Tye writhed desperately in the bodyguard’s grip. She had to break free, had to reach Ramez, struggled harder –
And then the voice rang out.
‘The child is not fit to be sacrificed.’ Harsh, high and terrible, the screech reverberated around the chamber.
The circle erupted in fear and confusion. Priests reeled back, or clutched hold of each other in fear. Shouts and gasps went up, Honor jumped to her feet and rounded on the statue, wielding the knife. Ramez pushed himself up on his elbows, staring round in terror.
‘Great goddess?’ Traynor’s voice was wary and low, he was holding himself completely still. ‘This is not how you came to me before.’
‘Bow down to me!’ came the commanding shriek. ‘Fall to your knees! All of you!’
And through a mouthful of thick and trembling fingers, Tye grinned in joyful disbelief.
Because however well disguised, she knew Con’s voice when she heard it.
People were falling to their knees all around, and Tye went limp in the bodyguard’s grip, making out she’d fainted. But the bodyguard could barely have noticed, he was hurrying to kneel as well.
‘Lower your unworthy eyes from my image!’ Con ranted in full-on goddess mode. ‘Or you will be punished, yes?’
‘No!’ shouted Traynor suddenly. ‘Get up you fools, it’s a trick –’
‘Now!’ came a shout.
It was Jonah’s voice – and the cue for all Mictlan to break loose in the temple.
Jonah launched himself through the smoky haze into the inner circle, Motti right beside him. With a bellow, Motti hurled himself at Traynor, bringing him down.
The sound of shouts and fighting filled the temple with hard, noisy echoes. The confusion and chaos was tinted blood red by the flaming torchlight. Jonah made for Honor and knocked the knife from her hand, she snarled with anger – but then someone grabbed Jonah round the waist, yanking him backwards. Jonah spun round, trying to free himself, and managed to crush his attacker against one of the pillars. Another priest appeared instantly to take his place, an old man with a cloak. Jonah ducked a fairly weak blow and then floored the old guy with a punch to the jaw.
But where was Honor now? She’d vanished from view, like Motti and Traynor – was she hiding? Jonah knew just how well you could hide in those thick, freezing shadows. It had been agony, seeing Tye so helpless but with no way of getting to her, as he and the others waited to grab their best chance of taking Sixth Sun off-guard. Unable to clear the rubble at the entrance, they’d climbed the sides of the pyramid and loosened a slab of plaster from an upper storey. They’d finished up in here, with barely enough time to replace the slab before Traynor led his party crashing out of the jungle. Coldhardt had taken Patch off to explore one of the lower levels, but Jonah had persuaded the others to stay and help him try to save Tye…
Staring round at the chaos as the temple filled with smoke from the billowing torches, he decided he was insane for ever thinking they could pull this off.
Another priest rushed for Jonah but stumbled over the old man’s body and crashed into the statue of Coatlicue. As he tried to right himself, a pair of well-manicured hands reached round from behind the hideous figure, grabbed him by the ears and whacked his head against the carved stone, knocking him out cold.
As the priest collapsed to the floor, Con burst from behind the statue. ‘This is madness!’ she shouted, high-kicking Xavier under the chin as he rushed for her, sending him sprawling back into the smoke and shadows. ‘We should be with Patch stealing that treasure.’
‘Did you see where Honor went?’ Jonah glanced at the ground and saw the sacrifice had gone – along with Cortes’s sword. ‘Where’s Ramez – did Tye get to him? Where is Tye?’ He stared round in confusion, but it was too dark and smoky to see far. ‘And where’s Motti?’
Suddenly Motti loomed up in front of him, glasses smashed and buckled, one eye bloody and black. ‘Where’s the goddamned exit?’ he said weakly, before falling to his knees. Then Con shouted out as a guy with a strip of red across his mouth tackled her and brought her down. She grappled with him on the temple floor.
Before Jonah could go to help her, Traynor came out of the shadows, his feathered headdress discarded, his robe and tunic torn. ‘You’re gonna pay for this.’ He advanced on Jonah, wielding Cortes’s sword like a Samurai. ‘You’re gonna pay with every last pint of your blood.’
With a sudden scream of rage, Traynor hurled himself at Jonah.
In the darkness beside the outer wall, Tye brought her elbow back with a crack against her bodyguard’s face then lunged forwards to break his grip. Throwing herself on to her back, she kicked him hard in the chest with both feet. Propelled backwards, he hit the wall with a thunderous crash, knocking out a stone slab from the fake window in the wall. Sunlight peeped timidly inside, filtered by the canopy of trees. But as it turned the smoke opaque, it actually made things harder to see.
Scrambling up, Tye peered through the haze and saw Con trying to drag an injured Motti clear of the fighting, even while red-mouth had hold of her leg. Her stomach twisted as she glimpsed Jonah ducking back behind the statue of Coatlicue, Traynor raising the sword of Cortes above his head.
It was as she was running to help that she realised Ramez was no longer on the ground.
Then suddenly the other bodyguard jumped on top of her, brought her down, his big hands fumbling for her throat. No time to waste on you, she thought. She slammed her hands down hard on his ears and twisted his head round with all her strength. He shouted out and rolled off her, clutching at his neck. But then yellow-mouth loomed up, grabbed hold of her arm, and tried to get her in a half-nelson.
‘Will you just give up and let me go!’ she shouted, anger giving her strength as she twisted her arm clear. She delivered a roundhouse kick to the man’s stomach, and when he doubled up, she punched him once – twice – in his stupid yellow mouth, before her final uppercut slammed him into one of the pillars.
Shaking her aching hand, Tye stared through the smoke; in just a few seconds everything seemed to have changed. Motti looked a mess, out of it, slumped on the floor. Con was matching red-mouth blow for blow, but there were others crowding round to deal with her in turn. Jonah was playing cat and mouse with Traynor, who was now lunging wildly with his priceless sword. Honor was still nowhere to be seen and neither was Ramez – he’d been drugged, he would be vulnerable, helpless.
Tye froze, agonised. Her friends all needed her at once. Who do I help? Who the hell can I help?
Jonah swung himself round past a pillar and into plain sight. But Traynor had anticipated his move, charged forwards, and swept back the sword ready to strike …
Then something knocked against Tye’s foot – Ramez’s bronze eagle helmet.
‘Jonah, down!’ she shouted, scooping it up. He looked at her, wild-eyed, as she hurled the heavy helmet with all her strength. It flew through the air and struck Traynor on the shoulder, knocking his sword arm aside; caught off-balance, he staggered and fell.
At the same time Tye sprinted to where Con was now taking on three men at once in unarmed combat. Tye came up behind red-mouth and delivered a karate blow to his back. Xavier spun round. She swiftly struck him in the throat and he staggered backwards into Con. She knocked his legs out from under him, then crouched and rammed her elbow down hard on his sternum. Xavier’s whole body jerked, then he lay still.
The third of Con’s assailants turned to face Tye – just as she launched herself into a flying jump kick, ignoring the way the wound in her side burned with pain. Her steel toecaps connected with the man’s ribs and probably broke a couple. He went down like a sack of sticks.
That was the last of the real muscle, surely – now she could help Jonah. But Tye found her way blocked by still more priests coming out of the smoky gloom to get them. She remembered the way they had worked at the rockshaft, and clearing the temple entrance – working closely together, methodical and precise. Relentless.
Then a shout went up. ‘The sacrifice! He’s getting away!’
Tye looked over to the exit to see three dark costumed figures vanishing through the doorway in pursuit.
‘Go on,’ Con snapped. ‘Get after Ramez. I’ll handle things here.’ As if to prove her point she grabbed hold of her nearest opponent and felled him with a single strike to the back of the neck.
Tye choked on a breath of smoke. ‘But Jonah –’
‘I will help him. If you lose Ramez now …’
If I lose him now, what? thought Tye, and as she raced for the gaping serpent’s-mouth exit she found she had no idea.
Exhausted, choking on smoke, Jonah pushed himself up from the clammy stone floor. If he could only put some of the Sixth Sunners between him and Traynor, a human shield to stop him swinging that –
‘Jonah!’ Con yelled.
He looked up at the warning, twisting aside as the rapier blade struck the ground beside him. Traynor was already back on his feet, and looked angrier than ever. He jabbed with the sword like he was trying to skewer Jonah’s heart. Jonah threw himself backwards, landing heavily back on the floor, frantically pushing himself away from Traynor with both feet, slithering towards the statue.
‘That’s right, boy, go to the goddess,’ breathed Traynor, seemingly oblivious to the chaos that surrounded him. ‘It’s time we got you gushing. Coatlicue wants to taste every last spurt of your blood.’ His eyes were dark and unblinking in the hazy torchlight. ‘What d’you want to lose first, kid – an arm or a leg?’
Jonah cried out as he cracked the back of his skull against one of the statue’s huge stone claws, reopening his old head wound. He wouldn’t have believed it was possible to feel any more scared, but for a second he was plunged into blind panic. By rights he should just have knocked through the phials of poison ranged in front of Coatlicue. But he’d felt nothing, so where the hell –
Someone darted out from behind the statue.
And suddenly Traynor staggered back, clutching at his face. Jonah saw it was dripping wet.
Coldhardt stood beside Coatlicue, half-hidden by the drifting smoke. In one hand he held an unstoppered phial. It was empty.
‘Thanks,’ croaked Jonah.
‘Sorry to be interfering again, Traynor,’ Coldhardt said. ‘But I think you’ve spilled enough blood in this cause.’
‘You old bastard!’ Traynor wiped frantically at his face with his free hand. ‘What have you done?’
‘Given you a taste of your own poison.’ Coldhardt surveyed him impassively. ‘Now, you know better than me how many people that phial could kill if it was poured into a water supply. But I’d imagine that with a concentrated dose, even the tiniest amount on your tongue …’
Traynor fell to his knees, spitting desperately, shaking his head like a wet dog trying to dry itself. The sword fell from his shaking hand and clattered to the floor.
‘I’ll take that.’ Coldhardt snatched it up. ‘Thank you.’
Jonah could see boils and blisters forming on Traynor’s good-looking, square-jawed face. Pus began to run from his eyes like thick tears. His skin began to blacken like burnt toffee. His struggles stopped. Then Coldhardt pressed one foot against Traynor’s chest and gently pushed.
Traynor toppled over backwards and lay still in the centre of the inner circle, both arms flung wide so his corpse formed a cross. A counterfeit Christ in a pagan temple.
Tye skidded to a halt on the landing beyond the sacred chamber – the air was clearer but the oily blackness was absolute. She could hear footsteps ringing out on cold stone, and stood on the top step in time to catch the last, indecisive light of a flaming torch as its owner vanished round the turn in the staircase.
The sounds of a struggle floated up to her. Blinking the glare from her eyes, heart pounding, she sprinted down the steps and into the resting place of the dead warriors.
She found three of the priests advancing on Ramez, who had retreated behind a stone bier and was now standing there, slack-jawed. The man with the torch – Tye saw it was pot-bellied Douglas – waved it threateningly in Ramez’s direction, while his two friends circled round the bier to catch him in a pincer movement.
But then Ramez burst into unexpected life. He grabbed the man to his left and kneed him in the balls, then shoved him into the path of the cultist circling from the right.
Tye tapped Douglas on the shoulder. As he whirled round she snatched his torch with one hand and punched him hard in the stomach with the other. He collapsed on his back, gasping for breath, flailing about on the flagstones like an upturned beetle.
She gave a low whistle of relief, then raised her eyebrows at Ramez. ‘Thought you were drugged?’
‘Thought you were,’ he retorted. ‘You don’t think they’d get me like that, do you? Hid the pill under my tongue and spat it out when they weren’t looking –’
‘Me too!’ She hurried round the bier to join him, squeezed his arm. ‘You son of a bitch, you could have tipped me off.’
He smiled, the smile he always used to flash when he’d promised her the world, and to her annoyance the old swagger about him sent a familiar thrill through her heart. ‘Couldn’t risk it,’ he said. ‘I was just kidding ’em, waiting till the last moment so they’d never expect –’
Tye’s vision exploded into stars as the blow smacked down on the back of her head. The torch fell from her fingers as she spun round, to see Douglas leering at her, holding one of the dead guard’s wooden clubs. She hadn’t heard him creep up behind her.
Now all she could hear was the ringing in her ears as she started to black out.
‘Don’t touch Traynor’s body,’ warned Coldhardt gravely. He raised his voice as he addressed the whole temple. ‘Listen to me. There is nothing to fight for any longer. Your leader is dead. Your dreams are over.’
‘Kill them!’ snarled the old professor. ‘Come on, we can still …’ But as Con dispatched the cultist beside him with a barrage of blows, he suddenly seemed to realise that he was the last man standing.
Quite casually, Con turned to him, seized him by his stripy cloak and bashed his head against the nearest pillar. He slid down it and lay still in a crumpled heap. She smiled proudly over at Coldhardt, wiping a trickle of blood from her mouth. ‘Now that they’re sleeping, they may have sweeter dreams, no?’
‘Where did Tye get to?’ Jonah demanded.
Con almost looked awkward. ‘She went to help Ramez.’
‘But Honor’s still around somewhere!’
‘She probably just ran out.’
‘We don’t know that.’ Anxiously, Jonah tried to rise but stopped as the temple seemed to spin. ‘My stupid head,’ he muttered through clenched teeth.
‘Con, get after Tye,’ Coldhardt instructed, examining the sword in his hands. ‘Jonah’s right, we can’t assume Miss Albrecht has departed. We must secure this site.’
‘Secure it?’ she questioned.
‘I must not be disturbed. Go, quickly. Then join Patch in assessing the treasures on the ground floor.’
Con ran from the circular chamber, and Jonah made a more determined effort to get to his feet. ‘I can’t believe you used that stuff on Traynor,’ he said. ‘You could have killed all of us.’
‘The agent was designed to be taken orally, in water,’ Coldhardt murmured, still concentrating on Cortes’s sword. ‘It was unlikely the contagion would be airborne.’
‘Where are the other phials?’
‘I moved them behind the statue so they wouldn’t be broken.’
His head pounding, Jonah crossed to check on Motti, who was starting to stir. ‘Thought you were still downstairs, anyway,’ he called to Coldhardt, ‘with Patch.’
‘I left him in the attendants’ resting place, working on the door to the treasure vaults.’ He placed the sword on the ground and crouched in front of the statue. ‘There are things I must do here.’
‘Sure.’ Jonah found he really didn’t want to know right now. ‘Mot, you OK?’ he asked.
Motti nodded, and winced. ‘What the hell happened?’
‘I think you’ll find Traynor made you his bitch.’
‘He did too. That bastard can fight.’
‘Not any more.’ Jonah glanced back at Coldhardt, and caught sight of a glint of gold in the old man’s palm. ‘What’s that?’
‘I searched the attendants’ bodies, as Traynor should have, Coldhardt explained. ‘Remember the prophecy – “when her attendants reach into their hearts”?’ He held up a circle of gold, like a wide, fat coin etched with a single symbol. ‘Where their hearts should have been, one of these had been placed.’ He placed a disc into one of the indentations for an exact fit. ‘They must have been worn round the neck like the Sixth Sun amulets, part of the ceremony of communion, placed here in a certain order.’
‘You seriously imagine you can actually talk with this presence thing –?’
‘Go to the others. They may need your help.’ He looked up angrily at Jonah and Motti. ‘Go.’
‘He’s right, come on,’ said Jonah quietly. Helping Motti to stand, he led the way to the exit.
Tye was clinging on to consciousness. She fell forwards into Ramez’s arms. They felt strong and warm while the world whirled about her. The old, familiar smell of him filled her nostrils, and for those few spinning seconds she was thirteen again and had all she needed.
There was a rustle and clatter of movement close by. ‘Aw, Jeez,’ Ramez breathed. ‘Why don’t you suckers stay down?’
‘Give it up, Ramez,’ said one of the men. ‘We’ve got you cornered.’
No, thought Tye desperately. There has to be a way out. After all we’ve been through, I won’t let him be dragged away screaming again. If I can only come up with a distraction –
‘You can’t run from us, Ramez,’ said Douglas sternly. ‘We kept our side of the bargain. We’ve given you everything you ever wanted.’
‘That’s right, you did. But guess what?’ He squeezed Tye protectively to him, his chest crushing against hers. ‘You can have it right back.’
And Tye cried out as she was pushed violently away. She fell sprawling into Douglas’s arms, knocked him backwards into the other two priests, and they all went down together. Ramez pushed past them in the confusion, ran off and away.
Tye opened her mouth to shout after him, but no words would come. She stayed silent, numb as the men hauled her up. Stared at the staircase he’d fled down, willing him to come back for her.
Then she had to shut her eyes as the flaming torch was pushed up to her face, so close she caught a crackle from her forehead, the acrid smell of burning hair.
‘We were going to have power,’ came a whining male voice. ‘Now everything’s ruined.’
‘And it’s all down to her and her friends,’ hissed Douglas. ‘Well, she’s going to pay …’
Then she heard footsteps pounding on the stone steps. Ramez. He had come back for her, of course he had –
‘Leave her alone!’ Con’s shout echoed and reechoed around the warriors’ tomb as she piled into the three men. Tye twisted free from Douglas’s grip just as Con knocked him to the ground. The torch fell with him, its heat searing Tye’s bare leg.
And as the burn shocked through her, something else ignited.
While Con tackled one of the men, Tye grabbed his friend and threw him to the floor. He landed on his back at the base of a bier. ‘Still think you’ve got power over me?’ she hissed. Grabbing one of the warrior’s wooden shields, she brought it down on the man’s face and he cried out. ‘Think I’m yours?’ He struggled so she hit him again, split open his nose. ‘That I could ever be yours?’
‘Hey. Hey.’ She felt Con pull the shield from her grip and kneel down beside her. ‘It’s OK, sweets. He’s out cold.’ Con’s arms slipped round her. ‘It’s over.’
Tye clutched blindly at Con, held her tight.
‘We won’t let you go,’ Con murmured.