The metallic screams stopped when he ceased firing and stood, weapon still at the ready, gazing through the gunfire’s smoke that clung to him. He peered forward, looking for the bloody remains of his victim. But the wreck was empty. There was nothing inside. No floor pan, no steering wheel, just a hulk.
He didn’t hear the scuff of dirt behind him, but he felt the sudden agony as a scaffolding pole was slammed against his back, and then, as he fell to his knees, the realization flashed into his mind that the boy had rolled clear beneath the wreck and got behind him. Max hit him again-a baseball-bat swing that clipped the man’s turban and floored him. At last the man went down and stayed down.
Max ran back towards the buildings. Fauvre lay in the dirt, pushing with all his strength to right the overturned wheelchair. Max had never felt fitter or stronger. Righting the battery-powered wheelchair, he grabbed the man under his arms and dragged him into the seat.
“Aladfar is loose!” Fauvre gasped.
“I saw him. But these men …”
“Tuareg!”
Max had heard of them. Horsemen warriors, old enemies of the French colonial powers and the Foreign Legion, they had a fearsome reputation. They were known as the Blue People-their skin stained by the indigo dye used to color their
“Behind you!” Fauvre yelled.
One of the Tuareg had run around the edge of the building, the flaming torch alerting Fauvre before the man stepped into view. There was no time to think. Max grabbed the nearest weapon he could find-a pitchfork. The warrior slashed the flaming torch across him with one hand while reaching for the AK-47 slung on his back. Within seconds his free hand had brought it to bear. Max had escaped one assault-rifle attack, but there was no protection where he stood now. And Fauvre was helpless.
No time to be squeamish-Max lunged, aiming for the man’s arm. The attacker jigged to the left, but one of the pitchfork’s tines jammed itself into the end of the gun’s barrel. He couldn’t shoot now, not without it blowing up in his hands. Max twisted and pushed, felt the gun yank free, but now the pitchfork was useless. The man grunted in disbelief and rage and reached for the curved knife sheathed on his waist, slashing left and right. Max gave ground, desperately trying to stay away from the cold metal that burned bloodred from the reflection of the flaming torch.
Max stumbled and fell-at least, that must have been how it looked to his attacker. Max knew it was difficult to assault a victim who is rolling round on the ground. Denied a slashing attack, the man would have to commit himself to reaching down to try and stab Max. Which he did. Max swung his right arm in a powerful curving arc and let loose the rock he had snatched up. The blow stunned his attacker, throwing him back on his heels. Losing balance, he thudded into the ground. The burning torch arced away, the knife dropped into the dirt. As Max sprang to his feet, Fauvre had already maneuvered the wheelchair and caught the groggy man from behind, his muscled arms encircling his throat, choking the air from his lungs. The warrior slumped.
“I’ll tie him, Max. You must get away. You must hide. I saw another three men. They have come for you!”
Fauvre was already binding the man’s arm, using the length of turban, but no sooner had he warned Max than a whoosh of flames sucked air into the storeroom and spewed out a fireball of burning straw.
Max got between Fauvre and the fire, pushing him to safety as another tongue of flame licked out into the night. They beat burning embers from their hair and clothes. Soot streaked Max’s face-he looked like a commando on a night raid.
“I can’t hide, Laurent. We can beat them! They won’t be expecting a fight. Abdullah and his man are here somewhere. We outnumber them.”
Fauvre looked past his shoulder and shouted-a guttural mixture of French and Arabic. Max spun round. Aladfar snarled, his body crouched in fear by the roaring grain store. The mayhem of the night’s terrifying sounds of gunfire and the scent that only men give off when they hunt had confused the big cat and he had run back to the one man who had ever commanded him.
Fauvre’s extended hand and his words held Aladfar’s gaze. Like a domesticated dog, the tiger slunk to the shelter of the stone wall.
“Where’s Sophie? Have they taken her?” Max shouted above the roar of the fire.
“I don’t know. She could have outrun them.” A father’s anguish caught hold. “Find her, Max!”
Max moved, but not before Fauvre’s iron grip caught his arm. Once again the man spoke rapidly to Aladfar. Urged him, caressed him with a language that soothed the animal’s fear.
Gunshots and screams, yells of confusion and threats, echoed across the Tears of Angels. Hunting dogs yapped, big cats roared and monkeys screamed as the ear-bashing siren continued to throw its noise across the desert. Aladfar was on his feet, eyes searching the night, jaws open, panting with excitement. Fauvre reached down and picked up the chain.
“Take him and find my daughter,” he said to Max, pushing the leather grip into his hand.
Max grasped it, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to have a three-hundred-kilogram tiger on the end of a chain in the middle of a night attack by ferocious Tuareg.
The store was an inferno; sparks leapt upwards to join the stars. Max and Fauvre coughed from the acrid air. Before Max could answer, Fauvre turned his wheelchair, leaned down and grabbed the warrior’s knife.
“I’ll get help!” Then he was gone.
Five meters of lightweight chain joined them. Max ran and the chain tightened as Aladfar kept pace with a boy who ran like an animal-a loping gait, nowhere near full stretch, but ready to respond to unexpected danger.
In the flitting shadows Max saw Abdullah fighting one of the Tuareg. The big man grappled with the attacker, grabbed his clothing, lifted and half turned him, then slammed him into the ground-a powerful wrestler’s throw that knocked the man unconscious.
Three down-one to go.
He was wrong. The sounds of fighting had reached the remaining two horsemen on the other side of the wall, and as any warrior wants nothing more than to join the conflict, one of them scaled the wall into the compound.
Max and Aladfar ran across a stone causeway, a small bridge that separated different animal pens. A nightmare figure ran screaming at them from the darkness-a shrouded warrior hurling himself forward, a curved sword in one hand, a flaming torch in the other.
Abdullah heard the man’s battle cry, turned in alarm and saw the determined attack on Max. His bellowed warning was swallowed by the siren. He had seen another warrior drop down from the wall and cut in from Max’s flank, running silently, sword held above his head, ready to slash down and kill.
Max heard a heart-stopping roar. Aladfar attacked, leaping meters towards the first charging warrior. The force of the tiger’s lunge pulled Max off balance just as the second man came at him from his blind side.
Thrown onto the ground, Max was twisted around by the tiger’s power as he gripped the chain. The sword, a shimmering blur, swung with enough force to sever an arm or leg, smashed into the stony ground. A moment of slow motion saw Aladfar trying to smother and rip the first attacker, but the man had miraculously rolled clear, his clothes shredded, blood running from Aladfar’s claws. With a fearful scream he threw himself across the nearest parapet to escape the final killing bite. Max knew the attacker had been lucky more than once. He’d escaped Aladfar and dropped down into the safety of the monkey pit. These images flashed through Max’s mind just as the chain went slack. Aladfar had turned.
Another roar.
Fear struck the attacker’s eyes. He had time to slash backwards and kill the boy-it was a practiced skill-but instead he felt the veil drop from his face, knew that his belief could kill him, because evil would strike into his heart through his exposed mouth and nose. That roar had come from this boy, from this changeling shadow that loomed up before him like a massive creature. Was it the raging fire that distorted everything?
Aladfar scuffed and jigged, wanting to strike for the kill, but the man was being beaten by this other creature
