Star of the North

by D. B. John

  It was a strange, haunting sensation, seeing the grim outlines of towers and state edifices slip past unlit. A city in a nightmare, or a city under siege in wartime, made all the more surreal by a sky lit with stars. Only the Father-Son portraits were illuminated, their lights burning by a current that was never cut. With no traffic and no traffic lights, Cho shot across intersections with barely a look left or right. Again Jenna felt a surge of nervous excitement.

  They were heading northwest, as far as she could guess, away from the monuments and the river. They crossed a high overpass, and she saw straight into dim apartments lit by kerosene lamps.

  After a few minutes’ driving fast, the towers began to thin out, and the city became squalid districts of tiled-roofed shacks, the parts of the capital visitors were never shown. The road deteriorated as they reached the sparse outskirts, and Cho had to brake suddenly to circle a craterous water-filled pothole. When the city limits gave way to hills and farmland, he broke his silence, and spoke in Korean.

  “The capital’s under curfew. I don’t know why. The phone network is down, so at least it means the car following me can’t raise the alarm in a hurry.”

  “What trouble are you in?”

  “The minders escorting your group to the banquet will think you’re trapped in that elevator. We have …” He glanced at the car’s clock. “… twenty-three minutes before the banquet starts, before suspicions will be raised.”

  “Are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

  “I can’t promise you’ll see her.” He stared ahead, preoccupied. “On the way back into the city, I will tell you what you have to do to get me onto the plane.”

  Suddenly she felt a rushing, hair-raising danger, with strong undercurrents of guilt. She hadn’t the first idea how she was going to help him, even if she could, without endangering the others. There was no possible way of contacting Langley for orders. Unless … Stevens’s satellite aerial.

  He said, “What time will the plane come?”

  “I guess … only a few minutes before we depart at six a.m. and then it will take off immediately. It’s a White House military jet. It won’t stay here a minute longer than it needs to.”

  Cho was sunk in silence again, and she wondered whether he had any plan at all, or if the unexpected lockdown may simply have thrown him a chance.

  They had driven so fast that they were now in the countryside and from the top of one hill Jenna thought she glimpsed the ocean. The car slowed again as it followed the high stone wall of a large, gated enclosure.

  “Get down in front of the seat.” They were approaching a barrier gate. Two squat entry boxes built of reinforced concrete stood to either side of the gate, flanked by rolls of razor wire.

  Jenna crouched, and a blanket was thrown over her.

  The car stopped. She heard boots approach across the gravel. Again, she heard them step back, and stamp in salute. Perhaps Cho had shown ID, but he had not even opened his window. Something about the car itself—the license plate?—was opening every barrier, waiving all formality.

  “Don’t move,” he said. A moment later they slowed for a second barrier. Again, salute, and the car proceeded. “You can get up now.”

  They were gliding along a road lined with Korean maples, each lit with tiny spotlights set in a landscaped lawn. To the left was a large ornamental lake with a brilliant illuminated fountain in the middle, turning the water to cascading white sparks. The silhouette of a peacock trailed its long feathers, and she glimpsed the floodlit putting green of a golf course. The transformation was shocking, as if they’d crossed a border from Mogadishu to Beverly Hills.

  Up ahead on the crest of a low hill was a two-story villa with a red-tiled roof, lit by spotlights set into the surrounding stone paths. Tall cypress pines gave the place a Tuscan air, and the windows cast strips of golden light down the slopes of the lawns. Driving around a tennis court they passed a covered area of parked luxury Western sports cars and Suzuki motorbikes that looked new and unused. Cho was about to stop when a bright security lamp blinked on, hitting them full beam. He drove on a little farther, finding a spot of deep shadow alongside a thick beech hedge.

  “What is this place?” Jenna said.

  “A few seconds only,” he whispered. “Then we leave—do you understand?”

  Jenna’s eyes were picking out every detail. She could see some kind of shooting range with targets fashioned in the outlines of soldiers. She wondered if she had seen this place before in the spysat images.

  “Did you hear what I said?”

  “Yes.”

  They got out and walked along the edge of the hedge. The air was so cold it burned her nose. Her heels sank into the grass and she stumbled; she reached out and Cho held her hand.

  He slowed, gesturing for her to stay in the shadow as they neared the end of the hedge. Music, and laughter, and the sound of many voices conversing—children’s voices—were coming from the side of the villa that overlooked the lake. Cho held Jenna’s shoulder and together they peered around the edge of the beech leaves.

  Inside the villa they saw a children’s party. The youngest were eight or nine, but they seemed to range in age up to early adolescents, thirteen or fifteen, perhaps. They were seated on the floor along low tables angled in a square around the room. The music, which sounded like a patriotic Soviet song, was coming from an ensemble of four children playing accordions. All were dressed in Western clothing—jeans, sneakers, sweatshirts—but there was something singularly un-Western about them. They were curiously composed and respectful, but that wasn’t it. It took Jenna a moment to see it. Some of the children were blond; others dark skinned and dark haired. Some had blue eyes; others dark brown or chestnut. In fact their unifying trait was in the shape of their eyes. Every child was half Korean. Smiling women in chima jeogori dresses were serving them food, and chatting with them affectionately. It took another moment for Jenna to register that the person seated at the head of the table, in a flowing, traditional Korean silk dress, was herself.

  In the place reserved for the head of a family sat a woman who was her replica. She was holding a silk fan, and her hair was in the conservative North Korean style of the 1950s, the same as the other women. She was inclining her head and listening to one of the older boys—a youth with East Asian features and striking, corn-gold hair—who was speaking into her ear. She made a polite show of laughter and ruffled his hair.

  Soo-min. As plain as day. Just yards away.

  Jenna felt her breath become ragged. Could she trust the evidence of her own eyes? It was as if she were seeing a magical animal, a creature of folklore. She took an involuntary step forward, but Cho yanked her back hard by her arm.

  The food being served was also unusual—not Korean food but pizza and Coca-Cola and salad. Food no ordinary North Korean would ever see, never mind eat.

  A plate was placed in front of Soo-min but she waved it away with an apologetic shake of her head. Then she stood up and the chatter and the music fell quiet. The children got to their feet. She made an animated face and said something that made them laugh. Now the children gave a deep bow, as if she were about to leave.

  Jenna lunged toward the window with her arm outstretched, but Cho held tightly to her. She coiled and tried to shove him away.

  “We’re leaving,” he hissed. “Now.”

  She forgot to whisper. She forgot about everything else in the world.

  “I am not leaving without her!”

  37

  Paekhwawon Compound

  13 Kilometers Northwest of Pyongyang

  North Korea

  His face was entreating, his finger to his lips, trembling, telling her not a sound.

  We had a deal. He was clenching her arm tighter, aware that he was hurting her.

  In the glow from the windows he saw her eyes flare with a tremendous kinetic force, emotions too powerful to subdue, and certainly not by him. He had become an irrelevance to her. She gave a violent movement
of her arm that disengaged his grip. Before he could prevent her, she had run across the stone path.

  She stopped just in front of the window. Her body seemed to soften and melt before the scene.

  Soo-min was still talking, her pink hanbok dress shimmering in the golden light. The children had sat down again. She was addressing them as if telling them a story. They listened, rapt.

  Jenna reached her hand slowly up in greeting. A young girl was the first to see her, and gave a shriek of surprise. Then all the children’s heads turned in unison toward the windows.

  And for three long seconds, the sisters’ eyes met.

  Soo-min’s face was blank, then it seemed to open like a flower, from bud to petals of fear and disbelief, astonishment and joy, and Cho imagined he witnessed something of immense power connecting, an arc of pure energy passing between the sisters.

  Then Jenna touched the tips of her fingers to the glass, and everything went to hell.

  White, saturating lights came on in all directions, and a deafening intruder klaxon pierced the air with long electronic dashes. The children scrambled to their feet and ran from the room, but the sisters’ gaze did not waver. Cho watched as an expression of great fear seemed to come across Soo-min’s face.

  A dog barked, very close.

  From around the corner of the house, about twenty meters away, a black shape scuttled into the light.

  Jenna turned to see the dog poised, snarling. With shocking speed it leapt for her, teeth bared. Before Cho could even react she had taken a step toward it and shot her right palm smack into the animal’s nose. Another step and she had kicked it hard out of the way. The dog howled and ran off.

  When she turned back to the window, the room was empty. Soo-min had gone.

  Men’s voices were shouting from the direction of the lake, and booted feet were running toward them along a stone path. Jenna was pushing hard at the sliding window, trying to force the catch.

  Cho yelled, “Capsida!”—Let’s go!

  Suddenly she backed away. Two armed guards had entered the room, their eyes scanning along the windows. Cho seized the moment. He lifted her clear off her feet, carrying her at a run around the side of the villa. To his surprise she did not struggle, and against his cheek he felt the soft gasping of her breathing. The Mercedes was bright silver under the glaring lights, the trees bleached a lunar white. The keys were in his hand. He bleeped the doors unlocked and had to lay her into the seat. Her body had gone supine, like someone in shock, or drunk. He threw the gear into reverse and released the hand brake. The car whined backward fast along the gravel to the covered area of cars and new motorbikes. He felt the bumper hit the nearest motorbike with a metallic crunch, toppling it into the next, crashing them like dominoes. He swung the steering wheel and spun the car around, spraying gravel onto the other cars, and accelerated down the tree-lined road along the lake toward the exit.

  There was no point in hiding her now. In fact, her face was their best chance of getting out of there.

  The first barrier was approaching. Flashlights were shone into the tinted windshield. They weren’t going to wave him through.

  A young officer signaled for him to pull over. Cho lowered his window. The klaxon was blaring in the guardhouse.

  “Sorry, sir, no one leaves the grounds until we have the all clear.”

  Cho’s face went as hard as rock. He held up a passbook with the gold-embossed insignia of the Workers’ Party, the ID of an elite Party cadre. If there was one thing he did well it was playing Pyongyang’s game of petty hierarchies.

  “Do you know who you’re talking to, you shit?”

  “Sir—”

  Cho flicked his head conspiratorially toward the passenger seat and the officer crouched down to peer in at Jenna. Her head was in profile as she gazed ahead, unseeing. She seemed calm, seraphic almost, like someone who’d experienced a vision.

  A look of confusion came over the officer’s face.

  “Open the barrier,” Cho said.

  The officer reached into his pocket for his cell phone, before remembering that all cell phones had been confiscated and the network was down.

  “I have orders to—”

  “My passenger must be in the city in a matter of minutes. Don’t make me tell you who she’s meeting. Believe me, you do not want to be responsible for fucking up his evening.”

  The officer froze with indecision, and looked at his subordinates manning the barrier. Only now did Cho notice that he wore the crisp uniform of the Guard Command. This was no ordinary unit of troops.

  A telephone bell, the old fashioned sort, began ringing urgently in the guardhouse. The compound must have its own internal communications system.

  “Your choice, Sergeant,” Cho said brusquely, taking out the notebook he carried in his tunic pocket. “Your name?”

  Fear streaked across the young man’s face. After another agonizing pause in which the telephone continued to ring, he signaled to the two at the gate.

  Cho slammed his foot down and shot through before the gate was fully open. He glanced at Jenna but her face was as inscrutable as a stone Buddha. The maples lining the road gave way to silver birches, flashing black and white in the glare of his headlights. The main exit to the compound loomed ahead. He heard the klaxons before he saw the two guardhouses of reinforced concrete, the high wall of the enclosure, and the main gate to the outside. He was certain they would have been warned by internal telephone by now. A spotlight came on, silhouetting a row of four caped and helmeted troops blocking the road, with submachine guns raised.

  Cho braked and slowed the car to a crawl. Expecting him to stop, two of the guards parted to either side to grab the doors. He stamped his foot down. The car’s wheels spun. One guard did a goalkeeper’s dive to avoid him. The side mirror clipped the other, knocking him backward. Voices shouted. The Mercedes roared in low gear, accelerating straight for the exit.

  The impact was intense. A ferrous flash of sparks and the gates broke wide open.

  The crash seemed to shock Jenna out of her trance. She turned to him. “Stop the car. Let me drive.”

  “Not stopping now.”

  The car swerved to the left and picked up speed, hurtling out into almost total darkness. A gauzy veil of cloud had erased the stars, leaving the moon faint and silken, like a moth cocoon. Not enough light to see the landscape. The car’s headlights beamed out into black void, with sudden twists and turns in the road revealing themselves only at the last second.

  Cho’s veins pumped adrenalin. He glanced at the clock. The banquet in honor of the Americans was about to start. The speech written for him by the First Deputy Minister was in his pocket. He pressed his foot to the accelerator pedal and gripped the wheel as hard as he could. The bumping and jolting from the road were tremendous.

  “I’m telling them,” Jenna yelled, her voice distorted almost unintelligibly by the shaking. “I’m telling them that I’ve seen her. She’s leaving with me tomorrow.”

  “Do you want to get her killed?” Cho shouted. “If you say anything, she’s in danger. They’ll deny any knowledge of her, but she’ll be in terrible danger. Trust me. You have no idea.”

  “Trust you?” she shrieked. “Last time we met, you were one of them!”

  She was radiating pure wrath. They glanced at each other at the same moment, and it seemed to Cho that a spark of something passed between them, which he hoped was indeed trust. You are beautiful, he thought. She was the first Westerner he’d ever been alone with, and they were just inches from each other in the dark.

  He said, “Tomorrow, when the plane—”

  Something in the rearview mirror caught his eye. Had he just seen a light? Jenna turned in her seat to look. There it was again—two lights, yellow like fireflies, cresting a hill behind him.

  Then he heard them—the angry buzz of two motorbikes, closing in on him. Cho dropped a gear for better control and accelerated.

  “Watch!” she shouted, raising her for
earms to her face. The car hit the enormous hole in the road they’d passed earlier, sending up a plume of deep water. The front wheels bounced, almost jarring the steering wheel from Cho’s hands; the car’s rear fishtailed on the wet tarmac.

  The road was leveling out and becoming straighter. The clouds parted, revealing a dim view of Pyongyang, black and sprawling like some vast geological formation.

  The two motorbikes were coming right at them. Cho saw a flash from one of the bikes. Next thing he knew half of the back windshield became a maze of spider-webbed cracks. The impact of the shot reverberated through the metalwork. He lowered his head and jammed his foot hard to the pedal, as the gun behind him lit up again. Another pang as a bullet struck and the rear window blew inward, showering them in a hail of glass. The car bucked and its lights went out, but they were still accelerating.

  Over the noise of the wind she shouted, “They’re gaining on us.”

  “We just need to make it as far as …” He clenched his teeth and the engine roared. They were careening down a straight gradient without headlights. The black outlines of poplar trees shot by in dim moonlight. “… there.” He nodded ahead in the gloom. Four or five flashlights came on and they saw what looked like sentry boxes on either side of the road. Cho glanced again in the rearview mirror. The motorbikes had cut their speed.

  Jenna turned again to look. “They’re stopping.”

  “We’re entering Pyongyang. The Guard Command has no jurisdiction here. This is the turf of the Pyongyang Police Garrison.” He slowed the car. “Let’s just hope communications are still down.”

  The Mercedes slowed enough for the sentries to see the license plate. Dozens of beams shone into the shattered, lightless Mercedes, sweeping across the faces of its driver and a female, mixed-race Western visitor, traveling without the two guides required by law. The men’s impulse to halt this car and arrest its occupants must have been tremendous, but it was protected by powerful magic. To question the driver of a 2★16 car was to question the Dear Leader himself. They stood aside, and the car entered the city.