The Venetian Betrayal (53 page)

"Don't open your mouth again."

She inspected the spacious compartment, which usually accommodated a dozen armed men. Vincenti's computers and the two spare robots were lashed tight. Cassiopeia Vitt lay still on the ground and the prisoners were being guarded by the four soldiers.

Viktor stood outside the compartment.

"You've done well," she said to him. "Once I'm gone, detonate the house and kill all of these people. I'm trusting you to keep this location secure. I'll dispatch additional men when I return to Samarkand. This is now a Federation site."

She stared toward the mansion, its top floors fully ablaze. Soon, it would be nothing but rubble. She already envisioned the Asian palace she'd construct here. Whether Alexander's tomb would be revealed to the world remained to be seen. She needed to consider all the possibilities, and since she alone controlled its location, that decision would be hers.

She faced Viktor, stared hard into his eyes, and said, "Thank you, my friend." She saw the momentary shock on his face as her words of appreciation registered. "No, I don't ever say it. I expect you to do your job. But, here, you did exceptionally well."

She took one last look at Cassiopeia Vitt, Stephanie Nelle, and Henrik Thorvaldsen. Problems that would soon be a thing of the past. Cotton Malone and Ely Lund were still in the house. If not already dead, they would be in a few minutes.

"I'll see you at the palace," she said to Viktor, as the compartment door slid shut.

VIKTOR LISTENED AS THE TURBINE FIRED AND THE CHOPPER blades twirled. The engine revved to full power. Dust swirled from the dry earth and the helicopter rose into the late-afternoon sky.

He quickly moved toward his men and ordered two of them to head for the estate's main gate and control ingress. He told the final two to keep watch over Nelle and Thorvaldsen.

He stepped over to Cassiopeia. Vitt's face was bruised, her nose bloodied. Sweat streamed down leaving furrows of grime.

Her eyes flashed opened and she clamped hard onto his arm.

"Come to finish?" she asked.

His left hand held a pistol, his right hand the controller for the turtles. He calmly laid the signaling device on the ground beside her. "That's exactly what I came to do."

The helicopter with Zovastina leveled off overhead and headed east, back toward the house and the valley beyond.

"While you fought her," he told Vitt, "I activated the turtles inside the chopper. They're now programmed to detonate when the ones inside the house are told to explode." He motioned. "That controller will make that happen."

She scooped it from the ground.

But he quickly brought his gun to her head. "Careful."

CASSIOPEIA GLARED AT VIKTOR, HER FINGER ON THE CONTROLLER button. Could she push it before he shot her? Perhaps he was wondering the same thing?

"You need to choose," he said. "Your Ely and Malone may still be in the house. Killing Zovastina could also kill them."

She had to trust that Malone had the situation in hand. But she also realized something else. "How could anyone possibly know when to trust you? You've played every side."

"My job was to end this. That's what we're about to do."

"Killing Zovastina might not be the answer."

"It's the only answer. She won't stop otherwise."

She considered his statement. He was right.

"I was going to do it myself," he said. "But I thought you'd like the honor."

"The gun in my face for show?" she quietly asked.

"The guards can't see your hand."

"How do I know, when I do this, you won't shoot me in the face."

He answered her honestly. "You don't."

The chopper was beyond the house, out over the grassy meadow, maybe a thousand feet high.

"If you wait any longer," he said. "The signal will not reach."

She shrugged. "Never thought I'd make old age anyway."

And she pressed the button.

STEPHANIE WATCHED FROM THIRTY FEET AWAY AS VIKTOR AIMED his gun at Cassiopeia. She'd seen him lay something on the ground, but Cassiopeia faced away and it was impossible to know what was happening.

The helicopter became a flying fireball.

No explosion. Just brilliant light erupting from all sides, like a supernova, its volatile fuel quickly joining the melange in a destruction that thundered across the valley. Flaming chunks of debris propelled outward, then rained down in a fiery cascade. At the same instant, windows on the mansion's ground floor shattered outward, the frames filled with a raging blaze.

Cassiopeia rose, with Viktor's aid.

"Seems he is a help," Thorvaldsen said, noticing, too.

Viktor pointed at the two guards and barked out orders in what she thought was Russian.

The men dashed away.

Cassiopeia fled toward the house.

They followed.

MALONE TOPPED THE STAIRS BEHIND ELY AND REENTERED THE library. Thumps echoed from somewhere inside the house and he immediately noticed a change in temperature.

"Those things have been activated."

Outside the library door fire sprang to life. More thumps. Closer. Plenty of heat. Building. He bolted to the door and glanced both ways. The corridor at each end was impassable, flames were consuming the floor and headed his way. He recalled what Ely had said. I have that stuff all over me. He turned and studied the towering windows. Maybe ten feet by eight feet. Beyond, in the valley, he noticed something burning in the distance. There would only be a few more seconds before the fire arrived.

"Give me a hand."

He saw Ely stuff the flash drive into his pocket and grab one end of a small settee. Malone grasped the other. Together they tossed it through the windows. Glass shattered as the sofa propelled outward, clearing a path, but too many shards remained for them to leap through.

"Use the chairs," he yelled.

Fire wrapped itself inside the doorway and started its assault of the library walls. Books and shelves erupted. Malone gripped a chair and rammed it through what remained of the window. Ely used another chair to scrape away jagged remnants.

The floor started to burn.

Everything basted with Greek fire quickly identified itself.

No more time.

They both leaped through the window.

CASSIOPEIA HEARD GLASS BREAK AS SHE, VIKTOR, THORVALDSEN, and Stephanie ran closer to the destruction. She saw a settee fly out and crash to the ground. She'd taken a chance killing Zovastina, with Malone and Ely still inside, but, like Malone would say, Whether right or wrong, just do something.

Another chair flew out the window.

Then Malone and Ely leaped out as the room behind them filled with waves of bright orange.

Malone's exit was not as graceful as it had been in Copenhagen. His right shoulder slammed to the grass and he tumbled. Ely, too, hit hard, rolled a few times, his arms shielding his head.

Cassiopeia ran to them. Ely stared up at her. She smiled and said, "You having fun?"

"About like you? What happened to your face?"

"Got the crap beat out of me. But I had the last laugh."

She helped him to his feet and they hugged.

"You stink," she noted.

"Greek fire. The latest fragrance."

"What about me?" Malone grunted, as he stood and brushed himself off. "No 'how are you?' Good to see that you're not a crispy critter?"

She shook her head and hugged him, too.

"How many buses ran you over?" Malone asked, noticing her face.

"Just one."

"You two know each other?" Ely asked.

"We're acquainted."

She saw Malone's face sour as he spotted Viktor. "What's he doing here?"

"Believe it or not," she said, "he's on our side. I think."

Stephanie pointed to fires in the distance and men running toward them. "Zovastina's dead."

"Terrible thing," Viktor said. "Tragic helicopter crash. Witnessed by four of her militia. She'll be given a glorious funeral."

"And Daniels will have to make sure that the next Supreme Minister of the Central Asian Federation is more friendly," Stephanie said.

Cassiopeia spotted dots in the western sky growing larger. "We've got company."

They watched as the aircraft drew closer.

"They're ours," Malone said. "Apache AH64s and a Blackhawk."

The American gunships swooped in. One of the Apache's compartment doors swung open and Malone spotted a familiar face.

Edwin Davis.

"Troops from Afghanistan," Viktor said. "Davis told me they'd be nearby, monitoring things, ready when needed."

"You know," Stephanie said to them. "Killing Zovastina that way may not have been smart."

Cassiopeia sensed the resignation in her friend's tone. "What is it?"

Thorvaldsen stepped forward. "Vincenti's computers and Lyndsey were on that chopper. You don't know this, but Vincenti found the cure for AIDS. He and Lyndsey developed it, and all of the data was on those computers. There was a flash drive, which Vincenti had when he died. But, unfortunately"--the Dane motioned to the burning house--"that's surely gone."

Cassiopeia saw a wicked look form on Malone's dirty face. She also noticed Ely smiling. Both men looked exhausted, but their feeling of triumph seemed infectious.

Ely reached into his pocket and held out his open palm.

A flash drive.

"What's that?" she asked, hoping.

"Life," Malone said.

Chapter
NINETY-FOUR

MALONE ADMIRED ALEXANDER THE GREAT'S TOMB. AFTER EDWIN Davis arrived, an army special forces unit had quickly taken control of the estate, disarming the four remaining troops without a fight. President Daniels authorized the incursion, Davis saying he doubted there'd be any official resistance from the Federation.

Zovastina was dead. A new day was coming.

Once the estate was secure, as darkness began to claim the mountains, they'd all climbed to the pools and dove into the tawny eye. Even Thorvaldsen, who wanted desperately to see the grave. Malone had helped him through the tunnel and the Dane, for his age and deformity, was a surprisingly strong swimmer.

They brought flashlights and additional lights from the Apaches, the tomb now ablaze with electric illumination. He stared in wonder at a wall of glazed bricks, their blues, yellows, oranges, and blacks still vibrant after two millennia.

Ely was examining three lion motifs formed with great skill from the colorful tiles. "Something similar to this lined the ancient Babylon's processional way. We have remnants. But here's one totally intact."

Edwin Davis had swum through with them. He, too, had wanted to see what Zovastina had coveted. Malone felt better knowing that the other side of the pool was being guarded by a team operations sergeant and three U
. S
. Army soldiers armed with M-4 carbines. He and Stephanie had briefed Davis on what happened and he was beginning to warm to the deputy national security adviser, especially after he'd anticipated their need for backup and had been ready to move.

Ely stood beside the two sarcophagi. On the side of one was chiseled a single word. . More letters adorned its other side.

"This one is Alexander's," Ely said. "The longer inscription is from the Iliad. Always to be the best and to be superior to the rest. Homer's expression of the heroic ideal. Alexander would have lived by that. Zovastina loved that quote, too. She used it many times. The people who put him here chose his epitaph well."

Ely motioned to the other coffin, its inscription simpler.

"'Hephaestion. Friend of Alexander.' Lover did not do justice to their relationship. To be called 'friend' was the supreme compliment of a Greek, reserved for only the most dear."

Malone noticed how dust and debris had been cleared from the image of a horse on Alexander's coffin.

"Zovastina did that when she and I were here," Viktor said. "She was mesmerized by the image."

"It's Bucephalas," Ely said. "Has to be. Alexander's horse. He worshipped the animal. The horse died during the Asian campaign and was buried somewhere in the mountains, not far from here."

"Zovastina named her favorite horse that, too," Viktor noted.

Malone scanned the room. Ely pointed out ritual buckets, a silver perfume container, a drinking horn shaped as a deer's head, even gilded bronze greaves with bits of leather still remaining that once protected a warrior's calves. "It's breathtaking," Stephanie said.

He agreed.

Cassiopeia stood near one of the coffins, its lid slid open.

"Zovastina snuck a look," Viktor said.

Their lights shone inside at a mummy.

"Unusual that it's not in a cartonnage," Ely said. "But they may not have had the skill or time to make one."

Gold sheets covered the body from neck to feet, each the size of a sheet of paper, more lay scattered inside the coffin. The right arm was bent at the elbow and lay across the abdomen. The left arm stretched straight, the forearm detached from the upper. Bandages wrapped most of the corpse in a tight embrace and on the partially exposed chest lay three gold disks.