In sixteenth-century Mexico, Pitoque is a reluctant spy for the Aztec ruler Montezuma, who is desperate to discover the truth about reports of strange, tall, odorous beings. Are these creatures the envoys of the man-god Quetzalcóatl? Pitoque can’t be sure—nor does he suspect how the arrival of Hernando Cortés, Spanish conquistador, will change the course of his country’s history forever.