The Crystal City: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Volume VI (31 page)

The ground shook again.

“I think we ought to lie down again,” said Bowie. “In case they come in and see us.”

“They aren’t going to,” said Calvin.

“How do you know?”

“Because the guards at the door just ran away.”

The door opened.

Bowie was in the middle of a snide remark about how reliable Calvin was when they realized that the man who stood in the doorway was not a Mexica. It was a half-black young man dressed like an American.

“Get ready to go,” said the young man. “We got about a day to get out of the city before Popocatepetl blows.”

“Before what?” asked a man.

“Popocatepetl,” said the young man. “The biggest volcano. All that screaming out there, the ground shaking, it’s because we just caused it to start spewing smoke and ash. And tomorrow, anybody who didn’t get out of the city will be killed when the thing erupts all the way.”

“Who’s ‘we’?” asked Bowie.

“My guess is it’s my brother Alvin doing all this,” said Calvin. “Cause this is his brother-in-law, Arthur Stuart.”

At once there were cries of protest.

“Your brother is married to a black woman?”

“Somebody named him for the
King
?”

“We’re supposed to listen to a slave tell us what to do?”

But Arthur Stuart’s voice cut through the noise. “It’s not Alvin,” he said. “It’s Tenskwa-Tawa. He’s making the volcano erupt to stop the Mexica from offering human sacrifices. It’s between reds, Tenskwa-Tawa against the Mexica.”

“So what are
you
doing here?” asked Calvin.

“Saving you,” said Arthur Stuart. “And anybody else who wants to come with us.”

“I don’t need you to save me,” said Calvin contemptuously.

“I know you don’t need me to get you out of this old church,” said Arthur Stuart. “But how are you going to get out of the city? I speak Spanish, which most of the folks here speak well enough, and I also picked up quite a bit of Nahuatl—that’s the Mexica language. Any of
you
know how to ask for directions or food? And good luck finding your way out of this valley with all the panicky people filling the roads. Plus I reckon a lot of folks’ll think you brought this down on their heads, and they won’t be too glad to see you.”

“But why should we leave at all?” said Calvin.

“So you don’t get burnt to a crisp and covered over with lava,” said Arthur Stuart. “This don’t take no Aristotle to figure out, Calvin.”

“Don’t you talk to a white man that way!” shouted a man, and a couple of others got up to do him some kind of violence.

And Calvin was perfectly willing to let them get started. Arthur Stuart needed to learn who was in charge here, and how to show proper respect.

But the men never reached Arthur. Instead, they started sliding and tripping over themselves just as if the floor was suddenly smooth marble covered in butter, and after a minute it became clear that anybody as started after Arthur Stuart would end up on his butt.

The boy had really learned some makery—but not as much as he probably thought. Calvin toyed with the idea of having an all-out wizard’s war with him right here on the spot, to show him just how far he had to go—but what would be the point? There was no time to waste.

“Forget him,” said Calvin. “He came to save us, so great, anybody who wants to run away, go with him, right now. He’s not much of a maker but he’s got a knack with languages and maybe he can get you to safety. But me, I think we can turn this to our advantage. We came here to rule over Mexico, didn’t we? So let’s let the volcano kill the Mexica and then claim we did it and rule over the country in their place!”

“What does Steve say?” asked a man.

It was only then that they all realized that Austin was one of the ones who had been drugged.

“You know what he’d say,” said Calvin. “He didn’t come here to quit. He didn’t come here so he could run away after a black boy who thinks he’s hot stuff cause he can make a floor slippery. We came here to take over an empire and I aim to do it.”

“Everybody already knows it’s Tenskwa-Tawa’s doing,” said Arthur Stuart. “His people are already here, they said when the smoke would start coming, and it came when they said.”

“But Tenskwa-Tawa ain’t going to come down here and rule over Mexico, is he,” said Calvin. “No, I didn’t think so. Well, somebody’s gonna do it, and it might as well be us. And after this is over, and we’re telling folks that it was my brother Alvin who was telling Tenskwa-Tawa what to do, and they’ve left me here to see to it Steve Austin is made emperor of Mexico…”

“Anybody who wants to get out of this valley alive, come with me now,” said Arthur Stuart.

“I’d rather die than trust a slave for anything!” shouted one of the men he had put on the floor.

“That’s the choice,” said Arthur Stuart.

The ground trembled again, and then again, and a third shock was so strong that several of the men fell down.

“You’re not doing that, are you?” Bowie asked Calvin.

“I can do it whenever I want,” said Calvin.

“You’re such a humbug,” said Arthur Stuart. “It took a council of shamans a year to get this volcano at the point of eruption. Even Alvin couldn’t make a volcano erupt whenever he wants.”

“Maybe there’s things I can do that ‘even Alvin’ can’t do,” said Calvin.

Arthur Stuart turned to the rest of the men. “How fast can any of you run? How far do you think you’ll get? When Popocatepetl blows up tomorrow, it won’t matter where you are in this valley, you’ll be dead. Do you understand? If we leave today, now, we’ll make it out of here in time.
If
you have me to help you move fast enough and get far enough. As for him—do you think he cares whether you live or die? Do you think he has the power to save you from a volcano? He’ll be lucky if he can save himself.”

A few of the men were wavering. “We can’t take over Mexico if we’re dead.”

“We can do it from outside this valley.”

Calvin laughed. “You saw what I did back in True Cross, didn’t you? Have you forgotten who and what I am? This boy is no wizard, he’s nothing, my brother keeps him like a pet, to do tricks.” And with those words, Calvin made the door behind Arthur Stuart fly from its hinges and burst outward onto the street. And then he made a wind that picked up Arthur Stuart and flung him through the door.

“Anybody who wants to,” said Calvin, “is free to follow him. Seeing how he has so much power.”

Arthur Stuart appeared in the door. “I never claimed to be more powerful than Calvin. But all his power doesn’t give him a single word of Spanish or Nahuatl. And he knows nothing about the red man’s way of running faster than a man can run. Come with me if you want to live. I can get you back to True Cross, and from there you can get safely home. Look at him! He doesn’t care about you!”

“All I care about,” said Calvin, “is the lives of these men.” Now he started talking to the men directly. “You trusted in me and I will give you what I promised—Mexico. All the gold and wealth of Mexico. All the people as your subjects, all the land as your estate. And when you hear of us ruling in splendor, while you sit in your miserable cabin on a bayou in Barcy, then make sure you thank this boy for saving you.”

Jim Bowie strode toward Arthur Stuart. “I know this boy,” he said. “I’m going with him.”

Calvin didn’t like that. Bowie had enormous prestige with the other men.

“So it turns out Steve Austin couldn’t rely on you after all,” said Calvin.

“He’s asleep,” said Bowie, “and as for you, you’re the one got us into this place. Who all is coming?”

“Yes,” said Calvin, “who are the cowards who refuse the chance to rule an empire?”

“Now,” said Arthur Stuart. “No second chances. Come now, if you’re coming with me.”

About a dozen men got up and came over to join, not Arthur Stuart, but Jim Bowie.

“What about the ones they poisoned?” asked one man.

“Their bad luck,” said Bowie.

But Arthur Stuart looked at the men near the door, the ones who drank first and were drugged. And as he gazed at them, one by one, they woke up.

Calvin was mortified. This stupid knackless boy had somehow learned how to counter the poison in their blood. And now he had to show off and rub Calvin’s face in it. Didn’t he know that Calvin could have learned how to do anything if he had wanted to? But why should Calvin bother learning how to wake up men who were stupid enough to get themselves drugged?

In the end, though, not one of the drugged ones decided to go; in fact, one of them was able to persuade his brother not to leave with Arthur Stuart and Jim Bowie. So when the boy left, he had ten men with him. The others all stayed in the church. With Calvin.

“Now all we’ve got to do,” said Calvin, “is find out where they took our weapons.”

“How you gonna do that?”

“By watching where that boy goes. Do you think Bowie’s going to let him lead them out of the valley without taking him first to his lucky knife?”

Several of the men laughed.

And sure enough, as Calvin kept track of Bowie’s heartfire, he saw when they got to a nearby building and Arthur Stuart opened the door and Bowie picked up his knife and the other men armed themselves.

“It’s only one street over, just outside the walls of this church,” said Calvin.

“Then let’s go,” said Steve Austin. “But let’s get organized first.”

“Let’s get armed first,” said Calvin.

“Doesn’t do any good to have guns if we don’t have a plan!” said Austin.

Ten minutes later they were still talking when the Mexica soldiers poured in through the open door.

“Fools!” shouted Calvin. “I told you to go!”

Two of the Mexica aimed their muskets at Calvin and fired.

Their guns blew up in their faces.

But the others were bringing their weapons to bear too fast for Calvin to plug them all.

So he did the only sensible thing. He stepped backward through the wall.

He’d done it before, back when Napoleon had him imprisoned in Paris. Softening the stone enough to slide through it, like pushing his hand through clay, and then letting it harden again behind him. He heard the bullets hit the wall just as it was hardening, so they sank into the stone with a soft thunk and the wall hardened behind the bullets without so much as a dent.

And there stood Calvin on the outside of the church.

Where was Arthur Stuart? Calvin found the boy’s heartfire, though it took some hard searching, and he was at the limit of Calvin’s range. Well, the boy said he knew how to get out of the city, and that’s what Calvin needed, now that these fools had wasted the opportunity Calvin gave them. They didn’t
deserve
to live.

He took off at a run. He had to pass near where the Mexica were dragging the white men out of the front of the church, but he didn’t even have to make up some kind of fog—nobody saw him.

And why should they even be looking? With him gone, there was nothing these unarmed men could do. And waiting for them there in the plaza in front of the church was that same high priest who had met them on the causeway. One by one the men were dragged to him and thrown onto a wooden altar that had been placed in the square. Two priests cut their clothing open and laid bare their chests, and Calvin could hear the screaming as one by one they had their hearts torn from them and held up as an offering to whatever god the Mexica thought might prevent the eruption of Popocatepetl.

What a stupid end to Steve Austin’s dream. But that’s all the man was, a dreamer, a planner. Even now, when he could have turned this all to victory, he chose planning instead of action and now he’ll die for it and ain’t that just too bad.

Calvin turned his attention to the streets of the city. There were people running every which way, and with Arthur Stuart so far away, it was all Calvin could do to keep track of where he was. Nor did he know which of these labyrinthine streets would take him there, so there was always the danger that Calvin would guess wrong and make a turn that took him out of range.

Instead, though, he was lucky and chose right every time, or at least right enough, and instead of getting weaker, his vision of Arthur Stuart’s heartfire got stronger. He was gaining on them.

When they reached the wall of the city, they stopped, and Calvin’s running was now pure gain. Arthur Stuart was opening a gap in the wall, and in his clumsy way he was making it take ten times longer than it needed to. Well, good for me, thought Calvin. And he got there just as the last of them was passing through an opening in the wall. Calvin ran straight up to it and plunged through.

Outside the wall at this spot was an orchard, and Arthur Stuart and Bowie and the others were running through it. But running oddly—they were all holding hands, for heaven’s sake, which was about as stupid a thing as Calvin could imagine. Nobody made his best speed holding hands.

Only they were running awfully fast. No one tripped. No one stumbled. And they gained speed and kept speeding up and no matter how hard Calvin ran, he couldn’t catch up. Nor did the ground prove as smooth for him as it had for them. Branches whipped his face and he stumbled over a root and fell and by the time he got up, they were out of sight. And when he looked for Arthur Stuart’s heartfire, he couldn’t find it. Couldn’t find any of them. It was like they had ceased to exist. There was only the trees and the birds and the insects, and the distant sound of shouting from the city and the roads.

Calvin stopped and looked back. The ground outside the city had sloped up enough, and he had run far enough, that he could see over the walls, though not down into the streets. Somewhere back there most of the men he had journeyed with were having their hearts ripped out, while in the other direction Arthur Stuart had run off with the ten best of them—the ones who were smart enough to act instead of plan. Why do I always get stuck with the fools on my side? thought Calvin.

Beyond the city, Popocatepetl spewed thick plumes of white ash into the air. And now it was beginning to fall onto the city like hot grey snow. It got into his lungs almost at once, and it felt like it was burning him. So Calvin turned his attention to keeping the air in front of his face clear of ash, as he began to jog on in the direction that he had last seen Arthur Stuart’s group going.