SEVENTEEN

The rope was still in his left hand. In the split second before he hit the uppermost leaves, Chase let go of his gun and snatched for the black nylon line with his right.

Branches pummeled him as he plunged through them, each one thicker and more inflexible than the last. One slammed against his shoulder, and Chase flung the rope at it.

Suddenly he was clear and falling again, nothing between him and the ground-

The line snapped taut.

He clamped his hands around the rope, screaming as friction seared his skin. He was slowing, slowing…

The severed end of the rope shot through his grip, and was gone. He was free-falling, the canopy of foliage rushing away-

Impact.

Blackness.

A distant voice, echoing down a pipe, saying something familiar…

Saying his name.

“Eddie?” A woman’s voice, getting closer. “Eddie!”

Chase’s eyes snapped open. He could make out scattered spots of the dusk sky through the jungle canopy, one larger hole directly above him.

It took several seconds for a thought to congeal into words. “I just fell through there!” he gasped, trying to sit up.

And immediately regretting it. Every muscle in his body ached as though he’d been beaten. He flopped back down again with an anguished moan.

“Eddie!”

“Nina?” He squinted as a face appeared above him, looking down anxiously. “My God, you look beautiful…”

“Well, at least he can still see,” said another voice. Kari came into view behind Nina, peering at him before turning her head upwards to the trees. Leaves drifted down around them like green snow. “That must be over twenty meters high…”

“My God!” said Nina, leaning closer. “I can hardly believe he survived!”

“Takes more than that to kill me off, Doc,” he said, forcing a painful grin. Even his face muscles hurt.

She stared at him for a moment, a mix of emotions flooding across her face, before suddenly flailing at his chest with her hands. “You moron! You absolute, utter, complete idiot! What the hell were you thinking? Why did you do that? What’s wrong with you?”

“Ow, ow! It’s a long list…” Chase cautiously lifted his head. Pain rolled in from all over his body, but none of it seemed to be the sharp stab-or the numbed shock-of a broken bone.

Well, except for his nose.

To Nina and Kari’s amazement, he began to laugh, a wheezing cackle of pure relief at being alive. “Oh Christ. That really, really hurt. And I didn’t even get the bastard!” His face contorted as he slowly sat up, Nina kneeling to help him. “What happened? How long was I out?”

“Not long,” said Kari. “The helicopter’s gone, it flew off northeast.”

“You might have a concussion,” Nina warned him. “Keep still.”

Chase saw something that instantly dismissed the pain from his mind. “I think that’s the least of our worries,” he said, very slowly.

Nina followed his gaze. And froze.

They were surrounded by Indians.

Supporting Chase between them, Nina and Kari were taken back to the village.

Though they weren’t openly aggressive-yet-Nina could tell the Indians were angry. Hardly surprising, considering that many of them had been killed, their homes were wrecked and the temple they and their ancestors had protected for thousands of years was now a smoking ruin. She was amazed that any of the explorers were still alive.

Her surprise grew as they reached the village. A fire had been lit, and di Salvo was lying next to it, still alive and conscious. His bloodstained clothes had been cut open and bandages applied to the bullet wounds. Next to him, Castille, with Philby’s help, was giving first aid to one of the Indians. “Edward!” he called as the party approached. “Mon dieu! You’re still alive!”

“Just about,” Chase croaked. “What’s with the MASH?”

“We have some new friends. Well, perhaps friends is not quite the word. Nonbelligerents may be better.” Castille nodded at the Indians.

“What happened?” asked Nina as she and Kari set Chase down. The Indians escorting them backed away, watching warily.

“When they saw us fighting Jason and his men, it seems they had a change of mind about us. What’s the saying? ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend’? Naive, perhaps, but it saved us.”

Nina looked at the Indians. Some of them were going through the items taken from the bodies of Starkman’s men, arranging them in piles and apparently taking a tally by making marks on pieces of parchmentlike bark. The bullets held a particular fascination; two of the women were clicking them out of the spare magazines with their thumbs, holding the shiny casings up to the firelight. “Is it really a good idea to let them play with bullets like that?”

“Better than letting them play with loaded guns,” Chase grunted. “How’s Agnaldo?”

Castille glanced at his patient. “I had to give him a shot, but he can still translate for us. Edward, we need to call for help. I’m sure the boat’s been destroyed, and that Captain Perez and Julio are dead.” Kari looked dismayed.

“Oh no,” Nina said softly. “Wait, if the Nereid’s been destroyed, how are we going to call for help?”

Chase managed an approximation of a smile. “Same way we’d order a pizza. We’ll ring for it. There’s a sat-phone in one of the packs.”

“That’s all well and good,” Philby snapped, voice tight with frustration, “but am I the only person concerned that a literally priceless archaeological find has just been blown up? This is worse than the Taliban!”

“You didn’t even see the interior, Jonathan,” said Nina sadly. “It was incredible. A replica of the Temple of Poseidon, exactly as Plato described it. And there was even a map showing the location of Atlantis…”

She trailed off. The map. There was something about it…

“Unfortunately, your gun-toting friends are already on their way there,” said Philby. She ignored him, thinking hard about what she’d seen inside the temple.

“Nina? What is it?” Kari asked.

“The map… Atlantis was definitely in the Gulf of Cádiz,” Nina insisted. “Starkman’s guy was wrong, he had to be. The Atlanteans were able to navigate across whole oceans-there’s no way their map could have been off by hundreds of miles with the position of their home! There’s something we’ve missed, something about the Atlantean… system…” She looked back at the women counting bullets. It was the way they were counting that caught her attention, opening up an unexpected line of thought.

She moved to crouch by di Salvo. “Agnaldo? Can you hear me?”

His face was drenched in sweat, but he was still responsive despite the painkiller. “Yes, I can. What is it?”

“I need you to translate for me.”

“I’ll do my best… What do you want to say?”

“First I need to know if it’s okay for me to go to those women, look at what they’re writing.” Di Salvo haltingly asked the two surviving elders, and nodded to Nina after getting a reply. Hands raised, she carefully approached the women. They reacted with surprise and a little fear, but it didn’t take long for her to persuade one of them to let her examine their pale sheet of bark.

Her guess was correct: it was a tally. She held it up to the firelight, trying to get a better look at the smudgy symbols, then spotted a chemical glow stick among the equipment. She bent it, releasing a vivid blue light. The Indian women jumped away, before slowly returning, fascinated. Other members of the tribe moved to stand around her, entranced by the sight. Nina gave them a reassuring smile, then returned her attention to the numbers.