The Lost Apostles (3 page)
One thing seemed certain. She wanted to spend time with them alone, away from the prying eyes . . . and ears . . . of anyone.
Through portholes, Lori saw the sky beginning to clear. As sand settled from the air she made out details of the landscape, with the milieu illuminated by starlight and a sliver of moon low over the horizon. Faintly, the regular pattern of desert dunes could be seen, and jagged escarpments topped by wizards’ caps of stone.
The pilot activated stabilizers, which whooshed into place beneath the craft. She emerged from the cockpit. “In addition to the engine problem, our ground camouflage system is out of commission,” she said. “We can be seen here.”
Lori glowered, heard the wind howling outside.
“We’ll spend the night here,” she said. “We don’t have any choice.”
“I’ll see if I can get the engines and camouflage going at first light,” the pilot said.
Lori nodded.
Hearing a foreign language spoken, she saw the translator Michelle Renee speaking to the children, presumably in ancient Aramaic. Lori did not understand the words, but they brought to mind a strange word that Veronica had mouthed to her one day in the Scriptorium.
Iktol
.
It had not been Aramaic. Instead, it was from a secret language unknown to the translators. And, inexplicably, Lori had understood it.
Iktol
. . . Murder.
Chapter 3
There can be tremendous beauty in a powerful storm, and a drab, predictable ugliness in serenity. Look at the woman who survives an immense force of nature, how she draws strength from it, absorbing the raw elemental power of our female deity and converting it to her own use.
—Amy Angkor Billings
After ordering the pilot into the passenger compartment, Lori locked herself inside the cockpit and tried to get some sleep. It was not easy. For more than an hour, she just sat on the deep-cushion of the pilot’s seat, with it tilted back as far as possible. Too many thoughts whirled through her mind. Countless troubles, dangerous possibilities. Across the expanse of desert, she saw the cloud cover opening up more, and a silver-sprinkling of stars against the deep indigo of the sky.
It occurred to her that the women in the back might take the four she-apostles and run off with them, might even go out in the night looking for Dixie Lou Jackson and the others. But she discounted the possibility. She had landed at least ten kilometers from Dixie Lou’s camp, and anyone on foot could get lost out there. At the minimum, she had until dawn to get a few hours of rest.
Through the windshield, she watched flashes of lightning illuminating desert escarpments for brief moments before flickering out like wicks, and saw the sliver of moon slipping below the horizon. She heard the wind picking up around the helicopter and the solid pelting of tiny, granular pieces of silica against the outside of the aircraft, as the break in the weather proved short-lived.
The fresh memory of automatic weapons fire returned, and of the tiny she-apostle Candace seeming to shift time around her . . . and avoiding certain death. Lori had so many questions about the she-apostles, and no answers.
She dozed off, and when she awoke the storm had subsided. Lori opened a small side window to allow fresh air into the cockpit, and then drifted off to sleep again. Several times, she awoke, and then slipped back into slumber.
In a dream, Lori saw flickering lights approaching on the desert, and soon realized they were lanterns, carried by people in dark robes. A woman called out from their midst, but in a language Lori didn’t understand, a tongue that rolled and flowed, like water streaming across the sands.
Lori counted six robed shapes, each with a lantern. As they drew close she saw dark skin and mysterious, glinting eyes beneath overhanging hoods. All appeared to be women. They continued to approach. In their unknown tribal language they spoke rapidly. Were they Arabs, or perhaps Berbers?
In the foreground, a toddler stood on the sand, looking at them.
With a start, Lori realized it was not a dream and she had been peering through the windshield of the helicopter. People really were standing out there, a group of women talking to one of the she-apostles, who stood by herself, with no attendant. Lori heard the women through the open side window, chattering rapidly in their language. She saw additional lanterns behind them, and the hulking shadows of camels.
Which child was it? In the low light of the lanterns, Lori saw red hair.
Mary Magdalene
. The toddler did not appear to be saying anything, and was just staring up at the hooded faces around her.
As Lori straightened in her seat, the women looked up at her and pointed. She also heard activity in the back of the helicopter, and voices back there.
Concerned for the safety of Mary Magdalene, Lori opened the cockpit emergency door, and was about to climb down onto the sand when she remembered the guns she had. After hesitating for a moment, she climbed down without the weapons.
“This is your child?” one of the women asked, in heavily accented English. She was quite large, the size of a big man. Her face was half in shadows, half in lantern light.
“I’m responsible for her,” Lori said, as she stepped onto the soft sand. Reaching down, she clasped one of the she-apostle’s hands, and felt a slight dizziness, which passed quickly.
“You are English?” the woman asked. She and her companions wore veils as well as hoods, but her veil was pulled to one side so that her face could be seen when the lights shifted. Lori heard the camels making noises in the background.
Lori nodded, thinking that they would not know the difference between the British and the Americans. After decades of terrorism, it was not always wise to admit that you were an American. “We had trouble in the storm and were forced to set down here.”
An odd sensation passed through the teenager, running from her hand holding little Mary up her arm. It made Lori feel a little light-headed, and something more that she could not quite identify.
“Your friends are setting up camp over there,” the woman said, pointing across the dark desert. “All of you seem to have experienced problems in the storm.”
Lori hesitated, then said, “They
aren’t
my friends.” This was not completely accurate since she did have at least one friend in their midst, Alex, and she cared about the welfare of the eight she-apostles in the group.
“They are your enemies?”
“Some of them are, very much so. It’s a very complicated story.”
“Life is like that, isn’t it?” the woman said, in her accented English. She held her lantern close to Lori’s face, looked into her eyes, and commented, “You carry truth in your face.”
“And you in yours,” Lori said, with a gentle smile. The woman appeared to be around thirty-five, with dark, sun-baked skin and glinting black eyes. Her face had a strength and hardness to it. Glancing around, Lori saw what she thought were the bulges of weapons beneath the robes of the group. She took a deep breath.
“I am a desert princess and these are my attendants,” the woman announced. She then said something to her companions in what Lori presumed to be Arabic, and they all laughed, which made Lori doubt if she really was a princess.
“Your life sounds very interesting,” Lori said.
She looked up at the portholes of the large helicopter, where dim lights were on inside and faces were pressed against the glass, peering out. She heard children crying. As Lori held little Mary’s hand a warm feeling ran through her and she felt comforted, that somehow the she-apostle was communicating with her.
“I’m sure your own story is much more interesting,” the Arab woman said, “but I will not ask you to talk about it if you don’t want to. We only wish to be of assistance to you in your time of need.”
“Thank you,” Lori said, “but I don’t know what you could possibly do. Our pilot is going to work on the engines when it is daylight, and as for my enemies, I’m afraid that is my problem.”
The woman narrowed her eyes. “There might be something I could do, if we are friends. I am called Malia Ali Khan.”
Lori considered not providing her own real name, but a small interior voice told her to take a chance—and she gave it to her, including her surname.
“Very nice to meet you.” Malia smiled broadly, revealing dark gaps in her teeth. She looked down. “And your young companion. What is your name, little one?”
When the child did not answer, Lori said, “Mary.”
“And you are not old enough to be her mother.”
“You’re right. She is not my child.”
“Jesus Christ’s mother was named Mary,” Malia said, a somewhat surprising comment. “I know something of your religion, because in Islam we respect your holy teachings.” She paused. “You are a Christian?”
“Not a very good one, I’m afraid.”
The robed woman leaned down to touch Mary’s face, then straightened and said to Lori, “Now that we are friends, I shall attack your enemies and kill them. We have many weapons, even machine guns.”
“They have more firepower than you do in those helicopters.” She nodded toward the aircraft. “Like this one. Besides, they have eight small children with them, and I don’t want them hurt.”
Malia nodded. “Very well, but I can still create a diversion for you, to give you time to get away. Would you like that?”
“Maybe. What do you have in mind?”
“We will offer them the hospitality of our village, and a very long meal. Perhaps in that time, you can get your repairs completed and leave.”
“Be very careful with the one called Dixie Lou Jackson. She is extremely dangerous.”
“But Allah is with us. And with you, too, as our special friend. There is only so much we can do in the form of a diversion, however. Perhaps only a few hours of keeping them busy, so you must hurry and get away from here.”
“Thank you. That will be a big help.”
Though she didn’t say so because she didn’t want to offend the woman, Lori wished she could fly as far away from here as she could get, with the four toddler she-apostles that she had in her care, Mary Magdalene, Veronica, Priscilla, and Sarah. It was dangerous to remain here, where Dixie Lou might find her. The other three aircraft had set down only a few kilometers away. But she couldn’t leave, not until the pilot fixed the engines, if that was even possible.
In addition, Lori had a peculiar feeling that she should remain, that she should not abandon the other eight she-apostles. The sensation confounded her, and she had difficulty imagining how to rescue them. She would have to sneak into Dixie Lou’s camp, find the children and get them out—basically by herself.
She did have a potential ally in Fujiko Harui, but she wasn’t certain she could rely on her yet. Especially not for something so critically important. Dixie Lou still had leverage on Fujiko, since she held her daughter Siana as captive, in punishment for the young woman’s participation in the attempted rescue of the she apostles. But that could go both ways, could cause Fujiko to seek vengeance against the Chairwoman.
“Please, let us pay you for your help,” Lori said. “You are going to a lot of trouble for us.”
“We do not accept payment from honored friends—such as yourself. No, there will be no charge.”
Malia means well
, Lori thought, as the Arabs departed into the night with lanterns bobbing in the darkness, and boarded their camels.
But she will have her hands full trying to deceive Dixie Lou.
Lori climbed back up to the cockpit, taking the silent, mysterious toddler with her.
Chapter 4
The sins within her skirts are many; her garments are the murk of twilight, her adornments are tainted with corruption.
—Manuscript from the fourth cave, Dead Sea Scrolls
Shortly before dawn, after only a few hours of fitful rest while waiting for the storm to pass, Dixie Lou activated a hatch door. It opened with a whir and a squeal, and she left the cramped quarters, descending a metal stairway to the sand. The wind blew the back of her braided hair behind her. She wore a dun-colored robe.
Following her instructions, everyone in the party met with her between the aircraft, which had been protected after they landed with chameleon camouflage, an electronic “fabric” that the pilots said utilized pulse-signals to match the nearby landscape. The ships on the ground were now invisible from the air, they said.
In the illumination of portable lamps, she met the gaze of her son Alex, who stood with matrons, translators, and councilwomen, some of whom held the eight she-apostles who remained with her. She corrected herself. In reality, it was only seven, since Martha was secretly a fake. “After we set up camp,” Dixie Lou said, “I’m sending out search parties, to see if we can find the missing helicopter.”
It irked her that four of the real she-apostles were missing, along with Lori Vale, Fujiko Harui, and Wendy Zepeda. She didn’t care that much about the teenager or the little Japanese woman—the latter of whom reminded her too much of the late UWW leader Amy Angkor-Billings—but Wendy was one of her most staunch allies. Dixie Lou hoped that she and the she-apostles were safe. The lives of the children only mattered to her for what they could do for the UWW, and especially for her as Chairwoman. They were more useful alive than dead, but if they were dead, she would make the appropriate arrangements. It meant that she would have to come up with four more fake she-apostles. Things would be more complicated, but she had learned with the bogus Martha that it could be done.
From compartments in the hulls, the pilots brought out survival packs, containing tents and other articles. “Press these buttons,” one of the pilots said. This was done, and the habitats snapped together quickly in a space between the camouflaged aircraft, with alloy rods extending and clipping into frames, and sheets of weathercloth fitting and sealing over them. Dixie Lou watched as the other women put the she-apostles inside one tent. Some of the children fussed and cried, and were tended to by their handlers.
The tents were tied into the electronic camouflage system, and within moments she saw the fabric shifting in color, taking on the hues and subtle tones of the desert. It was only when close to them that she could make out the outlines of the enclosures. . . .
* * *
While helping make camp, Alex Jackson saw the approach of flickering lights . . . lanterns, he decided. He made out the shapes of robed figures on camels. At Dixie Lou’s command, her youthful guards pointed semiautomatic rifles at them. Safeties clicked off.
“Stay away from us!” Dixie Lou shouted.
A woman shouted back, in what could be Arabic.
“We don’t understand,” Dixie Lou said, impatiently. “Don’t any of you speak English? Get out of here!” She pulled a handgun from her robe, and fired a shot in the air.
They started backing the camels up.
Apparently it wasn’t quickly enough, because Dixie Lou fired a clip full of wild shots in their direction.
The camels galloped away with their riders, disappearing into the night. Someone dropped a lantern, which Alex retrieved. It was still burning.
“You didn’t need to shoot,” Deborah Marvel said. They weren’t threatening us.”
“How do we know?” Dixie Lou shrilled. “They probably speak English, and understood everything I was saying. Maybe more of them were waiting in the darkness, where we couldn’t see them.”
“We can’t suspect everybody,” Deborah insisted. “They’re just poor Arabs—probably wanted to help us.”
“They can help by staying the hell out of our way,” Dixie Lou snarled. She reloaded the gun, replaced it in her pocket.
Suddenly a heavily accented female voice broke the darkness of the night, speaking English: “You aren’t a very good shot.”
“I wasn’t trying to hit you,” Dixie Lou countered. She looked around warily, reached into her pocket but didn’t bring out the weapon. “Who are you?”
“We have guns, too,” the voice said, “and we outnumber you.” A volley of shots rang out, and Alex dove for cover along with everyone else. The camp lights were turned off, and people found cover. Children cried.
“Hiding will do no good,” the voice said. “We see in the dark.”
“Then why are your people carrying lanterns?” Dixie Lou shouted back.
The voice laughed, and to Alex it seemed to come from a different direction this time. He heard Deborah Marvel and one of the pilots talking about the possibility of getting into one of the helicopters, in order to gain access to its .50 caliber machine guns and floodlights.
“That is a good question,” the thickly accented voice shouted. “You have a quick wit.”
“Perhaps we made a mistake,” Dixie Lou said. “We didn’t understand that you only want to be friendly. That is true, isn’t it?”
“We desire only to offer assistance to you, in case any of you might be injured. We saw your aircraft having trouble as you came down. It is difficult to fly in a storm.”
“I’m sorry for the misunderstanding.”
“Some of your people wear strange robes,” the voice said. “Very unsuitable for the desert, even at this time of year. Too heavy.”
“Why don’t you come out where we can see you?” Dixie Lou demanded. Alex heard her crawling along the sand.
“Why do you come here wearing strange robes?” the voice asked. “What tribe are you?”
“No tribe, and we didn’t intend to land here. The storm forced us down.”
“But the storm is past, and it would be safe to fly away now. Your behavior is most peculiar.”
“We’re not quite ready to go.” Dixie Lou looked around, trying to find the speaker’s location.
“Problems with your sophisticated equipment?”
“Just need to check the flight systems for safety.”
“And the reason you have camouflaged everything, making you invisible from a distance? We watched you land, and saw you vanish a short time afterward—until we approached to within a few meters, close enough to see that you were still there. Are you hiding from someone?”
“Of course not. Camouflage is just a secondary feature of the electronic veiling system we activated around the aircraft, to protect them from bad weather, because windblown sand can cause a lot of damage. As for the camouflaged tents, they are tied into the system, too.”
“I see,” the woman said, but Alex wasn’t certain if she believed his mother, whose lie about weather protection seemed obvious. But only to a westerner, perhaps, he told himself. This Arab might not be able to tell.
Alex approached the she-apostles’ tent, wanting to comfort the children inside, who were fussing and crying. Through the open doorway he saw the shadowy outlines of small shapes lying and sitting in air-cribs. Suddenly a guard stepped forward, and forced him away. Alex moved off to one side, but the guard didn’t leave.
“You have many children here,” the Arab voice said, out in the darkness. “We do not wish to harm them.”
“Come out where I can see you,” Dixie Lou said. “We’ll talk.”
Alex heard a flurry of movement behind Dixie Lou, and a muffled voice said, “We’re right behind you.” A lantern went on, and Alex saw three intruders behind his mother.
Dixie Lou whirled, but before she could get to her weapon, a robed woman put her in a headlock and jammed a knife against her throat. A veil covered the lower portion of the woman’s face, revealing only her eyes. Two smaller, hooded shapes stood with her. They lit another lantern, which showed that they were boys holding carbines.
“Permit me to introduce myself,” the woman said. “I am Malia Ali Khan. And you?”
Dixie Lou didn’t respond.
“Tell your guards to toss their weapons on the ground,” Malia said, in her heavily accented English. She was much taller than Dixie Lou.
“Do it!” the Chairwoman shouted. In the dim light, Alex saw rage and indignation on her face.
Guns and rifles thudded onto the sand.
“And the one in your pocket,” the tall woman demanded.
Dixie Lou added it to the others, and the knife was withdrawn from her throat.
“My English is not so good,” Malia said. “But I suspect it is better than your Arabic. We are Bedouin, from a village just over there.” She pointed across the sand.
Alex saw Dixie Lou staring at the weapons on the sand, and guessed she was trying to estimate how many more people were hiding in the shadows, behind waves in the sand. The boys had an air of deadly maturity about them, as if they knew how to handle the rifles they held.
“Do any of you have injuries?” the Arab woman asked.
“A few bumps and bruises,” Dixie Lou snapped, glaring at her. “We’ve administered first aid.”
Malia looked up at the pre-dawn sky. Then, lifting a finger to feel a slight breeze, she said, “By the grace of Allah, the storm is passed. You are safe now.”
Dixie Lou didn’t respond.
“We would like to offer you the hospitality of our village,” Malia said.
Studying her armed visitor, Dixie Lou responded, “Your generosity is much appreciated, but we really don’t have time.” But Alex heard something in his mother’s tone, a forced politeness and formality.
“You must make the time. Hospitality is the way of our people.”
“How large is your village?” Dixie Lou asked.
“We’ll take you there by camel, and you can see for yourself.” She pointed. “It is that way, a few kilometers.”
“By
camel
? We don’t know how to ride camels, and we have small children with us.”
“These are not problems. We have the means to accommodate passengers of all ages. Or, the children can remain here while we show you around the village and give you a fine Bedouin meal.”
“Do you have computers or videophones in the village?” Dixie Lou asked.
“You need them for some purpose?”
“To make an Internet connection.”
“You westerners are very amusing to us.” She stood there smiling, then said something in Arabic to her young companions. The pair nodded.
“We will be back this afternoon,” Malia said.
“You have Internet?” Dixie Lou pressed.
“Perhaps. We shall discuss it this afternoon.”
“All right.”
“It is late now, and you will want to sleep in, as you say.” She slid her veil aside and smiled, revealing black gaps where teeth were missing. “An English woman used to live in our camp, and she taught me many of your phrases.”
With a smooth motion, Malia whirled and flowed off into the cool shadows, followed by her youthful armed escort. The lanterns went out, and in the minimal light of approaching dawn, Alex saw the movement of many human shapes, boarding camels and riding away.
* * *
“Seven ball in the side pocket,” Zack Markwether announced, confidently. In his brother’s private game room at the White House, they were spending the evening together, after a long day. Zack leaned over the green felt table, lining up his shot with the cue stick. His officer’s coat and white gloves were draped over a chair, and a pair of aviator sunglasses sat open on a ledge. The walls were lined with photographs and paintings of foreign dignitaries who had visited the White House in years past—kings, queens, princes and princesses, prime ministers, premiers, presidents, shahs, dictators, ambassadors. . . .
“You don’t need to call your shots,” the President groused. “Just shoot the stupid ball, OK?”
With a self-satisfied smile, Zack snicked the purple seven ball into the designated pocket.
Chalking his own stick, the President said, “Incidentally, you need to stay away from the White House interns, Brother. I’m getting complaints.”
Calmly, Zack walked over to a side table, took a sip from a bottle of imported German beer. “You’re just trying to break my concentration. Actually, I’m only dating one of the interns, and she’s not even one of the youngsters I’m rumored to be with. She’s almost thirty.”
“Just be careful not to do anything to embarrass yourself, or me. I recall some stories about you in high school, back when I was a sophomore and you were a senior. Cheer leaders, weren’t they?”
With a broad grin, Zack said, “The old stories about me were all true. Nowadays, though, you shouldn’t believe everything you hear.”
“You gonna marry this one?”
He shook his head. “Not my style. Never has been.” He took another sip of beer. “Say, what about my letter to the Pope on Vatican security? Have you looked it over yet?”
“I’ll get around to it.”
Lowering his brow in displeasure, Zack said, “I didn’t do all that work for nothing, you know. Took me over a week in the Library of Congress and CIA Archives—researching old records that were never scanned for the Internet, either because they were quite old, or classified. In the Library of Congress I found information about an underground tunnel that connected Vatican City to the Castel Sant’Angelo, an impregnable fortress in Rome where popes took refuge during military attacks. Even the existence of that tunnel was a secret for centuries, though information on it eventually got out.”
He took a deep breath and continued. “But at the CIA I found more, descriptions of an even more secret, alternate tunnel system that also led from the holy city to the castle, developed because information about the main tunnel route had gotten into the wrong hands. The second route is more circuitous and longer, but the distance is still not that great, and it is a quick way to get from one place to the other undetected.”
“Interesting.”
“Obviously you didn’t read the research documents I provided to you.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“All right,” Zack said, “but those subterranean passageways worry me. “Maybe I should just send the letter to him directly, to make sure any tunnels are permanently blocked off, and can’t be reopened.”
“You could do that, but he might never see it. Some lower level functionary could just round file it. A letter from my office, on the other hand, would not be thrown in the trash.”