The Valhalla Prophecy (26 page)

The young woman shook her head firmly. “We did not want to tell
anyone
about my grandfather’s experiments,
or the eitr. That was something my grandmother made my mother promise, and she made me promise. It is a promise I meant to keep. I did not even tell my father.”

“But you’re telling me now.”

“Someone else already knows.”

Chase glanced toward the jungle. “The Russians?”

“It is the only possible reason why they would have taken me. They want to start the experiments again.”

“So why would they want you? Couldn’t they just go to wherever they found this eitr stuff and get more?”

“Because it was destroyed. My grandmother worked out what must have happened. The letter said the eitr was discovered on Novaya Zemlya, off northern Russia.”

“That was where the Russians tested their nukes,” he remembered.

“Yes, but a research facility was also built where they found the eitr. That was where my grandfather worked. I do not know the details, they were not in the letter, but there was an accident involving the eitr. Many people died. Khrushchev ordered the project to be closed down. That was when my grandfather decided to defect, and take his research with him. But he needed a sample of eitr to give to the Americans. There was only one place he could get it—the pit in the Arctic. So his plan was to go in secret to the facility to steal some; then the CIA would get him out of the country. He never came back. A nuclear test took place on the same day.”

“So … you’re saying they
nuked
the place?”

“They must have wanted to be sure that no one would ever have the eitr. They dropped the biggest bomb ever made—”

“The Tsar Bomb.” Chase saw her questioning look. “I paid attention to
military
history.”

“But you did not know the real reason why they dropped it, did you? It was to destroy the facility, and the eitr. I read about the results of the explosion. Nothing was left—even the ground was melted.”

“I still don’t get why they’d need you, though. It’s not like you’ve got eitr running through your veins.”

“No, I do not. But …” Natalia stared at the ground again, deep in thought, before continuing. “I have been
exposed
to it. Through my mother, and my grandmother. My DNA has been mutated by the eitr. If these Russians had samples, they could compare them to normal DNA and find out
how
it had been mutated. That could tell them enough about what the eitr does to create more, or create something that has the same effect.” She turned back to him, fearful. “They want to
use
me. They want to take what my grandfather did to me, and turn it into a weapon. Eddie, that cannot happen! I will not let it.”

“It won’t,” he assured her. “I’ll get you out of here, I promise.”

“That is not a promise you can keep!” she cried. “They are still hunting for us, they must be—if I am so important to them, they will not let me escape. If they find us—”

He put a hand on her arm. “I won’t let them take you.”

“How? With what? A broken land mine and a gun with one bullet?” She straightened, suddenly resolute. “The bullet—you must keep it for me.”

“What?”

“I am serious. You saw those poor children in there.” She jabbed a hand toward their building. “That is what chemical warfare did to them, and that was just a—a side effect. Agent Orange was created to kill plants; they did not even think about what it would do to people. But if the Russians create more eitr, it will be as a weapon of deliberate mass murder. Anyone who is exposed to it will die, either from the poison or from the mutations it will cause. I will
not
allow that. It is against everything I believe in. If I let it happen, I would be as evil as my grandfather! It cannot happen. It cannot.” She began to cry again. “Promise me
that
, Eddie. Promise me that.”

“I am not going to promise to put a fucking bullet in your head, Natalia!” he said, dismayed. “But I’ll stick to the promise I already made. I’ll get you out of here, trust me. It’ll take a bit longer since the phone’s out, but once I meet up with the others at the rendezvous, we’ll take you somewhere safe. These Russians won’t get hold of you.”

“But they are working with the Vietnamese, they must be,” she protested. “The man you knocked out …”

“Yeah, I know. One of my mates reckoned they were secret police—something called TC2.” From her stricken expression, he guessed their ruthlessness was far from secret. “But they won’t catch us either. You know I said I was a soldier?”

“Yes?”

He gave her a small but meaningful grin. “I wasn’t just some squaddie. Trust me, I’ll—”

He snapped his head around at a sound from the north. An engine. Someone was driving down the track into the village. “Oh, fuckeration. Time to go!”

“Do you think it is them?” Natalia asked as he jumped up.

“I’m not taking any chances that it’s not!” He looked up the hill. The vehicle was not yet visible, but he glimpsed flickers of color between the trees as it approached. The land around the village had been cleared, making their chances of escaping before the new arrivals spotted them slim. “Did you tell the people here what happened to you?”

“Yes, but—”

“Are they your friends?”

“Yes, absolutely, but—”

“Then tell ’em we need to hide!”

He ran with her to the nearby villagers. Natalia hurriedly spoke to them, then cried, “Here, quickly!” She and Chase rushed for the building that was home to the Agent Orange victims, one of the Vietnamese women going with them. A call drew out the woman inside. Natalia exchanged rapid words, then the nurse bustled them into the children’s room.

The only hiding places were under the beds. The woman led Natalia to one of them, then gestured for Chase to get under another. He dropped to his belly and slithered beneath it. There was barely enough room, his back touching the slats supporting the thin mattress; he realized at once that it was also too small to conceal him fully. Even if he positioned himself to be hidden from someone coming through the door, if they walked past the bed he would be visible.

Natalia, smaller and slimmer, was better covered, but the most cursory search would expose her too. She gave the Englishman a fearful look across the grubby floor. One of the children made a sound, excited at seeing the young blonde again, but the carer quickly hushed him.

The vehicle drew closer. For a moment Chase thought it was going to drive straight through the village, but then it downshifted rapidly before stopping. He heard voices, a man with an unmistakably commanding tone calling out.

Natalia tensed. “It is the men from the camp,” she whispered. “He is asking if they have seen any foreigners. They are telling him no, but …”

The sudden silence as the new arrivals switched off their vehicle’s idling engine was a clear sign that they were not convinced. More words were exchanged. “He says he is from the government,” she continued. “And that … Eddie, he is telling them that you have kidnapped me!”

“Let’s hope your friends don’t believe him” was his grim reply.

She kept listening to the unfolding discussion. The voices of the villagers became agitated. Were they going to give the fugitives away? Chase checked the room for other possible exits. A window with a half-open shutter, some uneven planks in one corner that might break if charged with enough force …

Natalia’s breathless whisper brought his gaze back to her. “They are still saying they have not seen us!”

Chase strained to listen, trying to read the emotional state of those outside from their voices. If the villagers were
too
insistent about not having visitors, it would arouse suspicion.

Had they convinced the secret police? Or would a house-to-house search be ordered? Chase looked back at the window, working out the quickest route to his weapons by the river …

“They’re going,” Natalia gasped. The commander issued orders with grudging acceptance. His men climbed back into their vehicle. “My friends did not give us away. I knew they would help us.”

Chase remained silent. The man was still talking; he guessed he was reminding the villagers of their duty to report any sightings of the kidnapper and his prisoner. Their replies sounded like assurances that they would. One of the women called out,
“Tạm biệt,”
which even after only a short time in Vietnam he knew meant “good-bye.” They had done it …

A child’s chatter and laughter caught his attention. It was the one-legged boy who had hugged Natalia earlier, scurrying from one of the houses to see the new visitors. His mother shouted for him to come back, but he was already in the middle of the group, asking excited questions. Chase held in a sound of irritation. The kid was going to hold up the secret police’s departure—

Natalia’s sudden look of horror warned him that he was doing more than that. “What?” he whispered.

She waved him to silence, listening intently. The commander was speaking again, but now in a much more amiable tone. The boy laughed and gave him a happy reply. The other villagers were conspicuously silent.

“He’s asking if he’s seen me,” she told Chase, frightened. “He calls me ‘the girl with yellow hair,’ and—and he said yes!”

“Shit,” Chase hissed. Outside, the car’s doors opened again. Still sounding friendly, the commander asked another question. The boy’s response was enthusiastic.

Too enthusiastic. He hurried to the door of the building,
calling out. Natalia swallowed. “He told them I’m in here!”

Options flashed through Chase’s mind. He didn’t like any of them. Both potential escape routes would put them only a matter of yards from their pursuers, but if he tried to stand and fight he would be outnumbered and outgunned—

Out of time. The boy ignored his mother’s pleas to come back to her and entered the building—then the room. Behind him, Chase saw tough leather boots beneath khaki trousers. The commander. A second man, then a third, followed him. One of the children in the beds made a sound of fearful surprise at the sight of the strangers.

Adrenaline surged through the Englishman’s body as the boy limped toward him, then stopped—but not by his bed. Or Natalia’s. The boy eagerly beckoned the commander to look at something.

One of the other men chuckled quietly, drawing an irritated exhalation from his superior. He spoke to the boy again, now more patronizing than friendly, then issued an order. The three men turned and clomped out of the building. The boy went after them, still asking questions.

Natalia started to crawl out from under her bed, but Chase waved for her to remain still. He waited until the car had restarted and driven away before finally signaling that it was safe for her to move. Hands shaking, she slowly emerged. “What happened?”

Chase had already gotten to his feet and found the explanation. “You
were
in here, and he brought them to see.”

The realization made her laugh, though it was a pure release of tension rather than humor. “So I am,” she said, gently touching the photograph of herself. “Oh God, I thought they had found us …”

“So did I.” He took a slow breath, trying to calm down. “It’s too risky to stay here—they’ll probably come back. They know that you know about this place,
and since it’s the nearest village, they’ll expect you to come here sooner or later.”

“I cannot let anything happen to my friends because of me,” she said, nodding. “You are right, we have to go.”

A thought occurred to Chase. “Bollocks!”

“What is it?”

“The mine. We can’t leave it for a bomb-disposal guy to deal with—they’ll know we were here.”

“How?”

“ ’Cause they’ll realize that someone with training did their job for them. And I’m guessing that even if we’re long gone, it won’t be good for your friends if anyone finds out they sheltered us.”

“It will not,” said Natalia gloomily. “It is getting better, but … it is still not a free country. So what do we do?”

“We’ll have to take the bloody thing with us. Once we get to the rendezvous, I’ll blow it up just before we leave.” He went to the window and pushed open the shutter. The villagers were clustered outside, several still staring anxiously up the road after the departed vehicle. “You say bye to your friends while I get the mine and my gun. Tell ’em thanks from me too.”

“I will,” Natalia replied. She began to say good-bye to the children.

Chase left her, giving hurried gestures of gratitude to the people outside before retrieving his rucksack and jogging back to the river. The Bouncing Betty and the AKS were still there, untouched. He shouldered the rifle, then carefully picked up the mine and detonator before starting back to the village. A flustered Natalia met him on the outskirts. “I told them that if I get caught, I will not tell them I went to the village,” she said. “But I—”

“We won’t get caught,” Chase cut in firmly. “I’ll take you to the rendezvous, and then we’ll be out of here. We just need to get across the river.”

She pointed downstream. “There is a shallow place where we can cross. It goes to a track on the other side.”

“Great.” He had already memorized the relative positions of the village and the rendezvous on the map; the journey through the jungle would take only a few hours. Cradling the land mine in the crook of one arm, he led the way along the riverbank, Natalia right behind him.

Nina stared coldly at her former colleague. Though he was only in his late thirties, a spell in jail had aged Logan Berkeley considerably; he had a streak of gray in his brown hair and deep creases around his eyes that were definitely not the product of laughter. There was also a lump in his nose—though that had come from Nina’s fist rather than incarceration. “So, Logan, you mind telling me what all this is about?” she demanded, struggling to hold back her anger. “Robbing museums, armed raids on archaeological digs—I guess this makes you a recidivist, since doing jail time apparently didn’t change your ways.”

“My
ways
?” Berkeley snapped. “You forced me into this, Nina!”

“Nobody forced you into anything.”

“No? Everything bad that’s happened to me in the past two years is entirely your fault. You ruined the opening of the Hall of Records and turned me into an international joke, and then you got me locked up in an Egyptian prison!” His nasal New England accent was still filled with an arrogant superiority despite his misadventures. “You destroyed my career—I’m doing what I have to do to get by.”