Rakkim felt his cheeks flush.
“You were cautious, I’ll give you that. I thought once she was married, that would be the end of such foolishness.” Redbeard dipped a hand in the stream, let the cold water rush over his fingers, his eyes half-closed. “I spoke with your imam. He said you haven’t been to mosque in years.”
“Guilty.”
“You avoid the company of believers. You spend your days with Catholics and worse.”
“Oh, much worse.”
“Have you become an apostate, then?”
“I believe that there is no God but Allah, and that Muhammad is his messenger. That is all I am certain of. I remain a Muslim. Not a good Muslim, but a believer all the same.”
“Then there is still hope for you.” Redbeard peered at him. “I heard a story that might interest you. It’s about a travel agent who takes no money for his services. Imagine that. Emigration without permission is an act of treason. Anyone connected with the act is equally culpable. Yet there is a smuggler who works for free. What would make a man do something like that?”
“A good Muslim is required to feed and shelter those who appear on his doorstep.”
Redbeard looked amused. “Ah, but you are not a good Muslim. Isn’t that what you just told me?”
Rakkim didn’t return the smile. “Was I really so unsuitable?”
“I had other plans for Sarah. Other plans for you too.” Redbeard backhanded the stream, sent water splashing into the foliage. “A lot of good it did me.”
Rakkim noticed that the right side of Redbeard’s face was slack. He had thought at first that it was just a trick of the poor light. “What happened to you?” He moved closer. “You favor your left leg when you walk, and here…” He lightly touched Redbeard’s cheek. “A fresh scar. Your beard doesn’t grow there anymore. Something happened.”
“There was an attempt on my life last month. They died. I didn’t. That’s all.”
“The Black Robes?”
Redbeard shrugged. “As you said, Mullah Oxley is too cautious to attack me directly, but it might have been someone in the hierarchy, one of his deputies hoping to curry favor. Or, it might have been another’s hand at work. A new player perhaps.”
“Who do you think was behind the attempt?” persisted Rakkim.
“Find Sarah, and perhaps you and I will turn our attention to that riddle.”
There was no sense trying to get more information out of Redbeard. “If Sarah’s been gone since Friday, she could be anywhere by now. You should have called me sooner.”
“She’s still here. Her call Friday night was local. The airports and train stations were already keyed to her profile—”
“There are other ways to leave the city.”
“Sarah doesn’t know she’s running for her life. She thinks she just has to stay gone long enough for me to call off the wedding. She knows Seattle. She won’t feel the need to leave. She thinks she can call me up in a month and invite me to lunch, and I’ll forgive her. I would forgive her too, but we don’t have that luxury.” Redbeard straightened his posture, winced. “I’ve assembled a complete file for you: her phone logs for the last six months, the memory cores from her computers, a list of her friends.” He sounded calm. “Whatever else you need, just ask and—”
“I’ll handle it.”
Redbeard looked past him. “I promised myself when you quit the Fedayeen that I was done with you. I told myself that you were dead…but you were not. The nights seem longer as the years pass. More often now, I wander through the house with only my footsteps to keep me company and wish you were beside me.” He swallowed. “Sarah…” His voice broke, but he kept his head high. “Now she’s gone too. I blame myself.”
If Redbeard was waiting for Rakkim to disagree, he would be waiting for a long time.
They sat beside the waterfall, listening to the cascading water, neither of them speaking. Alone in the garden, out of sight of the stars and satellites. Whether God was watching, neither of them knew.
Rakkim pushed his sleeve up, reached through the waterfall, and brought out a couple of bottles of Coca-Cola from Redbeard’s hiding place. He handed one to the startled Redbeard, unscrewed the other, and took a swallow. It was so cold his teeth ached. “Ahhh. No matter what they say, Jihad Cola is swill.” He clicked his bottle against Redbeard’s. “Fuck the embargo.”
Redbeard was aghast. “How long have you known?”
“Since a month after you brought me home.”
Redbeard shook his head as he opened the bottle. “That’s what I get for not counting.”
Rakkim had always been careful not to hit the stash unless Redbeard had recently restocked the secret grotto, and though he had shared his pilfered Cokes with Sarah, he had never revealed her uncle’s hiding place to her. She would not have been able to restrain herself, would have gotten them caught, not out of greed, but from a sense of joyous abandonment, a deliberate flaunting of the rules. He loved Sarah for her sense of invulnerability, but he knew better.
Rakkim drank deep. “Those peckerwoods in the Bible Belt are black-hearted infidels and eaters of swine, but you have to admit, they know how to make soda pop.”
Redbeard took a sip. “Peckerwoods have the formula, that’s the difference.”
“Time for our scientists to start working on that formula.” Rakkim admired the bottle. “Who could imagine something this good would be illegal?” he asked innocently. “Possession of contraband. Two years hard labor, no parole.”
“Don’t try to understand the law.”
“The law is beyond my comprehension, we both know that.” Rakkim took another swallow. “You ever had RC Cola?”
“Long time ago.”
“I had some about eight years ago…Tennessee…my first solo recon inside the Bible Belt. Checking out rumors of nuclear activity at the old Oak Ridge facility.” Rakkim took a sip, savoring the taste. “I spent three months blending in, beardless as a newborn. Worked the turpentine trail, fixing home electronics door-to-door, chatting up the housewives and factory workers. Joined the local church. Sat right next to the local sheriff, skinny black man with a wine-stain birthmark on his cheek, the two of us belting out ‘The Old Rugged Cross.’ I like that hymn.” Another sip. “Didn’t handle any snakes. Peckerwoods are supposed to do that, but I never saw it. Good people…I was surprised at that too. I guess I shouldn’t have been. Sarah always said they weren’t that different than us. Read your history, Rakkim.” He felt Redbeard’s eyes on him as he fingered the bottle. “And the food—you have fresh peach pie at a Pentecostal church social, fresh peach with a ball of homemade vanilla ice cream, and you’ll think about converting back to that old-time religion. Don’t give me that look, it’s the truth. I was there. The people, the food, the little kindnesses…girls in their summer dresses…small things, but if it hadn’t been for Sarah, the memory of her…” He looked at Redbeard. “I didn’t find any nukes. At least I never got a hit on my radiation patch.” He watched the bubbles rise in the bottle of Coke. “Oak Ridge people are partial to RC Cola. Their roads are worse than ours, and beef is scarce, but they got everything you’d ever want to drink. Bubble-Up, Seven-Up, Everclear moonshine, and bourbon so smooth it’s like drinking sunlight. I drank it all, Redbeard. I had to. They’re on the lookout for infiltrators, and a man who turns down corn whiskey gets a long, hard look. Coca-Cola’s still my favorite, though. So you can tell my imam I’m not beyond the light.” Rakkim took a long swallow, the icy sweetness like an avalanche down his throat. He stared at Redbeard. “All that fresh-bottled Coca-Cola…peckerwood’s finest, and none of it tasted as good as what I stole from your secret stash. Why do you think that is, Uncle?”
“Find her, Rikki. Please?”
Try as he might, Rakkim could not recall a single previous occasion when Redbeard had used the word please. It was almost enough of a surprise to stop him from thinking. Almost. “Why did Sarah leave now?”
“What…what do you mean?”
/>
“Why didn’t she leave a week ago? Or next week? Why now? What was the trigger?”
“There was no trigger.”
“That’s not what you taught me. You said that whenever someone makes an abrupt decision, a hard choice that changes their life, that there’s always a trigger. Find the trigger and you learn the truth, that’s what you said.”
“This wasn’t an abrupt decision, so there was no trigger,” said Redbeard. “She fooled me. I thought she had accepted her betrothal, but she was planning to leave all along. She had been taking money out of her bank account for months, small amounts, not enough to get my attention.” He frowned. “Twenty-five years old, she should have been grateful I could still make a match for her.”
“You can’t think of any other reason why she would run away?”
Redbeard looked him in the eye. “None at all.”
“I’ll find her.” Rakkim set down the empty Coca-Cola bottle. Redbeard, he knew, was lying.
CHAPTER 6
Before dawn prayers
Rakkim watched the military jets flying formation over the city as he drove from Redbeard’s villa, the old, but reliable, F-117 Stealths on their regular patrol over the capital’s restricted airspace. The faint thunder of their passage was comforting. He craned his neck for one more look, then headed home, driving east on I-90, taking the roundabout way back to the city in case he was being followed. He wasn’t worried about State Security tracking him—the silent-running Ford that Redbeard had loaned him undoubtedly had a GPS unit somewhere on its chassis, probably two transmitters, one to be easily found, the other built-in at the factory. Redbeard would know where the car was every moment, but Rakkim didn’t care. He wasn’t worried about Redbeard; he was worried about whomever Redbeard was worried about. If the villa was under surveillance, any car coming or going might be a subject of interest.
Most of the vehicles on the road at 3 A.M. were tractor-trailers hauling goods over the mountain passes to eastern Washington, and snow buggies on their way to Snoqualmie Summit. Rakkim held the Ford to just above the speed limit and checked the rearview screen. A green delivery van changed lanes when it didn’t have to.
Rakkim was still stuffed from the postmidnight breakfast Angelina had insisted he eat, blueberry pancakes and eggs and sausage. While she harangued him for being too skinny, he ate and questioned her about Sarah. The pancakes were more satisfying than her answers—it had been a long time since Sarah had confided in her, she had admitted, wiping her eyes.
Rakkim called Mardi’s number at the Blue Moon. “Howdy,” he said when she picked up, his greeting alerting her that the call might be monitored. “I’m taking some time off.”
Mardi hesitated. “Everything okay?”
“Doing a favor for a friend. I’ll see you in a few—”
“I hope it wasn’t anything I said tonight.”
“I’ll survive.” Rakkim broke the connection.
The freeway was potholed, the roadway buckled in places from the storms last fall. He took the off-ramp at Issaquah, one of the region’s high-tech centers, its office parks and underground research centers protected behind layers of biometric trip wires. The green van took the same exit, turned right at the traffic signal, and kept going. Rakkim watched it leave in his rearview screen, driving on, waiting. A mile later, he picked up a second tail, this one a silver sedan. Even on full magnification, he couldn’t see the driver. A family car with full security screen? Right.
A half hour later he was heading back to the city on one of the alternative routes, the traffic thinning out until he was driving in darkness with only his headlights for illumination. The sedan was still a mile or so behind him, its lights only occasionally apparent on the narrow, twisting road. The alternative route was cut through a forest of tall firs and cedars at the foothills of the Cascade Mountains, an old road, pretransition, well made and still smooth. A few housing tracts had been built out here ten years ago, but had failed to sell; the commute was too long and the homes were poorly designed and cheaply built. Squatters lived in the crumbling houses now, without power or sewage systems, roofs leaking, floors cracked, the yards gone to weeds and thorny blackberries. The neatly laid out culs-de-sac were barricaded with junked cars, off-limits to strangers, and ignored by the authorities. Rakkim could see bonfires burning through the trees as he raced by.
A light rain was falling now, the wipers seesawing back and forth across the windshield. The silver sedan had fallen back, careful in the treacherous terrain. There were no streetlights, no shoulders, just a sheer drop-off on one side, and deep woods on the other. The car had a programmable steering computer—all he had to do was key in his destination and sit back, take a nap if he wanted, but he didn’t want to input his destination, and the computer didn’t know the way through the badlands. Rakkim knew the road, knew where it dipped and fell, where it was underwater in the rainy season. He used the badlands to ferry people out of the country, Jews and homosexuals and runaway fundamentalists, all of them desperate for the relative safety of Canada, or the Mormon territories. He kept driving.
Rakkim had spent an hour in Sarah’s suite at the villa, Rakkim dizzy with the scent of her. Her favorite stuffed animal still rested on her bed, a wreck of a calico bunny, ears frayed, one eye missing. It had already lost most of its batting by the time he’d first seen it, right after Redbeard had brought him home. Rakkim had looked at the floppy creature that day and all he could think of were the bodies hanging from bridges after martial law was declared. He had hated that stuffed bunny then, he hated it now, but tonight he had straightened it on her pillow. Then he searched her room: her closet, her desk, her collection of classic Muslim Barbies. He saved her dresser for last, her silky things slipping through his fingers.
The car skidded, kicking up gravel, and Rakkim forced himself to slow down. He didn’t know if Redbeard had deliberately lied to him about the timing of Sarah’s departure, but he did know she hadn’t planned to leave Friday morning. Not when she left the villa. He didn’t know what it was, but there had been a trigger for her decision. Something had happened after she’d got to the university, something that had compelled her to leave. The proof was in his breast pocket: a wallet-size photograph.
The photo was Sarah’s most precious possession, kept tucked away in a secret compartment inside her music box. She had shown it to him once, made him promise not to tell, and he had kept the promise. The snapshot was of Sarah and her father. Sarah an infant, sleeping peacefully in his arms while her father looked directly at the camera. There were many official portraits of James Dougan—the first State Security chief was considered one of the nation’s greatest martyrs—but this was the only photo Rakkim had ever seen where he looked truly happy. Rakkim had never asked Sarah why she hid the photo away. Only someone who had not grown up in that house would have wondered—any secret kept from Redbeard was a victory. He patted his pocket for reassurance. If Sarah knew she was leaving that morning, she would never have left it behind.
A clear-cut section of forest gave a brief glimpse of Seattle glittering in the distance, dozens of airships drifting over Queen Ann Hill, guarding the presidential palace. The road curved, the faint lights of the trailing sedan lost to view.
The white-pine desk in Sarah’s bedroom had been stacked with real books and yellow legal pads filled with her small printing. She loved antiques, loved computers with keyboards and ballpoint pens, comic books and DVDs. There wasn’t a single photograph of Sarah’s mother in the room, not now, not ever. Katherine Dougan had disappeared just after her husband’s assassination and was widely regarded as having had a part in the conspiracy that had killed him, an attempt by radical Christians to destabilize the new Muslim regime. Despite Redbeard’s best efforts, she had not been found, and though the active search for her had long since been called off, Redbeard forbade even her name to be mentioned in the house.
Rakkim remembered wandering through the villa after he’d first arrived, room after r
oom, remembered dipping a toe into the swimming pool and telling himself not to get too comfortable here, that it could all end as suddenly as it had begun. He was barely nine, street-smart and wary; Sarah was five, an orphan just like he was, lively and smart, already reading. The first time they met, she looked relieved to see him, as though she had been awaiting his arrival for a long time.
They had grown up together in that great house, swam laps and splashed in the pool, collected bugs in the woods with their bodyguards, and worked on their homework side by side in the study. A confirmed moderate, Redbeard had insisted that Sarah be as well educated as any male, encouraged to ask questions, allowed to play sports and wear contemporary clothing, except on the Sabbath. After her book came out, he probably regretted not being more strict with her.
The back road gave way to an even narrower road. He kept his eyes open for the glint of broken glass or cables stretched from tree to tree—people traveled here at their own risk. Even the army only drove through by convoy. He didn’t mind. In thirty miles the road got even rougher, became a web of winding gravel and dirt roads, abandoned mining paths, railroad rights-of-way, and forest service roads, most of them no longer on any maps.
Maps were only an approximation, that’s what he had learned in the Fedayeen. Trust your instincts, trust your eyes, and trust your brother Fedayeen. Only when all else fails should you trust a map. So what was he to make of the map he had seen in Sarah’s room tonight? A world map hanging over her desk, colored pushpins stuck in various places, all of them evidently related to her studies in recent American history.
Red pushpins marked the Islamic Republic’s early military forays into the Bible Belt: Charleston, Richmond, Knoxville, Abilene, New Orleans. All of their attacks had been rebuffed, the breakaway Christians fighting like rabid dogs, fighting to the death, blowing themselves to pieces rather than being captured. The Bible Belt counterattacks were marked with yellow pushpins…Chicago, Indianapolis, Topeka, Newark. What a meat-grinder Newark had been; over five hundred thousand dead, most of them civilians. After Newark the calls for an armistice had been too loud for either side to ignore. The false peace had lasted ever since.
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