The Jaguar Trials Read online

  And dived.

  Ben had a feeling of flying, a strange sensation of time slowed down; of being straight and streamlined, like an arrow. He felt exhilaration as the air raced over his body; the rush of adrenaline as he plunged at his target, the staring eye of the hole.

  But the brief rush soon evaporated.

  The cliff was higher than he’d expected, the impact much harder than he’d thought it would be. He slammed the surface of the pool and went deep. Very deep. The water hit his face like a fist. Gasping, he shot down into the colder layers of current. He felt himself decelerate and then a brief moment of being suspended. He opened his eyes, wincing at the sting of water; he saw the hole right below him and swam towards it.

  Ben’s arms pulled at the water, his legs kicking. He swivelled his head to look up and could see the distant rippling shapes of Yara and Rafael on the top of the gorge, waving their arms about.

  How much further?

  Ben’s fingertips brushed the rim of the hole and he gripped on to it, heaving himself towards it, feeling the texture of hieroglyphs round its smooth edge. It was smaller than it had looked from the platform, maybe half a metre across. He strained to make it out through the murky water. His arm was in up to the elbow, searching; then up to the shoulder. But there was nothing he could see, nothing he could feel except the smooth, curving walls of the cavity.

  A stream of air bubbles shot from Ben’s mouth. There was no turning back.

  Ben knew he could hold his breath; the rapids had taught him that. And he could summon up extra energy when he needed it – hadn’t the hanging shroud trail shown him that? But he was wasting precious seconds.

  Ben grasped the perimeter of the hole and put his head inside, then slipped both shoulders through, all the time scanning the space, hurriedly feeling round it.

  Get back up, now! he told himself.

  Just a little longer!

  Go back!

  He felt the rock rub his spine as he went right inside. The water was gloomy and his lungs screamed for air as he felt round the chamber.

  But now something was happening above him.

  Ben sensed the light change and twisted his head round to look. His eyes widened, hurting from the cold of the water. For a few seconds he couldn’t make any sense of what was happening.

  What was that?

  Something was moving towards him through the water, rocking slightly as it came. It was a trick of the light, surely … an optical illusion because of the depth? But as he stayed there staring, suspended, Ben knew there was no doubt about it.

  A thin, wide piece of rock was moving through the water. Like a lid coming down, the slab was slowly, relentlessly sinking straight towards the hole.

  Ready to trap him inside.

  How? No time to think!

  Ben’s cheeks bulged as he fought the need to breathe. Find the clue! Get out!

  He frantically scrabbled at the rock at the bottom of the hole, feeling for something, anything. His muscles were heavy from lack of oxygen. It was like swimming upside down through syrup. The hole was closing. The circle of light above him was being covered over, as if in an eclipse over a sun. His palms hit out at the scoop of rock; he was using mostly touch now; mostly instinct.

  Ben’s chest tightened as something moved under his desperate fingers. Corners. Edges. No more time! Ben grasped the object.

  Head up! Get out!

  He kicked his legs, turning in the water with an agile twist; saw the light above him now dangerously narrow.

  The water felt thicker as Ben struggled to reach the gap, as if it were solidifying round him. He clasped the object to his chest with one hand and clawed his way up, in one – last – effort – to – escape.

  Shoulders, ribcage, spine, hips; he felt the rock scrape against him as he fought to get through. His legs slammed painfully against stone as he thrashed in the water. The rock trap gripped his feet, flexed his ankles and heaved at the water with his free hand to escape. He felt stone catch at his toes, then he was up … out…

  Light spread above Ben as he made for the surface.

  A blue sky, the light blue of early twilight.

  Blue like pale sapphires. Blue like Dad’s eyes.

  But he was still too deep, the surface still agonizingly far away. It was like being trapped under a lens. Ben flailed upwards. Was this how it had felt for Dad as he’d drowned? Yearning for air but never reaching it?

  Dad!

  The water around him exploded into ripples as Ben broke the surface. He turned on to his back, arms open, and let the water hold him; mouth gaping, controlling his panic, waiting for the air to come. It will pass.

  On the cliff he saw Yara and Rafael, and the professor and Luis. He felt his body convulse as he took in short stabbing snatches of air.

  Then a laugh exploded through Ben’s lips; he was gasping and laughing. It hurt to laugh, but he did it anyway. They were a step closer. A step closer to finding El Dorado! Another step closer to finding Dad! Treading water, with a coughing shout he lifted the object above his head for them to see. The last light of day glinted off the box in his hand.

  Yara yelped in delight. Raffie let out a holler and waved his arms about in a geeky dance. Ben saw the professor slap Luis on the back.

  A rope spiralled down from the cliff, its end hitting the water and floating there, and Ben swam to take it.

  He looped the rope around his waist and let himself be pulled up, still holding on tight to the box. One last drag and he was sliding forward on his stomach, back on to the smooth rock of the platform in a soggy heap. He rolled over and was helped up to a sitting position.

  “Rather a close call, that one, Ben,” the professor said, as he untied the rope.

  “Thanks, guys,” Ben panted.

  “Your jump triggered the fall of the rock,” Rafael told him, his eyes like an owl’s.

  “We could not believe it,” said Yara. “As soon as you jumped, the platform shifted forward, and then a whole piece of it fell down after you!”

  “A remarkable mechanism,” the professor remarked, studying the end of the platform. “My feeling is that only someone of the right weight jumping from that exact spot would have set it off. Quite ingenious.”

  “Whoever designed these trials,” smirked Ben, pulling on his shirt, “they really had a thing for water.”

  “It is getting to be something of a theme,” said Professor Erskine with a smile.

  “So what’s in the box?” Yara asked excitedly

  “It looks just like the first box!” Raffie said, craning over Ben’s shoulder.

  Ben fingered the small gold catch on the lid. The smooth pale alabaster shone in the twilight, silvery like the scales of a fish. He remembered that moment of his dive from the platform. He remembered how it had felt as he moved through the air, that sensation of flying, and his swift, straight plunge through the water.

  “Your turn to open, Raffie,” Ben said.

  His heart thudded as Rafael unfastened the catch. But even before his friend lifted the lid, Ben guessed what they would find.

  It was another gold icon. A pure gold icon, similar in size to the bat, only this time it was a bird, with a long sharp beak and a swirling crest, and every gleaming feather exquisitely cast. Even in the fading light, Ben could see how beautifully it had been made.

  “Oooh!” Raffie gasped.

  “Kingfisher!” exclaimed Yara, clasping her hands together.

  “An ultimate hunter,” said the professor, nodding at Luis.

  The five of them stared at the bird for a while, until Ben broke the silence, dying to tell them his theory. “They’re connected,” he said.

  “What are?” said Rafael, looking puzzled.

  “The trial and its icon!” Ben exclaimed. “Do you see?”

  Yara looked at him. “Yes!” she said suddenly. “I understand!”

  “I don’t get it,” Rafael frowned. “Connected? How?”

  “To find the gold bat,�
� Ben explained, “I had to act like a bat – climb the cliff, hang upside down and all that. To find this kingfisher, I had to do exactly what that kind of bird does – dive in to the water to reach a target, then swim back with it!”

  “Not just act like a bat and a bird,” the professor added thoughtfully. “Become a bat; become a bird.”

  “Yes,” Yara agreed. “Find a bridge between the human and animal spirit worlds.”

  “And the next trial?” Rafael asked. “The Trial of the Howling Heights? What animal skills might you need for that?”

  Ben drummed his fingers on the stone box. “Who knows? But first we need to work out where to go.”

  “What’s the next clue, then?” Rafael could hardly contain himself.

  Ben lifted the bird from the box and turned it over, and everyone leaned in to see.

  On the back was a series of lines that curved into spirals at their tops.

  “Trees?” murmured Ben.

  The professor held the bird up, studying the design. “It does look like some kind of forest.”

  A full moon was rising as they got back to the tents. Luis made a fire and while he cooked they looked at maps and talked about what the clue could mean.

  Ben smacked at a mosquito on his arm, leaving a smear of blood. The exhilaration he’d felt when he’d got the bird seemed to have vanished. They were frustratingly still no nearer to understanding where to go to next.

  Ben stared over the forest; the outlines of branches glistened in the ghostly light. He prodded at the fire with a stick as they ate. The campfire crackled. Insects sizzled as they flew too close. The moon cast bright light and deep shadows over the camp.

  The professor leaned towards the fire, so that flames were reflected in his eyes. He puffed on his pipe. “This forest clue is proving to be rather troublesome,” he said, and for the first time Ben detected a tone of annoyance in his voice.

  Everyone was looking at Ben, as if he had all the answers. He studied the map spread out on the rock, feeling the pressure of their eyes on him. He rubbed at his jaguar marks, hoping for a bolt of inspiration, but none came. He thought back through the things they’d already discussed:

  (1) The clue showed some kind of forest.

  But what kind of forest would be different enough from the hundreds of square miles of other jungle? Ben scoured the map again, but even with the professor’s numerous annotations, no areas stood out. Apart from rivers and mountains, there was only one patch on this map that wasn’t forest. It was right at the edge of the map and labelled “thermal area, unstable ground”, and hardly likely, as the professor had explained to Raffie, to be unchanged for centuries. Not a suitable place for the Ancients to put the next clue.

  (2) Why “howling heights”?

  Yara had suggested it was something to do with the howler monkeys that lived in parts of the forest canopy. Maybe the “howling” referred to some other natural phenomenon, thought Ben – moving water of some kind, maybe; or the sound of the wind through rocky pinnacles.

  “One feels we are very close now to finding El Dorado.” The professor smoked his pipe, and Ben saw his face glaze over with a look that was strangely disturbing. “That fabled city of gold.”

  “And finding my dad,” Ben reminded him, looking hard at the professor.

  “Finding your father,” Erskine agreed, blowing smoke from his mouth. “Of course; that too.” He got to his feet, rolling up the map. “I suggest we all retire to our beds,” he said. “Look at the problem with fresh eyes in the morning. Mind if I keep hold of the bat and bird until tomorrow, Ben? I’d like to make some sketches of them. Take some photos as well.”

  “I’m not tired,” said Ben, handing over the icons. It was his turn to feel annoyed. “I want to keep thinking about the clue!”

  “One needs to sleep,” insisted the professor. “One may find a new day brings new answers.” He gripped Ben’s shoulder as he went by, and Ben felt him pinch the skin, almost hurting him. Then the man patted him on the back. “Goodnight, my soldiers of fortune. Sleep well.”

  But even the gentle swing of his hammock couldn’t lull Ben to sleep. The sound of insects was like hundreds of knife blades scraping against each other. The heat was stifling. The din of tree frogs punctured his brain, never letting up.

  What if they couldn’t solve the next clue?

  Ben bit the inside of his cheek. The jaguar wounds on his arm throbbed. He kept shifting about, thinking about his dad, trying, and failing, to find a comfortable position.

  But there was something else that was bugging him; and it wasn’t just worry about the clue, or the sticky heat. It was the Professor. When Erskine had been talking about El Dorado and its gold – that look on his face in the firelight. It had been a look of real greed. Ben was sure he hadn’t imagined it.

  Time dragged. Ben dozed. Then suddenly he opened his eyes. There were noises outside the tent – agitated whispers. “Not here!” a voice hissed. “Do you want the children to find out?” Then the sound of footfalls moving away.

  Moonlight shone on the skin of his tent and Ben saw two moving silhouettes. The distinctive profiles of the professor and Luis.

  Find out what? Wide awake, Ben swivelled his body noiselessly. He slid his feet to the ground and lifted his mosquito net to slide through.

  Slowly, slowly he raised the flap of the tent and looked out.

  Professor Erskine and Luis were walking away across the outcrop. Where were they going? He heard their low voices, but couldn’t tell what they were saying. He slipped after them.

  They had descended a little into the forest and Ben edged forward, keeping to the shadows. Insects bit at his face – and who knew what might be waiting in the darkness between the leaves? But he had to find out what they were up to. This doesn’t feel right. He parted the waxy, dark foliage and looked through.

  “It’s strong enough to crush bone.” An American accent. It was the only time Ben had ever heard Luis speak.

  “The pelt must not be damaged.” The professor’s voice had a tone he hadn’t heard before either: tight, angry. Ben’s breathing speeded up. Pelt?

  “I’ve put four of these beauties along the trail.” Luis heaved up a metal object.

  Luis has a lot to say tonight, thought Ben. He strained forward, seeing two curved pieces hinged at one end, each lined with a row of stained, jagged points.

  Ben’s scalp crawled. It was some kind of evil-looking trap.

  “I don’t want any more mistakes.”

  “The wire did exactly the job you paid me to do,” Luis replied defensively. “We got rid of another rival.”

  Wire? Rival? Ben’s shoulders tensed. It was all starting to make horrible sense.

  The fire, the explosion… Erskine had told Luis to cause that?

  Ben remembered the metal wire he’d seen at Professor Erskine’s first camp. The figure he’d seen watching their boat before the accident – had that been Luis, checking the results of his work?

  And what had Erskine said about El Dorado research teams disappearing? All along, he’d been trying to make out that someone was after them, the liar!

  And it can’t have been the first time he and Luis had tried to kill someone.

  Ben curled his fists. He’d been tricked. He felt a mad urge to run out and confront Erskine there and then.

  Use your common sense, a voice inside him warned. They’ve already tried to kill you once. You’re all in danger.

  “How was I to know his boy was the One?” Luis’s voice was thick with sarcasm. “Anyway, he survived, didn’t he? He’ll lead you straight to the mask.”

  Mask?

  A night breeze ruffled Ben’s hair, and his back felt sticky under his shirt. What did he mean, mask?

  “The boy survived thanks to fate, not to you!” the professor snapped. “There are forces way beyond you at play here – ancient powers you cannot even begin to understand. You just do what I pay you for, and keep quiet!”

  Ben felt his
face go hot. All Erskine wanted was to use him to find El Dorado!

  “And if it wasn’t for your blunder,” Erskine continued, “I’d have the black jaguar pelt by now!”

  Ben swallowed a gasp. He remembered the captain’s words: I already have a buyer for that skin. The professor wanted to kill the black jaguar. And the disgusting animal trap Luis had now…

  He saw Luis prod the metal with the tip of his boot. “Elusive that cat is, after it got caught the first time,” he said. “Hard to track. There’s something strange about it. It’s high-risk. So to bring up the topic of pay…”

  “We agreed a share of the gold once we’re in the City,” the professor retorted. “I’ve been more than generous.”

  Luis paused before he replied. His voice had a hard edge to it. “I’ve slightly changed my mind on that front, though. Seeing how this mask is so important to you. Thought I’d get a share of that as well.”

  The next moment, Ben saw the professor spring towards Luis with startling speed. He had him by the throat, pinning him against a tree trunk. A flurry of grey insects flew from the bark as he banged the hunter’s head against it. “The mask is mine – and only mine!”

  Luis said nothing. Just gave a short nod, the whites of his eyes lit by moonlight.

  The professor released him and straightened the cuffs of his jacket. “And it must be the black jaguar – not that kind!” He gestured dismissively towards a nearby patch of trees.

  Now, for the first time, Ben saw something there, hanging from a branch. He peered into the shadows, then felt a stab of nausea. It was a cub, gold-coloured, with a pattern of black diamonds through its fur. A jaguar cub, strung up by the neck; dead eyes wide.

  “The pit’s ready, too,” Luis said. “Only something over a certain weight will set it off.”

  “Just make sure I get the adult male next time,” the professor spat, “not some pathetic cub! I have to wear that pelt, understand?”

  Luis narrowed his eyes, but said nothing.

  Seeing the dead cub shocked Ben into action. He edged backwards, away from the men. He had to tell the others; make a plan!