Aztlan: The Last Sun Read Online Free PDF Page A

way—and could only have faced what was going to happen with a belly full of dreams?
    In most cases, I could have dug up enough evidence to say one way or the other. But Patli had lived outside of civilization for so long, it was difficult to know for certain.
    If only the pyramid’s security system had been working, we would have caught some of the action on camera. But security always went in after lighting. You didn’t have to be a construction expert to know that.
    So where was I? No further along than before.
    Cycles earlier, when I began my training as an Investigator, the older Investigators told me time and again to consult my gut. That was what they had done when they were younger—they had gone with their instincts. And to hear them tell it, their instincts had never let them down.
    Of course, the world had changed since those Investigators were young. The Investigation business had become a lot more sophisticated. But there were still times when it wasn’t a bad idea to consult one’s gut.
    In this case, it told me that, despite what Takun had said, the cultists hadn’t killed Patli. They weren’t crazy enough. Or maybe I just wanted to believe that for Eren’s sake.
    For the sake of completeness, I took a walk along the fence. There were guards standing outside it at intervals. I nodded to each of them as I went by.
    But I didn’t learn anything else. And I probably wouldn’t, even if I stayed there all night.
    I decided to show up for dinner at Aunt Xoco’s a little early. I had a feeling she wouldn’t complain.
     



Chapter Three
    A s my aunt had promised, she made venison that second night. Broiled venison with the juices running, just the way I liked it.
    One wasn’t supposed to talk about death at the dinner table, especially during the Unlucky Days. But my aunt had learned, over the cycles, to talk about it without talking about it.
    “That article I saw on the Mirror,” she said, “about Centeotl—that was why they called you away last night?”
    “Yes,” I said. “I was just back there.”
    “Any answers?” Aunt Xoco asked.
    “Not yet. But we’re working on it.”
    She smiled. “ Working on it . That was what your father used to say all the time. You remember?”
    I remembered. “And my mother would tell him not to work on it too hard or he’d pull a muscle.”
    My aunt’s smile deepened. “Your mother had a sense of humor. But not like your father’s. He was in a class by himself.”
    I remembered that too.
    One Renewal dinner, when I was eight or nine, my father excused himself from the table to answer a buzz. When he came back into the room, he said, “I have to go to work,” which always meant that he had a crime to investigate and would be gone all night. My mother heaved a sigh of grudging acceptance because she had known what she was in for when she took my father for a mate.
    But Aunt Xoco, never too shy to speak her mind, said it was an affront against the gods for someone to interrupt a family dinner during the Five Unlucky Days.
We tried to carry on with the celebration after my father left, but his departure had laid a blanket over the festivities. There was no one to make little jokes at my aunt’s expense, no one to wink at me or pinch my mother under the table. It just wasn’t the same without him.
    Before too long, there was a knock on the door. Aunt Xoco didn’t answer it at first, hoping that whoever it was would take the hint and go away. But the knocking continued, and became more annoying by the moment, until finally my aunt swore beneath her breath, went to the door, and swung it open.
    She was greeted by a man wearing a big red-and-gold mask with a crown of white feathers—the laughing visage of Xochipilli, the flower god. It was my father under the mask, of course. But as I ran to him, squealing with joy at the trick he had played on us, he produced a sack and flung its contents into the room—just as if he were the real Xochipilli.
    Suddenly