‘A nature writer,’ the man said, sounding enthused. ‘I’ve been out here for three months, keeping a diary. I’m hoping to turn it into a book. Did you know some of the rarest snakes in the world are found right here on this island? It’s a real hotbed. I’ve been searching for them, recording them.’
‘No. I didn’t know that.’ Ryker turned away from the man, hoping he could avoid entering into a lengthy discussion about searching for rare snakes. He’d never trusted writers. Never trusted anyone who took pleasure in writing everything down, recording it. Making it permanent. He wanted to leave as little evidence of his existence as he could.
‘So what do you do?’ the man asked.
‘Whatever it takes,’ Ryker said, staring straight ahead.
Then he shut his eyes, memories of the Red Cobra still sloshing in his mind as he drifted off to sleep.
CHAPTER 8
Nineteen years earlier
Anna Abayev was nearly fourteen the day she was introduced to Colonel Kankava, a beast of a man who changed her forever. She’d been living in Georgia for five years, a period of real stability for her family, if not for the country in which she was living.
Contrary to popular belief of those who knew of her, Anna wasn’t Russian by birth but was actually Serbian. Her Russian father had met a young local woman while working in the former Yugoslavia in the early eighties, a number of years before the country had torn itself apart in civil war. Anna had never known her mother, she’d died during childbirth. Anna had always felt guilt over that, even though her father never made any suggestion that he blamed his daughter for her mother’s passing.
Anna’s father had long despised his home country’s then communist regime. His dismissal of his own people was a move which had seen him gather many enemies in the country he called home. They’d spent time in countless countries during her early childhood, always on the move to stay safe and to allow her father to take on jobs to keep providing. It was to Georgia that Anna had the strongest affiliation.
The country, newly independent following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, had been going through a period of immense turmoil. The economy was in free-fall and rival factions vied for control of the country leading to various bloody coups and internal conflicts. Hardly the perfect environment for bringing up a young family.
Despite this, Georgia was the place – perhaps due to familiarity as much as anything else – that Anna thought of as home.
Although her father had amassed sufficient money for them to live securely during the preceding years, without his needing to work and travel as he had done during Anna’s earlier childhood, resources were running thin and it was becoming more and more difficult for him to turn down the offers for his specialist work. Plus, having been in one place for so long, he was becoming increasingly paranoid that the wolves from his past were closing in.
Anna had sensed for a number of weeks that something would have to give.
‘But I could come with you?’ she protested as her father led her by the hand up the tree-lined driveway on a snowy winter’s morning. The crooked branches on the leafless trees silhouetted against the moody sky made the entire scene sinister. With each step they took, Anna grew increasingly terrified of what lay beyond the walls of the crumbling blue-and-white-painted mansion, where her father was sending her to work as a domestic maid.
‘No, Anna,’ her father said, sternly but with warmth. ‘You need to stay here and go to school. You’re getting big now. Your education is important. And you can earn good money here while I’m gone. The Colonel will pay you to help the soldiers.’
Her father had explained that Kankava was a former colonel in the Soviet Army. A native Georgian who, following independence, had aligned himself with the Mkhedrioni paramilitary group who were vying for control of the country. Despite the Mkhedrioni succeeding in overthrowing the government in a violent and bloody coup d’état in 1992, further in-fighting led to their eventual outlawing in 1995. Kankava had taken that as his opportunity to retire and set up a small charitable foundation for wounded war veterans. He bought a once-grand eighteenth-century mansion, renovated it, and opened the doors to some forty veterans who shared the same sympathetic nationalist views as Kankava.
Anna had no interest in the veterans or their politics. She just wanted to be with her father. ‘But why can’t you stay too?’ Anna stopped walking. ‘You said you’d always look after me. Protect me.’
A tear escaped Anna’s eye. It began to roll down her cheek but stopped after a couple of seconds.
‘I can’t, Anna. It’s become too... dangerous.’
Her father didn’t elaborate and Anna didn’t probe. She knew her father’s business put him in a dangerous position, that he had many enemies, but he never talked about it in any detail. They had come to an unspoken understanding that she’d never ask and he’d never tell. See no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil. Or something like that.
‘When will you be back?’ she asked.
‘As soon as I can.’
‘But what does that mean? Days? Weeks? Months? Years?’
‘It means as soon as I can.’
Anna didn’t push him. It really didn’t matter what she said in protest. He’d already made his decision. And it was final. She knew that.
They continued walking. Anna tried her best to hold back the tears that were welling.
When they reached the over-sized doors to the house – bare oak that was crumbling at the corners – her father reached out and rang the bell.
After a few seconds, the door creaked open. Beyond the fatigue-clad man who stood in the entrance, Anna caught sight of the wood-panelled walls and military paraphernalia that adorned the interior. The smell of the home that wafted out of the open door made her nose tingle and she cringed: furniture polish, boiled vegetables. Bleach to overpower urine and faeces, and whatever else. It smelled of... oldness.
Death and decay. That was all that lay within the walls of that house, Anna decided.
Anna looked at the man who had opened the door. One arm of his military fatigues hung clumsily by his side. An amputee. He was grey-haired. Young Anna had no idea how old he was. He could have been anything from fifty to ninety. To her he was simply old, that was all she knew. A thick beard covered his face reaching up close to his eyes, which were steel-grey. He stared down at Anna and the sides of his mouth turned upward as if in a knowing smile.
‘This must be Anna,’ he said, after shaking her father’s hand.
‘Yes. My precious Anna,’ her father said, ruffling her hair like she was still five years old. ‘You take good care of her for me.’
‘Oh, I will.’
‘Anna, this is Colonel Kankava. He’s in charge here. Anything you ever need, you ask him.’
‘Come on, Anna, let me show you around.’
The Colonel extended his hand. Anna looked at her father then back at the face of Kankava whom she already detested. But she did her best to bury her true feelings and took his hand. He led her inside. She turned to her father who was still standing on the step outside.