bobbing into existence in the belly of the overcast. A parachute flare, a big one.
Randi wasn't particularly concerned. The blowing snow and sea smoke went opaque, absorbing the flare light, and the winds swept the flare to the south and away from her. It simply proved the point that they were actively in pursuit.
In a way, it was almost a favorable thing. It opened up possibilities. If there were men out here on the ice after her, there was the chance she might be able to ambush and kill one of them for his clothes and weapon.
Randi couldn't count on it, though. They would have seen Kropodkin. They would know what she was capable of. They would be afraid of her now, and their fear would make them more cautious and more dangerous.
Something else was certain. If Jon was anywhere in the vicinity, he'd know something was up. If he realized a pursuit was under way, he would know who was being pursued, and he would come for her.
Randi paused in her in-place jogging, an odd random thought darting into her tired mind.
Jon would come for her.
Always at the core of her internal bitterness toward Smith there had been the sense that he had not been there for her fiance or her sister, that somehow he had not done enough to save them. And yet, from all she had learned and judged of the man in their random encounters over the past few years, Randi knew, without the faintest shadow of a doubt, that if Jon Smith realized she was in trouble, he would come to her aid, against all odds or orders and without regard for his own life. That was simply who he was.
Would he, could he, have done any less for Mike or Sophie?
She lacked the time to ponder the past now. She thought she could make out faint probing fingers of light in the storm. Powerful hand lanterns were panning the snow-the hunting party from the camp, tracking her. And the cold was gnawing at her, triggering an uncontrollable burst of shivering. She had to move again. Randi faced into the wind cascading over the ridgeline and started to climb once more. Maybe she could find an avalanche she could push down on those bastards.
Chapter Forty
The North Face, Wednesday Island
Smith flexed an all-environment chemical glow stick, breaking the inner capsule. Shaking its green luminescence to life, he clipped it to an outer cargo pocket of his snow smock. He could only hope that none of the Spetsnaz force had a line of sight on them. For this next evolution they had to be able to see.
A second pale green specter materialized in the swirling snow as Valentina lit off another chemical light. In the combination of the two glows they could just make out the irregular edge of a glacial precipice a few yards away.
They had reached the interface. They could descend no further on the broken, tumbled ice of the glacier. They must cross to the solid rock of West Peak, if the mountain would accept them.
Smith shrugged off his pack and drew a flare and an ice screw from its side pouches. Kneeling, he cranked the screw into the surface of the glacier, angling it away from the edge. Clipping his safety line to the anchor, he stood and edged carefully to the unstable shoulder of the ice. Striking the flare's igniter, he pitched the hissing red ball of flame into the black void below. He watched as it bounced and sputtered down the edge of the jumbled icefall to hang up on a ledge perhaps 120 feet down. In the ruddy glare he could make out the darkness of basalt, the peak facing. But beyond the ledge was the void of another, deeper drop-off.
"The photomaps were right." Smith lifted his voice over the wind. "There is a ledge down there."
Valentina edged to his side, her hand on the safety line. "It's not really all that much of a ledge, is it?"
"It widens out and descends the farther west you go, like it does on the south side. I'm just glad there's a valid traverse we can use to reach it. I wasn't sure there'd be one."
Valentina's hood turned toward him. "What would you have done if there hadn't been?"
"Let's just say I'm pleased the subject isn't going to come up. Once we get on that ledge it shouldn't be too much of a problem to drop down to the shoreline."
"The operative word in