fun for them. Anyway, I haven’t got any other ideas so we’ll just have to risk it.”
Richard had come onto the phone. He had heard what Matt was suggesting. “You can’t do this,” he pleaded. “It’s too dangerous. Please, Matt, think what could go wrong.”
“We don’t know where she is, Richard. There’s no other way we’ll find her.”
“What about Paul Adams? Once they have no further use for him, you know they’ll kill him.”
“He’s prepared to risk it. He knows what he’s done. And he’ll do anything to get Scarlett freed.”
It had worked out just as Matt had hoped. Six police cars had arrived at Wisdom Court just after seven o’clock. Lohan – with Richard and Jamie crouching next to him – had watched the police go in. They had seen the chairman arrive and leave and they were still there when Matt, semi-conscious and in pain, had been dragged out. Jamie had started forward at that moment, wanting to go to him. But Richard had grabbed hold of him, forcing him to remain still. This was Matt’s plan. It was all or nothing.
Matt had been driven across the city, never out of sight of Lohan’s men. They had seen him disappear into the prison close to Hollywood Road. So now they knew where he was being held. Hopefully, Scarlett would be there too. As the storm had worsened, Lohan had surrounded the prison, his men closing in from all sides.
The storm.
Lohan was beginning to think that it was getting out of control. In all the years that he had been in Hong Kong, he had never experienced anything like it. When he stood up, he could feel the wind trying to batter him down again. Dust and dead leaves whipped into his face. He could hear the air currents howling as they rushed through the streets. If it got any worse, it would be dangerous out here. But then, of course, it was dangerous anyway. If the storm destroyed the city, it would only be finishing what the Old Ones had already begun.
A crash of thunder. Rain lashing down so hard that he could see it bouncing off the parked cars, turning into miniature rivers that coursed along the side of the road. In seconds, he was soaked. Richard was next to him. “What’s going on?” he muttered.
“We must move now,” Lohan said.
Victoria Prison was a huge, solid building with barred windows and a single, massive door – the only way in. Six armed guards stood outside it in the rain, dressed in uniforms, with their faces partly obscured by their caps. Lohan, Richard and Jamie were watching from the doorway of an antique shop across the road. Lohan’s strategy was simple. There was no time to be clever. He knew he had to break in as quickly, as decisively as possible. Once the enemy knew he was there, they would fight back.
He gave the signal.
There was an explosion – the same explosion that Matt had heard – as a rocket launcher, concealed in a parked van, fired a 40mm shell at the main door. The prison hadn’t been built to withstand such an attack. The doors were blown apart in a ball of flame. Half the guards were killed instantly. The rest were cut down by a burst of machine-gun fire as the Triad fighters surged forward, pouring out of alleyways and rising up from behind parked cars. Further down the road, two of Lohan’s men, disguised as construction workers, cut off the main power supply, isolating the prison and short circuiting the alarms.
“Move!” Richard and Jamie were unarmed but they ran forward with Lohan and in through the shattered doors.
And then they were inside the prison. Lohan’s people were spreading in every direction, through the upper floors, smashing open the doors to reveal the empty cells behind them. Some of them were armed with guns and grenades. Others carried swords and chain-sticks. It was pitch black inside the building now that the electricity had been cut, but they had brought electric torches with them, strapped to their shoulders, the beams slicing through the dark and showing the way ahead. Lohan’s orders were clear. Kill anyone who gets in your way. Find Matt and Scarlett. We have only minutes to get them out.
There were more guards on the upper levels. Although the building held only two prisoners, the chairman had taken no chances. Now they opened fire on the invaders. Lohan saw the flash of bullets, heard some of the Triad men cry out. A few bodies fell. Then someone threw a grenade. Another fireball, and one of the guards pitched forward as if diving into a swimming pool, disappearing into the darkness below.
Lohan himself led a group of fighters four floors down into the basement, Richard and Jamie close behind him. Only now was Richard beginning to see the hopelessness of the task. There had to be at least two hundred cells in the prison. Were they really going to blow every one of them open? They came to a corridor with more steel doors set at intervals. A guard ran towards them, bringing his machine gun round to aim.
“Drop the gun!” Jamie said. “Lie on the floor.”
The guard did as he was told. A second guard appeared. He was less fortunate. Lohan shot him down. They had been in the prison for less than three minutes but they knew that reinforcements would already be on the way. There was another explosion upstairs, a scream, the clatter of bullets hitting metal.
Thirty doors stretched out in front of them. There was no point looking for bolts or keys. Lohan rapped out an order and his men blew them open, one at a time, using balls of plastic explosive. Richard and Jamie continued forward as, one after another, the doors were smashed out of their frames, orange flames briefly flaring up. The corridor stank of cordite. Smoke and brick dust filled the air. But every cell was empty. How much more time did they have?
“They’re at the end,” Jamie said suddenly. “The last door on the left.”
Lohan stared at him. But Richard nodded, relief surging through him. Somehow Jamie had managed to connect with them in his own way… telepathically. Lohan shouted something and his men ran down to the door he had indicated. A final blast. It swung open. Two figures came out into the corridor, choking and covered in dust. It was Matt and Scarlett.
“Matt!” Richard grabbed hold of his friend and embraced him. The night before, when he had pulled himself out of the water, he had been afraid that he would never see him again. “Are you OK?”
Matt nodded. “This is Scarlett.”
“I’m delighted to meet you.” Richard didn’t know what else to say. He examined the girl with the close- cropped hair. She looked worn out.
Jamie said nothing but he went over to her so that the three Gatekeepers were together.
“We have to get to the Tai Shan Temple,” Matt said.
Lohan was impressed. The boy was only fifteen but already he had assumed command. The experiences of the past twenty-four hours didn’t seem to have had any effect on him. But there was still more trouble to come. Quickly, Lohan took out his mobile phone, pressed a button and spoke a few words. He waited until he had heard what he wanted, then he turned to Matt. “The temple is safe now,” he said. “But we have another problem and it may be more serious. There is a storm. In fact my people are saying that it may be something worse…”
But they had all become aware of it. Above the gunfire and the explosions. Beyond the battle that was taking place inside the prison, the wind was screaming. The whole building was shuddering. The full force of the typhoon had fallen on Hong Kong and its total destruction had begun.
The sun was setting in Cuzco, the ancient city of the Incas, in Peru. There was a band playing and the sound of pan-pipes and the throb of drums rose up into the evening air. The shadows were stretching out over the foothills. The restaurants and cafes were beginning to fill up at the end of another day.
Pedro knew that they shouldn’t be here. This wasn’t Matt’s plan. He wished that they had been able to speak over the satellite telephone, but for the past forty-eight hours there had been only silence. A whole world separated them. They were thousands of miles apart. But he was about to take the single step that would bring them together. He wondered if it was a good idea.
Not that he had been given any choice.
The night before, Pedro had woken up to find Scott leaning over him. The two boys were sharing a stone house in Vilcabamba, high up in the Andes. This was the lost city where Pedro had gone with Matt when they were hiding from Diego Salamanda. It was hidden above the cloud forest in an extraordinary location, a mountain peak that couldn’t be seen by anyone. Getting there had involved a helicopter ride and then a one-day hike from Cuzco. The city itself could only be reached by a stone staircase which could vanish in a single moment.
“Scott…? What is it?”
Scott was deathly pale and his eyes were full of worry. Pedro had never seen him like this before. “Jamie’s in trouble,” he said. “We have to go to Hong Kong.”
“We can’t…”
“Pedro. You don’t understand. We have to go straight away. I have to go to Jamie. I’ve had a dream.”
