The young man Court called the Terp was a few feet ahead. He’d taken off his equipment so he could move with more dexterity, and was all the way up at the doorway in the front of the shop, chancing a look out at the street whenever possible. Rolling patrols of Syrian Arab Army vehicles passed by at regular intervals.

The Terp turned back to Court, thirty feet away, and made some sort of motion, but even though the dawn had broken outside, here in the pet shop that had no pets, it was still too dark to see.

When the Terp’s gestures became more emphatic, Court took off much of his gear and moved forward. As soon as he crawled up next to his partner, both men had to move out of the doorway as a single BTR-50 armored personnel carrier rumbled by.

When the rumbling ceased and the vehicle disappeared from view, Court looked to the Terp. “What’s up?”

“The building you wanted to use. It’s not there.”

Court looked ahead. They were near the far eastern edge of Palmyra, but the going had been painfully slow over the past few hours, and they’d only now made it to within three blocks of their intended destination. But when Court looked across the street, over the low buildings there, he saw nothing to the east other than the top of a distant pile of rubble that had once been the seven-story structure he’d wanted to use as his overwatch position. It was less than half the height it had been before.

“Shit,” Court said. He was so fucking tired and sore and scratched and bruised from his hours of crawling and climbing through the rat holes, abandoned buildings, and rubble of Palmyra.

The Terp said, “We can move two blocks to the south of where we are. There might be some taller buildings to the southeast.”

Court shook his head. “Too much light to keep going. Even if that building were still intact, we’d never make it across open ground to get there.”

He took the map from the Terp and looked at it with a penlight. “This building we’re in now. It looks pretty big. How tall is it?”

The Terp had no idea. The two men went back for their gear. Then they crawled back to the rear entrance of the pet shop, made their way down the hallway that made up the ground-floor spine of the building, and began climbing the stairs.

Slowly. Very slowly, because both men were exhausted.

* * *

? ? ?

Fifteen minutes later shafts of morning sun shone through holes in the wall as Court and the Syrian interpreter climbed the last of the broken staircase to the sixth floor of a seven-story apartment building that had been half destroyed by shelling and bombs. Court walked down a hallway that sloped where the floor had suffered a partial cave-in, and then he crawled on his hands and knees the last few feet to make his way into a room on the eastern side of the building. Here he saw that the entire eastern wall of the apartment was missing, so he was able to look out onto a wide vista with the sun rising over it. He saw that they were three blocks from the far eastern edge of the city, and all the buildings in front of him were significantly lower.

He peered out beyond the edges of the city, but it was too far away to make anything out.

If the base was out there, the shot he took at Azzam now was probably going to be three or four hundred meters farther than he’d planned.

But there was no way he could get any closer.

He turned to the Terp, who was just crawling off the slanted hallway and down into the room. “You did great, kid. This is a good hide, but we are a lot farther from the base than I want to be.”

He found a dark corner in a back hall near a bathroom, and he sat against the wall, facing the opening ahead. He put down his AK, his backpack, and his rifle bag, and he leaned back against the wall, finally allowing his body to rest a moment.

Instantly his body began cramping. “Water and salt, kid. As soon as we’re set up, we both need to hydrate.”

The Terp peered out into the morning light. “Are we supposed to see a Russian base from here?”

Court lay on his stomach now, pulled his Zeiss binoculars out of his pack, and stabilized them on his backpack. Through the twenty-power magnification, he began scanning the desert floor to the east.

It took him just seconds to see a Russian Mi-8 helicopter hovering over a large cluster of low buildings, all surrounded by concrete fortifications, wire, and other bunkering material.

“Got it.” He pulled out his laser range finder. “Two thousand, seven hundred fifty-two meters to the center of the base.” At 1.71 miles, this was a full quarter mile farther than any shot Court had ever attempted, but he knew it was within the capabilities of his weapon, his ammunition, and his scope.

Scanning around the distant base some more, he saw Russian military vehicles, mortar and rocket positions, men going about their day, and a second helo resting on a dusty pad.

The young Syrian’s binoculars weren’t as good as Court’s, but through them he scanned to the southeast. “You were right about the airport. Take a look.”

Court did so, and he saw a second baselike development just off the runway, far from the shattered airport terminal. This base was much smaller, but it was fortified with several armored vehicles, and four Russian military helicopters were parked on the sandy tarmac.

A pair of Kamaz Typhoon MRAPs, or mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles, also sat in the center of the base. Court knew these big transport vehicles were used in Syria by Russian Spetsnaz special forces units.

Only by carefully scanning the desert floor and the highway that bisected it here could Court see more infantry, more armored BTR wheeled troop carriers, and an assortment of big trucks and smaller military utility vehicles. It appeared to Court that at least two companies of regular Russian infantry were here, which was interesting, because he thought this was supposed to be a Spetsnaz or special forces base.

Clearly the area had been augmented with additional forces, and this meant to Court that something special was going on.

Next both men worked on their hide. Court pulled out the TAC-50 and set it up on its bipod, and he put his AK-47 within reach on the floor next to him. Now that he had his thirty-five-power scope on his rifle to use to sight on the base, he gave the Terp his twenty-power binoculars, along with a security sector to keep an eye on, and then he went back to work on ranging in his rifle for the approximate distance he’d be firing from later.

The young man asked, “Should we check in with Khadir and Yusuf to make sure they are in place?”

“Not yet.” The Motorola military-grade handheld radios the men carried were encrypted, and their range was over thirty miles. Still, Court had ordered the other team to stay off them until he transmitted, except in extreme cases. He was less worried about the transmissions themselves being picked up, but he knew it was always possible the transmissions could create an electronic signal that could be identified as an unknown force in the area on UHF, and the Russians could thereby determine they weren’t alone.

He looked at his watch. “It’s almost seven a.m. No idea what time Azzam is coming, but you can be damn sure we will see him when he comes.”

Court didn’t say it, but he was worried that seeing the Syrian president was all he would be able to do. He was just too damn far to feel confident in his ability to hit a man-sized target.

Court opened up an MRE packet of red beans and rice, which was full of the sodium he needed since he’d been sweating away salt for the past twelve hours. While he ate he drank an entire bottle of water, and he made sure the young Syrian did the same next to him.

While the Terp ate rations, he looked at Court a long time. Finally Court said, “I’d rather you didn’t stare at me.”

“Sorry. You don’t look like the other soldiers I’ve seen.”

“No?”

“No. What is your unit?”

Court spooned some rice into his mouth. “I’m with a unit that doesn’t feel the need to tell everyone about what unit we are.”

The Syrian seemed to think this over. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone from that unit.”

Court smiled a worn-out smile at this. “Tell me about you, kid. How did you end up here?”

“I’m the idiot who agreed to come with you.”

Court smiled again. “You’ve been hanging around smartass Americans too long.”

The Terp chugged water, then said, “As I told you, I was in the university in Homs. I started going to the protests when they were peaceful, just singing songs and stuff. But the protests got rougher, people started throwing rocks at the police, and the police started shooting back. Some of the students managed to get guns. I was against that, but what could I do? Soon enough the protests turned to battles, but I refused to fight. The Mukhabarat picked up my brother, said he was a ringleader, but I don’t believe it.

“He never came home.”