The chap­ter opens with the rit­u­al pre­ci­sion of Moctezuma’s after­noon nap—an act of impe­r­i­al dis­ci­pline that momen­tar­i­ly sus­pends the entire machin­ery of the Aztec empire. The silence demand­ed by his sleep is pro­found, yet its ces­sa­tion, marked by the ring­ing of a sil­ver bell, sends rip­ples through Tenochti­t­lan like a stone dropped in water. This care­ful­ly orches­trat­ed pause becomes a metaphor for the frag­ile calm before his­tor­i­cal upheaval, as the emperor’s rest coin­cides with the Spaniards’ uneasy accli­ma­tion to palace life. Aguilar, ever the observ­er, smokes his pipe while Caldera frets over clean clothes and cul­tur­al codes, their exchange laced with dark humor about impend­ing sac­ri­fice. The scene under­scores the sur­re­al ten­sion of the moment: two civ­i­liza­tions hov­er­ing on the brink of col­li­sion, each mis­un­der­stand­ing the other’s rit­u­als.

With­in the palace’s labyrinthine cor­ri­dors, the con­quis­ta­dors grap­ple with their para­dox­i­cal sta­tus as both hon­ored guests and poten­tial cap­tives. Caldera’s awk­ward attempt to don Aztec gar­ments under Aguilar’s guidance—a com­ic yet poignant scene—reveals the Spaniards’ vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty beneath their brava­do. The friar’s tat­tooed body and flu­ent cul­tur­al nav­i­ga­tion con­trast sharply with Caldera’s pale, horseman’s physique, high­light­ing the dis­so­nance between Euro­pean and Mesoamer­i­can ideals of mas­culin­i­ty. Mean­while, Cortés and Malinalli’s pri­vate exchange expos­es her grow­ing lin­guis­tic auton­o­my, a secret that threat­ens to upend the pow­er dynam­ics of trans­la­tion. When she reveals a priest’s omi­nous warning—“This wall has eyes”—the chap­ter crack­les with para­noia, sug­gest­ing the palace itself is an active par­tic­i­pant in the unfold­ing dra­ma.

Moctezuma’s post-nap iner­tia mir­rors the empire’s polit­i­cal stag­na­tion. Resist­ing the demands of gov­er­nance, he lingers in bed, delay­ing audi­ences and avoid­ing the regalia of pow­er. His request for Atotoxtli—to be sum­moned only after her own smoke-induced calm—hints at the strained famil­ial alliances under­pin­ning the empire. The chapter’s qui­et moments are its most rev­e­la­to­ry: Aguilar’s wry obser­va­tion that their real­i­ty would be dis­missed as “chival­ric romance bull­shit” if ever record­ed, or Caldera’s fleet­ing arousal at the thought of Tenochca war­riors “dying to take a nib­ble of his leg.” These glimpses into the pro­tag­o­nists’ psy­ches lay bare the absur­di­ty and ter­ror of their predica­ment, where cul­tur­al fas­ci­na­tion and mor­tal per­il inter­twine.

As the after­noon wanes, the Spaniards’ bois­ter­ous bathing in the palace pool becomes a metaphor for their entire enterprise—a dis­rup­tive splash in the still waters of an ancient civ­i­liza­tion. Caldera, watch­ing his com­rades with detached unease, rec­og­nizes their ghost­ly tran­sience: “a pack of ghosts” des­tined to either con­quer or be con­sumed. The chap­ter clos­es with Moctezuma’s delib­er­ate inac­tion, a sovereign’s hes­i­ta­tion that speaks vol­umes. His refusal to rise—to ful­ly awaken—prefigures the empire’s fate, sus­pend­ed between rit­u­al and real­i­ty, between the old world and the new storm gath­er­ing at its gates. The nap ends, but the dream of empire lingers, heavy with por­tent.