Quetzalcoatl's Story
The Gods reconstructed the Earth from the ashes, and Tlaloc's wife, Chalchiuhtlicue, the river goddess, became the fourth sun. She was very loving towards the people of Earth, but Tezcatlipoca, Cardinal God of the North, was not. Tezcatlipoca told Chalchiuhtlicue that she was not truly loving and faked her kindness out of selfishness to gain the people's praise. This crushed her, and she cried blood for fifty-two years, causing a horrific flood that drowned everything on Earth, and so ended the fourth sun.
Quetzalcoatl would not accept the humans' demise. He journeyed to the underworld, where he stole their bones from Mictlantecuhtli, the god of the dead. He dipped their bones in his own blood, which resurrected the human race and opened their eyes to the current sun, Huitzilopochtli.
The Tzitzimimeh, lights of night sky, grew jealous of their brighter and more important brother, Huitzilopochtli. Their leader, Coyolxauhqui, goddess of the moon, began an assault on the sun god. Every night they come close to a victory when they shine throughout the night sky. Yet every day, they are beaten back by the mighty Huitzilopochtli filling the Earth and sky with his light. To help the sun god in his never-ending war, the Aztec offers him the nourishment of human sacrifices. They also offer human sacrifices to Tezcatlipoca in fear of his judgment, and they offer blood sacrifices to Quetzalcoatl, who opposes human sacrifices. Should these sacrifices cease, Huitzilopochtli will lose the war, darkness will consume the world, and a massive earthquake will shatter the Earth. Then the Tzitzimimeh will slay Huitzilopochtli and all of humanity.
Chalchiuhtlicue, Goddess of Rain
Huitzilli was confused by Quetzalcoatl's answer. He asked the God how his actions were brave when they went against everything that they had taught him.
To this, the God replied, "Tell me, my child, what exactly do you know of me?"
"I know you are the god of wind, wisdom, and the west."
"Yes, I am that, and much more. I am the God of mercy, arts, crafts, learning, knowledge, astronomy, and patron God of priesthood. I am the one that shared the knowledge of the gods and taught humans how to write, harvest maize, and gaze upon the stars. This I did in the city of Tollan."
"Then why are you so far from home all alone in this hut? What is the God of the west doing on the east coast?"
"My brothers, the other cardinal gods, deceived me and now I live in this hut in exile. Somewhat like yourself, but let me teach you the history that has been kept from you."
Mictlantecuhtli, God of the Dead
After the resurrection of man, all the gods, except Quetzalcoatl, were content. He was angered at the subjugation of the human race by the other gods. He decided to adopt the human form and descend to the Earth to share the knowledge the deities possessed. He traveled through many lands until he reached the city of Tollan, where a human sacrifice was being carried out in the name of his brother, Tezcatlipoca. Quetzalcoatl, angered by this, demanded an end to the execution. Tezcatlipoca became furious and sent massive grey clouds to storm upon the city. The humans were fearful of Tezcatlipoca's wrath and panicked. Quetzalcoatl, using his power of the wind, blew the storms away and calmed the people. He told the people of Tollan that as long as he was there, the city would flourish like no other.
"From then the people of Tollan prospered," Quetzalcoatl said. "I taught them to work jade, grow the seeds of maize, dye cotton, enrich their writing, and I encouraged the worship of the gods. They wanted to worship me as a deity, but I denied that and any luxuries. I taught them to live with humility and learn with the purity of the soul. I forbade human sacrifices and taught them self-sacrifice by puncturing themselves with maguey thorns. I created an order of maids dedicated to cleaning and maintaining the temples. Tollan became a beautiful and sacred city."
Tzitzimimeh
Huitzilopochtli and Tezcatlipoca grew angry at the good fortune of Tollan. They decided to end the prosperity of their brother Quetzalcoatl and the Toltecs. They devised a plan to deceive Quetzalcoatl and turn the Toltec people on him. Tezcatlipoca descended to the Earth and disguised himself as an older man. He approached Quetzalcoatl and, using his powers of sorcery, entered his mind and caused him great pain. Quetzalcoatl became very ill and could not move. It was then that Tezcatlipoca offered him pulque claiming that it was a medicine that would ease his suffering. As Quetzalcoatl drank, his pain began to fade, and so he drank and drank, and soon, he was intoxicated.
"A primeval force overcame me, and I lost control of myself. It was in this state that I violated my own teachings and broke my celibacy with a priestess of my cult. I awoke the next morning feeling unclean and made one of the hardest decisions of my life: to leave Tollan for I was no longer worthy of leading them. I left and began heading towards the east coast. I promised the people of Tollan that I would return in a year. Since then, I have resided here, waiting for the moment to take back my city."
Huitzilli felt awful at hearing the god's story. He wished there was something he could do to help him reclaim his city. Or maybe there was?
Author's Notes:
Tzitzimimeh are beings that live in the night sky, what we call "stars." They were depicted as skeletal female figures wearing skirts often with skull and crossbone designs.
Pulque is an alcoholic beverage.
"Toltecs" is the word used to describe people from Tollan.
I had to wrap up the creation story so I just finished up at the beginning of this one.
I wanted to keep the same side by side story telling I used in the first story so for this one it's kind of like Quetzalcoatl is seeing flashbacks from his earlier days, which are the normal font, and then when he comes back to reality its the bold font.
This story is basically just me retelling Quetzalcoatl's story. I didn't have enough space left to get into the rest of the story so that will have to wait. It might end up making my storybook project four stories long rather than three, but well just see how that goes. I did add small changes to his story. In the sources I found, Quetzalcoatl takes the pulque as a gift and drinks it freely and then goes and rapes a priestess which is somehow his sister? I wanted to add a little more drama so I used the version where he gets tricked by Tezcatlipoca and feels ill. I think I read this somewhere I just couldn't find the same source again. I also wanted to keep the whole incest thing out of the story so I just excluded that detail. Also, in the original creation story, after the Earth gets flooded by blood, the humans don't die. They just turn into fish. Which I didn't really work with the rest of the creation story since Quetzalcoatl needed their bones so I just said that they all died.
The Nahuatl creation stories are so complex and they are so many different variations of them. In some, the four cardinal gods did not come from Ometeotl. You can see this in this story when its mentioned in the creation story that the Tzitzimimeh where jealous of their brother, Huitzilopochtli. I know this doesn't add up since I chose the Ometeotl version, but please just bear with me lol I'm trying.
Sources: Creation Story, Quetzalcoatl story 1, Quetzalcoatl story 2
Cover Image: Mural for a restaurant in Oaxaca. Part 1 by Emmanuel Valtierra
Images: Chalchiuhtlicue, Mictlantecuhtli, Tzitzimimeh