The Acquaintance Read online

  She looked at him pleadingly. She was on her knees in front of him. He had the power. He was in control. Come on now. Just take the bait already. She could sense exhilaration in him. Show me your superiority Rizwan. He finally met her eyes.

  “I could never hate you Nargis, never”, his pulse was steady, his eyes screamed sincerity, and for a moment Nargis was lost in them. Ram cleared his throat and Nargis made a show of coming back to reality. She hadn’t let go of Rizwan’s wrist though. She looked at Rizwan, the same way he used to look at her when he wanted to sleep with her. The “do this for me and I’ll give in to you” look. Most of the time the look had been quite transparent because he only ever used it for sex and Nargis went along with all his crazy requests because she was curious herself and wanted to try them out. Now the shoe was on the other foot and there was a lot more at stake here than mere coitus.

  She had always been a trophy to him. Among many other things she had realised that too late. She had never actually been a person to him. She was never his partner. She was at most a possession or a plaything for his amusement and his ego. The beautiful Nargis Hussein had been seduced by him, that was his achievement. He always had that triumph in his eyes, when he took her out and paraded her in front of their friends.

  But today that triumph was wavering. She saw his eyes dart to Ram who was watching him from a distance. Could it be? Oh my god. Even now, when so much was at stake. Rizwan Zaid and Ram Khanna were silently engaging in a pissing contest. Who was the bigger man? As she observed their silent stare-down, a plan formulated in her mind. She could use this. She had to convince him that he was in the driver’s seat, he was the alpha-male. And if she played her cards right, he would fall for it. Rizwan continued to stare at her. He didn’t say a word. Nargis knew what he was doing, he was assessing who had the upper hand here. She had to make it look like he was in control like he always was. She was just some stupid bimbo who was in over her head.

  “This is taking too long”, said Ram and the next second Rizwan’s head snapped back as Ram’s fist cracked into his jaw. Rizwan screamed out in pain as his eyes rolled back into his skull. Nargis didn’t move. She made no move to help him. He had to think that she wasn’t the one calling the shots. She squeezed his wrist tightly. “Listen to me Rizwan, if you don’t help us, the child could be dead by tomorrow, do you understand? Given everything that has happened in our past, the least you owe me is your trust. Even though you have given me no reason to trust you.”

  Rizwan averted his eyes in shame. Nargis had hit the spot. She had picked at the open wound gnawing between them, the raw pulsing vein that connected them like a singular strand of spider-silk. Guilt. A very effective tool when used in moderation and with precision. She didn’t say it out loud, but he knew what she meant. You were the love of my life. You still are.

  “Her mother’s name is Azhar Khan”, sighed Rizwan after what felt like an eternity. Steady pulse. Nargis nodded towards the two-way mirror. “I was in Peshawar when a desperate woman approached me with her daughter. I was working as a substitute teacher at the local school. They knew I was headed back to India in a year.”

  Nargis listened intently. Her fingers tapping his veins like a piano. “Who approached you? Whose they?”, said Nargis. “She was trying to escape a very powerful man. She wanted me to take them with me back to India.”

  “And you agreed?”, scoffed Ram. “That was magnanimous of you.”

  “I was working in a controversial valley, my passport had been flagged. The Indian Embassy had put me on a no-fly list. The woman had everything I would need, visas, passports, you name it. I was not leaving Pakistan without this woman’s help. So, yes I agreed to take a little girl into my care.” He looked at Nargis defiantly.

  Nargis knew that Rizwan was taking huge liberties with his stories but since they were not relevant to her needs she let them slide. She monitored the rhythm of his pulse closely while also listening to the parts of his stories that registered as true. There had been a powerful man, but it was not Shahzad. Someone else had approached him. A “Cobbler” perhaps. Cobblers were spies that created false passports, visas and other documents for their assets.

  At long last Nargis took her fingers off his pulse. He was lying. His pulse had threaded when he had spoken of the woman, Azhar. It was faint but it had been there. A spike in his heartbeat. A phenomenon that happened when you were consciously trying to believe your lie. She was pissed off, Rizwan was making this unnecessarily hard. “That she was not an orphan, she had a father. At the time I only knew him by the name the villagers called him, The Mahdi, but you might know him as Mahmoud Shahzad.” Nargis felt the blood in her veins turn to ice. Pin drop silence followed the words, which made Rizwan’s pulse all the more prominent. Shahzad’s daughter was on Indian soil and no one had a clue.

  CHAPTER 18

  The boy returned as a man. But the caves were still the same.

  The parched rock blazed in the heat. Maerifa wondered how much of a man he had become. He had quite the task ahead of him. “My son, you have returned”, said Merifa as he embraced the boy. He had been away for a long time. In a different country, studying and gathering knowledge from his enemies. But his absence from the caves may have been a detriment which the Maerifa had not seen coming. For in the boy’s absence, a new potential successor to Shahzad had risen. Though the Maerifa had kept him at bay, his popularity among the ranks of the warriors was fast rising. Shahzad himself had been softening towards this new child. While the boy was being poisoned with falsehoods and distractions in that land of heathens he had been sent to study. A calculated risk the Maerifa had taken. And he wished that the risk did not cost him everything.

  The boy was fervent with rage as he broke their embrace, the news had shaken him, that much was clear. That was a good start, the Maerifa needed the boy angry for what was to come. The Maerifa and the boy entered the cave where Shahzad lay, his body covered in a white shroud. The boy approached the corpse of his idol and pulled the sheet down. He gasped in horror and blinked back tears. Shahzad had been mutilated, his skull had caved in and half his face was missing. A truly grotesque sight and an unseemly end to a true warrior of god. “How?”, said the boy covering the face with trembling hands. “Co-ordinated attack by the SAS. Cowards attacked at night, when the warriors were asleep. A drone and a helicopter and yet they were no match for the warriors once they had been alerted to the presence of the Indians and the British. They tried to steal plans and intelligence, they tried to sneak away with the body, but we didn’t let them. We killed two of theirs as they made their pathetic escape. We tried to save him, but he was already gone.” The cave was a forgotten shrine. The warriors were already moving to new horizons.

  “I’m sorry we had to pull you out so suddenly, but as you can see, the circumstances were extenuating,’’ said Maerifa with tears in his eyes. The boy nodded. “Where is this Massoud Iqbal I heard so much about on my way here. Who is he?”

  “Massoud is the son of a popular chieftain in the mountains. His father was a great ally to Shahzad, apparently, it was an unspoken bond between them that if anything happened to Shahzad, the Chieftain would take over the warriors of ICARUS and if not his son. But they were not expecting you to become Shahzad’s favourite pupil in such a short time. That is why I sent you away. The clan was planning to kill you.”

  The boy remembered his last night in the caves, where three men had tried to suffocate him in his sleep. He had fought back but the men had overpowered him. The boy remembered the dread of being dragged to the middle of a quarry. The jagged limestone hovering over his head ready to crush his skull. His tears staining the naked rock for a brief moment before evaporating in the moonlight. Once again, he had been rescued by the Maerifa who slaughtered the men like halal meat, leaving one of them alive to take his message back to the Bedouin chief. He had never seen Maerifa so angry. When they returned to the caves, the Maerifa suggested that the boy leave for the time being for his own saf
ety. Shahzad had agreed. The boy did not want to leave but he hadn’t put up much of a fight. The memory of the attack was still fresh in his mind. The boy had stared defiantly at his assailants, but he remembered the fear that had coursed through his body at the sight of the rock. He was not ready to die.

  And so he had packed up his meagre belongings and headed to a country he barely knew. He was sixteen years old, full of fear and rage. The men who had attacked him had been tribal warriors, they looked like mountain men. They were citizens of the desert. The men who had attacked him had been Arab soldiers. The next decade, he spent in a country that he hated, but as he experienced the country and the people, he began to realise that there was more to it than met the eye. There were people here who weren’t completely horrible, a girl in particular had caught his eye, a fierce creature who had come to his rescue. At first sight he knew that she wouldn’t be tamed, but the boy had always liked a challenge.

  The more time he spent in her company the more frustrated he became. She was not someone he could control. Though he did try his best. At times though, she did acquiesce, it was because of her affection for him and not because of the tactics the Maerifa had taught him. Which frustrated him even more. Maerifa’s lessons were important for his future. If he was to lead the Bedouin warriors of ICARUS against the infidels, he had to be able to persuade them to die for him. How could he do that when he couldn’t even break the will of a silly girl. She was a false practitioner of the faith. In this godless country, she was a hypocrite. She wore no Burqa, nor did she wear a hijab. She roamed in clothes of loose women and enjoyed being ogled by strange men. He wanted so badly to strike her and show her her place but he had refrained, the Maerifa had taught him that violence was a fool’s first choice and so the boy had played his game and turned her to his cause. He had seduced her to be his plaything. She was his subject, to mould and to wield as he saw fit. Their wedding was the cherry on his presumed victory over her will. But his celebration had been cut short by the horrific news. The death of Shahzad. He had left her alone, abandoned her a mere day after their niqab. He felt a sadistic pleasure at the thought of her suffering, but also a sense of loss.

  “Boy are you listening?” The Merifa’s voice cut through his thoughts like a hot knife through butter. “As I was saying, this new successor came knocking two years after you left. His father had died in his sleep, so he had come to Shahzad for tutelage. He was not a threat, I saw to that but as the years passed, I could see his marked effect on the other warriors, he was a politician masquerading as a warrior.” The boy could sense a note of pride in the Maerifa’s voice. He didn’t like it. “He already had the backing of the name clan and he has built up a loyal base of support for himself among the warriors themselves. But none of that matters, you are Shahzad’s chosen successor, you have the right to the throne granted to you by Shahzad himself, all you need to do is remind them of that and of who you are and the rest will fall in line.” They had reached a massive circus tent made from spun yak wool, it was rusted from the outside. Dark brown and withered with a triple wall vestibule. Garish and unyieldingly conspicuous. Whoever used this tent was not much for discretion. “Who do I have to convince of my birthright? I’m sure you have names for me”, said the boy. The Maerifa smiled, “Of course I do, but first things first.” They stepped into the tent and the boy was transported to another world. The inside of the tent was modelled after an American military bunker with air-conditioning and heating facilities. Persian rugs adorned the floor, with refrigerators and banks of computers and TV screens projecting different talking heads and world maps.

  “May I introduce you to Massoud Mitri, the heir of the Baloch clan and one of ICARUS’ newest lieutenants.”

  Massoud was a slim man, with soft untanned skin, his face was unblemished and smooth like velvet. The boy smiled, how was this hijra any threat to the boy, the chosen heir to ICARUS. Massoud extended a hand, the boy took it, he had palms softer than a baby’s bottom. Massoud grabbed Rizwan and brought him into an embrace, kissing both his cheeks twice in a sign of endearment. He was inappropriately affectionate. Was he gay? The boy exchanged a glance with the Maerifa, who all but confirmed it. Oh my god, the leader of the Bedouin clan had a proclivity for boys. How did Maerifa ever consider this abomination a threat to him. “Rizwan jaan it is an honour to meet you at last. My father spoke quite highly of you.” I bet he did, thought the boy. His father had sent men to kill him. The boy and Massoud remembered Shahzad over tea and hookah. The boy was distracted by the sheer activity surrounding him. Men moved around the space like a colony of ants. No hand was idle. Everyone moved with purpose. The warriors were already falling into step with this usurper. The boy was beginning to panic. The Maerifa cleared his throat and gently guided the boy back to the present.

  Their talk had meandered into pointless chatter when the flap to the tent illuminated four familiar shadows. The boy sucked in a breath. He knew these men, they were the Mahdi’s lieutenants, his guard. They had trained with the boy in his youth. They had never really liked him from the beginning. To them he was an outsider, an orphan. He would never have their support. But then again, he didn’t need it. They took their place by Massoud’s flank without a word. Their allegiances were clear. “Do you see those liars and thieves up on their pedestal?”, said Massoud spitting at the TV screens. The boy drew on his pipe, inhaling a sweet cloud of rose smoke before nodding slowly.

  “We must strike back at those infidels with the might of Allah. At their heart, where they know not to cross the warriors of Allah.” The lieutenants murmured in agreement. They looked to the boy, waiting for him to say something. The boy felt-light-headed. The hookah smoke made his eyes water and his tongue dry. He should have stuck to the tea. There was a murmur of disapproval that cut through the haze and made the boy alert again. “I agree with you brother. And I assure you that I will personally see to it that they pay dearly with their lives.” The boy had drawn the line in the sand. He had stated implicitly that he was the one in charge and not Massoud. A dangerous move, but a ballsy one. Massoud didn’t flinch, “Well here to you brother and the fall of the infidels’’, he said raising his cup high. The boy and Maerifa did the same. The dogs of war were about to be unleashed.

  CHAPTER 19

  Rizwan was secured in a room on the East wing. It was not the most isolated room in the facility. But beggars couldn’t be choosers. She had requisitioned a better dead drop but John had allowed her only the bare minimum for her little renegade operation. He wanted her to fail and he was making no pretences about it. She needed this win badly but she knew that a whole lot more was at stake here than just Mahmoud Shahzad. She had the first aid kit in her hand. She didn’t know why she was hesitating, she had gotten what she wanted from him. She was standing outside his room. She didn’t need to knock. She turned the latch of the door and stepped in. Rizwan startled awake from the cot he was lying on. There was no mattress or pillow, sparse Spartan furnishings for convicts was the Indian way. Effective and economical. You give suspects comfort and they take you for granted. She knew she couldn’t help him with his jaw. Even with the rudimentary medical field training she had received. But she could see to his bruising. Ram had probably fractured his jaw in multiple places if not completely dislocated it.

  “So what are you going to do with her?”, said Rizwan as he saw her approach. “Thank you for helping us”, said Nargis deflecting, she placed the kit on the bed and sat down beside it. He was lying on the cot where he seemed to have collapsed in a heap of exhaustion. Nargis watched as he caressed his wrists and massaged his jaw. He had only been roughed up a bit and yet he was behaving like he had been water-boarded at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Ram hadn’t even started his true third degree questioning. Rizwan had always been of a soft disposition, but Nargis was beginning to wonder how long ago had the softness dissolved into an act. Rizwan was not the same man, his hardened edges were more than mere cosmetic changes to his physique. Though Nargis did notice wit
h some chagrin that he did look good, he had aged like fine wine, that soft boyishness around his face, the baby fat had all but melted away, leaving behind only hard, jagged edges of cliff-high cheekbones that bisected his angular face in planes of perfect symmetry. His body too was knotted with muscles, coiled and primed. This wasn’t the result of a gym work-out, he had seen her labour in the sun. The tan on his skin was the product of years in the heat. More specifically the dry, dehydrating heat of the mountains. He had trained himself for years. Now why would a teacher need to undergo such a physical transformation?

  Rizwan got up and Nargis realised she was too close to him. And there was no Ram Khanna acting as a buffer between them. What was she doing? Rizwan swung his legs off the side of the bed so that he was sitting beside her. Too close. He was too close. Their shoulders were touching. Nargis moved away and opened the kit. She pulled out an ice pack and handed it to him. He placed it on his jaw. His eyes never left her. Nargis pulled out a tube of Vitamin K cream and handed him the tube. He held up his right hand, the one holding the ice pack. The one with the broken index and little finger. “Could you help me out?”, he said without humour. He winced as Nargis dabbed his jaw with the cream.

  “I must admit, I didn’t expect to be seeing you after all these years, especially like this’’, said Rizwan. “Well life is nothing if not strange.” A beat of silence stretched between them like a black hole of secrets and regrets, before Rizwan decided to break it. “Aren’t you going to ask me why?”, said Rizwan, his eyes catching hers. His face was inscrutable, his expression impassive. Nargis knew exactly what he was referring to but she would not be giving him the satisfaction. “Why what?”, she said seriously. Rizwan scoffed. He had the nerve to scoff. Nargis used every ounce of self-control she had to not crack open his skull like a crab shell. “Come on Nargis I know you want to ask me, so go ahead and ask me why I left you a day after our wedding.” Nargis sighed and slid closer to Rizwan. He had no idea how vulnerable he was in that position, how easy it would be for her to just end his life or maybe he did. Maybe he was baiting her into doing something rash. She hated the fact that she second guessed herself at every turn when it came to him. Caution was always a good thing, but this felt a little restricting, even crippling at times to question every move you made. She knew who he was, she knew what he was capable of and yet she couldn’t help but hold a torch for him. Granted that torch had diminished to a flickering candle but it was still there. I hope that she can help him. Rizwan smiled, he could clearly see the internal turmoil Nargis was struggling with.