Princessa

Chapter 3  A Knight's Gambit

After the meal, Andy decides to walk home, through the chill night air, trying to clear his head, make some sense of it all. Feeling the cobblestone of the dark empty streets of the capitol under his feet. Listening to the echoing sound of his own footsteps. But he’s floating, barely feeling the chill mist surrounding the sight of his own winter breath. And yet aware of being able to see and sense everything all at once as if for the first time. Or the last, he doesn’t know which.

The muffled sound of taxis honking their horns in the distance, the stone and brick and wood of the buildings appearing sharp and distinct, even in the mist. And the names of the little shops, even the mist itself looks alive and moving graceful in the wind, like all part of the same cosmic dance. It’s exhilarating purely totally, and he wants to enjoy it absorb it and let all the myriad sensations sink in.

He’s feeling an absolute release from any bonds, and a freedom like he’s never felt before. Like a helium balloon slipped from a child’s hand in the park and just floating away by itself above everything. It’s magical serene intoxicating. Like good hashish, he thinks, but more powerful more intractable. Like he can do anything he wants to, whatever and get away with it, anything whatsoever. It won’t make any difference, ever again. He’s locked in fated zoned in inextricably sealed. And nothing at all matters now.

Like all the young boys in his country, he used to dream of growing up to be king one day. And like all the young boys, he’d given that up, become practical, joined the army. Now he’s just met the minister of defense, who is somehow related to the king, or at least is his chief confidant at any rate. And he has this mission, to take out the leader of the free world. They trusted him to do that; they believed in him, enough to give him this responsibility, only the wildest and boldest move his tiny little country had ever made in all their long struggling history. And it was all all of it in his hands; the whole future…of all these people, this place, and everyone, was on him. Things were looking up of a sudden, out of the blue.

But it wasn’t like the old general gave him any impression that they expected him back. This was more like a one-way ticket sort a deal. And why him, of all people. There were others they could’ve picked, older, more experienced. But none more, what was the word.... clever, he thinks. Or quick-thinking, able to think and act so quickly on your feet. Like racing full speed and suddenly changing directions, that nobody’d ever guess or be able to follow. Like a rabbit running full out and then suddenly stopping and turning and no one could ever catch you.

Well, that’s something, maybe; and… after all, he was their top marksman, by far, had the highest marks ever in target shooting. That was true enough. Could’ve even gone to the Olympics probably, maybe medalled in the biathlon. He would’ve liked that, would’ve been fun… yeah, some other time maybe, he thinks. But then…this other stuff, like his contact, Smet. What’s that all about, some kind of shake up at the top, or what; very strange.

Smet’s head of secret service now, the king’s bodyguards. And had been the chief of training at special forces when Andy was there, a couple of years ago. He liked Smet; a rugged old dyed in the wool war horse who had one focus and one focus only, the mission first, above all above everything. But Smet’s also the boss, or his boss anyway, why would they send an old dinosaur like that out on a field mission, albeit an extremely important one. And why had this mission come from Petros, minister of defense, and not Smet, head of security. Strange goings-on. He wonders about that.

Was the old man going to be there to watch over him, make sure he was okay, and that everything went off as it should. Or to clean up afterward if something went wrong, to eliminate any trace of evidence that could be linked back to them; like him, for instance. Just stuff y’have to think about, or consider anyway. But there was something else too. Something overshadowing all the other stuff somehow; making it hard to keep focused, to concentrate on these other things. Something Petros had said.

He turns the corner and sees the gleaming colored lights of the palace a few blocks off to the left The soft-hued pink and blues amidst the searching white. Like Disneyland, thinks Andy, though he’d never been there. But yeah… that was it, something Petros had said about meeting his niece. The amazingly beautiful Maria who was the most talked about kid in the country. At sixteen her photos were all over the magazines in Eastern Europe, had been for years, ever since she was a kid. That stunningly pretty young girl who was somehow the general’s niece, somehow the king’s granddaughter; and the most photographed royal, or royal wannabe, in this part of the world.

She’s at university now, even at such a young age, and had just been arrested for leading a student protest against the king’s policies. What a kid, and what a wild time in such an otherwise peaceful quiet out of the way little country. His footsteps lead him near the perimeter of the palace grounds. He knows this place, had walked by here often during his stays in the city. Had even been here once on a field trip when he was a boy in boarding school, and again once after that, a couple of years later when he was a decorated young soldier.

But why go here now. Just to think, just to sort things out. It was a test, he thinks to himself, like everything else. The meeting with the old general, in a public place like that. They just wanted to see how he’d react, how he carried himself. And he’d passed their test, he thinks, smiling to himself. Dazzled them with his arrogance and unpredictability, blown them right out of the water, like he always did. Or at rate, they hadn’t thrown him overboard as sometimes happened. Well… let’s see what they think of me now.

At a dark corner toward the rear of the buildings he takes off his coat and drops it to the ground. Then puts his hand on the iron grating and quickly scales the fence, hurls himself over and drops soundlessly down onto the soft turf. Hmm, he’s on their grass now, on the king’s lawn of  the king’s palace. And that brings him back to his senses. Must be some sort of crime, and feeling right at home now; spying is his business, crimes are a part of the job.

He moves through the shadows to the side of one of the buildings that flank the rear of the ancient palace. Then quickly quietly crawls up an old-fashioned drain pipe up to window levels and then higher, up to more windows and finally up to roof tops. Easy enough, no one around in the cold dark silence; and he’s good at this sort of thing, very good. Across the ceramic tile roof, like a cat burglar, calm, unhurried, mindful that in the foggy mist, one slip and you die. Nothing to grab onto between here and the dew-covered grass so far down below. That’s something to keep in the back of your mind as your ears strain for sounds and your eyes struggle with the shadows and the light.

But all this is natural to him, things he’d often done as a kid, even before joining the army, the special training, the elite status he’s now attained, even for such a young man. Just take your time, he thinks, do it right, blot out everything but getting across this roof, this building, crossing to the next, reaching the objective.

There’s only one light on in the windows of the residential quarters of the main palace building. He moves toward it, like a moth or a night creature and then hangs from the rooftop by his fingertips just briefly, to look down and around at the grounds far below. Just to do that because you aren’t supposed to. Without a sound, he drops down to a balcony. Then edges along the crevices of the cold stone walls, hugging body weight onto toes, fingers pressed into the mortar between the stone. Past a few more windows, finally to the one with the light.

It’s shuttered by old iron grates which are chained and locked with a shiny new padlock. That’s odd, all out of place here in the midst of all this reverent antiquity. He opens it and accidentally drops the lock on the stone casement where it rings out echoes into the dead night air. Strange, his hands are shaking; that’s never happened before, he thinks, looking at them objectively, like they’re just some tools you used on the job.

And even though it’s cold out, slick, even though he’s breaking into his king’s royal residence; things like that shouldn’t matter, shouldn’t make any difference. They never had before. He silently opens the window lock, pulls open one side of the glass panes and pushes the heavy drape aside to take a quick glance around the room before stepping in, out of the dark. It is all so different now, inside, in here. So warm calm tranquil after all that crawling along the cold wet rooftops controlling your breathing on the lookout for guards with automatic weapons, or cameras, trip wires. All the sort of things you have to bypass to get into the places they send you.

He sits on the edge of the bed and tries not to think, just look around. Be captivated by the splendidly decorous old palace bedroom, all the pretty fabrics and colors, the plush carpet, tapestry, portraits on the walls, the brilliant chandelier hanging from the high gilded ceiling, and the big solid wooden door with the fancy scroll work and heavy iron hinges. He barely notices when a young girl wrapped up in a robe and towel walks out of the steamy bathroom. “What do you want” she asks.

“Shssh” he puts his finger up to his lips and whispers “I’ve come to rescue you.”“Huh?” The girl is even prettier than her photographs. Her presence makes the whole room warm and glowing, outshining everything else.  She comes over and stands in front of him “are you one of the guards?” Andy smiles and shakes his head “secret service, come to set you free.” “You’re crazy” she says “I’m going to bed, okay?”

“Come with me” he whispers, strangely inviting. “Where?” she asks him. “America.” The young girl scrunches up her eyebrows “why?” He pauses and looks at her warm soft face “it’ll be fun.” She sits down on the bed beside him and starts to dry her hair with the towel. “Nice clothes” she says, noticing his fancy suit, all wet and soiled now “Milan, huh?” “No, well…almost. Just, outside there.”

The girl isn’t sure what this charming young fellow is up to. But it’s been so boring being locked in her room these past few days. She doesn’t much like it here anyway, preferring the wild excitement and freedom of university life. And to be locked up with guards at the door and escorting her just to go down to the kitchen to get a snack or something to drink; that kind of stuff makes her angry makes her want to get even with them for doing that to her, even though her “house arrest” is more formality than anything else.

She decides to get dressed and go with this crazy fellow. If for nothing else, than just to get out of the house, as it were, just to teach them a lesson. Once ready she starts for the door but Andy takes a hold of her sleeve and leads her over to the window. “This way” he says, smiling at her.