feet and she scowled.

“That wasn’t part of the ceremony,” Atzi said, more mockery than an annoyance in her voice. “The gods might curse you for that.” Somehow, she found the strength to look Meca in the eyes, and even in the darkness, his stare set butterflies loose in her stomach. She hated it.

“I think I’ve cursed myself enough,” he said thoughtfully, running a hand through his mess of curls. “I don’t know if it could get any worse.” Before her thawing heart could betray her, her mother stormed up to them, snatching Atzi by the arm. For once, Atzi was glad for it.

“Hello, Meca,” she said sweetly, but when she turned to Atzi, her eyes were black slits. “Atzi, it is not the time to be rebellious and thoughtless. The priest was supposed to say a blessing before you extinguished the fire!” She leaned in closer, her breath hot on Atzi’s face, nails digging into her skin. Atzi winced, the shadows suffocating her, cooing to be let out as she looked into her mother’s flaming eyes. “Are you trying to make this day more difficult? Your father and I are under enough stress already, and we do not need you acting like a child as well. Do you understand?” It wasn’t a question but a command, and despite the minutes counting down to her being crowned Huey Tlatoani, Atzi abided.

“Yes.” Her mother released her instantly and stepped back.

“Good,” she said, tone clipped. “Now, listen to what the priest says, and all will be well. The gods will accept you and you will become Huey Tlatoani.” Her cold fingers tipped up Atzi’s chin and forced her daughter to look at her. Fresh wrinkles creased her mother’s eyes, ones that Atzi knew appeared just overnight.

“Your brother would be proud,” she whispered, lips trembling as they shaped those five words. She pulled away from Atzi, turning to face the pile of wood and ash, arm looping around her husband’s while Atzi was glued in her spot. But she clutched onto her mother’s words before they could fly off into the night, before the cold could snatch them out of the pits of her heart. Her mother only mentioned her brother, not herself, but still, Atzi clung to those words like they were her lifeline. A something in a sea of nothing.

---

Atzi already had blood on her hands, and tonight a new, dark coat would be added to her fingers, which were already stained with a dried, copper crust. As the moon inched further across the sky, the ghosts became clearer and stronger. They followed Atzi’s every move and hissed at her every breath, because it was one more than they ever got, and they never let her forget.

They were their loudest at night, when the shadows inside of her were at their strongest. The shadows poked at her weaknesses and tugged at her past, seething over the darkness it was inked it. When the ghost’s faces appeared behind her eyelids she shook her head until they fell away, as if the memories dropped out of her ears and onto the ground.

She saw them now, ripples tearing through her vision becoming a broad man with red soaked hair and the rush of power all over her body as she-

The shadows rampaged inside of her at the memory, pounding on every closed door and screaming in her ears to let them out and relive it. But she dug her nails into her hands, holding them back. It was like living with someone else. Her mind was never her own. Her thoughts started off as just that, but then became threaded with the shadows. It was hard to pick away the darkness from herself now. There was barely a difference anymore, just a frayed thread hanging in her mind that she stood on one side of and the shadows on the other.

Tonight was no different. It was a waging internal battle, bloody and gory in her mind. Her eyes strained to stay clear as chilly voices sawed through her head. When a warm hand skimmed hers, it scorched her skin, like lava seeping down her wrist. She gasped, jerking forward.

“It is just me, cihuapilli.” It was the priest, hovering at her side. Atzi let out a breath. “It is time for you to take this.” He reached under the folds of his robes and revealed a dagger. Its silver metal glittered even in the darkness, catching the pale beams of moonlight shining from above. Fingers gripping the blade easily, he held the hilt out to Atzi. She hesitated and then wrapped her own shaky fingers around it.

Its hilt was wooden and carved with designs she couldn’t make out, but it was smooth to the touch with edges worn by age. Parts of the blade were darker than others and when she lifted it to her face, Atzi could see rust blooming where metal met wood.

She had killed three people but never had she held a weapon. She didn’t need one when she was just as deadly without.

“This was the blade used at the last New Fire Ceremony fifty-two years ago,” the priest explained, watching her eyes widen and narrow as she inspected it. Its power pulsed through her hand, tickling the veins rushing right under her skin. Or maybe the pulsing was from the shadows laughing with glee at the weapon entrusted to her. Atzi knew if she looked up people would be staring, wondering why the girl who was as deadly as a blade’s point was given a knife as well. She wasn’t quite sure herself, but she liked it, the extension of her arm, the controllable power.

“Where is it?” Atzi asked, tearing her eyes away from the blade. The priest raised a bushy brow.

“Where is what?”

“The sacrifice? Should they not be bringing him soon? It is almost midnight.” Atzi glanced at the night sky, at the moon shifting higher across it.

“Yes, yes,” the priest said hesitantly,” but remember, cihuapilli. The sacrifice may be a sacrifice, but it is still a person believe it or not.” Blush crept across Atzi’s face. She tried so hard to make others see her as a person and not a monster, yet here she was treating this person who was her passage into Huey Tlatoani as something rather than someone.

“Tonight is a big night, Atzi, and I hope you understand its importance.”

“I do, and I appreciate everything you have done for me.” The shadows spat something else in her ear and she winced, nails biting into her palm.

“Yes,” he said, “but I can also see that your heart isn’t in this. You don’t want to be Huey Tlatoani of Merdina, let alone the leader of an entire empire.” Atzi leaned forward, wondering if she misheard him. Chatter was thick and vibrant on the mountaintop, the voices of dozens of people layered in the air. She could have misheard him but no, the hard line of his mouth and the cold of his eyes told her she heard him right.

“You’re wrong,” Atzi said. “I do want this. I’ve worked hard for this.” The last two months of her life had been jammed with hours of lessons and meetings and hours of raking fingers through her hair and screaming into pillows. All for tonight. All for this.

“Maybe so, but you want this position for your own revenge. People have mistreated you because of who you are, and you want to use this to make them forget about your past. However, no matter how terrible, our past will always haunt us. You can’t let that be your drive to become our leader; otherwise, our empire will crumble, and that,” the priest said, glancing behind them at Merdina, their home, “is a fate much worse then a slip up at your brother’s crowning.”

Atzi went rigid, spine and muscles turning to stone.

“A slip up?” She broke through the stone and laughed, a laugh more shadows than herself. In her mind, she saw the blood and heard the strangled shrieks of the injured or dying. A slip up. The priest opened his thin lips to say something else, but a warrior appeared beside him, his round face streaked in rich paint and a pointed staff stabbed into the ground at his side.

“What is it?” the priest asked.

“The sacrifice is here, noble priest, and it is nearly midnight.” Atzi looked up, following the priest’s eyes to the silvery moon.

“Yes, yes,” the priest muttered. “I can see that. Bring him here and we will begin.” The warrior nodded, slinking back into the shadows and disappearing. A stormy cloud hovered over the priest’s face as he looked up at the sky, and then something broke through it. Something with jagged nails and hollow eyes that clawed off his face and right into Atzi: fear. She shuddered violently. She knew her parents waited in skepticism and fear for tonight, but if the priest did too, how was she supposed to feel? Not a single person held out hope for her, and now hope’s frail wings fluttered weakly in her own hands.

“No! No!” a strangled voice wrangled the shadows, halting conversations as everyone whirled around. Atzi’s heart stilled to a cold, dead mass in her chest as two warriors heaved a struggling figure onto the mountaintop. It was too dark to see clearly, the shadows seeming to thicken over the thrashing figure as he kicked out his legs, moaning and shouting between raspy breaths.

The sacrifice. Atzi let out a breath that felt like ice in her lungs. The thought of the sacrifice felt so simple before, a purpose without a face, but now she had the legs and arms to add to this faceless man. A real live person, probably someone captured in one of the small battles fought between Merdina and the few other neighbouring city-states. This man fought your people in battle, she thought to herself. He probably tried to kill them too. But maybe not. Sometimes warriors captured innocents from villages just to show they could. This man was young though, in his prime for fighting, with sculpted arms and legs and a face that might have been handsome if it wasn’t smeared in dirt and thin from the heinous beast of hunger gnawing at it. His skin was paler than hers and hung off the bones of his face like drying animal skins on racks. He wasn’t from Merdina.

The warriors threw him at her feet as she turned around, face now standing off against the bitter winds. She could see the darkness over her empire and the darkness in the choice that now laid at her feet. Or more like wriggled at her feet. He grunted and screamed, wrists and ankles bound by braided rope. Scraps of fabric that may have been white were wrapped only around his middle, covering down to the tops of his thighs. His bare skin was covered in grime and blood.

“Be quiet,” the warrior mumbled, giving the sacrifice a kick before returning to his position around the edge of the mountain.

“You’re gonna kill me,” the sacrifice said, and Atzi was surprised by the fire in his eyes, the anger and determination all sacrifices usually lacked, that now burned the words from her lips. “Aren’t you?” His eyes looked blue even in the dark, bright and glassy and broken by the burden of slavery. She felt sick looking at him, to see his wounded skin and shattered eyes and know it was because of her family that he looked that way. A few years ago she could not have cared less. She would have looked at this man and turned up her nose in disgust, if she even spared him a glance at all.

“Don’t answer that, cihuapilli,” the priest said, scowling. “The warriors informed him of his duties on the way up. He knows why he is here and we have no time to waste.”

“You people are sick,” the sacrifice sneered, struggling to his knees. His fingers twitched against the ropes holding him back, lips blowing strands of shaggy, fair hair out of his eyes. “Killing people for some gods that don’t even exist.” A laugh scratched his raw throat.

“We do not look for confirmation of our gods from our sacrifices.” Atzi’s father stepped in, hand hovering over her shoulder but careful not to touch her. “Do not listen to this maggot any longer, Atzi. Take the blade and carve out his heart for our gods.” He reached for her hand that squeezed the hilt of the dagger, but its power that once hummed in her body was gone, the blade a deadweight in her hand instead.

“Yeah, cihuapilli,” the sacrifice said, tracing his bloody lips greedily over her title. “Cut out my heart after I was tortured for three years by your people.” The blade went cold, skin numbing as frost spread over her hand.

What? Three years? She was fifteen three years ago, young, immature and naïve. In love with her brother’s best friend and feared by her empire. Not much had changed in those three years, but they were a significant wedge of her life.

“Don’t speak to her,” said Meca, his usually soft voice rigid. “You are nothing but the dirt on her shoe. You should feel honored to be used for something so significant to our people and who we are. Because of your sacrifice, we will all live through another era.” Meca’s words didn’t seem to penetrate the thick skull of the sacrifice. The entire time he stared up at Atzi with eyes half lidded as they drooped with exhaustion. Behind his veil of confidence, Atzi could see the deep lines of torture and pain scarring his pale skin. He could so easily disrespect her people because of what they had done to him, ripped him away from his home and beat him until his light left him through bloody wounds. She saw herself in this man but was disgusted with what she saw on the outside. Was this how the world saw me?

“I’ll say what I want,” he spat. “I’m gonna be dead in a few minutes anyways. Might as well say everything I want before I can’t no more. Like how you all are crazy and disgusting. My people fought yours ‘cause your ways are wrong, stealing innocents and bleeding them for some myths and legends. And you …,” his eyes moved back to Atzi. Rage seared uncomfortably in her chest, but no words bubbled out. Even her parents and the priest were stunned to silence, eyes wide and lips parted at the sting of this man’s cruel whip of words. “I’ve heard ‘bout you even back home in Aglacia. You’re a monster tryin’ to blend into the light, tryin’ to wash the blood off your hands and twist people’s minds to think you’re not one.” He spat at her feet and sneered. “You want to kill me, don’t you?” His lips twisted in a smile as Atzi’s face paled, her entire body trembling as his eyes and words raked across her. “You’re hungry for blood and guess what, princess?” He struggled to his feet, but two warriors hastily jerked out of their daze and yanked him back by the hair. He scowled and winced, baring his mouthful of rotting teeth. “My blood tastes fantastic.” A tear tinged with lava ran down her face, leaving scorch marks along her brown cheek as it rolled down.

“Don’t listen t-”

Atzi stepped forward, hand tight around the dagger’s hilt as she thrust it into the man’s chest and twisted. He gasped, muscles giving way as he slumped back into the warriors’ arms. Fingers of pain stretched and ruined his face, the blood rushing from his already pale skin. Atzi had placed the dagger in the middle of his chest but dragged it in a circle where his heart was now only faintly beating, a drum reaching its finale.

Her free hand was flat against his chest, feeling the cold shift as the breath slowly ran out of his lungs and then stopped completely. His head snapped forward, chin slamming into his bony chest with a jarring bash. Gritting her teeth, she yanked the dagger through his flesh, hot tears blurring her vision, but she was glad for the blindness. She could feel the slippery blood that poured from the wound drenching her hands and arms, splattering onto her feet and the ground. The ground rumbled beneath them, the deep groan of something waking from a long slumber tickling her soles. Surprise and anger kept Atzi from glancing down, knowing she would see the splattered blood devoured by the beast at their feet. A beast she thought was gone.

With each new well of blood, the shadows screamed. Their wails ripped apart her ears and forced her hand harder, farther, as she cut out his heart. The power was sweet in her veins, chasing away the tears. Warmth erupted in her stomach, working open the tightly locked gates of it, the person she sheltered inside finally stepping free. The hilt slipped in her grip, the sacrifice’s blood so wet and thick on her hands that the blade fell and clattered onto the ground.

Atzi blinked and stepped back, gasping, hands dripping in copper and now clutching the warm heart of a maggot who was supposed to be nothing but the dirt on her shoe.