Blood Sun (37 page)

“She says she believes you are a shaman and that they will help,” Flint said. “Their own parents were taken by the Serpent Warriors. Somewhere beyond the hummingbird god. It’s already killed a couple of the kids who tried to escape through the mountains.”

“Ask them about my mum. She was around here somewhere.” He gave the pictures to Tree Walker and his sister. “Was my mum with them? Was she taken as well?”

Flint asked the questions again and Tree Walker answered. Max listened to Flint’s translation.

“There’s a story about a white woman. She came in with a guide, but the woman got taken to the pyramid temple.”

Fear and hope mingled in Max’s heart. “Flint, don’t you see? That has to be where she was. You’ve seen the pictures.”

Flint shrugged. He did not want to tear apart Max’s hope. He glanced at Xavier, who sat listening.

“Cousin, it’s time for a reality check. Best thing we can do is get out of here. There has to be a way. We can’t go back through the cave—those guys will still be there. We gotta let these kids help us, yeah? There’s some really bad guys in here.”

Setting Star held one of the photographs toward Max. Her voice held regret. Max took the photograph back.

“She says this is near a temple of the Serpent Warriors. If your mother was there … then … well, then she wouldn’t have survived. That’s where they sacrifice anyone captured.”

Max felt the flutter of panic in his throat and chest. Terrible images of ritual killing flashed in his mind. And Mum. No! Was that why his dad had run?

“I don’ like the sound of these Serpent Warriors, cousin,” Xavier said.

Max’s hand trembled as he tucked the photograph away. He spoke directly to them as Flint translated. “My mother is dead. I know that. I want to know what happened to her. I need your help. I will not leave until I find the truth. Nothing else matters to me.”

As Flint translated, Tree Walker still seemed unconvinced, but he nodded when Setting Star touched his arm and answered Flint.

“They can take you only so far. They won’t go anywhere near the temples,” Flint said.

It was a small success. Max felt a surge of victory.

Three heartbeats.

One—Max saw a jaguar at the far edge of the clearing; then it disappeared into the forest.

Two—the birds fell silent.

Three—bloodcurdling screams shattered the stillness.

Then a sudden cacophony of conch-shell horns and wooden trumpets blasted the air as bass drums, like heart-stopping thunder, rolled through the trees. The forest edge shivered and changed shape as hordes of warriors yelled their battle cries and charged into the clearing. They were terrifying. Faces painted red and black, they wore plumes of feathers on greenstone-studded helmets and god masks of jungle creatures. All were armed with shields and flint-tipped weapons. Shrunken heads of victims slain in bygone wars dangled from their embroidered, sleeveless cotton jackets. It felt as if demons from hell had been vomited from the underworld.

Children screamed in panic. Tree Walker and Setting Star ran four meters in front of Max and stood firm, gripping their spears and bravely awaiting the charge—it was obvious they were going to defend Max.

Xavier ran, stumbled and tried to make himself small. Flint chewed through his cigarette, pulled his knife and awaited death. The blurred unreality of it all spilled across Max’s vision.

The horde of warriors surged forward, and Max did not flinch. Was it a moment of insanity? He was the eye of the storm. Still. Unmoving.

And then he yelled, “Don’t run! Don’t fight!”

Tree Walker and Setting Star turned at the sound of his voice. They did not understand his words, but the way Max stood—arms extended in a pacifying gesture, feet planted firm—told them everything. He was like a tree: rooted, un-moveable. Doubt momentarily crossed their faces. Then they shouted their commands. The children, and Flint, looked back to Max.

Somehow it all made sense. Why Max had stood his ground no one knew—perhaps pure instinct—but battle warriors would find no honor in killing someone who did not resist. Bloodthirsty slaughter may have been part of their heritage, but Max’s action stopped their leader from his advance. The surge stopped. The drums and trumpets fell silent.

Tree Walker and his sister ushered the children into retreat behind Max as a phalanx of warriors strode closer. Then they, too, stopped. The cave guardian pointed to Max, and a well-muscled warrior, who was obviously their leader, tentatively came a few paces closer. He lifted the wooden jaguar mask from his face and stared at Max.

The energy of the charge had eased into an uncanny silence. The warriors from the forest rippled as if the breeze brushed them. It was anticipation. Would their leader try to kill the Stone Serpent’s
wayob
?

Max’s fear seeped away. He felt strangely in control of his emotions. His legs had trembled when the attack started, his hands had sweated when he lifted the spear shaft, and his throat had dried seconds before he had spoken.

These were the Serpent Warriors—and they would know about his mother—and if their superstitions were intact, then they would take him as a prisoner to the temple pyramid.

The warrior signaled his men. They herded the children away from Max and began tying them with rope round their necks, ankles and hands. A dozen warriors surrounded Max, but he did not move. His back muscles prickled with the expectation of a spear being thrust into him, but he forced his mind—and his eyes—to stay locked on the devilish face of the Serpent Warrior in front of him.

The warrior reversed his spear and nervously bobbed forward, jabbing Max with the end, like someone scared of a corpse coming to life. Max was the unknown—how powerful was he?

Without the blood surge of the bellowing war cries, it was down to the warrior’s cold courage to determine whether Max could slay him with a look or a touch.

Max faced him down.

Keep your fear to yourself, son. You show you’re scared and you’ve given your opponent victory
.

Dad’s voice. Uninvited. Contradicting his own cowardice.

Being frightened is natural, Max. We all go through it. See it for what it is. Be brave even when you don’t feel it
.

Mum. Warm. Comforting.

This was all he could do. Everything else was out of his hands. Max stopped himself from saying something really stupid, like
Take me to your leader
. No sooner had the ludicrous thought flashed through his mind than he laughed aloud.

The warrior flinched. This boy-spirit had bared his teeth like a snake about to strike, in defiance of any fear. He raised his spear in an attacking thrust. And then nature saved Max’s
life. The ground shook, rippling like a small wave, swaying trees, buffeting the grassland like a horse’s mane.

Earthquake.

Warriors and children flung themselves to the ground. The minor earth tremor threw those left standing to the floor. Except for Max. The shuddering energy below his legs made him instinctively brace himself. It felt like being on a snowboard running across uneven, broken ground on a ski run. He kept his balance. For a few brief moments, everyone lay facedown around him. The warriors looked up to see this manifestation from the Cave of the Stone Serpent standing above them—like a king. This
wayob
had power. He had laughed at their most ferocious warriors and then caused the earth to strike them down to the position of lowly servants, lying before him in subservience.

The tremor passed. The warriors got to their feet and—with a respectful distance between themselves and Max—gestured with their weapons that he should walk. Surrounded, he did as they wanted and followed the child prisoners into the forest.

Max felt an almost overpowering sense of anticipation. Every step now took him closer to finding the truth of his mother’s death and his father’s betrayal.

Ridgeway was collating his resources, calling in favors owed from civil servants and cabinet ministers, as well as discussing his fears with retired senior military officers. Someone had cleaned that private mortuary so well it raised suspicions to the point where he had instructed his team to go beyond their usual fastidious checks. He wanted to know what had happened to his man, Keegan, and why that building was shrouded in such secrecy. And the more he reached out for information, the greater the pressure that came from MI6. It would be a battle of wills between the two security services whether the truth was exposed or buried. One thing he was absolutely certain about was that his government, or rather the key people within it, were involved in some kind of cover-up.

Ridgeway sat with Tom Gordon in his room. Marty Kiernan hovered in the background as the MI5 man unfolded a large map of Central America across the table. He knew he was
risking Tom Gordon’s health and mental stability by coming here, but he needed to pinpoint where the explorer and scientist had been with his wife when she disappeared. The room was tense with silence, and Marty could see the prickled sweat on his patient’s forehead as he gazed at the map.

“I have one of my people in the jungle. She has contacted me in the last few hours and believes she is close to an area that is exceptionally dangerous, guarded by armed men, and where your wife might have been before she died so tragically. Thanks to your son’s friend Sayid Khalif, we had sufficient information to convince us that an illegal covert operation is taking place. My agent volunteered for this. She wants to go in. She has no legal backing from me or our government, and I do not want to risk her life needlessly. There is a British Army training team based in the mountains of Belize, where our soldiers are taught jungle warfare. Right now there is a company of Gurkhas there, and if I have to, I will put my job on the line and get those men in to support my agent. But I have to know if this is the place.”

Max’s father gazed at the contours of the map, each swirl a memory of steep climbs and rugged terrain. Like a badly edited video clip made on a handheld camera, snatches of pictures flashed through Tom Gordon’s mind.

Ridgeway spoke quietly. “The boy who died on the London Underground has been identified as having gone there, and his death is still a mystery. But we believe that it’s the information he gave to your son that triggered Max’s disappearance. And if Max has survived, then I’d be surprised if he wasn’t in the same area. So these troops would be put at risk to save your son and help my agent,” Ridgeway said.

There was absolutely no response from Tom Gordon. His eyes were locked onto the map; he was in a world of his own, letting his mind reveal whatever memory could be recovered.

“Was this the area your wife had been in? If Max is there, we think time might be running out for him.”

Tom Gordon’s finger traced a route on the map. “A runner found me.… He came from the mountains, through a cave. He was frightened. He took me to my wife. I tried to save her. I tried … She was so ill.… No doctors … no one … That’s why I ran.”

Ridgeway saw that Tom Gordon’s hand had covered the area where Charlie Morgan was sitting on the edge of violence as volatile as an unstable volcano. He knew he could squeeze no more from the man’s ruined memory, but it was enough. He shook Tom Gordon’s hand and turned to leave.

Marty Kiernan escorted him to the door. “I know this has to be something big for you to be taking these risks, sir, and if there’s any likelihood of Max being in that area, then he’ll be there. The boy’s got guts and stamina—he’s proven himself before. I think there’s a better way of getting armed men on the ground—unofficially—and if anyone can help your agent and Max, then these are the people you need.”

Marty Kiernan had spent a few hours on the telephone. The British government might well have a training team of specialists in the jungles of Central America, but to use them for a live operation could cause a diplomatic incident. If there was a chance to save Max, and if there was fighting to be done, then Marty knew who to call.

Over the years, British soldiers who had trained others in
the specialist art of jungle warfare had stayed in the area, married local women and settled down to raise families in the environment that was second nature to them. Most had served fifteen to twenty years in the army and now received a modest pension to supplement whatever work they did. In the modern world of warfare, they would be considered too old to go on active duty—but when the call came from Marty, each of the dozen men went to that special place in his home where he kept his well-oiled and trusted weapons hidden.

Charlie Morgan winced. It was a ragtag army that arrived at the rendezvous point Ridgeway had instructed her to reach. Battered old pickup trucks, ex-army Land Rovers and a quad bike cut through the mud and bush. Some of the men were still close friends; others hadn’t seen each other for a few years, but the more she looked, the more she realized that these were hard-nosed veterans, their skin tanned mahogany from years in the sun. They might have been older than your regular squaddie, but she could see that the men had an understated, deadly efficiency about them. By the time they’d introduced themselves, made a few passing cracks about her being young enough to be their daughter and then started asking for tactical assessments of the target, she knew she was in business. These were the men who had taught others how to fight.