Caliphate (34 page)

From the castle they walked down to the town, and then to the lakeshore.

"I have a place," she confessed, still full of shyness, "up in a tower where I can see this. I dream sometimes of being free to walk the lake. Sometimes—yes, I know it sounds foolish—but sometimes I dream I'm a princess up there and a hero will cross the lake and take me away. Silly, no?"

"Maybe not so silly. Anything's possible."

"Not in the Caliphate," she said. "Not in the Caliphate for a woman . . . or a Christian . . . or a slave . . . or a whore."

"Stop it," he said. "What you have to do is not the same thing as what you are."

"Thank you, Johann," she said, quietly. "But even if that's true there are many things that I can never do that also define what I am." She stood facing the lake, wind blowing through the few loose strands of her hair, and continued, "I don't know how to cook. I can't sew or weave. Unless they decide to breed me they'll keep me from ever getting pregnant until it's too late for me to be a mother. If they did breed me it would be to produce a slave. I'd strangle the baby with my own hands, before I let that happen. No respectable man would ever marry me, not now. Independence for a woman is simply not possible here, except as a freelance whore.

"At least I can read and write. Well," she admitted, "I can read. My writing is not . . . good."

"That's okay," he said. "You could learn."

"Like you learned German?" she asked. "Yours is so much better than mine, so much more formal and correct. I was just a country girl, you see and . . .

"And this isn't even my country anymore."

Hamilton shook his head in agreement. No, it wasn't her country anymore.

"I've read of back when it was," Petra said. "My great-grandmother kept a journal. It's the only thing I really own for myself. I'd like to have lived back then. I wouldn't have done what she did. I'd either have fought, back when we could still fight, or I'd have left. She knew she should have done one or the other, too. By the time she knew that, though, it was too late."

"All right. Enough!" Ling said. "I believe you."

Yes, we do,
said the voice in her head.

Hans stopped his gleeful dancing atop the Koran and said, "Okay. Now what was this all about?"

Tell him. Bring him to our side.

Ling exhaled heavily. "Where to begin?"

At the beginning is usually a good spot.

She nodded.

Stop nodding. You
know
how annoying that is to watch on a viewing screen back here. Now tell him.

"Your sister doesn't know any of this, but I'm not human," Ling said. She laughed at the expression on Hans' face, an even mix of disbelief and horror. "I mean I'm not human the way you are. Not born of woman. No father. I'm a genetically engineered being."

Hans' horrified look was like a dagger to her heart. She hastened to add, "I am one hundred percent human genes. But surely you noticed my skin and my breasts. Those are not normally found where I came from . . . where I was sold from. But Hans, I am all human inside. I can have children, provided that my pregnancy blocker is removed or allowed to run down. I feel. I think." She shrugged and let her head fall to one side. "What more do you want?"

"I'm sorry," he apologized, forcing his face to something less objectionable. "It was just a shock. You're wonderful. Please go on."

"Okay. I'm also a chippie. I have a thing planted in my brain."

My, this is a day for shocks,
thought Hans.

"The reason I have a chip in my brain, and the reason I was genengineered, and the reason I was sold here, is that I am an enemy agent."

"Here to work against the Caliphate?" he asked. "Be still my heart."

"Yes," she admitted. "And that man you attacked . . . "

Hamilton spread out the thin blanket he'd found in the picnic basket, then walked to the lakeshore to look for some rocks to tack down the corners with. He was lucky to find two and an old brick; it just wasn't that kind of lake. He returned with these, adjusted the sheet slightly, then tacked down the three corners that were most into the wind. He invited Petra to sit.

She kicked off her shoes—more slippers than shoes, really; that was part of what had made the walk down "murder"—and stepped lightly onto the blanket. Moreover, she sat with a sheer grace he found utterly delightful, like a film of a growing tulip shown in faster than real time but in reverse.

Hamilton looked at the girl, sighed and said, "You really are incredibly lovely, you know."

"They tell me that sometimes. For myself, I don't know. Ling says I am."

"Ling?" He really didn't need to ask but it would have been odd not to have.

"The girl who was with me when my brother attacked you."

"That was your
brother
?" Hamilton suddenly had an altogether too kinky hint of something. It must have showed on his face.

Petra laughed. "No, no, no. It's nothing like that. He and Ling are . . . special to each other. It happens sometimes, even with houris. I, on the other hand, am going to have to go to some pains to make sure no one from my brother's new command ever sees my face. It would be a great shame to him."

This girl's brother and my contact have the
hots
for each other? Is this a good or a bad thing?

"He's
not
a slave trader?"

"No," Ling said. "Yes, he's had to put on a show and yes, those children really were sold, but no—and my control tells me this De Wet person was up in arms over the whole thing—he's not really a slave trader."

"Do you know what those children were sold for?" Hans asked. "Does he?"

"We've got a pretty good idea, Hans, yes. But if they're the price to pay for saving a world?"

"No one asked
them
if they were willing to pay it, did they?"

"No one asked me either, Hans, when they sold me to this place."

He nodded and said, "What a perfect Hell of a world. What now?"

"I'm not sure," she answered. "How far are you willing to go to hurt the Caliphate?"

Hans started to laugh. The laugh grew and grew until it filled Ling's entire room. It grew deep and belly splitting. It had to grow, for it held twenty or more years of hate in it.

"I love it here," Petra said. "Here by the lake, I mean, not up there in the castle. I wish it never had to end, that I could turn into one of the rocks, a tall one so I could see out, and just see the seasons pass, watch the birds and the bees fly, and never, ever, have to feel anything again. Thank you for taking me." She put her head down, shyly.

Hamilton wasn't sure quite what he felt at that moment. There was still some shame from being a boor earlier, surely. And he felt a great pity for the girl, too. But there was something else he hadn't felt in a very long time, something he absolutely didn't want to put to words or even admit to feeling.

Later,
he thought.
Later on, I'll take that out and examine it. For now, there's a job to do. Several, actually. And for God's sake don't give this girl a hope you won't be able to deliver on.

"It's getting late," he said, "and it's a longish walk. Let's head back to the castle."

"You mean you're not going to . . ." She didn't sound disappointed so much as surprised. Then again, it was a romantic setting and she was sure he'd want to. In fact, she'd been sure he'd taken her to the lake only to fuck her.

"No," he smiled. "Not here and maybe not there either. We need to have a long talk first. And I need to have a talk with my . . . ummm . . . servant."

"You're out of your fucking mind," Bongo said. "No way. No effing way! Not gonna happen."

Bongo and Hamilton were walking not far from where Petra and he had had their picnic earlier in the day. He'd walked her home, seen her to her room, kissed her chastely, picked up his deposit and gone immediately back to town to the hotel room. From there he and Bongo had left for the lake because, as Bongo had said, "I can sweep this room for bugs; I can't sweep it for ears."

"Let's let that go, for now," Hamilton suggested. "What have you found out?"

Reluctantly, despite the security of the open field by the lake, Bongo continued, "I did a recon of the castle—the one we're interested in—last night. It's pretty tightly sewn up. There's never less than forty guards on duty, on a one-in-three watch schedule. They're all well armed and apparently well disciplined. They're in layers, too. Some more high tech security also, sensors, lasers, CCTV . . . the kind of shit the Caliphate produces little of. They've got dogs . . . one of the furry bastards got my scent, too. I had a helluva time getting away unseen. Those guys will alert on anything. We're not getting in on the sly."

"I know," Hamilton agreed, "which is why—"

"Like I said, no fucking way. We are not taking into our confidence a fucking
janissary
for Christ's Holy Sake! Better to kill the bastard."

Hamilton looked up, intending to continue the argument, when he spotted a black-uniformed man leading a woman shrouded in a burka by the hand. The woman was not Petra; that much he could see by her walk. So he assumed . . .

"Why don't you kill him now?" Hamilton asked conversationally. "Me, personally, I think he looks kind of tough. You're on your own."

"Ibn Minden, Hans,
Odabasi
, Corps of Janissaries," Hans introduced himself, with a polite bow of his head. "And I understand I owe you a serious apology . . . which you have."

Hans inclined that head toward Ling. "She's told me everything—"

"Everything I know," Ling corrected. "Which may not be everything."

Don't be a bitch,
said the little voice.

In response, Ling nodded her head vigorously, half a dozen times.

Stop that!

For the first time since Hamilton had known him, Bongo laughed uproariously. Everyone, Ling included, looked at him strangely. That only made him laugh harder.

"I'm a chippie, too," Bongo finally explained. "She was punishing her control . . . weren't you, dear?"

"You never told me," Hamilton said.

"'Need to know,'" Bongo quoted. "I needed to have the chip put in to control some of my voluntary and involuntary muscles after I was medically discharged. It's not pleasant to have."

"
I
know your mission," Hans said. "And I will help. But I have conditions. You will be thinking of killing me now," he added. "This will not only be harder to do than you suspect, but my disappearance will alert the local forces. This you cannot afford."

Bongo began to tense, as if for a killing fight, then just as suddenly relaxed. "
What
conditions?" he asked.

"First, the children slaves in the lower castle must be freed and delivered to a safe place. You can do this."

"We've no way to get them across Lake Constance," Bongo objected.

"That is merely a detail to be worked out," Hans said. "Second, you must free my sister and get her out as well."

"Done," said Hamilton, drawing an angry look from Bongo.

"Third," continued Hans, "you must get Ling—"

"—I'm not allowed to leave, Hans," Ling interjected.

"We'll talk about that later," he insisted. "For now I want these gentlemen to agree in principle."

"I can agree in principle to anything," Bongo said. "Doesn't mean I can follow through."

"Ling?" Hans asked.

She shut her eyes for a moment, then answered, in a voice that was not quite her own, "His name is Bernard Matheson. Bronx, New York, American Empire. He is a veteran of the Imperial Army's Special Forces. He holds their Distinguished Service Cross for gallantry above and beyond the call of duty in the Fourth Colombian Pacification Campaign. Married three times. No current wife. No children. Entered Imperial Intelligence after being invalided out of— no, medically retired from—the Army as a result of wounds received in the action for which he received the Distinguished Service Cross. Terminal rank: Lieutenant Colonel. He's been working the Boer Republic for the last—"