Aztec Century Read online

  It was a fine September morning, the bracken on the valley slopes turning the same colour as the rusting winding tower. The pit itself was surrounded by spoil-heaps on which only a sparse grass grew. The colliery had closed down fifty years before when the first solar units were imported from Greater Mexico.

  Though our life in the valley had been rugged and sometimes perilous these past three years, I knew I would miss it. The Sirhowy river which meandered its way along the shallow valley bottom was little more than a broad rocky stream. It was a word of uncertain Welsh provenance which Bevan claimed meant ‘angry water’ – a name fit for an Aztec noble.

  Behind me, Bevan swore in Welsh. I turned and saw him duck as the red light of the tracking mechanism flashed on and the support framework slewed towards him, just missing his head. He delved into the base of the machine, and the movement stopped.

  I retraced my steps. Bevan took a grubby handkerchief from his trousers and swabbed his brow. He looked exasperated and irritable.

  ‘Leave it,’ I said. ‘We can manage without it for today.’

  He peered at me, his eyes shadowed by his square brow. ‘I take it you’ll be telling your sister she’s got to bath in cold water, then?’

  Victoria liked a hot bath every day after rising, but she would be more preoccupied with the news about the Russian ship.

  ‘I don’t think she’ll mind today.’

  ‘Still in bed, is she?’ Bevan hoisted his trousers and sucked on his teeth. ‘She gets plenty of beauty sleep, that one.’

  *

  I spent the afternoon with Victoria, packing our few belongings into two suitcases. From the bottom drawer of a dresser, I produced the old atlas my father had given me on my tenth birthday. It had been printed in 1930, during the reign of my grandfather, and its pages gave off the odour of history both literally and metaphorically. Stiff and musty, they mapped large areas of the world in crimson, recalling a time, only sixty years ago, when the British Empire was at its height. On modern maps, the crimson was displaced by swathes of Aztec gold.

  Victoria put on our mother’s wedding dress, which she had saved as a keepsake. It was an elaborate affair of white silks and French lace, unfashionably frilly and ornate. It fitted her perfectly. Our mother had died when Richard was born, and neither of us could remember her well; but from photographs I knew that Victoria resembled her strongly. Now twenty-one, she was entering the prime of her beauty, fair-skinned with hazel eyes and striking dark eyebrows.

  She flounced in front of the mirror, then said, ‘I wonder what would happen if I wore this to our first reception in Moscow.’

  ‘You’d certainly create a stir. But you’d have to have the mothballs washed out of it first.’

  ‘Do you think Margaret and Mikhail will greet us when we arrive?’

  ‘I’m sure they will, but not formally, or in public. Russia’s technically neutral, and it wouldn’t be politic.’

  ‘Won’t it be marvellous to be somewhere civilized again? I’m so tired of dressing in old clothes and eating potatoes every day.’

  She, more than any of us, heartily disliked the rigours of our life in the valley. And she was right to be excited at the prospect of greater comforts and freedom. I wished I could share her enthusiasm wholeheartedly, but I had always imagined that we would eventually escape to another part of the country to join an army in hiding, which would begin the reconquest of our land. A romantic fantasy, of course. For me, leaving Britain would not really be escape, but flight, an acceptance of the finality of conquest.

  That evening, everyone gathered in the candle-lit hall and we feasted on our produce: roast lamb with carrots, parsnips and green beans, washed down with several bottles of claret which Alex had unearthed from somewhere. Victoria got rather drunk, but gracefully allowed Alex to escort her to bed.

  We gathered on the balcony. It was a clear, moonless night, mild and still, the stars brilliant above us. A match flared in the darkness in front of Alex’s face, and he put it to the end of a cigarette.

  ‘Where did you get those?’ someone asked.

  Alex was holding a pack of Albions. We had run out of cigarettes a year before.

  Alex simply winked and offered the pack around, taking suitable satisfaction from his largesse. He was the eldest son of Lord Bewley of Norwich, and had been created Duke of Durham by my father when we married; but he had always had the common touch. Of the small retinue which had escaped with us from Marlborough, all were former staff – detectives, butlers, maids-in-waiting – but exile had broken down the barriers between us. We had each been forced to take our part in the urgent and continuing business of survival.

  I tracked a bright star-like point across the sky until it was lost over the horizon. The Aztecs were reputed to have a spy satellite orbiting the Earth which could photograph a rabbit in a field from a height of one hundred miles. Alex assured me the Russian ship would know their positions and be able to avoid detection. It was almost certain the Aztecs were aware our house was inhabited, but we assumed they would have no means of knowing by whom. I sometimes wondered if Alex was right that we had continued to remain free because of the Aztec policy of leaving unconquered territorial pockets intact in regions after invasion in order to maintain their armies’ sharpness. Much of Wales and Scotland had been spared, in defiance of normal military logic.

  I became aware that Bevan was present, a silent, forgotten figure on the edge of our group. He was the only one who knew nothing of our impending evacuation. I asked Alex for his cigarettes and went over to him.

  ‘Would you like one?’ I asked.

  He took the pack, withdrew a cigarette and sniffed it, inspecting the tiny gold crowns stamped around the filter.

  ‘Got a light, have you?’

  I lit the cigarette for him.

  ‘Do you know what’s happening?’ I asked.

  He squinted at me. ‘Planning on taking a trip, are you?’

  ‘A ship’s on its way. A ship from Russia.’

  It seemed to me quite unfair that we had told him nothing. He might want to come with us, and even if he didn’t, we could hardly leave him without an explanation.

  ‘Coming tonight, is it?’

  ‘We think so. There’s room for you if you want to join us.’

  He drew heavily on his cigarette, exhaling through his nostrils.

  ‘Is there, now?’

  I felt uncomfortable. ‘I only heard about it myself this morning. Probably no one’s bothered to tell you because they assume you want to stay here.’

  ‘Being Welsh, as I am, no doubt.’

  I couldn’t tell whether he was being sarcastic.

  ‘I mean it,’ I said. ‘We all appreciate the help you’ve given us here. If you come, I’ll make sure you’re looked after when we get to Russia.’

  ‘Very generous of you,’ he said drily. ‘Couldn’t go without talking it over with my mam, though, could I?’

  I never knew when he was joking. He claimed that his mother lived alone in Trefil, a village to the north of Tredegar, and that he had stayed behind to look after her. We had never been able to confirm this. He came and went as he pleased.

  ‘Bring her with you if you want to,’ I said.

  He looked beyond me at the others. I couldn’t see his eyes under the shadow of his brow.

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ he said, then turned and went back into the house.

  Alex had volunteered to take first watch. I stood with him on the balcony.

  ‘I’ve told Bevan what’s happening,’ I said.

  ‘Oh? Do you think that was entirely wise?’

  ‘It can’t make any difference now, can it? Besides, think of how much we owe him. I’ve offered him a place on the ship if he wants it.’

  He said nothing to this. I knew he and Bevan had never liked one another, but the Welshman had done as much as Alex to ensure our continued survival. I doubted he would want to leave his homeland for an uncertain future in Russia.

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sp; There was a draggy pain in the small of my back, and when Alex suggested we steal off to our bedroom for half an hour, for once I pleaded tiredness. He was ten years older than I, and we had met at Henley when I was eighteen. At first my father had resisted our involvement because Alex was a divorcé, with a reputation as a womanizer. I had found him irresistible from the start, and his appetite for me remained as strong as ever.

  ‘Besides,’ I said, seeing his disappointment, ‘we can’t leave the fort unguarded.’

  Another pinpoint of light was crossing the sky, winking as it went. The night was utterly still and silent, and I felt that we were naked under the gaze of the heavens. At that moment a terrible sense of foreboding filled me, though I couldn’t explain why.

  ‘Have you got my cigarettes?’ Alex said.

  It was only then I realized that Bevan had taken the whole pack.

  It was Alex who shook me awake. Groggy, I sat up and saw the first blue hints of dawn through the window.

  ‘Is it here?’ I asked.

  ‘Not yet. But I’d be grateful if you took over the watch.’

  ‘Have you been up all night?’

  He shrugged. ‘I thought I’d let everyone get plenty of rest. It could be a long day today.’

  ‘Into bed immediately,’ I ordered him.

  I dressed and went down to the balcony. The dawn chorus had started, though the valley still lay in darkness. Everyone else apart from Victoria was asleep on sofas and armchairs in the drawing room beyond.

  Perhaps the Russian craft had been delayed or even shot down. According to Alex, it would most likely follow a northerly route to avoid Aztec airspace in mainland Europe and England, coming down over the Irish Sea and approaching us from the west. I began to fear that it had never set out in the first place.

  I went to the kitchen and put a pot of water on the paraffin stove. The smell of the stove made me feel nauseous, so I returned to the balcony.

  And then I saw it.

  Far south, down the twilit valley, framed by the rounded black hills, was a point of light.

  My immediate instinct was to rouse the others and give them the good news that at last the Russians were coming. But as I stared, the point of light resolved into three – one larger, the other two smaller.

  All were golden.

  For long moments I did not move. I couldn’t take my eyes off their firefly glow, as gold as the sun.

  ‘Enemy aircraft!’ I shouted. ‘They’re coming!’

  In the drawing room, everyone awoke. There was a brief befuddled panic before Alex appeared and confirmed that they were indeed Aztec craft. He began marshalling us.

  I rushed off to rouse Victoria. She was still soundly asleep, naked under the sheets. I shook her awake. Ignoring her protests, I scrambled around the room, finding jeans, a blouse, a sweater.

  Alex hastened into the room just as Victoria was struggling into her boots. He was carrying his attaché case.

  ‘Quickly!’ he told us.

  We hurried downstairs and went out through a side door, crossing a potato bed before slipping through a yew hedge. A stone stairway led down and away from the house. We skirted the pine plantation, heading across the lower slopes in the general direction of the colliery.

  ‘Where are the others?’ I asked.

  Alex’s reply was drowned in a searing noise which was followed by an eruption of flame on the lower terraces of the garden. We were bathed in golden light as our attackers completed their first pass.

  The two smaller craft were fast-flying, manoeuvrable interceptors with slender fuselages and sickle wings. Their larger companion had a pointed nose and high swept-back wings which made it resemble an enormous golden bird of prey: it was a gunship transporter, its hold typically crammed with troops who would spew out to occupy positions softened up by the craft’s firepower. All three shone brilliant gold in the gathering dawn.

  Alex crouched and opened his briefcase. He took out the computer disk and thrust it at me.

  I stood frozen, staring at it.

  ‘Take it!’ he insisted. ‘I’m going back for the others.’

  He closed the briefcase and flung it away from him, sending it spinning through the air.

  ‘Alex—’

  ‘The codeword’s axolotl.’ He repeated the word, then forced a grin. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be back. Head for the bathhouse. I’ll find you there as soon as I can. Now get clear of here!’

  Banking sharply, and utterly silently, the interceptors came in again. Plumes of liquid fire spurted from their noses, plummeting down to burst on the ground, setting clumps of gorse ablaze and throwing the skeletal framework of the tower into stark relief. Alex was already blotted from view by the smoke.

  I slipped the disk into a pocket of my jacket. Keeping Victoria close to me, I led her down the mountain path towards the bathhouse, a squat building which stood on the lower flank of the valley. The air was thick with smoke and the petroleum smell of xiuhatl liquid incendiary.

  We skirted the colliery, and I kept glancing back with each explosion. The gunship hovered at a distance while the interceptors swept in, spreading fire and mayhem. The house was still intact, and now the small craft paused in their attacks while the gunship descended until it hung no more than a hundred yards above the house.

  White light from the belly of the ship bathed the entire area.

  ‘You will surrender immediately. No further attacks will be made. You will surrender immediately.’

  The amplified message came from the gunship. It was repeated. I pulled Victoria down behind a low wall, searching the hillsides with my eyes for some sign of Alex and the others.

  I heard the sound of rifle-fire, and I knew it came from the house, a defiant and futile attempt to resist the attackers with shotguns. A gust of wind cloaked us briefly in gorse smoke. There was a huge pneumatic thump, and the house erupted in a cataclysm of fire.

  The blast of heat from the explosion seared our faces, and I pushed Victoria down. When I finally looked up again, fleeing sheep shone like phantoms in the fierce light of the inferno. The house was gone.

  My eyes were blinded with heat and tears. Then my heart leapt into my throat as someone grabbed my wrist.

  It was Bevan.

  ‘Be quick, now,’ he said. ‘This way.’

  Half pulled, half following, we were led up an incline, scrambling over slag and discarded machine parts, slithering up treacherous shaley slopes, the ground sliding under our feet. Victoria was gasping and sobbing the word ‘Please … Please …’ over and over again, though whether she wanted to stop or was desperate to find safety, I could not say.

  Then in front of us, in an overgrown wall behind a tangle of hawthorn, a cast-iron pipe jutted out. About three feet wide, it was coated with moss and algae, a dribble of rusty water trickling from it.

  ‘Right,’ said Bevan. ‘In you go, then.’

  Victoria’s hand tightened on mine. All three of us were panting, and I felt as if I might be sick at any moment. The pipe stood at chest height above a stagnant rusty puddle. Its interior was utterly dark.

  ‘We can’t go in there,’ I heard myself say.

  ‘Says who?’ Bevan replied. ‘Want them to have you, do you?’

  ‘The others,’ I murmured. ‘Alex …’

  ‘You leave them to me. Go on, now. In.’

  The sky was lightening rapidly, and I knew we had little time left. His urgency and insistence galvanized me. Quickly I scrambled up into the maw of the pipe. Bevan helped Victoria in behind me.

  I wanted him to join us inside, but he did not. Face framed in its mouth, he said, ‘Go in as far as you can, where it’s dark. Stay there until I come back. Don’t make a bloody sound.’

  And then he was gone.

  The pipe was dank and cheerless. Awkwardly I moved down it, Victoria clinging on to me. About thirty yards in, it broadened and began to curve, slowly eclipsing the disc of daylight as its end. I halted, unwilling to surrender to total darkness.
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  It was impossible to sit or crouch without getting wet, but our knees and legs were already soaked. I put an arm around Victoria, letting her rest her weight against me, thinking all the while of Alex and the others, praying that they had got out of the house in time. I wanted to say something, to soothe Victoria with comforting words. But I had none.

  Time passed, filled only with the sound of trickling water and Victoria’s fragile breathing. The pain in my back grew worse. Victoria was huddled against me like a child. I stroked her hair absently, staring towards the slender ellipse of daylight, feeling wretched.

  After a lengthy silence, Victoria said, ‘I can’t bear this any more, Kate.’

  Her voice was wavering, on the brink of cracking. I tried to hush her, but she wouldn’t be calmed.

  ‘Nothing’s worth this. Nothing.’

  She began to sob, and I felt hot tears on my neck. I knew she wasn’t just talking about the attack, but the whole three years of our exile.

  ‘Do you think I find this easy?’ I whispered, battling against my growing physical discomfort. ‘We can’t let them capture us now. We have to hang on a little while longer.’

  ‘What’s the point? I’d rather be a prisoner than live like this.’

  ‘Bevan will be back soon,’ I whispered, without real confidence. I patted her head like a parent comforting a child.

  ‘You will come out now.’

  I went rigid, putting a hand over Victoria’s mouth. The voice was male, accented, the voice of our enemy speaking English. It echoed down the pipe.

  ‘You will come out now.’

  Matter-of-fact, decisive, certain we were inside. I moved my hand from Victoria’s lips and shook my head to indicate she should remain silent. She looked petrified.