Jean-Christophe Grangé - The Empire Of The Wolves

She said nothing, letting the rain mark the passage of time. Then, her voice muffled by her cape, she replied in French, "I want to know who I am. I've lost my memory"

"What?"

"I was arrested by the police in Paris. They made me undergo special mental conditioning. I'm amnesiac."

"That's impossible."

"Nothing's impossible in our world. You know that as well as I do.”

“You… can't remember anything?"

"Everything I know, I've found out for myself"

"But why come back? Why don't you just vanish?"

"It's too late for that. The Wolves are after me. They know my new face. I want to negotiate."

He carefully put down the flower, with its plastic hood, among the jerry cans and bags of leaf mold. He glanced at her sharply. "Have you still got it?"

Sema did not answer.

He asked again, "Have you still got the dope?"

"I'm the one asking the questions," she replied. "Who's behind this operation?"

"We never know any names. That's the rule."

"The rules have been broken. When I went out on my own, I overturned them. They must have questioned you. Some names must have been mentioned. Who commissioned that consignment?"

Kürsat hesitated. The rain slapped down on his hood, streaming across his face. "Ismail Kudseyi."

The name struck her memory-Kudseyi, the grand master-but she pretended not to remember. "Who's that?"

"I can't believe you've lost that many marbles."

"Who is he?" she repeated.

"The most important baba in Istanbul," he said, lowering his voice, quieter than the rain. "He was setting up an alliance with the Uzbeks and the Russians. The consignment was a trial run. A test. A symbol. It vanished along with you."

She smiled through the crystal drops.

"Things must be rosy between the partners."

"War is imminent. But Kudseyi doesn't give a damn. What he's obsessed about is you. Finding you again. It isn't even a question of money. It's a matter of honor. He can't admit that he's been betrayed by one of his own. We are his Wolves. His creatures."

"His creatures?"

The instruments of the cause. We were educated, indoctrinated, brought up as Wolves. When you were born, you were nobody. A lousy peasant raising sheep. Like me. Like the others. The camps gave us everything. Faith. Power. Knowledge."

Sema needed to find out the essential information, but she could not resist digging for more facts, further details. "Why are we speaking in French?"

A smile inched its way over Kürsat's chubby face. A smile of pride. "We were chosen. In the 1980s, the refs, the chiefs, decided to set up an underground army, with its officers and elite soldiers. Wolves who could mingle with the highest social strata."

"Was it Kudseyi's idea?"

"He started the project off, but with everyone's approval. Emissaries from his foundation were sent to the clubs in Anatolia. They were looking for the most gifted, most promising children. The idea was to provide them with the best possible education. It was a patriotic project. Knowledge and power were being given back to the real Turks, to the children of Anatolia, instead of the bourgeois scum of Istanbul…"

"And we were chosen?"

The pride swelled even further. "Yes, and sent to Galatasaray, along with a few others, thanks to grants from the foundation. How can you have forgotten all that?"

Sema did not answer. Kürsat went on, in an increasingly exalting voice. "We were twelve years old. We were already little baskans, chiefs of our region. First we spent a year in a training camp. When we got to Galatasaray, we already knew how to use an assault rifle. We knew entire sections of Nine Lights by heart. Then suddenly we were surrounded by decadents who listened to rock music, smoked cannabis, imitated Europeans-fucking Communists… To survive, we stuck together, Sema. Like brother and sister. The two bumpkins from Anatolia. The two paupers with their pathetic grants… But no one knew how dangerous we were. We were already Wolves. Fighters who had infiltrated a forbidden world. So as to struggle all the better against that Red scum! Tanri türk'ü korusunr!*"

"God save the Turks!"

Karsat raised his fist, with his pinkie and index fingers raised. He was doing his utmost to look like a fanatic, but he just came across as being what he always had been: a sweet, awkward child who had been conditioned into violence and hatred.

Motionless among the props and foliage, she asked. "What happened then?"

"For me, a science degree. For you, the modern languages department at the Bogaziçi University. At the end of the 1980s, the Wolves took over the dope market. They needed specialists. Our roles had already been set down. Chemistry for me, transportation for you. There were many more Wolves in high places. Diplomats, CEOs…"

"Like Azer Akarsa."

Kürsat jumped. "How do you know that name?"

"He was on my trail in Paris."

He shook the rain off himself like a hippopotamus. "They sent out the worst one of them all. If he's looking for you, then he'll find you.”

“I'm the one who's looking for him. Where is he?"

"How should I know?"

The Gardener's voice rang false. At that instant, she was pricked by a suspicion. She had almost forgotten her side to the story. Who had betrayed her? Who had told Akarsa that she was hiding in Gurdilek's baths? But she kept that question for later…

The chemist continued, slightly too hastily "Do you still have it? Do you still have the dope?"

"I've told you. I've lost my memory"

"If you want to negotiate, you can't come back empty-handed. Your only chance is to-"

She suddenly asked, "Why did I do that? Why did I try to double-cross everyone?"

"You alone know that."

"I involved you in my scheme. I put you in danger. I must have explained my reasons."

He gestured vaguely "You never accepted your destiny. You were always saying that they'd forced us to obey. That we had no choice. But what choice did we have? Without them, we'd still be shepherds. Bumpkins at the far end of Anatolia."

"If I'm a drug dealer, then I have money. Why didn't I just disappear? Why did I steal the heroin?"

Kürsat sneered. "You wanted more. You wanted to screw them. To set one clan against the other. This mission gave you a chance to get your revenge. When the Uzbeks and the Russians get here, it'll be mayhem."

The rain slowed. Night was falling. Kürsat gradually sank into the shadows, as if he was fading away. Above them, the domes of the mosque looked fluorescent.

The idea of betrayal forced its way back. She now had to go to the bitter end. She had to get this over with. "What about you?" she asked coldly. "How come you're still alive? They didn't come to question you?"

"Of course they did."

And you told them nothing?"

The chemist seemed to shiver. "I had nothing to say. I knew nothing. All I did was to transform the heroin in Paris and come back home. Then no one heard from you again. Nobody knew where you were. Especially not me." His voice was trembling.

She suddenly felt sorry for him. Kürsat, my Kürsat, how have you survived so long?

The fat man went on at once: "They trust me, Sema. Really they do. I'd done my part of the job. I didn't hear from you again. After you'd hidden in Gurdilek's place, I thought "

"Who mentioned Gurdilek? Was it me?" She now understood. Kürsat knew everything but had revealed only part of the truth to Akarsa. He had saved his skin by providing him with her Paris address but had said nothing about her new face. Thus had her blood brother negotiated with his own conscience.

The chemist stood there for a moment, his mouth agape, as though dragged down by the weight of his chin. The next moment, he stuck his hand beneath a plastic sheet. Sema aimed her Glock from beneath her cape and fired. The Gardener crashed back between the shoots and the jars.