Uprise of the Rebellious Princess

Of Course, I Found Love

She already felt lonely. The farther she walked from him, the more desolate her heart felt. But her life was awaiting her, and the more she was absent from the palace, the more anger her father could have. She crossed Colhuacan’s Main Square. Wherever she stepped, she noticed remnants of the nightly storm. Oh, the storm which she cherished so much. Just by looking at traces of rainwater her sensations of a night of love returned. Images, feelings, all flashed within her mind. And from such a lovely night only puddles of water remain and emotions kept. Moments of love dissipate into the unforgiving pass of time except for the emotions that mark our hearts.

She felt happy and joyfully hopped as she carried those memories. Her mind went into a pleasant frenzy of love that swirled her feelings. Her long paces were abruptly interrupted by a voice.

“Lady Atototzin!” said a young man.

She snapped out of her daydreaming and turned towards the voice. It was a taller-than-average young man, flanked by four seasoned Palace guards.

“Atototzin? We have been looking for you. The Tlatoani, your father, was deeply concerned about your whereabouts and sent people to find you,” he said in a very official manner.

“If my father was concerned, why didn’t he come out in the rain and search for me himself?” she immediately questioned.

“Actually, all search parties waited until the rain diminished,” he said.

She laughed with irony trying to embarrass the young man, and judging by the exchange of looks between the Palace guards she was achieving it. She walked towards the young man in the most whimsical manner.

“So my father, who was deeply affected by my mysterious disappearance, felt compelled to send the finest men to search for me. Because he was so saddened, he did not feel the need to come and look for me. Right? And then these brave, valorous men were thus ordered to fetch me as trained dogs do. But I guess dogs would have made a much worthy search party because they wouldn’t be afraid of rain.”

“Well, many of us volunteered for your rescue,” said the young man, very proudly.

She slowly crossed her arms, tilted a bit her head to her right and rested her leg outwards. There she stood staring at him with the most sarcastic face she could make. She felt angered at all the silly things her family had to do only to keep her close and controlled.

Atotoztli was not going to let such issues trouble her mind. Not even the most heated discussion can be won in her situation, she feared, so at least she will expose all of their wrongdoings with sarcasm. Who said you can’t spice a spat with humor? Quarrels may or may not be overcome, but a good pinch of cynicism will endure if properly stated. And many points can be solved with satire instead of bluntly overt affronts.

And so she remained still, silently staring at the young man. Atotoztli could notice from his expression the discomfort, and moreover a mortification so difficult to conceal. And so she decided to break the awkward silence.

“So?”

The young man was sincerely puzzled.

“Here I am, and by no means I see you or these brave men rescue me,” said a defiant Atotoztli. She turned around, gazing at pedestrians that passed by her on that calm morning. “I am here, visible in full, present, and quite apparent … danger. This damsel is ready to be rescued,” she added.

“Oh Cihuatecutli, you must understand –” he tried to explain as his hand tried to reach her left shoulder.

She rapidly arched her body to the right side and even took a step backward.

“Don’t you tell me what I must understand,” said Atotoztli, “And if you don’t mind –whoever you may be, sir –I will rescue myself to the Palace. Because frankly I am tired of all those alleged perils I have encountered.” She hastily stormed away, walking fast-paced towards the Palace main entrance.

“Lady Atototzin, I am Huehuetl if you may be in need of anything!” he shouted for her to listen.

She stopped and turned back to him, with the most jokingly smile. “A drum!” she said, “Your name is Drum?” She rolled her eyes and sighed. “You ought to be of far better service to a musician than myself, Huetzin.”

And so, she continued her way to the Palace. As she approached the main entrance stairs, guards were dumbfounded to see her return by herself. As the Lady got near them, she was able to listen to them speaking to each other in secret. Some even approached to each other’s ears. This behavior angered her deeply. She straightened up and lifted her head proudly as she stopped at the beginning of the stairs.

“Guard formation! Now!” she spoke firmly and with such a loud voice that made the guards tremble in confusion.

Right away, the guards desperately ran into positions, forming two files, one at each side of the stairs. It was such haste that some of them stumbled with each other in messy disarray. Haven’t she knew of their rigorous training, she might believe they were some backward newly formed soldiers. Finally, they were able to form the accustomed welcoming military formation. Silence reigned at the entrance stairs. Men were straight as unmovable trees, the wind only moved their feathered adornments just as trees have their leaves caressed.

“A Lady of Colhuacan is present!” Atotoztli teased. “May I remind you?” She stood there turning left and right as if expecting an answer. But no answer, as it should be.

Atotoztli stepped up the stairs slowly, inspecting the guards with an intimidating gaze. In reality, she had no interest in intimidating anyone. Her new self was not worried about the burdens of her protocol-filled life, she preferred to take it lightly and play along with a sarcastic twist. And indeed she did enjoy it this way. She kept walking up the stairs, conveying the idea of an earnest Cihuatecutli with her semblance, as everyone expected her to be. As she turned to her right, she caught a guard’s eyes in a surprisingly rapid gaze at her backside body. She abruptly stopped, almost at the top of the stairs, and violently turned towards the rest down.

“Tomorrow I will announce about executions to be carried on,” she said harshly, “But not today, for I am tired, and such things can’t be performed without having a good rest.” Atotoztli turned towards the mentioned guard, and with a menacing gaze she said, “We’ll do so indeed.”

She briskly walked up the final stairs, and into the Palace. Crossed the empty Great Hall, and turned to the left into the service entrance. There she walked through the tunnels amongst the Palace workers who halted their duties as they saw her. She reached the main kitchen, where all noise stopped as she rushed inside. She hastily went to the middle of the kitchen room and bent over the squared stone where food was prepared. Her arms were on her face, her back was table flat, and her long legs standing straight parallel to the stone.

Everyone at the kitchen was in shock, seeing such an image was unimaginable from the merry Cihuatecutli they knew. Some even dared to peep from outside the kitchen, others attempted to come in but halted their intentions at the entrance. Curiosity mounted speculating what grave gloomy sorrow smeared her every-day jovial cheerfulness. It is, after all, those minute changes in one’s life that stir people the more than an unchanged continuous behavior.

Go and do the same;

no one notices.

Go forth and bring change;

harvest surprises,

of covetous rage,

or good-faith prizes.

Oh! Fate of the sage!

Just as her flattened back exploded in convulsion, and her lungs reacted violently from her panting, the chief kitchen worker appeared at one of the entrances. Everyone gasped with great amazement and quickly turned towards Nenetl, who attempted to get closer with great haste.

“Move!” she cried, “Move, people! Let me through!”.

She anxiously moved as fast as she could, pushing shoulders. As people near Atotoztli realized Nenetl was approaching, they swiftly move away from her path, giving her chance to quickly draw near.

As she panted, her hair moved towards her arms that were still covering her face. At this worrisome situation, Nenetl stood beside her, and was about to touch her shoulder but immediately retrieved her hand when Atotoztli kept panting. Faithful to her lady, and worried this could escalate in front of everyone, she decidedly touched the farthest shoulder in order to try and embrace her.

Everyone gasped silently as Atotoztli tried to straighten up, amid her continuous puffing. Her body curled trying to stand up, but she felt it was an impossible task. The Cihuatecutli was clouded with such a cascade of emotions that literally impaired her whole body. It was far too difficult for her to even trust her knees and feet. All of herself was weakened by the incredible torrent of senses that inundated her every corner, her every limb. Clinging to Nenetl’s shoulder she slowly straightened up as her body shook so violently. Everyone expected the worse, with astonished eyes and fretted semblances. For Atotoztli, it was an unbearable agony not to be proper in front of everyone. She could not hold the torment anymore, so she finally bursted into an all-out laughter, louder and more meaningful than anyone could recall hearing.

Even when she tried her very best to hold on to her exhilarating sensation, Atotoztli could not resist any longer the muted chuckles. The laughter boomed to every wall of the kitchen packed with worried people. Many of them turned to each other in surprise. Atotoztli giggled as her hand gestured back and forth, and then laughed loud again. She got near Nenetl as her uncontrollable laughter shook her, holding both her arms with a tight grip.

“I’ve never felt like this!” she uttered the best she could in-between her unstoppable laughing, “So free! So much in liberty of doing things. You see, last night I opened my eyes to what I am, and what I can be.” Chuckles interfered with her words. “I just feel good. Such a liberating sensation.”

“My girl, my grandmother –what happened?” asked Nenetl, “What is the root of such merry feelings?”

“Well, I did more than anything accomplished in my life inside this Palace walls,” Atotoztli answered excitedly. “I learned my family thinks less of me. I escaped from an illustrious gathering. I found love half nude under the rain. I witnessed how street markets are installed early in the morning. I insulted an obnoxious young lackey of my Father called Drum. And just right now I threatened a Palace Guard for not respecting me. If you ask me, it was a pretty good night, and a marvelous morning so far.”

Everyone gasped, many with their hands covering their mouths awe.

“Love?” many whispered. “She found love!”

“Of course I found love,” she answered, “I wouldn’t be joyful by insulting people here and there. I am happy because I found love, making me realize all of this here, all those people, all is of no worth – only love is of value. Understanding love is the only thing I should have worried about makes my previous life meaningless.” Atotoztli turned around and saw everyone cluttered at the kitchen entrance. And as she calmed down, a more sober tone emerged. “All of our concerns and our petty problems, all of that is not truthful –it’s almost as if it didn’t exist but in our head,” said Atotoztli. “Yet love does exist, and thus truthful just as both life and death.” She gazed at the palace worker’s interested eyes, meditating for a brief while and crossing her arms. Her eyes moved left and right, for she felt her mind traveling to undiscovered and fascinating new ideas. It was too much of a torrent of thoughts that inundated her inner light. “You know, probably we have no certainty of things and persons to be real,” continued the Lady. “We are born, and we eventually die –this is real, no one can cheat this in our world. But between birth and death lies only love –or at least it should be.”

“My grandmother! There are so many things out there that are good and real,” said her faithful Nenetl.

“I don’t know anymore,” answered Atotoztli, “You know Nenetl, you all know, that I held dear to my family, my position, the rules, and so many things. But now, I can tell you, you never know who is who on this Earth. Either by means of crude betrayal or blunt belittlement, our perceptions are rattled to the unknown. I speak of love because I met someone who talks truthful words and has no twisted tongue. A young man who opened his heart and aided me in opening my own.”

“My little grandmother, how certain are you of this young man being honest in his words or actions? You have not experienced what is to be with men to compare.”

“Oh, my dearest Nenetl, I may have no intimate experience with men. True,” replied Atotoztli, “But one of the perks of being the Cihuatecutli of Colhuacan is that I have been surrounded by men all my life. Ever since my mother died when I was of young age, my Father immersed me in his world. First, men petted me in my pampering childhood, then intruded to guide my juvenile life. Now they lewdly covet my grown body. All my life surrounded by men of all sorts. Granted that love may be elusively concealed, but I reckon men’s intentions with great ease. And this young man is starkly different from all men I have ever met in my life.”

Atotoztli sighed, as everyone nodded. Nenetl nodded as well with an approvable semblance, but when she turned around she saw everyone profoundly immersed in Atotoztli talks.

“Return to your duties at once!” cried Nenetl to the improvised audience. “Go! Carry on! Go on!”

Everyone slowly reacted to her words and desperate hand waving, but eventually returned to their respective working area.

“I’m so sorry, my little grandmother, my dear Atotoztli,” said Nenetl. “I should have sent them away right from the beginning, but I was so worried about you.”

“I’m actually thankful for their presence,” Atotoztli replied, “I really needed someone to listen. What better than many ears to express my current situation. It was very helpful. Please thank everyone for their concern. Please.”

She felt a burden being lifted in her life, and still much remained. At least the Lady has taken the path to be liberated from old ideas. She did not wish for the previous Atotoztli to vanish into nothing, but to rather use her to step up into a new woman. That was the prime objective of the change she felt so much in the need for –to become a woman in full. Just as a child leaves behind playtime when growing into youth, she was changing from a youthful lady into a much-delayed transformation of a full-bloom woman. She had been very mature for her age and position, but she lacked maturity that only comes from the strife for self-determination.

“Maturity is seeded when pugnacious schisms are laid –though hardly anyone harvest it,” she realized in her mind.

She walked upstairs, thinking of the need for confronting her father and her family. She felt it was more of an explanation, as unharmoniously as it could become to deliver indeed. But no one was around, only palace servants coming and going. She searched all rooms, and no one was there. With haste, she descended and searched into the infamous Great Hall. No one was there either. A shadow was casted in front of her feet. She followed the elongated shadow until its source was revealed.

“My Lady,” said Huehuetl, “If it is your Father you are searching for, he is currently back in the Palace Gardens. If you wish, I may –”

“Please don’t!” answered Atotoztli coarsely.

She walked out to the gardens with fastened pace, abruptly avoiding any further conversation with the young man. She felt disgusted by that Drum, who kept pounding her patience. And as much as her mind could ramble against this man, she surely preferred to direct her thoughts towards her talk with her father.

She walked uphill as the wet grass smell grew thicker. The reason the palace was built as a two-story building was to take advantage of the city’s slanted terrain. The garden opened majestically as it turned around the Palace. The rest of the garden was flattened in old times, as many of the work done for the palace or the city. Recent rulers have managed to excel at maintaining what was done in previous generations. And indeed, the glory of Colhuacan was visible in its architecture. But since she can recall the city bows to the higher authority of Huey Tlatoani Xolotl. This ancient Toltec realm had its magnificence untouched at the high price of peacefully relinquishing their independence to the Chichimec Domain. And even when a skirmish did break out when Xolotl’s son Nopaltzin was on its way to take Colhuacan, the ruler of that time decided to hand over power instead of witnessing the fall of the last great Toltec city. So the city was preserved, the palace too. An uncomfortable chill scintillated through her body as she thought of that terrible cost so that her eyes could gaze upon the intact gardens her ancestors once gazed as well.

“How can one prefer to not even try to fight solely to preserve things as they are?” she thought to herself. “What a grand monument to idleness it is to see things unchanged –a reminder of ever-present cowardice.”

Such kind of inaction frightened her so deeply, so now she was resolute to change and not to remain still. Even though she felt she was an engaging woman in her personality, she realized she wasn’t in her own affairs. And now she wanted to. She wanted to let know that the Lady once bounded to the fate of a Palace was ready to set loose to reach her own fate.

“Every prominent Cihuapilli nowadays does as they wish in their realms, with girly, bratty desires and shallow thoughts,” she whispered to herself. “Why can’t I, a descendant of the ones who ruled this world many yesteryears, do as my mind and body wish in order to achieve genuine goodness?”

Oh! The wish for youth’s liberty!

From the bars of our own cradle,

And solemn bonds of family,

Till age slowly tears the bundle,

Full of fury, so necessary.

Is a battle just where woe grows,

And love goes to our soul’s dark soles?

Family love easily flows,

but its hatred splashes ashes,

That the pyre of the heart’s ire snows.

Raw sentiments choke heated brawls,

Lacerating once loving ties.

Claw of the blazing passions crawl,

Lassoing to its knees with cries,

As the young’s freed unto life’s dice.

The rear side of the Palace compound had wider and larger garden space. And although the garden continued around the other side of the palace, the Cihuatecutli stopped when she spotted her Father’s retinue. They were surrounding him as they strolled very slowly in the gardens carrying flowers to smell and admire. Atotoztli approached them, but once she got near she felt a certain insecurity that suddenly splashed her resolve. So many things to say that suddenly evaporated into the air as she got near his Father’s courtiers. Everyone turned towards to greet her with a bow. She barely nodded back. They all turned to the Tlatoani, and he dismissed them. Everyone went their way, not without bowing once again to both father and daughter.

She did not know what to do but to do her best to read her father’s face. His semblance presented no sign of emotion. Atotoztli was expecting an exploding volcano, but she only came to witness a stone – hardened yet still and serene. The Lady sighed and ventured to approach him. She walked towards him noticing he was also reading her facial expressions.

“Are you well, dear Atotoztli?” Asked her father calmly. “We –I was worried.”

He seemed truly well composed, not altered. Might there be any anger he was indeed excelling at not showing it. Seeing that her father set the way for a peaceful conversation, Atotoztli eased her ways and played along. She thought it was best to carry on with an amiable talk –after all, she cherished him not for being the ruler of Colhuacan but for being her father.

“Do not worry, father,” Atotoztli replied, “I needed time to myself after – you know… I do appreciate your concern.”

For a moment, both remained mute until he broke the uncomfortable silence.

“Whatever happened between both of you and your sister, you need to fix it,” he said, “We are people that solve quarrels with diplomacy.”

“I sincerely fear there may be no reconciliation with Ilancueitl,” Atotoztli explained. “She showed her true self, overtly manifesting a life-long loathing towards me. What can be done when one is hated unknowingly? Only to step aside and let her go, or confront an age-old misunderstanding. ”

“She is deeply affected by this situation,” he insisted.

“And I’m not affected?” questioned Atotoztli, “to discover that my own sister, which I thought she loved me so much, now unmasked herself to petty jealousy?”

“I just want you both to return to your previous friendship,” his fathers pressed. “This can’t be tolerated at the Palace!”

“She is not my friend, she is my sister,” Atotoztli argued. “You see? You should really understand what is happening within your own family.”

“Our family resolves things peacefully,” he replied. “That is the way of our lineage house, that is the Toltec way,” the Tlatoani explained calm and sure of himself.

This became a burdensome conversation for Atotoztli. And so, weary of the way the talk was taking, she decided to step in decidedly.

“Yes! Believe me, I know! Such is the way our family handle things that it made us surrender our realm to the invading Chichimecs. What a pity to be part if this ruling house,” she said.

Their conversation was interrupted by the presence of a third person. It was the city’s security advisor, a seasoned man in his late middle age whose serene semblance contrasted with his menacing body posture and intimidating haircut. Both her father and Atotoztli were surprised at his intromission in such an intimate moment.

“Yes, Tecpactl?” Uttered her father a bit confused, “What is it?”

“My lord, little grandson, oh Tlatoani Achitometzin!” he said ceremoniously while bowing his head. “I remind you, oh Lord, that a concise report is due to debriefing. Important matters of state need your attention with urgency, I shall add.”

“Tecpactl, I will be with you shortly, but right now I need no further interruptions of this sort.”

His secretive advisor bowed once more and signaled towards a small group of city notables. They all turned to each other and left the gardens.

Atotoztli gazed in awe how a hand gesture and a few words can transmit the wishes of a Tlatoani to his people. If only she could convey her intricate feelings to her father with such ease. But it seems the warmth of our heart cannot be expressed so coldly. Vacuous thoughts and brute commands can be spoken while fruitful ideas and emotive sentiments can only be felt. And this made her conversation futile. If her father could not understand her in matters of family, she could not imagine issues of love.

“I often wonder what my mother would have done in such predicaments,” provoked Atotoztli. “After all, you only live for an entire new family, the thousands who call you their grandson.”

“You know that is the folk way of talking. Understand mi position, I need to take care of a nation and my family.”

“I’m afraid you've already blurred the difference between nation and family.” Atotoztli sighed and continued, “I only ask to not be treated as part of your constituents, for I am just your daughter. Scold me hastily whenever I'm a bad offspring, but never, please, force me to perform as the kind of Lady you so much wish for. I am not a doll to be exhibited as a puppet of this rulership –that is no lady-like behavior.”

“You’re not like the daughter I raised,” he said appalled. “What strange ideas you bring forth! I truly do not know how to respond!”

“Well don’t! Leave me with my strangeness, but just let me be myself,” said Atotoztli, as she attempted to leave. But she halted her pace to add, “Oh, and sorry for ruining your momentous night by quarreling with my sister.”