The Verona Kidnapping

Prologue

ZAGROS MOUNTAINS, IRAQ

AZAD Barzani looked across the valley.

From his perch several thousand feet above the valley’s floor, he felt like he could see eternity.

The ridges stretched out in a long line of undulating terrain features culminating with snowcapped peaks far to the east. The lush hollow was blanketed in green and crisscrossed with roads and dotted with settlements.

The mountains straddled three countries and stretched from horizon to horizon.

Normally, a sense of tranquility seemed to radiate from the ancient stones as Azad guarded his flock of sheep.

Not today.

Today, a column of armored vehicles waited at the base of his mountain.

Azad waited with them. This was easier said than done.

As a boy, he’d constantly been in motion.

Even if he was forced to sit still, a foot shuffled, a finger tapped, or an eye blinked.

Like the torrents that cascaded down the Shevi waterfall, Azad could not keep still.

His father claimed that this was because he lacked the discipline necessary for stillness.

His mother believed he was imbued with the wild spirit of the mountains themselves.

Azad thought that both might be true.

Or neither.

Most days, Azad didn’t give much thought to his propensity for perpetual motion, but today his agha, or tribal chief, had given him a man’s job and Azad intended to live up to the newfound responsibility even if it required him to remain motionless in order to do so.

Though he was in his early twenties, Azad knew he had yet to prove himself to his elders.

Hopefully this would change today.

“Maybe we should go back.”

Azad turned from the awe-inspiring vista to his companion, who was considerably less so.

Rizgar had grown up in the same village near the Barzan valley, but the two boys couldn’t have been more different.

Unlike the craggy slopes, rocky passes, and hardscrabble mountain trails, Rizgar didn’t reflect the hardness of his homeland.

Instead, his features were almost delicate.

Dark, brooding eyes, a perfectly shaped chin, and straight white teeth.

To Azad’s eye, his friend had always seemed like a prince from a bedtime story who had been mistakenly switched for a herdsman.

But appearances could be deceiving.

In the same manner in which Azad’s rough-and-tumble exterior disguised a surprisingly soft heart, Rizgar’s aristocratic bearing concealed a ruthless intellect.

The young men had been inseparable since childhood, and in the way of those who grew up in the austere world embraced by nomadic herders, they’d experienced hardship and trauma early and often in their short lives.

Individually, the pair might have seemed ill-suited for the task they’d been given, but together they made a formidable team.

A characteristic the tribal chief had probably had in mind when he’d assigned them this task.

“Not yet,” Azad said, pointing to the mountain’s other occupants. “The column’s lead vehicles still haven’t left the foothills.”

Rizgar sighed.

Loudly.

But he didn’t push the matter. A bleating sheep seemed to voice its agreement for the slender man’s plan, but Azad wasn’t swayed.

If there were any constants in these mountains it was that the summers were hot, winters bitterly cold, and sheep always ready to return to their pastures.

That Rizgar wanted to follow in the flock’s hoofprints wasn’t a sign of fear.

In fact, it was quite the opposite.

A battle was imminent and Rizgar wanted to fight.

But that wasn’t the chieftain’s plan.

“Do you really think the Americans will come?”

Azad looked at his friend. “You don’t?”

Rizgar shrugged. “Americans love to talk. In the mountains, talk is cheap.”

Azad picked up the binoculars at his feet and swept the Iraqi armored column consisting of T-72 main battle tanks, brDM-2 amphibious scout cars, and BMP tracked armored personnel carriers.

Nothing had changed, but he hadn’t really expected to see anything different.

Looking at the column gave him an excuse not to make eye contact with his friend.

Rizgar could always tell when he was lying.

“They did more than talk when Hussein invaded Kuwait.”

Rizgar laughed.

It was a dry chuckle.

The sound of an old man scoffing at a boy’s naivete.

“To us, these mountains are everything. To the Americans, we are as insignificant as a sharp stone beneath a ram’s hoof.

Does he notice it when he’s standing on the rock?

Sure. But he’s forgotten it by the time he takes his next step.

For a moment, the Iraqis were a sharp stone beneath America’s feet.

By now, the Yankees are on to the next step and the step after that. ”

Azad frowned, glad the binoculars masked his expression.

The notion of his friend as a misplaced prince was from more than just Rizgar’s looks.

The other man thought deeply in a way that he didn’t.

For Azad, the course of action was clear.

The American president had encouraged the Kurds to revolt.

His father and other tribal leaders had taken the man at his word.

Fighters across Kurdistan had risen up to throw off the chains of oppression that had enslaved their people since Hussein had seized power in 1979.

The Kurdish warriors had done their part.

Now the American president needed to do his.

Preferably before the column of mechanized infantry setting up at the base of the mountain assaulted the Kurdish fighters’ dug-in positions.

Azad’s clan knew every inch of the countless goat paths that traversed the range.

If the Iraqis decided to pursue the fighters into their home turf, they would pay a heavy price.

Hardened mountain men waiting with RPGs, PKM machine guns, and Kalashnikov rifles lurked behind every pile of stones.

Azad’s clan would fight to the last man.

And they would lose.

Azad wasn’t a tactician, but he understood the concept of attrition.

The Iraqi army possessed more men, vehicles, and powerful artillery.

Without American aid, the fighters would be ground to dust beneath the weight of the advancing armored personnel carriers and tanks.

This was why the Kurds had never mounted a serious attempt to overthrow the Baathists before now.

The Peshmerga were some of the world’s fiercest fighters, but they needed help to offset the balance of force.

Help from American air power.

“Hear that?” Rizgar said.

He did. A deep whump, whump, whump echoed across the mountain. The sound seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere. Though he’d never experienced anything quite like the noise, Azad understood what the reverberation signified.

“The Americans,” Rizgar said. “They’ve come!”

Azad’s friend was smiling. Almost ready to dance.

The sheep had other ideas. Two bolted for the perceived safety of the underbrush, voicing their displeasure.

The third, a headstrong ram, sprang toward a craggy cliff face that was more shale than rock.

The scree gave way a heartbeat later, sending the prized animal tumbling into space.

“No!” Azad screamed.

“It’s okay,” Rizgar said, clapping him on the back. “One ram is a small price to pay for our freedom.”

“You don’t understand,” Azad said, turning to confront his friend’s smiling face. “Those are helicopters.”

Rizgar’s grin drained away, replaced by a puzzled expression. “So?”

“The Americans don’t have helicopters. Not here.”

“Then who…”

As if in answer, a pair of insectoid aircraft rounded the slope to Rizgar’s left.

Azad instantly recognized their distinct profile.

Soviet-made Mi-24 Hind gunships. The fearsome aircraft were armed with an autocannon and could carry an array of rockets and missiles as well as dismounted infantry soldiers.

Hinds had wreaked havoc on the mujahideen fighters during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and were nearly impervious to small-arms fire.

Absent shoulder-fired missiles, of which the Kurds had none, the flying tanks were almost impossible to shoot down.

The aircraft were also the Iraqi army’s preferred close air support platform.

The lead helicopter soared over the stalled armored column before pointing its bulbous nose upslope.

Upslope toward where Azad’s father and the rest of the village lay in wait.

Suddenly, he understood why he and Rizgar had been given the task of monitoring the collection of mechanized vehicles.

It hadn’t been because the chieftain was worried about a surprise Iraqi ground assault.

The pair had been directed to a section of mountain that would keep the younger men from danger. Danger of the sort that was even now streaking from the dual rocket pods slung beneath the helicopters’ stubby wings.

“No,” Rizgar said as the ground shook from detonating rockets. “No!”

“Come on,” Azad said, grabbing his friend’s shoulder, “we need to hide.”

“Hide?” Rizgar said, ripping from his grasp. “We must fight.”

“There’s no fighting those demons. That’s why we’re here.”

As if to punctuate his point, a single canister tumbled from the lead Hind’s underbelly. Azad tracked the munition’s progress, waiting for the thunderous explosion that would accompany the detonating high explosives. But when the metal cylinder broke in two, it wasn’t to unleash fire or shrapnel.

Instead, yellowish-brown mist smudged the blue sky.

“But our fathers—”

“Want us to live,” Azad said as the rationale to his strange assignment suddenly became clear. “Don’t you see? The older men didn’t believe they could trust the Americans, so the chieftain sent us away from the battle.”

“Why? We’re warriors. We should be standing with the others.”

“We are warriors. Maybe the last of our tribe.”

The dirty brown cloud settled among the trees as it drifted earthward. The gunships came around for another pass, and a second canister fell from the trail aircraft. Like the first, it broke apart midair, releasing more yellowish-brown mist.

“What is that?”

“Gas,” Azad said as the final piece of the puzzle clicked into place. “The Baathists are poisioning our people.”

“What will we do?”

“Remember. Remember and take our revenge.”