He sighed. “I knew you would never embrace your role in Raul’s ascension.”
“What do you mean?” she asked quickly, terrified of the boy’s lot in the hands of Sabian’s cult. “What role am I playing in your twisted bible?”
“Bible? A relatively new book compared to what is happening here. You are the Last Mother. You must bring Raul into the next world.”
“What the fuck?” she shrieked. “The next world? Like . . . the afterlife?”
“Now you’re getting it,” he smiled. “You were chosen thousands of years before your birth, Madalina. Long before the Inca Empire fell to the Spaniards, your forefathers. Raul was also chosen, though he is not of Spanish descent.”
“He’s not?” she asked.
“Raul is the last of the Inca emperor’s bloodline. He is the last full blooded Q’ero, the people of the emperor Atahualpa.” Dr. Sabian hummed the revelation like a song. “And you will have the honor of taking him to the next world.”
Madalina’s frown deepened as she tried to veer towards not dying in the story. “Right, so what use is he as emperor if he’s in ‘the next world’?”
Dr. Sabian erupted into a roaring laugh that terrified Madalina. It was a strange uttering that reminded her of a demon from an old horror film. “He’s not here to rule a dead empire, my dear, dear girl,” he gasped in amusement, “he is here as the sacrifice to open El Dorado!”
“Jesus Christ! Have you abandoned your wits completely?” she shouted. “You’re going to kill a child? And for what? For gold?”
Dr. Sabian was pleased. Finally the Last Mother fully understood her role, set forth according to the prophecy. “This was scribbled in a Nazi officer’s journal from 1944, recovered from a sunken, unregistered naval vessel off the coast of Peru,” he told her. “Shall I read it to you?”
The Martyr will fall when Inti makes fire of earth.
The Golden Woman will save the Empire when her heart is cut out.
And the Last Mother will bring the Red Messiah to the mouth of the Promise.
When Inti blinks, he will ascend in blood and renew the Temple.
Madalina tried to keep her senses straight while she bided her time for her sight to fully recover. For now, she pretended to have surrendered, to keep Sabian talking so that she would learn where Raul was being kept. “The Martyr is my brother,” she said.
“Uh huh,” Dr. Sabian affirmed. “Inti is the sun god, in other words, the sun.”
“And I am the Last Mother, but who is the Golden Woman?” she asked.
Dr. Sabian exhaled laboriously. “That, we are still not sure of. Only World War II legends have referred to something similar. The ship that sank off the Peruvian coast during the Second World War apparently had a sister ship somewhere in the Mediterranean. Both ships were to moor in Argentina, where the Spanish relics, once plundered from the Incas, would be reunited with the artifacts from the Peruvian-based ship.”
“So it is not a real woman?” she wanted to know, although she would never admit that she had become a bit intrigued by the story.
“We think it is a golden statue stolen by the conquistadors in the sixteenth century, one that had been stashed in a convent in Spain. However, I don’t care so much if our associates in the Mediterranean find her,” he confessed.
“Why not?” Madalina urged, playing dumb for now for the sake of her eyesight.
“Because she can save Raul from his fate, and I don’t want that. He must ascend for El Dorado to open, you see, for the ‘temple to be renewed’.”
“You think Raul’s death is going to open up the mountain and voila! Your city of gold will welcome you to pillage it?” she gasped in a shrill tone that irritated the Santero beyond measure. He wished he could silence her like he’d silenced her equally inquisitive and antagonistic brother.
“Yes, in fact. His death will renew the temple. According to historical accounts, the Inca Empire boasted several temples hidden in the rainforest, made of solid gold. When Inti blinks . . . when the solar eclipse commences in three days from now . . . we will go up to Macchu Picchu, where you will kill Raul to bring the Prophecy to fruition.”
“You must be hard of hearing,” she repeated. “I am not killing that boy. You cannot make me!”
Dr. Sabian shook his head and smiled tenderly at her, his condescension undeniable. “My dear Madalina, if I can make your brother starve himself to death and I can make you walk into a motel to kill someone, trust me,” he leaned closer, his malevolent eyes looking into her soul, “I can make you.”
29
Convergence
Nina’s lips fell softly onto Sam’s. He became aware of a hum that prevailed in the darkness, but he could not place what it was. Unaware of his surroundings, he only focused on her, his lover on occasion, his friend perpetually. Sam parted his lips with hers and he felt as if he were floating through space. The hum turned into a rhythmic echo far away, and it gradually turned into a heartbeat as his ears processed the sound. Eventually he realized that the heartbeat was breaking up into little pieces, separate voices and words, spoken in a tunnel.
Is this what it is like to be dead? he wondered, thinking of all those tales about tunnels and loved ones. But Nina isn’t dead, so I must be imagining her.
Sam could still smell her perfume, but she seemed distant, unable to see him. Drifting in and out of darkness, the words and voices became more prominent. Again he felt Nina’s kiss, but this time it was cold. Sam tried to open his eyes, but the dark would not release him.
“Sam!” he heard Nina yell. Her voice was sharp and loud, almost unpleasant. The he felt the cold, not the cold of her lips, but the discomfort of the cool wind on his wet body. “Sam, can you hear me?” she repeated a few times, tapping him lightly on the cheek. Her voice turned vague as she addressed someone behind her, “He is alive, but I can’t seem to revive him.”
He forced his eyelids apart, but as soon as he managed that he was blinded by a collection of bright searchlights glaring down on him. Sam lifted his hand to shield his eyes, but his arms felt like lead. “Oh God, my arm!” he groaned.
“He’s awake! He’s awake!” Nina shouted. “We got them both! Fuck yes!” she shrieked excitedly. “Sam, can you hear me, love?”
“I thought I was in heaven before, but I seem to be there now,” he smiled faintly. “You have no idea how good it is to hear your voice again. I thought I would never hear that sweet sound again.”
Purdue spoke from next to him. “And would you even have missed me?”
Sam tried to laugh, but both men were too exhausted, having barely survived their atrocious ordeal. Had it not been for Nina and Capt. Sanchez, they would have filled the bellies of sharks by now.
Blankets could hardly keep Sam and Purdue warm, but Capt. Sanchez’ officers brought them some soup and got them inside. Again, they sat at the nook where so many discussions had determined their fate thus far, that both of them looked a little ill in the gills at having to sit there again.
Purdue’s shoulder had been dressed. He kept it folded against his chest in a sling, while the EMT braced Sam’s arm and put it in a cast on site. They found that the infirmary on the trawler was less than adequate for these types of injuries: it had been ransacked, by the looks of it.
“Where is Barnard?” Purdue asked Capt. Sanchez. “How did you find us?”
“Who is Barnard?” Nina asked.
“A you-know-what from the you-know-who,” Sam answered, holding his bluish lips to the soup to warm up.
“What?” Sanchez asked with a frown.
Nina answered, “Another asshole from the Order of the Black Sun, Captain.”
“Oh,” he replied, “them again.”
“Aye, they are everywhere,” Purdue sighed. “How did you locate us?”
“Capt. Sanchez called me as I was about to start my search for you two,” Nina explained. “By the way . . . a huge fucking thanks for not calling me to let me know you are not dead, you bastards.
We will still have that discussion. I swear to God, if I was not so stoked to see you both, I would have keelhauled you myself.”
Purdue looked at Sam with a victory smile, gloating, “See? I told you we should have called her.”
Sam only scoffed. He was too tired to explain himself. It felt as if he had been rescued from the bowels of hell, and he had been, but he just wanted to sit there and listen to Nina’s bitching for a bit, soaking up her trademark threats with pleasure.
“We approached the trawler in the dark, using only infrared and radar to navigate. Dr. Gould asked me to assist her in finding you, so we picked up your signal, Mr. Purdue,” the police captain elucidated.
“His signal?” Sam asked.
“Your tablet, Purdue. Capt. Sanchez had been using a global satellite network to track the movement of the device since the date of the crash,” Nina smiled. “And we found you in the nick of time. Literally.”
“Earlier today, a patrol plane noticed that the Cóncord was in trouble when the pilot reported what looked like blood all over the decks and around close proximity of the boat—too much to be fishing bait. It coincided with your locator, which had Dr. Gould here convinced that you were in trouble . . . again,” Sanchez recounted. “We came out with an eight-man fire team, just in case. And good thing we did. We spooked the villains, it seemed, because we reached the trawler just after you were both tossed overboard.”
Nina looked upset, but she placed her hand over her mouth and contained it. “I watched it happen. Jesus, I watched it happen and I was still so far away, too far to help you.”
“But they took off as soon as we started shooting from the darkness. They obviously had no idea how many of us were on approach,” Sanchez said. “Who is Barnard, exactly?”
“Well, all we have gathered between the lines is that his grandfather was an Allied soldier during the Second World War, a traitor who assisted the SS in obtaining stolen relics from a Spanish convent,” Purdue explained through small sips of hot soup that were filling him with life again.
“Aye, and now he thinks he is entitled to the treasures his grandfather helped steal, like that golden statue,” Sam added. “By the way, where is she? Did they take her before you got to them?”
“Where is who?” Nina asked.
“The golden woman,” Purdue chipped in quickly.
Nina and Capt. Sanchez gawked at one another for a long moment. They looked taken aback by Purdue’s uttering. Shocked, in fact. Purdue saw that, and he wondered if they knew something that he and Sam did not.
“What?” Sam asked.
Nina and Sanchez started talking together, both fascinated by the cryptic clues falling into place by some eerie chain of coincidences. She let Sanchez have the stage on this one.
“From the last transmission Dr. Gould and I received from the bug on our suspects, the Golden Woman is part of an Incan prophecy,” he said in pleasant surprise. “I’ve been trailing a murder suspect who, believe it or not, is a victim of a bigger crook . . . uh, also from the Black Sun! This is why I called Nina in the first place.”
“No way,” Sam cried. “They really are everywhere!”
“But it gets better,” Nina squealed excitedly. She couldn’t believe that in all this misfortune and pain for so many people, she was sounding like a silly schoolgirl, but Purdue and Sam’s information finally helped her and Sanchez to make sense of Madalina and Raul’s abduction.
“They are out to kill a young boy as a sacrifice to open the golden city of El Dorado,” Sanchez told them. “And they tried it before, according to Dr. Gould, during the Second World War, to attain the hoards of gold reputed to make up the city.”
“They failed because . . . and here is the part we couldn’t solve yet . . . both ships sent to Argentina sank at the same time in different oceans!” she exclaimed. “I mean, they went down within the same goddamn minute, according to my records of the logbooks recovered!”
“No reason why they sank,” Sanchez added, looking as alive and enthusiastic as Nina. “They could find no cause of accident and no account of anything unusual by vessels in the same vicinity that night.”
“Don’t fuck with the golden woman,” Sam said plainly. Purdue nodded in agreement with his eyes wide. “Is the prayer stick still here? I suppose they made off with the golden woman?”
“Aye, there is nothing on board but some creepy fucking corpses in a bunch of secured crates!” Nina grimaced. Sam laughed and looked at Purdue in humorous reprimand. He pointed a thumb at Purdue. “Those are his.”
Nina stared at Purdue in disgust. “Really, Purdue?”
He shrugged. “Look, if we can analyze the tissue and the uniform fabric, we’ll know more about what caused their mummification. That, in turn, could link us into the local legends about seemingly groundless incidents of catastrophe. Think about it. Nothing just occurs by happenstance. Old mariners were superstitious. I am a scientist. I needed to find out how ships appeared to have just run aground, how men trampled each other into hot, dry areas where their skins turned to paper.”
“Um, that’s another thing,” Nina told them. “Our suspect’s brother suffered the same inexplicable fate.”
“How?” Purdue asked, hoping that it would explain his find.
“He wants a scientific explanation, Dr. Gould,” Capt. Sanchez reminded her, but she had to tell Purdue the truth. From what she and Capt. Sanchez had been hearing through the bug transmission, it was not science as much as psychology.
“He was compelled to self-mummification by a practitioner of Santería black magic?” she said timidly.
“Oh Jesus, Nina,” Purdue exclaimed, looking away.
Sanchez thought to lend some support down on the middle ground. “Don’t be so quick to dismiss that just because it sounds superstitious, Mr. Purdue. I am a very steadfast man. I’m not even religious, but I can tell you what we heard. This man, Dr. Sabian, is a psychologist who has used his professional therapy to brainwash, no, to hypnotically suggest to this young man’s brain that he was being emaciated and dehydrated. And from what we heard, he finally succumbed to the horrific spell.”
“Okay, say we buy that,” Sam said, “and he could do this, why would he do it? Are you of the opinion that this is what happened to the men on the ships?”
“Could very well be,” Sanchez answered. “You said it yourself, Mr. Purdue. Things don’t just happen without some explanation. Now we know, at least, that your Barnard and our Sabian are involved in the same twisted conspiracy to kill this little boy by the time of the next solar eclipse over the Incan city of Macchu Picchu.”
“We recorded the last transmission from the bug,” Nina explained, “where the Inca prophecy was recited. We know where they are and where they are going. We know when they are planning to kill the boy and the lady who has been protecting him. So I am afraid your analysis will have to take a backseat to this child’s life, Purdue.”
“Absolutely,” Purdue agreed. “We have to pursue them anyway, because they have the only two relics that can avoid El Dorado opening.”
“The golden woman statue?” Nina asked.
“And the prayer stick,” Sam added. “We have to melt down the statue to find something inside her chest to work in conjunction with the prayer stick, otherwise we can’t stop them from getting what they want.”
“How many days until the eclipse?” Purdue asked.
Nina looked stressed and Sanchez cleared his throat. “We have two days, gentlemen.”
30
The Cóncord and the Eagle
Solar Eclipse Imminent: 94%
The Spanish Coast Guard and local authorities took possession of the Cóncord in order to investigate a mass murder aboard the trawler, but they were not aware of true events. Captain Sanchez knew that the Málaga Police’s lengthy investigation into Barnard and his cohorts would severely compromise his mission and perturb his ability to successfully pursue Madalina and Raul. To disclose the identities of the culprits and to di
vulge Purdue and Cleave’s involvement would destroy all chances of arresting Dr. Sabian and his nefarious financial partner, Basil Barnard.
Therefore, the freelance task force operatives he and Dr. Gould procured to locate the trawler agreed to bend the truth in order for them to go after Barnard before the Black Sun killed the child. For Nina it was no problem to persuade the men who helped chase off the British swine to omit all details pertaining to Capt. Sanchez, herself, David Purdue, and Sam Cleave. In exchange, they could take all the credit for any arrests made and for reporting the appalling incident as a suspected drug bust gone sour.
It had come to the point where Sanchez had become so personally invested in Madalina and Raul’s plight that it did not matter who got the praise. Already, scarcely an hour after the task force leader had called in their so-called discovery on the trawler to the authorities, the story spread like wildfire all over the usual news channels. What made it especially juicy to the palates of reporters was, of course, the fact that this latest sea-bound tragedy had taken place practically at the same spot where the Purdue-crash had occurred less than a week before.
Once again, the locals had reason to speculate, and again tales of a cursed sea flared up across the broader region of the coastal towns and cities from Alicante to the Strait of Gibraltar. Tourism would flourish with accounts from locals interviewed on television with hands on hearts, bringing up old legends and long forgotten stories reputed to have happened. The police had their hands full with the families of the crewmen who had enlisted for the Cóncord excursion, inquiring about their brothers, fathers and husbands, all missing.
Of course, the bodies of the crew were nowhere to be found after they had been disposed of by Barnard’s men, but it only led to more superstitious rants about ghost ships and entire crews disappearing into thin air. Vincent Nazquez’s body was discovered inside a shipwreck at the bottom of the Alboran Sea, where he’d apparently died while scouting the wreckage on a dive for gold, of which there was no trace. And such were the misguided conjectures of the misinformed reporters that finally became the new truth for those who were not there.
The Inca Prophecy Page 17
