Shadow Puppets Read Free Page A

Bean.
    “As long as you have to look out for me,” said Petra, “you won’t die.”
    “So you’re coming along with me, increasing our risk of being identified and allowing Achilles to get his two worst nemeses with one well-placed bomb, in order to save my life?”
    “That’s right, genius boy,” said Petra.
    “I don’t even like you, you know.” At this moment, he was annoyed enough that the statement was almost true.
    “As long as you love me, I don’t mind.”
    And he suspected that her lie, too, was almost true.

2
SURIYAWONG’S KNIFE
    From: Salaam%[email protected]
To: Watcher%[email protected]
Re: What you asked
    My Dear Mr. Wiggin/Locke,
    Philosophically speaking, all guests in a Muslim home are treated as sacred visitors sent by God and under his care. In practice, for two extremely talented, famous, and unpredictable persons who are hated by one powerful non-Muslim figure and aided by another, this is a very dangerous part of the world, particularly if they seek to remain both hidden and free. I do not believe they will be foolish enough to seek refuge in a Muslim country.
    I regret to tell you, however, that your interest and mine do not coincide on this matter, so despite our occasional cooperation in the past, I most certainly will not tell you whether I encounter them or hear news of them.
    Your accomplishments are many, and I have helped you in the past and will in the future. But when Ender led us in fighting the Formics these friends were beside me. Where were you?
    Respectfully yours,
Alai
     
    Suriyawong opened his orders and was not surprised. He had led missions inside China before, but always for the purpose of sabotage or intelligence gathering, or “involuntary high officer force reduction,” Peter’s mostly-ironic euphemism for assassination. The fact that this assignment had been to capture rather than kill suggested that it was a person who was not Chinese. Suriyawong had rather hoped it might be one of the leaders of a conquered country—the deposed prime minister of India, for instance, or the captive prime minister of Suriyawong’s native Thailand.
    He had even entertained, briefly, the thought that it might be one of his own family.
    But it made sense that Peter was taking this risk, not for someone of mere political or symbolic value, but for the enemy who had put the world into this strange and desperate situation.
    Achilles. Erstwhile gimp-legged cripple, frequent murderer, fulltime psychotic, and warmonger extraordinaire, Achilles had a knack for finding out just what the leaders of nations aspired for and promising them a way to get it. So far he had convinced a faction in the Russian government, the heads of the Indian and Pakistani governments, and various leaders in other lands to do his bidding. When Russia found him a liability, he had fled to India where he already had friends waiting for him. When India and Pakistan were both doing exactly what he had arranged for them to do, he betrayed them using his connections inside China.
    The next move, of course, would have been to betray his friendsin China and jump ahead of them to a position of even greater power. But the ruling coterie in China was every bit as cynical as Achilles and recognized his pattern of behavior, so not all that long after he had made China the world’s only effective superpower, they arrested him.
    If the Chinese were so smart, why wasn’t Peter? Hadn’t Peter himself said, “When Achilles is most useful and loyal to you, that is when he has most certainly betrayed you”? So why was he thinking he could use this monstrous boy?
    Or had Achilles managed to convince Peter, despite all the proof that Achilles kept no promises, that this time he would remain loyal to an ally?
    I should kill him, thought Suriyawong. In fact, I will. I will report to Peter that Achilles died in the chaos of the rescue. Then the world will be a safer place.
    It’s not as if Suriyawong hadn’t killed