Empire of Gold

beneath his feet. But again, nothing happened. Either the trap had broken down over time, or the jaguar heads really were in the correct position to stop it from going off. There definitely was a trap, though; beneath the slab was a fulcrum, the stone tilting on it like a seesaw. But it wasn’t the weight of someone climbing up that would set it off, rather when they stood on the ledge itself, thinking they were safe . . . only for water to explode down the shaft and slam them into the spikes.

‘Clever little buggers,’ Eddie muttered, turning his attention to the top of the shaft. As far as he could tell there were no more hidden threats.

He climbed up into the cave itself.

Nina had guessed from the absence of water surging down the tunnel that Eddie had successfully avoided the flood trap. But as minutes passed with no sign of him, she became increasingly worried. Unable to endure the uncertainty any more, she went back through the opening. ‘Eddie!’ she called. ‘Eddie, can you hear me?’

No reply. Concern rising with each step, she peered up the vertical shaft – and Eddie dropped down in front of her, making her shriek in surprise. ‘Ay up, love.’

‘Jesus, Eddie!’ She recovered her composure. ‘Are you okay? What took you so long?’

‘I’m fine – I was just having a look round.’

‘What’s up there?’

He shrugged. ‘Bits and bobs.’

‘What?’ Disappointment washed over her, as cold as the waterfall outside. Had the site already been looted – or worse, was it nothing but a decoy, an Inca trick? ‘There’s no city? Nothing valuable?’

‘I dunno, I’m not the archaeologist, am I? Come on, I’ll help you up so you can see for yourself. Watch out for the spikes.’

He hoisted her up so she could climb on to the first ledge, then followed. Before long they were at the top of the shaft. ‘I’ll go first and pull you up,’ said Eddie. He climbed into the cave, then reached down for her. ‘Ready?’

She nodded and took hold of his arms, then he hoisted her up the final section of wall. Nina stood, eyes adjusting to the grey light as she looked into the cave.

For a moment, she was dumbstruck. Then she finally managed to speak. ‘Oh, you son of a bitch.’

Eddie shrugged again, this time with a grin. ‘Yeah, I was lying. Just wanted to see your face.’

Filling the great cave was a lost Inca city. El Dorado. The legend was real.

32

An hour later, the other members of the expedition had made their way into the cave.

‘Watch out for that,’ said Eddie, pointing, as Olmedo climbed up the rope he had secured round a boulder at the top of the shaft. Set into a nearby wall was a large square panel of silver that looked for all the world like an oversized cat flap. ‘That’s the trap. There’s a reservoir behind it – if you trip it, the flap opens and the water shoots down the hole and knocks you into the spikes.’

The trap was not foremost on the minds of the others, though. Instead, they stared, almost mesmerised, at the city before them. The cave floor sloped quite steeply, the Inca settlement constructed in tiers rising back into the shadows. The structures nearest the cavern’s entrance were small, like those in Paititi, but they became larger and more grand higher up the hill. Visible near the top was what appeared to be another Temple of the Sun, curved walls standing out amongst the rectilinear buildings around it. Behind it, rising above all else, loomed a palace.

‘I have to admit, Nina,’ said Mac, taking off his rain poncho, ‘this is far beyond anything I expected to see. Anything I imagined seeing, even. Pictures of the places you’ve discovered are one thing, but actually being here in the flesh . . . ’

‘It’s incredible, isn’t it?’ she replied, still awed by the sheer scale of the find. ‘But it wasn’t only me who discovered it, though. If it wasn’t for Leonard’s knowledge of Inca history and culture, it would have taken years to put together all the clues – if we ever managed to at all.’

Osterhagen was equally effusive. ‘No, Nina, you did far more than I. You realised the importance of the khipu – and if not for the IHA, I would not even be here at all. And to think I was angry to be asked to meet you!’

‘We both owe a lot to Kit and Interpol as well,’ said Nina, turning to the Indian. ‘He came up with the connection between the artefacts on the black market and the statues.’ The case containing the two – and a half – stone figures was amongst the gear the team had ferried up through the waterfall.

Kit adopted a humble look. ‘I only made a suggestion. I had no idea whether or not it would be true.’

‘All right, can the mutual admiration society hold its annual meeting somewhere else?’ said Eddie as he helped the second of the two soldiers out of the shaft. ‘We’ve still got to explore this place yet.’ He noticed Macy’s somewhat pensive expression. ‘What’s up with you?’

‘I just thought of something,’ she replied, taking out the folder containing the photographs from Paititi. ‘On the map, this place is coloured in gold, yeah? Just like the sun disc we found.’

‘Yes?’ said Nina, wondering where she was leading.

Macy waved a hand towards the waiting buildings. ‘So . . . where’s all the gold?’

‘Maybe it was only symbolic.’

Osterhagen shook his head. ‘No, she has a point. The Incas really did put gold on their buildings – the most important ones, at least. The Temple of the Sun in Cuzco was covered in sheets of gold. They were among the first things the Spanish stole and melted down.’

All eyes turned to the silent settlement. Even in the low light, it was plain that the only building material was stone, not precious metal, without so much as a golden glint even from the temple or the palace.

‘Perhaps we are not the first to find this place,’ said Cruzado.