“Janey Bloody Mac!” Lea yelled as she tumbled over and came to a halt on the grass at the edge of the cliff.
Ryan came to a halt a few yards away and took a breath. “Turns out we’re not going to the moon just yet.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The area known in Mandarin as Dong Jiaomin Xiang, but to the West as the Beijing Legation Quarter was in the very heart of the enormous, sprawling Chinese capital. It contained many of China’s most famous landmarks and buildings, including the Great Hall of the People, the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong and Tiananmen Square.
It also contained the headquarters of the Chinese Ministry of State Security.
The vast building was close to the Forbidden City, but the tourists rarely went south of the Tongzi River, and the building’s purpose was unknown even to most Beijingers. The machinations whirring behind its heavy doors were some of the most secretive on earth, and if the Guojia Anquan Bu, or Guoanbu, didn’t want you to know what they were doing, you didn’t know.
In an unassuming corner office somewhere in the building’s northeast, a thin man in a boring suit buzzed for his personal assistant and moments later she showed another man into the room. The second man had slicked-back hair and a small scar contracture below his lower lip. He nodded his head respectfully at the man in the boring suit and after being invited to take a seat he lowered himself into the uncomfortable wooden chair opposite the desk.
“Good morning, sir,” said the man with the scar.
“You are over two minutes late.”
“I apologize.”
The man in the boring suit, whose name was Zhou Yang, was the second in command of the General Office of the Central Investigation Department. He also ran a small subdivision of ruthless assassins informally named the Zodiac Syndicate. Sitting opposite him, with the scar, was the man they called Tiger. Zhou had long forgotten his real name and would have to search his files to retrieve it, something he was not particularly inclined to do this morning.
“Have you found her?” Zhou said quietly.
“Yes, sir. She is working with an independent Western agency.”
“Based where — London?”
Tiger shook his head. “Not London, but we don’t know beyond that.”
“Last known location?”
“Cartagena.”
Zhou nodded, unsurprised. “The little dragonfly has flown to Colombia, I see.”
“Your orders?”
“She is to be terminated, and so are any of her associates. We do not know what she has told them and we do not take risks.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Make sure you take only your best people with you.”
“Of course, sir.”
“I await your final report with restrained excitement.”
Tiger rose from is chair, bowed to the man and left the office. By the time he had closed the door Zhou was already on his feet and peering out his little window across the enormous courtyard at the center of the Ministry’s sprawling compound.
It was too bad the Dragonfly had betrayed him. Once she had been a loyal servant of the State and it was with disappointment that he had ordered her death. Such a beautiful and merciless creature as that would have had a glowing career ahead of her at the Ministry, but crossing him was unforgivable, and in their trade letting her live would be bad etiquette so he had no choice.
He sighed and buzzed his personal assistant again.
“Yes, sir?”
“One cup of white tea, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
He cut the connection and nodded his head slowly.
Very bad etiquette indeed.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Back at their hotel in Lima, the ECHO team and Luis Montoya grabbed a few cold beers and took stock of the mission. This was the first real chance any of them had to think about Ryan Bale surviving the Seastead battle and being back in the team, but it was bittersweet because of Maria’s death. They had also lost Professor Balta to Saqqal and Kruger, but they had finally got hold of the infamous Mask of Inti.
Now, they stared at the ancient golden mask in awe. It was vaguely circular and around twelve inches in diameter, formed into what was clearly a burning sun, with wild flames around the outside. In the center was a rendering of the face of Inti himself. He stared back at them with blank gold eyes and elongated, decorated ears.
Thanks to gold being the least reactive metal, no oxides had formed on the mask, so despite its ancient provenance it was still as glorious as the day it had been forged by the Incan goldsmith. Scarlet especially had a hard time keeping her eyes off it.
“You all right, Cairo?” Hawke asked.
“Why do you ask?”
“It’s that the way you’re looking at old Inti there I wondered if you two wanted to be alone for an hour.”
“An hour? Don’t judge everyone by your own standards, darling.”
He gave her a wry smile but turned away to face the Peruvian. “We’re going to need your help now, Luis.”
“Golden masks were very common in Inca legend,” Luis began. “Gold played an enormous part in their culture because they believed it was literally the sun’s sweat. They would use it for all kinds of jewellery and ornaments and they would beat it down into thin sheets and make plates, disks and of course masks from it.”
“No wonder the Spanish thought they’d hit the jackpot.” Lexi said.
“I’ll say,” said Scarlet, unable to take her eyes of the glittering mask.
Luis frowned. “The pillage of Inca treasure by the Spanish is a sad story full of violence and theft. When Francisco Pizarro led his conquistadors into the Inca lands back in the early 1530s and took Atahualpa prisoner, it is true that they couldn’t believe how much gold was here. Even today Peru is one of the largest gold-producing nations in the world.”
Scarlet walked to the balcony and looked out over the city. She let out a long sigh as she lit a cigarette. “I’ve finally found home.”
Luis glanced at her. “For most of the people in my country, Peru has a very low standard of living by most Western standards.”
Hawke cleared his throat. “Let’s get back to the mask.”
“As I was saying, it was previously thought that Pizarro held Atahualpa hostage until a ransom was paid, and because he was such a mighty emperor, they got their blackmail money. His people delivered more gold and silver than the Spanish had ever seen before — historians claim it was more than could be carried by fifteen thousand Incas — and the invaders happily took it all, including presumably this mask. Today we think it more likely that Atahualpa offered the incredible amount of treasure simply as a way to keep himself alive.”
“Did it work?” Reaper asked.
Luis shook his head. “It definitely did not work. Atahualpa’s generals, including the famous Rumiñawi continued to make war against the Spanish in a bid to free their emperor, so Pizarro staged a show trial for Atahualpa and found him guilty of rebellion. He was sentenced to be burned to death.”
“Bloody hell,” Scarlet said.
“An especially wicked sentence because it was the Inca’s belief that if you were burned to death your soul would not reach the afterlife. Luckily for Atahualpa, a Spanish friar managed to persuade Pizarro to reduce the sentence and he was garrotted to death.”
Lexi raised an eyebrow. “Yes, that does sound lucky.”
“I know what you mean,” Luis said with a smile. “But it was lucky for the emperor because at least that way his soul could go to the Hanan Pacha, their concept of heaven.”
“Anything else we need to know?” Hawke said.
Luis shrugged his shoulders. “Many years after Atahualpa’s death, another Spaniard named Valverde got married to a princess of the same Inca tribe and according to legend she took him to the famous lost treasure — the greatest collection of plates, goblets, salvers and sculptures ever created. The legend said he became very wealthy overnight and then returned to Spain where he wrote what is now known as the Derrotero de Valverde, or Valverde’s Path in which he carefully described how to find the treasure.”