Matthew Reilly - Temple

‘Thank you, Alberto,’ said he, taking the singing idol from me. ‘I think I shall take that now.’

Beside him, Lena smiled at me, her beautiful olive skin sparkling in the rainstorm.

‘So, you defeated the big gold eater to save our idol,’ she said. ‘Is there anything you cannot do, my brave little hero?’ As she said these words, she suddenly leaned forward and kissed me softly on the lips. My heart almost skipped a beat as her lips pressed themselves firmly against mine. My knees felt weak. I almost fell over, so delightful was the touch of her lips.

As Lena was kissing me so beautifully, however, a voice from somewhere behind me said: ‘Come now, monk. I thought that wasn’t allowed for men of your ilk.’

I turned to see Bassario standing on the stone steps behind me, his longbow slung over his shoulder, his face creased into a broad smile. ‘We reserve the right to make exceptions,’ said I. Bassario laughed.

Renco turned to face him. ‘Thank you for returning to help us, Bassario. Your arrows saved our lives. What made you return?’

Bassario shrugged. ‘As I reached the waterfall at the end of the quenko, I saw the gold eaters approaching from the other side of the river. Then I supposed that if by some miracle you survived all of this, people would sing songs about you. I decided that I wanted to be a part of those songs. To be remembered for something other than disgracing my family name, and at the same time, to restore that name to honour.’

‘You succeeded on both counts,’ said Renco. ‘You truly did. Now, however, may I beg your indulgence one more time and ask of you one final favour.’ As he spoke, Renco—holding a torch in one arm and both idols in the other—began to back away from the rest of us and headed through the rain toward the portal. On his way, he picked up the llama’s bladder from where it had been dropped during the battle and allowed it to fill with the pouring rain. The cats immediately began to follow him—or rather, follow the singing idol in his hands.

‘Once I am inside the temple,” said Renco as he walked, ‘I want you all to shut the boulder behind me.’

I looked from Renco to the three remaining Incan warriors beside me. ‘What are you going to do?’ said I.

‘I am going to ensure that no one ever gets this idol,’ said Renco. ‘I will use it to lure the cats into the temple. Then, when they are all inside, I want you to push the boulder back into the portal.’

‘But—’

‘Trust me, Alberto,’ he said, his voice calm as he moved slowly toward the portal with the pack of rapas slinking along behind him. ‘We shall see each other again, I promise.’

And with that, Renco stepped up into the open mouth of the temple. The cats crowded in all around him, oblivious to the pouring rain. Lena, Bassario, the three warriors and myself hastened over to the boulder. Renco stood in the entrance to the temple and gave me one final look. He smiled sadly. ‘Take care, my friend,’ said he. And then he was gone, disappearing into the darkness between the boulder and the great stone portal. The cats followed him into the temple one by one.

When the last cat disappeared inside the portal, Bassario called, ‘All right, heave!’

The six of us leaned on the massive boulder, pushed against it with all our might. The big boulder rumbled loudly against the stone floor. It was fortunate that we did not have to push it very far—only a couple of paces—otherwise we might not have been able to do it with only six people. But Bassario and the Incan warriors were strong. And Lena and I pushed with all the strength we had, and slowly, very slowly, the boulder began to fill the squareshaped portal. As we proceeded to seal the temple with the great stone, I heard the song of the idol inside it growing softer and softer. Then abruptly the boulder sealed the portal fully, and as it did so, it stifled the song of the idol completely, and with the ceasing of that song, a great sadness came over me, for I knew then, in that moment, that I would never see my good friend Renco again. Before I left that dreadful rock tower, I would perform one final act. I grabbed a dagger from one of the fallen conquistadors and I scratched a message into the surface of the great boulder now lodged in the portal. I inscribed a warning for all of those who might contemplate opening the temple again.

I wrote:

No entrare absoluto. Muerte asomarse dentro.

Do not enter at any cost. Death looms within.

A.S.

It has now been many years since those events transpired. Now I am an old man, withered and frail, seated at a desk in a monastery, writing by the light of a candle. Snow covered mountains stretch away from me in every direction. The mountains of the Pyrenees. After Renco entered the temple with the two idols and the rapas, Bassario, Lena and I returned to Vilcafor. It was not long before word spread throughout the empire of our deeds—word of Hernando’s death, and of the idol being laid to rest inside a mysterious temple in the presence of a pack of deadly rapas. Typically, the Spanish colonial government created some sham tale about the death of the Governor’s brother, Hernando. They said that he died honourably at the hands of an unknown tribe of natives while he had been bravely navigating some uncharted jungle river. If only my countrymen knew the truth. I also understand that the Incas did indeed sing songs about our adventure and, yes, those songs mentioned Bassario’s name and the singing of those ballads continued even after the Spanish conquest of their lands. The goldeaters, they said, could seize their land, burn their houses, torture and murder their people. But they could not take their spirit. To this day, I do not know what Renco did inside that temple with the two idols. I can only assume that in his wisdom, he anticipated the rumours that would spread after our victory over Hernando. Like Solon, he knew that people, hearing of the idol inside the temple, would seek it out. I imagine that he placed the fake idol at some location nearer to the entrance of the temple, so that if someone did open it up in search of the idol they would come upon the wrong idol first. But I speculate. I do not know for sure. I never saw him again. For my own part, I could no longer endure living in the horror that was New Spain. I decided to return to Europe. And so after bidding farewell to the beautiful Lena and the noble Bassario, with the help of several Incan guides I embarked upon a trek through the mountains of New Spain, heading north. I walked and walked, through jungles, mountains and deserts until finally I came to the land of the Aztecas, the land that Cortez had conquered in the name of Spain but a few years previously. There I managed to bribe my way aboard a merchant ship, laden with stolen gold, bound for Europe. I arrived in Barcelona some months later and from there I travelled to this monastery high in the Pyrenees, a place far away from the world of the King and his bloodthirsty conquistadors, and it was here that I grew old, dreaming every night of my adventures in New Spain and wishing every moment that I could have spent just one more day with my good friend Renco.

Race turned the page. That was it. That was the end of the manuscript. He looked forward through the cabin of the Goose. Beyond the windshield of the little seaplane he saw the sharp peaks of the Andes towering in front of him. They would arrive back at Vilcafor soon. Race sighed sadly as he thought about the tale he had just read. He thought of Alberto Santiago’s bravery, and of Renco’s sacrifice, and of the friendship that had developed between the two of them. He also thought about two idols resting inside the temple. Race pondered thatfor a moment. Something about it wasn’t right. Something about the way the manuscript had ended—so suddenly, so abruptly—and also, now that he thought about it, something he had seen yesterday, back when Lauren had done the original nucleotide resonance test to determine the location of the real thyrium idol. Something about the result of that test that wasn’t quite right. The thought of Lauren and Frank Nash’s expedition gave rise to a whole other set of thoughts in Race’s mind. How Nash wasn’t with DARPA. How he was actually in charge of an Army unit trying to beat the real Supernova team—a Navy team—to the thyrium idol. And how he had deceived Race into coming along on the mission. Race shook the thoughts away. He was going to have to figure out how he would deal with Nash when he arrived back at Vilcafor—should he confront him, or would he be better served remaining silent and not letting Nash know just how much he knew? Whatever the case, he would have to decide soon, for no sooner had he finished reading the manuscript than the seaplane tilted gently beneath him, dropping its nose. They were beginning their descent. They were returning to Vilcafor.