Grandmaster (A Suspense and Espionage Thriller)

by Molly Cochran

  "How?"

  "She has men. They live beneath the palace. They are"—she choked— "they are vile men who live like beasts. Varja lets them use us whenever they want. We were not permitted to speak of them to outsiders, but they are always in the palace. They'll come looking for us soon." She pointed into the distance. "There is a small cave nearby. My friend and I passed it when we escaped, but we did not stop there."

  "What happened when Varja's men found you?" Justin asked, trying to keep himself awake by talking. "Were you punished?"

  "I was made to wear the veil from that day. Varja said that my ugliness would someday be known to all the world. But I was very young, and the goddess had plans for me."

  "You don't have to worry about those plans anymore, Duma."

  Duma slowed. "Varja's plans are always fulfilled," she said softly. "My friend was not so fortunate. She was given the bowl to drink, as you were. I was made to watch her. Her punishment was life-in-death."

  "Like Saraha."

  Duma nodded. "And like Saraha, she never returned. The others speak of those who return after life-in-death, but I don't believe the legends are true. My friend is dead. And Saraha is dead."

  They walked in silence to a cave in the foothills of the great Himalayan peaks that surrounded them.

  "They will not find us here," Duma said. "It is dark, and they will walk beyond this place, to where my friend and I escaped before. You can sleep here, Patanjali."

  "No, I mustn't—"

  "It's all right. You will not succumb to life-in-death now. You are only tired."

  Justin felt himself sinking into the cold earth of the cave floor. "But I should watch ... for you...."

  Duma smiled. "I will watch, Patanjali. There is no danger now."

  "Duma," Justin whispered, taking her hand. The stillness of the cave enveloped them like a womb. "Will you stay with me forever?"

  Duma lowered her head. "I cannot stay with you at Rashimpur."

  "Then we will leave Rashimpur."

  "But you are the leader of the monastery. You are Patanjali."

  "And you are the woman I love. I did not choose to be Patanjali. I don't even know if I am what the monks say I am. But I know what you are." He caressed her face. "And I choose to be with you. If you'll have me."

  Duma looked at him with sad eyes. "We cannot chart our own destinies," she said at last. "If we are meant to be as one, then we shall be. But if we are not... if anything should happen ... I will always remember, Patanjali. I will always love you. I will save my heart for you."

  "Do you promise?"

  “I promise.”

  "Then I do, too. Duma, I will have no woman but you." Then he touched her, and she held him, and he loved her in the quiet cave, feeling the pain of her first experience, entering her darkness, exploding with joy, and he was glad he had waited for her, and he knew that if he'd had to wait forever, he would have waited, because no other love was possible for him. Then, wrapped in the warm smoothness of her flesh, feeling her beating heart next to his own, Justin slept.

  Rough hands awoke him, yanking his head backward, dragging him out from the cave into a night bright with fire.

  Duma was gone. In the distance, in front of a huge bonfire, wavered the shapeless forms of women whose screams pierced the stillness of the mountain night.

  "Duma!" Justin shouted, but there was too much noise and confusion for him to hear even his own voice in the sudden din. Big men with black-painted faces held him down as his wrists and ankles were tied.

  "Patanjali!" someone called from the distance. It was not Duma's voice, but one he recognized from among the women at the palace. As his eyes adjusted to the sudden brightness of the fire, he saw that the women were bound together in a circle surrounding the fire. He searched for Duma, but could not see her.

  "What do you want with me?" he shouted.

  The men didn't answer. Then, from the direction of Varja's palace came the jeweled palanquin of the goddess, borne by four men. When it approached Justin, the silk curtains of the carrier parted, and Varja, again resplendent in floor-length robes, stepped out.

  "What have you done with her?" Justin rasped.

  "Your accomplice will serve you no longer," she said. Her face held a look of malicious victory.

  "You've killed her, you filthy whore!"

  Varja raised her hand. "Ah, but you underestimate me, Patanjali. Killing is far too easy. Killing her, or killing you. No, my young fool. You shall live. For now."

  She took a black cloth bag from a cord tied around her waist and poured the contents into her hand. It looked like black soot. She sprinkled the powder over Justin's face and body.

  "And this shall be your destiny," she intoned in the formal dialect of her sect. "To live with such suffering that you yourself will seek death. To die with each breath of life. To be betrayed by all the gods. To be trusted by no one. To find no shelter from pain and sorrow throughout all your days. To see that which you love wither and die and be turned to dust. To be betrayed by your own heart. This to you, Patanjali, is the blessing of Varja and all the power at her command. And then, on the day that I will it, you will die and be no more."

  Then she raised her hands high, and the men who served her left Justin to form an outer circle around the women. Justin watched, horrified, as they drew long sabers and held them aloft.

  "What are they doing?" Justin asked, stunned. Surely... Not the women ...

  She lowered her arms. It was a definite, unmistakable command. And as Justin screamed with horror at the realization of what was about to happen, the guards hacked the heads off the women, one by one, and kicked the bodies into the flames.

  "This is the beginning," Varja said softly as she mounted her palanquin. Her eyes gleamed. She was smiling.

  At daybreak, after the men were gone, when the fire had settled to smoldering ashes and the stench of burning flesh had disappeared, Justin was able to release himself from the thick bonds that tied him. He walked to the site of the fire, feeling as if he had died along with the women.

  There was nothing of Duma. A few bones and undistinguishable shapes—burned meat—rested among the coals. Nothing else remained. Nearby, he could hear the shuffling of hyenas coming to feast on the dead, to lick the charred bones of his love.

  Using his hands, Justin covered the pit with earth, then walked back to the monastery at Rashimpur.

  Varja's curse had already come to pass, he thought. He would seek his own death, and welcome it when it came.

  The sooner the better.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  There was a noise from the base of the hill in front of Yva's small house. Justin sat bolt upright.

  "Yva!" a voice rang out. "I have to talk to you now, Yva. It's important."

  "It's Józek," Yva said, scrambling to her feet. She pressed her fingers to her lips and gestured for Justin to stay down. Hurriedly, she put on her dress and called, "What is it?" as she picked her way down the hillside among the traps.

  Józek was visibly nervous, his thin fingers twitching. "The medallion," he said without preamble. His eyes darted in all directions. "I—I sold it to a Russian soldier."

  "Pig!" she began.

  "There isn't much time. Listen to me," Józek said, shaking her, his voice hushed and irritated. "That was a week ago. I went to Krakow and sold it to a soldier there. Today they came—to my house—to take me back to Krakow. There was this big-shot officer from Moscow. He had the medallion, and wanted to know where I got it. They kept me for six hours. I had no water. I was terrified."

  "And so you told him," Yva said simply.

  "I gave him the long route, through Lubsana. They won't be here for a while. Yva, you have to get that man out of your house, out of the area. He's wanted, a criminal maybe. If the soldiers find him here, they'll destroy everyone in the village. As it is, they'll know I led them on a goose chase around Czeskow."

  Yva stuck out her chin. "Why should I believe you? You don't care anyth
ing about the village. And neither do I."

  Józek hung his head. "They brought the doctor along, too," he said. "They wanted to know if it was the same man he'd looked after before. This man rose from the dead, Yva. There's something terrible about him." He shook his head. Spittle formed in the corner of his mouth. "The Russians want him bad. He must be a big underground leader or something. The doctor told me to warn you. He's in the village now, telling everybody to bury their valuables in case of fire." He scanned the dark house on top of the hill. "We have to move fast. I'll help you carry him out. Can he move at all?"

  "Don't come," she said, pushing him back. "He can move. He's—he's already gone."

  "Well, all right," Józek said uncertainly. "I'm not going to stick around to find out if you're telling me the truth or not. I only came because the doctor's a good man. But don't let the Russians find your pretty boy here."

  Yva ran up the hill without another word.

  "You have to leave," she whispered to Justin. "Now. There's no time to explain, but get out. Get as far away as possible for the next few days." She spoke while she gathered some dried fruit and a jug of water.

  "Are you in danger? I'll wait nearby, where I can watch."

  "No! The soldiers are looking for you. If they find you here, they'll kill you, and me, and everyone else for miles around. Just listen to me, and don't argue." She thrust the parcels at him and pushed him toward the door. "They'll be coming from Lubsana, to the west. So head east, and keep moving. Things ought to be clear in a day or so."

  Justin felt helpless. Why was he running again? "I don't know any soldiers," he said. "What do they want me for?"

  "They say you rose from the dead. What difference does it make? Don't waste time thinking. Just go." She shoved him into the darkness.

  The jeep came within twenty minutes. To Yva's surprise, there was only one man inside, a Russian colonel.

  Yva rushed outside. "What's your business?" she shouted.

  "I am Colonel Alexander Zharkov. I am looking for a man named Justin Gilead. An American."

  An American! In her wildest dreams, Yva had not imagined that the beautiful boy with no memory was an American. She wondered if Justin even knew it himself. "There is no one here except me," she said.

  Zharkov got out of the jeep. "I'll see for myself, if you don't mind."

  "Wait," she said, picking her way among the hidden traps. "I'll bring you up." The traps were her only weapon. It would be wise, she knew, not to show her hand too quickly.

  Zharkov scanned the inside of the house cursorily, kicking the straw of the bed, flinging Yva's few articles of clothing to the floor. At last, he came to the large wooden table covered with sewing materials. He swept them away with one arm. Beneath, etched into the grain of the wood, was Justin's drawing of the coiled snake.

  Zharkov looked at her levelly. Slowly he took out his pistol. "Where is he?"

  Yva swallowed. "I never knew his name. He left several days ago. I took his medallion as payment for looking after him. I was going to turn him over to the authorities when he was well..."

  "How many days?"

  "Three," she said without hesitation. "He was sick until then."

  "What did he tell you about himself?"

  "Nothing. He couldn't talk."

  Something in the fireplace caught Zharkov's eye. He walked over to it, keeping the Tokarev trained on the woman. Reaching into the flames with a poker, he pushed out the charred corner of a checkerboard.

  "You're lying," he said evenly. He threw the board at her feet. "I'll be back."

  After he left Yva sat down, shaking. The danger was momentarily past, but he would come back with his men. That was a certainty. They would comb the woods for a man traveling on foot. They would guess his direction once they realized that Józek had given them the wrong route. They would alert the other villages to look for Justin. And Czeskow...

  There was a cry and a thump from in front of the house. For the first time since she'd buried her dead child, Yva crossed herself. The Russian officer had found the traps.

  Peering out the door cautiously, she watched for movement. Zharkov lay on the slope, his arms flung wide, his head bleeding against a rock.

  Yva scrambled down the hill to him. First, she picked up the Russian's gun, which was lying a few feet from his right hand, and threw it as far as she could into the shadows. Then she searched the unconscious man for the medallion.

  She found it in the inside pocket of his uniform jacket, still wrapped in the piece of dirty cloth she had put it in. She opened the cloth to be sure. The medallion was the same, and again it felt warm in her hand.

  "It is not yours," she mumbled softly to the unconscious Russian officer. "Not yours."

  She slipped away quietly and moved, with unerring instinct, down the hill to the base of a large tree. Using a rock for a tool, she dug a hole by the tree and buried the medallion. Then she placed the rock over the hole as a marker.

  Done. Now, whatever they did to her or to her house, the medallion would be safe for Justin. She said his name aloud. "Justin Gilead. An American." The thought of the strange young man's powerful body, his tender yet strong arms, made her heart beat faster.

  She scooped dirt into her apron until it was full, then, laboriously, handful by handful, pushed it all into the gas tank of the jeep.

  It was more than six miles to the village. Yva ran the whole distance, planning, praying, regretting that she hadn't shot the Russian officer with his own gun while she'd had the chance.

  But maybe things would be all right anyway. The Russian would find his way back to his troops in time, she knew, but that time might be enough for Justin to get away.

  She found the doctor, rushing from one house to another, warning the inhabitants about the approaching destruction.

  "I need to speak to you," she said.

  The doctor, exhausted and hoarse, took her arm. "Have they come?"

  She nodded. "One. But the rest will come. He knows the stranger was there. There were things I couldn't hide."

  The doctor sighed. "Then at least we have warning. Many have fled already. Thank you for your concern."

  "My concern isn't for you, or these people," Yva said flatly. "I want you to give the stranger a message if you see him again. I... may not."

  "Nonsense, dear. You'll come with my family."

  "No!" Yva shouted. "That would be suicide. The Russian officer will be looking for me. I'll be safer in the woods. But I want you to tell the stranger, if he comes back, that the medallion is at the bottom of the hill, by the tree. He'll understand."

  "All right," the doctor said, "But you—"

  "That message is only for him, understand? No one else. No one. In exchange for this message, I'm warning you to get whoever you care to out of Czeskow."

  She walked back to the cabin. It was nearing dawn. She longed for sleep, but there was still much to do. Zharkov would be back with his men in a few hours. It was enough time to pack some provisions and a blanket before she set out to find Justin in the forest, but not enough time to hesitate, even for a moment.

  She stopped at the bottom of the hill, near the tree where the coiled snake medallion was buried. The rock marker had not been disturbed. The jeep, useless now, remained where the officer had left it. Zharkov himself was gone, the trap sprung, as she had expected.

  But a faint, shadowy glow shone behind the brown oilskin windows. A lamp. Had Justin returned already? Had he been tricked by the calm into believing that nothing would happen?

  She rushed up the hill. "Justin?"

  "Yva."

  "What are you doing here? What—"

  The Tokarev was pointed directly at her face.

  Zharkov grabbed the shoulder of her dress and pulled her into the room. "Where's the medallion?" It was a command.

  "It's—" She looked around. There was no place for her to go now. "It's in Czechoslovakia by now."

  Zharkov's jaw clenched. "Where did you meet him?" />
  "Why should I tell you? Filthy Russian pig. It wasn't yours."

  "Tell me where he's gone!" Zharkov's voice was strangled. He grabbed Yva by the neck and slammed her against the wall, jamming the Tokarev into her temple. "Where?"

  Yva's heart pounded. Her eyes unwillingly welled with tears.

  "Where?" Zharkov repeated, pounding her skull against the wood. She was his, he thought, the Grandmaster's woman, and it gave him satisfaction to hurt her. "Is this how he takes care of you? Is this how he looks after you?"

  She managed to turn her head slightly. The round, frightened face gathered into a mask of hatred. In one last, defiant gesture, she spat in his face.

  Zharkov fired the Tokarev.

  The man who did not know his name was Justin Gilead returned to the house the following night. There were soldiers in the woods, heading east; they would long ago have passed Yva Pradziad s house.

  There seemed to be light everywhere, light and sound and excitement. The lights usually visible from the village were oddly extinguished, but there were other lights from the roadways, and the sounds of horses and cattle carried from isolated places on the wind.

  He walked around the house silently, watching, listening. No sound. No light. Had she left? No soldiers. He entered quietly, surprised to find that he could move without disturbing even the pebbles under his feet. He had to have learned that somewhere. Perhaps in the place where he'd gotten the medallion.

  "Yva," he whispered. Eve, the first woman. His mother, his teacher, his friend.

  He found her, bloody and decapitated. What remained of her face was splattered over the fireplace. A box had been tossed into the new ashes. Across her body were strewn its contents: the chess pieces Justin had whittled from scrap wood.

  Justin moaned. A vision of a mutilated old man tied to a burning tree came to him, followed by a nightmare sequence of still photographs: bodies in a lake, a golden hall filled with dead soldiers, a ring of headless women around a bonfire. And now there was yet another picture. Once again, someone who loved him had died in his place. Once again, the Prince of Death had triumphed.