David Gilman - Ice Claw

“He’s fourteen. My mate. He’s injured. They brought him here.”

“How would I know? Max, never mind him. There’s going to be a terrible disaster.”

Max turned away. Farentino thrust his arms through the cage, desperately begging.

“Max, listen to me, please … listen … I saw your father!”

Max spun on his heel, reached through the metal bars and grabbed the pathetic man by his shirtfront, pulling his face close. Farentino winced in pain.

“Liar! My dad would’ve clobbered you. He’d have killed you!” he shouted, throwing the man back into the stinking straw.

Max trembled with rage. This was insane. Whatever Farentino had got himself into was his own problem. Max had to find Sayid.

“The man who’s doing all this, he sent me to him. He thought you were working for your father, ever since you were in the Pyrenees. I had to go and see him. To make sure you weren’t working for him.”

Max was rooted to the spot. Fists clenched, legs trembling with adrenaline, wanting to punish the wretched Farentino. But he was in a pitiful state, beyond contempt, and Max knew he couldn’t inflict violence on him. If he did, what would that make Max? A thug? A mindless attacker overtaken by revenge? The conflict in his mind fought him for seconds that felt like minutes. He did want to punish Farentino. Maybe Max’s instincts were that basic. He shook his head.

“You’re not worth it, Angelo. You can stay here till you rot.”

Farentino had to break through Max’s anger. He whispered hurriedly, as if confiding a great secret, forcing Max to listen, demanding he concentrate, in case he missed any vital information. “Your father, years ago, before you were born, he knew about this area, he was part of a team-listen to me, Max, listen to me, you have to, because your father told me. He told me.”

Max hesitated, surprised. “Told you what?” he said, seeing Farentino’s shoulders slump with relief, having hooked Max’s attention.

Farentino’s words tumbled, hissing like the fast-flowing sluice. “Telluric currents, natural electromagnetic waves, grids of energy that lie below the earth’s surface. Like hairline fractures in the earth’s crust.”

Max understood. His dad had explained it once when their compasses went haywire. These electromagnetic currents could be measured at different points in the world. Companies used the data from the energy flows for prospecting, to identify electrical changes in the earth and locate petroleum reservoirs, fault zones-anything from geothermal water supplies to underground volcanoes. The intensity of these currents influenced weather patterns, created atmospheric electricity and huge thunderstorms. The Americans had even harnessed them back in the nineteenth century for their telegraph system.

So what?

“I don’t care, Angelo. This is too big. I can’t save this place, or you. But I can save my mate.”

Max turned away again. Somewhere in this mountain kingdom Sayid Khalif was being held, and every ounce of Max’s energy was going to be spent in saving him.

Farentino shouted after him, “This madman’s going to create a blast that’ll destroy Geneva! It’ll crack the lake! It will destroy the nuclear research center! Max! Stop! The shock wave and water will cut a swathe from here to Paris! This mountain and half the Alps won’t be here in a few hours!”

Farentino was right. There were only a few hours left. Max knew that. Time had slipped away from him. He was leaving everything too late. He didn’t even know where Sayid was, never mind how to get him out.

As far as he was concerned, Angelo Farentino was on his own. Max felt a ripple of uncertainty at his own cold-bloodedness. He was leaving the man to die.

The hoist’s platform hummed into life. Someone on one of the upper levels had pressed the call button. Max ran for the slow-rising platform. He was within a meter of grabbing the platform’s substructure. He would ride up undetected.

And then Farentino’s desperate shout pierced him like a spear.

“Your mother! I know how she died. How she really died!”

Farentino’s words captured Max. He’d left his escape too late. The platform eased down and four men came into view, each leveling a machine pistol. There was nowhere to run, but Angelo had stunned him and momentarily taken the fight out of him. Max’s mother had died in the Central American rain forest during a research trip when he was eleven. Maybe Farentino was playing games, saying anything to get Max’s help and escape.

Tishenko’s guards kept a firm grip on him as the hoist climbed upwards. Max stayed alert, searching for anything that might come to his aid when he escaped, because escape he would-he needed to be certain Angelo Farentino wasn’t lying.

Max figured the hoist was a crude lift mechanism used only for these lower levels. Tunnels hewn from the rock face went off in different directions on each floor they passed. Generators, power plants and general storage would be down here.

The hoist stopped and the men pushed him off the platform, across a more cared-for area and into a sleek, modern lift. Moments later Fedir Tishenko turned to face him when the express lift’s doors opened. Max’s stomach lurched. A stocky man with skin like a lizard’s looked at him. Half his face was covered in hair as dense as fur. It was fur, Max realized, trimmed close to the puckered skin. Max kept his reaction under control.

An armed guard stood over Sharkface. Max hadn’t seen the sky in hours, but now he looked through the massive window cut in the rock face. This must be three thousand meters high. A blue velvet sky shimmered with stars. You could almost reach out and take a handful, but what held Max’s attention was the cloud base a thousand or more meters below. The black carpet would cut out the night if he were on the ground, but from up here it swirled, in a conflicting tide, and small lightning flashes ricocheted through the dense cover.

Tishenko saw Max’s fascination. “That is a damp firework display compared to the apocalyptic event that will take place in only a few hours. My name is Fedir Tishenko. Where is Zabala’s stone?” He tossed the useless pendant at Max.

So, Max realized, Sharkface had landed himself in it.

“Where is my friend?” Max said, daring to bluff confidently.

“He is dead.”

No way. Max wasn’t going to accept that Sayid was dead until he saw his body. This monster was trying to scare him. Max didn’t show his emotions. “That’s a pity. He had the stone.”

“Oh, brave try, young Mr. Gordon. You have dogged my ambitions for some time now. We searched the boy, he had nothing. You, however, are the kind of threat I could make no allowances for in my plans. You have it. You must. Why else are you here, other than to make a futile attempt at stopping me.”

“I’m here for my friend.”

“But you did not know he was here until a few hours ago. Who told you?”

“No one,” Max lied. He looked at Sharkface. “I saw your thug here kill Peaches.”

“Why am I not surprised to hear that? Ruthless ambition can do strange things to a person. And then?”

“I followed him here.”

“Liar! No one followed me! I swear it!” Sharkface yelled, desperate for his life.

Max smiled. “You’re rubbish, mate. I could have followed you with my eyes closed in the middle of the night. You led me right here. I found Bobby Morrell’s van, and my friend left a clue there for me.”

Max was looking around, taking in as much as he could. There were big screens dotted around the room. Satellite pictures from space. Gathering storms across the Atlantic. Cold-weather, low-pressure fronts projected across Europe and a swirling, snakelike coil of clouds twisting towards the Alps. That was the expected monster of a storm. Hours away.