Assassins - Ian Watson & Andy West (27 page)

“Death to the heretic sultans and their
viziers!” exclaimed a leader from Iraq. “For those are the enemies
of true faith. These Frankish upstarts are but a devilish trick if
they distract us.”

“That,” agreed Nasir, “is why we treat with
the Grand Master of those Knights of the Temple, so their hostility
aims elsewhere and does not divert us from our true task.”

“Why not simply send a specialist to
eliminate this leader of
temple men
?” asked a da’i from
Khurasan, who evidently failed to understand the situation in the
west.

“Because,” said Nasir, “the Knights of the
Temple are not as other groups of men, where to cut off the head
causes confusion and disarray. Another Grand Master of equal
calibre would immediately be appointed. We would gain nothing, and
we might lose much.”

He paused significantly. “Never forget the
principle of
taqiyyah
, dissimulation. Sinan is speculating
that we can achieve a powerful alliance with the Knights of the
Temple, the Knights of the Hospital too, if we put on the cloak of
Christianity.”

There was momentary uproar, but Nasir raised
his hand.

“I said the
cloak
. The concealment!
Did not the Prophet hail
Isa ibn Maryam
, Jesus son of Mary,
as a Spirit from God, as the Word of God, who will return at the
end of time? Beneath this cloak, consisting of but a few rituals
and observances regarding the holy Isa ibn Maryam, we would of
course retain our true faith. Yet, by this ruse, the Christian
knights would
always
fight with us against the Sunni
enemy!”

“
Observances?”
came a sceptical
voice.

“Such as pretending to accept the delusion
that Jesus rose from the dead, and is himself divine, God in a
man’s body. Historical errors and failures of understanding cause
this delusion, yet the Prophet condones Christian observances,
those of the Jews too, since their misunderstandings nevertheless
embrace authentic revelations.”

Servants brought coffee, which sustains the
mind.

All present knew that dissimulation was
permitted if professing one’s faith could lead to persecution or
harm. Inevitably, Nizaris in areas controlled by Sunnis must
dissimulate, just as an assassin would dissimulate, occasionally
perhaps for years, so as to place himself close to his target,
supposing that the target protected himself as carefully as could
be. But to use such a huge dissimulation in order to produce a
hypothetical military advantage? Debate about this idea of Sinan’s
continued for some while, stimulated by the
qahveh
beverage
which excited the heart and the brain and the mouth.

“Whence this wonderful drink?” asked a man
from a remote northern region.

At which, most people laughed.

“It is the same,” said the Summoner to
Wisdom, “as the medicine and the meditation wine made from the
bright red cherries of a bush cultivated in Yemen, though
originally from Ethiopia. Except that the berries are dried and
then roasted. Everything valuable and useful comes to Alamut,
including persons of great scientific calibre…”

It seemed to Nasir that the Summoner,
inspired by the beverage, was tempted to add something more, but
the da’i restrained himself.

Gazorkhan to
Bandar-e-Anzali, Iran: May

Kamal had a business meeting in Rasht, after which
he’d promised Abigail a Caspian Sea sunset. They descended from the
heights back past Qazvin, thence to Mulla Ali, Rūdbar, and so to
Rasht. The traffic’s light flow followed the ancient course of
rivers that had carved their way through to the land-locked sea.
Green and gold rolled by for hours while the blue-dark mountains
marched constantly alongside.

Yet the grand vistas were spoiled for
Abigail, as she constantly checked the side mirror for glimpses of
the silver Mercedes. Often it seemed to have fallen away behind;
always it reappeared. Kamal seemed calmly unconcerned. He put on
some music and finally Abigail dozed.

Their silver tail clung to them right through
the busy streets of Rasht and beyond, where the town straggled
northwards up to its airport.

“Determined,” commented Kamal.

“Very!” But Abigail’s grin masked worry.

Kamal turned into an area of light industry
on the side of the highway opposite to Rasht’s modest airport. He
pulled up beside a long grey building, devoid of windows but
brightened by two metal doors painted orange.

“It’s usefully close to the airport. I’ll be
inside about an hour.”

“Oh, okay.” She tried to display a relaxed
smile, but couldn’t help glancing behind where the Mercedes had
parked in plain sight.

Kamal patted her arm. “Don’t worry. If they’d
wanted to trouble us, they would have by now. But give a blast on
the horn if they approach, or anything else happens.”

With that, he exited the car and pushed a
button by one of the orange doors, to be promptly admitted.

The moment Kamal had disappeared, panic
started to creep over Abigail. She adjusted the driver’s mirror and
glared at the threat reflected in its small frame.
Why am I
never free of interference?
Her throat became dry and her neck
prickled.
Get a grip, girl.
After several minutes, in which
absolutely nothing happened, she calmed down and tore her gaze from
the mirror. To keep herself busy, she fished Professor Ruffie’s
book out from her bag on the back seat and flicked through for more
references to the Nizaris.

Deprived of their castles by the irresistible
Mongol invasion, the Nizaris slowly diminished in Persia. They sent
missionaries to safer areas in the distant south-east, within
modern India, growing a sizeable community there over the centuries
that now is led by his Highness the Aga Khan. In a faraway land,
those sky-wrapped homes in the beautiful Elburz, so close to God,
remained only as a cultural memory….

The professor then went on to describe in
considerable detail the state of each site where a Nizari fortress
had stood; Abigail skipped to the end of the section.

The Mongols are universally viewed as a
nemesis for true Nizaris, yet the poem ‘The Triumph’ implies that
the Nizaris achieved some great revenge or damage upon the Mongols.
Known only through the late fifteenth century comments of ‘Abd
Allah Ansar, but probably penned well over a century earlier, ‘The
Triumph’ may simply be exulting that the Mongols had converted en
masse to Sunni Islam, after which they proved no more capable of
truly
erasing Ismaili heresy than generations of other
Sunnis before them.

Annoyingly, no lines of ‘The Triumph’ were
quoted. Nor did the professor’s book include any bibliography or
index. Abigail clucked her tongue. Unprofessional! She chewed her
lip thoughtfully while gazing at the mirror again.

She’d insisted to Jack that the Nizaris had
died out, bequeathing nothing to the Aga Khan’s benign community of
modern Ismailis. Yet what if there
was
some more direct
survival? Some secret thread in the tapestry of Ismaili history
that led right back to the old elite of Alamut, to a power that had
prompted the name
Al Maut,
the Death.

To her great relief Kamal emerged, and they
were soon back on the main highway, headed for the nearby port and
tourist town of Bandar-e-Anzali. They took a small hotel within
sight of the Caspian, then wandered hand in hand along the beach to
appreciate the promised sunset. Not a breath of wind touched their
faces; the water barely murmured. The western sky was candy pink,
striped with dark-gold syrup, laid upon a blue velvet cocktail.
They kissed as all was ignited to molten orange, which spilled
across the stilled sea and threatened to put the entire world to
fire.

After which, Kamal effortlessly produced a
yet more romantic setting, treating her to dinner in a converted
Caravanserai. Brick arches stretched from warm spheres of
candlelight to subtle shadows, fountains teased the eyes and
comforted the soul, waiters in felt slippers moved noiselessly on
the tiled floor.

Kamal’s exchange with the waiter sounded
different from the speech of Qazvin or Tehran.

“Were you talking Farsi there?”

“It’s Giliki, the language of about three
million people between the mountains and the sea.”

“So of course you can speak that too!”

Kamal smiled. “I can get by. This place has
often been invaded,” he went on swiftly. “Sometimes by more than
one army at a time. The British Empire fought the Bolsheviks here
between 1918 and 1920.”

After the meal, the evening air outside had
lost much of its earlier warmth. Abigail went up to their room
while Kamal chatted to a group of youths on the street. She thought
it cool that a man of his age and stature could still hang out with
young people, and used the time to prepare herself and the
atmosphere. Fortunately, she had some baby-oil.

Soon after Kamal joined her, Abigail returned
his gift of ecstasy given at Gazorkhan. She slowly massaged his
whole body, kneading the firm muscle as hard as she could, then
ending much more gently with his member. She didn’t use oil for his
eager manhood, instead providing lubrication with her tongue and
finally taking his smooth glans into her mouth. Kamal was curiously
silent throughout, but she was fully aware of his building tension
and his petit-spasms of pleasure that made her feel surprisingly
powerful, made her feel that at last she had a way to control this
potent man, if only for a little while.

At last he murmured as his muscles tensed and
she felt his moment coming. But she immediately pulled her mouth
away and pressed her thumb firmly against his swollen helmet,
forcing it back a little. She’d learned this trick to stop Terry’s
premature ejaculation, and sure enough Kamal slowly subsided too.
She cupped and softly caressed his balls while his muscles relaxed,
keeping a different kind of pleasant sensation going. Then once
more she took him up, yet again denied him release, and then a
third time she did the same. He moaned now and writhed as she
stroked him.

The fourth time, she freed him. As his dark,
straining member started its contractions, she didn’t want to risk
any disturbance by pulling her mouth away again. She stayed put and
let the pressured liquid of his love flood over her tongue,
something she’d never done before, nor even contemplated doing! The
warmth and salty taste surprised her, triggering a shiver of kinky
excitement, but she discreetly used a tissue moments later; she
certainly wasn’t up to swallowing, or at least not yet.

For once Kamal was speechless, his wit and
sophistication temporarily overwhelmed. However, he had enough
energy left to ensure Abigail didn’t have to sleep unsatisfied.

Bandar-e-Anzali
to Rasht, Iran: May

The next morning was one of the most unreal in
Abigail’s life. It started sanely enough, and pleasantly, with a
leisurely breakfast after making love again. Later, Kamal started
the car and edged into the busy main road outside the hotel;
Abigail turned around to see whether their silver shadow was still
in place. Indeed the Mercedes pulled out too, yet a
leather-jacketed young man on a moped seemed to appear right out of
nowhere and ran straight into the vehicle’s protruding wing.
Abigail gasped as man and moped hit the road surface.

“Kamal! Someone…”

“Yes. I saw in the mirror.”

“We can get away!”

Instead of doing so, Kamal calmly drove
around the block and came up to the Mercedes from behind. A large
group of youths had gathered around the silver car, all
remonstrating angrily with the unfortunate driver. Some were
shaking their fists while others aggressively slapped the bodywork.
A couple more were helping the guy on the ground.

Kamal smirked and accelerated away, as
realisation dawned on Abigail.

“This is your doing! But if they’re
government, things could get nasty. They might stop us leaving
Iran!”

“I doubt those men are government minions.” A
look of contempt flickered briefly over Kamal’s features. “Whoever
they belong to, they couldn’t keep
me
in this country.” He
flashed her a rakish grin. “Don’t worry Abigail, you’re safe with
me.”

Even deep inside, Abigail felt certain this
was true. Yet something still bothered her, something she couldn’t
quite put her finger on. Eventually, another thought took over.

“Will the young man be okay, the moped
guy?”

“Ha, of course! It’s an old trick. Apply
brakes at the last second, then kick out at the car to make it
sound like a bad impact. You do need to hit the deck, but with
barely any velocity.”

Kamal was driving leisurely, as if
deliberately frittering away his advantage. Abigail itched to ask,
but she knew there’d be a clever reason. Sure enough, the Mercedes
soon caught them up again, crazily overtaking the traffic
behind.

“So much for your gang of youths?”

Kamal merely smiled. After only a few
minutes, their tail began to fall behind again. Vehicles began to
pass the lagging Mercedes. As Abigail peered over her shoulder
through the rear window, distantly she saw the silver car pulling
off the road.

“Why on Earth would they give up?”

“In the confusion, my little
gang
levered the petrol cap and put sugar in their tank,” commented
Kamal casually. “That car will need some very serious repairs.”

Abigail was dumbfounded. Life with Kamal was
going to be anything but mundane.

She’d assumed that their only option was the
long road back to Tehran and a flight out from the International
Airport there. Yet Kamal soon surprised her by turning off the main
road. She recognised the area, just north of Rasht close to the
industrial district they’d visited the day before. This time Kamal
exited the highway on the opposite side to that grey building;
moments later they were entering Rasht airport.