eradicate all evidence of his tampering. He could hear footsteps
approaching from the direction of the transporter room as he leaped up,
tricorder in hand, looking for a place to eliminate the evidence of his
spying. Without the tricorder as evidence, he might be able to pretend
to have awakened in the night, ill, and to have been searching for the
station's automated med center. There was little chance that he would be
believed, but, without hard evidence, the Freelans might hesitate to
take him into custody. Seeing a disposal unit, Sarek dropped the
tricorder in and cycled it, not without a pang at the loss of his proof.
Logic dictated, however, that he save himself.
Glancing around him, the ambassador realized that the computer room was
singularly devoid of hiding places.
Silently, he resigned himself to being caught, and having to feign
illness, when a loud crash sounded next door, in one of the engineering
chambers that held banks of automated equipment.
The approaching Freelans exclaimed--in Romulan!--and went to
investigate. Peering out of the computer area, Sarek warily scanned the
hallway; then he made a swift, soundless retreat back to the entrance.
The ambassador knew that his young aide must have caused the crash that
had distracted whomever had come to investigate the "malfunction." Would
Soran be able to escape, also?
A second later Soran, soundless on his soft-soled shoes, hurried up
beside him. Quickly, the two Vulcans left the maintenance area and
returned to their quarters.
Later, as he relaxed in the narrow bunk, the ambassador allowed himself
a faint, ironic smile in the concealing darkness. It is not endgame yet,
Taryn, he thought. Today you may have had me in check, but mate is still
a long way off.
The next day, Sarek waited tensely for some indication that his
late-night foray had been discovered, but apparently the last valit had
been successful. Taryn displayed no indication of suspicion during the
morning's negotiating session.
The ambassador was just beginning the afternoon's session when Soran
approached, a guarded expression on his normally calm features.
"Ambassador? There are two messages coming in from Vulcan. They are ...
important."
Hastily, Sarek excused himself and went to his quarters to view them in
private. The first was a written message from his wife that read,
simply, "Come home if possible, please.
Amanda."
Staring at it, the Vulcan experienced a rush of unease.
Never, in over sixty years of marriage, had his wife ever interrupted
him in the midst of a mission to ask him to return home. What could be
wrong?
His silent question was swiftly answered by the second message,
prerecorded by his wife's physician, T'Mal. The graying Healer stared
straight into the screen, as though she could see him. Her expression
was calm, as usual, but the ambassador could discern a hint of sorrow in
her eyes.
"Ambassador Sarek, you must return home immediately.
Your wife is gravely ill. I do not expect her to live more than another
month ... possibly less. I regret having to impart such news in this
manner, but I have no choice. Return home immediately."
The ancient, stone-walled room was buried deep in the foundations of the
huge fortress-manor on Qo'nos, the Klingon homeworld. Outside those
age-darkened stone walls lay nothing but soil. The room had been tested,
retested, and verified to be free of all recording or surveillance
devices, which was why such a dank, dark room had been chosen for this
particular meeting.
Valdyr sat in one of the modern chairs that had been brought into the
room, feeling the chill pluck at her body, even as the words she was
hearing chilled her mind and soul.
Hesitantly, she glanced up at her uncle, the esteemed Klingon
the room, around the venerable, dagger-scarred table that had
undoubtedly been here for hundreds of years.
He is perilously close to treason, she thought, struggling to keep the
shock she was feeling from showing on her face.
The officers watched the speaker with varying degrees of enthusiasm. The
soft lights from the lamps glimmered off oiled black leather and
polished studs.
"Warriors," Kamarag was saying, his trained voice carrying such
conviction that it was nearly hypnotic, "we have all seen what is
happening to our Empire in the past months, since Praxis was destroyed.
The foundations of our exis tence are being eaten away! If this
continues, soon there will be no place for our race in this galaxy! The
Romulans will overrun us, for we will have grown soft, and weak as
females!"
Valdyr, the only female present, glanced up at him, but was careful to
conceal the resentment his words caused. Her uncle was the head of her
family. When her father had been killed attempting to board and conquer
the Federation starship Enterprise, Kamarag had taken his widow and four
children under his protection, providing for them, even sending Valdyr
and her brothers to school.
And last month, when her mother and eldest brother had been killed
during one of the devastating meteor showers that had bombarded Qo'nos
ever since the destruction of Praxis, Kamarag had taken Valdyr and her
brothers to live with him in the ancestral home.
Her uncle was the head of her family, and she owed him everything. If
not for Kamarag, her brothers would never have been able to go to school
and learn the skills necessary to serve aboard starships. They would all
have been relegated to a backwater existence in some hamlet, grubbing
for sustenance on land that was increasingly hostile to agriculture.
Valdyr owed Kamarag unquestioning loyalty. Still, his sneering reference
to her entire sex made her grind her back teeth. Her fingers clenched
against her own armor. At the mention of the word "females," one of the
captains, Karg, east Valdyr a leering glance.
"Females have their place--but what should that place be? Remember who
now sits in the chancellor's seat of our government, my brothers! A
woman.t Gorkon's daughter, to be sure, but she is not Gorkon, as she has
proved many times in the past days. Azetbur demands our loyalty, even as
she opens her arms to Federation influence--influence which may well
lead to Federation control. Who among us, brothers, wishes to live under
the heel of the Federation?"
A concerted growl from the officers present was his only reply.
Azetbur's ascension to the chancellorship had given Valdyr the courage
to continue her schooling past the age when most Klingons of her sex
were relegated to the home, their only power whatever they could obtain
by influencing the males in their lives. Valdyr respected Azetbur for
attempting to forge a true and lasting peace between the Federation and
the Klingon Empire.
To hear her revered uncle denouncing the new chancellor secretly enraged
the young woman
. She glanced up at him as he spoke. Kamarag had been a
formidable warrior in his youth, and his stance as he addressed these
officers was that of a combatant throwing down a formal challenge.
"Consider, my brothers!" he was continuing. "Consider what me must do,
each and every one of us, to uphold our honor as warriors! Each of us
must search his own heart to discover the best way to serve our
Empire--even, should it prove necessary, by serving outside the
strictures of official government policy. We must have the courage, the
honor, the valor to serve our Empire as warriors, as leaders--not merely
as those who blindly follow orders given by our nominal superiors!"
Valdyr's eyes widened. Her uncle was skirting the boundary of advocating
sedition ... outright treason! Such talk was dishonorable! How could he
speak so? Glancing over the faces of the assembled starship commanders,
Valdyr saw that their eyes were fastened on the ambassador with an avid
gleam-- all except one. Keraz ha d drawn back in his seat, and was
shaking his head. Suddenly, the commander sent his gauntleted fist
crashing down on the aged table so hard that the ironlike wood groaned
in protest. "Kamarag, you go too far!" he growled. "I have no love for
Azetbur, or her new policies, but I cannot disobey my oath as a Klingon
officer!
There are more renegades raiding across the Neutral Zone every day, and
I have no intention of becoming one of them!" Valdyr had to restrain
herself from leaping up and saluting the commander.
Kamarag drew himself up, as though deeply offended--but his niece could
tell that his indignation was feigned.
"Keraz, you mistake me! I have said nothing about disobeying oaths. I
have merely requested that each and every one of us assembled here today
spend some time in thinking about our current situation, and how it may
best be improved!
There was no talk of oath-breaking in that!" Valdyr sighed inwardly as
Keraz obviously lost some of his confidence. His brows drew together in
consternation.
"Yes, Keraz, were you not listening?" Karg growled sarcastically.
"Did you stay out last night drinking and wenching, only to fall asleep
just now and dream talk of oath-breaking?
For there was none of that voiced today!"
"Right!"
"Karg is correct?
"We have our honor!" The other officers snarled their support of Karg's
rebuke.
Keraz sat back in his seat. "Perhaps I misheard you, Kamarag," he said
grudgingly.
The Klingon ambassador nodded, and within minutes the clandestine
meeting had broken up. The moment she could do so without seeming
suspect, Valdyr left her seat and hurried out into the corridor. She'd
caught Karg ogling her with an appreciative eye, and she wanted to avoid
the captain at all costs.
But her way out of the deep cellars was blocked by the officers, who
lingered, talking in groups, or waiting their chance to speak personally
with Kamarag. Valdyr shrank back into an alcove that had once held wine
casks.
She'd been standing there long enough to grow chilled from the damp
stone surrounding her on three sides when she heard two familiar voices.
Kamarag and Karg were talking softly.
"It went well, I thought ..." Karg was saying. "Except for Keraz. He
should be Azetbur's personal servant, if he wishes to clean her boots
with his tongue. I knew he would be trouble."
"We handled it, between us," Kamarag said smugly.
"Keraz may not join us--but he will not betray us to Azetbur. He has no
love for her himself. Tell me, how did your latest raid go?"
"The best yet," Karg said. Valdyr could almost see him smacking his lips
over the memory. "One of those mixed colonies, mostly Tellaritesgyou
should have heard the females and the young ones squeal as we cut them
down!
There was very little worth taking on Patelva, true, but it was
wonderful to feel the heat of battle and smell the richness of
fresh-split blood again." Valdyr swallowed. Klingons gloried in war and
battle, true, but there was no honor in mowing down noncombatants.
Karg's words made her belly tighten with disgust.
Suddenly a new voice broke into the conversation. One of the other
otcers had come up to slap her uncle on the shoulder and congratulate
him on a stirring oration. Peering out from her niche, Valdyr saw that
the newcomer's back blocked her from view, so she seized that
opportunity to steal softly away down the corridor.
Later that evening, as she sat in her chamber studying for her next
examination in Federation Standard, the Klingon woman heard a knock on
her door. After bidding the visitor enter, she saw it was her uncle.
"Uncle!" she exclaimed, standing respectfully. Even though she did not
agree with what he had done that day, he was still her family's savior
and head. Klingon tradition decreed that her first loyalty be to him.
"I have something important to discuss with you, niece," he said in his
deep, resonant voice. "It has come to my attention recently that you are
of an age to wed." Valdyr's eyes widened. "Yes, I suppose so, Uncle,"
she said. "But I am so busy with school these days, I have not thought
much on the matter of prospective husbands."
"Your mother arranged no marriage for you before her death," Kamarag
said, seating himself on the narrow, shelflike bed. "Was that your
choice?"
"We never discussed it," Valdyr said. "My mother married according to
liking, not for family advancement. I believe she intended the same for
me, but I do not know for certain."
"My sister married beneath her," her uncle said grimly.
Valdyr stiffened at hearing her beloved father denigrated so,
but Kamarag did not notice. "However, there is no point in rehashing her
unfortunate choice, since it all lies in the past.
We must look to the future--your future. Someone offered for your hand
today, and I accepted." Valdyr held her breath. Who? Keraz? I do not
love him, but he is a warrior with honor ... no, that cannot be. Keraz
is married, I remember hearing that. Who elseg A sudden thought occurred
to her, and, with a sinking sensation, she heard her uncle confirm her
worst fears.
"Karg is a veteran of many battles, a warrior of considerable renown. He
fancies you, niece, and he is well able to provide you with anything any
female could want. I accepted his offer." Rising, he strode to the open
door and beckoned. The Klingon captain stepped in from the hall, and
grinned broadly at his promised bride.
"Karg ..." Valdyr whispered, faintly. The knot in her belly turned over,
and she had to lock her knees to keep from trembling. To wed and bed
Karg? NOT I would embrace my dagger as bridegroom before that
dishonorable Denlbya'qatlh!
As though he could read her mind, Karg gave her a mocking half-bow. "My
wife-to-be ... your uncle has'done me a great honor."
"Hah!" Kamarag barked out a shout of laughter, and slapped the suitor on
the back. "The honor is all ours, Karg!" He gave Valdyr a
smug glance.
"I Bo not wonder that she is speechless with joy." I cannot marry him, I
cannot! I hate and despise him, Uncle.t Do not make me do this.t But,
seeing the pleased expression on Kamarag's face, Valdyr forced herself
to take a deep breath and regain her control. She might not be warrior
material herself, being slender and not tall, but the blood of a noble
house of warriors flowed in her veins. She would not dishonor herself by
begging. "Uncle, I must think about this seriously. Karg needs a wife
who has high social position and much ... beauty," she said,
cautiously. "I have neither. I do not believe the match would be
satisfactory for such a high-ranked warrior."
"Such modesty!" Karg chuckled richly as he stepped over to the young
woman and ran a caressing hand up her arm, testing the muscle that lay
beneath her sleeve. For a lingering moment his hand trailed perilously
close to her left breast, and Valdyr went rigid. Would he dare to fondle
her in front of her uncle? If he does that, I will kill him here and
now, she thought.
But Karg contented himself with kneading and prodding the muscles of her
arm and shoulder. "Small, but there is good, wiry strength there," he
remarked approvingly. Then, glimpsing the outrage in her eyes, he added,
sardonically, "Ah, my bride ... you are so young, so innocent ... you
warm my heart."
Grasping Valdyr's chin and forcibly turning her face to and fro, he
continued to examine her as he might a prospective mount for his