A volley of rifle fire snapped M to attention. A forward roll brought her up behind a large rock. She kept her head low and waited. She counted to a hundred, then a hundred more and again. She peered around the rock, crept out of hiding and studied the forbidding landscape littered with the remnants of battle; empty shells, machine parts, burned hulks of vehicles, even an old tank lying on its side. In spite of the devastation, the view of the Northern Plain from the craggy heights was spectacular, nothing but desert for miles and miles.
Behind her, the rocky landscape exposed little, but ten minutes of determined searching revealed the entrance to a cave. Odors of ashes told her it was inhabited. Ducking low to avoid hitting her head on outcroppings of rock, she entered the cave cautiously. The setting sun provided enough light to see threadbare carpets and small bundles of clothing piled to one side. Two dented cooking pots, and a few metal plates, cups, and utensils sat neatly at the side of the cave nearest the fire pit. A few embers glowed in the ashes. No evidence of food. What did they eat? Perhaps there was enough wildlife to hunt. She couldn’t picture berries or greens in this mountainous terrain. Then again, she couldn’t picture animals either. She went back and poked a knife into the ashes. Small bits of bone. Mice? Rats? Snakes? Could be.
She rubbed her eyes wearily, left the cave, found a relatively flat rock nearby, and sat. “Mustafa, I know you are there. Come out.”
A dozen men emerged from hiding and circled her, fingers twitching on the triggers of their rifles. They looked wary and rough wearing an assortment of grimy, baggy pants, shirts, long vests, and sandals. None had socks or boots. A couple wore military camouflage jackets, three had blankets slung over a shoulder. Their turbans were grubby, but bound neatly.
The men gaped at her. Damn, I should have borrowed some clothes from Fatma.
She studied them and they stared back, hostile and unrelenting. She waited. They circled. She waited. They watched. She waited. Hell, this could go on forever. “Please, sit.” Her words sounded thunderous and seemed to echo across the plain. “We must talk. I need your help.”
“You are the one from the square?” The voice was rough and challenging. Mustafa made no effort to hide his censure.
“You know, gentlemen, I’d like to know what’s going on here too,” she muttered under her breath. Then louder, “Yes. I’m the one from the square.”
“How did you get here?”
What could she say? I was transported… I transported myself… There’s some force that… controls me… tells me what to do… makes me do the things I do… controls people’s reactions to me… I know what to do… instinctively… Maybe if… It’s like this Mustafa, I have no idea how the hell it happens or why. You'll just have to trust me on this one. As if! She chewed her bottom lip searching for the right words.
“You must come with me and take your rightful place as leader of this country.” Oh, Christ, how lame was that? She groaned and buried her face in her hands.
The circle of men tightened.
“Tell us what happened in the square.” The words snapped crisply, a military order. She related the events briefly. Mustafa’s stony expression didn’t change. The air crackled with tension. The men scowled and shifted, looked to Mustafa then back to her. They played with their rifles; they could and would kill her. Mustafa just had to say the word.
She sat motionless and counted as she forced her breathing to slow and the muscles in her neck and back to relax. Finally Mustafa spoke and the men let their rifles dangle by their sides. She sagged with relief, yet she had not truly feared for her safety.
She shivered in the cool mountain air. One of the men held out his old woolen blanket. It stank of campfire and sweat. She didn’t dare speculate on what might be crawling in it, but smiled thanks, and drew it tightly about her.
“What can we do?” Mustafa gestured almost helplessly to the few men around him. Even the young among them looked old, worn, tired, and in desperate need of food.
She outlined her plan. “I need you in the city by tomorrow morning. Do you have a vehicle?”
“No, but the Spinda have a nice Land Rover at their camp a few kilometers from here. You will help us steal it.” Mustafa grinned and appeared a dozen years younger. Hope made them all look younger and eager.
She couldn’t help grinning back, but her stomach dropped at the thought that the whole damn thing could fall to pieces. She could be leading them to their deaths. She gritted her teeth and crossed her fingers.
*
“Hiking boots, that’s what I need,” she muttered as she tramped along the trail behind Mustafa. She excused herself from the group. They were polite about leaving her alone, probably thought she had to relieve herself. What she really wanted to do was to test her theory about the travel/transport/beam-me-up-Scotty thing that was happening to her. She thought maybe she could control it, and the flimsy sandals were sufficient excuse to try. She attempted a transport back to Mustafa’s camp. She wasn’t about to go too far in case she had to walk back.
“Yes! It worked!” She danced and spun and hugged herself and punched the air. “Yahoo! It worked.” She tried a transport up the trail. That worked too.
She rejoined Mustafa and his men a few moments later and settled in to the walk again. Her sandals—so very pretty—magically provided traction on the steep trails and she didn’t have to struggle to maintain balance and keep up with the men. Still, she really shouldn’t be hiking in the dainty things. Too bad she couldn’t use her new found skills, but she didn’t want to cause more suspicion and fear. She laughed inwardly. Who was she trying to kid? She was already an abomination, or a miracle, depending on one’s point of view. How much worse could it get? She told Mustafa and his men she would meet them at their destination and did the transport thing again.
Standing beside Mustafa, looking down from their vantage point, she studied the outpost and the terrain around it.
“How many?” Mustafa asked.
“Those two are patrolling, but I counted seven in all.” A battered and rusted Land Rover sat beside the hut that served as outpost. Rumor had it that Land Rovers never died. She hoped like hell that rumor was right.
Mustafa pulled out an old pair of binoculars from a worn case and meticulously polished the lenses with a scrap of soft cloth. “Two spare tires and four jerry cans of fuel in the back. Hopefully, they’re full.”
“The keys are in the ignition,” added one of the men who had his rifle scope trained on the jeep.
Mustafa turned to his men and issued instructions. “We will go,” he said indicating four men behind him. “Ali will drive.”
“I’ll go down first and distract the Spinda,” she said. “You can then take over.” Whether the Spinda died quickly or died horribly was not something she wanted to contemplate. Sometimes “not knowing” might be a really good thing, she decided.
Mustafa studied the cliff. “We’ll have enough cover for our descent.”
“But after that, it’s open terrain,” one of the men said in a tone that told her he was stating the obvious and how stupid could she be. “How do we cross it without being seen?”
“We’ll all be killed,” another said. “You’ll be okay, honest.” She could have done it herself of course, disarmed the Spinda and herded them into the hut, but these men needed a victory, small though it might be.
Mustafa studied her, brows narrowed, forehead furrowed.
“You can do it,” she said. “I’ll help.” Man, this ‘stop the Spinda’ thing I have going had better work or we’re all screwed. Her throat was thick with fear.
“Like you did in the square?” Mustafa asked.
What if it didn’t work again? She could only nod.
“We’ll do it,” he said. There was no further protest.
Thirty minutes later she was watching the dust whorls as Mustafa and his group sped away.
It had been ridiculously easy. She had transported to the Spinda camp just as the men reached the bottom of the cliff. She sashayed out from behind a land rover, twirling her skirt around her calves, and then froze. Oh my God, what am I doing? Taunting them like this. Two patrolling Spinda screamed and raised their rifles. More men spilled out of the hut. M raised her hand to stop them. Sunlight glinted off her ring, momentarily blinding them. More shouting and curses.
“Tsk, tsk,” she said. “That's not very nice language. What would your mommas say?” Jesus, what's wrong with me? More curses from the men. She waved her hand again and the ring sent out sharp shards of light that had the Spinda squinting and covering their eyes. When they dared to peer out at her, she swished the skirts of her dress. Light danced off it, bounced along the sand and seemed to climb the men's clothes. They cried out and dropped back. She giggled. Christ, I've got to stop this.
By this time Mustafa and his men had crossed the kilometer of open plateau and wasted no time securing the outpost and locking the Spinda in the hut.
A grinning group surrounded her. Mustafa clapped her on the back. The others joined in. She was astounded. She would never have thought they’d dare to touch a woman. They almost knocked her over in their enthusiasm. They pumped her hand, crushed it in their energetic grips, and shouted messages of encouragement. Little kids really. It was nice to see them so excited.
Now, if only she didn’t fail them.
*
Elspeth danced and clapped her hands. “Oh, Yves, I love what you did there with the ring and her dress. Clever.”
“And fun.”
“And I love your M. She's so brave.”
“Yes, but....” I frowned. “She really shouldn't have teased them like that. It's dangerous. I'll have to put a stop to that.”
“Little brother,” Elspeth said, with a hand on my arm, drawing my eyes away from the earth scene to look directly at her, “everything you have her doing is dangerous. Let her have some fun too.”