Prism

by Rachel Moschell

  “Bad news,” Alejo frowned at her, then immediately began to pace. Wara blinked, noticing the bead of sweat that had popped out on his forehead just then. What was going on? She started to ask, but Alejo held up a hand to cut her off.

  “Let me think,” he ordered crossly. Wara bit her lip and sank down onto the sleeping back, hooking her hands around her raised knees.

  A few loud shouts rang out in the clearing, and Alejo muttered a very bad word. Animated conversation drew nearer outside the tent. “You didn’t have to come back here, sir,” someone said cheerfully. “We have everything under control—no worries.” A pause while a lower voice rumbled something. Then, “Yeah, she’s in there. Alejo’s been keeping her. Of course we understand that. He just wanted to wait until the Paraguayans were gone, not make a show of it.”

  Alejo swore, glanced at the tightly-closed tent door, and then swore again. He pressed one hand against his temple, and then fixed his eyes on Wara, taking a deep breath.

  “I hope you can forgive me for this,” he muttered, then swung down to yank her to her feet, pulling her against his chest. Panicked, Wara tried to pull away, but Alejo’s fingers dug into both of her wrists. When he let go, she couldn’t bring her arms around from behind her back. Something thin and biting dug into her flesh, pricking her hands. Alejo had bound her wrists together.

  She barely had time to register this fact before Alejo threw an arm around her and dragged her tighter against his chest. Her rib cage slammed into his and he hooked a leg around the back of hers, preventing her escape. Before she knew it, he was kissing her, the scarce stubble of his chin like sandpaper against her cheek. Appalled, Wara struggled against him, trying to free one of her legs to kick him hard. It was no use; she was caught like a worm on a hook.

  Heavy footsteps sounded outside, and sunlight flooded the tent as someone flapped open the door. Alejo took his time finishing the kiss, then finally let Wara draw back and turn towards the door. Her vision swam as she took in the familiar figures of Stalin and Gabriel, along with two new faces watching them from just inside the tent. A shower of sparks shot through her skull as Alejo grabbed her hair and tilted her face upward towards his. His eyes were glinting with a thousand specks of green fire, and she felt her face burn, absolutely humiliated. Alejo winked at her, then turned towards the guys at the door.

  “What is it?” he grinned. “We’re a little busy right now. I told the guys I’d be right back, Ishmael.” Wara shivered at his mocking tone. Alejo released her hair and she turned to see the newcomers, face still flaming.

  Standing next to Stalin stood a tanned figure, jaw hanging open as he gaped at her and Alejo.

  It was Lázaro.

  14

  beet red

  SHARP PURPLE STARS EXPLOEDED IN FRONT of Wara’s eyes. This could not be happening.

  “Lázaro?” She struggled to push away from Alejo, all the while unable to take her gaze off Lázaro in the doorway. He was wearing the same kind of Irish cap he had always worn, along with a casual sweater, jeans, and hiking boots. His eyes were hidden behind the same sunglasses he had been wearing in the truck in Coroico.

  Wara gasped loudly. Lázaro ripped the sunglasses from his eyes and gaped at Alejo. “Wara?” Lázaro said dumbly, gaze dashing back and forth between Wara and Alejo. “You’re the one they found…?”

  Wara’s eyes were torn away from Lázaro as Alejo’s hand forced her head against his chest. She tried to pull away angrily, then froze, weak-kneed, as she heard him unsheathe the hunting knife from his belt and saw its blade out of the corner of her eye. Remembering her position as captive, Wara let herself hang limply against Alejo as one of his hands continued digging into her cheek. With the other, he pulled at the plastic ties around her wrists and cut her hands free.

  Through his t-shirt, Wara could hear the steady, slow tempo of Alejo’s heart, totally composed, completely devoid of the fear that caused her own heart to race. She hated him for it.

  By now, the bridge of Lázaro’s nose had turned beet red, and his fists clenched at his sides. “That’s my girlfriend, you idiot!” he growled.

  Alejo started with surprise and a moment of silence rang over the tent. “Your ex-girlfriend, isn’t it?” he finally said coolly. “This is the missionary you used to go out with? Well you should thank me then for doing you a favor. Her boyfriend is dead, along with Salazar. Don’t get your knickers all up in a knot. C’mon, let’s take this outside!”

  Alejo’s fingers dug into her arm as he dragged her through the tent door. The others drew back to make room. Lázaro, apparently not satisfied in the least with Alejo’s calm explanation, swore foully and then rushed him, slamming into him from behind. Wara felt the momentum of the push twisting her off her feet. An arm caught her around the shoulders, yanking her back up to standing as Alejo released her.

  She saw Alejo land on both palms just before hitting the ground and release a lightening backwards kick that caught Lázaro under the chin, spinning him around with a grunt. Wara struggled to look behind her and realized that the man now holding her was Benjamin, the one with the wire-rim glasses. One forearm clamped tightly around her neck, threatening to cut off her airway if she moved. Wara was trapped, watching as Lázaro and Alejo flew at each other again in some kind of martial arts stance, each taking a few violent punches.

  Like Alejo had said earlier, most of the guys who had been up here on the mountain were already gone. An older guy Wara hadn’t seen before had appeared, however, watching the scene with displeasure, arms crossed in front of his chest. The man was actually much older than the others, wearing olive green pants with multiple pockets, a t-shirt, and one of those khaki vests full of zippers and flaps favored by foreign journalists in a war zone. A neatly-trimmed beard peppered with gray gave the impression that he could be a kindly grandfather, except for how his eyebrows were now knit into the perfect V, scowling first at her, then at the fight.

  Confused and numb by all the blows and shouts, Wara’s mind finally registered that Alejo had launched himself from the ground with a somersault and brutally knocked Lázaro to the dirt with a kick to the ribs. Spinning in a half circle, Lázaro fell with a thud, swore at the attempt to rise, then gave up.

  “Enough?” Alejo panted, sweat running down his back. “I like you, che, and I really hope that’s enough. I didn’t know, I promise you. Just for you, I won’t touch her again.”

  “Yes, I think fun time is over.” The authoritative voice of the grandfatherly newcomer carried over the group.

  “Asalaam alaikum, Ishmael.” Wara saw Alejo grin at the older man. Then Nazaret’s brother began speaking a different language, clipped, as if reporting facts. Lázaro was painfully picking himself up off the ground, a bloody gash running above his right eyebrow. He walked gingerly towards the rest of the group, keeping a wary distance from Alejo, listening. From time to time he threw a guarded glance at Wara.

  Soon after their little conference, the older guy turned his beady gaze back on Wara. She was still pinned against Benjamin, eyes barely slit open, for the first time ever not trying to figure out what language everyone was speaking. Sweat dripped down her back and she was terrified.

  “I am so sorry,” the older guy was saying with a smile in smooth Spanish, “that this has been allowed to drag on this long. I’m sure you are a nice girl. ”

  The smile died away, and he unsheathed a long, curved hunting knife with a smooth whine, turning his gaze towards Lázaro. “My son, it’s time for us to move on,” he explained patiently to Lázaro in accented Spanish. “Apart from being a witness to the bus accident, she can identify you.”

  A trickle of blood from the wound Alejo left was slowly winding down Lázaro’s face like a shiny maroon caterpillar. He gaped dumbly at the knife that the man now extended towards him

  “Lázaro,” Wara stammered, heart slamming against Benjamin’s arm. The fact that Lázaro, too, was here, part of this, was absolutely surreal. “How could you do this? Noah was your
friend, wasn’t he? How could you want to kill him? He never did anything to you! ”

  Lázaro just stared at her, possibly realizing for the first time that Noah too had been on the bus. He glanced at the old guy, nervously, and his hand closest to the offered knife twitched. Wara took in that Gabriel, standing next to Lázaro, appeared ready to vomit, one hand clutching his throat, staring at Wara’s neck.

  Feeling faint, Wara realized that they were going to slit her throat.

  Lázaro stumbled a slight step back, and at that moment Wara saw the flash of the knife against the sun as the old guy moved straight towards her, impatient. She felt Benjamin’s grip on her tighten as he said, “I’ve got her, Mr. Khan.”

  And then, from the side, Alejo was moving forward, marching towards her with a face full of calm fury. The fist that connected with her face shot white hot rays of pain through her head, splattering her vision with colored lights. Benjamin must have released her just as Alejo’s punch slammed into her nose. Wara twisted around backwards on lifeless knees, then crumpled to the ground with a jolt of fire.

  Evil lights flashed in front of her eyes, and she wanted to pass out, die, anything. No such luck. Wara shrieked in agony as someone grabbed her hair and pulled her to her feet, wrapping an arm around her shoulders to secure her against them because it was obvious that there was no way she could stand.

  Oh God, please help! Get me through this part…

  “Stand up!” a voice grated into her ear, and Wara’s heart sank as she realized it was Alejo She heard herself breathing loudly, vision swimming with the pain. Alejo yanked her hair back and Wara saw the silver of a razor-sharp knife blade, only an inch away from her exposed neck.

  “We have extenuating circumstances here, sir,” she heard Alejo say calmly. “Gabriel shouldn’t have to watch this. I’ll take her into the forest.” He dragged her in front of him so her bare feet skimmed the grass, then barked into her ear, “Walk!” To the other men he called, “We’ll meet in town!”

  Alejo pushed her ahead of him into the cover of the mossy forest, dragging Wara along as he stomped through the grass. Her vision had cleared enough to make out the trees, but everything still shimmered and she was sure if Alejo weren’t holding her up she would have just dropped to the ground. She absently realized the salty stuff dripping across her lips was blood and that her nose was probably broken.

  May Nazaret never hear about this, about what her brother has done.

  They pushed quite a ways into the forest, ducking under hanging tree fronds and circling giant banana plants. Then Wara’s foot hooked on a big root and she went hurdling towards the forest floor. The vision of the flashing knife waving near her neck told her Alejo was going down with her. Wara’s breath pumped out of her chest with a sharp gasp as his body slammed on top of hers, pushing her face into the raspy grass. A rough hand clamped across her mouth, sending rays of pains surging though her skull.

  “Don’t scream,” he whispered lowly in her ear. “Whatever you do, don’t scream. I’m not going to hurt you.” Breathing heavily, Alejo rolled off of Wara and sat listlessly on the ground by her side, one arm propped up on his knee.

  In a daze, Wara rolled over onto her back painfully, unable to stop shaking. Her eyes were beginning to swell. She gingerly wiped her sleeve across her face in an attempt to clear away some of the blood that was still flowing from her nose and stifled a sob at how much it hurt.

  God, what is happening?

  “You’re going to kill me later, then?” Even though Alejo had told her to be quiet, she had to know.

  He had been staring off into the jungle, but now his gaze jerked sharply back to her. Wara winced and raised her arm, cringing. He didn’t hit her again, and she opened her eyes in time to see Alejo hurl the knife off into the forest as if it were a deadly scorpion. He turned away from her and threw up onto the prickly tropical grass, gasped for breath, and then threw up again. Finally he lifted his head, white as a sheet, and wiped his mouth shakily on his sleeve.

  “I’m so sorry,” he choked. “I told you I wasn’t going to hurt you. Oh God, I’m so sorry. Nothing’s going to happen to you now, ok. I’m gonna take you where it’s safe.”

  Wara started to feel everything around her fading away. Maybe she was dying. The giant pine tree branches overhead were starting to sway as if a lazy breeze ran through them.

  No, that was ridiculous. She couldn’t be dying from a broken nose. But she felt so dizzy, and simply couldn’t move.

  What was Nazaret’s brother saying? That he was sorry he had broken her nose? Why? He hadn’t looked sorry a few minutes ago when he did it.

  And what was with the puking?

  Everything is spinning around so fast.

  Wara vaguely realized that she had been scooped up and was moving through the trees. Alejo must be carrying her.

  She slumped against his shoulder, and the sounds of crickets singing among the banana trees and grass crunching underfoot slowly faded away.

  15

  pale

  SHE FELT HERSELF GENTLY SWAYING back and forth, face hugging something scratchy and warm. For several minutes she drifted blissfully between semi-awake and half-asleep, trying to pry her eyes open but at the same time being quite sure she did not want to wake up. She remembered passing out, and that Alejo had hit her, and yeah, the pain was definitely still there.

  Wara gasped and jerked wide awake, rolling into a sitting position and looking over her shoulder.

  He was still here, sitting with arms propped on his knees.

  Wara grabbed her head as black and silver flashed across her eyes in a violent parade. The sunlight was blinding. They were in the back of a truck, surrounded by high wooden slats. Alejo was staring off to one side, watching the road through gaps between the rough boards. He turned towards her when he heard her groan, but Wara could only close her eyes and take deep breaths, trying to keep the world from spinning around backwards.

  Freakily, Alejo’s expression had completely changed from the way he had looked at her with remorse in the jungle for those few minutes after he had thrown the knife away into the wild. Now, his face had settled into such a serious mask that Wara was glad she was too dizzy to look at him. Those intense hazel eyes were just plain scary. She moaned again and weakly flopped back into a fetal position in the straw of the floor of the truck, her back to Nazaret’s brother.

  He had given her a concussion; she was sure of it. Against her closed eyes, she saw again the scene in the clearing of the camp, Alejo’s face as he swung at her in rage.

  The rest of the blank faces as they simply stared.

  “Why didn’t you kill me?” Wara barely recognized the croaking voice that came out of her own mouth. She cleared her throat slowly and curled up tighter in her corner of the truck bed, too weak to do anything else but wait for his answer.

  After a long pause, Alejo answered her, voice detached but non-threatening. “I never wanted to kill you. I just couldn’t let you know that, or you would have given away the escape plan.”

  “What?” Wara squeaked.

  “My friends are very smart. They would have been able to tell if you trusted me. I never meant to have to hit you”-- his voice faltered for a second there—“but it was the only way to get you out of there with what I had to work with. I was in charge of the rest there at the camp. But that man who showed up with Lázaro is Ishmael Khan, our handler. He’s our boss, and as soon as he arrived, I knew that you were as good as dead.”

  Wara frowned as Alejo went on. “Ishmael was already coming at you with the knife, because Lázaro wouldn’t do it. I had to stop him cold in his tracks, and hitting you was the only way I could think of. Two more seconds and he would have cut your throat. Gabriel was robbed and had his throat slit in Pakistan a month ago, and Lázaro was involved with you, so I had a good excuse to take you out of their sight and eliminate you. They couldn’t have handled it. And because you were…incapacitated, Benjamin and the Khan assumed they didn’t
need to come with me to keep you from escaping. Thank God they didn’t.”

  There was a long pause as Wara tried to focus on the details of what Alejo had just said. He had to break her nose to save her life? “You broke my nose!” she blurted out, then gasped at the nausea waves produced by the effort of shouting.

  “I won’t be able to tell if your nose if broken until the swelling goes down,” Alejo said, still maddeningly calm. “If it’s broken, I can set it. I’ve set a lot of broken noses, including mine.”

  There was no way she was letting Alejo touch her swollen nose. She dared to raise a hand to her face and realized that there wasn’t nearly as much dried blood as she remembered. Had Alejo cleaned blood from her face while she was sleeping? The thought made her frown. She just lay there, slumped into the straw, not knowing what exactly she was allowed to ask in the presence of a terrorist who was also the brother of her best friend. How did she address the man who had broken her nose and then saved her life? Wara found she didn’t care anymore; everything had become much too confusing.

  “So, who are you?” she finally asked, slowly working her way over onto her back. A painful blush spread across her face as the memory of Alejo kissing her in the tent played across her mind. She supposed it was part of his lovely escape plan, but she still didn’t like thinking about it at all. “You have a handler? Are you, like, a hit man?”

  Sitting cross-legged next to her, Alejo snorted, a frustrated, annoyed kind of sound. “No, I’m not a ‘hit man’! I work for a Muslim organization that works for justice by fighting against the bad guys, Wara.”

  “But you have a Bible. A really big one. Do you even read that thing?”

  Of course he didn’t read it. He was a Muslim. And a murderer.

  We fight against the bad guys, Wara, Alejo had said.

  Well, Wara was pretty sure Nazaret’s brother was confused about the definition of “bad guy.”