The Aztec Code (31 page)

Cautiously Jonah pushed open the door. ‘Whoa,' he said.

The door opened on to a large, wide chamber, lit dimly by a couple of torches set into the walls. The floor area was square, and the huge step cut into the ceiling above made Jonah feel like he was standing inside part of a giant Tetris puzzle. A pit the size of a swimming pool had been dug in the centre of the room – but instead of water, artefacts in gold and obsidian and jade sparkled in the flickering torchlight. The pit was piled high with treasures.

But there was no sign of Patch.

‘Come on, stop playing about,' said Con sharply.

‘Excellent advice.' Honor came out from the shadows at the far side of the room, her black hair in disarray. She was holding her sacrificial knife to Patch's throat. ‘Now then, Coldhardt's children. You are going to carry these treasures outside.'

‘That was kind of the plan,' Motti agreed. ‘We're thieves, see.'

‘Only now you will be stealing on my behalf, not Coldhardt's.'

‘It's no use,' said Jonah. ‘Traynor's dead, the poison's been dealt with. It's finished.'

‘Finished?' She smiled, almost fondly it seemed. ‘But it's never finished, Jonah. I have so many other irons in the fire. So many other plans to fulfill. I've invested a lot of time in this project, and require a return on that investment.' She tightened her grip around Patch's throat. ‘No more stalling. You will take as much treasure as you can carry through the jungle to my transport.'

Heart sinking, Jonah looked at Motti, then over at Tye and Con.

‘Go on, then!' gasped Patch, as Honor pressed the blade harder against his neck. ‘I'm talking to them, not you,' he added.

‘Looks like we've got no choice,' said Tye quietly.

Honor nodded. ‘So get in that pit and start shifting. Start with the jewellery, it'll be easiest to carry.'

Jonah walked to the edge of the pit, crouched and reached for an intricately cast gold pendant, pulling it out. Tye knelt beside him, rooting through plates and pottery and stuff.

Motti crossed casually round the edge of the pit in Honor's direction. Con took the left-hand side while Motti moved round to the right. Jonah watched as he gingerly flipped over a wide mosaic mask with his foot, as if expecting to find something nasty underneath.

‘Did you check this place for traps, cyclops?' asked Motti.

‘The door was full of 'em,' he said. ‘Took me ages to crack, and I nearly got my hand skewered to the
doorframe.' He sighed. ‘I'd just got inside when
she
showed up.'

‘Speed it up,' Honor ordered. ‘You –' she gestured to Motti – ‘get into that pit and start sorting through the relics in the middle.' She smiled at Jonah. ‘The biggest fish don't swim in the shallows.'

Motti glared at her. ‘And if it's booby trapped?'

‘Then you'll be maimed or dead and your friends will have to divide your load between them,' she said impatiently. ‘Now do it.'

Jonah felt his heart hammering as Motti stepped awkwardly out on to the stockpile of treasures.

‘The rest of you, get a move on,' called Honor.

Jonah looked down, and lifted a shield. Underneath was more jewellery, earrings and a necklace lying on a woven mat of some kind. What was a mat doing here? Hardly grade-A treasure…

He pulled it away and stared at what lay beneath.

Stone. Stone and broken pottery.

Frowning, he showed Tye, who rummaged a little deeper in her own pile. ‘Oh God. It's the same here.'

‘This is wrong,' Jonah announced nervously. ‘The good stuff's only on top.'

‘No tricks,' Honor warned him.

‘See for yourself!' Jonah snapped. ‘Underneath there's nothing, just landfill.'

By now, Con was sporting four or five dangling gold necklaces. ‘I've found plenty.'

Motti knelt awkwardly in the middle of the pit, moving masks and statuettes. ‘I got me a throw or something,' he reported. ‘And under it …' He reached in and picked up a couple of pieces of broken
clay. ‘Well, whoopee.' He tossed the fragments over to land at Honor's feet. ‘So much for the big treasure trove.'

Con looked outraged. ‘Someone's already stolen it!'

‘And dressed up a pile of rubble with a few baubles to make it seem like the whole lot was still here,' Motti concluded.

‘So we take the baubles,' Honor said darkly. ‘It'll still be worth a good deal.'

‘No,' said Jonah.

‘C'mon, Jonah,' Patch croaked.

‘No, I mean, something's not right. It would have taken ages to fill this pit with stone and pottery, and the attendants were still alive when the pyramid was buried. They wouldn't have let anyone take the real treasure before it was sealed, so –'

‘So this whole goddamned place is a trap.' Motti scrambled back to the side of the pit. ‘Jesus Christ, we gotta get out of here, and fast.'

But Honor shook her head. ‘That's enough hysterics.'

‘Didn't you hear him?' Con stood up and crossed back round to Jonah and Tye, jamming a pair of gold bracelets on to her wrist. ‘This place is simply bait, yes? A greed-trap for anyone who might have got inside while Coatlicue was flying up to heaven –'

‘Just get on with clearing the good stuff,' Honor ordered. ‘We've been in here for ten minutes at least and nothing's happened. Whatever was
supposed
to happen, it's clearly not working.'

The ground shifted and rumbled beneath them. A brutal, grating sound ground out from the walls. Then
Jonah felt a funny sinking feeling in his stomach, like he was in a lift heading for the ground floor.

Or the
underground
floor.

‘What's happening?' Honor demanded.

‘Whaddya think's happening, you dumb bitch!' Motti bellowed. ‘The trap's been sprung – the temple's sinking back into the ground!'

Suddenly Patch twisted his body round and elbowed Honor in the stomach. Caught off guard she overbalanced, and with a short cry of anger fell into the pit. The chamber lurched and Patch staggered, almost joining her in there. But Motti grabbed hold of his hand and yanked him back.

‘Thanks for that.' Patch grinned with relief. ‘So much for Honor among thieves.'

‘Look out!' shouted Con, bustling Jonah and Tye away as a shower of rock dust rained down from above – together with a large chunk of masonry. It crashed into the floor of the chamber, and a large split appeared in the stone, stretching from the pit to the door.

‘The temple wasn't designed to survive a journey back underground,' Motti shouted.

‘Out of here!' Jonah yelled – needlessly, since everyone was already running for their lives. He reached the doorway and looked back for Honor. But the torches had been extinguished and he could see nothing but thick, dust-choked blackness.

The others were charging up the steps to the next level. ‘I don't get it!' Patch shouted. ‘What happened to the real treasure?'

‘Hidden somewhere else,' Jonah suggested, ‘if it
ever really existed.'

‘But how do we get out?' Tye yelled over the slow, deafening grind of the temple's shifting foundations, as they emerged into the warriors' tomb and started on the second set of steps.

‘We came in through one of the false windows in the side of the shrine,' Con told her. ‘It's in the upper storey, it will still be above ground –'

The whole pyramid seemed to lurch sideways. Jonah lost his footing and slipped back down the steps, the hard stone edges biting into his backbone as he tumbled. With a gasp he hit the ground – and found himself staring into the sightless sockets of one of the long-dead warriors. Its remains lay sprawled on the floor, its skull-face grinning up at him as if mocking his efforts to leave. With a shudder, Jonah got shakily to his feet and rescaled the steps in a shower of sandstone shrapnel.

Tye was waiting for him by the serpent's mouth entrance, holding the back of her head and looking woozy. ‘You OK?' Jonah asked.

‘Not very,' she said, coughing hard. ‘Getting dizzy.'

Jonah opened his mouth to reply, but then heard Coldhardt almost screaming from inside. ‘Get out! Go on, all of you, get the hell away from here. Leave me!'

He followed Tye inside. Patch was struggling through the window, helped by Motti who was balancing on the narrow ledge the other side. But Con was making no attempt to get out, biting her lip, staring over at Coldhardt.

The old man was kneeling before the statue of Coatlicue, Traynor's corpse still spread-eagled behind
him. Some of the temple roof had fallen in, and in the fiery red of the setting sun the goddess looked still more terrifying. As if she were about to pounce on Coldhardt and devour him alive.

‘Con, I told you to get out!' the old man roared, staring round. Jonah saw he was clutching the sword in both hands.

Jonah steered Tye over to Con. The ground beneath them lurched again, and the whole temple seemed to scream as it slid lower into its waiting grave. ‘Help Tye through the window,' Jonah snapped, and Con nodded. ‘Then see if you can help some of those others.'

‘What, save Sixth Sun?' She stared at him incredulously. ‘Why – so they can try to kill us all over again?'

‘We can't just leave them to –' He broke off as another pile of stonework tumbled in from the roof behind them. One of the priests screamed – then the sound choked off.

‘
I
can,' Con assured him, and set about helping Tye crawl through the crumbling window.

Jonah turned from her. ‘Coldhardt, come on,' he shouted, ‘the treasure store was a sham and it's triggered the burglar alarm. We've
all
got to get out!'

‘Not yet,' Coldhardt shook his head. ‘I can't. Not now I'm so close. A chance of redemption, Jonah. Nothing else matters.'

Jonah rushed over to where he knelt. ‘Stay here much longer and you'll be dead! We're a long way from your vault …' He frowned as he realised Coldhardt was kneeling in a sticky crimson puddle.
‘Is that blood –?'

‘Someone attacked me.' Coldhardt gestured impatiently to a body lying beside the statue. Jonah saw it was Xavier, hands still clutched over the fatal gash in his stomach, but couldn't find it within himself to feel much regret. ‘Now get the hell out, Jonah. I have to try to commune with –'

‘You can't be serious –!'

There was a quick, metallic sliding sound that made them both stare at the statue. In the largest stone heart that hung round Coatlicue's severed neck, a slot had opened – just wide enough for …

Coldhardt raised the sword and slammed it into the slot, as the ground rumbled ominously beneath them. The sword blade jammed, three-quarters in. He tried to twist it from side to side, but nothing happened. ‘Come on … come
on
!' The temple seemed to roar like a creature in pain as the ancient foundations fell in on themselves. ‘What must I do?' Coldhardt howled above the cacophony, heaving on the sword. ‘To take life from death,
what must I do
?'

Then the blade snapped clean through, not far from the hilt. They both stared as the length of the severed steel blade seemed to be drawn inside the statue, like a key entering a lock.

‘The prophecy.' Jonah stared at the statue. ‘When the bloodied sword is wiped clean …'

‘This place is sinking too fast!' yelled Con, swinging herself out through the window. ‘Come
on
you two!'

Something was happening to the ground around the statue. It was starting to dissolve. The priests' gold discs that Coldhardt had pressed into the indentations
fell through the melting floor – into a shallow cache stuffed full of polychrome cups and precious stones and figurines and codices and –

Jonah reached down automatically, grabbing a handful of Aztec gold. ‘The real treasure,' he breathed. ‘It's
here
.'

‘Left in offering at her feet.' Coldhardt reached inside and groped around the cache. He pulled out a couple of deerskin books and a shell necklace, stuffed them inside his shirt and scrabbled about for more. He looked up at Jonah, eyes shining with naked greed. ‘Help me!'

But a deep, splintering scream of stone on stone echoed up from the bowels of the temple and the floor began to tilt. Jonah shifted his weight to keep his balance, then stared in horror as two little glass phials rolled from behind the statue and fell into the cache. One of them broke open on the edge of a mosaic mask.

Jonah backed away automatically. ‘The poison! We can't risk touching anything in there now.'

Coldhardt screamed with rage, banging his fist down on the bloody ground in frustration.

Outside Jonah could hear the others urging them to hurry.

‘You're, like, three metres off ground level and sinking fast!'

‘Move it!'

‘Get the hell out of there!'

Jonah looked at Coldhardt. ‘If we don't get out now –'

‘We never will.'

Jonah turned at the sound of the all-too familiar voice. Honor had followed them up, a thick slither of blood oozing from her forehead. ‘Help me carry these treasures,' she said almost drunkenly, ‘and I'll share them with you.'

Jonah saw she was clutching a pile of broken pottery together with chunks of slate and sandstone. Determined to salvage something, she must have grabbed for the closest objects to hand, not even realising what they were.

Jonah and Coldhardt ignored her and navigated the shaking floor over to the window. The old man swung himself through with surprising agility. ‘Now you.'

‘Didn't you hear me?' Honor called. ‘I said I'll share it with you!'

‘It's worthless!' Jonah shouted, starting to scramble after Coldhardt. ‘Drop it and get the hell out while you can.'

Her face twisted with rage as she stumbled towards him. ‘Call yourself thieves? Help me!'