PREVIOUSLY
[Those crude planks had evolved into galleons that traversed vast oceans. The journey had been arduous; from manual sawmills to dry docks, from bronze to iron, from placid lakes to the open sea—yet as enduring as the lace-work that still defined every Suaza hull.
He nodded slowly, tracing the proposed reinforcement with his finger.
"Well conceived," he said. "But add an intermediate floor timber here. Remember the first Tequendama that split open during the Isthmus trials… Pressure is a merciless master."
Cuhuca took note, a smile of recognition playing on his lips. Chuta leaned back slightly, letting the memory settle. Every naval advancement had been a lesson: wood yielded, the wind betrayed, and the sea punished. But since those days upon the lake, the Suaza Kingdom had learned, for the first time, how to answer back.]
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Year 12 of the SuaChie Calendar, Tenth Month (January 1495).
Central City (Tunja, Colombia), South-Central.
RegionCentral Mansion.
A few weeks later.
I would have remained in my office reviewing reports for another entire week had they permitted it—hidden behind maps and projections—but the entirety of the Central Mansion seemed to be breathing in unison with me. Every wall, every corridor, every polished stone echoed the same frantic pulse I was unsuccessfully trying to master.
It wasn't merely that my mother was in labor; it was that, for the first time in an age, I felt the very building that represented my progress and that of the realm was more unsettled by a single body than by all the borders on the map.
I had been "advised" to wait in a separate wing, far from the area my assistants and physicians had repurposed for the delivery. They called it the "Medical Wing" now, with a touch of pride, as if giving a name to their anxiety made it more manageable. I knew better: they simply wanted me out of the way, lest my nerves interfere. I relented, for my hands were trembling more than I cared to admit.
Nyia offered to accompany me without uttering a word. She simply walked by my side as we departed the main hall, possessing that unique way of hers—occupying little space yet being ever-present.
We settled in a quiet chamber, far from the murmur of hurried footsteps and the clipped orders emanating from the quarters of the midwives and doctors. The light filtered through a carved wooden lattice, casting geometric patterns upon the stone floor. I sat on a low bench; Nyia chose a chair by the window, where the clarity of the day fell directly upon her hands.
"You could have gone with Umza and Turey," I said, more to break the silence than out of reproach. "They are in their element amidst such a commotion... or at least Umza is."
Nyia traced a faint line with her finger through the invisible dust on the windowsill, not looking at me immediately.
"In the Medical Wing, there are too many voices," she replied at last. "And too many eyes that do not know where to look. Here, at least, I can... breathe."
I understood her better than I would have confessed aloud. Fleeing the heart of the tension was a luxury I rarely afforded myself. But this time, with dread coiled in my stomach, I accepted the sanctuary.
To distract ourselves, we began to speak of the paintings that had arrived from Europe the previous month—part of a shipment Chewa and other traders had secured after haggling with merchants who seemed more interested in our cacao and spices than in our ledger boards. They were Russian paintings, possessing a coldness one could feel in the very pigments.
"That one with the sky almost black in the middle of the day," Nyia remarked, a slight glint in her eyes. "There is something strange in the way they paint light. It is not like the Spaniards. It is... heavier. As if the sun were far away."
"Perhaps it is," I said. "Or perhaps their memories place it further than it truly is."
Nyia tilted her head, pensive. "Or perhaps they fear it might go out, and so they make it smaller in their frames."
I listened to her speak of brushstrokes, of layers of pigment, of the hues they used for shadows upon the snow. Her voice, usually soft, grew animated when she spoke of art; she could follow the lines of a stroke with the same intensity I reserved for the figures in a report. For a fleeting moment, the Mansion ceased to throb in my chest, and there existed only those distant canvases and the possibility of weaving their techniques with our own.
The strike of hurried footsteps in the corridor severed the conversation.
I felt my body tense before I was fully on my feet. I rose too quickly; my blood seemed to lag behind for a few seconds. My heart, already restless, quickened further. I stepped into the hallway, barely remembering having opened the door.
A physician was advancing toward us, accompanied by a nurse clutching a basket of clean linens to her chest. Their faces showed no panic, but neither were they at ease. I moved into their path before they could pass.
"How is my mother?" I asked, cutting straight to the point.
The doctor stopped short, lowered his gaze for an instant in a sign of respect, and then met my eyes.
"Lady Za is well, Young Chuta," he replied in a measured tone. "She has been in labor for less than an hour. It may take some time yet, but everything progresses as it should."
Everything progresses as it should.
I clung to those words, yet they did not sit well with the memory anchored in another part of my mind: a small body, high fever, a cough that would not cease. My younger brother—the one who had not survived a bout of flu before his first year. No matter how much my parents and the priests insisted that his birth had been normal and the tragedy came much later, my mind wove a different tale.
"Thank you," I said to the physician, releasing the breath I hadn't realized I was holding. "If anything changes, I wish to know immediately."
He nodded, gave a brief bow, and continued on his way. I saw the nurse swallow hard, her fingers tightening over the linens. No one was truly at peace.
I returned to the room with an ancient weight as my companion. The stone floor transmitted every footstep to my knees like an echo. I sat again, this time without seeking comfort.
"He says she is well," I informed Nyia. "Less than an hour. It may take longer."
She nodded slowly, as if she could see my thoughts arranged in rows. "That is good," she said. "An hour... is but a short time."
"I know," I replied, but my voice sounded harsher than I intended.
The memories of the little one who didn't survive mingled with another kind of fear—one that neither priests nor parents could dismantle with explanations. No matter how often they told me my own birth had been normal, that my mother had delivered Chuquy and Upqua without incident.
I could not stop thinking about the singularity of my existence: a man from another time, trapped in the body of a child. There were nights when I wondered if this was not, in itself, an imbalance for which the world was still exacting a price.
And if my arrival... had closed some other door for my parents.
The thought had haunted me in silence for years, a murmur that never quite became a word.
"I am going to the waiting room," I said suddenly. "I do not wish to remain apart from the others." My voice was firmer now, as if the decision had been made long before I spoke it.
Nyia looked at me, and in her gaze, I saw that blend of quiet affection and concern that only she could wield. "I will go with you," she replied, adding nothing more.
Feeling her hand take mine, we stepped out into the corridor together.
The walk, which in other circumstances would have been a simple transit between two points, became a trek where every step thundered in my chest. I felt the texture of the stone beneath my sandals as if every irregularity were a reminder that the world remained solid despite my frailty. The walls, decorated with reliefs and tapestries representing victories, treaties, and maps, now seemed to observe us in silence.
As we neared the Medical Wing, the murmur of voices intensified. A rhythm of footsteps, rustling cloth, and stifled sighs. When we were but a few meters from the delivery room, the movement in the hallway turned strangely frantic: it wasn't chaos; it was exhilaration.
I saw Umza first—or rather, I saw the motion of her body before her features: she was jumping in place, hands clasped near her chest, her face radiant. Beside her, Turey wasn't jumping, but she swayed slightly, as if her body followed the other's movement by sheer inertia.
I stopped involuntarily, rooted to the spot. I felt Nyia's hand tighten slightly over mine. She turned toward me; her eyes were already wet, but not with worry.
In that instant, from within the delivery room, came a powerful cry.
It was not a shriek of pain, but the sharp, clean wail of a newborn. The sound pierced the door, the hallway, and my chest—and something inside me finally let go.
The weight I had been carrying for months—built of doubts, personal superstitions, and guilts that no one had uttered aloud—dissolved as if someone had cut the rope holding it. I felt no irritation at the volume of the cry.
On the contrary: every note was beautiful to me, almost insultingly alive. I found myself smiling before I was even conscious of it; my shoulders, which I hadn't realized were hunched, dropped an inch.
Umza turned toward us, her eyes shining.
"It's a girl!" she shouted, nearly choked by her own emotion.
The echo of her words raced down the corridor. It's a girl. A little sister.
A new thread in the web that held the Kingdom together, but also a new bond for my mother, my father, myself, and my brothers. I felt Nyia's hand squeeze mine, as if she wanted to anchor me to the present so I wouldn't lose myself in calculations of possible futures.
For a moment, I was not the Son of Heaven, nor the architect of oceanic routes, nor the strategist against the Triple Alliance. I was merely a son listening to the cry of his newborn sister from the other side of a door, grateful that the world, at least for this night, had decided to be merciful to me and mine.
One month later.
Year 12 of the SuaChie Calendar, Eleventh Month (February 1495).
Explorer Division Headquarters.
A month after my sister's birth, the Central Mansion seemed to have regained its usual rhythm, though I still felt her cry echoing in some corner of my memory whenever I passed the old Medical Wing, which had since returned to being chambers and halls.
Today, I found myself back at the Explorer Division headquarters. I wasn't merely walking the halls, nor was I simply counting the assistants who followed me like discreet shadows or the guards who kept a prudent distance. My elder brother, Upqua, walked beside me, and the nervousness he attempted to mask was as evident as mine had been a month ago.
We were in the main corridors of the headquarters, where gravity reigned supreme: boots echoing against polished stone, the murmur of clipped orders, and the constant scent of linseed oil and worked metal drifting from the nearby workshops.
Upqua advanced with a steady stride, yet his shoulders were tighter than usual, and he cast quick glances toward the doors as if expecting someone to emerge with one last instruction.
"You are more rattled now than when you faced those southeast scouts without a map," I told him, keeping my voice light but unable to resist a subtle jab.
He scoffed, not looking at me. "Not all of us possess your usual composure," he retorted, a hint of annoyance failing to hide his unease. "Besides, you don't understand. A wedding is not a battle you can plan in three days."
I smiled to myself. Upqua was strong, loyal, the perfect general for the Southeast Zone—the interior of the Southern Quyca—which was now in constant expansion. Yet before his own wedding, he looked like a recruit on his first patrol.
We continued toward the inner courtyards, where the atmosphere shifted to the relative normalcy of an elite unit. Soldiers were polishing weapons, officers were reviewing rolled maps, and some groups practiced formations with training spears that hissed as they cut through the air. The mid-morning sun warmed the flagstones, raising a scent of dry earth and clean sweat.
"And you won't be the only one for long," Upqua added, attempting to return the blow. "Your own wedding isn't so far off either, you know. Three at once. You should start practicing that calm of yours."
I looked at him with deliberate expressionlessness, letting the silence stretch for a few paces. It was clear to me that my marriage to Umza, Nyia, and Turey was inevitable—a logical step in the balance of the realm. Not to mention that after so many years, I had grown very fond of them. My betrothed didn't just accept it; they expected it with a determination born of the education my mother and Simte's priestly assistants had instilled in them.
"The duty of a wife is to sustain the husband on his path," they were told.
And they, each in their own way—Umza with extroverted enthusiasm, Nyia with quiet resolve, Turey with her natural connection—were ready to fulfill it.
Yet ancient customs weighed like invisible chains. The stark roles between men and women, rooted in rituals and traditions I had tried to soften without fully breaking, still defined much of our society.
I attempted to give more prominence to women like Governor Chuquy, entrepreneurs like my mother Za, and artists like Nyia, but shifting centuries of expectation was not a matter of decrees. It was a slow drip, and my wedding would be another brick in that construction.
Upqua interpreted my silence as a victory, and his stride grew a bit more confident. "See? Even you are left speechless," he said with a crooked grin.
"Perhaps we should move mine forward," I replied, my tone unchanged. "With three betrothed, one must start as soon as possible... In fact, the wedding should be with all of them at once."
Upqua froze in the middle of the courtyard, turning toward me with wide eyes. The hand clutching the hilt of his dagger trembled slightly.
"What?" he stammered. "Are you serious? You, with three at the same time? ... You speak as if it were easy. I'm already losing my mind with Fiba, and she is but one."
I laughed—a genuine laugh that echoed against the courtyard walls. A few soldiers looked up curiously but returned to their work. Upqua stared at me as if I had just suggested rowing upstream in a perforated canoe.
"Relax," I said, clapping him on the shoulder. "The atmosphere of the year's end and the start of the next should remain festive."
The birth of my sister last month had been cause for celebration. Upqua's wedding this month was also a major event; he is a significant general, after all, and the people believe it should be celebrated well.
Simte's 50th birthday approaches next week, followed by Turey's 16th. Then mine the following month, marking the start of another year in the new calendar—the celebration of the Sun and the Moon with its pilgrimage... and then.
"There are several celebrations approaching," I remarked thoughtfully. "Weddings, birthdays, the New Year, my own birthday—not to mention the pilgrimage after that. Perhaps my wedding right after. Besides, it fits perfectly with the fifth anniversary of the athletic games."
Upqua blinked, processing, but focusing on what mattered most to him. "Games? Combat again?" he asked, adding: "Last time was just a whim of yours."
"They insist," I confirmed, feeling a wave of relaxation now that the weight of the birth had dissipated. "The kingdom has progressed in cultural unity, but it maintains that martial aura I do not wish to fully extinguish. It is part of us. And now that the little one is here and healthy... I am willing to participate."
He shook his head, but a smile was beginning to form. "You're mad. Three wives, public combat, and now back-to-back weddings. Do you never rest?"
"I rest when the kingdom allows it," I replied. "And this environment... it needs it. Unity and celebration for everyone. Besides, it will serve to show the Europeans the true heart of the kingdom."
Just as we turned to head back from our walk through the training grounds—where the shouts of officers and the clashing of wooden spears filled the air—Upqua stopped dead. I saw a slight tremor in his right hand, the one that always went to his dagger hilt by reflex. I followed his gaze.
At the main gate of the headquarters, Fiba waited with a rigid, almost military posture. Her expression was neutral on the surface—lips pressed together; hands folded before her—but we both knew how to read the underlying tension. The way her right foot tapped the ground, the angle of her jaw... it suggested a contained whirlwind.
We approached her. She didn't move, merely assessing us with the precision that had made her Governor of the Central City before she was twenty.
"There is still much to prepare," she said, her tone as flat as a sheet of polished obsidian. "There is no time for strolls."
Without waiting for an answer, she took Upqua's arm firmly. He looked back at me, searching for a salvation that never came. I could only laugh again, watching his expression shift from plea to resignation as she led him back to the carriage.
I stood alone at the headquarters gate, my laughter fading into quiet reflection. I prayed silently that my betrothed would have characters less... implacable than Fiba's.
Umza would be a whirlwind of energy, Nyia a silent anchor, Turey a bridge to the wild and nature. Three women, three distinct forces. Upqua was right about one thing: my wedding was not far off. And when it arrived, the entire kingdom would feel the change.
But for now, the festive spirit continued. My sister's birth had lifted a weight; Upqua's wedding would further unite the Southeast Zone. Simte would turn 50, Turey 16. My birthday, the games, the Sun and the Moon... It all fell into place. The martial aura of the realm—that legacy I didn't want to erase entirely—would find its outlet in the sporting arenas. And I, relaxed for the first time in months, was ready to take my part.
The sun warmed my back as I returned to the corridors. The solemnity of the headquarters enveloped me once more, but now with a lightness I hadn't felt in a very long time.
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[A/N: CHAPTER COMPLETED
Hello everyone.
Yes, you saw it right, and it's not an illusion, there's a third chapter. Will there be a fourth? I don't know.
This chapter is more about tying up loose ends. By the way, I don't mean I just wrote it on a whim; it was actually planned beforehand. I just didn't take as much time as I wanted to develop chapters more focused on technology.
The things that were left unresolved are Upqua's wedding, Chuta's wedding, and the birth of his little sister.
On the other hand, looking at the plan I had for the following arcs, the chapter sections, and some of the dilemmas I had before, I realized that I wanted to cover too much of the world's development, when it's even more interesting, at least for me, for the story to focus much more on the kingdom: its growth, conflicts, and difficulties, rather than developing many characters, each from different cultures.
This also incorporates some advice you gave me.
Therefore, I have decided:
To continue with the Aztec historical figures and add one more from the Inca culture, just for a while longer, to complete their story. Then their individual stories will be finished. The same applies to the Shadows, which were mentioned in the novel.
In the case of the characters from other continents, I plan to continue with Henry VII, finish Columbus's story, and add three characters: one from Eastern Europe, one from the Arabian region, and one from Japan.
All of these four characters will tell their own stories, the historical changes they undergo due to the appearance of Chuta and this new semi-globalized era.
It's similar to what was already happening with the Henry VII section, but now there won't be any more Shadows or historical or original characters appearing randomly, and I will focus solely on the overall development.
This will remove some narratives that were difficult to weave into the timeline (not for me, but for you), as they required somewhat precise and difficult-to-acquire historical knowledge.
By the way, this doesn't mean that characters who have appeared will disappear, but rather that they will be integrated into the main story.
For example, some characters who have appeared briefly but will soon reappear are:
Muyhyca: a member of the Shadows and also the Governor of the Southwest region, which borders the Inca Empire.
Sicaza: A former Muisca priest who sacrificed people to save Chuta's little brother, Hyqua. Remember that he was exiled.
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Read my other novels.
#The Walking Dead: Vision of the Future (Chapter 91) (ON HOLD)
#The Walking Dead: Emily's Metamorphosis (Chapter 34) (ON HOLD)
#The Walking Dead: Patient 0 - Lyra File (Chapter 14) (ON HOLD)
You can find them on my profile.]