Alai shot him in the head and he fell silent.
The driver was unconscious, but Alai shot him, too.
Then he went back to the bodies of the guards, who were dressed in western business suits. Ivan had shot one of them in the head. He was larger than Alai but his clothing would do. Alai had his white robe off in a moment. Underneath he wore jeans as he always did. After wrestling with the corpse for a few moments, he got the shirt and jacket off the man, and without popping any of the buttons off.
Alai took the pistols from the two guards who had never gotten off a shot and dropped them into the pockets of the jacket he now wore. Ivan's silenced pistol had to be nearly out of bullets, so Alai slid it across the pavement back toward Ivan's body.
Where do I imagine an African man can hide in Hyderabad? No one's face was more recognizable than the Caliph's, and those who didn't know his face knew his race. They would also know that he spoke no Hindi. He would not make it a hundred meters outside in Hyderabad.
Then again, there was no chance he could get out of the compound alive.
Wait. Think.
Don't wait. Get away from this murder scene.
Ivan jogged through the parked cars. The garage would have been cleared of any observers by Alamandar's men; that meant Ivan must have been hidden inside a car. Where was that car?
Keys in the ignition. Thank you, Ivan. You planned for everything. No time would be wasted fumbling with keys, as you dragged me to your car to get me out of here.
Where were you going to take me, Ivan? Whom do you trust?
Alamandar's last words rang in his ears. The Hindu woman is more of a Caliph than you are.
He thought they all hated her. But now he realized that she was the one advocating war. Expansion. The restoration of a great empire.
That's what they wanted. And all his talk of peace, of consolidation, of reforming Islam from the inside before reaching out to the rest of the world, of competing with Peter Wiggin using the same methods, inviting other nations to join the Caliphate without requiring them to become Muslim or live under Shari'a--they had listened, they had agreed, but they hated it.
They hated him.
So when they saw the break between him and Virlomi, they exploited it.
Or...was Virlomi behind this?
Was Virlomi pregnant with his child?
The Caliph is dead. But here is his baby, born after he died but infused with the gifts of God from his birth. In the name of the baby Caliph, the council of wazirs will rule. And since the mother of the new Caliph is ruler of India, he will join the two great nations in one. With Virlomi as regent, of course.
No. Virlomi could not have wanted him murdered.
Ivan would have an airplane waiting. The airplane that brought him. With his own trusted crew.
Alai drove at a normal pace. But he did not drive to the checkpoint where he normally entered the airport grounds. In all likelihood, that place would be manned by the conspirators. Instead, he went to a service gate.
The guard sauntered over and started to tell him only authorized service vehicles could use this gate.
"I'm the Caliph, and I want to go through this gate."
"Oh," said the guard, looking confused. "I see. I--"
He pulled out a cellphone and started to punch at it.
Alai didn't want to kill this man. He was an idiot, not a conspirator. So he swung the door open, bumping into the man. Not hard. Just enough to get his attention. Then he closed the door and reached through the window. "Give me that cellphone."
The soldier gave it to him. Alai switched it off.
"I'm the Caliph. When I say to let me through, you don't have to ask anyone else's permission."
The soldier nodded and ran to the controls and the gate slid open.