by Jeanne Rose
Quetzalcoatl had been conquered.
To remind the oh-so-earthly man of her identity, she had stripped off the tunic part of the costume she had collected from Juan that morning. Montgomery would recognize the full, firm breasts he had held in his hands. Not to mention that the convenient tunic could be used to carry away the gold lying on the altar, gold she would share not only with Tezco and their men, but with Monte, as well. For Xosi knew she loved the man and would not see him die. That's why she'd needed power over Montgomery. And no use letting the gold go to waste.
Xosi's eyes were drawn to the intoxicating sheen of the great wheel. Montgomery turned from the altar. She watched his expression change from arrogance to surprise...to rage...
Rage?
For the first time, Xosi was afraid and looked toward her brother, whose expression was also shocked, his eyes wide, his posture frozen.
Montgomery's hands shook, his lips trembled. Then he shouted, "Sacrilege!"
The booming voice rang through the canyon. Blue fire blazed from his eyes. And Tezco jumped forward, only to be caught and held by Xosi's guards.
Montgomery turned his ferocious glare on her brother. "Once more you have betrayed me, Tezcalipoca!" And just as quickly, he ordered, "Prepare the gift for the gods!"
"No!" Xosi screamed, even as she was lifted bodily and laid on the great sacrificial stone, her hands and feet tied down.
Montgomery approached, an oval knife raised. Teeth of shell decorated the wicked blade. Xosi's heart felt cold, yet hot blood pulsed through her veins.
"No!" she screamed again. "I took away your power, Quetzalcoatl. You cannot kill me!"
MONTE COULDN’T FIND the power to move. Sweating, heart pounding, he tried to make sense of the spectacle before him, a scene that should not be -- Tezco held by the guards and Xosi tied to the sacrificial stone. What the hell was she doing here?
Would Montgomery really plunge the knife into her breast?
He pulled the rifle from beneath his cloak, aimed it at Beaufort Montgomery, only to be distracted by the sound of thunder.
Thunder. The guns of the battlefield. The earth had trembled with their roar and the air had burned from their smoke.
Thunder rumbled now. Smoke rose. As did the moaning winds surrounding them. Shaking away the distant memory, Monte placed his finger on the trigger.
As if sensing this, Montgomery turned to him, met Monte's gaze and gave him a burning expression. Plummeted once more back to the Civil War, Monte looked into the face of the man who had saved his life. His hands began shaking so hard he couldn't pull the trigger...not even when Montgomery turned from him, raising the knife higher...
"No, please, no!" Xosi was sobbing.
Deaf to her pleas, the madman plunged the toothed knife down, burying it deep in Xosi's beautiful breast as lightning split the dark sky, illuminating the scene.
"E-e-e-e-e-e!"
Her scream shattered the air, overwhelming the warning rumble of thunder. Blood spurted like a fountain and her body convulsed.
"Xosi-i-i-i!" came another terrible cry to echo through the valley, this from Tezco, who lunged forward, shaking off his guards like a man possessed with the strength of ten.
Horrified, Monte still couldn't move, not even when the ground below him did, not even when Beaufort Montgomery ripped the bloody, still-beating heart from Xosi's chest and took off at a dead run. He gagged. "Xosi!" And something in him died, too.
Suddenly, the altar toppled...the gold wheel of life and death slid off. The pyramid itself was moving. Vibrating. The guards and the people in the procession cried out, started to run as a crack spread beneath their feet.
Earthquake!
Sick inside, Monte shouted, "Tezco!" If he hadn't saved Xosi, he could at least try to save her brother.
Lost, Tezco had eyes only for the limp, bloody body on the stone. He threw himself on her. "Xosi! Xosi!"
The crack in the pyramid widened and Monte stumbled backward, trying to keep his footing. Lightning flashed through the unnaturally dark sky, while the rumble of the earth grew louder.
He shouted one last time, tried to reach the other man. "Tezco, come on!"
But it was already too late. The top of the pyramid split completely open, revealing a deep, dark heart, isolating the bandit leader on the opposite side. The sacrificial stone tumbled, taking Xosi into the darkness below. The last thing Monte saw before fleeing for his life was Tezco clinging to the edge of the splitting stone, still crying his sister's name as she plunged into oblivion.
With the earth splitting toward him, Monte ran, dodging falling stone, aware the ground below him was shaking, and that crevices zig-zagged out in every direction. When a half-crazed guard confronted him, he froze, remembering too late the gun in his hands. A blast suddenly hit the guard in the chest. He crumpled.
"Ryerson!" It was Sam Strong, a Colt .45 in hand. "Got to save Louisa --"
Monte stopped him. "It wasn't Louisa on the altar. It was Xosi! Get out of here!"
Both men then ran to the base of the pyramid as the world rocked crazily. A sea of humanity surged around them, some falling, getting trampled, toppling into the crevices. Only when Monte jumped a wide crack, did he realize he'd left his sister's man behind.
"Strong?" he yelled, looking around.
But Sam Strong had disappeared and Monte could only hope he would head in the right direction.
Meantime, he sprinted off again. Shorty, Jake and Louisa should be waiting at the canyon's gate. If he was going to be buried alive, he wanted to die with people he cared about.
LOUISA WAS RIDING for the gate when the earthquake struck. Having waited for the gun shots – a signal that had never come – she'd decided to take action herself, had had all she could handle controlling the horses with the electricity of the approaching storm hanging in the air.
Now the earth itself roared.
El Tigre reared, knocking her sombrero off. Her hair tumbled down about her shoulders. Louisa firmly reined him in, at the same time trying to keep hold of the other four horses. Defiant squealed and dug in his heels, the other mounts snorted and danced. She felt as if her arms were being yanked out of their sockets but she held on for dear life and kicked the black stallion's sides.
"Come on, let's go!" she yelled.
She had to find Sam and the others, had to escape this place of death. Even earthquakes didn't matter.
El Tigre reared again, then came down with a lunge. Guiding him with her legs, Louisa held onto the ropes holding the other horses and galloped for the gate.
Chaos reigned. People shrieked, debris flew through the air, huts burned as they collapsed on themselves and the cooking fires within. Hell erupted around her, seeping up from deep dark bowels to set the earth ablaze. Swerving to avoid a growing crevice, she shrieked when the devil seemed to rise out of the trembling ground. Spooked, the horses came to a shuddering halt and screamed in terrified protest.
"Death!" shouted Beaufort Montgomery, gore staining his tunic, the feathers of his torn cape flapping and standing on end. "Sacrifice!" he roared, running toward her with a ragged-edged knife in one hand, a bloody organ in the other.
The madman still wanted to kill her!
Fighting to control the horses, fighting her own urge to throw up, Louisa felt fear and anger surge, then mix with something...wilder, more instinctive and elemental. The face of a long-haired, bronzed warrior flashed through her mind.
Montgomery was nearly upon her. "You were meant for the gods, damn you, and they shall have you!"
Louisa could ride a horse as if she were nearly one with the animal. And now she used her mount as a weapon, giving a warrior's loud war whoop, "He-e-i-!" While at the same time, she kicked El Tigre's sides hard to send him and the other horses hurtling at the demonic man. "Go back to hell from where you came!"
The stallion hit Montgomery squarely, knocking him to the ground. The bloody mass flew from his hand. Sharp hooves thudded over flesh and cracked on b
one. So much for his being some kind of god.
Heart pounding, she rode on, only coming to another dirt-splattering halt when a boulder rolled down the mountainside and rumbled across her path. The gate lay just ahead. Sam was supposed to be there. But he wasn't. And the horses spooked again when lightning flashed overhead. It took all of Louisa's strength to hold them.
"Sam! Sam, where are you?"
Sensing a presence beside her, she hoped to see Sam...but instead met the madman's insane gaze.
"Die, damn you, die!" screamed Beaufort Montgomery, grabbing her leg, tearing her out of the saddle.
He was still alive! Despite the blood pouring from multiple wounds and the leg he was dragging at a strange angle. Despite the caved-in chest revealed by his torn tunic, the sharp bone of a rib that stuck out, piercing his flesh. Louisa bit back a scream. Perhaps he was some sort of god or demon, one who couldn't die.
She fought and kicked wildly as the apparition wrestled with her, finally threw her to the ground. He was so strong, he held her fast and raised the knife, his face a twisted mask, red glittering in the depths of his icy eyes.
She saw her own death coming as he said, "Your blood shall make me live! Die–"
The last word was cut off in a gurgle as Montgomery was seized from behind. An arm locked around the madman's throat, Sam pulled Montgomery off of Louisa.
She scrambled to her feet, screaming, "Sam!"
With a fierce growl, Montgomery tore away from him and headed back for Louisa. Sam attacked yet again, punching the man viciously, then drawing a gun and shooting. Another bloom of red spouted on his chest. Montgomery roared with anger and tore the gun out of Sam's hands even as Sam tore a medallion that looked like the wheel from Montgomery's chest. With a display of more than human strength, the madman threw out an arm and knocked Sam several feet away. Blood trickling from his mouth, Sam groaned and lay still.
Dear God, was he dead?
Montgomery came for Louisa yet again, his face set into a snarl, his blood-stiffened hair coiling out like snakes.
An evil god.
Though that knowledge wouldn't stop Louisa from fighting for her life. Or avenging Sam's. She backed up, snatched the pistol from her belt and aimed it at him.
"Yah-h!"
The shout came from Sam. Thanks to the spirits of life! He was on his feet again, running at the madman.
"Be careful!"
Louisa manuevered the gun, looking for a clear chance at the madman as the two fought. If another bullet could stop him.
Montgomery shoved Sam backward with a snarl, then slashed the jagged blade at him. Sam feinted, lunged. At the same time, another crevice split the earth behind Montgomery. Sam charged him and – with the hand holding Montgomery's own medallion – hit him square in the bloody chest. Yowling, Montgomery flew back, teetered on the crevice's edge...and, finally, horrific face wreathed in surprise, fell in...
LOUISA STARED, gun still in hand.
Until Sam threw down the medallion and grabbed her in a crushing embrace. "Thank God!"
She clung to him, oblivious, no matter the chaos and carnage around them, and watched as the earth closed around the madman, swallowing him whole, then exploding in a shower of dirt and stone, the sight unlike any she'd seen so far. Montgomery's death bray vibrated beneath her feet and permeated the very air they breathed.
Sam was first to come to his senses. "Catch the horses! We have to get out of here!"
Quickly, she sprang to action, finding Defiant with his reins trailing and his eyes rolling, then El Tigre. As if they thought humans could offer them comfort in the upheaval, the animals had milled about but stayed nearby.
Sam caught the others, guided them back to her.
Both mounting then, they galloped for the gate.
"Jake!" Louisa shouted, catching sight of the cowboy as he and Shorty swung the barricade open. "Monte!"
Still dressed in his Aztec costume, her brother bolted up to spring onto a horse's back. Louisa on El Tigre, Sam bringing up the rear of the party on Defiant, he raised his hand in a cavalry signal. "Let's ride!"
And ride they did.
The quake continued to move outward from the crumbling pyramid. The pass ahead of them was so narrow, they raced single-file. Pounding El Tigre's flanks, Louisa flew, leaning over the horse's neck, only looking back to make sure that Sam was all right and that it was actually him on her heels, rather than a pack of blood-thirsty demons.
CHAPTER TWENTY
SAM KEPT HIS EYES on Louisa and rode hell bent for leather. The party galloped at top speed through the narrow pass whose sheer walls seemed ready to crumble at any moment. Small rocks pummeled them, sand sifted down and into their faces.
"Watch out!" yelled Monte Ryerson in the lead.
Sam immediately saw the rockslide near the mouth of the pass. Ryerson and Jake O'Brian swerved, slapped their horses with the reins and jumped the lowest end of the debris. Shorty's mount didn't quite clear it, his rear hooves scraping a small boulder, before scrambling across. El Tigre and long-legged Defiant leaped the barrier with ease.
Sam felt greatly relieved when the party finally shot out on the other side of the gorge. But a rumble behind them told him they had to keep riding. He glanced over his shoulder to see a wall of stone crack, break and thunder to the earth in a great cloud of dust. Lightning shot from the four corners of the sky to connect with the mountain in a single spot...which Sam imagined to be Montgomery's burial place.
Or was it Quetzalcoatl's?
He kicked the gelding's flanks, urging him on. "Ya-ah!"
The land they were covering now had flattened out but didn't seem to steady for at least another mile. The horses were lathered and blowing when Louisa pulled in the mustang stallion, dropping back beside Sam.
"Think we could slow down for awhile?" she shouted. "We're gonna run these horses into the ground."
Ryerson and his cowboys were already reining in.
Sam glanced around. "All right, let's walk them."
He prayed the quake wasn't coming this far. And they surely were going to need their mounts. To return to New Mexico Territory, thank God, since they'd made it out alive.
Still, they kept going, plodding along, putting distance between themselves and the canyon of death. Dark clouds sat on the far western horizon and lightning flashed from time to time.
When the ground started to rise again, foothills building toward another range of mountains, Sam called out to the others, ordering them to dismount. His final cavalry command, for he had finished his assignment. Face filled with emotion, Louisa barely hit the ground before she pounced and clung to him, tucking her head into the hollow beneath his chin. He rocked her, made soothing noises, and stroked her hair, silky despite a thick coating of dust. He never wanted to let go of her.
"I was so scared when I was bringing the horses," she murmured. "I didn't hear the shots. I couldn't find you anywhere."
"And I thought you were dead." He'd just about died inside himself when he'd seen the knife plunge into the victim's breast. "I tried to climb the pyramid but everyone was rushing down and drove me back, nearly trampled me."
Louisa tipped her head to gaze at him. "The pyramid?"
Sam realized she hadn't seen the sacrifice. "Beaufort Montgomery put his knife through Xosi's heart -- it wasn't Juan up there today. That's why there wasn't any signal. It took me awhile to find out it wasn't you dressed in that outfit."
Louisa's eyes widened. "Xosi? Why?"
"Can't be sure about that." Ryerson stood nearby, his usually taciturn face looking troubled. "Knowing Xosi, it probably had to do with getting her hands on the gold."
Knowing Xosi? Sam absently wondered how close Ryerson had gotten to the striking Mexican woman, having caught them with their heads pretty close together a few times. Not that it was any of his business.
The big man went on, "Whatever her reasons, Xosi's gone now. Tezco, too. Last thing I saw of him, he was hanging onto a piece of that
crumbling pyramid by his fingertips. He musta been crushed when the stone fell."
"Tezco's dead, huh?" Louisa murmured softly.
A twinge of jealousy struck Sam. Which was stupid, considering the circumstances. Louisa might have come to respect Tezco, but she'd never cared for him. He also reminded himself that the Mexican had come over to their side.
"Tezco didn't have to offer to let us in on the escape plan. But he did."
Ryerson nodded. "Too bad something went wrong. I could tell Tezco was as surprised as I was when his sister sashayed up the pyramid. The guards had to grab hold of him to stop him from taking action." The man went on, "And as soon as that madman killed Xosi, all hell seemed to break loose, the very earth quaked."
"The earthquake started the moment Xosi died?" Louisa turned to face the others but she nestled into the crook of Sam's arm. "That's strange."
Again Ryerson nodded. "Yeah, real strange."
"All hell breaking loose." Louisa shuddered. "I can imagine Beaufort Montgomery as the devil...or some kind of evil god. I don't know how he got off the pyramid, but he tried to kill me."
That got the other men's attention. Sam tightened his hold on her reassuringly.
"He wouldn't die." Louisa's face grew pale. "I ran him down with the horses and he got up again...his chest and his leg were crushed. Even when Sam showed up, he couldn't be stopped – not by fist or bullet. It was like he possessed supernatural strength."
"He didn't weaken until I hit him with that medallion of his," Sam said. "The one that looked like the sacrifice wheel."
"You killed him with his own magic," Ryerson said.
"Is everyone dead?" Louisa gazed toward the dark clouds.
"Nope, a few of them bandits got away." Jake O'Brian had plopped down on the ground in exhaustion. "Some of 'em rode out afore the rest of you showed up."
"And they wasn't lookin' neither to the right nor the left," added Shorty. "They was jest ridin'."