by Alex Archer
In the end it was her task alone.
THAT NIGHT A SCREAM awakened her.
She rolled off her pallet. Somehow she got out from under her mosquito netting without tangling herself in its folds. She was on her feet in a crouch in an instant, the sword firm in her hand.
She saw a flicker of motion from the top of the wheelhouse. A head with terrible incurving teeth flashed down to grab the upturned screaming face of a young man. Then coils as thick around as a truck tire slid down and around him, glistening in the light of the just risen moon. They seemed to move slowly, inexorable as fate. Yet by the time she reached him, sword raised to sever those thick brown-on-bronze loops of muscle, he was wound about three times.
His right arm, pinned against his body, couldn’t reach his weapon. Annja saw the peristaltic action of the great serpent’s body as it contracted around him, even as its weight bore him over the rail and off into the water.
The little round Belgian captain was out in a night-shirt, holding a big flashlight and screaming at the helmsman. The crewman had dozed at his wheel, and a trick of the current had drawn the boat under the overhang of trees on the banks. The anaconda had simply dropped down on the deckhouse from a branch and awaited prey.
In between barrages of abuse at his crewman she heard the captain wondering aloud just how the current could have so moved the boat when its slow, faithful engine was driving inexorably against it. As he vanished into the wheelhouse to take over the helm himself, Annja looked around to find the deck crowded with the surviving mercenaries. Instead of emptying their weapons into the waters that had claimed a third comrade, they all stared at her with big, round eyes.
“I was too late,” she said. “Sorry.” She walked forward. The mercenaries standing between her and her comfortless pallet melted from her like mercury from a fingertip. She made no mention of the sword.
Annja smiled a big smile. Grumbling, the others turned away. Presumably their work had inured them to horrors. These were new horrors, but, in the end, just horrors.
What force could make the boat stray from midstream like that? she asked herself as she ducked under the netting once more.
All might be explained by superior technology. That was what she had come for, wasn’t it?
She lay back down. The gauntlet had been thrown. She would face her enemies boldly, unafraid.
She slept solidly the rest of the night, untroubled by dreams.
As the sun’s first light poured forth, pursuing them upriver, the Marlow lookout’s call roused Annja. Blinking and fuzzy she crawled out from beneath the mosquito netting to stand upright in the bow.
Ahead, just where the great river bent to the right, its base obscured by mist as if it floated on cloud, a vast tree or collection of trees with nine trunks wound somehow together leaned out over the mighty Amazon.
27
Their beachhead was a natural clearing filled with shoulder-high grass. Natural seeming, Annja realized, when she saw that what she had taken for a driftwood raft caught on the bank, another hundred yards or so past the nine-trunked tree, was actually the remnant of a wooden dock, slumped into the water.
As the Marlow approached shore the men gripped their weapons and stared fixedly at the landing site. Annja thought it was professionalism belatedly asserting itself. A distressed-looking McKelvey disabused her of the notion as he removed his crumpled boonie hat to wipe sweat from his forehead.
“This is a bad place,” he said. “We better pray your man Moran gets plenty reinforcements in to us pretty quick, like he said he would.”
“Why is that?” Annja asked.
“A logging party got ambushed ten, twenty klicks back upstream from here, not three months ago. They had a whole security company with them, 120 men or more, with armored cars, machine guns, mortars, everything. Another two or three hundred workers, bulldozers, the whole nine yards. The Indians, just wiped the jungle with ’em. Total massacre.”
“Why didn’t I hear about it?” Annja demanded. It seemed to confirm they were in fact within reach of her goal. It also confirmed the level of danger.
“It wasn’t the kind of thing that’d go on FOX News, ma’am,” he said. “Not everything that happens even gets on the Internet, especially when it happens way out here in the back of beyond. A few survivors made it back to the gold camp. Some of Bull Campbell’s boys heard the bosses. Sounded like a real horror show.”
“What happened to the survivors?”
The lieutenant shrugged. But Annja noted his eyes slid away from hers. The Amazon camps were an ultimately Darwinian environment. And the big cage in the river always needed new gold panners, she reckoned.
Ashore, the men moved with self-confidence seemingly restored by familiar tasks. They unreeled rolls of the same German razor tape that topped the fence around Feliz Lusitânia. They set up curved plastic tablets whose convex face was stamped with the legend Front Toward Enemy. They erected little stands of equipment. It was all a very solemn ritual.
Annja had already knocked about the world enough in her young life to be familiar with most of it. The knife wire was suitably nasty. So were the Claymore mines. And the infrared detectors and infantry radars were undoubtedly far keener at night than plain low-tech human eyes.
Any stray capybara that chanced to wander out of the bush was certain to meet a swift and horrid fate.
As the activity got well under way McKelvey came to Annja, standing near the water. He seemed pleased. “We’ve got it under control now,” he said. “We’re doing what we do. We shouldn’t have any trouble now.”
“That’s what we thought all along. And you’ve lost three men,” she said.
His worried expression came back. “Well, I know there are Indian attacks all the time….”
“In the backcountry, on mining and logging camps,” Annja said. “Tourist and trade boats come up and down this river all the time. They don’t get attacked by Indians. Why your men now? With all these other incidents? And how many cases of anacondas attacking people have you heard about?”
“Well—there’s those movies….” His voice trailed off as he realized too late how lame that sounded.
“There are documented accounts,” she said. “A few. But three fatal attacks? You think that’s coincidence? Something doesn’t want us here, Lieutenant.”
“Rationally—”
“Yeah. That’s what I want to believe, too. But how rational is that level of coincidence?” Annja surprised herself with the question.
“Well…that’s what all the guys with guns are for, aren’t they?”
She resisted an urge to pat him on the cheek. “Sure, Lieutenant. And they’ll probably even be some help.”
He smiled and nodded. “Lucky there’s a clearing here, huh, Ms. Creed? Helps a lot.”
“I’m not so sure it’s luck. I suspect this is an old, abandoned rubber plantation. The jungle takes longer to reclaim some fields than others.”
“Huh,” he said again. “You really know a lot about this place, don’t you, ma’am?”
Annja scanned the surrounding trees. There was a break to the northeast. Beyond it she glimpsed more grassland. “Not as much as I intend to, Lieutenant.”
ACCORDING TO PLAN the mercenaries, having secured an initial perimeter, moved beyond the gap Annja had seen into the open grass to create a landing strip. The night before setting out from Feliz Lusitânia Annja had spoken briefly, almost robotically, by the camp radio-phone to Publico. He said he had finished his urgent mission overseas. He would join the party when they found the nine-trunked tree.
She had not asked him what his connection was to the camp and its evils. It no longer seemed important. Her quest consumed her utterly.
As the men set to work hacking and trampling the high grass, Annja decided to have a look around for herself. Walking off through a stand of trees along what she suspected was an old road leading northwest, she waved off the lieutenant’s worried question, “Don’t you want an escort
, Ms. Creed?”
She still wasn’t sure whether the mercenaries would prove more help than hindrance. She knew, ultimately, that what must be done, she must do alone. And after two days crowded on the boat with the surly, boisterous men, she wanted little more than to be left alone.
Unless it was a hot bath. But that would have to wait.
Emerging from the trees, she saw a cluster of buildings standing at the edge of the clearing a couple of hundred yards away. Guessing one was the old plantation house, and feeling the archaeologist’s urge to explore abandoned human habitation, she struck out for them.
She kept an eye out for any of the numerous types of poisonous snakes that could be lurking to bite her. She kept her eyes moving all around, in fact. There were other dangers that never realistically threatened ecotourists—such as native arrows, anacondas and, of course, golden onzas. Not to mention the odd green energy beam.
As she walked along a rutted track through more high grass she wondered what other defenses the Promessans might have in store. Whether or not this was the actual border of the settlement known as the Quilombo dos Sonhos they were near to it—she was sure of it.
“I guess we’ll find out soon enough,” she said aloud.
Small gold-headed blue birds flew up from the grass and away from her as she walked toward the buildings. As she drew closer she could see that they had fallen into ruin. The main building’s walls, of stone or brick—either of which had once been expensively hauled all the way up the Amazon by shallow-draft steamboats—still mostly stood. Smaller outbuildings, presumably of wood, had mostly slumped into overgrown mounds.
She went into what had been the plantation house. Climbing vines veined the walls. Their suckers had torn away the whitewash in irregular sheets. Inside she found the upper floor and ceiling had fallen in. She could see the sky above, blue with clouds beginning to close. It would likely rain soon.
The floor was a jumble of broken beams and furniture, much covered by vines and grass and even brush growing through the floorboards. She wondered at the totality of collapse. Had the house been burned down?
Looking up at a jut of beam from the wall right above the entrance, she saw rippled char on its end that seemed to confirm it had burned through. That led her to new speculation—did it burn by accident? Lightning? Arson? Had the plantation been overtaken by the collapse of Brazil’s rubber market, as Manaus had? Maybe it had been a front for the quilombo and the Promessans, as River of Dreams Trading Company was today, and had reached the end of its usefulness.
The Promessans, she thought, had a brisk way of dealing with things that outlived their utility. People, as well as artifacts, if the fates of the anonymous man in Feliz Lusitânia and Mafalda in Belém were any indication.
She backed out and went to the other sizable building. It was a chapel. Its walls of gray granite and even its arching slate roof were largely intact. The forest had grown right up against it.
Inside was bare but for broken pews and a layer of jungle litter on the flagstones. Buttresses mounted up the walls. Green lianas climbed them, as did chittering monkeys. Little blue ground doves pecked around the hollow altar. The windows had been broken out.
Annja wandered deeper into the chapel. Dry leaves skittered from her feet. Small creatures stirred unseen beneath drifted debris.
“Annja Creed,” said a voice behind her.
She spun. The sword appeared in her hand.
“You won’t need that,” Xia said.
Her black hair, bound by what looked like a thin jade band around her temples, fell around her shoulders. She wore a sleeveless top of shimmering green, and what might have been a green suede skirt, leaving her firmly muscled stomach bare. The straps of sandals twined up her bare legs like serpents.
At her side stood Patrizinho, his arms crossed over his muscular bare chest. He wore loose brown trousers with gold trim and low boots with no visible seams or fastenings. Figured golden armlets encircled his forearms. His dreadlocked golden-brown hair was swept back into a brush at the back of his head by a gold cloth band. Neither bore weapons that Annja could see.
“I think I do,” she said. To her surprise her voice did not shake from her anger, or the force she was exerting to keep it under control.
“Do I even have to point out that if we wanted you dead you’d be dead already?” Xia said. Her tone was mild, conversational. Annja understood that sociopaths were often accomplished actors. “Or that we can escape at will?”
“If I’m alive,” Annja said, “I presume it’s in your selfish interest to keep me alive.”
Patrizinho’s face split in a huge grin. It tugged at her heart. He was so beautiful she wanted to believe in him.
“She almost gets it, doesn’t she?” he said to his companion. “I told you, there is hope for her.”
“We shall all know very soon,” Xia said.
Annja laughed. It was a harsh sound. The laugh of a stranger. “You think I’m gullible because of how easily you tricked me before,” she said. “I may be a naive and spoiled North American. I may not be as streetwise as I like to think I am. I may not even be that smart. But I am capable of learning.”
“Good,” Xia said, smiling and nodding tightly. “Because time is short. So learn fast.”
“I already know all I need to about you.”
“Do you really believe so?” Patrizinho asked. He almost sounded surprised.
“You know nothing,” Xia said. “You have been misled, lied to at every turn.”
“By you!” Annja couldn’t keep the metal out of her voice.
“No,” Xia said.
“Even now, if you look deep into your heart you can see the truth,” Patrizinho said. He held out a hand. “Please.”
“You risk compromising your destiny,” Xia said. “You are betrayed. Now you risk betraying yourself and all that you stand for.”
“How dare you talk of me betraying what I stand for!” she demanded. “What do you know about my destiny?”
Gripping the sword in both hands, she charged toward them. In blind, weeping rage she cocked the weapon back over her shoulder to strike.
Xia and Patrizinho stepped backward out of the doorway and stepped to the side.
When she ran out after them they were gone.
They must have gone into the underbrush, she assured herself. Though she could see no sign of it—no branches asway from being displaced, no stirring of growth deeper in, no birds startled into flight by human passage.
There was no point in pursuing, she knew. This was their forest. They could ambush her or evade her at will.
This proves we’re in the right place! she exulted to herself.
From the southeast came the mosquito whine of airplane engines.
THE FIELD HAD BEEN VETTED for relative flatness and firmness by the mercenaries. It was nothing the little aircraft, and a seasoned Brazilian bush pilot used to landing on rough fields, couldn’t handle.
Mladko and Goran emerged wearing loose long-sleeved shirts and tan trousers. Their shaved heads were covered in Panama hats. They winged out to each side of the aircraft door and stood with thick arms crossed.
A similarly attired Publico emerged. McKelvey, alerted to the plane’s approach by radio, snapped to attention and saluted. Sir Iain acknowledged him with an airy tip of a forefinger off his craggy forehead.
Then his blue eyes lit on Annja, walking crisply toward him across the field. His face seamed in smiles. “Ah, Annja my dear. Just the person I want to see. Carry on, Lieutenant. You’re doing a splendid job.”
As mercenaries crawled into the plane between Goran and Mladko to unload Publico’s luggage, the man himself walked to meet Annja. “Come,” he said, taking her by the shoulder. “Walk with me. Talk with me.”
She nodded. For some reason she was too suffused with emotion to speak.
“You’ve done well by me,” he told her, as they walked back in the general direction of the plantation house.
A
nnja held an internal debate as to whether she should tell him what had just happened in the ruined chapel. Before she came to a resolution he said, “I’ve a proposition for you, Annja. You’re a remarkable young woman. You’ve achieved great things. And you’re really very beautiful, you know. So here’s my offer—become my consort, and we’ll rule the world together.”
She laughed. He frowned. To her utter astonishment he seemed genuinely annoyed.
“I thought you meant to give the whole world the gift of immortality,” she said half-facetiously.
“Are you daft? To hold such power, only to give it away? I’d have to be a fool.”
It was her turn to frown. “You can’t be serious.”
“I’m deadly serious,” he said, although he smiled once more. “You’ve put the power of the ages into these hands.” He held them up before her.
“Why me?” she asked, to give herself time to think. Or more accurately, to try to bring her whirling thoughts into something resembling order. “What you said about me is very nice. But I don’t have any illusions I’m anything special. Especially in the looks department. You’ve got to see that. You have beautiful women throwing themselves at you all the time.”
“Don’t sell yourself short,” he said, not bothering to deny her assertion. “Your appearance is quite striking. And intelligence as incisive as yours is an aphrodisiac. That and tenacious will and competence such as you’ve displayed. They’d set you apart from a sea of pretty faces, if those eyes and those cheekbones didn’t do the job.”
He stopped. They stood at the border of field and brush. A stand of trees stood between them and a derelict field that adjoined the old plantation house. He ran the back of his right hand down her left cheek.
She thrilled to the contact. There was a magnetism to the man, she had to admit. And yet—what he was saying went beyond bizarre. If he meant it, it was monstrous.
But she couldn’t believe. Wouldn’t believe. Surely we didn’t go through so much—surely Dan didn’t die, for some kind of B-movie megalomaniac?