Thieves Till We Die (23 page)

While the council members turned to each other, chattering excitedly in low voices, Honor was already up and heading for the door. She paused and looked back at Jonah, like he was a wayward dog she was calling to heel. Jonah threw a quick glance at Xavier, pleased to see him wearing the amulet round his neck again. ‘No hard feelings, I hope?'

Xavier's expression didn't change.
They might get a lot harder if you ever work out there's a radio transmitter hidden in your amulet
. If Motti's bug was working correctly, then he and Con should have picked up every word back at their motel in Florissant, just a few miles away.

What they could do about all this information with so little time left till kick-off was another matter.

Xavier gave him a shove in the small of his back. Jonah meekly followed Honor from the council chamber, rubbing his numb arm and wondering what the hell he was going to do next.

‘Gotta hand it to the geek,' said Motti, pulling off his headphones and turning to Con. ‘He's got balls of steel. He did good in there.'

‘For what it was worth.' Con was sprawled in an armchair with a Coke, staring at bits of paper scattered on the floor. He guessed she was still trying to work out hidden meanings in the pictograms. She hadn't stopped for hours; languages were kind of her thing, Motti supposed, and she didn't like being beaten on a problem. Shit, none of them did.

But this time, winning through was looking less and less likely.

‘Can't believe they're ready to move out tomorrow.' Motti shook his head. ‘We're royally screwed.'

‘They have all the cards,' Con agreed, not looking up from her work. ‘The sword, the location of the temple and the means to open it. And now they have Jonah as well as Patch and Tye.'

‘Looks like it's just you and me, baby,' Motti agreed. He gave a heavy sigh, checked the MP3 recorder was still getting down everything that Xavier's amulet was receiving. Considering the radio mike was the size of a pinhead pressed into a crack in
the jade, the sound quality was incredible. ‘Well, at least we can tell Coldhardt how things are. Maybe now he knows it's no good, he'll give up on this temple and concentrate on getting Patch, Tye and Jonah back safe.'

Con snorted softly, turned a page. ‘That's about as likely as an old Aztec goddess speaking in Traynor's ear.'

‘C'mon, Jonah, speak into mine,' Motti muttered, pressing one headphone pad back against his ear. He heard a dull, steady drone – a car engine. Jonah, this Honor chick and medallion man were in a car, on their way to her place. Motti listened on, but no one was speaking. He had an uneasy feeling building in his belly. Probably because he knew that it was partly down to him that the geek was now in this mess.

Jonah had come to him and Con, begging them to help him persuade Coldhardt to let him go to Colorado. It had been Motti's idea to wire up the amulet – and this had finally sold Coldhardt on the big gamble. The boss man knew time was tight, and since Jonah was willing, he had decided to risk the geek's life smuggling the hidden mike into the heart of Sixth Sun's sanctum, in the hope they'd hear something that could help them get ahead – maybe even the location to the temple. But it looked like Traynor and co were keeping that info to themselves, and meantime Jonah had been beaten up and Tye and Patch dragged off to God knew where…

‘So – radio mike. Great idea,' murmured Motti. ‘All we know now is how much we still
don't
know. Aside
from the fact that Traynor is crazy and Jonah's in big, big trouble.'

Con shrugged. ‘It was a gamble. We may not have won but we've found out why Sixth Sun are doing this – and how.'

Motti looked over at her. ‘Y'know, if Jonah gives us the address they're going to, maybe we can spring him, or get the chick and force her to take us to the temple … Even trade her for Tye and Patch.'

‘Can we follow the signal from the radio mike?' Con wondered. ‘Use it to track them to the temple?'

‘We don't got the range,' Motti told her. ‘Why'd you think we came way out here to listen in on 'em? In any case, by the time we've followed them to wherever the temple is, they'll have emptied the whole goddamned place – well, so long as the sleeping goddess don't wake up and have something to say about that.' There was no reaction from Con, and Motti glowered at her. ‘Tell me if I'm boring you, OK?'

‘Wait. I think I might have something …' Con held up the same old pictogram, the one that showed the heart thing hanging over the two boxes. ‘Coffers!'

Motti pushed his glasses up his nose and squinted at the picture. ‘Huh?'

‘Maybe the boxes aren't just boxes. Maybe this longer one is meant to be a coffer, yes?'

‘So what?'

Con started rifling through her papers. ‘By combining words, the Aztecs changed their meaning, remember? If you take “heart” and “blood” and put them together, you get cacao, their bitter chocolate drink.' She stabbed her finger at a point on the page and
shoved it under his nose. ‘And according to this old lecture on their language, if you put the phrases “in a box” and “in a coffer” together, you create a new meaning – the word “
secretly
”.'

Motti frowned at her. ‘So, taking the picture altogether we're left with, “secretly cacao”. What the hell does that mean? Sounds like a perfume or something.'

‘I don't know,' Con admitted. ‘But this other pictogram, the one that was hidden on the statuette …'

‘The one that looked like a big egg in the middle of four trees? Even the geek couldn't make no sense of that.'

Con looked at him, her blue eyes brilliant. ‘Maybe they're cacao trees. Maybe the egg represents the temple – a kind of rebirth thing, yes? Maybe it's buried beneath four trees.'

‘But the pictogram's a code,' Motti argued. ‘Isn't it? I mean, how the hell would we find four cacao trees in the whole of Mexico? There must be millions of 'em out there.'

Con slumped back on the bed. ‘I suppose you're right.'

‘Wish I wasn't.' Motti turned back to the headphones and placed one pad to his ear.

It was dead.

Swearing, he twiddled with the receiver. There was just static.

‘What is it?' Con asked.

‘Damn mike must have gone out of range.' Motti stopped the MP3 recorder and started skipping back through the contents. ‘We only got us a twenty-mile
operations zone, enough to take in the weapons centre and Traynor's place. Wherever Jonah is now, we can't get to him – and we can't listen in, neither.'

Con swung herself off the bed. ‘Let's look at the map. If they're out of range already, we can work out which direction they've taken from the positioning of Traynor's place, no?'

‘And then drive round, see if we can pick up their signal again. We might hear something that gives us a clue where they've gone.' Motti nodded in agreement. ‘OK. Let's do it.'

‘And hope we pass a McDonalds somewhere on the way,' Con added, giving him the tiniest of smiles. ‘I'm starving.'

Jonah stared at the bloody steak Honor placed in front of him, fresh from the fridge. ‘I'm, uh, not hungry,' he said.

‘It's for your cheek,' she informed him. Without the freaky make-up, she was a striking woman, stick-bony and ashen-skinned, but with a steely strength about her. It showed in those dark eyes that seemed somehow just too big for her face. ‘It will help with the swelling and constrict the blood vessels to stop further discolouring of the skin.'

Jonah gingerly picked up the meat and placed it against his sticky cheek. ‘You a doctor or something?'

She turned that white, voracious smile on him again. ‘I know a very great deal about the way the body works, Jonah.'

He nodded vaguely, looked away. The steak did actually feel soothing, but the smell of the raw meat
threatened to turn his stomach. Or maybe that was down to his situation. He was trapped in a fancy rented top-floor apartment in downtown Colorado Springs. A man who had nearly killed him a few days back was guarding the door outside, while he was left alone with a woman at least five times as tough as she looked, the high priestess of a murdering cult of loopers.

He hoped that Motti and Con were still listening in, that they had some idea where he was. That they were coming to get him. Otherwise he was in big trouble.

‘So where did you meet Traynor?' he asked conversationally.

‘I heard of his reputation in certain areas that interest me, and sought him out.' She smiled. ‘It's been well worth it.'

Jonah sucked in a breath as he pressed on the steak. ‘Does he often beat up his visitors?'

‘He has something of a temper.' Honor shrugged, and smiled. ‘But then, so do I. If you're thinking of trying to escape from here, I should warn you that what I did to your arm I can do to just about any part of you.'

Jonah didn't like the way she was looking him up and down. ‘I wouldn't want to upset a potential employer, would I?' he said, hoping she actually bought his story about running out on Coldhardt.

‘So,' she said, moving closer, her eyes fixed on him. ‘You would like to please me?'

‘If you're happy, I'm happy.'

‘You're, what – seventeen? Eighteen?'

‘Eighteen, last December.'

‘And yet so highly-skilled, and pleasing to the eye. Yes, I may have need of someone like you, Jonah.' Standing right in front of him, a predatory look in her eyes, she wiped a finger over the plate that had held the steak and licked it – just as there was a bang at the door. ‘How very tedious.' Her black bob swung glossily as she turned to the door. ‘Xavier? Who is it?'

‘Kabacra,' he reported.

‘I want to talk,' came a hoarse voice.

Jonah had never imagined feeling overjoyed to have a crazed gun-runner drop in unexpectedly, but right now he felt like punching the air. ‘Damn,' he said, acting rueful. ‘Just as things were getting interesting.'

‘They'll get interesting again, I assure you.' Honor steered him towards the hallway. ‘Now, there's a guest bedroom along here. You will stay there, safely out of the way.'

‘Couldn't I stay with you, listen in?' he asked casually, lowering the steak from his face. ‘I mean, if I'm going to be a part of all this –'

‘Trust is earned, Jonah,' she told him, ‘not given.'

‘Worried I'm going to tell him what Traynor said – that he's not getting what he thinks he is?'

‘Actually, no.' She smiled knowingly and opened a door on to a small, plainly furnished room that was just about empty save for a bed, a dresser and a flash stereo. An inner door led to a small en suite bathroom.

Honor switched the stereo on to a local radio station, turning up the volume loud. ‘I appreciate how tempting it must be for you to listen in on my business
meetings, but that's not going to happen. Not until I'm truly satisfied …' She widened her dark eyes, all but licking her lips. ‘Satisfied, that is, as to where your loyalties truly lie. Now, make yourself comfortable and enjoy the music. And don't try to turn it down, Jonah –'

‘Or you will turn
me
down, right?'

She shut the door behind her and locked it, leaving him with only a soft rock guitar solo for company. He heard the door open faintly, but could catch only a murmur of conversation.

His mouth felt horribly dry, so he went into the en suite. No surprises – just a sink, shower and toilet, all done out in white and chrome. A waterproof radio hung from the shower's housing. Great, he could listen to cheesy old rock songs in here too … He ran the basin tap, swilled water around his mouth.
Come on guys, get me out of here!

Then an idea gripped him. There was a radio mike in Xavier's amulet, right? That had to mean it broadcast on radio waves. Could a regular radio pick up those wavelengths? He grabbed the one in the shower, a flash digital job. Surely there was a chance?

He closed the door to quieten the music. Then he dumped the steak in the sink and pressed the shower radio to his ear, scrolling through the stations. The auto-tune didn't pick up anything, but maybe if he tried it manually …

Soon, with a thrill, he caught faint voices. It was Kabacra and Honor. He grinned in disbelief – their voices were carrying from the living room through the front door to where the mike in Xavier's amulet was
picking them up and broadcasting them to the little radio!

Jonah kissed the speaker, then pressed it up against his ear. The quality of the sound was terrible, peppered with weird digital whoops and harmonics. But he could just make out what was being said, and thanked God it wasn't in Spanish.

‘… the demonstration was very convincing.' Kabacra was speaking, and Jonah shuddered to recall that scarred, scary face on the computer screen in Guatemala. ‘Now I know how deadly this stuff is, I can think of a dozen groups who would take it – we could name our price. But if Traynor truly imagines he can part-pay me for Cortes's sword with a substitute formula a thousand times weaker …'

‘Bloody hell,' Jonah breathed.
So that's what he's getting. And he already knows about the stitch-up
.

‘Try to see it from Traynor's point of view,' said Honor. ‘He sees himself as the instrument of Coatlicue's vengeance – and the power of life and death on such a scale certainly makes him godlike. He's not going to hand it over to just anyone – particularly someone like you.'

‘That's why you must get me a sample yourself,' said Kabacra menacingly. ‘That weak junk Traynor's trying to foist on me is no better than most other products on the market. We'll get a fraction of the cash we could get for the real thing.'

‘Bloody,
bloody
hell.' Jonah felt sick. The latest in biological weapons, to be used on God knew how many people, and all so Traynor could stage the last part of the prophecy –
Then Coatlicue will arise from
her temple and feast on the poison in men
.