Vanguard (3 page)

Now she needed to save one life. Only one. Surely it wasn’t too much to ask.

“Sophie?” She looked up from her wool-gathering. Anjali and Will had packed up the leftovers. “Let us give you a ride home.”

“You can’t drive me to Brooklyn at this hour. Just take me to the train.” Like most New Yorkers, Sophie couldn’t afford to live in Manhattan, so she rented the upper floor of a ratty duplex in Brooklyn.

“You’re staying with us tonight,” Anjali said.

When Sophie started to protest, Will interrupted. “You can’t help him if you keel over from exhaustion before you get to Orlisia.”

She surrendered silently, following them out of the office and into their car.

“Did you have any luck at Interpol today?” asked Will.

“Not much. I got a few new things. Photocopy of Michael’s US passport. The number might come in handy in the future. Some interesting notes in his dossier. I dropped by to see Hallie at the Red Cross before I caught the train.”

“We’ll be there soon,” he said. “The Soviet government will grant us access any day now. If he’s in that camp, we’ll find him.”

Sophie caught his eye in the rearview mirror. “It’ll be at least another month, probably more with Christmas coming on,” she said bleakly. Will looked back at her, troubled. She was right, and he knew it.

She took the tiny guest room that had once been the den in her friends’ condo on the Upper West Side. She’d slept there many nights as of late and kept several changes of clothing in the cupboard. Sophie left Will and Anjali to enjoy a drink in the kitchen, took half a sleeping pill, and went to bed. Oblivion took her fast. She did not dream, for which she was grateful.

~~ - ~~

January 10, 2014

Friday flew, as always. She felt like she’d just sat down at her desk – a few stray Christmas cards gathering dust there – when Will appeared beside her, his face expressionless.

“Five o’clock already?” she mumbled. Sophie stuffed her laptop into her bag and walked to the door with him. Everyone in the office found other things to look at.

“Let’s have them.” He held out his hand, and she handed him her office keys and security card without a word. He put them into his pocket and hugged her like he always did every Friday. “Have a good weekend. We’ll see you Monday.” Then he gently pushed her out the door, his worried eyes never leaving hers as the elevator doors closed between them.

Will had put his foot down when he’d found her curled up asleep on the floor in the Situation Room one Monday morning, unwashed and wearing the same clothes she’d had on the previous Friday. Now, she couldn’t enter the office on weekends. She was allowed to take her laptop and iPhone home with her, but that was it.

As humiliating as the weekly ritual was, it turned out to be one of the best decisions Will could have made. In retrospect, Sophie realized she should have made it herself, if nothing else than to maintain one of her guiding principles:
Always be planning.

Sophie had learned this at the feet of a young development worker to whom she’d been assigned during a volunteer opportunity in China as a teenager. The woman’s name had been Kei-Yee, but Sophie had been startled to learn that the woman also had a Western name – Vivian – that she’d expected Sophie to use because it was easier to pronounce. Sophie had refused to call her anything except her Chinese name. Amused by her stubborn charge, Kei-Yee had relented, but hadn’t hesitated to turn it into a lesson on cultural sensitivity.

“Many Chinese professionals take Western names in addition to the names they were born with,” the woman had explained. “This is the way of business here. Always know the customs of the country you are entering. It creates an atmosphere of goodwill and respect from the start.”

Kei-Yee had shown her how to respond to floods and earthquakes, two of the most common disasters in China. Their refugee infrastructure was immense, designed to work with huge populations of displaced people. Sophie had learned more in that week with Kei-Yee than she had in two months in the classroom.

“Planning, you must always be planning, Sophie. One billion people – always plan. No disaster today, maybe one tomorrow. Plan.”

Kei-Yee had been right then, and she was right now. Sophie needed to be ready to go to Orlisia on a moment’s notice, personally as well as professionally. She put her weekends to good use.

Promptly at seven on Friday evening, her language teacher, Alex, knocked on the door of her apartment. Mugs of tea steamed on the table while they spent two hours in intensive Soviet study. Ninety minutes for language, thirty minutes on culture and social customs. Sophie’s Russian had slipped over the years, and she needed it in top form for this trip. Alex had immigrated to New York from the Soviet Republic just two years ago, and had brought with him an excellent understanding of its rapidly evolving society.

“Use the fact that you are a woman to your advantage,” he urged as they role-played. “Soviet society is historically patriarchal, of course, but there has been a dramatic culture shift in the last twenty years to improve women’s rights, among other things. We’ve had nothing less than a cultural revolution. My country has instituted and upheld strict laws against the abuse of women in all member nations – look at the success we’ve had in ending honor killings in our Muslim societies!”

“Should I be more feminine?” she asked. “Appear helpless?”

He shook his head, grinning. “No. Be more dominating.” Alex reached out to tip her pointed chin higher. “Deep inside, every Soviet solider holding an AK-47 is still afraid of his mama.”

~~ - ~~

Sophie rose at six on Saturday and spent two hours at the gym: one hour of cardio, one hour of weights. Then she meditated, no small task for someone as intense as she. But Anjali wouldn’t let her go into the field with sky-high blood pressure, and she had to find peace somehow.

She spent the afternoon running errands, then worked at home until midnight. As she did almost every night before she went to bed, Sophie picked up her phone, dialed Michael’s cell phone number, and listened to it ring.

“
This is Dr. Michael Nariovsky-Trent. I regret that I have missed you. Please leave a message, and I will return your call.”

His voice left a dull ache in her chest as she clambered into bed. A picture of the two of them sat on the bedside table, a snapshot from the year they’d spent together more than a decade ago. They were on the bus, sleeping. Sophie lay against Michael’s chest, his arm curved protectively around her. She looked at the picture, swallowed her sleeping pill, then turned out the light.

Michael’s voice followed her into her dreams.

Chapter 2

Eleven years earlier

Sophie had spent all of her seventeen years being exceptional. But today, she was just one of many. After this year, she’d be one of a handful of people on earth who could add three prestigious letters after her name.

GYL

Global Youth Leadership was the world’s most exclusive private education opportunity. Every year for the last thirty-four years, thousands of young adults around the world endured a grueling marathon of applications, interviews, and testing. Only fifty would be invited to travel the world for 365 days of hands-on learning on all seven continents.

Participants in GYL were chosen not just for intelligence, but for their interest and involvement in world issues, leadership skills, and cultural awareness. Every student traveled on full scholarship, funded by public, private, and corporate donors. The program had produced seven world leaders in its history (including one US president) as well as countless CEOs and a couple of Nobel Prize winners.

Like all GYL scholars, Sophie was extraordinarily intelligent. High school valedictorian, Honorary National Merit Scholar, National Honor Society member – there wasn’t an award out there she hadn’t earned. She was California’s star in language, international affairs, and world history. A thoughtful young woman with a stubborn will and the ability to see things in remarkable new ways.

But meeting forty-nine other GYL scholars, ranging in age from 17 to 25, all as exceptional as she, daunted her. She scrunched down in her seat in the lecture hall of GYL headquarters, letting her straight red hair fall around her face. Grey eyes, fair skin, freckles, and a nicely curved body. At seventeen, Sophie had been accepted to GYL at the youngest possible age.

A professor called the students to order and talked about their four weeks in New York. They would live in their designated quarters as part of the Columbia University campus in Morningside Heights, Manhattan. The university tolerated the annual influx of young overachievers; GYL brought recognition … and more than its fair share of exceptional applicants once the year was over.

This four-week period was the “nesting” phase during which the students would get to know one another, work with academic counselors, and establish goals for the year. They met the staff that would travel with them, then one by one, the students introduced themselves to their classmates.

“I’m Sophie Swenda from Chico, California,” she said when called upon. “I’m seventeen years old. I’m interested in developing world issues and crisis management. I plan to pursue a career in international development after I finish college.” She rattled out her many achievements, conferences she’d been invited to, events she’d participated in.

“I speak four languages fluently: English, Spanish, Russian.” Sophie paused, and saw the three Soviet students – two boys and a girl – look at her with sudden interest. “I also speak Orlisian.”

A murmur ran through the room, and something clattered to the floor several rows back. She knew it was unusual – and ironic – for a Westerner to speak the native languages of two faraway countries that hated one another so bitterly.

“I’ve studied Orlisian history from unification through the Soviet occupation and the country’s subsequent liberation. The language is essentially a Latvian dialect but is evolving as the country matures. Orlisia has been an obsession for me since its inception. I was hoping it would be on our tour schedule.”

At the end, the teacher gestured to a lone student at the back of the lecture hall. Sophie caught her breath at the sight on him. He had a head of black curls, and stern green eyes under heavy eyebrows. She wondered what he looked like when he smiled.
Lebanese? Israeli?
His light complexion suggested otherwise. He rose, his expression guarded.

“My name is Michael Nariovsky-Trent.”

Sophie frowned. What was that accent? It sounded familiar, like something she’d heard before but more…authentic, somehow.

“My family lives here in New York City, but I was born in Europe, where I lived until I was fifteen. I have been accepted to the medical school at Harvard in Cambridge, where I have already completed my undergraduate studies.” Like everyone else, he recited a laundry list of accomplishments, including some foreign honors Sophie had never heard of. He sat down abruptly at the end. The teacher looked as if he expected more, but Michael glared back with a startlingly hostile expression.

“Thank you, Mr. Nariovsky-Trent,” the teacher said, moving into a lecture on the rules that governed GYL. No drinking or drugs. Curfews, dress codes, mature behavior. Intra-student relationships were permitted, but had to be kept reasonably chaste.

The group walked the hallway of the main building to a large, airy cafeteria. Sophie took a tray, feeling awkward. She saw a Brazilian girl, Ana, sitting alone. “May I sit with you?” she asked. The two spent the next half hour making tentative forays into friendship, the conversation drifting to their lives at home. Sophie asked about the ring the other girl wore on a chain around her neck.

“Ah,” Ana said, blushing. “My boyfriend, Raphael, gave it to me. He was scared I wouldn’t come back to him! Like I would ever want anyone other than Raph.”

Sophie nodded. “I have a boyfriend at home too,” she said. “Matt Cain. He’s pre-law at Berkeley. No one here could replace him.”

Ana’s eyes darted over Sophie’s shoulder, and she giggled. “You’re sure of that?” she whispered. “Because that guy, Michael with the complicated last name, keeps looking over here, and he’s not staring at me.”

Sophie peeked back over her shoulder. Michael was definitely staring at her. She returned his intense gaze for a moment. A tall, athletic guy – Carter DeVries, Sophie thought his name was – tapped Michael on the shoulder, and he turned away. Sophie looked back to Ana, then gasped as recognition struck.

Michael’s accent had been Orlisian.

~~ - ~~

“Why didn’t you tell the class?” she asked him a few days later. “You aren’t ashamed of who you are.”

“Of course not. I do not tell people right away because I have so much pride in being Orlisian. My pride will be my downfall.” He paused. “Here in America, people know nothing of my country. The blank looks I receive when I say I was born in Orlisia bother me. Now I tell only the people I feel comfortable with.”