Evil Star

INTO THIN AIR

The next available flight from Lima didn’t get in until nine o’clock in the evening and Fabian had arranged to meet Matt and Pedro one hour after that, in front of the cathedral in the main square. That gave them the rest of the day to kill until he arrived.

They spent the time walking around Cuzco, trying to keep out of everyone’s way. It was a weird experience for Matt. Normally someone like him would only come here as a tourist and if he had been dressed differently, that was what people would think he was. He could imagine himself stopping to photograph the long galleries with their stone archways and the bustling shops behind.

But his disguise had put him right at the heart of the city. Matt had become part of it. At one point, as he and Pedro sat on a step outside a museum, he even found himself being photographed by two Americans. For reasons he couldn’t quite understand, he was annoyed to see the expensive zoom lens being focused on him. Before the camera had clicked, he sprang to his feet.

“Why don’t you take a picture of someone else?” he snapped at the astonished couple. He knew he wasn’t being fair but he still felt a brief sense of victory as the man and his wife backed away, confused.

Later that afternoon, he and Pedro came upon the temple of Coricancha. In fact, they could hardly have missed it. This was a major tourist attraction, located in the southern part of the city and surrounded by coaches, with a non-stop flow of visitors around the main entrance. Once again there were Inca walls, and a terrace high above, giving panoramic views over the city. There was also a Spanish church on the site. In fact it had been constructed over it – one building on top of another – as if it had been dropped there from outer space.

Why had Micos sent them here? There didn’t seem to be any reason and Matt wasn’t prepared to waste any of their money paying to get in.

Even so, he lingered around the entrance and listened as the tour organizers delivered the same lecture to each group of tourists. Coricancha was the ancient word for “golden courtyard”. There had once been a great temple with four thousand priests living here. Every wall had been lined with plates of solid gold and the rooms had been filled with statues and altars… also gold. It had been used as a religious centre and also a celestial observatory by the Incas. But then the conquistadors had come. They had taken everything. They had melted down the gold, ripped out the altars and built their own church on the ruins that remained.

Would Fabian bring them here on Friday night, Matt wondered? Was there a chance that Richard might turn up? A guard walked out of the entrance and gestured at Matt and Pedro to move away. Pedro muttered something ugly and guttural in Spanish and tugged at Matt’s sleeve. Matt understood. The guard thought they were trying to beg from the tourists. They had no place here. Poor people in Cuzco really had no place anywhere.

As the evening drew in, they walked back to the square and sat on the long step between the cathedral and the fountain. Matt wondered what Pedro was thinking about. He had tried to explain that Fabian was coming, but he wasn’t sure how much the other boy had understood.

At last, the darkness came and with it Cuzco was transformed into something almost magical. Matt had noticed how strange the light was by day. At night, the sky became a luminous blue with the mountains stretching out, deep black, below. Thousands of orange lights sparkled in the outlying suburbs and streetlamps glowed all around the square. After the heat of the day, the evening was cool. The restaurants were filling up, the pavements packed with people in no hurry to go anywhere, like extras on some huge, open-air stage.

The police car entered the square just after nine o’clock. Matt noticed it first: a low, white vehicle with a blue and yellow stripe and a strip light mounted on the roof. There were two men inside. He watched the car as it cruised slowly along the far side and parked in front of one of the money-changing shops. The two men didn’t get out.

He thought nothing of it. There were police everywhere in Cuzco, just as there had been in Lima. It seemed that their main job was to keep the tourists happy. Tourism must be worth millions to the Peruvian economy. They had to feel safe.

But then a second police car joined the first and he began to grow uneasy. They couldn’t be looking for him! Apart from Fabian, nobody knew they were there. Pedro nudged him, glancing in the direction of the second car. The expression on his face was clear. The police in this country were bad news. The two of them had been moved on plenty of times throughout the day and Matt had no doubt that he and Pedro could be arrested just for sitting here. What was the time? Surely it must be getting close to ten o’clock. He wished Pedro hadn’t stolen his watch.

Two police cars. More policemen on foot. They were entering the square from all sides, moving slowly, seemingly with no particular purpose. What was going on? Pedro was becoming more and more agitated. There was something animal-like about him now. His eyes were wide and alert. Every muscle in his body seemed to be locked. He was sensing danger, even if he hadn’t seen it yet.

“I think we should move,” Matt said.

He didn’t want to go. Fabian would arrive any minute now. If he could wait just a few minutes longer, the whole ordeal might be over. And getting up, walking, might draw attention to himself. Every fibre of his being screamed at him to stay where he was. While he was sitting down, unnoticed, he was safe. But at the same time, there were more than a dozen policemen in the square now, fanning out, all of them armed. Had the police come by coincidence or did they know Matt was here? Was this just another raid, or were they looking for him?

The question was answered in an instant as the passenger door of one of the police cars opened and a man got out. It was Captain Rodriguez. He was standing directly under a streetlamp and it cast a glow across his face with its rough, pitted skin and heavy moustache. He looked like a boxer stepping into the ring and as his eyes swung across the square, Matt knew without any doubt at all that his phone call to Fabian had been intercepted and that he had walked straight into another trap.

He stood up, forcing himself not to panic. Rodriguez hadn’t seen him since the Hotel Europa and didn’t know what he looked like now that he was in disguise. There were still plenty of people around. The two of them could just walk away, mingling with the crowd.

Pedro dug his hand into his trouser pocket. When he brought it out, he was holding his rubber slingshot. Matt shook his head.

“Not now, Pedro,” he said. “There are too many of them.”

Pedro frowned, then seemed to understand. He put the slingshot away again.

The scream of a whistle cut through the air.

Suddenly, all the policemen were running towards the two of them as if they had known where they were all along and had simply been playing a game. Another car cut in from behind. Rodriguez was pointing directly at them and shouting. Tourists and travellers stood gaping, afraid, finding themselves caught up in the middle of something they didn’t want to see. The friendly mask of the country they had come to visit had slipped to reveal the brutality beneath. There were armed police everywhere.

Matt saw at once that all four corners of the square were cut off. The trap had closed in from every side. There were two police cars speeding towards them… they would reach them in seconds. That left just one direction – up. The cars couldn’t follow them up the steps. He looked round and saw that Pedro had worked this out for himself. He was already halfway up, heading for a group of Europeans standing together at the top. They’d been about to have their photograph taken in front of the cathedral when the police raid began but now they were just staring out, slack-jawed. Matt saw Pedro barge through them. Why? He glanced back and understood. Some of the policemen had taken out their guns. Pedro had seen the danger, but at the same time he had guessed that they weren’t going to fire anywhere near tourists. His move had been quite calculated. He was using the Europeans as a human shield.

Matt joined him, clambering up the last five steps and then across the top, next to the cathedral. The tourists scattered. Someone cried out. Pedro was moving like the wind and Matt wondered if he would be able to keep up. Already he had discovered something he had suspected all along. It was almost impossible to run in Cuzco. The air was too thin. He couldn’t have been going for more than half a minute and his head was pounding, his throat was sore and he felt as though he was about to faint. He forced himself on, not wanting to be left behind. Pedro was one of the Five. Matt couldn’t lose him now.

But Pedro was looking out for Matt. As a policeman swung around the corner, he shouted out a warning. Matt ducked low. There was an explosion and one of the stone steps spat dust. They were shooting at him! Matt felt a tremor of disbelief. Rodriguez had given orders to take him dead or alive.

The gunshot had been a mistake. Now everyone in the square was panicking, running in all directions, desperate to get away. For a moment, the police found themselves powerless. The boys were out of sight. Then something strange happened. The policeman who had fired the shot threw himself backwards and lay sprawling. Matt twisted round and saw that the slingshot was in Pedro’s hand. He certainly knew how to use it. The policeman had been standing in front of a road that was otherwise unguarded. Matt forced some air into his lungs and set off.

Out of sight. That was the key. Matt knew they had to get under cover. They had to find somewhere to hide. Give them a bit of time and maybe they could work out what to do next. Pedro ran through an open gateway leading off the street, signalling at Matt to follow. Matt did just that and found himself in a rough courtyard with patches of grass growing through the rubble and the dust. There was another market here. Stalls, lit by oil lamps, stood haphazardly against the walls. They were open even at this time of the evening and a few backpackers were wandering idly between them, examining the hats and ponchos, rugs, beads and bags on sale. The great mass of the cathedral rose up behind.

The two boys didn’t stop. They came to a second archway and burst out to find themselves in another street. But this time they were not alone.

A very old Indian woman sat facing them, squatting on the pavement with a little pile of handmade jewellery. Her hair hung down in two long pigtails and there was a baby, wrapped in a striped blanket, nestling against her chest. She was looking straight at them and as they stood there, panting, wondering which way to go, she suddenly smiled, showing yellow teeth that were little more than stumps. At the same time, she pointed towards an alleyway that led off behind her.

Matt wasn’t sure what to do. The old woman was behaving as if she knew them. It was almost as if she had been sitting there all evening, waiting for them to come so she could point out the best way. Matt fought to get more air into his system and to keep the dizziness at bay.

“Which way?” he shouted at Pedro.

The old woman raised a finger to her lips. This was no time for a discussion. Once again, she pointed the way. Behind them, they heard shouting. The police had entered the marketplace.

“Gracias, senora,” Pedro muttered. He had decided to believe her.

The two of them ran up the alleyway, disappearing into the shadows that pushed in from both sides. Tattered posters hung on the walls and wooden balconies jutted out over their heads. The street was cobbled and Matt’s rubber sandals were almost torn off his feet as he tried to run.

But was it worth going on? Matt could hear sirens and whistles echoing all over the city and with a heavy heart he knew that he and Pedro were never going to get out of this, no matter how fast they ran. They were two rats in a maze. They could scurry round the streets and passageways of Cuzco until they were exhausted or they could find a building to hide in but it would make no difference. It might take the police all night to find them but they would do it in the end. Cuzco was surrounded by mountains. There was no way out.

Somewhere, just out of sight, another car pulled up. Boots stamped down on concrete. A whistle blew. Even Pedro was beginning to slow down. Sweat was dripping off his face. It would all be over very soon.

The alleyway led to another narrow street with a T-junction at one end. Pedro started towards it but almost at once a blue van came skidding to a halt and three policemen piled out. One of them shouted excitedly into a radio while the other two took out their guns and began moving towards them. Matt didn’t have the strength to move. His heart was about to burst. He could only watch as the two men approached.

And then it happened again.

Another Indian appeared, stepping out of a doorway, pushing a heavy cart laden with food and drink. He was wearing white trousers and a dark jacket but no shirt. Nor did he have any shoes. Long hair hung down, obscuring most of his face. He stopped in the road, completely blocking it and it seemed to Matt that he had acted quite deliberately. He had known they were coming and wanted to give them more time. The policemen began shouting. One of them was trying to push past. The Indian nodded and smiled at the two boys. With renewed strength, they set off the other way.

Something was happening in Cuzco. Someone was trying to help them. First it had been the old woman, now it was the food seller. But who were they? How had they even known that he and Pedro were there? Matt wondered if he was imagining things. And no matter how many people tried to help them, he still couldn’t see how they were going to get away.

They turned another corner and suddenly Matt knew where they were. This was one of the most famous streets in the city. Just a few hours earlier it had been filled with tourist groups and guides; now it was completely empty, lit only by the glow from the sky. One side of the street was lined by old Inca walls, ten metres high. Matt recognized the huge stones, slotted so ingeniously together. Pedro was leaning against one of them, panting for breath.

“Which way?” Matt asked.

Pedro shrugged. Either he was too exhausted to talk or he had come to the same conclusion as Matt. There was no way out so it didn’t matter where they went.

They started forward, slowly, making their way down the deserted street. They could hear shouting all around them, disembodied voices flitting like night creatures, everywhere. Only one thing was certain. Their pursuers were getting closer all the time.

And the street led nowhere. It was blocked by a tall metal gate that had been swung across the end, and locked.

There was no way back. Matt could hear footsteps rushing up behind them and knew that the police were only seconds away. He no longer had the heart to run or to hide. He reached out and rattled the gate. It was too high to climb. Pedro had given up too. He was looking angry and exhausted – the bitterness of defeat obvious in his eyes.

“Amigos!”

The voice came from just behind them. Matt turned. Incredibly, there was a young man standing in the street just a couple of metres away. He was wearing a red-and-mauve poncho, jeans and a woven hat that had flaps hanging down over his ears. He seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.

And Matt was sure he knew him. For a strange, unnerving moment, he was sure it was Micos. But Micos was dead. So who…?

“Amigos,” the man repeated. “Come quickly!”

Amigos. It was the one word of Spanish that Matt knew.

Friends.

The man gestured. Matt looked past him and saw an incredible sight. Part of the wall had swung open, revealing a secret door with at least seven sides. It was impossible to imagine the hinge mechanism that had made it work but when the door was closed it would be completely invisible. Matt and Pedro had just walked past it without realizing it was there. Millions of tourists must have done the same. Matt took a step forward. There was a passage inside the wall. He could just make out a narrow corridor but it ended almost at once in total blackness.

“No.” Pedro shook his head. He was afraid.

The man spoke to him quietly and quickly in Spanish, then turned back to Matt. “The police will be here very soon,” he said. “If you want to live, you must trust me. Come now…”

“Who are you?” Matt asked.

The man made no reply and Matt understood. He wasn’t prepared to talk about this, not now. An amazing secret – this hidden door – had been revealed to them. It had to be closed before the police, or anyone else, saw it.

Pedro was looking at him, waiting for him to make a decision. Matt nodded. The two of them stepped inside the wall. The man followed. The door swung shut behind them.

Blackness.

Matt couldn’t hear anything apart from the sound of his own breathing. He stood in pitch darkness and it occurred to him that he could have died – that death might not be so different from this. He had been cut off from the city of Cuzco the moment the wall closed. There was a slight dampness in the air that clung to his skin, but apart from that he felt nothing. He had to force himself not to panic, to avoid the thought that he might just have been buried alive.

Then the man in the poncho turned on an electric torch and the light sprang out to reveal a narrow corridor with a staircase leading down. They were inside the wall. The great stones were on both sides. Where did the steps lead? Matt couldn’t even begin to guess.

The light also showed the face of the man who had come to their rescue. Matt had only glimpsed him in the street and the earflaps of his hat had concealed much of his face. Looking at him more closely, he saw that he did bear a very close resemblance to Micos – although without the scar. He was also slightly thinner, with a narrow chin and the beginnings of a beard. He couldn’t have been more than twenty-two or twenty-three years old.

“Who are you?” Matt asked again. He wondered if his voice would carry out into the street. But that was impossible. The walls were at least a metre thick.

“My name is Atoc,” the man replied. His accent was strange. There was a hint of Spanish in it but also something else, some sort of native Indian.

Atoc was the name that Micos had spoken just before he died. He had wanted to get a message to this man. His brother? Matt hoped not but that would explain why they looked so alike.

“What is this place?” he asked.

“It is an old, Inca passage. Very secret. Very few people know.”

“Where does it lead?”

“I take you somewhere safe where Salamanda cannot find you. There are friends waiting but it is far and there is still much danger. Police looking everywhere. We cannot talk now.”

Atoc turned to Pedro and spoke briefly in Spanish. Once again, to Matt’s ears his accent sounded strange. Presumably he was translating what he had just said. Pedro nodded. A decision had been made.

“This way,” Atoc said. He swung the light at the stairs. “We go down. It will be easier soon.”

They began to climb down. Matt tried to count the steps but after twenty-five he gave up. The walls were very narrow, pressing in on them from both sides, and he could feel the weight of the earth pushing down from above. There was a heaviness in his ears and the air was getting cold. He could only see a few steps at a time. The torch wasn’t powerful enough to light much more. But as they reached the bottom with a second passageway bending round ahead of them, he became aware of a strange, yellow glow, coming from somewhere just out of sight. They began to walk forward and soon Atoc switched off the torch. The way ahead was lit, but not by an electric light. Matt turned the corner and gasped.

The passage ran on for as far as he could see, with flames burning in small silver cups set into the walls, about twenty metres apart. They must have been fed by a hidden oil supply. But it was the walls themselves that caught the light, magnified it and reflected it back. The walls were lined with sheets of what looked like brass, but – Matt somehow knew – were actually solid gold.

How much gold was there in the world? Matt had always thought it was precious because it was rare and he remembered what he had heard outside the temple of Coricancha. The Spanish conquistadors had looted the city. They had been mad with greed. They had taken all the gold they could lay their hands on. Or that was what they had thought. But now he could see that they had found only a fraction of what was there. Tons and tons of it must have been used to make this incredible route far below the city. It was stretching ever further into the distance, picking up the light from the lamps, turning night into day.

They were not intended to make the journey on foot. Another Indian, dressed like Atoc, was waiting for them with four mules. Matt wondered how the animals could bear to be here, so far underground, but he supposed they must be used to it. The Indian bowed low as he approached. Matt smiled, feeling increasingly uneasy.

“Please. We must hurry,” Atoc said.

Matt and Pedro climbed onto the first two mules. Atoc and the Indian took the two behind. There were no saddles, just brightly coloured blankets, tied underneath. Matt had never ridden an animal in his life and wondered how he was meant to make this one go. But the mule knew what it was doing. The moment all four of them had mounted, it set off at a fast pace, its hooves thudding rhythmically on the soft, earth-covered floor.

One after another, the flickering oil lamps lit their progress. Nobody spoke. Matt noticed that some of the gold panels had designs beaten into them: faces and warrior figures bristling with weapons. After a while, the passage widened and they passed countless treasures, lined up against the walls: jars and pitchers, cups and trays, idols and funeral masks – many of them made of silver and gold. He wondered how long it would take them to reach wherever they were going. The fact that he had no idea of their destination only made the journey seem longer. And it was almost impossible to measure the passing of time. All he knew was that they were climbing. The path had been sloping upward almost from the start, but he was sure they were getting no closer to the surface. So they must be heading out of Cuzco, into the mountains. That was the only possible explanation.

After at least one hour and possibly as much as two, they suddenly stopped. Despite everything, Matt had been drifting into sleep and he was nearly thrown right over the animal’s head. His legs were sore from constantly rubbing against the coarse hair. And he had added the smell of mule to the many other smells he had picked up since Lima.

“We walk from here,” Atoc said.

They all dismounted, leaving the animals with the other Indian who had never spoken, not even to tell them his name. Matt assumed that there must be another exit from the tunnel, some other way to bring the mules into the open air. Ahead of them was another narrow staircase and a lever set in the wall. Atoc raised a finger to his lips and pulled the lever. Matt heard a slight creaking, the turning of a wheel, and guessed that the mechanism being used was similar to the one that had first opened the wall and let them in.

Atoc waited a moment, listening. Somebody whistled, two single notes that sounded like a bird. At once, he relaxed. “We can go up,” he said.

They began to climb. Matt could see a circle ahead of him, lit by a white light that seemed to hang in the far distance. Some sort of tattered curtain hung down. It was only as he passed through that he realized that this was the mouth of a cave, surrounded by foliage, and that the light was the full moon. And then he was back out in the open, on a hillside high above Cuzco, with two more Indians in ponchos bowing at him, just like the man in the tunnel.

Pedro joined him and they saluted him too. Then Atoc appeared. Matt looked back. There was a round hole in the ground, the entrance to a cave. But it only ran a couple of metres. The back wall was solid. The steps had disappeared. Matt realized that the lever must have been pulled a second time and some sort of huge boulder had rolled into place. The exit from the tunnel was as impossible to find as the entrance.

So what now?

The two Indians gestured and he followed them away from the edge of the hill and into what looked like the ruin of an ancient football stadium, a theatre, a fortress… or perhaps a mix of all three. There was a flat area, roughly circular in shape, covered by grass and surrounded by gigantic boulders that had been arranged in a zigzagging line. There were three levels to the stadium. Whatever activity had once taken place in the arena could have been witnessed by thousands of people, standing or sitting above. The place was lit by floodlights and there were still twenty or thirty tourists wandering through the ruins. Nobody took any notice of their arrival. They had come out of nowhere and Atoc had made sure nobody had seen them arrive.

“This… Sacsayhuaman,” he told Matt. “Sacsayhuaman means ‘Royal Eagle’ and this place was once a great fortress until the Spanish came. You see the throne of the Inca!” He pointed to the rough shape of a seat that had been cut into the rock on the opposite side. There was a girl in a fleece sitting there, having her photograph taken. Atoc frowned in distaste. “Now we leave,” he said.

There were a few taxis and a single bus parked in a car park on the other side of the ruin. Matt could see a road twisting back down the hill and into Cuzco. But that wasn’t where they were heading. For the second or third time that night, Matt stopped in total amazement. Right in front of them, out of sight behind the Inca throne, a helicopter stood waiting for them with two more Indians on guard, looking out anxiously for any sign of the police. Matt could now see how much organization had gone into finding him. From the moment he had run out of the main square in Cuzco, an invisible net had been drawing in on him, waiting to scoop him out.

“You’re not serious,” Matt muttered.

“We must go long way,” Atoc said.

“Where’s the pilot?”

“I’m the pilot. I fly you.”

There were just four seats in the helicopter, two in the front, two behind. The cabin was little more than a glass bubble in a metal frame, with the rotors hanging limply above. One of the Indians opened the door. Matt hesitated. But wherever they were going, it had to be better than Cuzco. Captain Rodriguez was there, looking for him. The helicopter would take him out of the city. Maybe it would even take him out of Peru.

But before he could move, he heard the sound he had most dreaded. Sirens. The police were on their way, coming to investigate. Someone must have seen the helicopter land. And suddenly there they were, two cars no bigger than toys bouncing up the road, still far below, but getting nearer all the time. Atoc pushed Matt forward. It was definitely time to leave.

But Pedro wasn’t budging. Matt could see how tense he was, his fists clenched, refusing to move. Pedro turned to Atoc and let loose a torrent of Spanish. Atoc tried to reason with him. Matt remembered how he had felt as they took off from Heathrow. He had been sweating. Pedro would never have flown in his life, and to him this helicopter must look like some sort of nightmare, oversized insect.

The police cars were getting closer. Their headlights seemed to be reaching out in front of them, eager to arrive first. Pedro stayed where he was. He pointed at the helicopter and snapped out a few ugly words. Atoc held up his hands – a gesture of surrender – but at the same time he spoke again. His voice was soft despite the urgency. The first police car was perhaps a quarter of a mile away.

At last Pedro turned to Matt. “Tu que piensas?” he asked.

Matt hoped he’d understood. “It’s OK,” he said. “I think we should go.”

Pedro let out a deep breath. He unclenched his fists, ran forward and clambered in. Matt could see how much effort it took. He followed. Atoc climbed into the front seat and punched at the controls. The rotors began to turn.

Matt wondered if they had left it too late. It would be several minutes before the helicopter was ready for take-off. The rotors were turning so slowly that he could see each one. The police cars were so close now that he could make out the men inside. Pedro wasn’t even watching. As the engine began to scream, he went completely white and sat frozen, staring out at the sky. The first police car reached the car park and tore over the gravel, heading towards them. But then its windscreen shattered and Matt saw that the Indian who had opened the door for them was holding a slingshot, like Pedro’s. He had hurled a stone at the car and scored a direct hit. The police car wheeled around and came to a halt. Too suddenly. The second police car smashed straight into it, spinning it round. Both cars stalled and were still.

The doors opened and uniformed men tumbled out, pulling guns from their holsters. The two Indians next to the helicopter turned and ran. Matt wondered what would happen next. They were sitting targets. The rotors still weren’t turning fast enough. He glanced round and saw the tourists diving for cover. One of the policemen took aim.

But the rotors had finally picked up speed. Suddenly the dust rose in a cloud. The policemen disappeared from sight and Matt guessed they must have been blinded. Pedro cried out. The entire cabin had rocked as Atoc played with the controls. Then he pushed forward and the helicopter lurched into the air, hovered for a moment, then spun round and flew into the moonlight. Behind them, the great stones of Sacsayhuaman quickly shrank away.

The policemen cursed and rubbed grit out of their eyes. By the time they were able to look up, the helicopter had gone.

Anthony Horowitz

Evil Star