But now the Spaniards could see in front of them the line of Inca warriors, three or even four deep, blocking the road through the terraces to the west of the city. Juan turned to Gabriel. His eyes said what his mouth couldn’t.
With his sword unsheathed, Gabriel shouted the order to increase their speed to a gallop. Itza immediately bounded forward and increased her pace, as though the command was all she had been waiting for. Her mane streaming in the wind, she seemed to be floating towards the enemy, her hooves hardly touching the ground. The other cavalrymen, a compact mass of flesh and steel behind her, moved as one in her wake, followed by the Canaries who, waving their axes and with their shields raised, ran on with astonishing speed, all the while howling at the tops of their voices.
For a brief moment, the Inca warriors squeezed closer together, holding their spears out in front of them and their clubs in their other hands. But everything happened too quickly, faster than the flight of the sling stones that ricocheted off the Spaniards’ chain mail and breastplates. The Incas watched with wide eyes as the horses bore down on them. The ground itself shook, and the hammering sound of the animals’ hooves rattled their own bodies like a vibration of fear. The scything blades of Spanish swords seemed to hack the sun itself into shreds of blinding light. Inca mouths gaped in agony as Spanish steel tore into their flesh while horses’ hooves crushed their bones and staved in their chests. It wasn’t long before the Spaniards had stabbed and slashed the Incas so fiercely that their faces were unrecognizable. They cried out in anguish as the horses, bucking around and around in tight circles, trampled not on stone or earth but on a yielding carpet of flesh and bone. Only then did the Canaries join the fray, adding to the general confusion. The ferocity of the battle doubled, and the dead fell quickly, clearing the way forward for the Spaniards as their swords cut through those Incas still left alive.
The Inca lines had to yield: some warriors flung their clubs at the Spaniards’ heads before taking to their heels, while others effectively committed suicide by standing their ground and trying to thrust their spears into the horses’ bellies or their riders’ legs. But their heroism was futile.
Their chests and hocks now covered in blood, the horses extricated themselves from this tangle of death and galloped toward the first turn in the pass, beyond the reach of the slings.
His face covered in sweat and blood, his body aching from having swung his sword so much, his chest burning, Gabriel, out of breath, nevertheless continued shouting for the Spaniards and their allies to follow him.
He was exultant. His excitement rose above his indifference, his distaste for life. Now he felt a boundless sense of power.
‘Santiago!’ he cried once again, his voice hoarse from shouting.
And in the voices of the Spaniards and their allies as they answered him, in the whistle of falling arrows and the clashing of sword and ax blades, in the cries of agony and triumph, in the din of battle and the thunder of horses’ hooves, Gabriel heard the mountains, the stones, the earth itself placing the mark of victory upon him.
* * *
But the Spaniards and their Indian allies had so far accomplished only the easiest part of their mission. The slopes of the Carmenga Pass proved as steep and as difficult to scale as Gabriel had feared, and it sapped the conquistadors of most of their strength.
For two hours, they climbed up and up the steep, winding road. Sections of the path had crumbled away, leaving spaces barely large enough for a horse to pass or even creating actually impassable crevasses or falls of scree. So until the Canaries, as busy as ants, had finished clearing away the scree or, squatting on their little square shields, bridging the crevasses, the expedition had to suffer the hail of stones flung down upon them from above.
Gabriel smelled the foul stench of fear rising up again from the Spaniards. Impatience and anxiety sharpened by hunger eroded the courage of even the hardiest among them. A stone struck a horse directly on its nose, injuring it, and it reared up in pain. It struck the horse in front of it with its forelegs, and threw its rider, who would have tumbled all the way to the bottom of the ravine had not two Canary warriors saved him. But the panic spread to all the animals in the vicinity, and the ensuing crush almost sent half a dozen horses and their riders plummeting down the cliff face.
‘Dismount!’ shouted Gabriel. ‘Dismount and hold your horses by the bit. Force them to lower their heads!’
But, hearing the men murmuring in protest, Gabriel changed his tone and asserted as confidently as he could:
‘We will pass! We will pass, because we have to!’
Yet Juan looked doubtful. In truth, all the men were haunted by the same thought: that the struggle for the Carmenga Pass would become a repetition of the battle in the Vilcaconga Pass. There, many years earlier and for the first time since they had arrived in Peru, the Spaniards had found themselves in such a dangerous situation that Gabriel, who had been at death’s door, had survived thanks only to his tenacity and his love for Anamaya.
‘It’s the same situation,’ murmured Juan, closing his eyes as though trying to shut out a nightmare. ‘Them up there and us down here… and hampered by our horses.’
‘No,’ said Gabriel in a hushed voice so that Juan alone could hear him, ‘there’s no one up there. The bulk of Villa Oma’s troops are behind us.’
‘May God make it so!’
‘I remember a rocky ledge, just below the summit of the pass. We can remount there, and then follow the terraces to the north-west. They’ll think that we’re leaving the fortress behind us. They’ll think we’re just trying to get away.’
Juan’s only answer was to make the sign of the cross over his bandaged face.
‘Watch out for the stones!’ roared a voice. ‘Watch out for the stones!’
Gabriel instinctively raised his shield over Juan, whose thickly swathed head prevented him from wearing a helmet.
‘Protect yourself, Don Gabriel,’ ordered Juan in a low voice.
This time, the stones fell so thick and fast that it seemed that the entire mountain was avalanching down upon them. The Spaniards held their shields over their heads, but many of these protective coverings cracked, and men shouted as their horses neighed in terror. Everyone, however, including Gonzalo, saw the deluge of stones miraculously miss Gabriel and his white mare, even though they were right in its path and even though everyone else, without exception, had their thighs, backs, and shoulders bruised by the missiles despite the protection of their shields and padded armor. And they saw that Juan was as safe from the stones under Gabriel’s shield as if it were a solid roof.
But no one dared breathe a word. Instead, they tightened their lips and prayed fervently.
When the downpour of stones ceased at last and they had reached the ledge as Gabriel had promised they would, the Spaniards found that the Inca warriors who had been plaguing them from above numbered no more than fifty. They didn’t dare approach closer than the range of a sling and the Spaniards only had to gallop at them briefly for the Incas to turn on their heels and bolt.
Gabriel listened to the Incas shouting to one another as they fled.
‘They think we’re going back to Castile!’ he announced to his compatriots, laughing.
Their relief was as great as their terror had been a little while earlier. Their chests swelled with laughter, and for the moment they felt released from their exhaustion.
‘Santiago! Santiago!’ cried the cavalrymen before crossing themselves and lowering their eyes, as though they preferred not to know to what they owed their success.
Gabriel felt a chill settle on his soul.
He thought about what was to come, and the vision of it filled his mind’s eye as though he had already lived through it.
* * *
It was only in the middle of that afternoon, after a number of detours, that the Spaniards reached at last an uneven platform, strewn with enormous black rocks, from which a gentle slope led down to the back of the Sacsayhuaman fort
ress. The fortress’s high walls were built of massive stones so meticulously fitted together that it was difficult to imagine how human beings had been able to place one on top of another. What was stranger, however, was that there seemed to be no Inca warriors at all standing guard.
Juan ordered the men to stop and rest beside a gurgling spring. Some Canary warriors had been able to catch a few wild rats and even two llamas that had become separated from a herd – no doubt scattered by the war – during their march to their present position. Overjoyed, they carved up the animals and ate them raw, fires being forbidden.
For a long while, a curious silence reigned over the halted expedition. But after a few mouthfuls of meat, savoring the sickly taste of the blood that they drank, even the most exhausted men quickly recovered their energy and alertness. Gonzalo was the first to call for them to attack:
‘It’s time, my brother. We mustn’t wait for night to fall. The Canaries have returned from their reconnaissance mission. The passages between the fortress’s defensive walls are indeed barricaded but, as we thought, no Incas are guarding that part of the fortress. I suggest that our friend Don Gabriel exploit his… unusual gift to accompany the Canaries and open a passage for us. He can send us a signal when we are clear to charge. And as you are in no condition to lead one, dear brother, I suggest that you remain here with a dozen cavalrymen to reinforce us if we need it.’
Gabriel smiled thinly at Gonzalo’s irony. His gaze met Juan’s, and he put his crimson-feathered morion back on his head as he nodded and said:
‘It’s not such a bad idea.’
Then he caught Gonzalo’s glancing stare and what he saw in it gave him the satisfaction that came only with the onset of revenge: he saw that handsome, cruel Gonzalo was afraid of him.
* * *
Gabriel approached the first totally undefended barricade on foot and surrounded by Canary warriors. It took them little time to breach it.
While the Canaries finished dismantling the stone barricade in total silence, Gabriel remounted his horse. He silently urged Itza into the maze of natural rock and thick walls that were the first line of defence around the fortress’s great walls and towers.
He expected to hear an Inca lookout raise the alert at any moment.
But no such cry came.
No one saw or heard him. He passed alongside the little hill that hid him still from the great wall. Soon, he made out the walkway opening up ahead of him, and he slowed to a walking pace until he reached the edge of the vast, grass-covered space at the base of the fortress. He looked at the gargantuan stone blocks that made up its wall.
Gabriel’s heart skipped a beat. No Inca warrior had spotted him. No stone or spear had been thrown at him. Not far in front of him, to his left, the main wall followed a zigzag turn. In it, he could make out a large, trapezoid gate that had been somewhat carelessly barricaded with stones and logs. If they could breach it, they would reach the very heart of Sacsayhuaman.
He had seen enough: sure of the conquistadors’ coming victory, he yanked on his mare’s reins and galloped back to rouse up his companions.
‘Everyone mount your horses!’ Gabriel ordered when he was within shouting range of Gonzalo. ‘The road is clear! Don Hernando is distracting them on the city side of the fortress, and they are completely unaware that we are here.’
As had been arranged, only Juan Pizarro and a handful of cavalrymen remained behind, ready to reinforce Gabriel’s soldiers if necessary. The rest galloped as quietly as they could behind Gabriel on his white mare. They leaped over the dismantled barricade, hurtled past the Canary warriors, and charged the great trapezoidal gate.
It was then that everything went horribly wrong.
They heard a conch horn sound from the top of the round tower. A furious clamor immediately erupted from the top of the great wall. Gabriel was about to launch his forces across the terraces, terraces that had been empty a moment earlier, when he was appalled to discover a hundred, two hundred, possibly even a thousand Inca soldiers assembled in front of him.
Before he had even managed to halt Itza’s flying gallop, he felt the air around him quiver as the warriors whirled their slings so powerfully that they might have been hurling cannonballs rather than mere stones. A moment later, and a hail of stones tore through the air and thrummed above him. The cavalrymen behind, still exposed on the walkway, screamed with pain as they were hit. The horses stumbled on the bouncing stones, throwing their riders forward over their heads, and already there were Inca warriors swarming forward to seize them.
Gabriel roared furiously, scythed his sword through the air and headed back to their rescue. His solo charge terrified Sacsayhuaman’s defenders enough for them to move out of the way. The riders who had been thrown tried to yank their horses back up or else abandoned them, jumping instead onto the hindquarters of their companions’ horses and bolting back the way they had come.
But still, utter confusion reigned among the Spaniards. The Canary warriors, surprised by the sudden appearance of the Incas, defended themselves poorly, and their hand-to-hand combat with the enemy obstructed the retreating cavalrymen. Furthermore, the ground was now so strewn with stones that the horses were able to move only gingerly. Only Gabriel’s mare maintained its gallop, and he charged down on the Incas again and again in a futile attempt to force them back.
No one knew how long this madness lasted.
The Spaniards, their frustration heightened by the growing pangs in their empty stomachs, repeatedly beat early and pitiful retreats to the other side of the first barricade. Gabriel had to come to them five or six times and harangue them to get them to return to the fray.
But their advance was turned back time and again by the hail of stones, long before they ever reached the massive wall. They were utterly unable to follow Gabriel’s white mare, and each time they had to hold their own horses back lest the animals should break their legs.
More than an hour passed, draining the Spaniards of their courage, and now the light was fading from the sky. Gabriel returned to urge them to make one final, heroic effort. But he had only just come up in front of them when a yell of rage exploded in his ear. He raised his shield by reflex and in doing so saved his own life: Gonzalo had brought his sword crashing down when he’d shouted, trying to cut Gabriel in half.
‘Traitor! Filthy vermin!’ screamed Gonzalo, a mad look in his eyes. ‘At last, we see your true colors! May you be cursed to hell for having led us into this trap!’
‘Don Gonzalo!’
‘Shut up, you goat turd! I saw you! We all saw you: the Incas leave you alone! You’ve learned how to dodge their stones, and now you want to lead us right to them so that they can slaughter us at their leisure!’
Gabriel hadn’t time to reply before Gonzalo was at him again, standing in his stirrups, waving his sword and screaming:
‘Compañeros! Compañeros, listen to me: this man is not Saint James come to save us, but a filthy traitor and a devil! Do not follow him! Do not obey him, or he will lead you to your death!’
The Spanish cavalrymen, deeply weary after all their efforts and all their disappointments, stared at the two men, unable to distinguish the truth from the madness. Some crossed themselves, others bandaged their wounded legs, shattered by stones, still others pulled arrows out of one another’s chain mail or from their horses’ breastplates. But then the sound of galloping horses saved them from having to choose. Juan and his reinforcements were approaching them at full speed.
‘Juan!’ Gonzalo shouted furiously. ‘My brother, you put out your hand to a viper, and he’s bitten you! Montelucar has led us to our perdition. He’s the Devil himself! The Incas were expecting us; they had probably even been warned! We will never make it into the fortress! We must go back down to Cuzco before night falls!’
‘Don Juan,’ exclaimed Gabriel, ‘don’t listen to your brother’s nonsense! We still have one chance left: the Inca warriors are as tired of slinging stones at us as we are of receiving
them. Soon they’ll be too tired to even lift their arms! We must attack them one more time: I’ll go alone if I have to!’
Juan didn’t hesitate. He pointed at the fortress with the point of his sword and whipped his horse’s flank. A moment later, the entire contingent had followed in his wake, despite Gonzalo’s protests.
This time, once he was past the first barricade, Gabriel launched Itza down the side nearest to the hill, where he had spotted a few rocks stepped one above the other. His mare bounded up them deftly. He charged at the forward Inca line from behind, forcing them to rush back before they could turn and whirl their slings. His small, single-handed victory so inspired the Spaniards below that they cried out joyously with renewed hope.
A moment later, and Itza’s white mane beneath the red feather of Gabriel’s helmet seemed to be visible everywhere above the mêlée, and even seemed to be moving closer and closer to the great wall. It was a marvel to the Spaniards, who began shouting out victoriously.
But then a horrendous volley of stones and arrows fell upon them from the top of the great wall. Gabriel raised his shield like everyone else, and he heard the deadly patter of arrows slamming into his and Itza’s padded armor.
A brief, unnatural silence followed. Then a terrible cry tore through the air:
‘Juan! Juan! Oh, my brother…’
A hundred paces from Gabriel, Juan Pizarro fell from his saddle and crumpled onto the layer of stones now covering the grass. His bandage had come off, and the entire upper part of his skull was a bloody mangle of bone and brain. The excitement of battle had made him reckless and he had lowered his shield, leaving his unprotected and already wounded head exposed to the enemy’s stones.
Gonzalo was already on his knees at his side, his mouth agape as he wailed and sobbed. He drew his brother to his chest and cradled him like a child, but it was pointless.
The Light of Machu Picchu Page 9
