For this chapter, I will be making a key to all of the terms that are being used. If you guys like the key or just hate it put up a comment so that I know whether or not to put it up for the next chapter that uses a lot of words terms. Without further ado the words are:

Tlapitzalli: a type of Aztec flute usually carved out of stone with four holes

Kokopelli: the humpbacked Flute Player, mythical Hopi symbol of fertility, replenishment, music, dance, and mischief.

City-Dweller: Derogatory term used by Outlanders towards the people who chose to live in cities.

Tepoztopilli: Aztec spear that, in Cay’s case, is seven-and-a-half feet in height with a blade a foot long.

Nonan: Literally “My Mother”

Tatli: Literally “Father”

                                                                      ***

                                                                                   Uetzcayotl

I was on my lightning cloud while playing my tlapitzalli, a flute carved by Kokopelli himself and gifted to me on my fifth birthday. I wasn't into public performances like Ish, but playing it helped to calm me and at the moment I was extremely close to snapping. To explain, the person that I was supposed to protect pulled a dirty trick on me. I knew that she was giving me weird looks yesterday, but never did I think she would pull something like that.

We had been walking to a place that she said she needed to go because of her work and when an officer walked by, she ran up to him and started crying on how I was her abusive boyfriend and while I was trying to prove my innocence the mouse ran just like a real one would have. Not only that, but due to that incident, I had spent the past two hours undergoing a damned interrogation where the stupid city-dweller kept on asking me the same questions over and over again.

I was an Outlander through and through so the cramped interrogation room was bad enough, but when they called Moustapha on those weird wrist projection devices, the man laughed. Moustapha freaking laughed. In the end, I still managed to get out, but now I apparently had something called a "record," whatever that meant, and I had to find the mouse that pulled such a trick, in the first place.

As I played, I contemplated how I would get back at her. I couldn't fight her like I would if Ish tried something because the mouse didn't look like a fighter, but rather a flighter. I would have to be smart about this. A frontal wouldn't work so I would have to bide my time until I found out something I could use against her. And then, when she least expected it, I would have my revenge.

When this thought ended, I spotted a figure with the same presence and looks as the mouse so put my flute away and brought my lightning cloud behind her.

She was sitting on a railing with her silver eyes lost in a daze and her wild black curly hair flying a million directions.

She stiffened and slowly turned her head before muttering, "khara, I thought I got rid of him" and jumping down.

I caught her and said, "I may have underestimated you, but I promise you that I won't make the same mistake twice."

It was at that moment that I heard a disgustingly familiar voice say, "Chichiton?"

Then another annoyingly familiar voice said, "Uetzycayotlpillo? Canin itztoc?"

At the sound of their voices and my native tongue, I paled and got so nervous that my lightning cloud fell away. When we fell, I flipped her into my arms and landed in a crouch on the ground. After, I let her down and said, "We have to go. Now."

"What do you-"

"I know those two and if we don't go, we're going to be in a whole different set of problems."

"But-"

Ignoring her I grabbed her hand and ran into the direction farthest from their voices. As we ran, I remembered the first time I had met him. The stories say that he was a hero who often battled against his evil brother and although that brother is indeed evil, and a thousand times worse than him, I never liked him. Not from the moment I met him.

This was long before I met Gabriel, Raiju, and Ish. I was three at the time and my father was coming to visit my mother and I so as with every time that he would, my mother made me wear my best clothes and combed back my hair. I had received my tepoztopilli the week before for my birthday and was excited to see him again. When he arrived two figures walked in. The first was my father. Most would consider him ugly with his canine head, ragged dog ears, and skeletal feet that run backwards, but they never really bothered me because that was how he had always looked. If anything, I found it embarrassing that I had inherited my mother's delicate features instead of my father's strong and frightening ones.

Unlike some of the legends that say he has a skeletal body, his body was strong, but of course it was because after all, even with all his deformities, he was still the one who retrieved the rotting bones of an extinct being from Mictlantecuhtli and the one who guides the souls of the dead through the underworld. The other figure was tall and had a similar build to my father, but he did not have any of his deformities.

I asked, "Nonan, tatli, who is the weird man?"

At this, Tlapaxqui laughed until the weird man shot him a glare which caused Tlapaxqui to say, "What I meant was that, Lord Uetzcayotl, this man is your uncle and should be respected as such."

The weird man put his arm on my father's shoulder and said, "Xolotl, you sure this is your kid. He doesn't look anything like you and is too rude to be related to you."

People say that children don't understand anything, but that's a lie. Even at three, I knew perfectly well what he was insinuating. Because of this, I lost it.

I shifted into a mexican doberman, although not as large as I can now (I was only three), and launched at him so that I was gripping his arm with my teeth.

He said, "Cute, just like some puppy. Tlazohtzin, you cheat on him with some shifter"

At which, I sent a lightning bolt through my mouth so that it electrocuted him before releasing him and shifting back to a boy.

As I stood there with a smirk on my face for having defended my mother from the weird one's taunts, he said, "I stand corrected. That's definitely your kid."

My father said, "Of course he is. As if Tlazohtzin would ever betray me."

At this, my short mother pulled my father's head down to give him a kiss on the mouth before saying, "No need to defend me. I learned a long time ago to ignore Quetzalcoatl's taunts. He's just jealous that he now has to share his brother with two more."

After shaking himself off from my lightning bolt, the weird man said, "Xolotl, about what you said earlier, I accept it."

My mother asked, "Accept what?"

Xolotl replied, "Last week I gave Uetzcayotl a tepoztopilli for his birthday and although I am capable of fighting just as well as Quetzalcoatl, my feet will prevent me from being an adequate teacher so I asked him to come by twice a week to teach Uetzcayotl and he said that he had to meet him first."

I said, "Tatli, I have to see the weird man again?!"

With a chuckle, my father said, "Although I do agree that he is a little weird, this man is your uncle and my twin. Not only that, but he is one of the finest warriors I have seen and you want to be strong. Don't you, Uetzcayotl?"

I said, "Yes, but he's so weird. Why does it have to be him?"

At this, I heard my uncle say, "Oh, I'm going to enjoy this."

Since then, every single time that guy came around I've felt nothing, but pain and torture at his hands.

I didn't know why Tlapaxqui was with him considering that he didn't like him either, but if he saw me with a girl (in his mind it didn't matter that this was just a job) and knew that I was omitting my parentage from the people I was staying with, he would exploit it so I ran.

The mouse said, "Who are we running from? Are there more warlocks?"

I answered, "What we're running from is a thousand times worse than any warlock or witch in the world."

At this, a thunderbolt launched in front of us, effectively stopping us.

From the sky, Quetzalcoatl said, "Now, is that anyway to treat your uncle, puppy?"

I muttered a curse in Nahuatl and pushed the mouse behind me before saying with a strength I did not have, "What are you doing here?"

The mouse said, "Uncle? You're related to the person we're running away from?"

I answered, "It's complicated."

It was at this point that Tlapaxqui ran up to me yelling in Nahuatl, "Lord Uetzcayotl, it is you! I am sorry that I could not serve you as my great master Xolotl commanded me to, but I have been stuck dealing with that wretch for the past couple of weeks, but you're here too! Oh, how happy I am to be reunited with you, Lord Uetzcayotl!"

At this, I looked at the three of them. The confused girl I was supposed to protect, but who hated me, my uncle who made it his life's mission to torture me, and my father's servant who wanted nothing more than to be the most perfect servant and I thought, I am so dead.

Next Chapter: Chapter 5