Blood Fever

by Charlie Higson

  ‘I don’t know,’ said James. ‘It’s a miracle.’

  Halfway up the ‘miracle’ was explained as they passed the other car coming down.

  It was packed with a group of confused and frightened guards from the dam, reluctantly trying to join the fight. The surprised look on their faces as they saw the two children serenely clanking up the hill past them was almost comical, and it was a few moments before they realised what was going on and started to shoot at them.

  There was a sudden deafening racket as bullets slammed into the car. James and Amy threw themselves to the floor and they were soon lying in a thick carpet of shattered wood and broken glass. The cars quickly moved too far apart, though, for the men to fire accurately and neither of them was hurt. Once it was safe they got gingerly to their feet and brushed the debris from their clothing.

  The rest of the jouney up passed without incident, but they forgot all about applying the brake when they reached the winch-house and the car slammed into the buffers, knocking them to the floor again. James was covered in tiny cuts but felt nothing. His body was flooded with adrenalin. No pain signals were getting through to his brain.

  They dragged themselves back on to their feet and looked out. The place was deserted. James picked up the tommy gun. It was heavy and smelt of oil.

  They jumped down and James went over to the cable that supported the car.

  He aimed the machine gun and pulled the trigger, fully expecting that nothing would happen. But the gun came alive in his hands and jumped crazily, pushing him backwards. The din was terrific. He managed to hold it reasonably steady, though, and in a few moments the shredded cable gave way with a loud twang and the car rolled back down the cliff, picking up speed as it went.

  ‘There’s no way of anyone following us up here now,’ said James.

  ‘Yes,’ said Amy, ‘but how do we get down?’

  ‘We’ll worry about that later.’

  The noise of the shooting below was tinny and distant; it sounded like nothing worse than a fireworks display. Here by the lake it was calm and peaceful. The sun sparkled on the water. The mountain peaks were honey-coloured against the perfect clear blue of the sky. But James knew that somewhere up here was a killer, intent on turning this idyllic postcard scene into a vision of hell.

  ‘Is he here?’ said Amy.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said James. ‘Maybe I was wrong.’

  He scanned the lake. Along the left-hand side was a small run of low buildings. There was no reason why Zoltan would have gone there, but where was he?

  ‘What did your cousin say exactly?’ said Amy.

  ‘He thought that that long overhanging rock over there was unstable,’ he said.

  ‘So he’d have headed for that, then,’ said Amy.

  ‘I suppose so,’ said James. ‘Let’s go and look.’

  Ugo’s motor launch was moored next to the big, ungainly seaplane at the jetty. James ran out and jumped into it.

  ‘Do you know how to work one of these things?’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ said Amy excitedly as she climbed aboard and cast off the rope. ‘I’ve spent half my life on boats.’

  She busied herself with the motor, glad to be doing something to take her mind off the danger they were in and the terrible violence they had witnessed.

  Soon the motor launch was speeding out across the water, churning up its glassy surface and disturbing the fragile peace. Amy was steering and James pointed her towards the right-hand side of the lake. Once they were near the overhanging shelf of rock they slowed down, and cruised slowly along, keeping their eyes fixed on the coast, looking for anything that might give them some idea of where Zoltan was.

  And then James saw the black mouth of a cave.

  ‘Over there,’ he said, and Amy moved the boat closer. They saw that the entrance had been enlarged and was shored up around the edges to make it safe to enter.

  Amy manoeuvred the launch into the cave and they found themselves in a short tunnel lit by a string of bulbs in the ceiling. They followed the lights around a corner into a small, gloomy cavern. It was cold in here and the air felt damp. Water ran down the walls and dripped from the roof, and everything was coated in green slime.

  James quickly took in the details. There was a small dock for mooring boats, and a rotting wooden platform built on concrete piles with an iron staircase leading up from it through a fissure in the rock. There was a stack of mouldering barrels on the platform and as James tied up the boat Zoltan stepped out from behind it. His face was covered with a film of sweat and his eyes were mad with fever and burning red.

  ‘James,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘You are a clever boy. You found me. Well done. You have brought me Amy. Thank you.’

  Amy turned on James, suddenly angry. Had he betrayed her? Had he tricked her into coming here?

  James took hold of her hand and squeezed it reassuringly, praying that she would trust him.

  He looked down at the machine gun, lying in the bottom of the boat. Zoltan saw it too. ‘If you try to use that, I’m afraid I will have to kill you,’ he said, drawing his Beretta from his tunic. He jerked the gun sideways, indicating that the two of them should come out of the boat and join him.

  Maybe that would convince Amy that he was on her side.

  As they crossed the platform James noticed a tangle of wires disappearing into a hole in the rocks. Tree-Trunk was crouching down in the shadows uncoiling more wire from a big spool of cable.

  ‘What are you doing?’ said James, his voice echoing in the cave.

  ‘Please. Don’t try to stop me,’ said Zoltan. ‘I have to do this.’

  ‘You’re going to blow up the rock?’

  ‘I will wipe out Carnifex and his whole pathetic empire,’ said Zoltan.

  ‘You mustn’t,’ said James. ‘You can’t. Think of the people who will die. Innocent people.’

  ‘Innocent? Who? They are all dogs and pigs. They are scum. I will be doing the world a favour.’

  ‘But what about your own men down there?’

  ‘They are all probably dead already,’ said Zoltan with a shrug. ‘They were outnumbered. They were merely a diversion. I can find more men.’

  James tried to protest, but the big Samoan swept him up in one strong arm. He swept Amy up with his other arm and held them both as fast as if they were shackled in iron.

  ‘Bring them with us,’ said Zoltan.

  ‘No!’ James shouted. ‘Please don’t do this.’

  ‘It is too late,’ said Zoltan quietly. ‘It is done.’

  Zoltan took up the cable spool and unwound it behind him as the three of them clanged up the steps. James struggled in Tree-Trunk’s effortless grip but it was no use.

  They emerged into sunshine above the lake and climbed further up the mountainside until they came to a concrete viewing platform where a detonator had already been set up.

  Zoltan sat down heavily. He was worn out from this small exertion and was breathing painfully. He fastened the ends of the wires to two brass connectors on the top of the detonator with trembling hands, cursing his clumsiness. He was evidently very sick now and had to stop to wipe away the sweat that was dripping down his face and blinding him.

  James and Amy watched in horrified fascination as he turned the crank on the side of the box to charge the battery, then put a hand to the switch.

  ‘Carnifex should never have crossed me,’ he said. ‘Now we will see if Victor Delacroix was right.’ He waved towards the dam and saluted. ‘Goodbye, my emperor.’

  He shunted the switch across and James was sickened to hear a muffled boom from below. He felt like weeping. This shouldn’t be happening. He had failed.

  A few stones and smaller rocks dropped from the ledge into the lake with feeble splashes and then nothing.

  Silence hung over the mountains.

  James’s spirits lifted. He looked at Amy. There was a glimmer of hope in her eyes.

  Zoltan laughed crazily. ‘He was wrong,’ he cried.
‘Victor was wrong. Carnifex is the better engineer after all. It seems that his dream will stand.’ He laughed again and cursed the lake in Hungarian.

  It was then that James felt the ground shift beneath his feet, as if he were standing on the back of some huge beast waking from a deep sleep. There was a crack, a sound like ice breaking, deep within the mountain, and the air seemed to split around them as a shock wave passed through it. It hit James in the chest and he could feel the effects of it through his whole body.

  There came another long crack, then another and another, like rolling thunder. It was awesome, a tearing and ripping sound on a massive, unimaginable scale. The ground gave another giddy lurch and James actually saw ripples pass through it.

  Then there was silence again.

  Time seemed to have stopped. The world was waiting. The whole area had gone completely quiet. No insect or bird made a sound.

  James realised he was holding his breath.

  28

  The Magyar’s Revenge

  Down below, at the palazzo, Ugo had heard the sound and felt the mountain quake. He looked up at the dam, towering tall and white in the sun. His great pale brow creased.

  ‘Ita fua cussu?’ he said. What was that?

  The question was aimed at no one in particular and no one replied.

  He frowned and sniffed. It was probably nothing.

  There was work to be done. His guards had rounded up the last of Zoltan’s men and herded them on to the piazza by the ruined funicular railway.

  He turned to the captain in charge of the execution squad. ‘When you are done,’ he said, ‘you will get rid of the bodies and wash the stones. Clean the whole palazzo. I cannot stand this filth.’ He stepped forward and raised one arm. ‘Now, prepare your guns,’ he said. ‘When my hand drops, open fire.’

  Stefano and Vendetta had heard the explosion, too, and some instinct told them to run.

  ‘Aio caida!’ Stefano yelled. Come on. He dragged the girl up the mountainside as fast as he could, away from the ravine.

  Perry Mandeville and the other Eton boys had been playing football when they heard the bang. They were out in the fields next to Ugo’s stadium and they stood now, shielding their eyes from the glare and straining to see what was happening.

  Peter Haight and Mr Cooper-ffrench had disappeared and Quintino, their Italian guide, had been supervising them. Left to their own devices, they had done what boys everywhere will do and started kicking a ball around. All morning they had heard the strange noises from up at the palazzo and assumed it was part of the carnival, but this latest mighty thump had sounded different.

  ‘I wonder what’s going on up there?’ said Tony Fitzpaine, his heavily bandaged nose making him sound stuffy and nasal.

  ‘Oh, they’re m-mad, the Italians,’ said Perry. ‘Quite m-mad…’

  James was still holding his breath. He felt an unbearable tension. Zoltan was standing staring at the lake, his right fist clenched.

  ‘Come on,’ he whispered. ‘Come on, damn you.’

  Then James saw the gentlest puff of dust rise from the ground; next to it a second puff danced into the air, and then a third plume that zipped along the rock, like the dust thrown up behind a speeding animal, as a long black fissure opened in the top of the ledge.

  ‘Oh, my God,’ whispered Zoltan. ‘She is going.’

  He was right. The whole ledge began to topple over, slowly at first, then in a great rush, as half the mountainside came away.

  It was a terrifying sight, 100,000 tons of rock crashing downward in one great crumbling, roaring mass.

  As it slammed into the lake there was a deafening crash and water was sent steaming up into the sky, so high it blotted out the sun for a moment. One minute it had been a calm, sunny afternoon and the next James was in the centre of a torrential downpour of stinging water so thick he couldn’t see his hand in front of his face. When the air cleared he saw something he could hardly believe: a vast, 20-foot-high wave was travelling along the length of the lake.

  The surging water scraped the edges of the basin, tearing up trees by their roots and wiping out the little run of buildings on the other side. Then it picked up the big white seaplane like a child’s toy and tossed it over the side of the dam.

  James watched as the plane glided a little way out across the valley before tipping and plummeting downward.

  Ugo was standing on the piazza, transfixed, one arm raised to give the signal to his men, looking up, unable to comprehend what was happening, as his beloved Sikorsky flew over the dam and dropped towards him.

  Behind the plane a solid block of water filled the sky.

  ‘No!’ he said and stretched his hand out still further as if to hold it back. ‘No!’

  But he could do nothing to hold it back. The plane swatted him like a fly and an instant later the water smashed into the palazzo, washing the other men off the piazza.

  The wave had completely swamped the dam, cracking the stonework, but as the flow diminished James saw that it was still standing.

  It wasn’t over yet though.

  When the ledge had hit the water it had sent out massive underwater shock waves unseen to James and the others and the stonework was fatally damaged. It would take next to nothing now to push the dam out and release the tremendous pressure of water behind it.

  And there was something coming, something big.

  A second wave had gone the opposite way up the lake, hitting the rocks at the far end, and, like water splashing about in a bathtub with nowhere to go, it was coming back.

  It was smaller than the first wave but it was still powerful, and, as it crashed into the dam, the wall finally collapsed.

  The massive force of 20 million gallons of water pushed the broken concrete out of its way in a mindless rush to escape. The plug had been pulled from the bath. The lake was draining and nothing could stop it now.

  The aqueduct was obliterated, wiped out in an instant, sending stonework and masonry tumbling down into the valley. The palazzo didn’t stand a chance either; an unimaginable torrent of water and concrete and rock was sent hurtling into it. Columns and pillars were washed away like twigs. Whole buildings were ripped from their foundations and tossed down the mountainside. The parapets and walkways, the courtyards and all the fine squares and fountains were scrubbed into oblivion.

  The people who were left inside had no chance. There was nowhere to run, even if they had had time or warning. The merciless water found its way into every hole and hiding place; nothing was spared. The few remaining roofs collapsed and the last of the walls buckled and broke apart. The tapestries and paintings, the statues and fine furniture, the silver ornaments and chandeliers were all utterly smashed to pieces and swept away.

  After the water came the mud – an avalanche of sludge from the bottom of the lake and earth from the mountainside, an evil flow of dark, stinking slime. It forced its way through what was left of the windows and filled the rooms, so that soon there was nothing to see of Ugo’s palazzo and it was as if there had never been anything there.

  ‘What have you done?’ said James to Zoltan, who was staring at the lake that had quickly become a fast-flowing river.

  ‘I have drowned him,’ said Zoltan. ‘He was always worried about filth in his precious palazzo, now it will take a thousand years to clean.’

  Countess Jana Carnifex stood in the valley looking up at the ugly smear of black mud that was crawling down the mountain like a flow of cold lava. She knew that everything had gone. Her home, her beautiful clothes, her gold and silver jewellery, everything.

  She had been born with nothing, and now she had nothing again. Nothing except a cold, dark lust for revenge. She was from the Barbagia. She had grown up being taught all about the code of vendetta. She didn’t care whether she lived or died now, as long as she destroyed everyone who was responsible for this thing happening.

  When the shooting had started she had been in the palazzo infirmary. Every week she visited the doctor
for a check-up. She had a weak heart and he gave her pills and injections for it. But just as he was holding the syringe up and tapping it to free any bubbles, they had heard gunshots and shouting.

  The doctor had glanced out of the window, then turned back to Jana with a concerned frown. Jana had pushed him out of the way and looked for herself.

  There had been confusion in the palazzo, men running and shooting, servants screaming. There was an explosion nearby, shockingly loud, and the doctor had said that they should leave. They had made their way outside and run towards the mines.

  And then she had seen the English boy, James Bond, with the girl, Amy.

  She had thought about him all the way down as she joined the stream of servants, fleeing from the fighting through the mining tunnels.

  As she had emerged into the light at the bottom she heard explosions above and stared up just in time to see the dam collapse, bringing down half the mountain with it.

  Most of the people in the valley had had time to get to higher ground and avoid the roaring flood as it charged into Sant’ Ugo. They were already joining with the survivors from the mining tunnels to organise rescue parties. Jana recognised the schoolboys, from Eton, from James Bond’s school and again her cold heart beat faster.

  She would not sleep until she had her revenge, and she knew where she would start.

  With James Bond, and all his family.

  29

  Behind the Mask

  All the dogs in the valley were barking. They had sensed that something terrible had happened. Stefano and Vendetta could hear them even from here, perched on a rock looking down at where the water had carved out a great crescent in the ground below.

  Vendetta looked over towards the ruins of Ugo’s palazzo.

  ‘James Bond,’ she said.

  ‘Mortu est,’ said Stefano. He is dead. ‘You will never see him again.’

  Vendetta didn’t cry. She hadn’t cried since she was a baby. There were no tears inside her. She had had her revenge for Mauro. Ugo was gone and his palazzo destroyed. She would return now to her life in the mountains. She had always had a hard heart, now it would be even harder.