“We’ve suspected the Russians have been hiding something related to the Misha incident from the beginning. Maybe Smith found it.”

“But, damn it, they came to us! They asked for our help!”

Klein sighed and flipped his glasses down onto the bridge of his nose. “Again and again, Sam, we are dealing with the Russian government here. For a Russian political leader, konspratsia is like breathing; it’s a survival mechanism. We are also dealing with the Russian culture. Remember what Churchill called them: ‘Orientals with their shirttails tucked in.’ To assume their logics and motivations will always be the same as ours is a mistake.”

“But why would they risk alienating my administration now, with so much on the table between our countries?”

“It must be something…” Klein paused for a moment, seeking for a word. “…extraordinary. I’ve had my people within the Russian Federation probing the Misha crash since the inception of this operation, and all they’ve been able to ascertain so far is that a ferocious level of security is involved. They’ve also encountered a term, ‘the March Fifth Event.’”

“The March Fifth Event? What’s that?”

“As of yet we have no idea. It’s a euphemism for some larger scenario within the former Soviet regime. The crash of the Misha 124 is apparently only one facet of this larger whole. The term is used almost fearfully within the current Russian government.”

“Get me more,” Castilla said flatly.

“We’re already working the problem, but it may take a while. The Russians have the lid screwed down airtight on this thing.”

“Understood.” Castilla’s voice dropped an ominous octave. “In the meantime we’ve stuck our necks way the hell out to accommodate President Potrenko on this. If he’s backstabbing us now, whatever the reason, by God, he will rue the day…”

“I suggest we wait for Colonel Smith’s sitrep, Mr. President,” Klein interjected quietly. “That should give us a better idea of where we stand.”

“I only hope he’ll be able to give us one, Sam. I’ll be standing by at the White House.”

“I’ll be remaining here at headquarters until we get a resolution, Mr. President. We will keep you advised.”

“Understood, Fred. It’s going to be a long night until morning.”

Chapter Thirty-nine

The South Face, Wednesday Island

A polar environment demands that a dreadful knife-edged balance be maintained. Vigorous exercise and activity could keep the cold at bay, at least for a time. But not so much as to cause perspiration. Moisture destroys insulation. It can freeze and conduct temperature extremes. Sweat could kill you.

Randi Russell understood the mechanism and took care to stay within the boundaries of exertion as she swung wide around the Science Station and worked her way toward the ridge, moving fast but not too fast. As she semijogged through the darkness she grimly assessed her prospects.

They didn’t look promising. Exercise or not, she was cold. The layers of clothing she possessed were adequate to ward off immediate hypothermic shock and to protect her from frostbite, but not over the long term. Exposure would become a critical factor within the next couple of hours. Furthermore, to keep warm she had to keep moving, and she recognized that her strength and energy reserves were already critically low.

Beyond that, twenty very nasty men on this island were out to kill her. Under other circumstances and with somewhat more lackadaisical security forces, she might hope pursuit might sensibly be put off until morning. But given she had just eliminated their employer’s nephew, they’d be on her trail now and staying there.

Suddenly the sky lit up in the direction of the science station-a hazy globe of light bobbing into existence in the belly of the overcast. A parachute flare, a big one.

Randi wasn’t particularly concerned. The blowing snow and sea smoke went opaque, absorbing the flare light, and the winds swept the flare to the south and away from her. It simply proved the point that they were actively in pursuit.

In a way, it was almost a favorable thing. It opened up possibilities. If there were men out here on the ice after her, there was the chance she might be able to ambush and kill one of them for his clothes and weapon.

Randi couldn’t count on it, though. They would have seen Kropodkin. They would know what she was capable of. They would be afraid of her now, and their fear would make them more cautious and more dangerous.

Something else was certain. If Jon was anywhere in the vicinity, he’d know something was up. If he realized a pursuit was under way, he would know who was being pursued, and he would come for her.

Randi paused in her in-place jogging, an odd random thought darting into her tired mind.

Jon would come for her.

Always at the core of her internal bitterness toward Smith there had been the sense that he had not been there for her fiancé or her sister, that somehow he had not done enough to save them. And yet, from all she had learned and judged of the man in their random encounters over the past few years, Randi knew, without the faintest shadow of a doubt, that if Jon Smith realized she was in trouble, he would come to her aid, against all odds or orders and without regard for his own life. That was simply who he was.

Would he, could he, have done any less for Mike or Sophie?

She lacked the time to ponder the past now. She thought she could make out faint probing fingers of light in the storm. Powerful hand lanterns were panning the snow-the hunting party from the camp, tracking her. And the cold was gnawing at her, triggering an uncontrollable burst of shivering. She had to move again. Randi faced into the wind cascading over the ridgeline and started to climb once more. Maybe she could find an avalanche she could push down on those bastards.

Chapter Forty

The North Face, Wednesday Island

Smith flexed an all-environment chemical glow stick, breaking the inner capsule. Shaking its green luminescence to life, he clipped it to an outer cargo pocket of his snow smock. He could only hope that none of the Spetsnaz force had a line of sight on them. For this next evolution they had to be able to see.

A second pale green specter materialized in the swirling snow as Valentina lit off another chemical light. In the combination of the two glows they could just make out the irregular edge of a glacial precipice a few yards away.

They had reached the interface. They could descend no further on the broken, tumbled ice of the glacier. They must cross to the solid rock of West Peak, if the mountain would accept them.

Smith shrugged off his pack and drew a flare and an ice screw from its side pouches. Kneeling, he cranked the screw into the surface of the glacier, angling it away from the edge. Clipping his safety line to the anchor, he stood and edged carefully to the unstable shoulder of the ice. Striking the flare’s igniter, he pitched the hissing red ball of flame into the black void below. He watched as it bounced and sputtered down the edge of the jumbled icefall to hang up on a ledge perhaps 120 feet down. In the ruddy glare he could make out the darkness of basalt, the peak facing. But beyond the ledge was the void of another, deeper drop-off.

“The photomaps were right.” Smith lifted his voice over the wind. “There is a ledge down there.”

Valentina edged to his side, her hand on the safety line. “It’s not really all that much of a ledge, is it?”

“It widens out and descends the farther west you go, like it does on the south side. I’m just glad there’s a valid traverse we can use to reach it. I wasn’t sure there’d be one.”

Valentina’s hood turned toward him. “What would you have done if there hadn’t been?”