Carter awoke shortly after first light, in the cold grey gloom of the farmhouse. He crawled out of his sleeping bag, packed his kit in the Hilux and ate some cold rations while he waited for the others to finish their morning prayers. The old man insisted on serving more green tea, and then Sharza announced that it was time to go. Carter gave the boy another unwrapped chocolate bar as a leaving gift and got a beaming smile in return. He thanked the old man for his help, but the guy refused his offer of a gold bar for his troubles. They were good people, Carter thought, doing their best to eke out a living in a hard place. He hoped they would make it through the terrible years to come.
Three minutes later, they were heading east again, following the road as it curved round the edge of the mountains. Carter had studied the route from the safe house to Zarangir earlier that morning. The village was eight kilometres east of Khordokan, twenty-five kilometres from their present location, and accessible only via a series of narrow dirt roads. Sharza reckoned it would take them around thirty minutes to reach Zarangir. According to the old man they would have to watch out for Taliban in the area. Khaibar had said that the group had been increasingly active in the districts to the east, going out on frequent patrols in the villages as part of their drive to curb the poppy trade.
Carter had asked how the guy knew all this stuff. Sharza had merely laughed and said that word travelled fast in Afghanistan.
‘Do you really think your friend is hiding in Zarangir?’ he asked.
‘The place ticks a lot of boxes,’ Carter replied after a pause. ‘It’s remote, and there’s access to food and drinking water. If he’s not there, he can’t be far away.’
‘Perhaps.’ A doubtful expression played out on the interpreter’s face. ‘But I am not sure, brother.’
‘Why not?’
‘The people in Zarangir have no allegiance to the resistance groups. They don’t like—’
‘Outsiders,’ Carter interrupted. ‘Aye, I know. What’s your point?’
‘No one would dare to shelter a British soldier. It is not worth the risk.’
Carter said, ‘Maybe so. But even if Dave isn’t hiding in Zarangir, someone might have seen something. He might be close by. Another village, perhaps, or a farmstead.’
Sharza made a pained face. ‘I’m sorry, my friend. But there is nothing else beyond Zarangir. Nothing at all.’
Twenty minutes later, the road abruptly snaked away from the river and coursed north through a small valley devoid of vegetation. After another kilometre they neared the outskirts of a village set in the floor of a sandblown plain bordered by a series of steep mountains. Sharza kept the Hilux ticking along at twenty per until they were two hundred metres from the settlement. Then he pulled over at the side of the road and cut the engine.
He said, ‘Wait here. I will go and speak with my contact. I won’t be long.’ He sprang the door handle, started to get out, then turned to Carter. ‘I forget. I will need some gold.’
‘What for?’
‘My contact,’ Sharza said. ‘Sometimes the tongue needs to be loosened. Also, we need fuel.’
Carter did a quick mental calculation. Figured out that they had already covered well over three hundred kilometres in the Hilux. Equivalent to a third of the eighty-litre tank capacity. They had an unknown amount of ground to cover, plus whatever distance they might need to travel to extract Vann from the country. Carter grudgingly parted with two more gold bars from his belt stash.
Another five hundred quid from the survival fund. He was down to his last four tablets. The equivalent of a thousand quid in sterling. Which would have to cover their fuel, food and other expenses for however long it might take to find Vann.
Assuming we find him at all.
He watched Sharza set off on foot towards the village and glanced at his watch. Eight o’clock in the morning. Less than three hours since dawn had broken. A long day ahead of them, possibly. Depending on the outcome of Sharza’s enquiries.
Carter sat in the Hilux and waited. He rested his M4 rifle between his legs in the footwell, barrel pointing down. Ready to put down rounds if things got hairy. Every few minutes he flicked his gaze to the side and rear-view mirrors, keeping an eye out for approaching Taliban patrols or civilian vehicles. He felt dangerously exposed out in the open. Like a swinging dick in a room full of eunuchs. Any passers-by would surely take notice of the pale-faced bloke sitting in the pickup truck. News would quickly get back to the Taliban if they were in the area.
There’s a Westerner in the village to the north.
Asking questions.
Time crawled past.
Carter concentrated on next steps. What would he do if the trail went cold in Zarangir. He had no other leads to follow, no other scraps of intelligence that hinted at Vann’s whereabouts. He would have to speak to Langley after he’d exhausted his enquiries. Tell them that the search mission had failed.
Someone would then have to make a call. Someone above Mullins’s pay grade, in all probability. Do we continue the search, or pull our guy out?
Pros and cons would be weighed up. Different scenarios played out. There would be political angles to consider. Risk assessments would be made.
Eventually, it would come down to a basic question: how much time and effort were they willing to throw into the hunt for a missing ex-Blade?
It didn’t take a genius to guess the answer.
If Vann didn’t show up soon, Vauxhall Bridge would conclude that he had been killed in a firefight, perhaps left behind by the resistance fighters in the mad dash to escape, which would explain the absence of a corpse. Maybe his headless torso would show up on a riverbed a few weeks from now. They wouldn’t want to keep Carter in Afghanistan for longer than necessary. He reckoned he had another four or five days before they pulled him out.
An hour later, Sharza emerged from the muddle of buildings two hundred metres to the north. The interpreter was alone, his back slightly stooped as he carried a jerry can in either hand.
As he headed towards the Hilux, Sharza abruptly stopped in his tracks. He set down the petrol cans and wheeled round. Carter looked on as a second figure hurried over from the direction of the village. An older guy, a long beard as white as snow, with a dark shawl draped around his shoulders. The white-bearded man spoke with Sharza for a couple of minutes. He did most of the talking, pausing to glance back at the village, flapping a hand in the direction of the mountains.
After a couple of minutes they said their goodbyes, slapping each other on the back like old friends. The man headed back to the village. Sharza hefted up the jerry cans and lugged them over to the pickup. He loaded them into the back seat, then scooched behind the wheel.
Carter said, ‘Who were you talking to?’
‘My contact,’ Sharza said. ‘He says he was afraid to tell me anything in front of the elders. He did not want to be seen to be helping a friend of the British. This I understand.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He thinks he saw the man you are looking for.’
Carter felt his breath hitch in his throat. ‘Is he sure?’
‘Yes. Very.’
‘Where?’
‘At the stream. Three kilometres from here.’ Sharza pointed in the same direction the man had indicated. The mountains looming to the north of Zarangir.
‘The man says he went there with his son to collect water,’ Sharza continued. ‘When they arrived, they saw a man at the edge of the stream, filling . . . I do not know the word in English. The American soldiers carry one and drink from it. A green bottle.’
‘A canteen?’
Sharza nodded. ‘Yes. That is it.’
‘What did he look like?’
‘The man was dressed like an Afghan, and his beard was long, but he did not respond when the father called out a greeting to him. Instead, he turned and left with his mule.’
‘When was this?’
‘Two days ago.’
‘Then he must still be in the area,’ Carter said, his mind racing.
‘Yes,’ Sharza replied. ‘I think so.’
‘Which direction did he go?’
‘North. My contact was very certain on that point. He says your friend took the road north of Zarangir.’
North, thought Carter.
The only other route out of the village. The road to nowhere. The single-lane track that ran from Zarangir to the dead end fifteen kilometres away.
A dead end, Sharza had told him. Not the kind of place Vann would select for a hiding spot.
No escape.
Sharza stared at him. ‘Do you really think your friend is there? In the abandoned village?’
‘Only one way to find out,’ Carter said.
*
They continued north on the road. After three kilometres they passed a bridge over a gently flowing stream edged with ribbons of grass and stunted trees. A loose throng of Afghans lined the water’s edge, elders and children dressed in colourful clothing, filling up torpedo-sized plastic bottles with water. The menfolk all looked exhausted, worn down by a lifetime of war and grinding poverty.
They motored through an increasingly barren landscape, populated with a few clusters of flat-roofed buildings and animal pens fringing the foothills of the distant mountains. Goatherds shuffled along the roadside, driving on their scrawny livestock. As they cantered along Sharza pointed out how many people had once lived in a particular settlement, how many had fled after the Taliban’s return to power. How many remained. Providing a running commentary of destruction and despair.
Carter turned his restless mind back to the problem of finding Vann’s hideout. He imagined Vann taking this same route north from the stream. He wondered where the guy might have chosen to bed down. Somewhere safe. That would be his priority. Somewhere that wouldn’t put him at risk of getting compromised by the enemy.
The road passed along a dried-out river, and then it degraded into a gravel track. Ten minutes later, they reached a narrow valley interspersed with clumps of drooping pine trees and dwarf shrubs. The abandoned village was at the far end of the valley. It looked even more decrepit than Carter had imagined: a handful of decaying buildings set near the base of a densely forested mountain. From a distance he saw no obvious signs of habitation.
Sharza downshifted and nosed the Hilux towards a patch of dirt at the side of the gravel road. The two men hopped out. Carter snatched up his M4 and threw the attached bungee sling over his head, allowing him to carry his weapon close to his chest, barrel-down, with his right hand clasped around the trigger guard. Ready to bring the rifle to bear on any threats that might be lurking around the area.
They spent the next hour methodically clearing the village, building by building. They started with the biggest homes and worked their way down, searching them room by room. Looking for any signs of recent habitation: a carelessly discarded wrapper from a ration pack, a piece of clothing, mouldy bits of food.
Carter saw a lot of rubbish. He saw frayed rugs caked in dust, plastic bags filled with old junk, an old TV that looked like it pre-dated the invention of the printing press. Insects scuttled through the rooms. But he found nothing to suggest that Vann or anyone else had recently been in the area.
They looked under rugs and behind frayed curtains. They checked the homes for every conceivable hiding place and rooted through the smaller outbuildings.
The village was more deserted than Bigg Market on a Sunday morning.
Your friend is like a ghost.
Once Carter was satisfied that they had thoroughly searched the place, they circled back round to the Hilux.
‘He is not here,’ Sharza said in a resigned tone of voice. ‘I’m sorry, brother. I did try to tell you.’
‘I don’t get it,’ said Carter as he cast his eye over the valley. ‘Dave must have travelled in this direction from the stream. He couldn’t have gone anywhere else.’
‘Maybe he sheltered in one of the other villages we passed,’ Sharza suggested.
Carter considered, then shook his head. ‘No. There are people in them places, even if it’s only three or four families. Dave wouldn’t do it. He’d be taking a big risk.’
‘Perhaps he left the area, then. After my friend saw him at the stream.’
‘That was two days ago,’ Carter said, thinking aloud. ‘Even if he had moved on, there would be signs of activity here. Footprints or something.’
‘Then he cannot be here.’
‘So where is he? He can’t have vanished into thin air.’
Sharza gave a shrug. ‘I don’t know.’
Carter squinted as he scanned the ground beyond the village. He looked towards the mountain to the north. The gravel road ran on for a hundred metres past the edge of the village before it stopped at the foot of the thickly forested lower slopes. Higher up, the trees thinned out as the slope inclined sharply towards a forbidding rockface some distance below the peak.
Nowhere to go.
A dead end.
Carter dropped his eyes to the gravel road again. A short distance further along the road, something caught his eye. Fifty metres away from his position. A cluster of hard round lumps.
Animal droppings.
Carter stared at the mound of shit.
A thought pickaxed the back of his mind.
He set off down the road, moving at a quick walk as he beat a path towards the droppings. Sharza hurried after him, following a few metres behind.
‘Where are you going?’ he asked. ‘There is nothing around here, brother. I am telling you.’
Carter didn’t reply. He knelt down beside the pile of animal shit and picked up one of the stinking clods. Sniffed it, then broke it apart. The moist turd came apart easily in his grip. Sharza stood over him, his brow knitted in confusion.
‘Goat droppings?’ he asked.
Carter shook his head. ‘Not goat’s. This is mule shit, mate.’
‘So what?’ Sharza scratched his elbow and shifted. ‘This could have been here for months. Maybe longer. Doesn’t mean a thing.’
Carter shook his head. ‘It was left a lot more recently than that.’
Sharza gave him a puzzled look. Carter indicated the soft lump in his hand and said, ‘This came out of the arse of a mule between two and two and a half days ago.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘The inside of the turd is still moist,’ Carter said. ‘There are blades of grass in here that are still green, probably from the mule’s last but one feed. If this shit was any older, it would have hardened by now, and the grass would have discoloured.’
The Afghan’s frown deepened. ‘But there are no mules around this place. No people. No nothing. Look for yourself.’ He swept an arm across the abandoned valley to emphasise his point.
Carter nodded at the rest of the droppings. ‘Some of this shit is a few days old. Some of it is about a week old. You’ve got month-old turds mixed in here as well. I bet if we inspected the roadside from here to the stream bed, we’d find loads more droppings along the way.’
‘So?’
Carter said, ‘Someone has been bringing a mule up and down this road on a regular basis. As recently as a few days ago.’
‘You think that is your friend?’
‘Your contact in Zarangir said Vann had a mule with him,’ said Carter. ‘When he spotted Vann at the stream the other day. He must have taken this route back from the village.’
‘To here?’ Sharza looked sceptical. ‘But we have already searched the village. There is nowhere else to go. Nowhere else for your friend to hide. Dead end,’ he added despondently.
Carter tossed the softened lump aside and wiped his hands on a tuft of grass. Then he turned his attention to the ground immediately downstream from the gravel road. North of the roadhead was the densely wooded area at the base of the mountain. He looked at the point higher up where the trees thinned out and the incline sharpened. He looked at the near-vertical rockface rising towards the summit high above.
The thought picked at his skull again.
Carter walked on past the edge of the gravel road. Towards the foot of the wooded slope, fifty metres away. Along the route he spotted two more mounds of mule shit. He stopped at the edge of the treeline and scanned the ground keenly. Sharza stood a couple of paces away, watching Carter with a curious expression.
‘What are you looking for?’
‘Sign,’ Carter said.
‘Of what?’
Carter didn’t answer. He was looking at tangle of felled branches strewn across the ground between a pair of straight-trunked trees. Beyond the tangle he saw a scattering of dead leaves and loose grass, running on for half a dozen metres towards a patch of thick forest.
He marched over to the branches. Looked at them closely. Looked at the deadfall further up the gentle incline. Gears turning inside his head.
He thought about Vann. Thought about what he would do if he was in his mate’s position. Alone, on the run from the Taliban, in a remote corner of Afghanistan.
A seeming dead end.
But maybe not.
‘What is it?’ Sharza asked.
Carter began clearing the ground. He worked quickly, chucking aside the cut branches and sticks. Then he moved further up, brushing away the leaves and grass until he had swept the area clear of deadfall. Beneath it, he found what he was looking for: a patch of densely compacted earth running between a narrow gap in the pine trees.
He turned to Sharza and said, ‘This isn’t a dead end. This is a trailhead. It’ll lead up through them trees higher up the side of this mountain.’ He pointed up the slope.
Sharza looked at him in surprise. ‘But . . . how did you know?’
‘This is ground cover.’ Carter indicated the deadfall. ‘Someone laid this here to disguise the entrance. That’s what they taught us to do in the Regiment. It’s basic fieldcraft when you’re looking to hide your tracks.’
Sharza lifted his eyes to the mountain. ‘You think your friend is up there?’
‘Has to be. It’s the only route Vann could have taken.’ Carter stretched to his full height. ‘I’ll grab the kit. Let’s get moving.’
He collected his rucksack from the Hilux. His professional eye told him that the climb from the valley floor to the plateau would take between one to one and a half hours. He wanted his kit with him in case the trail ran over the ridgeline and descended on the far side of the mountain. They could be trekking for hours, depending on how far away Vann had based himself. In which case they’d need food, clothing, blankets, water, maps, torches. All the basics.
He switched on his satphone, checked the battery. Four bars left. He made sure that he had the remaining gold bars in his belt pouch. Then he ordered Sharza to move the pickup out of sight, behind the grouping of derelict buildings in the village. He was sure they hadn’t been followed by anyone since leaving Zarangir, but there was a small chance that a patrol of Taliban or ISIS-K soldiers might stumble upon the pickup truck. Better to err on the side of caution.
Two minutes later, as the sun reached its zenith in the cloudless sky, they started up the trail. Carter led the way, setting a brisk pace as the path zigzagged up the slope, meandering through clumps of pine trees and dense undergrowth. After two hundred metres the incline rapidly increased, and Carter dropped to a slow walk. Sharza followed a few metres behind Carter, moving effortlessly despite his bulk. The benefit of living in the wilds of Afghanistan. He had spent his whole life walking up and down mountain trails.
As they picked their way through the woods, Carter scanned the ground three paces in front of him, looking for telltale hints of recent movement along the track. In one place he noticed a snapped branch. In another he caught sight of a patch of dampened soil bearing the faintest imprint of a human boot. Further along, he saw more mule deposits, a few of them containing bits of recently digested grass and hay. Easily missed by a casual observer. But to the trained eye of a Hereford man, they stood out like blood spatter at a crime scene.
At one point they seemed to lose the trail. It took Carter a few moments to establish that a section of it had been brushed over. Someone had made a poor attempt to cover their tracks. Carter pointed out the swept area to Sharza before they picked up the trail six metres further up the hill.
‘How do you know all this stuff?’ Sharza asked.
‘You learn about it in the Regiment,’ Carter replied. ‘Every guy who goes through Selection spends a week doing tracking and anti-tracking.’
The Afghan angled his head. ‘Will your friend know about this as well?’
Carter gave a dry laugh. ‘Dave helped write the manual, mate.’
‘Then why has he left all these tracks? Why not cover up everything?’
‘He might not be alone,’ Carter speculated. ‘He might have some of the other guys from the National Alliance with him. Guys who aren’t as well trained. They might have been sloppy on their way up the track.’
After half an hour they reached a narrow gap between the pine trees. Carter shaded his eyes against the sun as he looked up towards the sheer rock wall further up the slope. He saw no visible means of access to the ridgeline nearer to the peak. There didn’t appear to be any footpaths cut into the rockface, either. He doubted Vann could have made his way up there. Not unless he had climbing equipment.
They pushed on again in the early afternoon heat. A hundred metres later, the track flattened as they neared a patch of level ground about the size of a tennis court. The track ran on for twenty metres before it wound its way past a mass of weathered rock and thorny shrub. He detected more signs in the surrounding vegetation and felt a prickle of excitement on his neck.
We’re getting closer.
Not long to go now.
He glanced over his shoulder again. Sharza was three metres behind, moving easily as he followed Carter up the track. The guy had barely broken into a sweat.
Carter looked ahead again.
Stopped.
Something caught his attention to the left of the track, at eye level. A scrap of bright red fabric snagged on a bush.
Torn clothing.
Carter felt his pulse quicken. The fabric could only mean one thing, he knew. Someone else had recently taken this same footpath. He took a step towards the shred of material, intending to take a closer look at it.
Then he heard a metallic click.
Coming from directly beneath his right foot.
A sound Carter had heard before. He recognised it instantly, in a half-second of cold terror.
The triggering of a landmine.