She was still alive.
Barely.
The two men had left her tied and crumpled in the dirt behind the courtyard.
Face down.
Naked.
Bloodied.
I don't know what I expected to find when I limped around that corner. Maybe I wanted to believe they'd shown her some mercy. Maybe I thought they'd just taken what they wanted and left her in one piece.
But no.
They'd taken everything.
Her clothing. Her dignity. Her name.
She didn't even look human anymore.
Her skin was streaked with blood, bruises blooming down her ribs, her arms twisted behind her back where they'd tied her so tightly the cords had dug in deep. The side of her face was swollen beyond recognition.
Her huipil was gone.
The skirt was torn, thrown a few feet away like it had disgusted them.
I dropped to my knees beside her.
My hands hovered above her, unsure where to touch without hurting her more. I wanted to cover her. Wrap her in something. Say something that might mean anything at all.
"I'm sorry…"
The words died before they left my throat.
Because what was the point?
I did this.
Not directly — no.
But if I'd stayed quiet, they might've just taken her body. Used her. Left.
But I had to speak.
I had to believe she was more than just a body.
"I thought… we could hold on to something. That maybe if we remembered who we were… we wouldn't become like them."
My voice cracked.
She stirred.
Not a movement — just a twitch. Her eye fluttered open slightly. She looked at me.
Not with recognition.
Not with anger.
Not even with sadness.
Just the glassy, dull gaze of someone who had stopped being.
"They tore everything off you," I whispered, shaking now. "Because I tried to act like we were still Mexica. Like that word still meant something."
I pulled my knees to my chest and sat beside her in the filth.
We stayed like that a long time.
I don't know how long passed.
But the sun began to rise.
A warm golden light bathed the blood on her skin. On mine.
It should have felt like a new beginning.
It didn't.
It felt like a lie.
Like the sun didn't care what happened in the dark.
I glanced at her again. She hadn't moved.
Her breath was shallow. Her lips were dry.
"You were probably the daughter of a priest," I said softly. "Or a scribe. Maybe even someone high enough to walk the palace floors. You probably grew up reciting poems to the stars. Dancing on festival days. You probably believed in something."
I bit my lip until it bled.
"And now this."
The city around us groaned. Somewhere in the distance, I heard a baby crying. A fire crackling. The wet shuffle of someone dragging a corpse. Life went on, somehow.
I looked down at my hands.
Filthy. Shaking.
Useless.
I couldn't save her.
Couldn't save anyone.
Couldn't even save myself.
I pressed my forehead to the bloodied stone beside her and whispered:
"I'm sorry."
And that's when something broke.
Not like a snap. Not a scream. Not an explosion.
Just… a quiet break.
Like a thread pulled too tight finally unraveling.
All the thoughts I'd been carrying — about right and wrong, about unity, about honor — they didn't vanish. They just fell silent.
Because what was the point of ideals when they led to this?
What was the point of loyalty when no one was loyal back?
What was the point of being human in a world that only respected pain?
I had spoken up, and they made her suffer more.
I had tried to show them we were the same.
And they beat that idea out of both of us.
Our blood meant nothing.
I sat there with her until the morning was fully alive.
She didn't speak again.
Didn't move.
Her body twitched once, but I wasn't sure if it was pain or just the last of her nerves reacting to the cold.
Eventually, I reached over and took the torn remnants of her skirt and covered her shoulders.
Not because it would help.
Not because it would heal anything.
But because if she was going to die, she shouldn't have to do it naked in the dirt.
Even that small mercy… felt empty.
I stood.
Wobbled.
Looked back down at her.
Whatever part of me still clung to the old world…
Whatever voice in my head still whispered about decency, or morality, or "doing the right thing"…
It had nothing left to say.
It had seen this.
And it knew.
This was not the world I was born in.
This was the world that killed that boy.
And what rose in his place would never again speak soft words to men who only understood hunger.