"No," he replied, after taking a long moment to think. "Not really; I just felt like I needed to be in on it and I pushed real quietly until I got put on it."

"There's stuff going on here that has got to be echoes," she said. "And I would bet my hand that a lot of it ties in to you. It just feels that way."

Instead of denying that, Mark thought about it. "You know," he answered reluctantly, "I hate to say this, but I think you're right. It does feel that way."

"I have a proposition."

"Shoot."

"Your Prime is mediumism. There's a corollary to that mediums very frequently are quite good at past-life regressions "

"What, Bridey Murphy?" he laughed. "Come on ".

She shook her head. "Let's leave poor Bridey out of this; it was a very unscientifically done study, and unfortunately it's thrown a pall over the whole notion. I've done some work along those lines that was a lot better, so I'm inclined to have it incorporated into my belief system. Thing is, I'll also keep an open mind on it while I believe in recycling, I'm also willing to believe that what the regressed subjects are picking up is the memories of strong-minded individuals in the akashic record."

"The who?"

"Remember that I told you that there's another kind of collective memory one that does go back to the caves?"

He nodded.

"That's the akashic record. You will also recall, I think, that I told you that I can't get at it without a whole elaborate song-and-dance act. And even then I'm not very good at it. Mediums, on the other hand, are or else they're good at past -life regression. You pays your money, you takes your choice; the important thing is, it works the same no matter which you believe."

"So? Are you asking me "

"To be the victim. I'm convinced this all dates back to the last days of the Aztec Empire. I'd like to regress you because I'm convinced you've got a former incarnation back then or get you accessing the akashic record, whichever you prefer and find out what the h.e.l.l happened back then that links this all together."

He considered the proposition. It had a lot of merit.

"Any chance I could get ah stuck back there?"

"Not in my hands," she said. "I've done this too many times."

"Okay," he said, secretly a bit pleased that she was calling on him for help. "You're on."

The G.o.d was not pleased. Chimalman cowered beneath the lash of his anger. The metaphor was not figurative; although his anger would leave no physical signs, she felt the agony of one having the skin flayed from her back.

Finally his anger cooled enough to end the punishment.

"I told you to leave the witch be" he rumbled, sitting back into the furs of his throne. "I told you that if she drew too near, that you were to kill her, not challenge her!"

"Lord "

"Five times a fool you are! Once to be so proud as to leave your marks upon the last sacrifice.

Twice to decide that you were wiser than I, that the power of the sorcerers we have trained was greater than hers. Three times to take the best of those without my leave, and goad him to challenge the witch. Four times to fail to kill the witch when she began to win! And five times to allow her to regain her memories and her mind!"

"Lord "

"It was only by sheer good luck that I discovered what you had done and broke the spell that held him in life before they could question him!"

"Yes, Lord." Chimalman groveled a little more.

"Now it is too late; she is alerted, and we, we, are not strong enough to challenge her at her full strength." He brooded for another long moment, and his eyes glowed red with anger. Chimalman cowered, and awaited the descent of the sorcerous lash again.

"We must lie quietly; very, very quietly. In fifteen suns comes the sacrifice of the Corn Woman; that will bring us to full power, enough to defeat the witch. Until then there must be nothing to arouse her suspicion or her wrath." He stared down at the cowering handmaiden. "Nothing!"

"No lord," she quavered, trembling. "Nothing."

FOURTEEN.

It took a week before they both felt ready to try the regression. Di needed to recharge after the duel arcane badly. Although she hadn't let on, she'd been running on pure nervous energy until the moment Mark dropped her off at his Aunt Nita's.

She'd slept twenty-four hours straight, and so deeply that even her alarm clock going off in her ear hadn't awakened her.

After that she'd spent the next three days not only replacing the energy she had depleted, but bringing herself up to maximum energy charge. Then she'd spent three days in near-total isolation "meditating," she'd said. Mark figured it was more complicated than that but he also figured it was something along the line of religious secrets and had no wish to pry. One thing he did know: she'd spent at least part of those three days closeted with some of the Xeroxes she'd made at the university library.

Finally she'd gone over his apartment from top to bottom, first physically and non-arcanely cleaning the place (for which he was profoundly grateful), then purging it magically. She was taking no chances on anything going wrong And Mark wasn't feeling like arguing with her. After all, it was going to be his psyche on the line.

They decided that Mark's living room would be their "sanctuary" for the regression; it was where he felt the most comfortable and secure. Di could ward just about any place, so Mark's sensibilities took precedence.

"Scared?" Di asked Mark, easing herself down onto the carpet beside him.

"A little," he admitted, trying to find the most comfortable reclining position he could on the flip- chair which had been stretched out its entire length. Di had warned him that this was what he'd better do, since he might be spending a long time that way. "I've never been hypnotized before."

She half laughed. "That's what you think."

He twisted his head around so that he could see her; she was sitting in a very relaxed lotus position just behind the "pillow" of the chair. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"My turn at confession. I've had you under at least half a dozen times, my friend. Only I didn't tell you I was hypnotizing you; I told you I was putting you through a 'relaxation exercise.' You're such a good subject that after the first time all I had to do was use the trigger phrase on you, and pop" she snapped her fingers, a rueful smile on her lips " you were gone to na -na land."

He remembered those "relaxation exercises" quite vividly they had all been times when she had needed his particular talent and he'd been spooked, too nervous (and, frankly, scared) to cooperate properly. "Spooked" was an appropriate term, since all six times they'd been checking out buildings Di had certified as genuinely haunted, and she had been unable to get the haunt to "move on," as she put it.He felt a little betrayed. "Why didn't you tell me that was what you were doing?" he asked, hurt. It wasn't so much that she'd hypnotized him because he could account for nearly every second of the time he'd been "under." It was that she had not told him the truth.

"Mark, you were the only reliable medium I had, and those weren't abstractions or Hollywood special-effects, those were people we were trying to help; trapped, unhappy people. Dead people, but still people. If I'd even mentioned the word 'hypnosis' back then, you'd have freaked on me. You still thought all hypnotists were children of Svengali. And you'd make a d.a.m.ned ugly Trilby."

"Okay, I'll admit I was a bit irrational. It still wasn't right," he complained, trying to read her eyes.

"I agree," she replied, and he had no doubt that she was feeling a certain amount of guilt. "And I'm sorry. I'm not immune to making mistakes, moral or otherwise. If I had it to do over, I wouldn't have pulled that trick on you; it wasn't fair at all. Will you accept my apology?"

"Yeah," he said, after a while. "You did what you thought you had to do, I guess."

"And there are times when my sense of proportion is a bit skewed. Still want to go through with this?"

"More than ever." He grinned up at her. "Now that I know you had me in your power before this, and didn't take advantage of me."

"Don't count on it," she grinned back. "The tapes will only cost you a small fortune. Okay, are you ready?"

"All systems go," he answered, getting himself back into his comfortable position.

"Meadowsweet, lycopodium, knotweed."

"Who are you?"

Cuauhtemoc heard the voice in his head without fear; it was odd but he somehow knew that it meant him no harm, just as he somehow knew his name was also "Mark," although that was nothing like his name now, and that in that time-to-come he was not seven, but much older and a wise warrior.

So he answered the voice without taking his attention from the spectacle before him.

"Cuauhtemoc, son of Nanautzin, a potter." Then, because that seemed too little to say about the kindest, bravest father in all of Tenocht.i.tlan, he added, "Son of the best potter in all the world!"

The voice chuckled. "Well said, Cuauhtemoc. What is the year, and the place?"

"The year is Three House, in the Fifth Month, the Feast of Tezcatlipoca," he answered politely. The voice in his head gasped a little. "We are, I am, in Tenocht.i.tlan, in the plaza before the Great Temple of Tezcatlipoca."

"What do you see before you?"

He described for the voice (poor, blind voice, not to be able to see the most beautiful place in all of the wide world) the plaza in which he was standing. To both sides and behind him was a throng of Azteca, brilliantly garbed in their very best. They had gathered, hoping with fading hope that the Great One would descend truly at the climax of this rite, descend and save his people. Their thin, sun- darkened faces were full of equal hope and fear. The bright colors of their festival costumes, red and yellow, blue and white and green, were dulled and s.m.u.tched a bit by the smokes and fires that had plagued the city daily. Even now there was smoke on the wind, and beyond the chanting of the priests you could hear the screaming and the sound of fighting on the causeways to the city.

His mother's hand was warm on his shoulder as he told the voice of the immaculate stone-paved plaza, shining white in the blinding sun before him, the equally dazzling pile of the pyramid atop which rested the beautiful temple itself. "The temple of Tezcatlipoca is the most beautiful temple in the city now," he concluded and his voice faltered a little at the memory of the evil omen.

"Was there another that was more beautiful?" the voice prompted.

He began to nod; then, remembering that the voice was blind, answered. "Yes the Great Temple, the twin temple of Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc, the place called Tlacatecan. It burned, of itself. It was a terrible omen, though no one knew what it meant, then."

"What did it mean?"

"The coming of the Terrible Men, the ones led by the man who said he was Quetzalcoatl. He lied,"

the boy said defiantly, although he knew very well that his elders were divided on the subject. "There were other omens, too. There was a fire in the sky in the year Twelve House, then the temple burned.

Then the sun struck a blow to the temple of Xiuhtechutli. That was all before I was even born. Then there was a fire that ran from sunset sky to sunrise sky, while the sun itself was still shining. Then in the year of my birth the lake boiled up and flooded the whole city, and there was a spirit-woman that ran through the streets, weeping and saying that all must flee. Then a bird with a mirror in its head, all covered with feathers the color of ashes, came to the emperor and showed him fearful things. Then there was a man in the city with two heads. I myself saw him," he added, self-importantly.

"I don't doubt you," the voice replied gravely. "Those are fearful omens."

"Then the Terrible Men came," he said, sadly. "That was why my brother "

"Yes?" the voice prompted.

"That was why my brother became Tezcatlipoca. He said that if the Great Sacrifice was given by one who chose to become the G.o.d, that the G.o.d would have to answer and save us. My mama cried."

And so did I, he added, without speaking the words aloud.

"That was very brave of him."

"Yes," he replied, secretly wishing that his brother had been a little less brave. There had been no shortage of volunteers. But his brother had said scornfully that most of those only wished to trade a probably painful death in combat for a year of pleasure and a quick, nearly painless death. "Even the emperor said so. The emperor is very afraid. He thinks the Most Terrible Man is Quetzalcoatl; but even if he is, and I know he cannot be, the Feathered Serpent is not as strong as Smoking Mirror. I know this, for are we not stronger than the Elder People? The Smoking Mirror is our G.o.d, and he is my brother, and when the Great Sacrifice is made, he will rise up from the altar and he will kill all the Terrible Men and their emperor who is not the Feathered Serpent!"

There were tears running down his cheeks now, tears of pa.s.sion and the loss he dared not confess, for was his brother not greater than the emperor? Was he not the savior of his people? Was such a sacrifice a reason for tears?

"Hush, hush " the voice soothed. "Tell me what you know of the Terrible Men, what they have done to your people."

"They have taken Moctezuma; they hold him prisoner. They killed many, many people and they have burned up all the country beyond the lake," he told the voice, trying not to be afraid. "They tried to take the city, but we drove them out. I helped. I carried water and arrows to the soldiers."

"Where are they now?"

"All around the lake. They have demons that make a noise and throw round stones, and more demons, huge, with two heads and four legs and voices like trumpets, and they stop everybody who comes on the causeway from the city. They have tried to come back, but we have stopped them." The procession came into view just then, and the boy craned his neck, intent on being the first to catch sight of his brother.

"What are you seeing?"

"It is the procession!" he answered, excitedly. "I see the priests now the handmaidens there!

There is my brother! He is playing his flutes, and he doesn't look the least, tiniest bit afraid! But "

"Is something wrong?"

"He " the distant figure seemed very pale, and not entirely steady. "He nothing. He is going up the pyramid."

"Tell me."

"He is playing, he has a servant with all the clay flutes he has played this year, and he is climbing the pyramid and breaking each one after he has played it a little "

There was no doubt about it, the distant youth staggered as if he was drunk.

"Go on."

"There is something wrong " Panic edged the boy's voice.

"What?"

"I don't know!" The notes of the song quavered now, and it was not a deliberate trill. "I think I don't know! He can't be sick! He's the G.o.d, G.o.ds don't get sick!"

"How, sick?"

"The Terrible Men there was a sickness, with spots ""'Mission control to Mark,'" said the voice, "Mark, what is he talking about?"

"Measles," the boy heard his mouth saying, though he was too worried about his brother to find it strange that another spirit should use his mouth. "The Spanish brought measles with them; it wiped out hundreds, maybe thousands, and it's at epidemic levels right now."

Just then the youth, so small, so fragile on the great stone stairs, stopped halfway up the pyramid.

He set his hand to his head, swaying, and dropped the flutes he was carrying. And as they shattered, he himself dropped to the stone, cried out and stopped moving.