Exile

by James Swallow

‘Yeah, sure,’ Kawal sneered. ‘But you get paid along the way, no?’ He shot a look toward Bidar. ‘Gotta have some paper.’

  Kawal’s thoughtless accusation made a nerve in Ramaas’s jaw twitch and he briefly considered ending the fool’s misunderstanding about their association. Instead, he pushed the annoyance away and dismissed him with a wave of his hand. ‘Talk to Guhaad,’ he ordered. ‘You have contacts in the city? I want them to keep an eye open for people snooping around. Foreigners from Europol, understand?’

  ‘Cops?’ Kawal snorted. ‘They won’t mess with –’

  Ramaas cut him off with a nod to Bidar, who pulled Kawal away. ‘And don’t speak to me again unless I demand it.’

  Kawal reacted, about to throw back a retort, but then he met the warlord’s dead-eyed gaze and his bluster faded. Ramaas returned to his charts. The youth’s voice had grated on him, and he needed the quiet to think and to prepare.

  *

  The cold breeze off the Öresund strait kept Marc from spending too long on the balcony of the apartment block in Ribersborg. It was overcast now, but he reckoned that if it cleared he would be able to see across the water to Denmark. In the other direction, the city of Malmö extended away northwards. It was the first time he’d been in Sweden, and up until now the view from the balcony was the most he’d seen of the country, aside from the glimpses of the residential district below.

  The escape flight from Poland seemed to take forever, each minute ticking past like an hour, but Silber had got them out of the country without issue, ghosting the HondaJet in to a Swedish provincial airstrip under a false flight plan. From there it had been a two-hour journey in the back of a windowless van, with Malte up front as usual and Marc forced to share the back of the vehicle with Jadeed Amarah. Fortunately, the terrorist didn’t want to talk any more than Marc did, and the sullen silence carried them through to the safe house with barely a word uttered the whole way.

  Ribersborg was quiet at this time of the day, and that suited the team just fine. Busy streets would have meant people to notice the arrival of the harried group of strangers who dismounted from the unmarked black van, and more chance of someone getting suspicious. The district reminded Marc a little of the South London housing estate where he had grown up, although the scrupulously clean streets and lack of any graffiti made it seem somehow artificial.

  He wandered back into the apartment. Malte glanced up from the open-plan kitchen where he was busily cooking himself thick stew from a tin. Marc smelled gravy and his mouth watered. Another forgotten reaction resurfaced in him; he was always ravenous after air travel. Malte intuited this and nodded toward a cupboard stocked with more tins. Marc examined them in order, and bypassed the canned herring in favour of meatballs.

  Marc wasn’t sure if he was imagining it, but he could have sworn Malte’s attitude toward him had thawed. Maybe I earned a little respect from him, running the break-out on the fly, he wondered. Or not.

  Amarah entered from the bathroom, having helped himself to fresh clothes from the safe house’s wardrobe. He had his orange prison jumpsuit rolled into a wad, and with a sneer he threw it onto the kitchen table. ‘Burn that,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t want to keep it as a souvenir?’ Marc asked mildly.

  The other man ignored him and pushed past, glaring at the available food. ‘Unless you want me to starve, get me something halal.’

  ‘We’ll order in,’ Marc promised, shooting Malte a look. Because of his drastic change to the mission plan, that was one of the small details about this end of the operation that had not been prepared for, but right now the dietary requirements of a terrorist killer were not top of his priorities. ‘In the meantime, why don’t you make good on your promise? We got you out. Now tell us where we can find the Baker.’

  Amarah took a seat and shrugged. ‘It’s not that simple. I could tell you where he is, but that would do you no good. He changed his name, he changed his face. You wouldn’t know where to start looking for him.’

  Marc sat down opposite the terrorist, once more drawing on his own experiences of being on the wrong side of a grilling. ‘My organisation . . . The Combine has a lot of resources.’

  ‘So I have been informed,’ Amarah retorted. ‘But I tell you now – without knowing exactly, precisely where to find Sood – he will hear you coming and vanish before you can reach him.’ He made a vague, fluttering gesture with his hand. ‘And he will not surface again.’

  Over Amarah’s shoulder, Marc saw Malte’s expression harden and he knew the Finn was thinking about the application of a more kinetic method to make the terrorist forthcoming. But Amarah had spent months in a CIA-sponsored black site, weathering interrogation after interrogation and never leaking the information they wanted from him. The brute-force approach wasn’t going to cut any ice.

  ‘So where do we go from here?’ Marc asked the question and watched Amarah mull it over. But before the other man could answer, there were four slow knocks at the front door across the room.

  Malte put down his stew and opened the breadbin, to reveal a pair of silenced Glock 17 semi-automatics hidden inside. He tossed one to Marc, who caught it easily; by reflex he checked to find that the slide lock was off and a round was in the chamber. Amarah retreated toward the door to the balcony, eyes searching the room for a weapon of his own.

  A key turned in the lock and the front door opened carefully to reveal a weary-looking Kara Wei. She had a large grocery bag propped up in the crook of her arm and the door keys in the other hand. ‘Hey,’ she offered. ‘Sorry we didn’t call first. My phone battery died.’

  Malte’s combat-ready pose fell and Marc let the muzzle of his own gun drop away, relieved that things hadn’t gone in a more dangerous direction.

  There was someone else with Kara, a woman in a dark grey sweatshirt and a black hijab scarf that covered all of her head except the oval of her face. She had heavy spectacles like the ones Marc had worn during the Strefa G infiltration, and as she entered, the woman gave a brief, wan smile. Her whole body language was meek and self-effacing.

  ‘You guys remember Lula,’ said Kara. ‘Right?’

  Marc blinked as ‘Lula’ met his gaze and he looked right into the eyes of Lucy Keyes. She looked like a totally different person, her face fatter and paler, her manner completely altered – but there was no mistaking the brief glint of cold amusement in her gaze.

  ‘Yeah,’ he managed. ‘You . . . got here okay then? No problems?’

  ‘Some,’ Kara said pointedly, handing the bag to Lucy, who dutifully carried it to the kitchen and started to unpack the food. ‘A few unexpected changes to the programme. But we had to adapt.’

  ‘Right,’ Marc repeated. He glanced at Amarah, whose gaze had caught the packages of halal meats and bread that Lucy was removing from the bag. Marc’s hand tensed around the grip of the Glock, waiting for the moment it would all go horribly wrong.

  But Amarah’s gaze raked over ‘Lula’ and slid right off again. He went to the food and helped himself, giving no indication of realising that the woman in the hijab was the same one who had kicked his arse up and down Independence Avenue a year earlier. Then again, it is a pretty good disguise, thought Marc.

  They cooked food and ate, and the day passed into evening. While ‘Lula’ took care of the housekeeping and Malte set up a watch station near the windows, Kara brought out a laptop and suite of recording gear as Marc sat down with Amarah to finish the conversation they had started earlier.

  ‘You were about to tell me where to find Jalsa Sood,’ he said.

  ‘What guarantee do I have you won’t kill me the moment I tell you?’

  Marc smirked, channelling the attitudes of every snide dickhead he had ever met. ‘Do you really think you’re that important, Jadeed?’ He deliberately used the terrorist’s first name to belittle him. ‘Your only value right now is what I want from you. The Combine showed we were willing to work to your ends . . .’ He nodded at the walls. ‘We wouldn’t be here i
f that wasn’t true. You’re free of the Americans, free to do whatever the hell you want. So make good on the deal. Where is Sood?’

  ‘Dubai,’ said Amarah, after a moment. ‘Living a high life, so I have been told. I suppose when one gets old and weak, soft beds and easy days have their appeal.’

  ‘How do we get to him?’

  Amarah smiled. ‘Oh, for that, you’re going to need me. And it will cost extra.’

  ‘Figures,’ muttered Kara, without looking up from her screen.

  ‘I will need to make the introduction. Personally, face to face. Jalsa won’t refuse to meet with the man who killed him, after all.’

  ‘I imagine not,’ Marc allowed, thinking it through. ‘Okay. We can arrange transport into the Emirates . . .’

  Amarah raised his hand. ‘No. If this is going to be done, it will be done under my direction. You’ll follow my lead . . . So I am certain I will not be double-crossed at the end of things.’

  Kara looked up at him. ‘And why exactly should we trust you?’

  He gave her an irritated look. ‘Because I am Al Sayf, and we have paths around Dubai you are unaware of. A group of Westerners, blundering in like clumsy animals? You’ll be spotted immediately. I have a way in, under the radar.’ He sat back, the annoyance giving way to arrogance. ‘Your oligarchs and rich old men can pay the way. For once, the Combine can work for me.’

  Marc pushed a pen and writing pad across the table toward him. ‘Tell us what you need.’

  *

  There was a nondescript company staff car waiting for Saito when he disembarked on the tarmac at Paris Charles de Gaulle, and he peeled off from the line of passengers walking to the terminal building without breaking his stride. He climbed inside and the driver paused to hand him a sealed bag before they drove away, threading around the edge of the apron toward the less trafficked end of the airport.

  Inside the packet, Saito found the usual assortment of clean cover documents, which he exchanged with the ones he had used to depart Brazil without alerting local security. A Turing secure smartphone was in there as well, and he frowned at it, wondering if his own personal communications had been compromised.

  The phone activated of its own accord and asked him for a scan of his thumbprint and a facial-recognition image. When the device was satisfied, it connected him through a web of dark net servers to a familiar, rough-edged voice. ‘Report. What happened in Rio?’

  It was typical of the Russian to open a conversation without preamble. Saito believed that it was because he felt his wealth put him above petty concerns like civility. The operative never expressed such opinions, however. He knew his place. Saito was the servant, and the Combine was his master.

  ‘I have the information we require,’ Saito began. ‘We were able to locate Fedorin without issue. His travelling companion made an error of judgement, and my team was in place to exploit it to the fullest.’

  ‘What is Fedorin’s status?’

  ‘He won’t cause any further problems.’ Saito glanced out of the window of the staff car as it descended into an underpass. Daylight briefly vanished as they sped along below the active runways, returning as they emerged on the far side across from the hangars designated for private corporate aircraft. ‘I used my discretion in the matter.’

  ‘Did you?’ The tone of the reply told Saito that his explanation wasn’t as satisfactory as the Russian would have liked, but then he didn’t answer directly to this one man. Saito worked for the ideal of the Combine, not for the individuals within it. ‘What about the device?’

  ‘It was not present,’ he explained. ‘But we assumed that would be so. Fedorin traded the device for his escape before he fled Europe. I am on my way to Croatia now. The general provided information on the identities of the men he dealt with.’

  ‘I want this situation contained,’ said the Russian, a rare flash of annoyance in his words. ‘Quickly.’

  ‘I am working as expediently as possible,’ Saito replied. ‘Additional information would be of great use in this next phase.’

  ‘I’ll arrange it,’ said the other man. ‘Who are these men?’

  The car rolled to a halt in the shadow of one of the hangars. A maintenance crew were already opening the doors, preparing the Gulfstream jet inside for immediate departure. ‘I need everything we have on a group of Serbian gunrunners known as the Kurjaks.’

  ‘Done,’ said the Russian. ‘And to be clear, Saito. Whatever your “discretion” may direct you to do, be sure to leave nothing behind.’

  ‘As you wish.’ Saito bobbed his head in an instinctive bowing motion as the Turing phone’s screen darkened. As he pocketed the new cover documents, his hand brushed over the secret, shielded pocket in his jacket where he kept the misericorde. The Russian’s words served to remind him that he too was a tool of sorts. Like the weapon, something with only function, without conscience.

  *

  After he had given the Combine agent what was needed to prepare for the journey to the Emirates, Amarah told them that he needed his privacy for prayers and he retreated to the rooms they had given him. But when the door was closed and he was alone, he did not go through the motions of the Salat Al-maghrib. He sat and stared into space. Amarah had not followed the prayers for a long time, and with each day he did not, the distance between him and the beliefs he had grown up with grew wider.

  Glimpsing the woman in the hijab among the Combine group had unsettled him. Once upon a time, seeing such a thing would have sent him into a rage, to think that she might be tainting herself to work with such infidels. But now it only served to remind him of the choices he had made. He avoided her, partly through force of habit, but more from an unwillingness to accept what she represented.

  Captivity had given him time to ruminate on his past choices and the truths that he had devoted his life to. His original beliefs had been the spur that brought him into the orbit of Al Sayf in his younger years, enticed by the firebrand oratory of jihadi imams and stories of brothers who were fighting for honour and eternal glory. But what had really made Jadeed Amarah take that final step was his hate. Looking back now, he saw that the fuel for his revolutionary fire came from his hard life and a loathing for the Westerners. New clarity showed him that as much as he had cloaked it in rhetoric, the reality was that Amarah wanted to hurt those who had more than he did – the ones he saw as undeserving of their wealth, privilege and power.

  During the time the CIA had interrogated him, the Americans had brought every weapon in their arsenal to bear on breaking Amarah. None had been more troubling to him than the interrogator who was also a Muslim scholar, a studious and pious man who explained to Jadeed over and over again how the acts he had committed were against Islam, against the words of the Prophet.

  He lost something in those days, trapped in the ghost prison with the endless sermons from this man. A vital piece of himself withered and died – but it was not the one the Americans had hoped for. They wanted him to feel guilty, but that only showed how little they understood him.

  Amarah’s isolation did not stifle his hate. It fed it.

  As he began to doubt, to rage silently in his cell at anything and everything, he asked himself questions that before he could never have voiced.

  Did Al Sayf abandon him? Did Omar Khadir, the commander to whom he had dedicated his life, leave him to the mercy of their enemies? Was anything he believed in truly worth the effort?

  That day, he had not prayed. And with each day that followed, it became easier not to. Amarah lived deep inside his own mind, and after the Americans had finally left him alone, that disconnection had grown.

  What am I now? he wondered. What do I have? The answer was clear to him. It had become his new devotion, his creed redefined. I have my hate.

  He nodded to himself, all thought of Gods and glory fading away. He would use these fools to take him from this place and back toward the lands of his youth. There were men there who could make use of skills like his, a sold
ier who had such raw enmity to power him forward. And once he was there, he would forge his own path – but not before murdering these Combine fools the instant the opportunity presented itself.

  *

  Marc stared out of the apartment window, his mind drifting. In the corner of his eye a dark shape moved and he turned as Lucy settled quietly into the seat across the table from him, cupping a mug of tea in her hands.

  He watched her face change from the plain, open neutrality of the ‘Lula’ identity and back to the woman he knew. Lucy took off the thick-rimmed glasses and pulled wads of padding from inside her cheeks. Her blank-eyed, docile look went away and she was suddenly stony and pugnacious.

  She threw a glance in the direction of the door that Amarah had gone through, and then turned all her attention on Marc. ‘What the hell were you thinking?’ Lucy spoke quietly, but with no less force than usual.

  ‘I didn’t have a lot of choice at the time,’ he told her, keeping his voice to the same level. ‘But it worked, didn’t it?’

  Lucy’s jaw hardened. ‘I know we play things pretty fast and loose at Rubicon, but perhaps you didn’t pick up on the fact that I am in charge of this operation.’ She leaned closer. ‘You countermanded me. I told you to scrub the mission and you went off comms and just made up some shit on the fly!’

  ‘I did,’ he admitted. ‘It’s par for the course for me. I’m getting pretty good at it.’

  ‘Lucky,’ she corrected. ‘That’s what you were. But that has a tendency to run out right when you need it, Dane.’ Lucy shook her head. ‘You should have backed off. We could have figured out another way to go at Amarah, or looked for a different lead on the Baker.’

  ‘How long would that have taken?’ Marc shook his head. ‘You know as well as I do that it would eat up time we don’t have!’

  ‘It’s a moot point now, anyhow. But I think you need reminding of something. This shit we do?’ Lucy gestured around. ‘It’s a team sport. So don’t go cowboy on me again without making sure we’re all on board first.’

  Marc heard the echo of Schrader’s admonishments in her words and his jaw set. He didn’t want to admit that she was right.