Pyramid of Blood (Swords Versus Tanks Book 3) (4 page)

Ranulph accepted his sword.

"I will follow you in war and peace," said Sigurd.

Ranulph returned the blade. "Sigurd Flaxenlocks, I shall be your good lord."

“Who else…” began Ranulph.

Jasmine shouted from the control car, "Land!"

#

Now respectably covered by her grey shirt and baggy grey trousers, Jasmine pointed to port out of the Control Car's window.

Ranulph vaulted down to join her. He pressed his face to the unnatural glass.

The wind was carrying them west into a great bay. Ahead, low cliffs rose from wide white-sanded beaches. Beyond the cliffs, dark green hills rippled off beneath the black storm clouds.

Jasmine raised her double-tubed spyglass. “Do you see those mounds? Behind the cliffs?”

Ranulph strained his eyes. Now she had pointed them out, he could see them. Every so often, the smooth green was broken by strangely regular mounds of rock. “What are they?”

"Pyramids! We’ve reached the Tolmecs," she said.

“The Land of Black Glass!” declared Ranulph.

The Northmen cheered. They half tumbled, half climbed down into the control car. There was just standing room for all of them.

Jasmine lowered her glasses but did not join in the jubilation.

Ranulph touched her shoulder. He lowered his voice, “You seem troubled, Milady.”

Her lips twitched. “Well, on the one hand, their national drink is almost pure alcohol, which would do nicely in the fuel tank – make the airship fly properly, I mean." Jasmine slid into the pilot’s chair. “But on the other hand—”

The airship came alive under Ranulph’s feet and surged forward toward the green landmass.

The soldier woman threw up her hands. “Shit and fuck we’re underway.”

The Northmen fell to cheering and exchanging boasts about the treasure they would loot.

Jasmine, however, was chanting, “Oh shit. Oh shit.”

“I take it,” said Ranulph, leaning over her, “that you’re not making this happen?”

She shook her head. “I haven’t even switched on the engines, Big Guy. Something’s yanking us west.”

“Interesting,” said Ranulph, not fully understanding her words. “So what was the
other hand?
”

“Other hand?” asked Jasmine. Her gaze drifted down. She blushed. “Hadn’t you better get dressed, by the way?”

“You said,” persisted Ranulph. “
On the one hand
there will be fuel…”

“Oh.” Jasmine threw him a look over her shoulder. "On the other hand, the Tolmecs tend to be literal about giving your heart to God."

The airship bumped and shuddered like a longship skipping over the waves.

CHAPTER FIVE

At the top of every Tolmec pyramid, quaint stone benches provide rest for the weary. Nearby, carved Spirit Forms proffer trays; no doubt once laden with wholesome vegan fare.

— Stella Ibis-Bear, "The Path of Enlightenment" (Kinghaven Theosophical Society, 1917)

#

Pearl-eyed fishermen looked up from their rafts as Airship 01 glided over them at 90 metres, straight for the summit of the grey-stone pyramid that rose from the clifftops.

Jasmine wiped the sweat from her brow and adjusted the field glasses.

Under the canopy of oily cloud banks, the artificial mountain looked like a smoldering gasoline engine half-sunk in a bed of moss. It even had a ragged comb of statuary to stand for the stubs of torn-off coolant tubes.

Jasmine shuddered despite the heat. This was where Rhodes D Miller had filmed
Von Hoflich and the Pyramids of Blood.
True, Jasmine had spent most of the movie in the back row of the cinema being groped by one of her brainless prize fighters. Even so, she’d learnt quite enough about Ancient Tolmec culture when Rosetta had decided to cash in on the film with a series of Tolmec paintings, and
then
wouldn’t stop talking about her research.

"This is powerful sorcery," said Sir Ranulph. "I wonder if they will share it with us."

Jasmine laughed. "You won’t find magic here.” Von Hoflich certainly hadn’t, otherwise history would be have been very different.

Sir Ranulph moved to stand next to her. "And yet, it seems to me that something uncanny draws us to that castle."

"
Pyramid
," she corrected. "Like a cathedral, but pagan. That mini-pyramid on top is the sanctuary." But it was true. The airship was sailing straight for the pyramid as if under full power. What had Lowenstein called it?
Psychokinesis
. She shook her head. Fooling her mind into thinking Maud was invisible was one thing. Controlling something the size of an airship, was another thing entirely. "They probably sited the pyramid for the odd air currents."

"If it is a heathen holy place and we are not invited, we shall find a poor welcome."

"No shit!" Jasmine considered. "But, landing early would mean ditching. And I’ll bet the grapple will latch onto that pyramid.”

A now-familiar pause as the medieval knight digested her words. It was too easy to forget the four-hundred year gulf between them. "Then we shall take the adventure of the temple." Sir Ranulph shrugged his broad shoulders – not a shrug, a
stretch
; the kind athletes do before a competition. "In the past, my sword has proven a fine ambassador."

Thorolf grunted something in Northern. The other barbarians broke into feral laughter.

A fist clutched Jasmine’s heart. When they didn’t find magic, they wouldn’t bother to seek service with the Tolmec government, they’d just conquer the place. Thanks to her, Sir Ranulph and his monstrous barbarians would overthrow the ancient civilisation twenty years early, and just before Integration Workers could give them their own reservation. Even if their priests were as murderous as the movie made out, the ordinary Tolmecs didn’t deserve to be invaded.

Jasmine cleared her throat. “Do you know a certain Von Hoflich?”

Ranulph frowned. “Oh, young Baron Von Hoflich? I met him in passing at the Imperial court. I hear he pawned his lands to finance a voyage around the the Horn of Muspell.”

“Well in my history, he’s due to come
here
with three ships. Only one ship makes it home, and that’s with a crew of six survivors.” No need to tell Ranulph about the second expedition that conquered the Tolmecs.

“Ah,” said Ranulph. “Ragnar and Hjalti did mention that the locals were dangerous.”

"Since I know about the Tolmecs," said Jasmine. "Suppose you make
me
your ambassador. I’ll get fuel for the airship so I can fly you guys home." A few extra men would hardly tip the balance against the Egality, and she’d be saving an entire culture.

A moment’s silence. Then Sir Ranulph said, "What of magic?"

"I’ll leave that to you." An easy promise to keep since he’d find none.

"If I have your parole?" he said.

"Of course. I'll need my weapons."

"Your dagger and baldric should suffice," said Sir Ranulph. He gave orders in Northern.

The airship climbed a little. She'd just have to hope the wind didn't change direction. She nudged the rudder so as to steer to the left of the great pyramid.

"What are you doing?" asked Ranulph.

"I can't just do a bootlegger turn," she said. "I need to bring her back into the wind." She glanced at the fuel gauge. The needle was on red, she might only have one attempt. Ranulph's barbarians had better understand their duties.

As they passed the pyramid, the thermals lofted the airship, opening up the view of the hinterland. Far, far, below, ant-like figures swarmed over a wide avenue which formed a muddy skid-mark through the heart of a sprawling city. Now figures were visible on the pyramid’s summit, all gathered in front of the sanctuary house.

Unnaturally squashed faces regarded the airship – she remembered the bit in the movie where Von Hoflich discovered the Tolmecs lashing boards to their children's heads to promote an elongated shape. Feather headdresses waved in the breeze. Obsidian-headed axes twitched, flashing reflections in what light oozed through the black clouds.

Just one person did not turn to stare: a naked girl stooped over a stone altar. Petite, pert-buttocked with skin like wet sand. Jasmine chuckled. A week was too long to spend in the company of unshaven men. She raised her fieldglasses.

The girl raised a pulsing red blob over her head then lovingly deposited it on a tray held by a carved fish with too many tentacles –
any
would be too many — which stood by the altar like a nightmare surgeon's assistant. Jasmine glimpsed golden body jewellery, then the corpse splayed out on the stone plinth. The man’s ribcage gaped like the exit wound from an anti-armour round. Despite the breeze that carried along Airship 01, the air around the altar seemed still. The clouds of incense were not enough to keep off the flies. Jasmine’s stomach lurched.

Just a single human sacrifice. Why did that seem worse than the wholesale carnage of war?

"They have no steel," said Thorolf. He handed Jasmine her utility belt then pushed past to press his bearded face to the Flexiglass.

"But is booty. And bare-naked ladies," said Sigurd. He added something in his native tongue, setting off another round of laughter.

"Not a good plan," said Jasmine. She opened the throttles.

"Indeed," said Sir Ranulph over the whine of the engines. He turned to his men. "There will be no plunder or rapine unless I order it." He repeated the phrase in Northern – Jasmine caught words which sounded like
plunder
and
ravish
— and felt her muscles unclench. If the big knight was going to take her seriously, then she might just come out of this with clean hands and the full complement of internal organs.

Jasmine glanced at Sir Ranulph. "Landing stations." He gave the order and six of the most competent barbarians hurried off to take their stations by the cable winches.

Jasmine heaved on the rudder, threw the port engines into reverse. The airship turned. Creaking and groaning, it swung seaward to face the pyramid.

The pyramid was steep-sided with a single narrow stair running up to the platform. Statues bracketed the stair, each a potential anchor point for the mooring cables. Meanwhile, the sanctuary house rose from the top of the pyramid like a lost bungalow. The spires on its roof looked solid enough for the grapple.

Jasmine eased back the throttles. She ran out the prow grapple and the airship's nose dropped five degrees.

The priestess turned to confront the airship, her long face as impassive as that of a graven god. Gore mottled her skin like a crimson parody of Stormwarrior camouflage.

The headwind died and the pyramid rushed closer. Tolmecs half-tumbled off the platform and down the steps. The long-faced girl merely wiped her knife on the corpse then slid it into a golden sheath that nestled between her small breasts.

The vessel shuddered to a halt. Its shadow fell on the Tolmecs, sending them scurrying down the steps. The grapple clanged shut. Then the ship rebounded, every strut creaking and groaning.

"Now what?" asked Sir Ranulph.

Jasmine switched on the intercom and barked, "Landing drill!" She flicked the switch.

Electric motors hummed as a half a dozen winches paid out mooring lines. One by one they cut out, switched off by the change in tension as the Northman dangling from each got his feet onto one of the pyramid’s tiers.

Jasmine angled the engine nozzles to counteract the now slightly positive buoyancy and the ship sank towards the pyramid.

"What's happening?" asked Ranulph.

"Just giving them some slack!" She glanced up over her shoulder. "Shut up and let me do my job."

Sir Ranulph's eyes twinkled. "Aye aye, Captain."

She switched off. Without the rotors forcing it earthward, the ship floated up, then came to a halt. Jasmine mopped her brow with her sleeve. "That's the ride home guaranteed — your boys have done a good job for a bunch of hairy-assed barbarians."

Ranulph grinned. "You should see them crew a dragon-prowed longship in a storm."

Jasmine pulled a lever and the gangplank slammed down like a drawbridge, blocking her view of the pyramid. She slipped out of her seat and bounded up the Control Car ladder.

Ranulph grinned and handed her her combat dagger. She slotted it into its sheath and felt… complete. This was the longest she'd been without a weapon in years. "What about my Stormgun?"

Ranulph chuckled. "It is safe." He pointed towards the hatch. "Come! While they are still astonished." He strode towards the head of the aluminium mesh ramp.

Jasmine ran after him.

The wind had stopped and the humidity hit her like a warm shower. She blinked sweat from her eyes and tripped at the foot of the ramp. The stones slammed into her soles, then her knees and hands. She found herself looking at a pair of sleek brown feet. Gold hoops encircled each blood-flecked toe. More clasped the ankles and thighs. Smaller loops even hung from her-

Mother of God!
Jasmine winced and looked away. Slowly, she stood and faced the priestess.

The crowd fell silent. "I am Lady Wisdom-at-Night," said the girl in perfect Modern Western. "Priestess of the Dancing Earth Fish. Are you Gods or Magicians?" Her lips didn’t really move in sync with her words. It was like watching a poorly dubbed foreign movie — a Saumurian one, given that the speaker was a naked girl. More of Lowenstein’s Anomaly?

Jasmine glanced down the pyramid. Airship 01 was properly secured to the statues lining the temple's great stair. Moorings fastened, the six mailed Northmen climbed back up the steep steps between lines of gawping Tolmec warriors.

There was plenty that was extraordinary, but none of it obviously magical.

Lady Wisdom-at-Night, however… even her eyes spoke of dark secrets. Half-faded tattoos of sea creatures zigzagged over her cheekbones and she wore her bloody nudity like a uniform.

Jasmine made herself check for threats. The Tolmec audience on the lower tiers of the pyramid showed no signs of interfering. However, most of them hefted volcanic-glass-headed axes, reminding her of how South Sea natives hacked up Captain Whitehaven for masquerading as a god. She coughed, then raised her voice. "We are magicians travelling foreign lands. We bring you gifts of fine fabrics and outlandish garments."