"I should kill you for betraying me," he said.
"Well, I think you will have to get much better first," she said calmly. "You lack the strength to kill me right now." Nevertheless, she took a small step backwards.
Sold to the temple of the goddess Xochiquetzal as a child, Papalopil serves as a temple dancer and part-time courtesan and is determined to buy her freedom. In order to do so, she is told by the elder priestess to study warriors and become skilled at serving them. She becomes fixated on Lord Atlatzin, leader of the Emperor's Jaguar Warriors, who has taken a public vow of chastity. They never should have crossed paths.
But when the calendar wheel turns and the day foretold for the return of the god arrives, mountains floating on the sea touch shore, and strange creatures emerge with magical weapons that shoot fire. Emperor Moctezuma is unable to decide if the arrivals are gods or men. All anyone knows for sure is that they are marching toward the capital. Visions in an ancient crystal warn Lord Atlatzin of what is to come, but the Emperor still cannot act.
It is her deception that initially brings them together, a deception that could cost her life. But as Cortés tears their world apart and plague creeps through the land, Papalopil and Atlatzin must learn to trust and even depend on each other in order to survive.
The Fifth Sun is not a typical love story. Instead, it is a powerful story of love and loyalty, one set during the final days of the mighty Mexica Empire.

About the Author: I was a college dropout. At the end of my first semester at Northwestern University, back in the days when female students were locked in the dorm at 9 p.m., I made a rope ladder out of sheets and escaped out the window. I fled to New York to do Off Broadway, ending up working with Dustin Hoffman, among others. In between shows, I supported myself as a puppeteer, a "Beat" poet, and a diamond courier. After several seasons, I went with friends to Mexico and from there to Florence, Italy. But the wet Italian winters depressed me, so I strapped my guitar on the back of a motor scooter, and headed across the Alps to southern Spain. During the next decade, I married a Spanish pop musician, had a daughter, worked as a folk singer in London, and traveled across Europe with the band. Ten years later, I returned to the United States to find myself a single parent with a high school education and very limited labor market skills. I worked as a Spanish/English interpreter in Chicago and then branched out into folk and cabaret singing before moving to California. Here I sang in several clubs and got full-time work as a cocktail waitress and bartender while I went back to college. Fortunately, going back to school gave me access to a great library, and I learned to love doing historical research. Finally I got enough scholarships to quit my job and go to school full time at the University of California at Irvine, first getting my BA, Magna Cum Laude, and then my Ph.D. in the interdisciplinary Social Sciences, with an emphasis on the sociology of sex and gender. I spent about 36 years as an academic. When I retired, I was able to return to my first love - writing novels. My academic career gave me the training to be as historically accurate as possible, a fact that I believe enriches my writing and helps bring the stories alive. I hope you feel that way when you read them. Today I live in California with my husband, a goldendoodle and a pond full of koi. Wendy Lozano is also the author of "Sweet Abandon" and "She Who Was King" available on Amazon.