The Gold Eaters (32 page)

Riding at the rear of the cavalry through wind-carved dunes of snow, Waman comes upon a dozen Spaniards thawing their feet in the disembowelled bodies of people they have slain. He sees others, not far ahead, butchering three stout women merely for this purpose.

Then nothing.

He feels himself being helped to his feet. A Spaniard he doesn't know. “You dropped from your horse, lengua. Like you'd been shot.” Waman looks around. The gruesome scene is still there. Bloody
snow, war-dogs at the corpses, others lapping vomit where he fell. His own.

He climbs back into his saddle, shaking, avoiding the barbarians' eyes, not answering when they call,
Are you all right?
He rides off a short way, lets his mare drink where a spring breaks from the ice. He cannot watch more, cannot wait until One-Eye nears the sea. He must flee soon, at the first chance, no matter what risk. He must get down to the coast, return in disguise by some roundabout way to Cusco, to Tika. The barbarians appear to him now as they must to her: as demons, creatures of nightmare.

—

On the following afternoon the vanguard spies a terraced hillside of corn and potato fields, and the first town of any size in Chile.

The houses are empty of people and supplies. Forewarned of what is coming, the townsfolk have barricaded themselves behind some ancient ramparts on a crag, which Pawllu's men call Mawk'a Pukara, the Ruined Fort. Almagro sends Waman up alone with the usual message: that the people have nothing to fear if they will surrender and become the Christians' friends.

At the foot of the ragged walls the interpreter unbuttons his doublet, bares his chest, and spreads his hands to show he is an Indian and unarmed. After a short delay, he is allowed through the gate and taken to a roofless building near the top of the stronghold. From the woollens of those around him comes a smell of smoke and cold sweat, a taint of fear. He is given water and a bowl of potato stew—the best meal he's eaten in weeks.

Waman relays Almagro's message to some leading men who understand the Empire's language. He then tells them it is a lie, that if they leave the fort they will all be killed, even women and children. Their only hope is to stay where they are.

For some time they give no answer. He sees them speaking in their own tongue, looking him up and down, inspecting his strange clothes. Why should they trust him?

“If you wish,” he says, “I will stay with you. I will help you hold this place. I'll tell you all I know about the strangers. How best to fight them. They are many. Their beasts run like the wind. Their swords can cut a head off in one blow. They have pipes that shoot fire with a sound of thunder. And they are well armoured, very hard to kill. I am not saying that if you listen to me you will win. The choice may be bleak: to die fighting up here or be slaughtered like llamas down there. The decision must be yours.”

Again, the people confer in their own tongue.

“Tell us who you are,” an elder woman asks. “If they are as you say—and you are as you say—why haven't they killed you? Why are you with them? Why do you claim to be our friend.”

Why indeed? Waman gives the quickest summary he can. “I am their prisoner,” he concludes. “I have chosen this moment to escape. Escape or die.” In the discussion that follows he hears them saying
Atawallpa
,
Cusco
,
Manku
several times. A man takes Waman to a high vantage point on the walls. They can see the Cusco squadrons forming up behind the Spaniards, pikes flying the serpents-and-rainbow.

“Why so many troops of the Inca with those barbarians?”

Waman begins to elaborate, then stops. How to answer them? How much does he truly know? Nothing in the World is what it seems. Is Pawllu here as a hostage? Or are he and Willaq Uma feigning, waiting for the best time to throw their troops against Almagro's? “I am not sure,” he admits. “There was discord in Cusco. Among the barbarians and among the Incas. All may be playing hidden games.”

It is just possible, he thinks, that if these Chileans put up a good
fight, Willaq Uma might attack the Spaniards here. He keeps it to himself: he mustn't tempt these folk with his own hopes.

“Whether you want me with you or not,” he adds, “here's what I can tell you. The bearded ones are most dangerous in open country, where they fight from their animals' backs and spear anyone who walks or runs. But you have this crag, these walls, many boulders and sling stones. And I see you have food and water. Do not leave the fort, even if they turn and flee. That's a favourite trick of theirs, to draw you out. Stay behind your walls. Hurl everything you've got when they're in range.”

All that day
and the next, the fighting raged. On the second evening Spaniards swarmed over the weakest points with ladders. Waman heard the war cries—
Santiago!
—and the wounded invaders calling on their god, or cursing him. He climbed a broken parapet above the breach, threw rocks at glinting helmets until it was too dark to see. Several times he heard that sound from Gallo Island: the low crunch of stone on skull. Spanish losses were heavy, but not enough to stop them cutting down the defenders, room by room.
The interpreter!
He heard.
Find the interpreter! Take him alive.

But the sky had clouded over and darkness pooled thick in the warrens of the ancient fort. Waman lost his footing on the wall, knocked his head, blacked out. He came round sticky with blood, pinned under fallen men, unsure if he was badly hurt. He could hear Spaniards elsewhere in the ruins—congratulating one another, readying to leave, carrying out their wounded—a shouted order to leave the dead till morning.

Waman lay still, heart pumping. When there were no more voices and the attackers seemed to have gone, he wriggled free. His limbs
worked; the blood on him was mostly others'. He took the clothes off a headless Chilean and dressed the body in his own. Remembering the gold and other valuables sewn into his doublet, he searched the quilting still warm with his old life.

He stayed where he was for what seemed two hours, until sure the Spaniards had gone. A thick fog descended, with freezing drizzle. A few survivors began to groan and stir.

A man and girl, perhaps father and daughter—both wounded but walking—led him away through the night into the hills.

THE AFTERMATH
Cusco and Vitcos

1544

19

W
aman greets the Day, then sinks onto the doorstep of his one-room farmhouse, elbows on knees, head thrust out towards the risen sun. He feels like an old man at the end of a long, hard life. How old
am
I? he wonders, totting up the years since Chile.

When he fled One-Eye he thought he'd get back to Cusco and Tika within a year at most. But it has taken eight. Two of them at sea. He remembers making his way down through the Chilean mountains to the desert coast, finding a small port and a ship bound for the north—a two-master like the one on which he sailed as a boy. When the ship reached Chincha, a small craft came alongside with news that the Empire was again at war. After enduring many outrages, Waman learned, and being held prisoner in his own palace, the young Inca Manku had escaped from Cusco, repudiated his alliance with the bearded ones, and attacked them throughout Tawantinsuyu. Manku's armies had killed all the barbarians except for the Old One's force at Lima, which was under siege. Some reports said Cusco was also besieged, others that the city had been burnt along with its Spanish occupiers. The fate of Almagro and Pawllu was unknown.

The ship's master changed plans at once, sailing on north beyond the Empire's border. He picked up provisions in the hotlands, then struck west across the ocean many weeks without sight of land.

Waman gazes vacantly at a snowpeak ruddy with dawn, his mind's eye on very different landscapes: ocean fogs and the smoking cone of a volcano; the scrub hills of the Tortoise Islands, roamed by giants of that kind, prized for their meat and shells; lava-rock headlands where great lizards swam like seals in the surf. Then there were gales that carried them far south to other islands—these high and lush—inhabited by wild men tattooed from head to foot. He sighs at the irony: his childhood dream of a great voyage to the faraway lands his grandfather knew was unexpectedly fulfilled. Yet now he has no family he can tell. Perhaps no living kin at all.

Twenty-two when he fled Chile. So he must be thirty now. Eight years. And they seem like eighty.

His eyes stray wearily over the familiar landscape of his refuge, Pukamarka. Its houses of red clay. A dale green with alders at the foot of the hillside. Stepped fields. Coppery grass marching in waves on the uplands. His home for six months now; if a wanderer like him can have a home. He was lucky to find such a place—only three hours' walk from Cusco, yet far enough to have escaped the wars. The people, much reduced by plagues, were glad to take him on as a helper, to plant and weed, clean sluices and canals.

Twice a month he goes into the capital, disguised as a simple hill farmer—hardly a disguise, for that is what he is. At last it seems safe, more or less. Those who knew him years ago in Cusco are all dead or gone away. All except Pawllu, and Waman takes care to avoid that turncoat Inca. He seeks travellers and traders, shifting beggars, healers, helpers—anyone who might have got wind of his family on the lonely, broken highways of the Empire. For though the capital is burnt and half in ruins now, all roads still lead there: Cusco is still the centre of the World.

Always he asks the same questions, questions he's asked from
Tumbes to Huanuco to Tinta, everywhere he's roamed since returning from the sea. And in the capital—the heart of the wars that raged while he was gone—he is trying to find out what became of the Chosen when Manku fell on the invaders. Did the women escape before the city was unroofed by flames? Has anyone seen an Aklla, or former Aklla—a Chosen One—of his own age and with something of his looks, though unmarked by the spotted death?

A shape is moving in the distance, lurching through mist snagged like wool on the alders at the foot of the hill. A llama? A deer? The shape becomes human, a running figure. As the runner comes nearer, Waman makes out the checkered uniform of the imperial post. Not a common sight these days, especially so far from a main road. He watches from his threshold, interest turning to unease as the postman heads his way. The
chaski
is soon standing before him, fogging the air with heavy breaths, retrieving a letter from a shoulder bag as patched and faded as his uniform.

“Are you Felipe Waman, formerly of Tumbes Province?”

Still sleepy, he is too surprised to deny it, though he doesn't admit it either. His first thought is that the message could be word from Tika or his mother. Word at last.

“I'm instructed to await a reply,” the postman adds with self-importance. Waman bids him sit down and brings water. The youth peers into the cup fastidiously, then drinks.

The letter is on fine Valencia paper, folded and sealed. He holds the scab of wax at an angle to the sunlight and makes out the imprint of the Bishop's ring. But there hasn't been a Bishop of Cusco since Valverde fled—to a well-earned death in the hotlands. Eaten by cannibals, they say.

“Who wrote this?”

“I only know who sent it.”

The runner has indeed come from the Bishop's palace, where he was summoned by a servant at first light.

Waman hesitates. Over the years he has heard more than once that the Spaniards think their old interpreter Felipillo is long dead. Death suits him; the dead have little to fear.

Now he is uncovered. But how? Who could have recognized him? He looks so different: humble, ragged, his Spanish dress and ways all gone. His youth too. He considers dismissing the postman and fleeing at once to the no man's land along the border.

The World is now partitioned: half of it occupied, half free. Pizarro's cavalry broke the siege of Lima when the Inca troops came down onto the fields for a final assault. Almagro did the same in Cusco, after an outbreak of smallpox crippled the Inca army. In this he was also helped by Pawllu, who betrayed his elder brother and took One-Eye's side. Pawllu's reward was to be crowned puppet Emperor by Almagro. A reward he still enjoys—though the Old One and both Almagros have been dead for years, killed in a string of wars and assassinations as the Spaniards began fighting amongst themselves, more divided than the Incas.

An uneasy stalemate has taken hold. The invaders control the seaboard and parts of the highlands, including Cusco. But the invasion has stalled at the high ranges east and north of the capital, where roads are blocked and bridges all thrown down. Beyond this mountain wall the defiant Manku is the Only King, waging guerrilla warfare from the Empire's eastern quarter, planning to retake the whole.

Waman looks at the postman, thinks again of fleeing. But it's too late. Soldiers on horseback could catch him easily this near the city. And if they failed they'd vent their anger on the farm folk who have sheltered him.

He breaks the Bishop's seal.

To the esteemed royal interpreter, Don Felipe Waman of Tumbes, greetings

First, it cheers my heart to learn you are alive. Many had given you up for lost, saying you died in Chile or perhaps in the wars for this city when the Inca Manku rebelled and the traitor Almagro made war upon his fellow Christians.

I write with good news. Our Sacred Catholic Majesty has sent this kingdom the blessing of a Viceroy, Don Blasco Núñez Vela, recently arrived at Lima. He brings New Laws for the protection and welfare of all Indians. In light of this I have every confidence that this realm will soon be restored to the order and good government it enjoyed in the days of its own sovereigns.

You may therefore return to Cusco in full trust and safety, as have many other displaced persons. Here there is much need of your services. In particular, the Inca Pawllu, a great friend and bulwark to us Christians, was recently baptised into the Holy Faith. We expect that a general conversion of his subjects will soon follow.

The letter goes on to say that although there are now several interpreters in royal service, none is the equal of Felipe. Only he can be entrusted with so delicate a task as the translation of liturgy and scripture.

I therefore have the honour of requesting your help in this holy work and, God willing, some other matters which I shall set before you. You may find the latter to be of personal interest and advantage.

I need hardly add that your cooperation will wipe away all stains with which, during your long absence, some have unjustly besmirched your name.

The Viceroy will learn of your services and, in due course, reward your worthiness and loyalty.

From this city of Santiago del Cusco,
Day 14 of July, year of Our Lord 1544,

Luis de Morales, Vicar-General

Curiosity satisfied, disappointment follows. The letter brings no news of his family. Not unless
personal interest
refers to them somehow.

Waman reads it through more closely. Flattery (“Don Felipe”); a threat (thinly veiled); a hint of sympathy for the plight of Indians; promises of reward. Sometimes Spaniards keep their promises, but only to those who stay useful; like the treacherous Pawllu, who changes loyalties as easily as shirts—forgiven even for taking the Almagros' side against the Pizarros.

He becomes aware of the young postman staring wide-eyed at the sight of a lowly rustic reading the foreigners' tongue. Waman smiles.

“You may tell the sender that I look forward to seeing him next time I'm in Cusco. In half a month.”

“With respect,” the youth answers, “I am instructed to say that someone will come tomorrow to escort you. He will bring horses.”

Waman agrees. To do otherwise would stir suspicion. Once the runner has left, he looks at the letter again and finds a postscript overleaf. This explains that the writer is fulfilling the Bishop's duties for the time being, because “the long troubles of this realm” have
hindered the arrival from Spain of a replacement for Bishop Valverde, “that good servant of God, so savagely martyred in the hotlands.”

Waman smiles at this old news.

They are mules
, not horses, and the escort is merely a helper from the Bishop's palace, an elderly fellow, unforthcoming and none too clean. Waman finds this reassuring. He had expected a guard, a Spaniard.

On his undercover visits to Cusco he has avoided authorities of every kind, swimming among the little fish, haunting travellers' camps and markets, drinking dens frequented by servants, the shanties where ruined people live like spiders in the ruined city. And the dismal hospices where friars tend the sick and wounded—many maimed or burnt in the wars, others punished by mutilation for taking Inca Manku's side: men without ears or hands; women with breasts and noses cut away.

Waman hasn't been in a saddle since Chile. After riding a while he dismounts and walks beside the mule, preferring his own legs.

They come at last to Cusco's fortress on the brow of the city. Its three towers are broken now, but the citadel's colossal ramparts show little trace of war, so massive they seem a rock formation rather than a work of man.

Some way below, on Granary Terrace, stands one of the few palaces still roofed in Inca style, though its ridges are clad with copper instead of gold. Formerly Waskhar's, then Manku's, it is now the seat of Pawllu.

He hurries by, down into shattered streets, past blackened walls.