“Fareed Agha. Mirwais Khan.” He paused between names, watching my face to confirm I recognized the names. “Abdullah Raheem.”

These were my father’s friends, the men I had called “uncle.” The people who patted me on the head and marveled at how tall I’d grown. The men who slipped brightly wrapped candies into my palm on holidays and told me to treat myself to ice cream.

“All these men have taken positions in the new government.”

I winced.

“There are other names that do not make it into the newspapers. Those are the ones who have disappeared,” Shair said plainly, as if it all made perfect sense. He released his hold on me.

I crumpled to the floor.

When night fell, I stared out the window at the pointy nose of Taurus until my eyelids grew heavy. Shair took his place sitting guard over me. Kabul was in a deep slumber when I woke to Shair slapping a stretch of duct tape over my mouth. I tried to scream, to kick and claw, but stopped when I saw that he had his pistol pointed at me again.

“Not a sound,” he warned.

Tahera surely heard my struggle. I imagined her on the other side of the bedroom door, wringing her hands.

Shair wrapped a shawl over my head and shoulders and led me out of the apartment. Despite my limp, he moved us quickly and silently through the building’s stairwell and then, checking to make sure no one was around, pushed me headfirst into the familiar smell of stale cigarettes and gasoline. This time, though, he shoved me into the passenger seat of the car. He walked around and slid into the driver’s seat, tucking the gun beneath his thigh.

My stomach sank when he pulled away from the austere apartment complex. He drove in silence until we reached the Ministry of the Interior, which I recognized despite the damage it had suffered. Here, finally, was evidence that something horrible had happened.

“Do you see?” he said, pushing the back of my head so my forehead pressed against the window. I said nothing. He pulled his hand away and drove west to show me more pockmarked buildings. Then he drove toward the barricaded road that led to Arg, and my heart nearly stopped. A cluster of soldiers guarded its entrance. He drove out of the city, down a lonely road. A dust-colored compound that seemed to stretch forever came into view.

It was Pol-e-charkhi prison.

“You see this place? The president did us a favor when he built this place. Now we have somewhere to put his people.”

The tips of machine guns poked out from guard towers along the compound’s perimeter.