Casca 44: Balkan Mercenary Read online

  CASCA

  BALKAN MERCENARY

  This is a book of fiction. All the names, characters and events portrayed in this book are

  Fictional and any resemblance to real people and incidents are purely coincidental.

  CASCA: BALKAN MERCENARY

  Published by arrangement with Eastaboga Entertainment, Inc.

  Printing History

  2016

  Americana Books

  A Division of Lonewolf Group Inc.

  Copyright 2016 Eastaboga Entertainment, Inc.

  Cover Design by John Thompson

  All Rights Reserved

  Including the rights to reproduce this book or portions thereof

  In any form or format without permission.

  For information contact

  Americana Books

  P.O. Box 210314

  Nashville TN 37221

  ISBN 978-1513609836

  Printed in the United States of America

  Contents

  TONY ROBERTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  Zagreb, August 1991

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Casca series available in ebooks

  TONY ROBERTS

  My mother was my unlikely route into becoming a Casca fan. On one shopping trip she bought me a copy of Casca 3: The Warlord. 3 was not a great place to start but I devoured it anyway, loved the character and the sense of history made real. Then followed 13 years while I collected the original series; without the help of the internet. Then what to do, the series was over. I started to write my own Casca novels, and set up my website www.casca.net, building a worldwide base for Casca fans and contacts.

  My first Casca novel, Halls of Montezuma, was published in 2006. Balkan Mercenary is my eighteenth novel in the series.

  I live in Bristol, England, with my partner Jane and a fluffy cat called Cassia.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Zagreb, August 1991

  The war had hardly touched the capital of the newly created Croatian state. A few air raids had sounded out over the past day or so, but for the most part the people carried on as though it was peacetime and they were still citizens of the now defunct Yugoslav state.

  The thick-set square-built man with a scarred face stopped by the steps of the Interior Ministry building and briefly studied the brand new brass plaque on the wall. The old plaque had gone, rudely torn from the stonework in an orgasm of nationalistic fervor two months before, shortly after the Croatian declaration of independence from the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

  The plaque now proudly declared this to be Croatian rather than Yugoslav. Serbs had been expelled from all positions within the ministry, whether it be high up or lowly paper shufflers. The new nation simply would not tolerate those the Croats saw as an enemy working for them. Taking a quick look left and right at the smartly-dressed guardsmen on either side, he entered through the heavy wooden doors into the entry vestibule, a large stone-floored chamber with stairs ahead running up, probably to functional offices of the minister.

  The scarred man, Carlos Romano, or as he had been originally known, Casca Rufio Longinus, paused to get his eyes adjusted to the darker interior. Summer in the Balkans was hot and bright. It was mercifully cooler here inside. He breathed in hard and an idle thought popped into his head. Pannonia. This is what this region had been known in his youth, when he had served in the 7th and then 10th legions of Imperial Rome. That was before he had been changed into an immortal.

  Sighing softly he looked round. A man was standing by the bottom of the staircase, so he wandered over to him. “Good morning,” he said in Serbo-Croat. “I’m here for an interview.”

  “May I have your name please?”

  “Casimir Lonjic,” he said, giving yet another of his many aliases. Best to adopt a locally flavored name to maintain at least the semblance of anonymity. Just in case.

  “Ah yes,” the man consulted a hand held flip-pad, running a finger down the sheet. “First floor, room 4B.” He turned his head to one side. “Krista, please escort this man to room 4B.”

  From behind a desk on the other side of the staircase, a smartly-attired woman stood up and came walking over, walking in the way that men stopped what they were doing or saying just to watch. High Slavic cheekbones, platinum blonde hair tied behind her neck. A starched blouse tightly tucked into a wide leather belt that contained the ubiquitous holster and pistol, which only promoted the size of her chest to admirable proportions.

  Lonjic eyed her pneumatic charms with approval, then for politeness sake looked her in the eye. He smiled, his scar whitening.

  Krista smiled back, an automatic gesture. She was not smiling with those brown eyes. Yet, Lonjic added as a corollary. Give me time and I bet she’d be butter in my hands. Still, he’d no time for flirting or pleasantries. When one is summoned to the Croatian Interior Ministry from halfway round the world two months into a civil war he knew he wasn’t being called to discuss the tourist spots round the coastline. He was going to be needed for something nasty and unpleasant, and fast. Killing was his profession, his skill. It had been for nigh on two thousand years. Roman legionary, then barbarian, then sword for hire for centuries until that had changed to gun for hire.

  Sometimes he’d served in armies, other times as a mercenary. Whatever, he knew his job and knew how to kill.

  He followed the swaying ass of Krista up the stairs and his mind briefly went to matters of a carnal nature before they turned right at the top. He came up alongside and glanced left and right at the décor. They still hadn’t gotten round to cleaning up the orgy of ripping away all the hated symbols and such of the old order. Gaps and spaces showed where items belonging to forty-five years of communist rule had once stood, but now had gone. Either they had been smashed or sold to international dealers. Money was money, after all. The emerging Croat state had been funded by emigres quite generously, and now these same emigres were flooding in to defend their ‘homeland’ from the depredations of the Serbs and their friends in the old Yugoslav army, the JNA.

  Lonjic knew the history of these peoples better than anyone. Most of what he’d heard or read over the past few months had been total propagandist shit. Nobody was innocent or totally guilty. Both sides were committing atrocities and murder. It was just that the western press tended to side with the Croats, and the Germans and Austrians were using a massive amount of political pressure to get the new state recognized by both the UK and the USA.

  Because of the fluctuating alliances and press headlines, Lonjic had decided it best he not declare himself as American, British or Spanish. Be a local. Much safer. Krista stopped and indicated a pine paneled door with 4B inset in the center. “Please wait here a moment.” Her voice was low, husky. Sexy. Lonjic’s desire to see her that evening grew. She would be about twenty-four, twenty-five. No engagement or wedding ring on her finger either.

  She knocked on the door, and it opened and she leaned in, speaking to someone on the other side. A nod, and she turned to the thick-set mercenary. “You can go in; they are expecting you.”

  He took a risk. After all, it was likely he’d never see her again after today. “When do you finish here today?”

  She looked startled, then looked furtively left and right. “Five o’clock.”

  “Fancy a drink after work?”

  She pondered
for a brief moment, sizing him up. “Across the road, The Hussar bar.”

  “Ten past five, then,” he smiled and went into the room feeling much happier.

  The room was comfortably carpeted with an oak desk at the far end, and chairs arranged in a haphazard manner about the rest of the room. Two large oblong windows looked out onto the main road outside but there were heavy curtains hanging to either side, and these were drawn. Maybe to hide what was going on in the room, maybe to help diminish any possible result of an explosion.

  There were four men in the room. Two were in military gear, two were in civilian dress. All were hard-bitten men aged forty or thereabouts. Each had the stamp of a warrior written on them. The two in military gear took up a standing position on either side of the man behind the desk, their pistol holsters unfastened.

  The two civilians were alike in build; squat, wide and with close-cropped iron grey hair. One had a jutting beak of a nose and dark brown eyes, and he sat behind the desk. The other was fairer in complexion and possessed clear sparkling blue eyes. His nose had been broken sometime in the distant past.

  “Welcome, Mr. Lonjic,” the man behind the desk said, standing up as a courtesy. “Please, be seated. May I introduce Slaven Bibovic, Ministry for the Interior? He represents the minister, so what goes on here today shall be relayed to him. Mr. Bibovic also carries the wishes of the new Croatian government with him, therefore what he says is what is representative of our president, Franjo Tudjman.”

  Lonjic bowed to Bibovic. This was as high as he could get in this country without meeting any official minister, all of whom would be busy frantically seeking diplomatic support in the war. “And you, sir?”

  “I represent interested parties in certain – outlying areas of Croatia,” the man behind the desk smiled. “I have, like you, recently arrived here from abroad. Unlike you, however, I am Croatian. I understand you have a Spanish name in reality?”

  “Another nom de plume,” Lonjic smiled apologetically. “Someone in the line of work that I have requires to be anonymous. My enemies, at least the ones who are still alive, would dearly love to find me and, ahem, exact some revenge?”

  The others grunted in amusement. The man behind the desk waved at the two soldiers. “General Mandaric,” he motioned to a tall man with dark hair and inquisitive brown eyes. “Colonel Blazic,” he indicated a shorter man with a scarred chin and stubble. “They are interested directly with what we are to discuss.”

  Lonjic sat down after acknowledging the two soldiers. “So why me?”

  “Why you?” Desk Man echoed, lacing his fingers and leaning on his elbows. “What do you know of the situation here in Croatia?”

  Lonjic shrugged. “You declared independence from Yugoslavia in June. Belgrade opposes this, unlike the Slovenian declaration. They won’t let you leave the Federated Republic. Serbia under Milosevic cannot afford to let all the areas of fertile land and your industry to separate themselves from their country. They intend enforcing their wishes by military means, either directly through the JNA, the irregulars or both.”

  “Fighting has already erupted all along our frontiers. In many places land we regard as ours has been taken over by the Serbs and our people either exterminated or displaced. Refugees are flooding into deeper areas of Croatia. Dubrovnik is being shelled; Vukovar is likely soon to be surrounded. Artillery is pounding our cities and towns. People are dying, Mr. Lonjic.”

  The Eternal Mercenary leaned back. “Serbia could level similar instances of killing at you; they also point out that Serbs have been fired from employment in Croatia even before the declaration of independence.”

  Desk Man frowned. “That depends on whether you read the propagandist Russian media or not.”

  Lonjic shrugged. “Or the propagandist Western media.” He grinned to rob any offense from his words. “I tend not to worry too much about what newspapers say. After all, they only wish to present their side of any argument. Rather uninformed than misinformed, after all.”

  Bibovic looked wounded. “Surely, Mr. Lonjic, you realize that we are only seeking a legitimate allowance for self-rule and determination? We are seeking democracy after years of repressive communist rule, and Milosevic’s Serbia certainly is not interested in that. The JNA, as I’m sure you’re aware, is dominated by Serbs? It is nothing but a military fist to be used by Milosevic. Did you know, for example, that just before the fall of the Iron Curtain, Serbia completed a deal with the now defunct Soviet Union for a massive shipment of arms and other weaponry via Romania?”

  Lonjic shook his head. “No, I didn’t know that.”

  “I don’t suppose many people do – but nevertheless it was signed. Only the fall of the communist apparatus there stopped Serbia from being armed to the teeth. We would not have stood much of a chance.”

  “Oh I don’t know, you people did a particularly good job in World War Two against a better armed and equipped Germany.”

  The men in the room looked at one another. One of the two soldiers, General Mandaric, spoke for the first time. “Yes, my father fought in that conflict as a young man. But today we are not fighting Germany, we are fighting the sons of those who fought, like our fathers, on the same side.”

  “Not completely, General,” Lonjic corrected him. “The Ustashas? They sided with Fascist Croatia against Tito. I’m willing to bet there’s plenty of old resentments that have been allowed to resurface now.”

  Bibovic looked uncomfortable and shifted in his seat. “Serbia accuse us of being a fascist state, carrying out the wishes of the Fourth Reich – Germany. Now Germany has been reunited the Serbs see them as the revisionist disciples of world fascism.”

  Lonjic chuckled. “Propaganda, Mr. Bibovic. Look, it’s a straight fight between Croatia and Serbia, and each side is determined to get what help they can and demonize the opposition by any means. I don’t care, frankly. I’m a mercenary, paid to do dirty jobs governments around the world cannot do legitimately. So, what is it you want me to do?”

  Desk Man pulled out a file from a drawer in the desk and tossed it across to Lonjic. The scarred mercenary picked it up and flipped the cover open. The first thing that met his eyes was an A4-sized black and white photograph of a man wearing a black beret and camouflage clothing. He saw the face and his blood ran cold. He looked up.

  “Yes, Mr. Lonjic, Ivan Vardaric. I believe you know him quite well?” Desk Man was smirking now.

  “What’s this evil bastard been up to now?”

  “It’s what he’s going to do, more like. We are concerned as to his intentions in Eastern Slavonia. Tell me, do you know of Arkan?”

  Lonjic nodded. “Who doesn’t in our line of work? A criminal, butcher, warlord. I heard he’s in Serbia working for Milosevic.”

  “So’s Vardaric. He is, after all, Serbian.”

  “Macedonian,” Lonjic corrected him. “I’ve seen his birth certificate.”

  The others looked at one another in consternation. “How? All his records have been destroyed!” Bibovic said.

  “Not those in Interpol. Their copies still remain. I have contacts. So, Vardaric. You want him dead?”

  Bibovic cleared his throat. “Ah, well, since you put it like that…”

  “Discreetly,” Desk Man interrupted. “When you went under the name Carlos Romano you almost got him in Panama in ’89. Revenge, I understand, for what happened in the Cameron Highlands.”

  “Let’s not talk about that, shall we?” Lonjic snapped. The death of Yu Li still hurt. That was the day his identity of Casey Romain had ended and Carlos Romano begun. He wondered how much these Croats knew about him. Best he didn’t ask. “Look, I want this murdering bastard dead. So point me in his direction and I’ll take him out. Give me a MiG, or a fucking T54. I don’t care.”

  “Not so easy, Mr. Lonjic,” Mandaric shook his head. “Our sources state Vardaric has collected an even nastier bunch of murderers than Arkan has, released from Serbia’s jails, to accompany him to areas of our sacred soil
currently under occupation by the Serbs. Once there, it is understood he intends slaughtering all non-Serbs. Croats of course, but also Hungarians who also form quite a minority there. Ethnic Cleansing, they call it,” he spat.

  “The UN wouldn’t permit that sort of thing, General, surely.”

  The Croats laughed cynically. “Oh, Mr. Lonjic, please! They are powerless, especially with Russia – the USSR’s successor state – vetoing everything to protect Serbia. We don’t want the UN here anyway. They would hand over lands that are ours by right to Serbia simply because those parts are ethnically Serb. And if Arkan and Vardaric have their way, more and more areas of Croatia will be ethnically Serb!” Mandaric slammed a fist onto the desk. “Where will they stop? Zagreb itself, perhaps?”

  “Calm, General,” Desk Man motioned gently with his hand. He turned to Lonjic. “We found out from our contacts that you had a special interest in Vardaric, and that you yourself have had a colorful past. Therefore it appeared to us that this was a perfect contract to offer you. Go in with a small team of hand-picked men, mercenaries of your choice of course, find this Vardaric and take care of the matter.”

  “Won’t the Serbs and the UN object?” Lonjic queried.

  “Not if they do not know you’re acting on our behalf.”

  Lonjic thought for a moment. “I’ll have to go over the logistics of it, what you are going to supply me with, what official protection I can expect, where we are to be sent, where Vardaric is, what he has under his command and so on.”

  “And of course the pay,” Mandaric said sourly.

  Lonjic looked up at the hard-bitten soldier. “General, I have no state or nation I can call my own, therefore I do not fight for a flag or ideal. I’m a mercenary, I’ll go do the dirty jobs you cannot. I expect to be paid for my services, and you’ll find out that whatever job I take, I deliver. So please, I don’t want any of this hate-mercenary shit, no offense of course.”

  “None taken,” Mandaric pulled a wry smile. “Very well. You will be taken to my camp for kitting out. Your other colleagues will be sent there directly once you have chosen them, and a small training regimen will be available if you require.”