"Your face looks like Montezuma's after he discovered Cortes was not an Aztec G.o.d."

"It's Elena's wedding day. She may be getting married at this very moment."

"It is also the day of reckoning for us. The viceroy's men will be on the streets looking for us. We will not last long if our plan to start a riot does not work."

Jaime the lepero knew some of our sins, but nothing of our plans. As for Ramon, Luis, and the viceroy, they might conclude that I'd fired the warehouse, but they would not know about my larger plans.

We went onto the streets dressed as leperos, our swords hidden under ragged cloaks. We headed for the marketplace where maize would be sold. What we found there was turmoil. A large crowd had gathered before the stalls of the maize sellers. The dealers were literally auctioning off the maize to the highest bidders. And the bidders were the servants from the wealthiest families in town.

"Nothing will be left for us," I heard people mutter.

"It's not fair!" Mateo shouted. "My babies will starve! Food and justice!"

"My family's hungry!" I roared. "What can I feed them? The soles of my shoes?"

"The viceroy's men fired the warehouse to raise prices!" That from someone, I imagined, who had been paid by us.

A group of ten guards from the viceroy's palace stood by at the edge of the crowd, uneasy. They were outnumbered by fifty to one. An officer on horseback watched me and Mateo.

"We will all starve!" Mateo shouted. "It's the viceroy's fault. He eats fatted calves while our children cry and die in our arms!"

"I need food for my babies!" an old hag yelled. The woman looked many years from having birthed any babies, but I took up her cry and soon other women were shouting for food.

Arguments broke out between the food sellers, and people demanding they be sold maize at an affordable price. Pushing and shoving ensued and tempers flared. The crowd was already enraged, and with each new indignity, the fury grew, people gathering strength from others around them. People who would normally scurry away like whipped dogs from a spur wearer's whip were shouting for food and justice.

The officer ordered his men to follow him as he cut through the crowd in a straight line for Mateo and me. We pried stones from the pavement and let them fly. The crowd parted as the officer quickened his horse. My stone went wide, but Mateo's. .h.i.t the man's helmet. As he came up to us, Mateo pulled the officer from the horse.

A musket went off and the old hag crying about her imaginary babies fell to the pavement.

"Murder!" Mateo shouted. "Murder!"

The cry was picked up by a hundred voices. Violence spread like the fire in the warehouse. As the other soldados came forward, pushing their way through the crowd to try and reach their officer, people grabbed them. The last I saw of the viceroy's men was a mob of street people beating them.

The anger and frustrations, not just of a food shortage, but a lifetime of being treated as little more than curs, erupted like a volcano. People attacked the stalls of the maize merchants.

Mateo climbed onto the officer's horse and raised his sword. "To the viceroy's palace," he shouted, "for food and justice!"

He helped me up behind him on the horse. The mob followed us out of the marketplace, growing bigger with every step it took. Soon it was a thousand strong, then two thousand as it poured into the main plaza, looting merchant shops.

A wild frenzy seized the crowd as it neared the palace.

"Gold!" Mateo shouted and pointed at the palace. "Gold and food!"

The cry was picked up by the mob and shouted by thousands of voices.

The palace was not a fortress. The city had no walls, and the palace walls were designed more for privacy than protection. The city was in the center of New Spain, a week's journey at least for any invading force. No one had ever challenged the city, so there had been no need for a fortress.

The viceroy's gates offered little resistance to the mob. A cart filled with paving stones being used by laborers to repair ruts was grabbed and slammed through the gate; nor did the vastly outnumbered palace guards, who melted away at the sight of two thousand angry people marching at them, offer resistance. Not even the futile shots that would have been fired at foreign invaders were expended at the crowd.

"That bench!" Mateo shouted at those who followed us to the front door of the palace, "we'll use it to knock down the door!"

A dozen hands lifted the heavy wooden bench and sent it crashing against the tall double doors. Two more times it was rammed before the doors flew open. Mateo and I rode the horse into the palace, followed by an army of looters.

While the mob surged down the great hall, we dismounted and went up the stairway. Coming out of the viceroy's chambers at the top, I saw a group of people: The viceroy, archbishop, and aides were hurrying down the upstairs hallway. Behind them came Ramon, Luis, and Elena.

"Elena!" I shouted.

The three of them turned to us. Mateo and I saluted the two men with our swords.

"Go!" Mateo yelled. "Run like women from their husbands' penes. Return with a rolling pin to fight us."

Ramon stared down at us calmly. "You two have caused me a great deal of trouble, but killing you will be worth something."

He came down the hallway with Luis beside him as we went up the stairs. I stole one frantic glance at Elena in her wedding dress before we met the two swordsmen.

Mateo was a step ahead of me and immediately engaged Ramon as I squared off against Luis. The sound of our striking blades played above the sounds of the mob below. We heard musket shots. Apparently the viceroy's guards had decided to take a stand.

Luis's features were contorted with hate yet also a strange sort of glee.

"I'm going to show my new bride how a gentleman handles lepero sc.u.m," he said.

His swordsmanship was dazzling. He was far better than I would ever be. I could not believe my own rage had sucked me into this. I would be cut to pieces in front of Elena. Only raw hate kept me going, giving me speed and strength and cunning I never dreamed I had. Still it was not enough. He slashed my forearm, cut my right shoulder, and reopened the wound I had gotten from the Veracruz pirate.

"I am going to carve you into pieces, not kill you quickly," Luis said. "I want her to see every drop of your tainted blood spill."

His blade sliced my knee. I was bleeding in four places, and he was backing me up with sword work I could never hope to match. He touched his newly shaved cheek with his sword-the cheek I had impaled with my writing quill.

"Si, you cut my face so I would look like you, and I hate you even more for that," he said. He backed me against a wall, and his blade cut my other knee. My leg collapsed, and I went down on one knee.

"Now your eyes and then your throat," he said.

He suddenly expelled air from his mouth as if he had been struck in the back and lost his breath. He stared at me with wide eyes and then slowly turned around.

Elena was standing behind him.

As he turned, I saw the dagger in his back. It had not gone in far and, he shook it off.

"b.i.t.c.h!" he screamed.

I leaped forward and hit him with my shoulder. He flew backward and hit the railing. I kept my momentum going and hit him again. He burst through the railing and fell to the floor below. I staggered to the edge and looked down. He was on his back, still alive, moaning and moving his arms and legs, but nearly unconscious. The pox marks on his face were not visible from the top of the stairs. With his shaven face and cheek scar, it was as if I was looking down at myself.

Luis had made the same mistake that the pirate had: He had underestimated a woman.

"Elena." I held out my hand to her. She grabbed me around the waist and I leaned on her for a few seconds before pulling away. "I must help Mateo."

The picaro was faring no better with Ramon than I had with Luis. Mateo was a better swordsman than I, an extraordinary bladesman for certain, but Ramon was said to be the best sword fighter in all New Spain.

As I limped toward the action, Mateo suddenly moved into the circle of death, lunging at Ramon. Ramon's blade swung around to Mateo's neck, and Mateo's left arm went up and caught the blade against his forearm. At the same time Mateo stuck his dagger in the man's abdomen.