Blake was well out of it, although I could only imagine the row that would ensue when Mr. Hart got home. Although perhaps neither Blake nor his father would speak a word of it. Blake had known of his father’s involvement for a while now. Perhaps they would keep pretending.
Soon we left the city behind and entered the dark roads of the valley. We passed the beautiful estates of the wealthy, which gave way, higher up, to the little grass houses, their cook fires still smoking. We only saw one rider, already facedown on the ground, his horse stamping nearby and whickering gently. The light we carried was the only light on earth, although above us, the brightness of the moon shamed the stars.
We left the road and found the winding path where Blake had shown me his idea of paradise. The smell of ancient loam rose up beneath our tramping feet. It was darker under the trees, and sinister; the path more treacherous, with fallen trees trying to trip us, vines winding around our ankles, and branches ripping at our sleeves. Once, something rustled in the undergrowth, and my heart jumped in my chest, but it was only a rat eating guavas.
As the path narrowed, the warriors began to crush the undergrowth, and I called a halt in the clearing where the village had once stood. “We should leave them here,” I said. “They’ll leave a trail a mile wide if we bring them to the cave. Put out their torches.” Kashmir sprang to, taking the torch from the general and extinguishing it. Eerily, the other warriors followed suit, all at once, and stood in silence, their red eyes glowing in the night like scattered coals from a dying fire.
Slate’s face was pale in the moonlight. “How much farther?”
“Not far, Captain,” I said. “But from now on we’re climbing.”
We pushed into the forest, taking the path hand over foot at times, it was so steep. It hadn’t rained today, at least not near the sea, but the undergrowth was wet here, and the leaves glistened where the moon shone through the trees. It was easy to lose sight of one another in the thicket, and I slowed, not wanting to get lost in the dark. We passed the waterfall, the mist writhing through the rocks like ghosts among headstones, and continued upward with muddy hands and knees.
“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” Kashmir said.
“Almost positive.”
Slate barked in laughter, violating the dark. “Confidence! Now that’s the mark of a good Navigator!”
I paused, throwing back my hand. “Wait!”
“What?”
I listened. My breathing was even louder in my ears than the sound of the rushing water. “I thought . . .” I paused again. “I thought I heard something.”
“Oh, that.” Kashmir stepped closer, lowering his voice. “Yes, amira. Someone’s following us.”
“Probably Hart,” Slate muttered. “Just keep going. We can’t take a stand here. The money isn’t our business. We only need the map.”
“Dad. Do you honestly think he still plans to give us the map?”
Slate was quiet. “He has to answer to Mr. D,” he said, but he sounded uncertain.
“What a cock-up,” Kashmir said. “I should have gone back to his house and taken the damn thing.”
“On our way down?” Slate said.
“Perhaps,” Kash said. “If we make it down.”
We continued up—the cave would offer more cover in a fight—and mercifully soon, the path widened and leveled, leading us through the twisted trees along a windy ridge. I recognized the ledge up ahead, or at least, I thought I recognized it. Steely in the moonlight and slashed with deeper shadows, everything seen by the light of day was always slightly foreign in the dark.
As we entered the cleft in the rock, I found the torches we’d laid by the opening. I lit one gratefully, throwing light over the pit we’d dug and the shovels we’d used to dig it. I leaned out of the cave then, peering into the dark, but it was even harder to see with the light in my eyes, and the only sound was the soft question of a white owl.
I stabbed the torch into the soft sand in the back of the cave and rubbed the mud from my palms, while Slate flung the bag down by the hole. “You deal with the gold.” Then he drew and cocked his pistol, leaning against the wall at the mouth of the cave, facing the trail. “I’ll wait for Hart.”
“Let’s bury it,” Kashmir said, tossing the bag down by the trench. “Grab a shovel?”
I picked up one of the spades and hefted it. It was reassuringly solid in my hands—but no match for a gun. I peeked over my father’s shoulder and into the dark outside. It might not have been Hart in that second-floor window—it could have been one of the men whose houses he had looted. Yet it had to be him; he would not have left the gold behind unguarded. Of course he would have followed us, but here in the cave, we had the advantage. How had he gotten hold of a rifle? Unless . . .
“Stop!” I whirled around, too late. Kashmir dropped the ties; the leather flap twitched, and out of the bag climbed Mr. Hart.