The man seemed oblivious to Drake now, completely entranced by the play of light on the oversized blade. Just as suddenly as his focus had shifted to the knife, he whirled with a cry and moved back to where Drake lay. He screamed, his voice a shriek, holding the knife above Drake’s throat, repeating the gibberish.
Drake clenched his eyes shut and cried out, “I don’t speak Spanish!”
The man stopped, the wicked blade only inches from Drake’s neck. His smell was overpowering, and for a moment Drake thought he would pass out again. Then he sensed the man moving away, and he opened his eyes. The mud-smeared figure was grinning demonically, the boy’s blood still caked on his face as he regarded Drake, the knife hanging loosely at his side, his arms only bone, thin to the point of being emaciated.
“You…speak…English.” The words sounded unfamiliar on the man’s tongue, heavily accented and coarse, as if he was just learning them, the notes different than those he was familiar with — than his native Russian.
“Yes.”
The man’s eyes narrowed. “Ah. American.”
“Yes.”
The man nodded as though he’d discovered a great secret, and the tribesmen around him watched with interest as their leader communicated with the captive.
“Why…are you…here?”
“I’m looking for Paititi,” Drake said, seeing no point in lying.
“Paititi? Paititi! Paititi!” the man cried, and then sang the word over and over in his eerie falsetto. He began his shambling jig again, and Drake saw that his toenails were long, yellow, and cracked, like a wild animal’s. The odd song faded as he seemed to lose steam, ending with a wet cough before he stared at Drake again. “This…is lucky day, then…for you. You…found…Paititi.”
“Who are you?” Drake asked, playing for time, praying that Spencer and Allie had registered his absence and returned for him.
“Me? I…I am…called…many names. They mean…nothing…to you. For I…I am ruler…of Paititi. The lost city, da? I am king. A god…here…in earth’s womb.”
“Grigor Palenko?” Drake tried.
Something shifted behind the man’s eyes, and a look of sly cunning returned to them as he licked his lips. “Da. That…was…one of my…names. But he…he is dead. Reborn as…as a god. Risen like phoenix, yes?”
Drake didn’t know how to respond. Palenko had obviously crossed an important line beyond which reason had been abandoned, and now inhabited a dark world of shadows where he was a deity, with the power of life and death in his grasp, worshipped by the men around him. Drake waited for him to continue, wary of saying anything that would set him off.
Palenko shambled to the backpack, knife still clenched in his hand, and picked up Drake’s flashlight. When he clicked the light on, the tribesmen gasped in astonishment as he played the beam into the darkness of the brush.
“See? I am bringer of light. I rule this city…of the dead. Of riches…beyond…imagination…” Palenko seemed to deflate, his train of thought lost. He stopped, defeated; a tired, old, sick man. Turning to his followers, he flicked the light off and raised it over his head, like a high priest preparing to sprinkle holy water upon a crowd.
Drake tried to recapture the Russian’s attention. “Then you found the treasure?”
Palenko’s cackle was maniacal, a half shriek, deranged beyond imagination. “Treasure? Oh, foolish boy. Da, I found. But…real treasure…is in my head…in city of the dead…encased in lead…while rivers run red…” His voice rambled off until Drake couldn’t make out his words any more. Palenko shifted from bare foot to bare foot, his leg muscles also wasted to nothing, and Drake began working his wrists around, trying to free himself.
Palenko seemed departed for another plane, but returned to the present as he tossed the flashlight on the ground near the rest of Drake’s things. He cocked his head from side to side like a bird of prey, the light glinting off the knife blade as he moved it slightly, enraptured by the reflection. Then, without warning, he hurled it at Drake. The blade plunged into the ground barely six inches from Drake’s head. Palenko’s laugh rang through the trees, and then he called out to the assembly in a native dialect.
The same tribesman who had dragged the boy to the altar approached Drake and grabbed him under his arms. He said something to one of the others, and a second native hefted Drake’s feet. They carried him squirming to the altar and set him on top, facing the sky, as Palenko hummed tunelessly to himself, mumbling nonsense as he shuffled his feet in the wet leaves.
The pounding of the nearby drum sounded like cannon fire to Drake as the nightmare performance he’d just watched played out again, only with him as the intended victim this time.
Drake fought to free himself, but it was no good — the one tribesman pinned his shoulders to the altar while the second man gripped his feet, and the bindings on his wrists combined with his head wound and broken ribs had effectively immobilized his upper body. Drake turned his head to where Palenko was standing with the knife and called out to him.
“If you’re going to kill me, tell me where the treasure is. So I know my journey wasn’t in vain.”
“Where? Why…beneath our feet. In cool water…where it remains. Holiest of holies, riches of lost time. And my own…contribution. The world…is unfit…for any of it. If there is…a world…outside of this place. I am…not so sure. Maybe it was…all…dreams. As are you…as am I. All…invention. Of…pretention.” He looked up at the sky. “They’re destroying the rainforest…you know? Eighty percent…the world’s oxygen…comes from…plants. And they’re cutting…they’re cutting down…the trees. Idiots. Unfit to survive…killing my planet.”
“What about your technology?” Drake asked over the drumming, trying to engage the madman and pull him back to reality long enough to survive a few more minutes.
“Mine? Ha. They would use it…to destroy. I demonstrated…potential to create…and all they wanted…was to make death. They are unfit. Unfit to…rule…”
The drumming stopped and Palenko returned his focus to Drake, the Russian’s bloodshot eyes crimson gashes in his skeletal face. Palenko nodded at the tribesman standing by the head of the altar, and held the knife aloft, as he had with the machete. The native moved forward, took it from him, and turned to Drake. He stepped to the altar and, after saying a few soft words, perhaps a prayer or a curse, held the knife overhead and tore Drake’s shirt open.
The man gasped and murmured something as he reached out with a trembling hand to touch the jaguar amulet on Drake’s neck — the carving the shaman had given him, still on the leather lanyard. He turned to Palenko, fear in his eyes, and shook his head.
Palenko barked at him, but the man remained frozen. Palenko took the knife away from him, seeing that he wasn’t going to carry out the execution. He backhanded the native across the face and spit on him, and the man cringed like a child. Palenko held up his hand and pressed the knife blade against it, and sliced his palm with a swift cut. Blood welled and pooled from the gash. He rubbed it first on his own face, then on the cowering native, and then finally on Drake’s forehead. Drake tried to pull away, but couldn’t, and pain again shot through his skull as his head wound ground against the stone.
Chastised, the native moved back to the altar and accepted the knife, and this time his eyes held a trancelike quality, as though he were sleepwalking. He held the blade over Drake’s chest with both arms extended over his head, and Drake winced as he saw the man’s muscles tense.