The Devil's Breath (40 page)

The pilot prepared to lift off. “No!” Max cried, and jumped to the ground. Without hesitation Mr. Peterson and the soldiers followed him as he sprinted into the hangar. “Dad! Where are you? Can you hear me?” he screamed.

A blur of white against the distant wall caught Max’s eye. Zhernastyn. He’d know where his dad was, but as he shouted his name Mr. Peterson caught up with him and grabbed him.

“Enough, Max! We have to get away! Take him!” Mr.

Peterson yelled to the soldiers, who roughly grabbed him and pulled him back towards the helicopter. “Mr. Peterson! Dad’s here! Right here! Don’t leave him! Please! Please!”

No matter how he fought and kicked, he was no match for the tough soldiers.

“The place is gonna blow, mate. You’ve done all you could,” one of the men shouted as he covered their retreat, his machine gun tucked into his shoulder. Max had never felt such despair. All the fight went out of him. He had lost. And he had used his very last ounce of energy to keep going. There was nothing left inside him now. No matter how much he willed himself, his body had finally failed him.

One last gasp of hope.

The key!

The Humvee.

Where else could his dad be? He would have crawled away from the blaze and the gunfire when Max had escaped. The armor-plated Humvee was the only safe place to hide, but if they didn’t get him out he would be burned to death.

“The Humvee!” Max yelled.

He looked into Mr. Peterson’s eyes and for a brief moment it seemed that Peterson faltered. He stopped as they dragged Max further and further away from finding his father. And then Mr. Peterson turned back into the hangar.

Somewhere in there, lights were flashing. Max could barely see now; the rain stung his eyes and the helicopter’s noise beat the air out of his ears, but there were definitely orange lights flashing and a siren—a car’s alarm. The weight
of clouds sat over them now and the wind’s unearthly growl cut a frightening wound through the air.

His back scraped against the metal floor of the helicopter.

Voices shouted. They had to go. Time was up. They had to go now!

The black shape with the lights flashing and the struggling sound of the alarm was a Humvee. His dad hadn’t made it out, but he was in there. Max screamed at the soldiers, but no one could hear him shouting against the storm and the helicopter’s rotors that his dad was in there. That his dad must have heard the helicopter, must have heard Max’s voice calling to him. That his dad had set off the Humvee’s alarms. To alert them. For help.

Strong hands still held him. The helicopter quivered, the skids lifted.

Then one of the soldiers, eyes squinting against the rain, pointed.

From out of the hangar, through the curtain of rain, Mr. Peterson was holding his friend, Max’s dad, carrying him like an injured child towards the impatient helicopter.

Drenched by the rain, but alive, Tom Gordon was hauled into the helicopter. Soldiers yanked Mr. Peterson aboard, and the pilot worked hard to get them airborne.

Max’s eyes were closing. As the storm snatched at them, he saw a break in the clouds and spotted the figure of a man in a white coat, making his escape in a boat, down the slipway, into the river, where the boat settled for a moment and then began to sink.

In his panic to escape, Zhernastyn had forgotten that the boat was in need of repair.

The clouds closed around the picture of the man in the rain-stung water as bow waves rippled towards him.

Crocodiles don’t mind bad weather.

The wind and rain muffled the explosion, and the clouds shrouded the fort’s collapse. It didn’t matter anymore.

Father and son lay, soaking wet, next to each other on the cold metal floor. Max pulled himself against his unconscious father, lay an arm across him, and put his head against his chest.

He wanted to hear his heartbeat.

Nothing else mattered.

Fading words, snatched through the noise, penetrated his thoughts.
Too late to reach Chang … troops can’t … thousands’ll die … poison water … weather shut down … rain cleared at dam … but … too dark … too late … too late
.

Carried into a storm-blasted lullaby, the swaying helicopter rocked him this way and that. But the frightening sensation of being at the mercy of a tremendous storm was not what Max felt. Part of him inside had stepped through that place again. His shadow-form had left him on the floor of that bucking helicopter and glided across the darkness that had settled over the land. Now he could feel his feet gripping rock as he ran, hard, unyielding in his determination, and he smelled the musty warmth of another animal nearby.

He ran into the night, instinct guiding him; his lungs burned; his eyes searched for the unseen quarry. Being earth-bound could not help him. And what was less than a thought-beat away became reality. The scudding clouds had taken the rain with them; now there was only the wind, but the wind was second nature to him. He no longer felt the hard-edged stone beneath him; now the sky was his domain.

He saw the steel bird that sheltered in an enclave of rocks, a safe haven from the storms. It sat unmoving, its wings silent. The sword and shield tattooed on its body were defiant in the night.

A movement caught his eye. A blackened shape loped across the rocks where moments earlier he had run, and he heard the familiar whinnying call. The dog-creature stopped. It had gone as far as it could on the clifftop. Max circled. The jackal looked upwards at Max as he heard his own keening call in response.

The lightning that crackled down from its hidden place above the clouds illuminated the mountains—ghostly veils of mist tearing away from the rock face. The concrete bridge between the two mountains. Images repeated themselves from his memory—the dark cave in a black night. He hurtled ever closer. Trying to understand.

The cave was a shape that moved. A man. Big and square-shouldered. He held a dully glowing light in his hand. A control. Some kind of remote device. And as the man held his arm out towards the stone towers that controlled this bridge across the night, Max knew he was at the dam.

Gates in the dam wall began to open. Far below, the white spume of the river’s overspill was already hurtling through the
valley floor. As the floodgates opened wider, a tremendous force of water spewed out. The power seemed even greater than the storm that now punished the land on the horizon.

Was it instinct that made Shaka Chang turn and look upwards? Was it his unfailing ability to know when danger was close? It made no difference. He spun on his heel as Max fell ever faster, directly at him.

It was Shaka Chang’s turn to realize he was finished. Whatever it was that screamed out of the night sky in a near vertical dive shimmered through the darkness. His reflexes didn’t fail him as he smashed a hand through the air, and he connected with talons. The attack stopped him from completing the code on the remote control that would have fully opened the floodgates. He grappled, felt the bite of claw on his hands and arms. He dismissed the pain, but the attack caused him to drop the device, which arced away from his bloodied hands.

One hand grabbed the safety rail to counterbalance his lunge for the remote. The blood on the steel barrier was like oil on glass, and his bulk and weight carried his momentum forward. In his moment of disbelief he felt the breath of ice-cold water flare in his nostrils as he tumbled over the edge. Caught by the thundering torrent that he alone was responsible for, he was snatched and pummeled into oblivion. His scream was unable to escape his final gasp for life.

Max slept for two days. When he woke up he had a ravenous appetite. The private room in the military hospital was basic but comfortable, and the food they brought him was enough for two men.

The doctors insisted he should eat before they allowed anyone to visit him, but they assured him that his father was safe and being cared for and that !Koga had come through his operation.

Once he had scoffed every last morsel, he eased himself achingly onto the cold linoleum floor. His reflection in the bathroom mirror told him that someone had bathed him. His hair, longer than usual, left a pencil line of white between his scalp and a dark brown tan. Now that the dirt and ingrained grime had been scrubbed off, he could see the cuts and bruises he had sustained; some would leave permanent scars. It didn’t matter. What he wanted more than anything right now was to clean his teeth. They felt as though they were caked in cement.

No sooner had he got a mouthful of foaming toothpaste than Sayid barged into the room, and cuffed him round the back of the head. “You’re a bloody hero, mate. I’m gonna eat out on this for a long time to come.”

Max stopped himself from choking and spat the toothpaste out. “I’m OK. Thanks for asking,” he said.

“Oh yeah. How are you? You were out for the count. Couldn’t wake you.”

“I feel as though I’ve been run over by a steamroller.”

“Yeah, you look taller. So, what do you reckon? Freebies forever?”

“Odds are, the powers that be will shut the whole thing down and no one will say anything. Imagine the scare stories that could come out of this. No one would ever fill a kettle again.”

Before Sayid could argue, Kallie tapped on the door. “Up
and about, hey? Next time, go on a guided bus tour, will you, this was too much trouble.” She kissed his cheek, which made Sayid examine the walls a bit more closely.

Max was wearing boxer shorts, but when she looked at him he felt uncomfortably naked. “They said I could come through. Thought I’d say hi. Feeling OK?”

“OK.”

“Yeah, I bet. You did all right.” She smiled. It seemed a hell of a compliment.

“Listen, Kallie, you did wonders out there. I mean, getting me down on the ground and everything.”

“Nah, it was nothin’. You didn’t need me, you’d have sorted it out. Even a monkey could fly one of those things.”

He smiled. It felt good to see her again.

She helped herself to one of the apples on the bedside table. “Pa’s got himself in a state. Says I’m not to be trusted flying around on my own, so he’s grounded me, literally, for a few days. Just long enough to make sure you Brits leave the premises quietly. Want to see !Koga? He’s doing great.”

“Absolutely. Dad first, though.”

“Doctors are doing their rounds, Max,” Sayid said. “Mr. Peterson’ll come and get us when they’ve finished.”

Max grabbed a T-shirt and pulled on a pair of shorts. He winced as he tugged them on.

“That cut on the top of your leg will take a while to heal,” Kallie said. “!Koga told us everything that happened. I reckon you must have done it when you fell into the Devil’s Breath.”

Max nodded. “I suppose it’ll take me a while to put the bits that hurt together with the time when I did it.”

Something didn’t sound right. The cut on the back of his leg was high up. Just below the cheek of his backside.

She smiled as she saw him realize. “Look, I’ve got a brother at home, there’s only one bathroom. They were
short
of nurses! Everyone was running around, looking after your dad. All right?”

“You washed me? All over?”

She shrugged.

He blushed.

“Gross,” said Sayid.

The military hospital was in a small town where mainly army personnel lived. It was where they took soldiers injured in battle. A quiet, little-known place with an airstrip that seeped out of the desert at one end and disappeared into the trees and scrubland at the other. The perfect place to keep secrets.

!Koga had never worn pajamas in his life, but the military nurses had insisted. Now he sat with the window wide open, his jacket undone, the heat touching his skin. Anything less would be worse than a prison cell for a boy who had never slept under a roof before. There was little sign of the operation he’d had, other than his shaved head and the dressing that covered the surgical wound, and he looked as skinny as ever.

His face burst into white teeth and laughter as Max came into his room. The two boys hugged each other. “You saved my life! They told me!”

“You came back for me. What are friends for?” The
tensions and danger of their journey were behind them, the freedom from fear gave them a lightness they had not known for a long time.

“Miss van Reenen told me everything, and your friend Sayid, and the man who came from England, and Miss van Reenen’s father has taken his plane down to find my family. Then we will go home.” His smile faded a little. “And you will go home.”

“Yes,” Max said, “I will.”

Mike Kapuo stood with Mr. Peterson at the door. “I’m Detective Chief Inspector Kapuo. I need to talk to you two boys. We have to piece this whole thing together from day one.”

“OK,” Max said. “Where do you want us?”

“Well, I know !Koga’s first language isn’t English, and I don’t speak much of the Bushman language, so I’ve brought in an army interpreter; he’s a Bushman, so we’ll talk to !Koga first, and maybe Kallie can stick around to help out.”

Max hugged his friend. “Don’t tell them about the cave paintings and the prophecy. They won’t believe you.” He went out, leaving Mike Kapuo and Kallie with bewildered looks on their faces.

“I will tell them because it needs to be told, and it is the truth,” !Koga said, and laughed.

Out in the corridor Mr. Peterson shook Max’s hand. “Doctors have given you a clean bill of health.”

“Thanks, Mr. Peterson. And thanks for saving my dad.”

“I didn’t—you did. You
knew
he was in there, and I had to give it one last try. You want to see him?”

Max nodded and swallowed the lump in his throat.

They stood for a moment outside his dad’s room, looking through the window at the gaunt figure of his father, who lay in bed, drips feeding into his arm, seemingly asleep. Mr. Peterson put an arm around Max’s shoulders.

Sayid pulled a face. “Sorry, Max, I tried to cover it over. I didn’t know how to tell you.”

Max nodded. “ ’s OK,” he answered quietly.

Mr. Peterson stepped away, allowing Max to go into the room when he was ready. “This is going to take a very long time to try and fix, Max. He’s going to be all right physically, but they hurt his mind—we don’t know how long it will take.” Mr. Peterson hesitated. Max looked at him, seeming to hear the unspoken words—
maybe he’ll never be healed
. “You understand, Max?”