Caliphate

their turns on the border and rebuffed any threat from the Caliphate, usually with much fall of blood and with few or no prisoners taken on either side. In a sense, the country was in a continuous low-level war that for level of sacrifice per capita matched the endless war to maintain and expand the Empire.

'I'm an idiot,' he announced.

'Why? How?'

'Because we don't have to cross the lake. We only have to get to the Swiss side of it. And that's much closer.'

'Won't the Swiss shoot at us?' Petra asked.

'That's always a possibility, yes. But 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend.' As long as the janissaries are trying to kill us, the odds are on our side that the Swiss will help us.'

'Oh. I'm not sure I like that word: Odds.'

Hamilton laughed. 'Honey,' he said, 'all of life is nothing but playing the odds.'

Petra really didn't want to think about her perforated body sinking to the bottom of the cold deep lake. Instead, she changed the subject to life on the outside.

'Well, for one thing, you're going to like learning to swim and going scuba diving in a wet suit,' Hamilton answered, as he turned the little rental boat to shore. And I am so going to like teaching you.

Petra leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. She had to raise her veil to do it.

Castle Honsvang, Province of Baya, 13 Muharram,

1538 AH (24 October, 2113)

Hans stood at attention in front of his corbasi. 'Sir, the security around the castle could be much improved,' he said.

As an initial matter, the colonel was inclined to be unpleasant over someone telling him that his own arrangements were inadequate. On the other hand, he had been somewhat distracted. He decided to hear the young odabasi out.

'Speak.'

'There are two things, sir, that I think we can do. One is that the boys have become stale, doing nothing but standing guard. I think we should take . . . I should take, one to three platoons at a time out and train them in janissary skills that have become . . . slack.'

'And?'

'There is no reason that the space between the wire obstacles cannot be mined,' Hans said. 'That's the second thing.'

The colonel thought about that. He agreed wholeheartedly about the training suggestion. It was so refreshing to have a young officer with some initiative. He was less enthusiastic about the mines, given how often the American renegades staggered back to the castle drunk. He said as much.

'Command armed and optionally command detonated,' said Hans. 'We can ordinarily leave them disarmed and harmless, and only arm them if there is ever an attack on the facility.'

'Well . . . ' the colonel agreed, 'we do have a fairly liberal ammunition budget that we've hardly ever touched. I approve, young odabasi. Start your training program and start improving the defenses.'

Honsvang, Province of Baya, 13 Muharram,

1538 AH (24 October, 2113)

There were two ways that control, back at Langley, suggested to Matheson that he could proceed. One involved Andrussov oxidation. This was comparatively difficult and dangerous. On the other hand, the materials were certain. He began with that.

The materials weren't much of a problem. Methane was easy; the sedan ran on it and getting a spare tank was no problem. Pure oxygen was available, Matheson discovered, from the local pharmacy. Better, no prescription was required. He bought three tanks and two masks. Ammonia? That was available everywhere.

Platinum was a little more difficult. There was no jeweler's shop in Honsvang that had any. Nor had those of any of the other towns nearby had anything like the quantity he needed. And it would have been very suspicious for a kaffir, as he obviously was, to buy several hundred thousand rand or dinar worth of gold and diamond jewelry just to extract the little bit of platinum that held the stones in place.

He'd had to go all the way to am-Munch to find any substantial quantity of platinum, and then it came in coin form rather than in jewelry. The drive over country roads and along the decrepit remains of E533 had taken the better part of the day.

Still, there was an easier and safer method, if he could get the materials for that. Bernie hadn't been sure until he actually tried.

There was a print shop in am-Munch, one with a sign proclaiming it had been there for centuries. This provided a dye, Prussian blue, for no more than cost plus a moderate bribe to one of the workers. A bakery, of all places, had lye in sufficient quantities. Sulfuric acid he didn't bother getting, as Hans had said he could get it in any reasonable quantity from the motor pool.

Having the materials for the easier and safer method in hand, Bernie went after the lab gear required. In am-Munch, he also picked up the makings of a burner, beakers and tubing, plumbing supplies, a double walled stainless steel pressure cooker, a lot of epoxy, and some glass jars in large and small sizes, the smaller being able to fit inside the larger. That had taken most of the rest of the day. Almost as an afterthought, he picked up a bag of charcoal.

He drove back to Honsvang, then moved all of his little treasures into the suite. There he discovered that Hans had left him several liters of sulfuric acid, rather more than he needed. When it was all present and accounted for he thought, Okay, you bastards. Teleoperate me. Let's make us some cyanide.

Oh, and be really fucking careful, huh?

The thought came back, Mr. Matheson, this is Doctor Richter. I'll be operating you. I'll do my best.

Castle Noisvastei, Province of Baya, 13 Muharram,

1538 AH (24 October, 2113

It wouldn't do to have Petra in the suite while Bernie Matheson cooked up his devil's brew. For that matter, Hamilton had no desire to be there either. Mom didn't raise no fools.

Hans and Ling were in the next room. The castle's original walls were, of course, very thick and utterly soundproof. Not so the dividing walls that had been put in to make more cubicles for the houris. Thus, between the gasps, the moans, the thump-thump- thumping of bed against wall . . .

'Does that bother you?' Hamilton asked Petra, lying beside him wearing nothing but a smile.

She shrugged, then rolled over on one side to face him, her head resting on one hand. 'You really get to where you don't even hear it.'

'I suppose,' he conceded. 'That is, you don't. I do.'

'Does it bother you?' she asked, then glanced down and, giggling, said, 'I see that it does.'

Her face grew serious. 'You own me for the next week or more. I am your field. You know you can have me, if you want me.'

He sighed and rolled his eyes. 'I know. And I know it wouldn't mean very much to you. Or maybe it would be nothing. And . . . I'd rather not have you if it doesn't mean anything. Call me old fashioned.'

'You're 'old fashioned,'' she echoed, and then laughed.

'I like the sound of your laughter,' Hamilton said. 'Truly, I do.'

'No one's ever said that to me,' she admitted. 'Tell me more of what it's like where you live.'

'It's a long way from perfect,' Hamilton said. 'And