Blood Trust - Eric van Lustbader [82]
“The fate of so many,” Naomi said sadly.
“Yes, but these girls are special. Their beauty makes them tremendously valuable to people like the Xhafa brothers. But their value is now exponentially greater. They possess important knowledge regarding, I’m assuming, Arian Xhafa. But that’s just a stab in the dark. Liridona was interrupted in her last call to me and I haven’t been able to reach her since.”
“Where are they now?” Naomi asked.
“Liridona called me from Albania. Vlorë, where the family lives. She doesn’t know where Edon was taken, though I strongly suspect that it’s out of the country.”
Naomi pressed her hand against the bole of the tree to steady herself. “It’s a sickness, a disease.”
“What is?”
“Greed.”
“Greed and despair,” Annika said. “They’re epidemic.”
Naomi pulled out her cell phone.
“What are you doing?”
“What do you think? I’m calling this in.”
“Don’t.”
“Excuse me?” Naomi shook her head. “That sounded like an order.”
“Just a suggestion,” Annika said. “If you call it in, it will become public, and Mbreti will vanish into the shadows.”
Naomi put the cell up to her ear. “I have to do what I have to do.”
“Then you’ll never find him. This I can guarantee.”
Naomi looked off into the distance. The odor of Arjeta’s death clotted in her nostrils. Her pale, bony face haunted her. The line connected and she heard a querying voice in her ear, thin and electronic.
“These deaths will go on and on,” Annika said softly. “Is this what you want?”
Duty and desire, the two weights the cosmic scale held in balance, if not equilibrium, vied with each other for dominance.
At last, she took the phone away from her ear and killed the connection.
“All right,” she said to Annika. “Was it Mbreti who killed Arjeta? Was it Mbreti who tortured and killed Billy Warren, and the two men at Twilight?”
“No, not him, though he may have ordered it,” Annika said.
“Do you know the perp’s name?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The murderer.”
“Yes. A man named Blunt. I believe you’ve met him under the legend name of Willowicz.”
* * *
DOLNA ZHELINO was a tiny mountain village nestled in a finger of a valley dipping between two wooded hillsides high in the Korab mountains. At one end was a small watercourse, fed by the Vardar River; at the other was a wide, undulating, mostly cultivated valley, the gateway to Tetovo, Arian Xhafa’s stronghold fifteen miles to the northwest.
About an hour ago, they had forded the river at a fairly shallow spot. But the rocks on the riverbed were slippery and Alli had stumbled, hitting the water with a splash. Before Jack could get to her, her head was under the water. An instant later, she surfaced, drenched from head to toe, but otherwise unharmed.
Now, hunkered down in the midst of a dense forest, Dennis Paull checked his folding map against his GPS coordinates. Jack looked over his shoulder. From their elevation, they had an excellent view down the length of the finger. The red-tile roofs of the whitewashed houses looked like a jumble of dice, except for the soaring minarets of the mosque. This area of the country was predominantly Muslim, so a mosque in every town or village was to be expected.
Twilight was still at least an hour away. Alli leaned against a tree and gazed out at the town. She seemed lost in thought, and Jack wondered what was on her mind.
“We’re right on track,” Paull said.
Assuming this is the right track, Jack thought, but he kept his opinion to himself. Paull already knew where he stood on the subject.
Paull checked his watch. “The best time to make it through the valley without being spotted is at twilight. We’ll be able to see our way without lights, but for everyone else visibility will be poor. Looking at us will be like looking at clouds.”
He glanced around. “We have time to grab something to eat.” He jutted his chin. “Go tell Alli.”
Jack rose and went over to Alli. “Eat while we have the time,” he said.
She made no move.
“Alli, it’s liable to be a long night.”
She nodded, shrugged off her pack, and, squatting down, rummaged through it. Jack