Exodus Code (5 page)

The old woman placed her rough hands, the hands of a farmer as wel as a holy woman, gently on Gaia’s shoulders. Even a priestess had to work to sustain life in the tribe. No matter how sacred their purpose, they stil had to eat.

‘The elders wil go with you to bring him back. Can you manage the climb?’

The Priestess looked at Gaia’s feet.

Gaia nodded, quickly braiding her hair and pul ing her cowl over her head, leaving only her dark eyes and dimpled chin visible.

‘If this fal en man is the prophesied one,’ said the Priestess, ‘then he must be sacrificed to the mountain as has been foretold, but, Gaia, if he is not…’

The Priestess did not finish voicing her doubts, fearing what it would do to Gaia if this man was not the one from the prophesy. Gaia’s quick mind had no space for uncertainty in this matter, no crevices for doubt. This was her destiny. Her reason for existing. The Priestess sighed. Gaia may have been born an ancient star guide, but in the old woman’s eyes she was stil a child.

‘Remember what you’ve learned. He must be examined on the mountain, Gaia, and if he is not the one, you must do what you have been trained to do.

He must not return here with you. We must not be discovered until the prophecy can be fulfil ed.’

The Priestess lifted down a long wooden case from a stone shelf. Her knees popping as she bent to lift a sword that rested inside on red satin, its silver hilt carved in the image of the puma with jade for its eyes and a col ar of pure gold.

The Priestess eased the heavy sword into a leather sash fastened across Gaia’s chest. ‘If he is not the one, his head must return to the mountain.’

Gaia nodded. ‘But if it is him?’

‘Then as it has been foretold, you wil assist his return to the stars.’

‘And mine?’ she asked, lifting her head, her eyes blazing, her hand resting on the hilt of the sword.

‘You wil be his guide,’ the old woman replied.

A COPPER BELL forged at Chavin de Huantar had once hung over the entrance to the temple. Its chime would have brought everyone immediately, its particular pitch heard by a Cuari no matter where she was on the mountain. But when it had last been rung, a decade earlier, its chimes had sent Gaia into a madness that it had taken her months to recover from, and her sensitivity to the world was increasing the further she crossed into womanhood.

Instead, the Priestess sent two girls scurrying to cal the rest of the Cuari from the mountain above the vil age. The pair dashed up into the mountainside.

The women set down their tools, hitched up their l amas and al of them processed down the lush green slopes, their chatter like birdsong in the wind.

The Cuari gathered quickly and quietly in front of the Priestess. Propped at the old woman’s feet was a lavishly embroidered pouch, concealing something that was the shape and size of a head.

‘
Mujeres de la montaña
,’ said the Priestess, raising her arms to the sky, speaking in the language of their Cuari ancestors. ‘As the oracle has foretold, the deity has made his escape from the heavens. We must prepare him for his return to Uku Pacha so that time may be free.’

The Cuari glanced at each other, excitement in their eyes. A few whispered among themselves, one or two nodded and looked to the heavens in silent prayer. No one chanted or shouted or praised the heavens aloud. They were far too close to the temple and to Gaia for any vocal demonstrations of their faith.

‘Gaia wil lead you to him,’ said the Priestess, addressing four of the strongest Cuari kneeling before. They were dressed in colourful tunics, with the tribal symbol, three interlocking circles, raised to a point tattooed on the backs of their necks. Their feet were bare, their hair neatly braided, their brown faces mapped with sun and suffering. ‘Remember that if he is indeed the one from the stars, he must be returned here before nightfal , before the heavens discover that he has gone.’

The Priestess lifted the heavy screen from the temple entrance and Gaia stepped out into the sunlight, her cowl protecting her eyes from the dazzling light. The entire vil age prostrated themselves in front of Gaia and the Priestess. A few of the younger women who had been children when Gaia had first gone into the temple had never seen her before, and they gasped at her ethereal beauty, their voices tickling Gaia’s toes. She looked across to the younger women and smiled broadly at them.

The Priestess motioned Gaia to step forward and hold out her wrapped hands. She anointed each of Gaia’s fingertips with balsam oil in a blessing to the mountain for Gaia’s safe passage before handing her the head-shaped pouch, which Gaia accepted with a curt bow. Then, with the help of another Cuari, Gaia slipped the pack over her shoulders with great care, balancing its weight against the tilt of the sword in the sash across her chest. As a guide, Gaia knew she and the Priestess were the only living beings who could have any direct contact with the deity from the heavens. With al her heart, Gaia prayed he was the one – his presence among them, his return to them, would al ow her to bring an end to her suffering without bringing dishonour to the Cuari from the gods.

Before Gaia and the elders began their ascent to the mountain’s flat top, one of the vil age women passed Gaia a pouch fil ed with water, two warm tortil as and a lump of goat’s cheese. Knowing they would not be stopping until they reached their destination, Gaia tore into the sparse meal as she led the procession up into the canyon towards the bil owing smoke.

For anyone else the climb would have been a difficult one, but the Cuari had spent their lives on this mountain and they were as agile in their movements and as skil ed in their climbing as any mountain lion, especial y Gaia. She kept a safe distance ahead of the elders so that their odours and the low hum of their conversation caused her as little discomfort as possible.

When the narrow pass began to flatten out towards the plateau and a field of ice was visible like glass on the horizon, the temperature dropped drastical y. The cold chimed in Gaia’s ears like distant goat bel s. Despite the wax plugs, Gaia could hear a long low moan of anguish in an outcropping of rocks directly up ahead. Gaia tasted saltwater and her fingers tingled. She knew they were close to him.

Gaia raised her hands and stopped the elders, pointing up ahead to the sagebrush and the rocks where the man’s mangled legs and twisted feet were visible, twitching against the ground.

The Cuari stopped, not shocked at the sight of the shattered body and broken limbs caught between the rocks – they had seen enough slaughtered animals in their lives – but at the feral moaning that was emanating from the man. It was terrifying. If this man came from their gods, one of the Cuari elders thought, he was not happy about leaving.

Gaia was about to run forward when the same elder reached out and grabbed her from behind. Gaia flinched as if she’d been struck with a whip.

The elder pul ed away her hands immediately. ‘Forgive my touch,’ she whispered. ‘But he may be dangerous.’

‘He wil not be,’ replied Gaia. Her own voice tasted like ginger root on her tongue. Gaia was far too curious to see what the gods had sent to wait any longer. The elders drew their swords and formed a horseshoe round the rocks, making sure they could not look upon the man, but they could assist their guide if she needed protection quickly. Gaia tiptoed closer to the body.

The mist had lifted from the mountain and the sun was at its peak, long shadows poking like curious fingers between the rocks.

Gaia untied the pouch and set it on one of the larger flatter rocks, halting a few paces from the soft brush where the man had landed. She stared down at him and prayed he was the god who would be the mountain’s salvation. And her own.

He was broken in too many places for Gaia to count, his body lying at odd angles, his arms dislocated from his shoulders, his head lol ing to one side on a pil ow of blood. The back of his skul had flattened in the impact. His face was so swol en that his eyes were slits sliced into his bal ooned skin. Teeth had stabbed through his lips and they were stil oozing blood.

This is not the prophesied one, Gaia thought. This is a mortal man. She turned to the elders. ‘He is not the one the oracle foretold.’

Gaia leaned forward, and tilted the man’s head back, exposing the torn skin and ragged bone of his broken neck. Turning her body, she unsheathed her sword, holding it steady at her side. Living a life cloistered from the world had given Gaia al the time she needed to master most of her ancestors’ fighting skil s. She was as adept with her sword as any knight had been. The jade on her hilt caught the sunlight, sending triangles of light bouncing off the rocks and a melody of flutes in Gaia’s mind.

The man moaned.

Gaia lifted her sword above her head.

In the seconds before Gaia brought down her blade, the man turned his head and Gaia watched in astonishment as his neck healed and the back of his skul fil ed out.

Letting her sword fal at her side, she dropped to her knees. Without knowing why, the elders fol owed their guide’s lead, and they too knelt.

‘Forgive me,’ she said to the man’s swol en face, his lips repairing themselves as she stared.

He howled again. With every smal tear that healed, every bloody wound that dried up, some agonising, mind-blowing pain seemed to be shooting through his brain.

Recognising his suffering, Gaia reached into the pack the Priestess had given her. She slid out a gold mask like the helmet of a Conquistador, with a faceplate shaped like the sun soldered to it.

He seemed to be aware of Gaia’s movements and the soft melodic lilt of her soothing voice, and his howls quieted. Crouching next to his head, Gaia slipped two cacao leaves from her sword’s pouch.

She looked up at the sun. They didn’t have much time. The sun was already making its descent to the underworld, and when it reached Uku Pacha the gods would know this deity had escaped. They had to move quickly if they were going to get him safely to the vil age before night and prepare him for the mountain.

She gently opened his mouth wide enough for her to press the two leaves on his swol en tongue. She poured water into her hands from her canteen then trickled the cool liquid from her fingers into his mouth, lifting his head slightly so he could swal ow. Dripping more water onto her wrapped hand, she mopped his forehead and bathed his swol en eyelids. Then she rubbed soft wax across his cracked lips. He moaned again, softly, less agitated this time.

Gaia thought he was trying to smile.

She stayed at his side until his anguished moaning ceased and the coca leaves had calmed him. When he was silent, she was aware that his legs had healed themselves, bone no longer cutting through his torn trousers. Gaia lifted the mask from the rock above him and eased the golden sun over his face.

Her task completed, she nodded to the elders that she was ready. The four women spread the sling open next to his body and then careful y rol ed him onto the sturdy skin. Gaia noticed that his arms were no longer dislocated.

The revelation that this man was able to heal his own body did not shock her.

He was after al from the heavens.

Lifting the poles onto their shoulders and with Gaia leading their descent, the women raced the setting sun down the steep canyon pass to the vil age.

Langley, Virginia, present day
DARREN CROWDER HAD been a journalist before the Miracle, a good one. He’d been working on the health desk of the
Washington Register
, an online weekly read mostly by policy wonks and government agency bureaucrats. As tragic as it had been, the Miracle had given Darren and his col eagues lots of ‘I told you so’ opportunities as the events of those terrible months had exposed flaws inherent in America and the world’s healthcare policies. When people final y began to die again, two significant global changes occurred as a result: governments increased the personnel in their clandestine agencies in the hopes of avoiding another such event; and, within these agencies, they covertly invested resources to track the three families who were behind the near apocalypse.

Many months and far too many international tribunals and governmental hearings later, the anger and horrors surrounding the Miracle had dissipated, and blame had been spread evenly among governments, corporations, health organisations and NGOs for the catastrophic administrative and leadership failures that had led to such terrible lapses in global morality. Ordinary men and women just wanted their lives to return to some kind of normal. Their deaths, too.

Darren Crowder had been recruited for the Special Activities Division of the CIA. The Deputy Director had read and appreciated Darren’s work post-Miracle Day, and had personal y hired Darren as an analyst. The new agency was known publicly (and any time the Deputy Director was within earshot) as the Office of Geo-Global Affairs; the rest of the time, it was known as ‘the Morgue’, because their mandate was the result of death’s comeback.

Looking across the crowded room, Darren decided that, although this was a branch of the CIA, the space had al the characteristics of a newsroom. Its mandate was unique but its approach was no different – smart men and women gathering information, raking through reports and records to uncover patterns and relationships. In the case of the men and women in this particular room, sifting to discover how deep the power of the three families ran, whether or not they continued to pose a threat, and perhaps the most important question of al , as far as Darren was concerned, who the hel were they?