The desert air was blistering on his skin. He could smell the odor of the desert. It was an odor that had no odor—only heat, like water that has no taste yet is unmistakable. Youssef and he both leaned forward and scanned the empty horizon ahead like a pair of hunting falcons. Behind the Land-Rover was an endless plume of dust churned up by the wheels. Ahead, he could see only the twin tire tracks leading onward across the honey-colored plain and the distant shapes of the dunes on the horizon.

He tried to put the girl out of his mind. He didn’t want to think about how he had come back to the well, knowing he would find it empty, yet still getting that hollow kicked-in-the-stomach feeling when he found her gone.

It wasn’t hard to track Bandar’s movements. A trail of bodies, including some he had simply driven over, led them into the desert. There was still fighting and mopping up to do and Harris tried to fill him in over the radio. The Saudi National Guard had rallied to the king and loyal elements of the Royal Saudi Army had halted the Yemeni drive towards Mecca at Taif. There was a report that the Cuban, Huevas, had been killed outside Taif. Fighting had broken out at Qamr Bay on the Yemeni-Omani border. PLO commandos had blown up the oil facilities at Sea Island and Ras Tanura, but were now trapped by Saudi National Guard troops supported by U.S. Marine helicopters and naval air support. Fighting was reported at Basra in Iraq. Iran had mobilized forces on both its Soviet and Iraqi borders and had vowed to destroy the U.S. fleet and close the Straits of Hormuz. Apart from some bow-scraping incidents and a few dog-fights in the Straits, the U.S. and Soviet fleets stalked each other but hadn’t gone to DEFCON Red yet.

Harris wanted a report on the ground situation, but the Scorpion left the receiver dangling and Harris talking to the air. A Rualla tribesman picked up the receiver and listened to the incomprehensible English sounds.

The Scorpion had grabbed clothes and an M-16 from a dead Mutayri and he and Youssef had driven off.

Why had she left the well, he wondered. Was it fear? Or was it getting too hot there? Or panic—after all she’d never before been in the sheer chaos and horror that is battle. Or maybe something else. Or maybe Bandar.

But Bandar had found her. Bandar, whose very touch made her shudder like the slithering caress of a snake. And now they were racing for the darkness. It was kismet, the Scorpion knew. Either he or Bandar would die before the evening star rose over the dunes.