Leo didn’t dare to blink, forcing his eyes to remain open, as if a flutter of his eyelids could wipe her from existence. Clutching the tea tight to prevent him from taking her hands, he said:
— I’m sorry I didn’t make it to New York. I tried. If you’d been by my side I know we would have made that journey. The truth is I’ve never amounted to anything without you. Loving you was the only achievement I’ve ever been proud of. Since you died, I’ve been a distracted father and worst of all, I’ve become an agent once more – doing a job you despise.
As he began to cry, the image of Raisa became blurred. He cried out:
— Wait!
He wiped the tears away only to see that the woman in front of him was no longer his wife but Nara Mir.
Nara sat silent for some time before asking:
— Raisa was the name of your wife?
Leo closed his eyes. Immersed in darkness, he breathed deeply.
— Raisa was the name of my wife.
In all the years of smoking opium he’d never been gifted with a clear vision of his wife, never experienced a hallucination, never seen her before him or felt her near him even for a fleeting moment. Now, without any drug, she’d been by his side. It was wrong to call these withdrawal symptoms – the opposite was true, opium had been a withdrawal from the world. These were the symptoms of a man returning to the world.
He stood up, slowly. With one hand on the cave wall, he found his way outside. It was night. The moon was bright. Before him, the valley dropped down steeply and in the distance mountains rose like the spine of a dormant prehistoric monster. Village fires flickered like disgraced stars tossed down from the sky while those in the heavens sparkled brilliantly, as numerous as he’d ever seen. No longer numb, Leo felt childlike wonder at this view. He was not yet done with this world. Not only did he feel it, he believed it too.
Next Day
Nara sat at the entrance of the cave watching the sunrise. Light sliced by the jagged mountaintops into uneven beams promised a perfect day. The sight of sun gave her no pleasure and no feelings of hope. On the run, chased by the bombs of the Soviet aircraft, exhausted, she had no time or energy to dwell upon her actions. Reaching safety, taking shelter in the cave, she could think only of her decision to call out for Captain Vashchenko. The sound of her words echoed in her head: her voice was awful, full of self-satisfied pride, deluded belief that she was performing a valuable duty to the State.
There is something you must see.
She’d beckoned him to an injured girl knowing his intentions exactly. He would shoot the girl as he had shot the boy. She could not claim ignorance as an excuse. She had been prepared to watch the execution of a seven-year-old girl.
Her identity had changed and there was no undoing the transformation. Even when her family had plotted her death, observing the hatred in her father’s eyes she had never doubted the nature of her character. She was a good person. She had been wronged and misunderstood. Her intentions were noble. She was not like the men who attacked her: she was not like her father planning her death or her mother silently standing by. She would not be defined by rage and anger. She would be motivated by hope, idealism, and she was not afraid to make a stand. Yes, the repercussions were that she was alone and unloved. Better to be isolated than to compromise her beliefs, striving for acceptance from those she did not respect. There was no value in love that was dependent upon pretence. For as long as she could remember she’d been someone who did the right thing, no matter how difficult that made her life. That was no longer true.
The conclusion was inescapable. Having lost one family, she was not prepared to lose another – the State. She was a coward. It begged the question of whether her values had been nothing more than personal ambition reconfigured as ideology. Just as she’d been unable to resist the captain’s decision, she’d been unable to support Leo’s resistance, standing on the side, incapable of making a stand. She was a traitor in the eyes of the Communist state and a traitor in the eyes of the Afghan people. To Leo, she was morally weak. Had she worked so hard at her education in order that she might manufacture justifications for the murder of a young girl? Was this why she’d read so many books? Her sense of shame was intense. The feeling was akin to grief, as though her identity had died. The prospect of young Zabi waking up and asking for breakfast, unaware of the fact that Nara had called out for her execution, made it difficult to breathe. She sat, snatching gulps of air.
Nara stood up, leaving the cave and moving down the path. They’d not been guarded since any attempt to run was futile, even with several hours’ head start there was nowhere to hide. They would be tracked down and killed. Only a few paces away the narrow mountain trail narrowed, with a sheer vertical drop of some thirty or so metres to one side. Arriving at the drop Nara looked down. Without any sense of self-pity she accepted it was the only option remaining. She no longer knew how to live. She no longer knew her place in this world. She could neither go back to the Communist regime, nor could she go back to the little girl. She closed her eyes, ready to step out, falling to her death.
— What are you doing?
Startled, Nara turned around. Zabi was standing close by. Responding in an uncertain voice, Nara said:
— I thought you were asleep?
Zabi raised her arms, displaying the burns.
— My skin hurts.
The pale ointment that had been used to treat the burns had rubbed off. The brittle scabs and damaged skin were exposed. There were raw patches of red. Nara ushered her back, shooing her away.
— Go to the cave. Please, go back.
— But I can’t sleep.
— Go to the cave!
At the sound of Nara raising her voice, Zabi slowly turned around.
Alone again, Nara looked down at the drop. Instead of death, her mind was full of thoughts of how to make a new ointment. Without one, Zabi would scratch the scabs and the wounds could become infected. Nara knew a little about the natural properties of mountainside vegetation, taught to her by her grandfather when she was a young girl. She’d cherished those lessons. He knew every plant that grew on the Afghan mountains; during his years as a smuggler he’d been forced to survive off the vegetation on several occasions. Instead of thoughts of suicide, she recalled that juniper berries could be used to create a soothing balm, particularly when mixed with natural oil, such as that pressed from nuts or seeds.
She turned her back on the drop, and ran to catch up with the tiny figure of Zabi. Nara called out to her:
— Wait!
Zabi stopped walking. Nara bent down, examining the girl’s skin.
— It’s important you don’t scratch.
Zabi whimpered.
— It itches.
Hearing the girl’s distress, Nara began to cry, unable to stop.
— I’ll make you a new ointment. And then it won’t itch any more, I promise.
Confused by Nara’s tears, Zabi stopped crying.
— Why are you crying?
Nara couldn’t answer. Zabi asked:
— Does your skin hurt too?
Nara wiped away her tears.
Same Day
Having slept for the first time in three days, Leo sat up awkwardly, his muscles aching. The cramps were still painful. His hands trembled from dehydration, lack of food, exhaustion. His lips were cracked, his skin broken. His nails were black with dirt. His hair was wild. Without the aid of a mirror, he began to tidy himself up. He used a splintered match to scrape the dirt from his nails, one by one, a thick line of grime accumulating on the match, wiped on the ground. Using a cup of cold water he made an attempt at washing his face, picking the patches of dry skin from his lips and straightening his hair.
The voice inside him demanding opium was a constant nagging rather than a deafening demand, now quieter – more like a distant whisper. He felt strong enough to ignore it. Another voice had returned, his own, and it demanded he concentrate on the matter at hand, escape, not i
nto an opium seclusion, but escape from their predicament. First, he needed to assess his situation: he was not sure how many soldiers there were in this base. He was not even sure where they were located.
As his thoughts turned to the possibility of escape a question arose: to where and to what end? For so many years his life had been directionless, it was hard to remember a time when he was driven by dreams and ambitions of his own. He could no longer drift through days and weeks, in a haze of opium smoke. There were decisions to be made. He had a new family to look after. The plans of the Soviet defector returned to his thoughts, the aspiration of crossing the border into Pakistan and taking asylum with the Americans, seeking their protection in exchange for the information he had about the occupation of Afghanistan. It would serve two ends: survival and an opportunity to reach New York. Yet while that option would protect Nara and Zabi, there would be grave risks to his daughters in Moscow if he defected. His mind had grown slack with opiate-laziness and was unaccustomed to such dilemmas. Sensing the enormity of the journey ahead, Leo felt hungry, a sensation one that yesterday he would’ve sworn he’d never experience again.
Nara and Zabi were sitting at the mouth of the cave. He joined them, discreetly noting his surroundings and the number of soldiers. The girls were eating shlombeh, milk curd with flat bread studded with spices. Though he felt better, he decided against milk curd, instead ripping pieces of the warm flat bread. He ate slowly, chewing carefully. The dough was dense and pungently seasoned with crushed cardamom seeds. He ripped another fragment, the oil turning his fingertips yellow. Watching him eat, the young girl said:
— Are you better now?
Leo finished chewing before replying.
— Much better.
— What was wrong with you?
— I was sick.
Nara said to Zabi:
— Let him eat.
But Zabi continued her questioning.
— What were you sick with?
— Sometimes a person can become sick from giving up. They’re not suffering from a disease. They have no sense of purpose, or direction, despair can make a person sick.
Zabi concentrated on everything he said as carefully as if it was the wisdom of an ancient professor. She noted:
— You speak my language very well for an invader.
Zabi was forthright, blunt in her observations and fearless for a girl without a family, so far from home, a home that she’d witnessed being destroyed. Leo answered:
— When I arrived in this country I was a guest. There was no Soviet army. No military garrisons. And I set about learning your language. But you are right. Now that my country has invaded, I am no longer a guest.
— Is Len-In your god?
Leo smiled at the way in which she pronounced the name. He gently shook his head.
— No, Lenin is not my god. How did you know that name?
Zabi took another spoonful of the milk curd.
— A friend told me. He was going to compose a poem. He’s dead now. He died in the attack. My family is dead too.
— I know.
Zabi made no more mention of her family or the attack that had killed them. She ate the milk curd without any showing any outward display of grief. She possessed a degree of introspection unusual in a young child, perhaps a form of retreat from the horror of the events she’d witnessed. She would need help. She was in shock. At the moment, she was behaving as though events unfolding were quite normal. Unsure what to say to her, he noted the burns on Zabi’s hands and arms and head – they’d been freshly covered with an ointment. He asked:
— May I?
He took her arm and smelled the ointment.
— What is it?
Zabi said:
— It stops the burns from itching. So I don’t scratch them and they can heal, that’s what Nara says.
— Where did you find the ointment? Did the soldiers give it to you?
Nara answered:
— We made it, while you were sleeping. From almond oil, boiled juniper berries and some flowers we found outside. The soldiers gave us the oil. We found the rest of the ingredients. Zabi insisted on the flowers.
Zabi added:
— We didn’t know what kind of flowers they were. I’ve never seen them before. I’ve never been this high up before. This is the first mountain I’ve climbed.
Nara stroked back Zabi’s hair.
— I tried to explain that just because something is pretty, it doesn’t make it harmless.
Zabi replied:
— Before I could use it in the medicine, she ate a flower, just to test to see if it was harmful. I watched her put it on her tongue and then swallow it. The petals were blue.
Zabi paused, looking at her fingers.
— Did you know that the colour red tastes bitter?
Without any preamble, apparently for no reason at all, she began to cry, unable to stop. Nara put an arm around her, careful to avoid her burns. Whatever Leo planned to do, he would have to do it with them. They would come with him. He would not leave them behind.
Same Day
After breakfast, Leo waited for a chance to speak to Nara alone. While Zabi reapplied the ointment, he took his opportunity.
— Walk with me.
They left the cave, following the path down the mountainside, reaching the steep drop. Despite Leo’s urgency, Nara seemed distracted. He touched her arm, trying to get her to focus, unsure how long they had.
— Nara?
She looked up, saying:
— You find it hypocritical of me to look after Zabi as if nothing was wrong. I tried to have her killed and now I tend to her wounds? Tell me, how should I behave?
— Nara, you made a terrible mistake. I have been in the same position as you. I have made similar mistakes believing that I was serving a greater good. However, the people who I wronged did not survive. You have an opportunity. Perhaps she is a miracle – she survived.
— I will always know what I did, even if she doesn’t.
— That is true. You must find a way to live with that. It is possible, difficult, but she will need someone to look after her. She is alone. You could love herif she will let you.
No guards had come after them and Leo was pleased that security seemed relaxed. While Nara was still brooding over her decision, he changed the subject to the prospect of escape.
— What are the soldiers planning to do with us? Have they said anything?
Nara shook her head.
— They’ve said very little. They’ve treated us well enough. They’ve fed us. They gave us the almond oil we used for the ointment.
— And Fahad Mohammad?
— He’s here. They haven’t allowed us further inside. When we arrived they provided us with a blanket and told us not to light a fire. They were worried it might be seen.
— And Zabi? How is she?
— She’s upset . . .
Leo interrupted:
— I mean, is she strong enough to run?
He peered down the path, assessing their position and altitude. A man leading a mountain pony was climbing the trail towards them, the pony sighing from the exertion, laden with supplies. Nara was perplexed by his question.
— Run where?
— We can’t stay here.
— To escape?
— Yes.
— How far do you think we’d get? They know these trails. They know every village from here to Pakistan. We wouldn’t stand a chance. Why do you think they haven’t bothered to guard us? Or tie us up?
— I’ve made difficult journeys before. But I won’t do it without you.
— I don’t know what you’ve done in the past. This is my country. You must listen to me. I am not afraid of dying. But what you suggest is impossible.
Before Leo could press his case, a group of mujahedin emerged from the caves. The tall figure of Fahad Mohammad was among them. He did not seem concerned that they were outside the cave.
— A jirga has co
nvened.
A jirga was a council, a decision-making body composed of elders. Leo asked:
— You wish me to stand before it?
— The three of you will stand before it. Follow me.
Entering the depths of the cave network for the first time, Leo was impressed by the degree of sophistication in its development. Further inside there were timber steps, a drop of at least ten metres to an uneven passageway – a narrow man-made corridor, blasted with dynamite and supported with scaffolding. There were extensive munitions and food stocks in several uneven-sized stores on either side. At the end of the passageway there were further steps down, leading into a natural chamber, a giant dome, as if a massive air bubble had been trapped in the rock when the mountains were created. There was running water, a mountain stream. The air was cool and damp. There had to be a natural ventilation source for they were too deep ino the mountain for air from the entrance to offer enough circulation. The base was an ingenious fusion of the natural environment and the man-made, enabling this central chamber to be inhabited deep inside the mountain with a thousand metres of rock and snow above them as protection.
Leo counted six men. Like elders in a village, they wore no uniforms, with mismatched weapons by their sides, some with pistols so ancient it was hard to consider them anything other than symbols of war, others with rifles, all crouched in a typical stance, legs tucked under them, bodies hidden beneath thick pattu, blankets wrapped around them like seed pods. The lighting in the cave was electric so as not to foul the air with burning torches. A system of wires ran along the floor connecting batteries – it was a dim, bat-like existence, and Leo took a moment to adjust, before being able to observe their faces. He was presented first while Nara and Zabi were held back at the entrance of the domed chamber. The man in the middle of the council, apparently the leader, stood up: