Outlanders 13 Shadow Scourge, page 4
In the dark recesses of Grant's mind, an inner voice shouted an alarm.
DOMI'S THOUGHTS MOVED at random. She floated on a sea of shadowed clouds and she took a childish pleasure in the unreality. It never occurred to her to flee or even to struggle. Raised in the brutal hardship of the Outlands, accustomed to the cruelty of men, she appreciated the loving attention bestowed on her by the beautiful brown people. If they wanted her to crouch like a white statue of marble while they painted her, she saw no reason to object. She enjoyed the sensual, teasing touch of their wet, blue fingers dabbing at her breasts and belly. The Indians glided around the altar, their legs and feet moving in a slow, deliberate measure. A low chant arose among them, with the word Kukulkan repeated over and over.
Domi lay on the soft animal pelts, enjoying the way the fur tickled her bare skin. She did not expend any effort on reasoning or analyzing why the nice brown people wanted her blue. It simply was, and the touch of their fingers simply was. Casting a shy glance toward Grant, she wondered aloofly why he sat there and gazed at her beneath a furrowed brow. Although he still smiled blandly, the expression in his eyes was troubled and confused, and for an instant, she experienced a nudge of unease. Then she felt a delicate, delicious fondling touch at the juncture of her thighs and with a low moan, she ceased to care about the look in Grant's eyes. Just when the prayers, chanting, dancing and touching began to lose their novelty, the man in the snakeskin stepped up to the altar and gazed into her face. Domi felt a chill creep through her veins as she looked into the shadows beneath the overhang formed by the serpent's snout. She saw his eyes, but they did not appear to be human eyes. They were luminous, radiant in the moonlight. He took her by the hands and tugged her off the altar stone and enfolded her in his arms. His lips pressed hers in a long kiss. His tongue carefully inserted itself into her mouth, and on the tip of it was a tiny, fibrous button, like a flake shaved from a root. When her own tongue touched it, she sensed rather than saw a blinding flash of white light. It flared within the walls of her skull with the incandescence of the sun. After it faded, she felt herself slumping in the snake man's arms, incapable of speech or independent movement. When the kiss ended, two men took Domi by the arms, holding her up. Her head lolled loosely on her neck. High above her, the face of the full moon seemed to acquire a black dot, like a pupil in a vast eyeball. It grew and expanded, and all about her the chant rose higher, a soft, unceasing paean of joy. The man in the snakeskin gestured sharply and turned away, marching purposefully toward an arch in the wall of the enclosure. The Indians followed him, and Domi glimpsed Grant trudging along. He was not smiling now; the corners of his mouth were turned down beneath his mustache in a slight scowl, as if he were disturbed but uncertain of why. The procession filed beneath the arch to the foot of the stairs built into the face of the pyramid. Arrayed on both sides of the steps stood men and women, torches blazing in their hands. A huge deep drum boomed from the top of the pyramid, like thunder from the pinnacle of a mountain. Brass cymbals clashed. The people lining the stairs voiced groaning shouts. "Kukulkan, Kukulkan."
Domi tilted her head back and looked up the stairs rising wide and white to the temple. She almost fell over backward, but with the supporting hands of the men holding her she managed to place a foot on the first step. They urged her on and up. Fear shot through her, a small spasm that briefly unsettled the haze of content clouding her mind. But she could not remember what she feared. A dew of perspiration formed on her face beneath the spots of blue paint, but the warm breeze wafting from the lush jungle dried it. Domi concentrated only on climbing the pyramid. Her legs felt as if they were filled with molten lead, and only the men on either side of her kept her on her feet. She walked to the measured cadence of chant, drumbeat and cymbal clash. Her body was lost to all feeling, numb to every sensation except putting one foot in front of the other. She had no idea how much time passed before the climb ended. She stood panting and swaying in the temple, knees trembling from the exertion. The square pillars supporting the flat roof showed bas-reliefs writhing around them. The primary motif was the profile of a man with an aquiline nose and a paternal smile on his lips. On the back of his head, a serpent bared its fangs and a forked tongue coiled. The little stone statues placed at all four corners were similar. Twisting her head around, she saw Grant, towering head and shoulders above the Indians around him. Pebbles of sweat glistened on his forehead, and he blinked repeatedly, as if trying to rouse himself from a dream. She smiled at him inanely, but he didn't return it. Six figures in blue robes, each one wearing a wooden mask bearing the stylized likeness of a snake's head, stood around the huge bowl occupying most of the temple floor. Plumes of feathers nodded above the masks. They crashed cymbals in unison. The chanting voices of the people on the stairs held one long, yearning note, then the painful clash of the cymbals broke it. In the sudden, startling silence, Domi thought she heard a dry rustling sound from within the bowl. The man in the snakeskin stood before it and spoke patiently to Domi as if explaining a complicated problem to her. He spoke in his own tongue, and she didn't understand a word. He gestured to the massive bowl, and again came the slithering noise, as of leather scraping against metal. Her body grew chill, and she knew that within it lay the entire reason for the bathing, the painting, all of the prayers and ceremony. Four of the six masked men lowered their cymbals and took up positions around the bowl. They fitted their hands into small notches set into the rim and strained to lift it. Metal grated, followed by a faint but prolonged hiss, as sibilant as steam escaping from a valve. Something bumped against the inside of the lid. One of the robed men gestured for Domi's escort to step back. With questioning murmurs, they obeyed. The masked man stood behind her, hands possessively on her shoulders. She noted absently that he seemed at least a head taller than the men identically garbed. Lowering his head, he whispered into her ear in a language she knew and a voice she recognized. "When I give the signal," Kane said urgently, "move."
Chapter 3
The descent down the hillside into the city wasn't difficult, but it required more time than Kane initially estimated. Forcing Morning Breeze ahead of him while trying to evade the Indian's companions added minutes he didn't want to spare. He heard the piercing whistles of night birds several times but he didn't need Morning Breeze to tell him they were signals from the other warriors. A couple of times, Morning Breeze protested Kane's rough treatment, assuring him that Grant and Domi would not have their hearts cut out. However, he refrained from describing what his people actually had in mind for them. As a general rule, Kane sympathized more with primitives than with the ville bred. Usually he found them far more honest, mannerly and ethical than the so-called civilized people raised in and around the baronies. He went out of his way to respect aboriginal beliefs and taboos, regardless of how irrational they might seem to him. But he drew the line when those superstitions put him or his friends in jeopardy. Morning Breeze led him at an elliptical angle toward the tilled fields. Kane concentrated so much on keeping to the shadows and watching for the other three Indians that the chant rising from the vicinity of the pyramid hardly penetrated his consciousness. "The ceremony has begun," Morning Breeze murmured. "Soon your friends will be taken to the temple of the Feathered Serpent and will bask in his love and wisdom."
"The temple on top of the pyramid?
" Morning Breeze nodded. "That's where we'll go.
" The Indian stiffened, digging his heels into the ground. In a scandalized whisper, he declared, "It is forbidden—it is blasphemy. You have not been purified! You will insult the Feathered Serpent—" Morning Breeze struggled against Kane's grip and reverted to his own language, babbling shrilly about Kukulkan. Kane tried to restrain him, then muttered, "Fuck it." Reversing the grip on his knife, grasping it by the shank, he struck Morning Breeze sharply with the pommel across the base of his skull. He had to hit him twice before the man sagged unconscious to the grassy sward.
Swiftly, Kane used the variety of straps and rawhide thongs about his clothing to hog-tie and gag him. As an added measure, he took one of the drugged darts from the Indian's pouch and drove the point into the side of his neck.
He started to drag him beneath the drooping fronds of a plantain tree when he heard the keening cry of the night bird again, this time much closer. Crouching over Morning Breeze's body, Kane scanned his surroundings, trying to penetrate the pattern of moonlight and shadow with his eyes. He saw nothing but brush, but he knew the three Indians were backtracking. Not having come across either Morning Breeze or Kane, they moved toward the outskirts of the city. Under similar circumstances, it was what Kane would have done.
Reflexively, he stiffened his wrist tendons, preparing his hand to receive his Sin Eater. With a conscious effort, he relaxed and the blaster remained in its holster. The Sin Eater was more than a Magistrate's assigned weapon; it was as much of a badge of office as the black body armor worn by Mags into the field. The Sin Eater was a big-bore automatic hand- blaster less than fourteen inches in length. The magazine carried twenty 9 mm rounds, and the stock folded down when it was holstered along his right ann. Actuators attached to the weapon popped the Sin Eater into Kane's waiting hand when he flexed his tendons in the right sequence, putting it there in an eye-blink. There was no trigger guard, and when the firing stud came in contact with Kane's finger, it would fire immediately. Since the handblaster did not come equipped with a noise suppressor, firing it in the valley would be like the roar of a howitzer, alerting every Indian, monkey and dog for miles around. Kane withdrew the blowgun from his belt. Carrying the pouch of darts, he crept away from Morning Breeze, taking up a position beneath the plantain tree where it backed onto a wall of shrubbery. If Morning Breeze had led him on a standard route to the city, then his fellow Indians would follow the same path—he hoped. He examined the blowgun, cursing softly when he couldn't distinguish between the spitting end and the shooting end. Carefully he removed the darts from the pouch. They were a little more than six inches long, with a brown, tarry substance smeared on the needle-sharp, tapered points. Inserting one of the projectiles point first into the tube, he raised it to his lips. Then he waited. The minutes dragged by. The drumming from the city continued unabated with a lulling rhythm. Then, with a suddenness that nearly made him swear aloud, three men stood warily on the hillside. There had been no sound preceding their almost magical materialization, and Kane felt a grudging admiration for their stealthy art. The Indians scowled around, then stalked forward, studying the ground. The man in the lead placed his fingers in his mouth, preparing to whistle, but instead he stiffened, grunted and gestured with his stone- bladed club toward Morning Breeze's crumpled body. The three Amazonians clustered around him, nudging him with their feet, talking in faint but excited whispers. One of the Indians stooped over Morning Breeze to untie his wrists. He presented Kane with an unobstructed view of his nearly-naked backside. Filling his lungs with air, then holding it, Kane took advantage of the target of opportunity. He placed his mouth on the hollow bore of the blowgun and expelled all of his breath in a single, powerful gust. The Indian howled, leaping straight up, slapping frantically at his buttocks. By the time his fingers found the dart and plucked it away, Kane had loaded a second wooden needle and spit it on its way. Another warrior cried out, clawing at his back, dropping his weapons while he reached for the spot between his shoulder blades where the dart had embedded itself. The third Amazonian instantly realized what was happening and assessed the trajectory and direction of the darts. He came savagely to the attack, plunging toward Kane's position with his war club held over his head in a double-fisted grip. Kane managed to spit a dart at him, but he had no idea if it struck home or not. The Indian tore away the fronds of the tree and bowled into him, chopping at his head with his bladed bludgeon. Throwing himself backward, Kane instinctively raised the blowgun to ward off the blow and the club easily sheared through it. He tried to entangle the warrior's legs with his own and knock him down, but the tough stems and roots of the bushes tangled up his own legs. The Indian dropped onto him, sitting down heavily on his chest, flailing wildly with his club, but the plantain tree impeded his movements. With a click and the whir of a tiny electric motor, the Sin Eater sprang into Kane's hand, but he kept his index finger well away from the firing stud. He used the blaster to parry a bludgeon blow, the crack of stone striking metal sounding almost as loud as the Sin Eater's report. The Amazonian squeezed Kane's chest between his powerful thighs, compressing his upper rib cage, pushing the bones against his lungs. Then, with a protracted sigh, the man leaned forward, his body shaken by a shudder. He went completely limp, his black eyes still open but seeing nothing. The club fell from his slack fingers. Kane pushed against his chest with the barrel of his blaster, and the Indian bent backward at the waist as if his spine had turned to rubber. Only then did Kane see the little pinpoint of blood shining on his left pectoral where the dart had penetrated but fallen away. Climbing to his feet, Kane swept his gaze over the four motionless bodies, tamping down the impulse to surrender to his training and deliver killing head shots to each one of them. But he was no longer a Magistrate, and regardless of the Indians' treachery, he and his friends were still interlopers in their world. He didn't bother tying up the three men as he had done with Morning Breeze. They were still conscious, but paralyzed, and he was running out of time. A glance at his wrist chron showed how the precious seconds ticked away, like water from a leaky faucet. Kane crossed a field then entered the city, his dark clothing blending with the night. He could hear every rustle of whipcord and creak of his leather boots. The dim passageways between the houses seemed to hold danger in every shadow. He tensed with anticipation, his teeth clenched, waiting for an Indian to glance out a window and then raise an alarm. He couldn't help but be reminded of his penetration into Mesa Verde canyon almost a year ago to the day. That hard-contact Magistrate mission had set into motion a sequence of events that resulted in his exile from Cobaltville. He smiled bitterly at the irony. If he hadn't gone into that Colorado canyon, he would not now be skulking through alleys in South America. He saw no one in the sidelines or even on the main thoroughfare. The houses were deserted, but Kane refused to relax. He kept his eyes on the towering edifice of the pyramid, noting how a fire flickered near it, staining the sky with orange shadows. The drumming went on, now overlaid with a singsong chant. Peering around the corner of a house, he saw a procession of Indians scaling the long stairway that stretched to the top of the pyramid. They took up stiff-backed positions on either side of the steps, each holding an unlit torch. A man carrying a sparking firepot moved to each in turn, and they thrust the pitch-coated ends of their torches into the pot to set them aflame. Kane had no idea what the people were doing or why, but their presence on the steps explained the absence of activity in the city streets. Moving in fits and starts, he circled around to the rear of the immense structure, belly-crawling into the mouth of another alley. He reached a wall encircling the grounds of the pyramid and straightened up for a quick look on the other side. From an arch in the base of the pyramid emerged six figures wearing long blue mantles that draped their bodies from throat to ankle. Their faces and heads were concealed by monstrous serpentine masks. From their crests floated colorful plumes of feathers. The man in the lead carried a staff that supported a grinning human skull.
Kane watched as the shamans began to climb a small series of stairs set into the pyramid, moving at a measured, ritualistic pace. His next move was the most obvious one suggested by tactics and opportunity. He slid between the double gates in the wall and rushed toward the last man in line. Kane counted on the drums and the headpiece to mute the sound of his rapid approach. The man's peripheral vision was impaired by the mask, so he had no idea of who belonged to the arm that cinched tight around his throat and yanked him backward. The man struggled and tried to shout. Thrusting out a leg, Kane swept the Indian's legs out from under him and slammed him painfully to the paving stones surrounding the base of the pyramid. Air exploded from the man's lungs in a muffled whoosh. Kane deprived him of further oxygen by knee-dropping his entire weight onto his diaphragm. As the Indian convulsed, Kane snatched off the headpiece, revealing the swarthy face of a man in middle age. He was almost unconscious, lips writhing over discolored teeth. Kane recognized him as the shaman Cloud Minder, as he leaned close to jab the last of the drugged darts into his jugular vein. Whipping off the blue cloak, he drew it around his shoulders and quickly tied the thongs around his neck. He placed the mask over his head, wrinkling his nose at the odor of stale sweat and the ripe scent of breadfruit. He had difficulty seeing out of the eyeholes, but managed to reach the steps without stumbling. The figure ahead of him turned his head awkwardly toward him as if asking a silent question. Not to do what was expected would arouse instant suspicion, so he lengthened his stride, falling in three steps behind the man. As they ascended the stairs, Kane heard them muttering one word over and over: "Kukulkan, Kukulkan."
By the time they reached the top of the pyramid, Kane's lungs labored for air inside the stuffy headpiece, and the tendons at the back of his knees ached. Without being too obvious about it, he stared with interest at the pillar carvings, the little idols and in particular at the huge metal bowl. A monotonous chant from many throats wafted up from below, climbing in volume. The shaman with the skull staff made a gesture, and Kane's companions took from stone shelves small discs of metal. They passed them around, a pair to a man. Kane held them uncertainly, watching the others. When they began to strike them together, setting up a nerve-stinging racket, he followed suit, trying to match their rhythm. He was far too apprehensive to feel foolish. He remained beside the bowl, his left arm occasionally brushing it. He felt movement in the metal and at first he attributed it to sympathetic vibrations caused by the clashing of the cymbals. But as the minutes wore on, the movement inside the bowl became more frequent, completely out of sync with the noise. With a sinking sensation in the pit of his belly, Kane realized there was something alive within it, something big and anxious to get out. He took a surreptitious, sideways step away from it. At that moment, an incongruous shape appeared on the opposite side of the temple, rising from the stairway. For a split second, Kane's heart thudded in instinctive fear, then he recognized King Chaac decked out in an elaborate costume made of cured snakeskin and feathers. A group of people followed King Chaac to the top. Young men, their naked bodies decorated with spots and whorls of blue paint, half carried a diminutive girl between them. Domi's nude body was covered in blue paint, and if not for her white hair and half- closed crimson eyes, Kane would not have been able to identify her. Her head wobbled drunkenly, and she breathed in great gasps, gazing around with unfocused eyes. Kane clenched his teeth but did nothing except to crash his cymbals together. A few seconds later, Grant stepped beneath the roof of the pyramid, surrounded by a bevy of Indian maidens. He wasn't naked, although his female escorts were, but he didn't look particularly happy about it. In fact, his eyes were narrowed to slits and he gnawed at his lower lip. Sweat glistened on his dark face, as if he struggled to break invisible chains. Both people were obviously under the influence of some drug, but the extent of its effects was determined by their individual physiques and metabolisms. Domi, small and childlike, appeared to be only semiconscious while Grant reminded Kane of a man just roused from slumber—still groggy and disoriented, requiring only the proper stimulus to come to full wakefulness. The chant reached a high note, then ended. At the same moment, the masked men stopped clashing their cymbals together.
