Chapter 3

I wasn't dead. That was the first thing I realized three days later.

The second was that I was deaf in my left ear, and a chunk of my scalp was missing.

The third was that my rescuer wasn't Kuthian military, nor was he from the embassy.

"You are very lucky," the man said in stiff but precise English. "Another inch over, and your brain would be leaking out."

I was lying on a cot under a canvas tent. A beam of sunlight cut through a tear in the fabric, illuminating the dust motes dancing in the air. I tried to lift a hand to my head, but it was strapped down.

"Do not move," he said, his hand pressing gently on my shoulder. "You have a fever. The wound is infected, and we are short on antibiotics."

I finally got a good look at his face. He had deep-set eyes, dark skin, and a hawkish nose. A scar ran from below his left eye to his jaw. He wore camouflage but no military insignia.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"My name is Adam Noor," he said. "I am an enemy of the Freedom Front."

An enemy of the Freedom Front?

I closed my eyes, the last moments flooding back: the helicopter, Edward's back as he protected Clara, the explosion, the heat, and the warm trickle of blood down my face.

"The embassy... what happened to everyone else?" I asked.

Adam's expression was grim. "The government army withdrew from the west district yesterday. Your embassy was leveled."

My heart sank. "Survivors?"

"We only found you," he said, handing me a cup of water. "In the rubble on the roof. You were holding this."

He opened his palm. Inside was a twisted, mangled gold ring, my wedding ring. I had pulled it from my finger, intending to throw it from the roof, but had clenched it in my fist instead.

"Your husband?" Adam asked.

"He was," I said.

He raised an eyebrow but didn't press.

I learned later that Adam was the second son of a northern tribal leader. He had studied in Moscow and spoke four languages.

His clan had a blood feud with the Freedom Front but didn't trust the government either, maintaining a precarious independence in the three-way conflict.

I spent two months in his camp. The wound on my head healed slowly, leaving a jagged scar that ran from my hairline to my eyebrow. My left ear was completely useless, and the hearing in my right was damaged.

My left ear was completely useless, and the hearing in my right was damaged. Unless someone raised their voice, I couldn't catch a word they were saying.

Adam had an old woman from the tribe tend to me, but he himself was rarely around.

"Are you avoiding me?" I asked him one day.

He was cleaning a Kalashnikov, and he looked up. "I am considering what to do with you."

"Do with me?" I asked.

"You are an Kuthian," he said. "Your husband is a diplomat. Your government is currently negotiating with the Freedom Front for the release of their foreign hostages. If they learn you are in our hands..."

"I have no value," I said flatly. "I was abandoned, remember?"

He stared at me, his amber eyes seeming to see right through me. After a long moment, he put down the rifle and pulled a newspaper from his pocket. "This is from three days ago. It came up from the south."

It was the international edition of the New York Times. On the front page was a grainy photo of Edward helping Clara off a plane, their faces etched with the weary relief of survivors.

The headline read: [Kuthian Personnel Successfully Evacuated from Briaca; Diplomat Edward Linfield Praised for Valor.]

I stared at the picture, seeing Edward's hand resting on Clara's waist and her wind-tousled hair against his shoulder. A smaller caption below read: [Geologist Clara Whitman returns safely with vital intelligence, securing a major strategic asset for the United States.]

"Your husband," Adam said, "is a hero now."

I folded the newspaper neatly and handed it back to him. My fingers were trembling, but my voice was steady. "He's not my husband anymore. In my country, divorce requires signatures, but here..."

I pointed to the scar on my head. "Evelyn Lane is already dead. She died in that rubble."

Adam was silent for a long time. Outside, I could hear the shouts of soldiers training and the distant rumble of artillery.

When he spoke again, his voice was barely a whisper, "Do you want revenge?"

I looked up at the tear in the tent's ceiling. The sun was shining directly on my face, warm and comforting, like an embrace.

"No," I said. "I want to live. And I want to live better than they do."