Caliphate Read online

  That said, or thought, Gabrielle didn't feel the need for restraint in her message of protest. Lifting her sign high and waving it, she increased the volume of her chant, "Kein Blut für Oel. Kein Blut für Oel. Kein Blut . . . "

  Later, chilled to the bone and shivering, Gabrielle and several friends repaired to a nearby coffee shop. It seemed like half the protestors had had the same idea. It was not a large coffee shop and still it held them all easily. That, too, was a little annoying.

  Ah, well, Gabrielle thought, maybe I can't save the world but at least I can try.

  She smiled up at the waiter, a handsome, olive-skinned boy about her own age, and gave her order. "And please, might I have some cognac in the coffee?"

  "Will Asbach-Uralt do, miss?" the waiter asked.

  "Wonderfully," Gabi answered.

  Mahmoud didn't feel any of the irritation many of his co- religionists might have felt at being asked to serve alcohol. His Islam was pretty nominal. In fact he was known to take a drink himself from time to time.

  And why not? He'd come to Germany to escape from Islam.

  "Surely then, miss," he answered, returning her smile. "Right away."

  Gabrielle looked at the waiter, saw that his name tag read, "Mahmoud," and thought, Yum.

  Chapter Two

  "They [those who claim Islam is against slavery] are merely writers. They are ignorant, not scholars . . . Whoever says such things is an infidel. Slavery is a part of Islam. Slavery is part of jihad, and jihad will remain as long there is Islam."

  — Sheik Saleh Al-Fawzan, Saudi cleric, author of the bestselling textbook, al Tawheed (Monotheism) and imam of the Prince Mataeb Mosque, Riyadh, 2003 (circa 1423 AH)

  Kitznen, Province of Affrankon, 4 Shawwal,

  1530 AH (3 October, 2106)

  "Nobody's going to bid on a crying girl," the auctioneer-cum-slave dealer said to Petra, lifting her chin with the quirt he'd carried for so long he was hardly aware of it as anything but an extension of his right hand. "Or, at least, nobody you would want to bid on you. Do you understand me, girl?"

  Lips crinkling and quivering with deepest sorrow, Petra sniffed and rubbed at her face, trying to push back the tears. She nodded her head three or four times, briskly, and answered, "I'll . . . try. But I miss my famileee." The last word ended in a wail that Petra, herself, cut off abruptly. "I'll try," she said.

  The auctioneer smiled at her and answered her nod with one of his own. He'd seen it so many times before. And yet slaves must come from somewhere. They don't replace themselves, generally. This child, at least, has a chance of finding a reasonably happy position. How much worse for the ones who are older, the ones over nine?

  "That's a good girl," he said. "I'll tell you what; let's make a deal. If you can stop crying I'll do my best to get you into a decent family that won't make you work too hard and won't beat you. And—" the auctioneer reached into a pocket of his robe and pulled out a bar of halawa, waving it slightly under Petra's nose—"if you'll show me how well you can smile, I'll give you this."

  Petra hadn't been fed since being taken from her family. Though the slaves were watered, feeding slaves who weren't expected to be here in the stables long was something of a wasted and unnecessary expense. She licked her lips at the sight of the bar of honey-sweetened, crushed sesame.

  "Can you smile for me?"

  Slowly, and with difficulty, Petra forced her face into something that was approximately a smile.

  "There's a good girl!" the auctioneer congratulated, patting her gently on the head. He took her little hand in his own larger one and placed the sweet in it. "Here, this may help you keep that pretty smile."

  "What's the reserve on this one?"

  The speaker was a Moslem, Abdul Mohsem, a man, a merchant, in his late thirties, with a substantial roll of prosperity-born fat about his middle. Stealing a glance upward from where she knelt on the straw of her cell, Petra thought he looked kindly, despite the rifle slung across his back.

  Few of the Nazrani in the province even had the wherewithal to buy a slave. Fewer still were interested, though some were, notably the brothel keepers. These sometimes took a chance on a pretty girl, even if she was still far too young to put to service. Abdul Mohsem knew this, and hated the idea.

  True to his word, the slave dealer had sought out a decent family for the girl. Indeed, he'd sought out the most decent patriarch he knew in the community.

  "Ten gold dinar," the slaver answered, then, seeing that Adbul didn't blanch, added, "plus twenty silver dirhem."

  Abdul Mohsem scowled, inducing the dealer to further amend, "But for you, just ten gold dinar."

  "Ten gold dinar seems fair," Abdul said, "but I wasn't scowling over the price; I was scowling over the fact."

  "The fact?"

  "Facts, actually. One, that we sell young girls and, two, that if I don't buy this one she'll end up in a brothel."

  "It is not for us to forbid what Allah permits," answered the dealer, who considered himself, not without reason, to be a pious man.

  "Neither does Allah require of us everything that he permits," observed Abdul Mohsem, still scowling.

  To that the dealer shrugged. It was not for him to question the words or the workings of the Almighty. "Do you want the girl or not?" he asked.

  Without answering, Abdul Mohsem knelt down and pushed aside Petra's long blond hair. With his thumb he brushed off a smudge on the girl's cheek.

  "Would you like to come home with me, and become a companion to my daughter, Besma?" he asked, smiling.

  Shyly and fearfully, forcing a smile, Petra nodded.

  "Be happier, girl," Abdul chided. "We'll not work you too hard, nor force you to give up your faith. And my Besma is sweet, if maybe a little too strong-willed. You'll like her. And it's better than the alternative."

  Of that, Petra had little doubt, even if she was hazy on the details.

  Leading Petra by the hand, Adbul Mohsem brought her through the Marktplatz, past a dozen or so tables where men chatted while sipping at thick Turkish coffee. Ultimately they arrived at a large house guarded by a doorkeeper in one of the town's better residential neighborhoods.

  The doorkeeper nodded respectfully at Abdul Mohsem, smiled down at the girl, and then held the heavy oaken door open for them. Abdul Mohsem's was a happy household; smiles were not rare.

  "Besma!" the patriarch called, "Besma, light of my life and pearl of my heart, come here."

  Petra heard the pitter-patter of feet little or no larger than her own, coming down a hallway to the expansive foyer in which she stood with her new master. She soon caught sight of a girl, about her own size if a little older, very pretty with huge brown eyes and slightly olive skin. The girl's smile was brilliant, and why not? "Besma" meant "smile."

  Besma took one look at Petra and began to dance around the foyer, shouting, "Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh, Father, a friend for me! Oh, she's beautiful; she's wonderful! And I've been so lonely. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!"

  Seeing Besma jumping and twisting in the air, her feet kicking lightly, set Petra to laughing, shyly at first but growing with each new step, leap, twist and kick. Finally, worried that she might offend, she covered her mouth and forced herself to seriousness, pushing her chin down to her chest.

  Besma, however, was having none of that. She stopped her dancing, walked over to Petra and took her by the hand. "I only have one sister," the Moslem girl said, "Aisha. And she's a lot older than me, with her own family now. I miss having a sister at home. Will you be like my sister?"

  Fort Benning, Georgia,

  5 October, 2106

  Cars were no longer a matter of right for an American. Between the strains of the war, the taxes, the limits on gaseous and liquid fuel and the priority the military had on it, not all Americans could afford an automobile. Of those who could, not all were permitted to own one. The country had changed in many ways over the last ninety years, and many of those changes were not for the better.

  As a milit
ary officer, Hamilton was in the privileged class. He could have a car. He was allowed to have one, though, not for his own pleasure and convenience. Rather, he was allowed to have one to take care of military business at personal expense and to ensure he could make it in to his unit in the event of an alert.

  The car drove itself, leaving Hamilton free to interlace the fingers of both hands between his head and the headrest, and simply to relax. After the last couple of months, relaxation was something he would never take for granted again.

  The car—it was a two-seat, multifuel job made down in Guadalajara to a Japanese design—left the strong smell of overdone french fries behind it.

  "Building Four coming up on the left," the vehicle announced.

  Hamilton glanced leftward out the window and smirked at the bronze statue in front of the main academic building on the post. The building dated back to 1964 and had seen many renovations in its time. The last one had, with something less than full success, attempted to make the thing match the more tasteful architecture of the Infantry Center's early days, all stucco and red tile.

  The statute, bronze and about as old as the building, was of a lieutenant in the act of leading his men forward. The lieutenant wore a helmet of a design obsolete more than a century past. One hand gripped an even older style rifle while the other gestured onward, poised forever at about neck level.

  "I've had this shit up to here, too, buddy," Hamilton whispered.

  He'd graduated from the Imperial Military Academy, though it had been touch and go the last month, with most of his free time spent walking off his myriad sins. He'd won the Martinez Award, too, as everyone had predicted. Then, to everyone's shock, Hamilton had finished Ranger School as the Distinguished Honor Graduate. This was no mean feat in a class that size or with competition that fierce. As such, under the regulations, he'd had his choice of branch and chosen Suited Heavy Infantry. He really didn't want to freeze his ass off hunting the northern rebels he still—punishment tours or not— thought of as Canadians.

  On the other hand, Hamilton had lost forty pounds in the school, half wrecked his health, and damaged both knees. Fortunately, he'd done non-suited jump school a couple of years prior. Otherwise, he thought, he'd probably not have made it. His knees really were a mess and five hundred deep knee bends followed by a five- to seven-mile run were not a formula for success.

  Fortunately, suits don't jump as a rule. Better, they take a load off my ever-so-fucked up knees.

  On its own, the car queried the nearby parking lots and determined that there was a spot reasonably convenient to the building's main entrance. It sent out the signal to claim the spot, then turned left, left again, then right and entered the lot. On its own, it parked, raising the "driver" side door and shutting down the engine. It would secure itself once Hamilton had exited.

  Taking only his government issue Mark XVII tactical handheld with him—the thing was light and only seven millimeters by twenty by twenty centimeters, EMP hardened and with holographic screen and virtual keyboard—Hamilton walked as briskly as sore knees would permit from the lot, around the building, and in through the flag-flanked main entrance.

  There he was met by a sergeant first class sitting at a desk. The sergeant held out one hand and requested, "Orders, please, sir."

  Hamilton reached into a breast pocket then withdrew and passed over an identity card. This the sergeant laid down on a gray-colored panel. Instantly a scaled-down picture of Hamilton appeared above the gray pad, flanked by various copies of orders on one side, and disciplinary and academic records on the other.

  "Ohhh," the sergeant said. "You're the Martinez Award winner. We've heard all about you, sir."

  Hamilton sighed. Make DHG out of Ranger School and nobody cares. Set a record for walking the Area and nobody forgets.

  "Yeah, that was me, Sergeant."

  The sergeant—Hamilton saw that his name was Moore—stood and held out his hand. "Sir, if you don't mind, I'd like to shake your hand. I figure nobody who hasn't got what it takes could piss off that many people and still graduate from the IMA."

  Flattered, Hamilton shook Moore's hand, but countered, "It isn't like I pissed all those people off deliberately, Sergeant."

  "I know, sir. I'm sure you didn't. But when a man has a talent like yours . . . well . . . that talent is just gonna shine through.

  "Computer," Moore said.

  "Yes, Sergeant Moore?" the machine answered.

  "Log this officer in. Do we have his billet?"

  "Lieutenant Hamilton is assigned to Room 217, Olson Hall, Sergeant. It is a single with a private bath and maid service. The room has been notified to admit him. His inprocessing schedule has been downloaded to his Mark XVII, along with the academic schedule for the first two weeks."

  "Only two weeks?" Hamilton asked.

  The sergeant shrugged. "Sir . . . this isn't the IMA or even Ranger School where everything goes right pretty much all the time. This is the Regular Army and if you can follow a plan for ten days you're doing pretty well. Two weeks is actually pretty optimistic."

  "But . . . "

  "War is chaos, sir, and we practice chaos every day. That's our unique talent."

  Back in the car, Hamilton let it drive again. Though he'd been at Benning for two months now, all that time had been in Ranger School. He didn't know his way around.

  This was wise, letting the car drive. There's no particular and necessary logic to the way the military designates buildings, fields, ranges and such. Sometimes they have both names and numbers; other times not. Sometimes, they're numbered in accord with when they were built. Sometimes they were so numbered, but the numbers were changed. Sometimes they're numbered by blocks. The names can change to suck up to the latest political figure or general officer.

  Most of the time, you're doing well if "Building 398" and "Building 399" are within a mile of each other. Chaos: it's what's for breakfast.

  Olson Hall, an old barracks used for the last century and a half as a bachelor officers quarters, or BOQ, had somehow kept its number, Building 399, for well over a century. Where Building 4, the main academic building, had had a facelift that didn't quite take, Olson Hall still reflected the look of solid military efficiency it had been born with. Brick, built in a quadrangle open to the west, the living space was stretched around broad interior-facing, railed walkways. The only elevator was industrial, not passenger; those lazy lieutenants could just walk upstairs.

  Which is fine, Hamilton agreed, as he trudged up the broad concrete steps carrying four bags full of uniforms and the minimum necessary other gear, a little exercise never hurt anybody . . . but my fucking knees are killing me.

  Arriving at the second floor, Hamilton's nose was assailed by a mix of esoteric foodstuffs in preparation mixed in with the marginally washed bodies of some of the sepoy officers—foreigners selected to lead some of the empire's foreign volunteers—who trained at Benning. These sort were often quite good, Hamilton understood. Some said that their ideas of personal hygiene did not always match those of the American citizen officers among whom they were billeted. More objective sources had told Hamilton that people with different diets will smell different, no matter their personal hygiene habits.

  There were enough breakable objects in the bags that just dropping them was a poor idea. Instead, he bent at the waist and the knees to lower the two handheld ones to the concrete. Then, straightening— ouch—he reached up and lifted the third. This one he'd had balanced on the back-borne fourth and held steady with the pressure of his head. After lifting it overhead, he placed it, too, on the deck. The last (and curiously enough the Army was still issuing green duffle bags with shoulder straps) he took off one strap at a time.

  His other personal belongings, books, dress uniforms and such, would arrive sometime in the next few days. He'd have to call to arrange a drop off and authorize the room to accept it.

  "Welcome, Lieutenant Hamilton, to Olson Hall," said the room. "If you would place your palm on t
he gray panel to the right of the door and look with both eyes directly into the scanner above and to the left of that . . ."

  As the palm and retinal scanner recorded and verified his identity, Hamilton heard a familiar feminine voice say, "About time you showed up."

  "Hodge, you look like hell," Hamilton said, as the two sat at a table down in the bar just off the lobby of Olson Hall. "Your skin's a mess. You've lost what? Twenty pounds?"

  "Twenty-five. And you think you look any better? They starved you worse than they did me."

  "True," he agreed, "but not for as long. And it doesn't matter if my tits disappeared. I didn't have any to begin with."

  "Never mind," she said, tilting her glass towards him. "They'll grow back. And drink up. I'll start looking better, I promise." She tilted her head to one side. "Did I ever tell you you're an asshole?" she asked.

  "Many times."

  "Did I ever tell you that you're a cute asshole?"

  Kitznin, Affrankon, 5 Shawwal,

  1530 AH (4 October, 2106)

  Besma was awakened by crying. Worse than crying, really; what she heard was a brokenhearted sobbing severe enough to shake her little bed. Tossing the covers off, she put her feet on the floor and walked on cat feet to the source, an even smaller bed at the foot of her own.

  "Petra, are you all right?" she asked. The sobbing grew, if anything, worse.

  "I m-m-miss my mommy. I m-m-miss my daddy. And I w-w-want my brother, Hans. They didn't even let me take m-m-my d-d-dolly!"

  Besma wasn't much older than Petra. She hadn't a clue about any clinical theories on what to do with a child who's been dragged from her home and sold as a slave. She did, however, have a good heart, a naturally kind and sympathetic heart. She spent some time stroking the hair of the weeping slave, then laid her own dark head down on Petra's lighter one. Finally, when those things did no good, she just wrapped the little Nazrani in a hug and joined her in her sobs.

  The next day Besma cornered the groundskeeper, another slave though he was a Moslem from Mauretania, and asked him, "Ishmael, will you escort me to the town my new friend came from? She left some things behind and I'd like to get them for her."