Temple (44 page)

And all the while making a fake idol for you. No, I have done my
share, and now I am leaving.'
'Have you no loyalty to your people?'
'My people put me in jail, Renco,' Bassario retorted harshly. 'Then
they punished my family for my crime—banished them to live in the
filthiest, roughest quarter of Cuzco.
My sister was molested in that slum, my father and mother beaten
and robbed. The robbers even broke my father's fingers, so that he
could no longer fashion stone. He was left to beg—to beg for scraps
to feed his family. I have no grudge
against my own punishment, no grudge at all, but then I also have
no loyalty whatsoever to the society that punished my family for a
crime that was mine and mine alone.'
'I am sorry' said Renco softly. “I did not know of these incidents.
But please, Bassario, the idol, the Spirit of the People '
'It is your quest, Renco. Not mine. I have done enough for you,
more than enough. I think I have earned my freedom.
Follow your own destiny and allow me to follow mine.'
And with those sharp words, Bassario shouldered his longbow and
climbed down into the quenko and disap peared into the
darkness.
/ Renco did not attempt to stop him. He just looked after him, his
face awash with sadness.
Now it was that the rest of us were all prepared for our con
frontation with the rapas. All that remained was one final
touch.
I picked up the small bladder of monkey urine that the toothless
old man had given to me earlier that night and opened its
cap.
At once, an utterly vile odour assaulted my olfactory pas sages. I
winced at the odour and despaired at the prospect of pouring the
foul-smelling liquid over my body.
But I did so nonetheless. And oh, how putrid it was! It was no
wonder the rapas detested it.
Renco chuckled at my discomfiture. Then he took the small bladder
from me and began dousing himself in the stinking yellow liquid.
The bladder was passed to the other warriors who would be venturing
up into the mountains and the too, began bathing themselves in the
foul, reeking liquid.
As all was approaching readiness, Lena returned with a much larger
animal bladder—a llama's bladder, I guessed— also filled with
liquid.
'The rainwater you requested,' said she to Renco.
'Good,' Renco said, taking the llama's bladder from her.
'Then we are ready to go.”
Renco poured a trickle of rainwater from the llama's blad der over
the real idol.
It hummed to life instantly, singing its melodious song.
The interior of the citadel was empty. Lena had already sent the
women, children and old folk of the village down into the quenko to
commence their journey into its labyrinthine tunnels, a journey
that would ultimately take them to the waterfall at the edge of the
tableland. Lena herself had stayed behind in the citadel, ready to
shut the doorstone after us.
'All right,' said Renco, nodding to the pair of Incan war riors
manning the doorstone. 'Now.'
At that moment, the two Incan warriors rolled the big
stone aside, revealing the dark night outside.
The rapas were right there!
Waiting for us.
Gathered in a wide circle immediately outside the citadel's stone
doorframe.
I counted twelve of them—twelve enormous black cats, each possessed
of demonic yellow eyes, high pointed ears and powerful muscular
shoulders.
Renco held the singing idol out in front of him and the rapas
stared at it, transfixed.
Then, abruptly, the idol stopped its singing and equally suddenly,
the rapas broke out of their trances and started a low
growling.
Renco quickly doused the idol with more water from the
llama's bladder and the idol's song resumed and the rapas lapsed
into their hypnosis once again.
My heart also started beating again.
Then, with the idol in his hands and the seven Incan war riors and
myself in tow behind him, Renco stepped through the citadel's
doorway and out into the cold night air.
The rain had stopped—at long last—and the clouds had parted
somewhat, revealing the starry night sky and a bril liant full
moon.
With flaming torches held high above our heads, we made our way
through the village and onto a narrow path that ran alongside the
river.
The rapas were all around us, moving with slow, deliber ate steps,
keeping their bodies low to the ground while at the same time
keeping their eyes fixed on the singing idol in Renco's
hands.
My fear was extreme. Nay, it must be said that I have never been
more terrified in my life.
To be surrounded by a pack of such enormous, danger ous
creaturesreatures totally devoid of pity or mercy, creatures that
killed without the slightest hesitation.
They were so big! In the flickering firelight of our torches the
muscles on their shoulders and flanks rippled orange.
Their breathing was loud too—a kind of deep-chested bray ing sound
not unlike that of a horse.
As we walked along the riverside path, I looked behind me and saw
Lena standing at the edge of the village holding a torch, watching
after us.
After a few moments, however, she vanished from my view—having
decided, I imagined, to go back to the citadel and carry out her
duties there. We continued on our journey up to the mysterious
temple.
Along the path we went. Nine men—Renco, myself and the seven Incan
warriors—surrounded by the pack of rapas.
We came to the mountainside, to a narrow passageway set into the
rockface. One of the Incan warriors told Renco that the temple was
to be found at the other end of this passageway.
Renco doused the idol once again. It sang loudly, its high- pitched
tone cutting through the early-morning air. Then he entered the
passageway, the cats trailing close behind him like children
following a schoolteacher.
As we walked down the narrow passageway by the light of our flaming
torches, one of the Incan warriors foolishly attempted to stab one
of the entranced rapas with the point of his spear—but just as he
was about to drive his weapon into the beast's flank, the rapa
turned on him and snarled ferociously, stopping him in mid-lunge.
The big cat then just turned forward and resumed its enraptured
pursuit of the singing idol.
The warrior exchanged a glance with one of his companions.
The rapas might have been entranced, but they were not totally
defenceless.
Now it was that we emerged from the narrow passageway into a wide
circular canyon of some kind. As the chieftain Vilcafor had said, a
most incredible finger of stone shot up out of the middle of it,
soaring high into the night sky.
A path was cut into the canyon wall to our left—the .escape path
Vilcafor had ordered his people to build. It curled around the
circumference of the cylindrical canyon, spiralling up and around
the finger of stone in its centre.
Renco mounted the path, stepping slowly upward, holding the wet
idol in his hands. The cats followed him. The Incan warriors and
myself walked slowly up the path behind them.
Up and up we went. Round and round, following the steady curve of
the path.
At length we came to a rope bridge that stretched out over the
canyon, connecting the outer path to the finger of stone in the
middle of the great canyon.
I looked out across the ravine at the stone tower opposite
me.
On top of the tower, surrounded by some low-cut foliage, I saw a
magnificent stepped pyramid not unlike those found in the lands of
the Aztecas. A box-shaped tabernacle was mounted atop the imposing
triangular pyramid.
Renco crossed the bridge first. The cats followed him, one by one,
bouncing with supreme surefootedness across the long swooping
bridge. The warriors went next. I crossed last of all.
Once I had navigated my way across the bridge, I mounted a series
of wide stone steps which opened onto a clearing of some sort. At
the head of this clearing lay the portal to the temple, the
entrance.
Wide and dark, square and menacing, it yawned open as if daring all
the world to enter.
With the wet idol in his hands, Renco approached the portal.
'Warriors,' said he and firmly, 'man the boulder.'
The seven warriors and my humble self hurried over to the boulder
that stood to the side of the temple's yawning entryway.
Renco stood in the mouth of the portal, dousing the idol with
rainwater, causing it to continue its melodious song.
The cats stood before him, staring at the singing idol,
hypnotised.
Renco took a step inside the temple.
The cats followed him.
Renco took another step down and the first cat went inside after
him.
Another step.
A second cat, then a third, then a fourth.
At which stage Renco tipped as much water as was left inside the
llama's bladder over the idol, and then—after taking a final solemn
glance at his people's most prized possession—he hurled it down
into the dark depths of the temple.
The cats leapt inside the temple after it. All twelve of
them.
'Quickly, the boulder!“ Renco cried, hurrying out of the temple's
entrance. 'Push it back into the portal!'
We pushed as one.
The boulder rumbled against the threshold.
I leaned on it with all my might, straining against the weight of
the great stone. Renco appeared beside me, also heaving against
it.
The boulder moved slowly back into the portal. A few more paces to
go.
Almost there…
Just a couple.., more…
'Renco,' a voice said suddenly from somewhere nearby.
It was a woman's voice.
Renco and I turned together.
And we saw Lena standing at the edge of the clearing.
'Lena?' Renco said. 'What are you doing up here? I thought I asked
you to—'
At that moment, Lena was shoved roughly aside, thrown to the
ground, and suddenly I saw a man standing on the stone steps behind
her, and in that single, solitary instant, every ounce of blood in
my veins turned to ice.
I was looking at Hernando Pizarro.
A stream of about twenty conquistadors poured out from the foliage
behind Lena and spread out around the clearing, their muskets
raised and pointed at our faces. The firelight of their torches
illuminated the entire clearing.
They were accompanied by three olive-skinned natives who each had
long, sharp spikes of bone protruding from their cheeks. Chancas.
The Chanca trackers Hernando had employed to follow our trail to
Vilcafor.
Last of all—nay, most ominously of all—came another olive-skinned
man. He was taller than the others, bigger, with a long shock of
matted black hair that came down to his shoulders. He also had a
spike of bone thrust through his left cheek.
It was Castino. The brutish Chanca who had been in the same prison
hulk as Renco at the beginning of our adven ture, the one who had
overheard Renco say that the idol was in the Coricancha in
Cuzco.
The conquistadors and the Chancas formed a wide circle around
Renco, myself and the seven Incan warriors.
It was then that I noticed how filthy they all looked. To a man,
the conquistadors were covered in mud and grime. And they looked
worn and exhausted, weary beyond measure.
Whence I realised—this was all that remained of Her- nando's
hundred-strong legion. On their march through the mountains and the
forests, Hernando's men had died all around him. From disease, from
starvation, or just from sheer exhaustion.
This was all that remained of his legion. Twenty men.
Hernando stepped forward, yanking Lena to her feet as he did so.
Dragging her behind him, he approached the temple and stood before
Renco, staring imperiously down at him. Hernando was a full head
taller than Renco and twice as broad. He shoved Lena roughly into
Renco's arms.
For my part, I cast a fearful glance at the temple's portal.
It was still partially open, the gap between the boulder and the
great stone doorway easily wide enough for a rapa to fit
through.
This was not good.
If the water drained off the idol and it stopped its song, the
rapas would break out of their spells and-
'At last we meet,' said Hernando to Renco in Spanish.
'You have evaded me for far too long, young prince. You will die
slowly.'
Renco said nothing.
'And you, monk,' said Hernando, rounding on me. 'You are a traitor
to your country and to your God. You will die even more
slowly.'
I swallowed back my fear.
Hernando turned back to Renco. 'The idol. Give it to me.'
Renco didn't flinch. He just slowly reached into the pouch on his
belt and extracted the false idol.
Hernando's eyes lit up as he saw it. If I didn't know better, I
would have sworn he began to salivate.
'Give it to me,' said he.
Renco stepped forward.
'On your knees.'
Slowly, despite the sheer humiliation that attended it, Renco knelt
down and offered the idol to the standing Hernando.
Hernando took it from him, his eyes gleaming with greed as he
stared at his long-sought-after prize.
After a few moments, he glanced up from the idol and turned to one
of his men.
'Sergeant,' he said.
'Yes, sir?” the sergeant standing nearest to him replied.
'Execute them.'
My hands were bound together with a long length of rope.
Renco's were too.
Lena was snatched away from Renco by two of the Spanish soldiers,
and the two brutes goaded her with foul utterings of what they
would do to her once Renco and I were dead, utterings which I dare
not repeat here.
Renco and I were made to kneel before a large rectangu lar stone in
the middle of the clearing, a stone that looked like a low
altar.
The Spanish sergeant stood over me, his sabre drawn.
'You, Chanca,' said Hernando, tossing a sword to Castino. Ever
since he had arrived in the clearing, the vile Chanca had been
eyeing Renco with pure unadulterated hatred. 'You may dispose of
the prince.'
'Gladly,' said Castino in Spanish, catching the sword and marching
quickly over to the altar stone.
'Cut their hands off first,' said Hernando judiciously. 'I would
like to hear them scream before they die.'
Our two executioners nodded as two more conquistadors pulled Renco
and myself into position—yanking on our bonds so that our arms were
stretched out across the wide altar. Our wrists were now totally
exposed, our hands ready to be excised from our bodies.
“Alberto,' said Renco softly.
'Yes.'
'My friend, before we die, I would like you to know that it has
been an honour and a joy to have known you. What you have done for
my people will be remembered for gen erations. For that I thank
you.'