The Ice Curtain (31 page)

The engines were thundering, their blast blew the smoke from the rocketed jeep away in a hurricane of heat. Yuri yanked the stiff nylon rope he'd tied to the steel chock. The Yak needed no more encouragement. The jet started to roll.

“Get us out there!” Kirillin shouted. He threw the glasses down and snatched the radio. “Mobile Two! Intruders on the runway! Stop them!” He yanked the Kalashnikov out of its rack.

Stepanov jammed his boot down on the gas pedal. The tires slipped, skidded, then caught. The Volga shot ahead.

The men of Mobile Two had seen white-clad men top the mound of plowed snow on the far side of the runway. They'd seen one of them dive under the nose of the Yak. Given another half second they might have been able to bring them under fire. But in that half second, Mobile One vanished, and now they had more important things to consider.

Automatic weapons fire erupted. Bullets spatted angrily against their jeep's thin sides. Short rounds burrowed into the snowbank. The air was filled with invisible droplets of death. They did what anyone would do given the circumstances. They dove and rolled down the far side of the bank, then crawled away as fast as their knees and elbows would take them.

The jet was rolling, faster, faster. The airspeed indicator came awake. Close to flying speed. The pilot was leaving whatever had blown up behind. He pressed the transmit button on his yoke. “Mirny Control, this is Kristall Six! What's going on?”

But there was no one able to tell him. At least, not before he heard a shout from the rear cabin, followed by the hammering staccato of an assault rifle firing on full automatic.

The militiamen of Mobile Two cautiously poked their heads up above the snowbank. The shooting had stopped. The Yak was hurtling down the runway, dragging its tail ramp, trailing a stream of sparks.

Kirillin was screaming over the radio:
“Shoot! Shoot them!”

Yes, but who were they supposed to shoot?

The Yak roared by, accelerating.

General Stepanov's black Volga fell in behind. Kirillin was leaning out the window with a rifle in his hands. It was a race, and the car was swiftly losing ground.

Yuri was only halfway up the ramp. It was grinding itself into oblivion as the speeding jet dragged it across the runway.

“Let's go, boss!” shouted Mahmet.

Yuri reached up to grab Mahmet's hand when, with a sharp
pop,
a ragged hole appeared next to his head. Then another. He crouched down and looked back. A series of white puffs erupted from the side of a black Volga that was chasing them. He felt something cold and wet flood over his face. He screamed. He'd been shot.

“Boss!” Mahmet tried to grab Yuri's arm but his hand slipped. The Chechen took hold of the collar of his white snowsuit and hauled Yuri up the ramp like a freshly caught fish.

The jet's nose wheel broke ground, and the world tilted. He slid back down toward the open ramp. Something stopped him. A foot, clad in a paper slipper. He looked up. It was Nowek.

Kirillin shifted his fire to the engines, aiming into their hot exhausts.

“They're taking off!” Stepanov shouted.

With our diamonds.
Kirillin couldn't stop them from taking off. But he might be able to keep them from getting very far. He pulled the old clip out and rammed a fresh one in.

He swung the black snout of his Kalashnikov to the wings and emptied the whole clip into the fuel tanks. Kerosene billowed out in a white mist. Oily drops spattered the Volga's windshield.

Yuri was thrashing around as though he'd been riddled with bullets. Chuchin didn't know what he was screaming about. There was no blood
he
could see, just a lot of jet fuel covering his oversuit. Chuchin tried to get around him to pull the lanyard and close the ramp, but Yuri kept rolling in the way. He reared back and kicked him, hard. Yuri was on his feet in a flash, fists balled and furious.

Chuchin shoved him back against a metal box attached to the cabin wall. It was hinged, and now it flapped open. An emergency kit, filled with bandages, ointments, aspirin. Three red cylinders fell out with the rest.

Flares. He scooped one of them up and slid down the oily ramp to the bottom step. The concrete below was falling away fast. As the wings took hold, he twisted the cap and tossed it out.

It struck the concrete once, bounced, tumbled, then vanished behind.

The flare erupted with a hard, brilliant light. General Stepanov saw it through the oily windshield as a glowing cloud that flashed bright, then brighter.

The air reeked of raw fuel. Kirillin was slick with a kerosene glaze. He watched the flare bounce up, then tip. “Turn left!”

General Stepanov swung the wheel. The front wheels moved, but nothing happened. They were skidding down the runway on an oil slick.

The flare was no longer a point of light, but a red-hot sphere.

“Left! Turn left now!”

Stepanov jammed his boot on the brake pedal. The Volga swerved sideways until Kirillin's open window faced dead ahead.

The alchemy of fire is surprisingly picky. Too much air and nothing happens, too much fuel and nothing happens. But in the invisible world where molecules meet, there is a favored place, a precise point, where very big things happen.

The flare burst through Kirillin's open window and struck him in the chest. It blossomed into something he could no longer explain. Something like pure light.

Mahmet disarmed the militia sergeant and found the keys to Nowek's cuffs. Freed, Nowek kicked off the paper slippers and yanked open the curtain to the main cabin.

Hock sat in the gray leather chair. He'd swiveled it around to face backward, and had his hands in plain view. He beckoned Nowek to come, as though he were intruding on a busy schedule.

Nowek looked for Larisa. He saw her on the deck at Hock's feet, covering Liza with her body. She raised her head and looked at him, but nothing, not surprise, not even recognition, registered. Her eyes were like those of the birds in Kristall's book. They might have been made of glass.

Yuri and Mahmet continued up to the cockpit. Nowek and Chuchin stopped in front of Hock. Chuchin had the big Nagant pointed at the South African's chest.

“You know,” said Hock. “None of this was necessary. We could have reached an understanding. Maybe we still can.”

“You're too late. Volsky only wanted money for the miners,” said Nowek, feeling something inside him give way and break like a dam releasing a raging, unstoppable flood. It ran beyond reason, beyond anything. “I want more.”

“What, justice?” said Hock with infuriating calm. “In
Russia
? You're too intelligent for fairy tales. You know everything is for sale here. Everything is up for negotiation. Even now.”

“Mister Mayor,” said Chuchin. “Let's throw this fat bastard out of the plane and let him negotiate
that
.”

“It wouldn't change a thing,” said Hock.

“It would change
you,
” said Chuchin.

“You're wrong, Hock,” Nowek said. “Something big has changed. The diamonds were going to London. Now they're not.”

“Perhaps not right away,” Hock allowed. “But unless you plan to eat them, they're going to be sold. When they are, they'll go to the highest bidder.
We
are
always
the highest bidder.”

“Petrov didn't think so.”

“Petrov was a fool. He thought he could play around us by sending stones to Golden Autumn.” Hock smiled. “Well, what did he accomplish? Golden Autumn sold the stones to
us
and kept the money for themselves. Not one
ruble
came back to Russia or to Petrov.
That's
what he accomplished. Then your President pledged those diamonds to the IMF, and Petrov knew they weren't there. Neither was the money. He was about to run for some nice, warm island when your friend Volsky showed up. Really, who could turn his back on a gift like
that
?”

“What is he talking about?” Chuchin said with an impatient wave of the Nagant.

“Petrov had Volsky murdered?”

“Who else?” said Hock. “It wasn't difficult. Petrov has a lot of friends. More than you. But let's talk about you. The diamond world's a circle. The only meaningful question is, are you in or out? Like Volsky, you're in way over your head. Like him, you're in trouble. You can still do something about it.”

“
Fuck
him.” Chuchin held the Nagant out to Nowek. “Give him nine grams of trouble. It's already more than he's worth.”

Nowek's blood answered
yes, yes, yes
! What could be more satisfying than to see Hock's smile fade at the
click
of the Nagant's trigger? It took all his will, all his resolve, to push the revolver away. “There's one thing you've overlooked,” he said to Hock. “Volsky had demands. I have the diamonds.”

“But not nearly enough of them,” said Hock. “That might be important in a few weeks. How will you fix
that,
Delegate Nowek? Frankly speaking, I'm your only hope. You may want to keep that in mind.”

“I know where to find more. Enough for the IMF. Enough to break your cartel.”

“I wouldn't count on things that are out of your control.”

“We'll see what happens when Mirny Deep goes into full production. When diamonds become cheaper than eggs. We'll see what the cartel finds more valuable. You, or the richest diamond mine on earth.” Nowek turned. “Chuchin? Take him back. Use the cuffs and make sure he doesn't fall out of the plane unless it's
absolutely
necessary.”

Chuchin prodded Hock to his feet with the barrel. “There's a Russian card game,” he said as he herded Hock back to the tail of the plane. “It's called
Durak
.
The Fool.
I think you'll like it.”

Nowek looked down at Larisa.

“Gregori,” she said, “I know about the—”

“No,” he said to her. “Don't talk. Listen.”

When he was finished, she said, “Are you sure? You could come with us. We could—”

“No,” said Nowek. “Hope is your diamond, Larisa. Not mine.”

Yuri opened the cockpit door with Mahmet beside him. He took in the instruments, the fact that they were making wide circles over Mirny airport, that down below a fire was sending greasy smoke into the air from the middle of the runway.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” he said to the two pilots.

The captain said, “Are you the leader of this gang? Before you make demands you should know there's not much fuel.”

Yuri glanced at the gauges. One of the slipper tanks had leaked dry. How big a hole could drain that thing so fast?

“Let's be serious,” said the captain. “We're going to land.”

Yuri peered down through the window. “I don't think so.”

“
You
don't think so?
We're
the pilots.”

“Pilots,” Yuri said with a snort. He reached up to the overhead panel. “What's this?” There were three red levers. The fire handles that would shut down the fuel to each of the engines. He picked the middle one.

“Get your hands away from that!”

Red flashing lights erupted as the center engine, the one mounted in the tail, starved for fuel and sputtered out.

“Are you trying to commit suicide?”

“We're all breathing. We're still flying.” And they weren't using so much fuel. Yuri turned. “Mahmet? Take them back.”

“Stand up,” Mahmet ordered. “Both of you. Move.”

The captain stiffened. “You won't fly a jet with a rifle!”

“Are you afraid to die?” asked Mahmet.

“Absolutely!” the captain said with a vigorous nod.

“Then you better start walking.”

The pilots exchanged looks of perfect terror. They unbuckled their seat belts and slowly got up.

Yuri saw the captain casually let his finger brush against the autopilot switch, triggering the wing leveler. The Yak immediately stopped its gentle turn. “What's the big deal? It's just like a car, except that it flies.” Yuri settled into the left seat and clicked the wing leveler off. He grabbed the yoke. “You steer with this, right?”

“
Don't!
That's the—”

Yuri threw it hard over. The wings dipped, the horizon tilted crazily across the windshield.

Yuri smiled. “See? Just like a car. It's only a matter of—”

“Boss!” Mahmet's eyes were wide. He was looking straight down the wing at the ground below.

An enormous yellow cloud had erupted from the top of the headworks tower over Mirny Deep. As Yuri watched, it grew, turned black. A sharp rumble shook the air. The ten-story tower began to shed its skin in giant panels. They fluttered away like petals, leaving only the tower's steel skeleton behind, engulfed in bright flame and dirty smoke.

“Tell Nowek to come up here,” said Yuri.

Mahmet let Nowek through the cockpit door. The view from the cockpit was panoramic. The destruction below, complete.

The entire tower was a naked chimney. A blast furnace.

Nowek thought of the fissures of the Ninth Horizon. The looted Closet that could be refilled with its treasure. Not now. Now the IMF would turn its back on Russia. Never mind the miners of Mirny. The banks would fail and the nation would shatter like an egg. Petrov might have murdered his friend, but the cartel had just put a torch to Russia. The cartel, and
Hock
. “Let's get out of here,” he said to Yuri.

Yuri leveled the wings and pointed the Yak south for Irkutsk. He pointed to the copilot's chair. “Have a seat, Delegate Nowek.”

Delegate? Fugitive Nowek was more like it. Nowek settled himself into the copilot's chair. The open, empty land scrolled beneath them, quilted in patches of white and green. It reminded Nowek of the flag of Siberia. The snow. The taiga forest, an ocean of trees, rolling unbroken as far as Nowek could see. “So White Bird flies to Mirny now?”