should welcome them.’
Tariq looked at her as if she had gone mad. ‘But they are riding here at speed and they are armed. Their intentions are clear I think.’
‘And what of our intentions – if we meet them with closed gates and pointed guns, what does that say about us?’
‘It says we are strong and we are prepared to defend what is ours.’
‘But this isn’t ours. A few days ago I had never even set foot here and neither had you. And now you are prepared to take men’s lives and risk your own for it? Doesn’t that strike you as insane?’
‘It is the way of things. It has always been the way of things.’
‘But things can change. People can change. Open the gates and put down your guns. Whatever happens is meant to happen. Nothing here is worth fighting for. And nothing here is worth dying for either.’
Shepherd drove through the barrier and back into Quantico a little after midnight, just as the storm was finally blowing itself out. Franklin had been on the phone most of the way. He’d called O’Halloran first to give him a pared down headline account of what they’d discovered at Goddard, then spent the rest of the time liaising with the tech guys who had finished processing Kinderman’s office and were now heading back. Shepherd drove squinting through the spray and the darkness, trying to glean what he could from Franklin’s half of the conversations and wondering what would happen when they got back to base.
The van was already parked up by the laboratories when Shepherd pulled up next to it and shut off the engine.
‘Thank you, driver,’ Franklin said. ‘That will be all.’ He slid out of his seat and was already halfway to the entrance before Shepherd managed to fumble his own door open.
‘What do I do now?’ he called after him.
Franklin didn’t look back. ‘I want your report on my desk by 0800. After that you’re free to return to your training.’
Shepherd got a sinking feeling in his guts. He had suffered Franklin’s disdain all the way through the few short hours he’d been on this investigation that he hadn’t wanted to be assigned to in the first place, but now, as it was about to be taken away from him … he desperately wanted to remain part of it.
He took a step forward, aware that Franklin was about to walk through the door. ‘Maybe I should take a look at Dr Kinderman’s hard drive.’ Franklin stopped but didn’t turn round. ‘I can help sort through the data. Sift through the emails and the technical stuff to look for anything unusual. It’s bound to be full of astronomical terms and acronyms that could easily confuse someone unfamiliar with the jargon.’
Franklin grabbed the handle, pulled open the door and stepped through without saying a word.
Shepherd watched it slowly swing shut: closing on his last chance. He was about to turn and walk back to the dorms when Franklin reappeared round the edge of the door. ‘Report on my desk by 0800, Agent Shepherd,’ he said. ‘Until then your time is your own. So if you’d rather spend it staring at a computer screen than getting some shut-eye then maybe there’s hope for you yet.’ Then he shot him the smile and was gone.
Liv felt the ground tremble as the riders poured through the open gates and quickly surrounded them on all sides. She kept her eyes fixed on the lead horseman who halted the line with his upheld hand and trotted on alone on his pale horse. He removed his keffiyeh as he approached, revealing a dust-rimed face burnt almost black around the eyes by years in the fierce desert sun.
‘See who is with them,’ Tariq whispered.
Liv scanned the line of riders and saw Malik smiling back at her. It was he who probably brought them here, though for what reason she could only guess at. She stepped forward, opened her arms and smiled. ‘Welcome,’ she said in fluent Arabic that surprised the rider. ‘You must be thirsty after your long ride, your horses too.’
The rider looked down from his lofty position and circled her slowly, scrutinizing her down the curve of his long nose. She could smell the dust and dung of his panting horse, feel the heat radiating from its damp flanks as it was brought to a halt in front of her. The rider turned to his men. ‘I was hoping Ishtar would have more meat on her,’ he said loudly.
The riders erupted in laughter, Malik included.
He turned back, his lined face now split in a smile of his own to reveal an incomplete set of long, broken teeth. ‘You don’t look much like a goddess to me.’
Liv smiled, her eyes flicking to Malik then back to the rider. ‘You shouldn’t believe everything people tell you.’
‘Are you calling me a fool?’
‘No. Why don’t you tell me your name, then I can call you that.’
He leaned forward, his worn saddle creaking beneath his shifting weight. ‘They call me Azra’iel. You know what that means?’
It was an odd quality of her new fluency with language that she often saw images rather than meanings, and felt the words rather than interpreted them. Azra’iel. A picture formed in Liv’s head of huge black wings and she felt fear. ‘It means “Angel of Death”.’
The broken smile returned. ‘Maybe you are a goddess after all.’ His hand passed across strips of bright ribbons on his chest and in a movement too fast to register Liv found herself staring down the barrel of a pistol. ‘Maybe I put a bullet in your brain to find out.’
Before Liv could react Tariq stepped in front of her, shielding her body with his. ‘Take it,’ he said. ‘It’s the water you want, you do not have to kill to get it.’
‘Do not tell me what I want. No one tells Azra’iel what he wants.’
‘It’s OK,’ Liv said in English, moving from behind him, doing her best to ignore the gun as it swung back to point at her.
‘What are you – American? English?’ the rider said, picking up on the switch in language.
‘American. I’m from New Jersey.’
Azra’iel sat high in his saddle and swept his arm across the desert landscape. ‘This is where I am from. My family has lived on this land for two thousand years. We have seen the great Caliphs come and go, then the Mongols, and then the Turks.’ He jabbed the barrel of his gun at the ribbons on his chest. ‘Saddam Hussein gave me these himself for defending his Republic against the American invaders, but he was an idiot and now he is dead. I was not fighting for him, I was fighting for the land. And now the land belongs to me.’
Liv held his gaze and slowly shook her head. ‘The land does not belong to any man,’ she said. ‘It is we who belong to the land.’
‘You are wrong, goddess. It belongs to any man who will fight for it – this is what my people have learned – and you did not fight.’
‘No. We welcomed you. We invited you to share it, in peace. Isn’t that a better way?’
The jagged smile returned. ‘Better for me.’ He turned away and raised his voice so all could hear. ‘This oasis is ours now. I give