Her keeper’s hands gripped her hair from behind and snapped her head up, hauling her up to her knees. Her wounded foot folded under her and stretched the healing incision. Laynie bit back a cry of pain. Instead, she worked to crack one eye, but the light’s onslaught was too much.
A well-modulated voice in accented Russian asked, “This is the woman? Director Wolfe’s prized agent?”
“Yes, Sayed.”
“She stinks.”
“Indeed, Sayed. Her long journey . . . she is not presentable. I apologize.”
Laynie cataloged the new voice, the man her keeper called Sayed. She heard authority and pride in Sayed’s words, in his tone. She also heard how her keeper responded to Sayed. His replies carried reverence. Even a touch of fear.
She sensed a form squatting before her. Her keeper’s grasp jerked her head farther back.
I’m being inspected.
She commanded her eyes to open—she demanded that they obey her. In response, one eyelid cracked. She peered through the narrow slit and saw . . . a black beard. A thin face. A man, perhaps in his early forties. A slight build. She knew immediately who he was, this “Sayed.”
You are the head man, aren’t you? The leader of AGFA.
We have been looking for you.
His mouth curved into a smile as he observed her appraisal.
She tracked from the man’s mouth up his face and stopped where her gaze should have encountered his eyes. Where the windows to his soul should have been.
Should have been.
Instead, hard, dead, glittering stones stared out at her.
She forced both eyes open and met those lifeless orbs.
“Ah, there you are,” he murmured. “Much older than the kafir women I usually choose but defiant and godless as I presumed. Good. I shall enjoy breaking you—once you are cleaned up.”
He stood and the grip on her hair let go. Laynie’s head immediately rolled forward. Her stinging, fatigued eyes again sought refuge behind her eyelids. Her scalp tingled and ached where her hair had been yanked and pulled. Her injured foot throbbed.
“I congratulate you on your successful mission, Bula. Snatching her as you did was audacious. Worthy of great respect!”
“They will be looking for me.” The words jumped from Laynie’s mouth.
Sayed laughed. “No, they believe you are dead. In fact, I hear from our source that Wolfe and his so-called task force are in deep mourning. They haven’t an inkling their agent is alive. Yes, well done, Bula.”
“Thank you, General.”
They believe you are dead. Sayed’s words gutted Laynie.
They believe you are dead. Fatigue clawed at every joint in her body.
They believe you are dead. She swayed on her knees.
Her keeper grabbed her shoulder, held her upright. “What are your orders, Sayed?”
“You took many precautions and more time than necessary in bringing her here, Bula—but that was at my direction, and you followed my wishes exactly. However, I was told she is quite a beauty and am saddened to see she has not fared well.”
He thought a moment. “Have two kafir women bathe and clothe her. Feed her and care for her needs. I will see her again after the recovery period, say, four mornings from now.”
“Yes, General.”
“Take care, Bula. I do not wish to see her in this weakened state when she comes to me. Do whatever must be done to restore her to health and vigor—particularly vigor. She will give me no pleasure if she is feeble when I take her.”
“It shall be as you command, General.”
Sayed thought of something else. “You carried her, Bula?”
“Yes, General. She had no shoes and was unable to walk even if she had.”
“Yes, I understand. Since you have gotten her stench on yourself from touching her filth, please bathe yourself and put on clean clothes.”
“I will, my General.”
Laynie’s keeper, the man Sayed called Bula, pulled her up and into his arms. Cursing her under his breath in Russian—but leaving the bag he’d pulled from her head behind—he carried Laynie from Sayed’s presence, through a curtain, and back into the tunnels.
Laynie stared at the rock walls. A string of dim, widely placed, electric bulbs hung near the tunnel’s ceiling, just enough light to illuminate their way. The low light was a welcome change. Her eyes began to adjust, and she tried to pay attention to what she saw and where Bula was taking her.
Then the tunnel took an abrupt right turn into a junction where tunnels branched in two directions, right and left. Bula took neither branch. He crossed the junction and entered a wide, spacious cavern with a high roof overhead. Laynie smelled more than felt moisture in the “room.”
This space formed naturally, There must be a water source nearby that used to drip from the walls and ceiling. They probably diverted the water to dry the cavern.
Laynie saw lines of tables that would seat perhaps two hundred and a partition of rough wood built across the left side of the cavern. The partition had windows and counters for passing food into the open cavern—to the tables.
Kitchen and dining hall. Common area.
A massive old coal-burning furnace occupied the farthest reach of the room. The farther into the room and closer to the furnace Bula carried her, the warmer the air became.
Bula sat her at a table and bellowed for someone, but Laynie had eyes only for the furnace. It blazed away, pumping out merciful heat, its sprawling “octopus” ductwork pipes feeding its warmth—Laynie presumed—to other parts of the cave system. She noted a great bin of coal two or three yards from the furnace. She wanted to lie down in front of the furnace’s belly and fall asleep in its warm embrace.
The person Bula had called emerged from the doorway leading into the kitchen—an old woman, hunched over, wearing a worn, full-length gown. Over it she wore a contrived niqab—two veils, one that bound her head and covered her hair, the other across her nose and mouth and tied behind her head so that nothing of her face was visible except her eyes. Her hands and shriveled face were the only parts of her body visible.
Bula spoke to the woman, gesturing toward Laynie.
The woman protested. She pointed to the coal bin, then the furnace.
She’s the night caretaker, Laynie deduced. Her job is to feed the furnace and keep it going all night.
Right then, the pounding in Laynie’s head reconvened.
I’m so thirsty. Dehydrated.
Bula said something else, and the woman nodded and half-bowed to Bula, then fixed her weary eyes on Laynie.
Bula turned to leave. Took several steps.
“Wait,” Laynie called to him in Russian.
He returned but kept his distance and stared down at her.
Laynie experienced a moment’s discomfiture as she visualized what she must look like. The only clothing she wore—as Bula had to have known—was a thin blanket over a soiled, reeking hospital gown. Her hair, too, was filthy and greasy.
Now that her body was warming, she caught a whiff of herself.
Ugh.
Bula’s nose, too, wrinkled in disgust. “You speak Russian?”
“Yes.”
“Why did you call to me?”
“What day is it, please?”
He snorted. “The day or date can mean nothing to you . . . here.”
“As you say. However, since the day I was abducted, I have had nothing to eat or drink.” Forming the words and ushering them to her lips cost Laynie. They scraped like broken glass across her throat, each syllable rougher and “croakier” than the previous.
He studied her. “Breakfast is in two hours. I will arrange food and water for you then—after you bathe.”
“Thank you, but . . .”
He flicked an angry brow at her.
“May I have a drink of water now? I am parched and can hardly move.”
He barked a command at the old woman. She shuffled through the kitchen door and returned with a cer
amic bottle. The sight of water dribbling from the bottle’s mouth and down its glazed sides fused Laynie’s tongue to the roof of her mouth. She began to tremble.
Bula drew a knife from the scabbard on his belt and sliced through the tape binding Laynie’s wrists together. Her hands fell to her side, fingers numb and cold, temporarily useless.
Bula chuckled softly. Laynie ignored him. Her attention was on the water.
The woman tried to hand off the bottle to Laynie, but her weak fingers couldn’t even hold the bottle to her lips. Bula said something, and the old woman tipped the bottle into Laynie’s mouth. The scent of minerals hit her nose at the same moment the ice-cold water triggered her gag reflex. She choked on that first sip, and the old woman drew the bottle back until Laynie recovered and could swallow again.
Laynie managed a second sip without coughing, then gulped down several mouthfuls.
“Thank you,” she said to Bula.
A glimmer of something—curiosity? Pity?—lit his eyes. For an instant. Then he turned on his heel and left.
As soon as he was gone, the old woman left the bottle on the table near Laynie and stationed herself between Laynie and the entrance to the tunnel. But Laynie’s thirst had awakened. It clawed at her, greedy, voracious, demanding.
Drink it all. You don’t know when they will give you more.
She told her brain to send a signal to her arms and was able to lift her weakened hands to the bottle. Cradling it between stiff fingers, she tipped it to her mouth and took slow, easy sips, carefully returning it to the table between drinks. When she had emptied the bottle, Laynie turned her head to her “guard.”
“More?” she asked, indicating the bottle.
The old woman shook her head no. Her guileless expression alternated between fierce attention to duty and flickering worry.
Aren’t you the cutest little jailer ever, Laynie thought to herself. Don’t worry ’bout li’l ol’ me. Right now, I couldn’t punch my way out of a wet paper bag.
Bula was gone only a short while. He returned with a second man, much younger than him, and two women on a leash.
A leash.
That was the only way Laynie could describe it. The women’s wrists were tied to a length of rope. Bula held the rope’s end. When he jerked the rope, the slip knots around the women’s wrists tightened.
The women wore black abayas—full-length outer garments—and niqabs. They kept their faces toward the floor, seeing nothing but what was in front of their feet.
The young guard, however, studied Laynie with unabashed interest. Laynie studied him back. He frowned and put his hand to the knife sheathed at his side. Laynie looked away.
No sense antagonizing my captors . . . not at this stage of the game.
Bula spoke to the old woman, who shuffled away toward a curtain off the near side of the kitchen. Then he spoke to the two bound women and the guard accompanying them. The guard began to loosen the ties around the women’s wrists. Whatever orders Bula had given, Laynie did not know the language to understand them.
Finally, Bula spoke to Laynie in Russian. “These women will prepare a bath for you and help you bathe, wash your hair, and dress properly. This man—” he pointed to the younger guard, “will supervise.”
Bula fixed Laynie with a cold stare. “You will be wise to follow his orders.”
She nodded. You are leaving me with a single guard—an inexperienced boy—because you know I am in no fit condition to try to run off.
Bula reached for Laynie and pulled her up in his arms. Walked toward the curtain next to the kitchen. The young guard held the curtain aside, revealing an improvised bath house—two ancient tubs, nonslip rubber mats on the stone floor, and benches alongside the tubs. The two women followed Bula through the curtain.
The old woman was running water into one of the tubs. Bula sat Laynie on a bench beside the old cast-iron thing and said something else to the woman. Then he motioned to the guard. The boy ran his curious eyes over Laynie a last time before following Bula. Laynie heard Bula’s footsteps fade as he left. The boy, however, remained just outside the curtain.
Laynie’s attention was on the steaming water pouring into the tub. Its mineral scent filled the air.
They definitely have access to a natural water source, and they must use the furnace to heat a tank of it. Clever. They have all they need to shelter their entire militia here for the winter.
The old woman placed a stack of clothes on the bench next to Laynie. She kept her eyes averted, as though Laynie were something evil to be avoided. She shuffled to a cabinet and returned with towel, washcloths, and soap.
One of the women tended the bath water as it filled the tub. The other, while keeping her eyes on Laynie, absentmindedly rubbed her wrists. Laynie noticed the lines of chapped skin around them. She glanced at the other woman’s hands and glimpsed the same red, calloused lines.
They are tied to a leash on a regular basis for those marks to be semi-permanent. Then she remembered Sayed’s exact words, “Have two kafir women bathe and clothe her.”
Laynie had learned a few Arabic words and phrases from Jubaila and what they signified in Islam. Kafir meant “one who denies or opposes the truth.”
An unbeliever or infidel.
Sayed had used kafir to refer to her, too.
“Sayed thinks I am a godless infidel,” Laynie whispered aloud.
The three women turned toward her. They seemed upset.
“Is it because I used his name?” Laynie murmured, soft enough that the young guard wouldn’t hear her. “Because I said, ‘Sayed’?”
The old woman wrung her hands and glanced with apprehension toward the curtain and the guard. The woman who had been rubbing her wrists shook her head and raised a finger to her lips.
Laynie nodded her understanding. After a few more worried looks aimed at the guard on the other side of the curtain, the women seemed to relax.
They gestured for Laynie to get into the steaming bath. The one tending the water reminded Laynie of a much younger version of her former maid, Alyona. Alyona, the vigilant and sour Belarus woman who had served as Petroff’s first line of surveillance over his “property,” Linnéa Olander.
She spoke to Laynie, again gesturing her to the steaming tub.
Ironic. They have no idea how much I want to get in that tub, Laynie laughed to herself. And if they knew how weak I am, they’d be less concerned about my running off and very worried that I might fall and crack my head open trying to get in.
Laynie slowly stripped off the thin blanket and soiled hospital gown. She reached a hand toward the woman nearest her. After a moment’s hesitation, she took Laynie’s hand and helped her up.
Laynie tried to stand, but her strength wasn’t enough. “Alyona” saw and came to help. With the two women supporting her, Laynie reached the tub. She sat on the side and put her right foot into the water. Her cold foot registered the warmth, and Laynie sighed.
Oh, such bliss!
The women helped her drag her left leg over the edge. All was fine—until Laynie’s left foot registered hot water on its tender, not-quite-healed wound. It stung like fire. She hissed and lifted it out.
She hadn’t had an opportunity to examine the gash. Now that she saw it, she grimaced. The women, too, saw the wound. The old woman peered closely and clucked over it. She said something and motioned to the other women.
Leaving her injured foot hanging over the outside edge of the tub, the three women eased Laynie down into the water. The remainder of her body she surrendered to the water’s soothing heat.
They let her relax for a minute before coming at her with soapy rags. Laynie tried to take a rag, but they insisted on scrubbing her, going at her like a plucked turkey in the sink on Thanksgiving morning.
When they got to her hair, it was a different story. Laynie’s last trip to a salon had restored her natural blond look, and all three of the women wanted to wash it or just touch it, whispering excitedly to each other.
After they had washed her hair twice, they assisted her from the tub, dried her off, and helped her don a shapeless shift. They pulled a faded abaya over that, then socks and sandal-like shoes.
The old woman, who seemed to have some authority over the two younger ones, insisted they sit Laynie in front of the furnace to dry her hair. Their guard, a frown perpetually creasing his face, apparently didn’t like the idea and said so. The old woman, shaking her finger under his nose, told him differently.
Interesting. Apparently, this old gal isn’t kafir. She has some pull and isn’t afraid to use it on this young man.
A minute later, Laynie was ensconced on a chair before the roaring iron beast while “Alyona” and “Not Alyona” bickered over who got to brush her hair while it dried. It was then Laynie realized that the two women were quite young.
Why, they are no more than girls. Perhaps only fourteen or fifteen years old.
The old woman dispensed a cranky order, and “Alyona” ran to obey. She returned with a towel and a folded garment that she placed beside Laynie. She then worked the towel over half of Laynie’s hair while “Not Alyona” brushed the other side. After a few minutes, they switched off, all the while whispering or giggling under their breath so as not to attract the young guard’s attention.
Just girls. Barely teenagers.
Laynie was facing away from the furnace, toward the entrance to the cavern, when three additional women arrived. When they saw Laynie, they came to inspect her.
Breakfast crew?
Laynie’s stomach lurched. Her belly was so hollow that, for an instant, she thought she might be sick. To distract herself, she studied the new arrivals. They, too, were young, possibly in their late teens, but obviously better kept and better dressed than “Alyona” and “Not Alyona.”
While the new arrivals chattered, giggled, and fingered Laynie’s hair, they gave no notice to the girls who had been drying her hair.
Not a nod or a word. Nothing.
In fact, at the appearance of the new arrivals, “Alyona” and “Not Alyona” had clammed up. They let go of Laynie’s hair and stepped back, their heads tipped toward the floor.
The old woman entered. She shouted at the new arrivals. With a last glance at Laynie, they hurried to obey the summons.
Laynie Portland, Spy Resurrected Page 18
