“Neither would I,” said Chel. “What you’re not seeing, Reston — and it’s not your fault, because you’re not in possession of the full facts — is that the Great Speaker himself will walk voluntarily up the gangplank, straight into our waiting arms.”
“Yeah, right. Because he does that, climbs aboard random aircraft that touch down on his roof.”
“He will if he’s under the impression that this is the disc that’s been chartered to fly him to China for a High Priestly conference due to take place on Two Flint Knife.” Chel grinned. He’d just played the card he’d been keeping up his sleeve all this time, and he was convinced it trumped all.
“Conference?” said Stuart. “I didn’t know there was one happening.”
“It’s not been widely advertised. These hieratic synods rarely are, for security reasons. Only much closer to the date does the information get released, a day or so, and then it’s touted all over the news networks, the biggest thing since, well, the last one. I happen to have heard about it well in advance thanks to an insider in Beijing. Preparations at the Forbidden City have been going on for months. It’s supposed to have been kept under wraps, but you can’t hide that much construction work or that level of heightened security around the venue. The more hush-hush the activity is, the more obvious it becomes that something big is in train.”
“And your man in China knows for a fact that it’s a conference? All the High Priests are going to attend?”
“He does. He’s an Anahuac, a cousin of a cousin of mine. Works in the building trade over there. He’s been supplying labour to the site. They’re putting up a convention hall right where one of the main palaces in the Forbidden City used to stand. They’re also raising a brand new temple ziggurat. There’s going to be some serious sacrificing once the Great Speaker blows into town.”
“How do you know he’s on the level, your cousin’s cousin? Mightn’t the Empire have turned him? Could he be feeding you deliberate misinformation? Couldn’t this all be some Imperial plot to smoke Xibalba out?”
“Ah, so suspicious,” said Chel. “And you are wise to be. However, I’m in absolutely no doubt that he’s telling the truth. He’s sympathetic to our aims, and what with that and our shared blood, I trust him implicitly. That’s why I’ve obtained this aerodisc. That’s why I’ve cooked up this kidnap plan.”
“Kidnap? It isn’t going to stop at that, though, is it?”
“No.” Chel looked grave. “It can’t. The Great Speaker has to die. And he has to die publicly, screaming, begging for his life. As a man, not a god. In mortal terror.”
“In Beijing.”
“That would be the ideal location. The world’s press are going to be there. It’ll be the focus of international media attention. Before hundreds of cameras, before millions of watching eyes, Xibalba will unmask the Speaker and show him to be a human being, as frail as any of us and as capable of dying. We will cut him down just as his priests have cut down so many countless others, and the Empire’s reign of terror will be over.”
Off the top of his head Stuart could think of a dozen objections to this plan. The ways it could go wrong were many and obvious. For one thing, they had to make sure the Serpent Warriors at Tenochtitlan were fooled into believing this disc was the one that had come to fetch their master. For another, it was a distance of several thousand miles from Anahuac to Beijing. Could such a rusty old rattletrap make it that far? And assuming they got there in one piece and were able to stage a public execution for the Great Speaker, wasn’t there a chance people might be made to think it was faked? The Empire could claim the whole thing was a setup, with some hapless impostor duped into wearing a replica set of robes and golden mask. A replacement Great Speaker could be wheeled out at short notice and declare that a vicious prank had been played by enemies of the Empire and the world should pay it no attention.
Chel studied his face and saw all the doubts there.
But he saw something else as well.
“It’s not without its potential drawbacks,” he admitted. “I’m well aware of that. Some might even call it harebrained. But imagine if we manage to pull it off. Just imagine. The Empire is predicated on the fact that its Emperor is Moctezuma the Second, ancient and everlasting. If we were to prove convincingly otherwise, it would have nothing to stand on. It would fall heavily and hard. And…”
He moved a step closer to Stuart.
“What a grand gesture it would be. What a spectacular coup. I know your love of the bold, flashy statement, your flair for the dramatic. You understand that that’s what’s needed to get one’s point across. A slumbering public has to be woken up. It has to be shocked out of its complacency. People are numb, docile — sheep. What else was the Conquistador about if not throwing a metaphorical grenade in their laps? This would be the biggest grenade of all. The effects of its explosion would be felt for all time. It could change everything!”
Chel looked deep into his eyes.
“Let’s set it off. Let’s at least try.”
SEVENTEEN
Same Day
Stuart was on first watch that night. He and a man called Auilix patrolled the perimeter of the clearing separately, Stuart at one end, Auilix at the other. Every now and then they met in the middle to exchange nods and maybe a word or two.
Since his conversation with Chel, Stuart had oscillated between feeling the Xibalba leader was hopelessly deluded and wondering if he might not be on to something. If the plan could be carried out without a hitch, it would make everything Stuart had done as the Conquistador look small-time indeed. It might even, as Chel insisted, cause the Empire to crumble. At the very least, shake it to its foundations and leave significant cracks in its facade.
But…
The odds against success were inordinately, almost ridiculously high.
But…
If there was even a tiny percentage chance it would work, wasn’t it worth attempting?
One Flint Knife was half a trecena away. Stuart had seven days to make up his mind.
The rainforest was unusually loud this evening. The animals seemed to have recruited several new members to their nightly glee club. The racket made it hard to think. Stuart, as he did his semicircular circuits of the clearing, could scarcely hear his own footfalls.
Then, all of a sudden, it stopped.
A hush descended.
The hush stretched on, as eerie as it was absolute.
Stuart strode over to Auilix. The Mayan had the lightning gun, while Stuart had a semiautomatic rifle. Stuart could see he was perturbed.
“What’s up?” he whispered. “Why’s it gone so quiet?”
Auilix shook his head uncertainly, and both men stared into the darkness of the trees. The only sounds were the burble of the waterfall, the faint ripple of a breeze through high branches, and their own breathing.
“Sometimes, if there’s an apex predator around, the other animals are subdued,” Auilix said. “But not like this. Not this silent.”
Stuart felt the hairs prickle on the backs of his hands.
“Someone…” said the Mayan, so softly it was almost inaudible. “Someone is moving around out there.”
Immediately Stuart racked the bolt handle on the rifle. The sound seemed astonishingly loud, but he was happy with that. Whoever was in the forest, he wanted them to know he and Auilix were aware of their presence and ready to deal with them.
His eyes searched for movement. With the Eagles he had learned to use peripheral vision at night. The blind spot at your focal point, his training sergeant had said, could hide an elephant.
There.
Black amidst the blackness. Something shining. A glint.
Stuart raised the rifle and sighted along the barrel.
But the glint had gone. It could just have been moonlight reflected off a leaf.