Hungry Ghosts (Eric Carter #3)(50)

“Son, when I say I’m from the old country I mean the really old country. I’m some grade-A, antediluvian shit over here. I know a thing or two about bending cosmic powers to my will.”

“Uh huh. Sure.”

“Okay, yeah. I mean, I am really goddamn old. But I been here before. I know my way in and out of Mictlan.” He leers at me. “All I need’s a hole.” Yeah, that’s Darius, all right.

Connections begin to click together. “Mictlantecuhtli told me when he was trapped in his tomb that he cut the Spanish off from some superweapon, but it was too late to save his people. I thought it was Quetzalcoatl. But it was you, wasn’t it?”

Darius throws back his shot, gets a faraway look in his eye. “Seven? Eight thousand years ago? I was trapped by a Halaf wizard in Tepe Reshwa in Mesopotamia. Fucker stuck me in a clay pot. Stunk of spoiled mutton. Still can’t stand the smell. Couple thousand years later my prison gets an upgrade to a gourd.”

“A gourd?”

“A gourd.”

“Livin’ the high life, there.”

“Oh, it was a nice gourd,” he says. “As gourds go.”

I knew Darius was old, but Jesus. Eight thousand years? And that’s how long ago he was trapped. How long had he been alive before then? Does “alive” even apply to Darius? I’m afraid to find out.

I slam back my drink. It might not be real, but it still tastes good and if I’m lucky it’ll make me just as drunk as the real thing.

“Eventually I ended up in al-Andalus. Berber general name of Tariq ibn-Ziyad. Bounced around, changed hands. By the time I ended up with Cortés I was in an actual metal and lead crystal bottle. Very swank.”

“I thought you came across with Cabrillo. By the time he came to California, Cortés had already wiped the Aztecs out.”

“Yeah, by the time he came to California, sure. But first he was in Mexico. Came over with Pánfilo de Narváez to kick Cortés’ ass. Some political bullshit. Only Cortés heard about it and left Tenochtitlan to wait for Narváez and take him out. Once Narváez was out of the way, Cortés pulled his troops into his own army.”

Something about this story is poking at the back of my mind. Then I have it. “Cortés already had Tenochtitlan when that happened. And when he left that’s when things really went to shit.”

“Yep. Left some yahoo in charge who panicked and ended up slaughtering a few hundred Aztecs. By the time Cortés got back it was a lot worse than when he left. Lost a lot of men trying to haul his gold out of the city. Had some help from the Tlaxcala, some locals who hated the Aztecs. Shit, everybody hated the Aztecs. After that it was a real war. Cortés regrouped. Months of fighting to take Tenochtitlan back. Tens of thousands of men dead.”

“What were you doing during all this?”

“Keeping Huitzilopochtli, Tlaloc, and all the other gods off Cortés’s ass. Weren’t for me, they never would have made it half as far as they did.”

“And Cabrillo?”

“He got put in charge of a bunch of crossbowmen. After the siege to retake Tenochtitlan Cortés stuck him on a fool’s errand. There was this priest who wanted to take the fight to the Heathen Gods. Found some ritual to get into Mictlan. So Cortés hands him my bottle and tells him to go nuts. So it’s me, this crazy-ass priest and Cabrillo and his men. And your buddy Quetzalcoatl. Gods are batshit, but him? Hoo-boy. He was a piece of work.”

“No shit,” I say. “He’s running around Mexico as a wind spirit made of trash now.” Darius cocks his head, looking like a cat that’s wondering whether something should be played with or eaten.

“Huh. That’s news. You’ll have to tell me that story sometime.”

“Let me survive this one first. So you killed a bunch of the gods and came into Mictlan to finish the job.”

I play that sentence back in my head. Darius killed the Aztec gods. Holy shit. Darius killed the Aztec gods. I’ve gone drinking with this guy. He’s in my goddamn city. Trapped, sure. But what happens if he gets out? What happens if somebody lets him out?

“Most of them.” There’s a dangerous gleam in his eye as though he knows what I’m thinking. And hell, maybe he does.

“That does explain why you were worried I’d come after you once I’d signed on with Santa Muerte. I can’t imagine she likes you much.” Though what the hell he thinks I can do to him I have no idea.

“Mother of all understatements, there.”

“Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“Partly because I couldn’t. There’s all sorts of things I can’t talk about. Those two death gods saw to that. But mostly I figured you’d freak the fuck out.”

I think about that for a second. “Good assumption. I probably would have. So what the hell happened in that tomb? The place is littered with the bones of dead Conquistadores.”

Darius takes another drink. Both our shot glasses are suddenly full. I remember this is a dream. I toss back a second one and watch it fill back up the second I put it back onto the table.

“Got ambushed. Mictlantecuhtli was waiting for me. Set a trap. Had some mojo all set in there to stick me back inside my bottle and lock it up tight. I don’t know what the plan was after that. Whatever it was, it didn’t happen. I turned him into a rock while he was sitting there working his magic to shove me back in my bottle. Everybody was losin’ their shit about then. Dead soldiers. Priest just a smear on the wall. Lots of chaos.”