times of darkness. Come, you will be safe inside the fortress.'
'Uncle, what is going on here?'
'It is my fault, my nephew. It is all my fault.'
The weighty stone door to the citadel rolled shut behind us with a resounding thud.
The interior of the two-storey pyramid was dark, illuminated only by the light of a few hand-held torches. I saw a dozen frightened faces huddled in the darkness before me women holding children, men bearing injuries or wounds. I guessed that they were all Vilcafor's kin, those fortunate enough to have been inside the citadel when the slaughter had occurred.
I also noticed a square-shaped hole in the stone floor— into and out of which some of the men climbed every few moments. There seemed to be a tunnel of some kind down there.
'It is a quenko,' Bassario whispered in my ear.
'What is that?' I inquired.
'A labyrinth. A maze. A network of tunnels carved into the rock underneath a town. There is a famous one not far outside Cuzco. Originally, quenkos were designed as escape tunnels for the ruling elite—only the royal family of a given town would know the code that would enable them to navigate the labyrinth's confusing array of tunnels.
'Now, however, quenkos are mainly used for sport and gambling at festival time. Two warriors are placed inside the maze, along with five adult jaguars. The warrior who successfully navigates the quenko—and evades the jaguars—and finds the exit first, wins. It is very popular to gamble on the result. I would imagine, however, that the quenko in this town is used more for its original purpose as a ttmnel through which royalty can beat a hasty retreat.'
Now it happened that Vilcafor guided us to a corner of the citadel where there was a fire. He begged us to sit in some hay. Some servants arrived and gave us water.
'So, Renco. You have the idol?' said Vilcafor.
'I do.' Renco pulled the idol—still cloaked in its magnificent silken cloth—from his leather satchel. He uncovered the glistening black-and-purple carving and the small group gathered in the corner of the citadel gasped as one.
If it were at all possible, I do believe that in the flickering orange light of the citadel the idol's snarling feline features attained a new level of malevolence.
'You are truly the Chosen One, my nephew,' said Vilcafor.
'The one destined to save our idol from those who would take it away from us. I am proud of you.'
'And I you, Uncle,' said Renco, although I gathered from the inflection in his voice that he was anything but. 'Tell me what happened here.'
Vilcafor nodded.
Then he spoke thusly: 'I have heard of the inroads the gold-eaters have been making into our country. They have penetrated villages both in the mountains and in the wetland forests. I have long believed that it is only a matter of time before they find this secret encampment.
'With this in mind, two moons ago I ordered a new path be constructed, a path that would lead deep into the mountains, away from these gold-lusting barbarians. But this path would be a special path—-once it was used it could be destroyed. Then, owing to the terrain in these parts, there would be no other entrance into the mountains within twenty days' travel from here. Any pursuer would lose weeks trying to follow us, by which time we would be long gone.'
'Go on,' said Renco.
'My engineers found the perfect place for this path, a most wondrous canyon not far from here. It is a wide circular canyon with an enormous finger of rock protruding up through the middle of it.
'As it happened, the walls of this canyon were perfect for our new path and I ordered the commencement of building work immediately. All went well until the day my engineers arrived at the summit of the canyon. For on that day, as they looked down on the canyon beneath them, they saw it.'
'What did they see, Uncle?'
“They saw a building of some kind—a building made by man—situated on top of the enormous finger of stone.'
Renco cast a worried glance in my direction.
'I immediately ordered the construction of a rope bridge, and then, accompanied by my engineers, I crossed that bridge and examined the structure on top of it.'
Renco listened in silence.
'Whatever it was, it was not built by Incan hands. It looked like a religious structure of some sort, a temple or shrine not unlike others which have been found elsewhere in these forests. Temples built by the mysterious empire that inhabited these lands many years before our own.
'But there was something very strange about this particular temple. It had been sealed by a great boulder. And on this boulder were inscribed many pictures and markings which not even our most holy men could decipher.'
'What happened then, Uncle?' said Renco.
Vilcafor lowered his eyes. 'Someone suggested that perhaps this was the fabled Temple of Solon, and if it was, then in it there would be a most fabulous treasure of emeralds and jade.'
“What did you do, Uncle?' said Renco seriously.
'I ordered that the temple be opened,' said Vilcafor, bowing his head. 'And in doing so, I unleashed an evil
