The Council of Ten

by Jon Land

  “He knows only what it isn’t, not what it is, and only because one of your men in Nassau kept a sample.” Corbano paused. “None of us are immune to mistakes. We are limited by the people we retain.”

  “And I, it seems, am limited to you. After learning that one of those old women had talked and the DEA was going to follow the chain, I decided to wipe it out. That task I gave to you while I worked on moving up the timetable for Powderkeg. Now, though, I learn that not only is Jordan still at large, but so is the man it was his role to kill.”

  “Too-Jay’s went off without a hitch.”

  “Except your man there must have killed a double, leaving Trelana at large. I’ve listened to the tape of Jordan’s phone call last night on the line you placed an override on. He asked about Trelana specifically. Obviously the drug lord is the one who sprung him from jail and sent him to Nassau in the first place.”

  “They’re cut off from each other.”

  “Only for now. I am concerned over the potential damage a man with Trelana’s power could do us even at this juncture.”

  “I’ll get Trelana.”

  “No, Mr. Corbano, we’ll get Trelana. You seem to have your hands full with Jordan.” The leader paused. “Not to mention this added complication I have just become aware of. A stranger paid a visit to one of our shelters yesterday. He fits the description of one Peter Wayman, better known as the Timber Wolf.”

  Corbano cringed. “Impossible!”

  “Ah, I see you recall the name. An old friend of yours from what I’ve been told. And also, apparently, a friend of Jordan’s.”

  “When? How?”

  “Miami, probably, before the police picked the young man up. It doesn’t matter. The point is that the Timber Wolf is involved and has uncovered yet another aspect of Powderkeg. The harm a man of his abilities could do us is immeasurable.”

  “No, he’s just a shell, a shadow. I know. I made him that way.”

  “Not according to my reports, which indicate he is at the top of his game. Our people are looking for him now, but his involvement in this must be regarded as another failure on your part.”

  Corbano squeezed his eyes shut. He was not used to reprimand, even less so to the kind of fear that the leader’s unwavering voice could generate. His teeth gnashed together. He found himself speechless.

  “I am willing to forget about your oversights concerning Trelana and the Timber Wolf,” the leader continued. “But only if Jordan is apprehended before further damage can be done. If our efforts to locate Trelana fail, he may be the only one who can help us.”

  “I’ll get him,” promised Corbano.

  Drew had gone straight back to Miami Airport after fleeing Greynolds Park. The warm night air dried his clothes well enough to get by and he booked a seat on the next flight bound for Washington, leaving himself barely enough time to retrieve the flight bag containing the white powder from a locker before departure.

  With Trelana’s forces no longer accessible, he had to reach Pam. She was a biochemist. She could find out for him what the white powder really was. Of course, the FBI or a similar agency could perform this task equally well, but Drew recalled the words of Trelana warning him that the enemy’s reach was everywhere; what had happened to the drug lord’s own organization proved that much.

  Drew was safe only so long as he stayed on the move. He still had no conception of what was really going on, no story anyone would believe, and until he did there was no sense in approaching legitimate authorities of justice. The powder was the key. Learn what it was and he would have a place to start, the evidence to back up his story.

  Drew arrived in Washington in the cold hours of Saturday and checked into the Hilton Hotel close to the airport to consider his next move. Pam was only a phone call or short cab ride away, but neither was possible. He had seen enough this past week to be sure that she would be under constant watch with her line tapped. Whatever means he employed to reach Pam could not place her in any danger. That was priority number one. She was the one person left he loved and trusted. He knew her schedule thoroughly and this being Saturday she would spend the day working on her thesis in the George Washington Library. Under watch all the time. Impossible to approach without someone noticing him. There had to be a way. Disguise, perhaps. Ridiculous. They’d make him in a second. Or maybe he could hire a messenger. No again. Too many questions, too much time to prepare, and mostly anywhere he sent Pam to meet him, her tails would not be far behind.

  Drew lay atop the covers in the darkness, occasionally passing into an uneasy, brief sleep. He could never remember being so tired, but sleep refused to come. His body ached and throbbed everywhere, twists and turns painful for him. His head pounded. His mind, though, refused to shut down, continuing to ponder, running the same options over and over, inevitably rejecting them.

  Pam would arrive at the library, book bag in tow, by ten A.M. What if Drew waited inside for her, in an elevator perhaps, or near her carrel?

  He sat up suddenly, mind racing. The carrel Pam worked out of, that was the key! George Washington University reserved a special section in its library for graduate students with carrels set aside to allow them to leave the dozens of necessary books within them. Drew could arrive early, leave a note in Pam’s carrel, and be gone long before she arrived. Contact would be initiated. But so much more was required, so much he had to explain to her. Directing her to a phone or a meeting would be to defeat the whole purpose. Any change in her routine, anything that looked out of place would alert the enemy to his presence. Everything had to fit in context.

  The answer came to him quickly. It wouldn’t be easy to pull off, but it was all he had. The men watching Pam would never know the difference.

  Pam saw the envelope as soon as she sat down. It was wedged between two books in her carrel, hidden and yet meant to be seen. Pulling it out, she noticed her name scribbled across the front of the envelope and recognized the handwriting as Drew’s, noting that the envelope was part of a local hotel’s stationery. She lifted the single sheet of paper and read as quickly as her mind would let her, breath held and eyes widening.

  Pam—

  There’s lots to explain and I can’t possibly put it all down here. The whole world seems to be coming apart. We’ve got to talk, but I’m sure you’re being watched and I can’t contact you directly. Don’t react to what you’re reading. Pretend it’s just some stray notes. All of this is my fault. I’ve put you in danger, but I think I can get us both out. Come to my house tonight at eight o’clock. Turn on the computer and plug in the phone modem. I’ll contact you from another terminal and explain everything as best I can. I’d meet you in the house, but I’m sure they’re watching that, too. In the meantime, don’t do anything out of the ordinary. They’re watching you even now. You’ll never be able to see them, but they’ll see you. I love you.

  Drew

  As calmly as she could manage, Pam placed the letter on her carrel desk and made some notes on it, pretending it was just a bit of research she had picked up on where she left off. Involuntarily, her eyes wandered to the front and sides. Other graduate students were busy at work, none interested in her. Any of them could be watching, though. She had to keep Drew’s warning in mind.

  My God, she thought, what does it mean? She had been so worried about him since he had left for Florida. And then the police had come with their questions, informing her that Drew was a murderer. It had been so hard to keep her mind on her work, but it was her only outlet until sense could be made of whatever was going on. Now at least Drew had returned, obviously in desperate trouble.

  Pam read the letter again. None of it made any sense, but she was terrified nonetheless. Only Drew could reduce her fear.

  And she was the only one who could help Drew.

  Elliana had never worn a nun’s robes before, so she wasn’t sure what they were supposed to fit like. Sister Catrina assured her that she would blend with the others well enough for their weekly descent down the m
ountain into the village.

  Our Lady of Queralt was located at the top of a long winding road. All windows within the ancient building provided a magnificent panorama of the surrounding hills and the town of Berga below, especially from the side of the chapel that opened over a solid wall of rock. In fact, from below the chapel looked to be teetering precariously on the edge of the precipice, in danger of plummeting downward at any instant. Ellie shuddered at the thought that America’s plight might well be no different, with the Council of Ten behind it to lend the final shove.

  “I don’t know how to thank you,” Ellie said to Sister Catrina as they moved together into the courtyard.

  “Go with God, child. That will be thanks enough.”

  Ellie found herself shaking her head. “I’ve committed enough sins for any ten people. Don’t waste your prayers on me. I’m not worth God’s help.”

  “Why not let Him decide that?” Sister Catrina returned calmly.

  Minutes later, Ellie, in her robes, was flowing in step with a group of a dozen sisters out the huge gate fronting the courtyard and onto the winding road that would lead them to the village. Under Sister Catrina’s careful instructions, the nuns made sure Ellie was always in the center of them so her slight limp and pained walk would be virtually unnoticeable. Ellie found herself amazed at how the older sisters were the ones who set the pace, the oldest of all being the spriest. The peaceful existence these women enjoyed provided a marked contrast with her own. To live for so long and be happy, at least content… . As they continued their silent trek down the mountain, Ellie thought of how wonderful it would have been to have spent a normal life with David, building a house, raising a family, traveling in peace. All that was gone now, in its place a trail of pained vengeance that marked her pursuit of the men forming the organization that had taken her husband’s life. She was close to the Council now, but she felt no satisfaction, only apprehension of where the next step might take her.

  Heinrich Goltz, presently a cabinet minister in West Germany, was identified by Maria Carvera as a Nazi. A man with a past he wanted to hide. And a present. Goltz was the strongest connection anyone had ever made to the Council. She had to reach him, interrogate him. She would find a way where none seemed to exist. There were questions that had to be answered. The Council was surfacing. That could only mean their predestined, manifest strike was close. The chain she had followed proved that.

  And somehow the white powder was the key. Goltz would tell her how.

  Ellie’s ankle was a mass of fiery pain by the time they reached the village. Her shoulder hung limply by her side. Moving it in the slightest sent waves of agony through her, but she bit them back, not wanting to attract attention to herself from those she was certain were still watching for her.

  Saturday was by far the biggest shopping day in the town of Berga. All the shops along the main streets were crowded with patrons out to buy, or just out. The second stop took the sisters into a clothing store. Following Sister Catrina’s plan, Ellie slipped away into one of the dressing rooms and slid out of her robes to reveal a casual dress beneath. A few tosses of her hair and she looked enough like a local to pass at first glance. The sisters who had found her had not retrieved her gun, so the journey would have to be made weaponless.

  The bus was due any minute now. It would stop directly in front of the clothing store and Ellie waited inside right up to the instant it squealed to a halt. She slid with a crowd toward it and climbed aboard the bus bound for Cardona.

  From there for her it would be Bonn. And Heinrich Goltz.

  The Castle of the Moors, Castello dos Mouros, had seen much life since its construction in the seventh century. It had also seen much death. Located in the hills of Sintra, a short drive from Lisbon in Portugal, the castle itself was thought to be dead for years. The overgrowth of brambles formed its coffin and the soupy coastal fogs its shroud. The slightest step upon them would force the ancient stone steps to crumble, the castle’s only residents seeming to be the birds nesting in the once proud battlements. It was a gloomy place, eerie, avoided by villagers for the haunting sounds of the winds swirling through its ramparts and by tourists for its pervading sense of doom.

  The Council of Ten had changed little of this when they decided to make the castle their headquarters. The exterior of the castle had to remain the same so as not to draw attention from the curious. To further assure this, the legend of the ghost of the moors was created. A pair of young lovers seeking to spend a night on the ancient grounds to the castle were never heard from again. So, too, a young boy who had gone up on a dare. And an old man who had simply lost his way. Word spread among the locals that death itself resided in the Castello dos Mouros, and being a superstitious lot, the castle ceased to exist for them.

  Which was just the way the leader of the Council wanted it.

  At nightfall the fogs would roll in, hiding the structure from all sight even under the brightest moon. Occasionally lights were known to flash in one window or another. Few paid attention. No one investigated.

  For anyone brave enough to try, the Council had also constructed a number of booby trap and trip devices, a labyrinth of possible death promised at almost every step from every approach. The precautions were necessary. The castle held the base of operations for the most ambitious plans for world domination since the time of Alexander the Great.

  A plan known only to the prime Council members as Powderkeg.

  All major construction within the castle had been undertaken underground in huge chambers once used as dungeons, torture cells, and prisons. The work had been started a generation before by the original revivers of the Council of Ten, ambitious men who lacked the facilities and resources to attain what they regarded as their destiny. Time passed and in the natural order of things, these men were replaced by others, always forcefully and often violently. For years, the Council found itself plagued by the same problems besetting more legitimate orders.

  Until Powderkeg and the man who found it.

  The leader of the Council of Ten sat now at the head of a conference table deep within the bowels of the great castle. His chair, he liked to say, was an ancient relic once owned by Alexander himself. Although this could not be confirmed, neither could it be denied. The story held.

  Extraordinarily few could grasp the scope of his power or the intricate means he had used to obtain it. Yes, Powderkeg would be the final catalyst that would propel the Council to the genuine status of a world power, but it was the steps leading up to the plan where the true accomplishment, the true genius, lay. The 1960s and 1970s—much of the 1980s as well—had been filled with many groups and men with an obsessive desire to change the system. Mostly they took the role of terrorists, revolutionaries, anarchists fighting small wars they lacked both the capacity and the vision to win. Occasionally small strides would be made. Mostly, however, for every foot they gained, there was a yard lost.

  The leader of the Council of Ten had watched such quests with keen interest, especially when a belated and insincere attempt at unity resulted in something amorphously titled the International Terror Network, something that for all intents existed only in name. Yes, the terrorists had the right idea; they just lacked the resources to carry it out. Still, the attempt awakened thoughts in the Council’s leader. In the end what had destroyed the terror network and others like it was a collection of individuals whose own vested interests far outweighed their desire for community. The problem became one of convincing enough men who stood apart but stood with many, that, although they had reason to hate each other, they had even more reason to hate the powers governing the world. Eliminate the chasms of race, culture, and perceived destiny to forge a common goal of achievable ultimate power. Men chosen not so much for whom they led as that they led. Men with incredible resources and followings who nonetheless alone could never hope to achieve the sweeping changes mandated for the world and their followers. Link those resources and central organizations together and all obstacles cou
ld be overcome. It became a matter of forgetting hostilities long enough to remember ambitions.

  On paper it all looked good, ingenious, terrifying. Yet, it still remained for one to bring it all together, one man whose own conviction might overcome collective hate and doubt and channel raw ambition into tangible ends.

  The leader of the Council of Ten leaned back in the cold of the castle and smiled. The entire brain center lay around him, and yet none of the other Council members at present had ever even been here. Five days from now they would meet together for the first time, just as Powderkeg was dawning at a time when such petty distractions as their differences might easily be shoved aside. Since they had never met, there had been no time or opportunity for bickering, second guessing, or the type of politics that doomed the terror network before it started. There had merely been individual roles to fill and duties to carry out, all leading toward a whole that was far greater than the sum of those individual parts.

  The leader had offered the destruction of the country they loathed the most as their first project. America was the one thing that stood in all their ways, but now out of its ashes the true Council of Ten would rise. The inevitability of that had forged tungsten links out of tenuous ones. Together the Council of Ten would accomplish what alone its members could only dream of.

  The end of America. The birth of a new world power.

  All starting in five days.

  Chapter 25

  PAM SWITCHED ON Drew’s Apple IIe just before eight P.M. Saturday night. She hooked up the telephone modem, fit the telephone receiver into its slot, and sat back to wait. Soon he would make contact with her from another terminal. She would stay here poised before the screen for as long as it took.

  Using the computer in his condo was a regular procedure for her, three nights a week at least, so there was no reason to expect undue attention from the men Drew insisted were following her. Additionally, if they had the phones tapped as well, a conversation held by computer would remain undetected. Unless they knew exactly what to watch for, they’d never even know the phone was in use.