TWENTY-SEVEN
THE MARK
Gender stereotypes be damned, this jet is the work of a woman.
Sitting next to March in a ridiculously soft leather seat, I grip my armrest as the jet gains speed on the runway. Low vibrations travel through my body as we take off in the closest thing to heaven I’ve experienced since leaving the poisonous cocoon of Ingolvinlinna. It’s obvious that extreme care went into every detail of the plane’s interior, from the soft white and beige palette of the furniture, to the vibrant gold of embroidered silk cushions strategically flung on a long couch—all matching the bed’s linen in the small bedroom I noticed at the back of the plane. Black peonies rest in a Ming vase on a lacquered cupboard right next to a wall-mounted screen, and of course, there’s a ceiling shower in the bathroom.
So yeah, a woman was here, and I don’t mean the flight attendant Dries is wooing behind us. I know I shouldn’t, but I listen, because this is basically a master class in seduction. A suave compliment about the beauty of her ebony skin got her to admit her mother was South African. What a coincidence—so is he! And which town does the hartjie come from? The darling—whose name is actually Isabelle—is from Johannesburg. Another coincidence! Why doesn’t she sit down for a moment and share a flute of champagne with a fellow Joburger?
Perhaps sensing a trap, Isabelle declines with a gentle but stern reminder that she can’t drink on the job, and much less with passengers. Damn, foiled!
Next to me, March dozes, his eyes half-closed. His gaze follows Isabelle when she retreats into the galley, probably out of a deeply ingrained habit to scan any potential threats. She’s pouring a flute of rosé champagne for Dries. Threat level: low.
I pat his thigh. “I’ll go take a shower and change.”
He nods with a tired smile. “Take your time. You need to relax.”
What a gentlemanly way to say that he’s the one who needs to relax and that he’ll fall asleep as soon as I’m gone . . . Dries pays little attention to me as I pick up my suitcase and head to the bathroom. His lips resting against the rim of his glass, I can tell he’s mentally undressing Isabelle. She tucks a stray curl back into her tightly braided bun with a gracious hand and smooths imaginary wrinkles from her navy blue dress. For all her professionalism, I’m not entirely certain she minds his attention . . .
Once I’m alone in the bathroom, I immediately proceed to strip from Dominik’s Springboks T-shirt and the black mechanic pants I’m floating in. I tumble into the futuristic oval shower stall with a sigh and rest my forehead against the glass panel as warm water pours over my head like a summer rain. I let myself slide down until I’m sitting in the tray and gather my knees against my body. I think of Anies, who promised we’d go to Ecuador together. The prospect of facing him again has been kind of abstract in my mind until now, but now I’m on this plane, and it’s becoming real. Strangely, I’m not scared as the droplets hit my back, drip down my chin. I’m well aware that there are still a number of ways he could hurt me if he wins this round, but the whirlwind of these past few days has made my skin a little thicker. I’ve tasted despair and, with it, found a renewed hunger for life. I scramble up and grab a bottle of shower gel with a determined huff. We’re going to get the world rid of at least one sketchy uncle.
I don’t remember Phyllis, March’s assistant, but she remembers me: every single clothing item neatly folded in the suitcase she had delivered at the airport for me is a perfect fit—including the underwear, I realize with a blush. Also those trashed jeans and the gray T-shirt featuring a cartoon cat double-flipping its audience off is likely what I would have gone for if left unattended in a shop. I fumble in the little bag with a smile. It’s a bit silly, a drop of water in the grand scheme of things, but having forgotten my entire life, I’m inordinately happy to discover the bottle of perfume. I spray some on my wrist and inhale the clean, flowery scent. I decide that my former self made sound decisions: I indeed love White Musk.
I come out of the bathroom to find Dries sitting on the couch with Isabelle—looks like she finally agreed to share the champagne with him. I register the hushed notes of a guitar playing in the background while he tells her about the beauty of Oman, especially at night. Has she ever been there? No? Maybe he should take her then. I purse my lips to contain a sigh—as long as they don’t start making out right in front of me . . .
Still in his seat, March is hunched over a tablet, seemingly—or willingly—unaware of the fact that he’s been made an extra in an Enrique Iglesias video. I shake my head and return to my seat. He didn’t seem the type, but March is deeply engrossed in crosswords. I watch him beat a particularly tough definition before victoriously typing prurient in the remaining empty squares. I offer a round of applause while he sets the tablet on the mahogany table facing our seats.
He studies my new appearance with a tender smile. “Much better . . .” His head dips to my neck, to inhale the fragrance clinging there.
“How do you like the Queen’s Gulfstream, Island?”
I jump at the sound of Dries’s voice, and March’s head snaps up. I’m reminded of March’s tale about Dries barging into our room on his yacht when we were about to . . . Then there was Dries’s claim that March is no longer allowed to touch me, as per some unwritten rule he made up and intends to enforce. An imperceptible sigh deflates March; his mentor isn’t done with him yet.
I wrestle my wince into a smile. “It’s a beautiful jet . . . But what kind of queen are we talking about? A real one?” I’ve come to understand that Dries remains a powerful man even after his downfall, but somehow I didn’t picture his connections including royalty.
Suddenly a notch cooler, he glances at the puzzled Isabelle, who’s still curled on the couch with her half-empty flute of champagne. “Why don’t you go take care of dinner, hartjie? I’m starving.”
Ouch . . . rough douche move. Thirty seconds ago, she was a goddess he planned on taking all over the world with him, and now she just got relegated back to the kitchen. What a complete dick he can be. Regardless, once she’s disappeared into the galley, Dries sits across from us and crosses his arms. “It’s a pity you forgot about her, because Guita hasn’t forgotten about you.”
“Guita?”
“The Queen.”
“Of what?” I insist.
“Of the Board,” March clarifies. “It’s a large criminal organization. Many, if not most criminal networks answer to the Board one way or another.”
“Or rather used to,” Dries corrects.
My gaze travels between the two of them. “And is there a king?”
Dries chuckles. “No. He’d be long dead. Guita doesn’t like to share.”
“But she lent you the jet,” I counter.
He clasps his hands. “Let me put this in a way I’m certain you’ll understand: the Board used to be instrumental in bringing balance to the force.” My ears perk up as he goes on. “The Poseidon, which Anies destroyed, belonged to the Board. It was both a tactical and symbolic asset. The Board’s most influential members used to meet there, and it was also a considerable source of revenue.”
My head bobs up and down as I process all this. “And destroying the Poseidon rattled the whole organization?”
“Precisely,” March confirms. “The Queen’s leadership was brought into question, and with Erwin losing control over the Directorate of Foreign Operations around the same time, the Board’s cordial ties with the CIA have been all but severed. This means no more cooperation or mutual protection for the players on either side.”
“What kind of cooperation?”
Dries shrugs. “The usual . . . Act like you didn’t notice me buying opium from some despotic fruitcake ruling over a hellhole in central Asia, and I’ll pretend I don’t know your agents are actively funding the next revolution there.”
I wince. “So the Queen is basically after Anies because he ruined her business?”
“In short, yes.” Dries nods. “But it goes deeper than that. He destroyed a very delicate balance, which we, the Lions, were part of. Our role was to fight the Board’s battles and eat the carcasses.”
I smile bitterly. “But that was no longer enough for Anies . . . He wanted more than just leftovers.”
“I’m guilty of sharing that dream,” Dries admits with a shrug. “But the difference is that I woke up.” His eyes set on March, an unexpected spark of affection in their depths. “I thought a lot about what you told me back in Tokyo . . . You were right. The Lions were never meant to rule over anything.”
March shakes his head. “But Anies thinks otherwise, and now that both Erwin and the Queen are out, the brotherhood has been busy.” He goes on, for my benefit, this time. “As Dries told you, Guita was forced to step down from the Board following the destruction of the Poseidon. There’s a succession war going on between the supervisors of the Hong Kong and Moscow subdivisions. The Lions have taken advantage of it and have been plundering the Board since, killing its members, taking over their operations.”
“They’ve been on a rampage,” Dries notes, a twinge of admiration in his voice.
“But Erwin knows about all this, right? Can’t he . . . do something?”
A husky laugh bursts from Dries. “Have you forgotten he’s under new management?”
“President Steed? Yeah, you said he doesn’t trust the CIA, and he replaced old farts like Erwin.”
“The agency tried to prevent his election with all sorts of quite hilarious leaks. That wound hasn’t closed yet,” Dries confirms. “And he’s been busy with internal politics since his election. He’s trying to ignore that he’ll need them sooner or later.”
“Speaking of which,” March interrupts. “Perhaps it’s time we show Island what’s bringing us to Ecuador.”
He takes his tablet from the table and connects it to the wall-mounted screen in front of us.
“Erwin had the right intuition,” Dries begins, as March opens various scans of bank documents and waybills on-screen. “He was trying to prove that Aidan Keasler and Anies are, in fact, the same man. He knew about Keasler Industries, and he could tell that the amounts of cash flowing through KI were not only massive but highly suspicious. He simply didn’t know where to start.” A smirk cracks through his silvery beard. “But then you came back to us, with fascinating tales about a factory in Ecuador . . .”
I fidget in my seat as he zooms in on the logo on one of the invoices. “Saraya Mediasat? It is one of Anies’s businesses?”
“Yes,” March confirms. “He bought it through a shell company based in the Caymans three years ago.”
Dries shakes his head, his mouth quivering into a snarl. “And here I was with my biltong factories.”
“Saraya . . . launches satellites,” March states, eyeing the data in the screen with the closest thing I’ve seen to fear in his eyes so far. “They operate a space center fifty miles south of the Colombian border.”
“In the middle of the jungle . . .” I note, when his fingers swipe on the tablet’s screen to open a satellite map. “Maybe they’d have the technology for a launch . . . but if Odysseus was there, wouldn’t it show up on satellite surveillance?”
“There’s nothing,” Dries admits. “But what you see are the past twenty-four hours.”
I nod. “Supposing that’s where he took the ship, he’s had months to hide it.”
“You mentioned shipments,” March adds. “Perhaps you won’t be surprised to learn that KI’s activities have been primarily geared toward Saraya over the past two years. The rest of the group is little more than a cash machine financing Saraya.”
Frowning at the screen, I tap the tip of my nose—there’s something familiar about the gesture, but I can’t remember where it comes from. “That’s what Erwin wanted from us. He wanted to understand what’s the deal with Saraya. But now we have enough evidence for the US government to look into it, right? They could, I don’t know, send a bunch of agents there . . .”
Dries snorts. “They won’t.” He takes the tablet from March to open a series of grainy pictures. “Here comes my favorite part.”
I fight a shudder when I recognize Anies’s black mandarin suit. As for the other guy . . . his face is a little too blurry, but the fiery-yellow comb-over billowing in the wind looks familiar. “Hold on. Is that Steed?”
“Oh, yes, it is,” Dries replies in a smooth, dangerous voice. “Saraya launches Steed Media Global’s satellites for a very competitive price.”
March shakes his head. “The US’s diplomatic relations with Ecuador have been strained over the past decade, mostly over intelligence issues . . . Steed won’t trust Erwin’s word unless he can prove with absolute certainty that Saraya is behind the theft of Odysseus. Until then, I doubt that Steed will ever green-light an operation on Ecuadorian soil, and targeting one of his most strategic business partners no less.”
“So we need to find that ship,” I conclude, pointing at the map. “If we can prove it’s there, or even just parts, Anies is going down.”
Dries looks at me then and smiles. Not a douchey smile or even a smug one. A genuine dad smile, if my instinct is correct about it. One that makes me feel strong, pumped. He tips his head to the galley door, through which a rich scent I identify as truffle wafts to us. “Now, is anyone hungry?”
•••
As I suspected, the Queen knows how to live. I wolfed down that plate of prosciutto and truffle pasta and even ate the edible flowers decorating my strawberry-and-pistachio cake. Next to me, March remained quiet and dignified as he ate his portion of pasta. Then a second one, before the rest of his tray was meticulously cleared, down to the slightest bread crumb. Dries, for his part, hit the champagne harder than the food but requested a second slice of cake from Isabelle—I suspect that we share a sweet tooth on top of a gap tooth.
After Isabelle has picked up our trays, I fall back in my seat with a moan of delight. “I’m in heaven!”
“Would you like to rest?” March asks. “Isabelle prepared the bed.”
Dries’s head snaps up from his cake. His eyes turn to slits.
“It’s okay. I’m not really tired yet. Plus, when we land it should be around 5:00 p.m. in Ecuador, right? So I’d better not sleep too much during the flight,” I muse out loud.
March doesn’t seem fully satisfied with this answer, but Dries is. He rises from his seat, towering over his disciple, all disdain and warning. “Ek hou jou dop.” I’m watching you.
He’s not, actually. He disappears into the bathroom, and a minute later, I hear the shower running. Because I have no respect for authority, I immediately shift in my seat to press a kiss to March’s lips, tasting of sugar and strawberries. It’s over too soon when his eyes dart over to the galley to which Isabelle retreated again. “Perhaps at another time,” he whispers.
I give a reluctant nod. He’s right: I don’t really want to be caught in the middle of a savage making-out session, either by her or Dries. Besides, there’s something else I need to discuss with him. Ever since we parted ways at Atatürk airport, Isiporho and Dominik’s strange mission has been at the back of my mind.
I place my palm against my window, watching the sun set and burn the sea of clouds beneath us. “March . . . the temples, what are they?”
There’s a pause before he replies, “Landmarks for the brotherhood. Over the centuries, the Lions have often been scattered by wars or political shifts. They’d disappear and relocate. The temples are safe places they built over time, places where they could hide valuable documents and artifacts . . . The Lions would tell you they’re where their heritage is kept alive.”
I turn to look at him. “And what’s so special about the Paris temple?”
“It’s where they keep records of the mark each brother carries.”
“You mean like that scarification on your back?”
“Yes. It’s all a bit arcane, but there’s a meaning behind each mark. There’s a unique code number but also symbols that represent who you serve, your abilities, and what position your master intends for you to fulfill in the brotherhood.”
“So Dries wants information on someone’s mark . . .” The missing piece falls in place in my mind. “Stiles?”
“Yes. I think Dries wants to know if Mr. Stiles was ever carved in the first place, and if so, who did it, and what’s in the mark.”
“Anies kind of hinted he had big plans for Stiles.”
“But that could only be true if Mr. Stiles was a Lion,” March completes.
So Dries too suspects Anies wants to make Stiles his successor . . . “Back when I was at Ingolvinlinna, I noticed Anies looked ill,” I recall. “He’d cough all the time, and he drank absinthe to numb himself.” March’s eyes narrow in curiosity, but he remains silent, allowing me to go on. “And in the car, Stiles said that it was true, that he was dying.”
He nods slowly. “Dries didn’t realize Anies was getting out of control, and it was perhaps too early for him to detect external signs of illness.”
“But he’d have found out eventually, and he was the vice commander: he’d have been next in line. Anies got rid of him eight months ago, probably before Dries could take over and ruin his plans.”
“Possible,” March agrees, his gaze somber. He takes my hand and squeezes it, his thumb stroking my palm tenderly. “Island . . . there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you . . . but I don’t know if I should.”
I shrug. “Dries kept an amputated hand under his seat. He passed it to Dominik, and then Dominik returned it, and he put it back under the seat. So ask. Nothing you can say can beat that.”
March’s eyebrows draw together in contrition. “Island, I’m profoundly sorry—”
“Ask.”
He does, in that quiet, straightforward manner he does everything else. “When I saw you in Hamina, you were with Mr. Stiles.”
I feel suddenly a little cold at his evocation of the Christmas market. I knew nothing at the time; I was putty in Stiles’s and Anies’s hands. “Yes,” I confirm.
March takes a deep breath that makes his nostrils flare, like he’s trying to contain something that might otherwise explode inside him. “Did he touch you?”
There’s so much loaded in those four words. I see myself again, laughing while Stiles picked a reindeer costume for his cats, his hand on my shoulder. Then I saved his life back in the woods. Begged for it, really. And he spared us in Romania, whatever his motives were. I wrench my hands nervously. I can imagine how things look from March’s perspective.
I shake my head. “No. It was never like that. He”—funny how I was about to say he took care of me. I can’t though; the very notion twists my stomach—“I trusted him,” I finally say. “I thought he was taking care of me, and obviously I had that wrong. Anies wanted”—he wanted to breed me. I look down at my lap, shame burning my cheeks at the idea of wording Anies’s intent out loud—“I think Anies would have wanted me to get closer to Stiles, so there could be . . . more potential successors. But Stiles never did anything. He never took advantage of me.”
The half lie makes me cringe internally. Stiles never crossed that line, but he was getting ready to. He and Anies thought I was ripe for the taking, and I don’t want to imagine what would have happened if Dries and March hadn’t rescued me. Would I have eventually capitulated like Stiles said? So that Anies could play Sims with me and his favorite goon? An involuntary grimace twists my mouth. I hate that feeling that my body was no longer mine, that it was just a thing to drug, to modify . . . to use.
March brings me against him; his lips brush my ear. “Island. If I see him again . . . ” he murmurs, the words soft but laced with razor-sharp warning.
I bury my face in the cotton of his shirt. “I know. You’ll kill him.”
“Yes.”