Gods of Jade and Shadow - Silvia Moreno-Garcia Page 0,86
the Yucatán. A calculated game, which has not bothered me until this point, but now I wonder…if I’d first found the eye instead of the necklace, it might be better. This, around my neck. I thought it would be enough, I wanted it to be enough, but it’s not enough…My strength ebbs.”
He pressed a hand against his throat. He’d cast an illusion and the jade necklace now appeared an ordinary tie, but it was there. She perceived it without seeing it. “And you look weaker too, more frail,” he muttered.
He had not gazed out the window, the scenery did not concern him, but now he turned his gaze there, ignoring her. He spoke as if talking to the desert, the sand and the sky, not to her.
“I must return home. Every second away is unbearable. Xibalba needs me and I need it. At times I think if I spend much more time in this land I will not be able to return to where I was…to who I was.” He shook his head “You wouldn’t understand.”
“I do understand.”
“Please,” he said dismissively.
His poised indifference offended her. He was being rude, cruel, and rather than accepting this as the whim of a god she spoke, harsh and loud.
“You don’t realize it, do you?” she asked. “You don’t see the way you are turning my world upside down. I was someone in Uukumil, someone I may never be again.”
“I’ll remove the bone shard as soon as I have my throne back, I won’t waste a second,” he said, and the words were like a blow. She raised her head high.
Casiopea stood right in front of him, so that he could not glance out the window and ignore her. She almost felt like grabbing him by the lapels of his jacket to emphasize her point. “It’s not the bone shard,” she said “It’s everything. I have no idea where I’ll go after this, what I’ll do. Did you ever even wonder about that? You’ll return home, but I’ve forsaken mine. My family won’t take me back.”
“It is not the same.”
He stood up. The desert heat shrank the boundaries of their compartment, drawing him closer to her. She thought about a story Mother had told her one time when she was bad, about wicked girls combusting into balls of fire. She could swear she was about to be scorched, but she stared at him.
“I can feel the taint of your mortality in me, and I must scrub it off, soon,” he went on.
“You talk as if I’m poisonous,” Casiopea protested.
“You are,” he said, careless and cold. “And I’m poisonous to you, killing you with every breath you take. If you had any common sense you’d understand why I grow weary. If I had my eye back I might be stronger, if I was in Mérida…but I am here, incomplete. You are not foolish, you must have some idea…”
As he spoke, the words grew sharper, and she realized something, hearing him speak, something that ought to have been obvious from the moment they had woken up and he’d sat, morose, in his corner of the compartment. “You are afraid,” Casiopea said in wonder.
Afraid of death. Of life? How to define it. It was clear then, the nervousness, the way he stood, the timbre of his voice. And why wouldn’t he be? Immortal, suddenly faced with the possibility of mortality, of all his plans gone asunder. Casiopea was not able to summon much fear for herself, although she was aware that she was dying, that he was drawing her essence away, and when he was full she’d crumple, a wilted flower. For the moment she was more interested in his reaction.
He jerked his head up, annoyed, and did not reply.
“You should have told me. I thought you feared nothing,” she said, pressing on.
“Quiet now,” he said, his voice low. “The things you name grow in power.”
She closed her mouth and stared at him, wondering what black luck she was inviting by speaking as she’d done. There was magic to be reckoned with and the rules of gods she didn’t comprehend. She’d made him speak, and maybe she ought to have let him be quiet, as he’d wanted.
“I’m sorry,” Casiopea said in a whisper.
“It is no matter,” he replied, casually, and she realized there was pretense in his voice; he was rattled but would not show it openly.
Casiopea nodded, but his distress was palpable, a frightened creature that circled the room.