Chapter 91
The end and aim of spying…
Is knowledge of the enemy;
And this knowledge can only be derived…
From the converted spy.
Hence it is essential that the converted spy
Be treated with the utmost liberality.
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—Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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MIKHAIL
Long before we get to the village which lies at the foot of the Bargylus Mountains, Marwan raises his hand and signals us to duck down.
"Something isn't right," he says.
"What," Utbah asks in heavily accented Kemet.
"Those." Marwan points at the lush, green fields which begin suddenly out of reddish-brown desert. "This land should be dry. The last time I came this way, the fields were little more than plots planted next to the houses."
I pull out my binoculars and survey the long, narrow houses nestled into this valley which acts
