by David Wood
“Hey Maddock, are there piranha in this river?”
“Some. Why?”
“Because if I have to listen to one more minute of this relationship talk, I’m swimming for it.” He pulled the brim of his Washington Nationals baseball cap down low over his eyes, folded his hands across his chest, and leaned back against a sack of provisions. “Besides, it annoys me that you obviously don’t understand irony.”
Kaylin flashed a wicked grin, gave Dane a satisfied look, and turned to look downriver. “How far do you think we’ll have to go?”
“I don’t know. The Xingu runs north all the way to the Amazon. Could be a long way.” He thought about it. “Thanks to modern transportation and roadways, no matter how badly in disrepair, we’ve already covered a distance that took Fawcett a month or more to trek. We’ll just see how it goes.”
The sun beat down on them as the day wore on and the heat of the Amazon shrouded them like a blanket. Dane kept a close eye out for danger, especially the human sort. According to Simáo, the natives in the area through which they would initially travel were usually easy to deal with, provided one treated them with courtesy and respected their lands. Dane was more concerned about the threat posed by ScanoGen. He had no doubt they too were following Fawcett’s trail, and he wondered what resources they might bring to bear.
By late afternoon, however, the only potential threat he had spotted was the occasional black caiman peeking up out of the water, dark eyes and black, scaly skin gleaming in the sunlight, but the deadly reptiles all kept their distance from the boats.
Up ahead, in the lead boat, Matt waved for him to pull up alongside of them. Dane brought his craft around to their starboard side and slowed to match their speed.
“Simáo says he thinks the first landmark should be up ahead. If we’re reading the map correctly, we’ll have to make a short portage.”
“No problem,” Dane said. “I’m ready to stretch my legs anyway.”
When they rounded the next bend, everyone sat up straighter. Bones raised the bill of his cap and took off his sunglasses to get a better look.
“Dude, is that the ruins of some lost city?” He turned to Simáo. “How long have you known about this place?”
Their guide laughed. “Many people are fooled. It is natural formation in the rock. I can no say how it happen.”
As they passed alongside the rock formations, Dane could see how someone could mistake this place for the site of ancient construction. The natural rock lay in regular, even layers, giving the impression of stone work. Vertical shears created the illusion of corners and right angles. One shape even resembled an arched doorway.
“Man, this is unbelievable.” For the first time all day, Willis actually laid down the Mossberg 501A1 shotgun he carried, and looked on in fascination. “And you’re sure this ain’t the real thing?”
“Is real, yes. Made by man? No.”
Following Jimmy’s application of the Fawcett map to modern maps, they left the river just beyond the stone formation. Dane thought they might have to search for the hidden branch of the Xingu to which they had to portage, but Bones solved that problem immediately.
“Someone’s been through here. Several someones.” He squatted down to inspect the ground about ten paces from the river’s edge. “I see scuff marks and some bent grass.”
“How long ago were they here?” Kaylin knelt down next to Bones and squinted in the direction he was looking, as if she too could see the signs.
“I’m not that good, but I appreciate your confidence in me, chick. There are a few plants back home that, if they’re broken off, I can make a fair guess by the amount of wilting, but not here. I can tell you, though, that they went thataway.” He pointed off into the distance, like a general commanding his troops.
Leaving the others behind, Dane and Bones scouted ahead, making sure they had a clear path for the boats. The trail snaked through a dense patch of jungle growth, leading them back toward the rock formation, where they passed between two high walls of stone that Dane, despite knowing their natural origin, still could have sworn were wrought by human hands.
They emerged on a bluff overlooking a waterfall that poured out from an underground channel below their feet, feeding a narrow river that churned its way into the jungle and out of sight.
“Somewhere back there, the Xingu runs underground and comes out here,” Dane said, looking down. “And with this branch of the river being so narrow, it’s no wonder it escaped the notice of map-makers. It didn’t even show up on Jimmy’s satellite images, though, thanks to Fawcett, we knew it was here. I’ll wager not many people outside local natives even know about it.”
“Dark and dangerous. Sounds like my kind of place.” Bones cracked his knuckles. “So, are we ready to haul all those freakin’ supplies and the boats over here?”
Dane would have groaned in mock-complaint, but just then, something caught his eye. Twenty feet away, almost completely hidden by undergrowth, a body lay face down on the ground. Dane drew his Walther and dropped to one knee. Glock in hand, Bones was at his side in an instant, looking all around.
“What are we looking for?”
“Probably nothing,” Dane replied. “See that body over there?” Bones cursed at the sight. “Not a local, unless the tribes around here are African-American with a buzz cuts, t-shirts, and camo pants.”
He looked around. Obviously, if anyone had a gun and meant them harm, they’d already be dead, or at least have been shot at. Besides, from the looks of things, the dead man’s head had been bashed in, which meant he’d probably been attacked by a local. After they’d waited long enough to satisfy themselves that no one was about to attack them, they went for a closer look.
The back of the man’s skull was crushed. Dane didn’t have enough experience with such things to know how many times he’d been hit, or with what type of object, but he definitely had not been shot. He rolled the man’s body over onto his back and his eyes widened in surprise.
“That’s one of the dudes that came after us in London,” Bones said, kneeling to check the man’s pockets for identification. He came up empty. “I guess a local killed him and took whatever he was carrying.”
“If he’s from ScanoGen,” Dane said, looking around, “where is the rest of his group?”
“I guess they left him behind. Those are some cold characters, bro.”
“Another reason I’m going to keep my eyes open and my guard up,” Dane said. “Let’s get those boats down to the river and see if we can’t ruin their day.
Chapter 17
“There’s the second landmark.” Kennedy pointed straight ahead, where a large, gray object rose up out of the water. It was a dome-shaped rock at least ten feet high, and it looked to Tam like a giant tortoise cutting through the water as the river rushed past it on either side of it. Centuries, millennia of erosion had worn away a few inches of the base on either side, adding to the tortoise-shell illusion. Faint lines carved into its surface indicated that, at some point in the past, humans had also seen the resemblance and sought to augment it by carving a tortoise shell pattern into the stone. Had she been a tourist, she would have stopped to take pictures, but time was a luxury she did not have. In fact, it bothered her that these stray thoughts even entered her mind. What was wrong with her? She had a job to do.
“That’s a relief,” she said, though she hated speaking to Kennedy at all. “I was hoping the map-maker didn’t intend for us to take a right at the first turtle that came swimming up to the boat.”
The corner of Kennedy’s mouth turned up in a false half-smile, but that was the only response. He was angry about Jay’s death, but if he knew the truth, he’d kill Tam, or at least, try to. She had a feeling the two of them were headed for a reckoning sooner or later, but for now, she needed him.
“Go right at the fork,” she told the guide who piloted their boat. Now that two of the landmarks had proved to be real, her confidence was bolstered, and she was eager to pre
ss on toward their destination.
“When can we stop and eat?” Even riding in a different boat, Cy managed to get on her last nerve. Despite his recent spate of screw-ups, and the death of his partner, he seemed to believe he was only a notch below Kennedy in the pecking order, and in his mind, Kennedy was at the top of the food chain on this expedition. He bullied their guides and condescended to the three ScanoGen security agents, all of whom were ex-military men Tam had brought along for extra muscle and firepower. Add in the fact that he made no bones about his belief that Tam was in charge in name only, and she was seriously considering going ahead with Salvatore’s orders regarding Cy, no matter what her conscience might tell her.
“Later,” she snapped. “Keep a lookout on both sides of the river for something that looks like an open mouth. Once we find it, there’s a side channel somewhere around it that we’ll need to take.”
“Shut up and look,” Kennedy snapped, not looking back at Cy. Perhaps Tam should have appreciated the support, but she knew it was simply Kennedy trying to assert some authority over the only man on this trip who was clearly loyal to him.
“If you say so.” Cy made it clear that the “you” to whom he was referring was Kennedy, not Tam. He took off his cap and fanned at the cloud of mosquitoes that swirled around his head.
Biting and stinging insects were just a few of the minor perils of the Amazon. They all wore long pants and long-sleeved shirts, and frequently doused themselves with the finest insect repellent money could buy. Cy, however, still managed to draw a cloud of swarming pests. They hovered around him, seemingly waiting for his repellent to wear off so they could suck him dry. He complained about it incessantly, pointing out that no one else received similar treatment from the flying nuisances. She could not help but laugh at the man’s petty annoyance, which was far less than he deserved.
Seated in front of her, Smithson, one of her hired guns, leaned back, let his arm hang over the edge, and trailed his fingers in the water.
“Don’t do that!” Her tone was harsh. He jerked his hand back immediately and gave her a look that was a mix of annoyance and embarrassment. “You can lose a finger that way, or worse. There are piranha, caiman, snakes, even electric eels in these waters. Unless you want to lose your trigger finger, keep your hand inside the boat.”
Smithson lost the annoyed look, nodded, and turned around to face forward. At least the security guys were willing to take orders from her. Rather, they had been willing up to this point. She worried that Kennedy would insinuate himself in-between her and the men. She would just have to deal with that as it came.
Shafts of late afternoon sun bathed the river in a burnished orange glow when they finally spotted it. The river twisted sharply to the left, and directly in front of them loomed the arched outline of a dark cave. Its façade resembled a macabre face. The cave was the mouth, a stone jutted out directly above the opening, forming the nose, and jungle growth hung like thick hair up above it.
“If that’s our landmark,” Kennedy said, “where’s the side channel?”
“I think we’re supposed to go inside the cave.” A deep sense of foreboding filled Tam. She didn’t like the look of this cave, but she knew she was right. She could tell by the flow of the water that the cave was not a dead end, but a passage leading… somewhere.
Kennedy turned to her. “Have the third boat take the lead.”
She understood his thinking. The third boat held supplies, a security agent, a guide, and Andy, the professor of whom she was to dispose since he had no useful information to offer. To Kennedy’s way of thinking, they were the most expendable.
To her mind, however, she was at least a little more certain of the loyalty of her handpicked members of the expedition than that of Cy or Kennedy, though the guides frequently gave her dark looks, and muttered under their breath when she gave them orders. Besides, it wasn’t his place to give orders to her, even if he had almost made it seem like a suggestion. At least he hadn’t given the order outright, a sign that he, too, thought the guides and security men might properly acknowledge her as leader.
She decided to split the difference. She wasn’t expendable, but Cy was. She instructed the guide piloting his boat to take the lead. Cy probably should have been annoyed, but he quickly rummaged for a flashlight, drew his side arm, and crouched over the bow like an eager pirate ready for plunder.
Kennedy gave her a dirty look, which she met with a smirk. “You know what Salvatore’s instructions are in regard to our friend Cyrus,” she said softly. “Maybe something in there will do the job for us.”
Kennedy looked, for a moment, like he was about to argue, but he held his tongue. He turned around and fixed his eyes on their destination.
The cool, moist air of the cave was a welcome relief from the oppressive heat on the river. Nonetheless, Tam did not relax. Weapon in hand, she played her light back and forth in the darkness, wondering what might lay in wait. Her mind conjured images of vampire bats, or the glowing eyes of a jaguar lying in wait.
Her pulse quickened as they penetrated deeper into the darkness. The low ceiling gave her the feeling that the world was pressing down upon her. As they passed through the tunnel, the water was filled with sharp rocks that had to be carefully skirted, lest they damage their boats. Several times the boats hung up on the shallow bottom, and they were forced to get out and drag them, all the time worrying about the dangers that might lurk in the dark water just out of sight.
She breathed a deep sigh of relief when they finally emerged unscathed into a mist-shrouded lagoon. It was nearly sundown; the waning light and the thick canopy of the jungle cast the place in sinister shadows.
She spotted a clearing on the far side of the lagoon and directed them to go ashore there to set up camp. The jungle was silent here, and when they cut the engines and let the boats glide the last few feet to shore, the discomfort she felt in the cave filled her again.
Her grandmother had taught her that some places were “just bad,” and were to be avoided. She hadn’t meant dangerous places, like bad neighborhoods, but wicked places, places where evil resided so strongly that one could literally feel it. Tam had never believed her, but now she did. This was a bad place.
It happened in the blink of an eye. There was a sudden blur of motion as something sprang up from underneath a low-hanging branch. The guide in the lead boat had only a moment to cry out in surprise and pain before something clamped down on the back of his neck. Tam’s mind registered only a flash of olive and yellow before the man was snatched down into the water.
“Anaconda!” she cried, springing to her feet and almost capsizing their boat. Her Makarov was in her hand and her head was on a swivel, searching for a target.
Kennedy, cursing like a sailor, fired blindly into the water. The lagoon was filled with shouts as the two remaining guides called their friend’s name, while Cy cried out in panic and dove for the unattended motor. All the boat engines suddenly roared to life as everyone tried to get to shore as fast as human possible.
Tam wobbled as their boat struck ground, but she kept her feet and sprang nimbly onto shore. Their guides scrambled out of their boats and fled blindly into the jungle. Everyone else stood watching and waiting.
“Over there!” Cy shouted as, on the far side of the lagoon, the water roiled and a mass of coils surfaced for an instant. Only the man’s left arm was visible, desperately tugging at one of the coils. Cy and the two agents sent a flurry of bullets in the anaconda’s direction, but if they hit it, there was no sign.
“Stop!” Tam shouted. “You’re wasting ammunition. There’s nothing we can do for him now, and we don’t know what else we might run into.” Deep in her bones, she knew her words to be prophetic. Something told her their troubles had only just begun.
Chapter 18
This place was wrong. Everything about it sent up warning flares in Dane’s subconscious mind. He scanned the shore of the lagoon, but saw no obvious threats. Of course, in the Amazon
, the unseen threat was often more dangerous than the one you saw coming.
“I don’t know, dude.” Bones was searching the trees with the same intensity as Dane. “There’s some serious wrongness here. It’s too quiet, and I don’t know what else, but I feel it.”
“Man, check out that snake.” From the other boat, Willis pointed to a spot along the bank where the biggest anaconda Dane had ever seen lay sunning itself.
Bones cursed and reached for his Glock, but Dane grabbed him by the wrist. “Don’t bother. Looks like it’s already eaten.”
Bones’s eyes went wide when he saw what Dane had already noticed. The middle of the snake’s body was swollen and distended almost beyond recognition, but it was evident that its last meal had been a human being.
“He won’t be going after anyone for a while. He’ll be too slow, and won’t have much of an appetite. What we need to do is make certain there are no brothers and sisters ready to make a meal out of us.”
All eyes went to the surrounding trees, scanning the branches for the giant predators. Matt hefted his Heckler and Koch MP5 submachine gun and his expression made it clear he was ready to shred anything that moved. Willis kept his Mossberg trained on the sunning anaconda, his finger on the trigger. He despised snakes, and all manner of what he termed, “squiggly things.”
“Come on Maddock! Let me take care of this thing.” In the shadowed lagoon, Willis’s eyes seemed to glow against his dark skin. “It ain’t hungry now, but it just might be by the time we come back this way.”
“No. The ScanoGen people might be somewhere close by, and they’d hear the gunshot. If it can be helped, I don’t want to warn them that we’re catching up to them.” They had taken a risk and traveled through the night. One person in each boat took a turn piloting the craft while the other two slept in the bottom of the boat, using mosquito netting for a blanket.
