“But have you read the new Sayak yet?” she said. “There are a few surprises there that you will enjoy. Personally, I think it’s her best.”
Garak sighed. “Over the past week I have done no more than look hungrily at that book,” he said. “What’s the point of an advance copy if it just sits there gathering dust? Never mind. This is the path I chose, and I must follow it to its conclusion.” He was about to pour himself another cup of gelat, and then tutted and held back. “My aide doesn’t allow me more than three cups,” he explained. “She says it makes me impossible.”
Lang poured him another one anyway. “Live dangerously.”
He laughed, and then studied her sharply. “I was sorry to hear you decided you are no longer willing to be considered for the post of chief academician.”
“You’ll forgive me if I say that that was not the impression I was given!”
“Yes, I would like Ventok to take the post,” he agreed. “I think he’d be rather good at it, don’t you?”
Lang picked at the remains of an ikri bun, pushing her fingertip through the dust of icing on her plate. “He will be a fine leader. He’s a good man and very energetic.”
“Why have you decided to give up?”
She looked around the room. There was a fine painting on the wall behind Garak, depicting a city on Earth. “Is that Paris?” she said.
“Yes, it is. I imagine you’ll visit one day. You’ve not answered my question.”
“Well,” she said, “I’m not sure that my future lies on Cardassia Prime.”
He shook his head briskly. “Nonsense. You’re one of our leading public figures.”
“I don’t see how that can continue—”
“It shall,” he said firmly. “It must.” He pursed his lips. “Really, Natima, what would you do in retirement?”
“Travel. Write the next book.”
“Charming plans. I hope for something similar. Reading rather than writing. What will you write about?”
“Truth,” she said, “and reconciliation.”
“No small topic,” he said. “Perhaps you need more material before starting work.” He picked up a sweet pastry and tore it apart. “Are you worried about your reputation?”
She nodded. “After this . . . What credibility do I have?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Garak said. “What do you think my reputation is?”
She looked at him directly. “You are rumored to have been a killer. A torturer.”
“Yes,” agreed Garak. “I was all those things.”
“A soldier, and a patriot.”
“Those too.”
“And, perhaps, a penitent?”
He smiled. “I’d like to think so. So many of us were so very guilty in those days. Our whole way of life forced us into it.” He took a small bite of the pastry. His manners were almost dainty. “Why am I telling you this?” he said. “You knew it. You diagnosed it. You wrote about it in your book. The Ending of the Never-Ending Sacrifice.”
“Some of us,” she said pointedly, “were considerably guiltier than others.”
“You are not telling me anything that I do not know.”
She looked back at the painting. Paris did look very beautiful. All light and glass. “When did you read my book? While you were in the Order?”
“I did read a great deal of your work at the time. But that particular book I didn’t read until I went into exile.”
“A little late for it to be useful, then,” she said tartly.
“Not given my subsequent career. You talk about guilt, Natima, but the point is that some of us—you, not the least—were considerably more innocent than others. The people of Cardassia accept me as castellan because they have understood the work that needs to be done to secure our future, and because I am a reminder of the uncomfortable truths of our past. But the time is coming when the past will no longer have such a hold on us. You’ll find the castellanship is not an easy task—”
She stopped him. “The castellanship?”
He gave an impatient tut. “What else? You can do it. I believe you might even enjoy it.” He paused. “Of course, you’d have to persuade the Cardassian people of that. We are a democracy now. For better or worse.”
Lang pondered this future for a while. Then, very softly, she said, “The problem is that I’m not sure. I’m not sure whether I was responsible or not. I don’t remember. I was under so much pressure at the time, concealing so much. I was on that Committee. Did I sign something, allow something, without knowing?”
He looked at her with great compassion. “Don’t torment yourself needlessly. But don’t make the same mistakes again.”
“What mistakes?”
“Don’t run. Fight! Get the right people around you. Let them in and keep them in, and if they ever stop telling you when you’re making mistakes, remind them of their job.” Garak added, “I have a fine team. They all greatly admire you, and I imagine they’ll jump at the chance of working with you.”
She looked at him dryly. She thought she understood, now, his careful distance from her over the past few months and the past week in particular. They had been vetting her. “This all sounds as if it’s decided.”
A small smile played around his lips. “Do you really want retirement? You were going to be Tekeny Ghemor’s successor, once upon a time! Why not mine?”
“There is,” said Lang, “the small matter of an election.”
Garak waved his hand. “Oh, that’s the fun bit. Really, I haven’t enjoyed myself as much in years. Being cheered. Having people chant your name. It’s marvelous! You’ll love every second.” He became deadly serious. “But then the election day is over—and what comes next? There is nobody in the Union who has thought as deeply about that as you, Natima, nobody who has prepared so long and so hard for this. A university?” He snapped his fingers, dismissing the project as unworthy. “Leave that to Ventok. There’s the whole Union out there, Natima. You can—and you should—be the one to shape it.”
She began to believe him. Elim Garak really was a most persuasive man.
* * *
Elima Antok’s day began more gently, but was no less momentous for her. The reunion with her family had been tender and loving. The boys were vaguely aware that something very serious had happened, and that their mother had perhaps been in some danger, but the unexpected trip to the country, the arrival of the officers sent to protect them, and the numerous rides they had taken in police skimmers had gone a long way to leave them with the impression that they had been part of an exciting holo-drama. They were glad to see their mother, of course, but mostly were just full of their adventures of the past
few days.
The previous night she and Mikor had talked for a very long time about what they should do. “I am with you whatever you choose,” he said. “I love you and our children. I will support whatever choice you make.”
So she made it. She would carry on with her work, and the next few days were busy speaking on the ’casts, defending the Carnis report, and saying what needed to be done to achieve justice. As for herself, Antok was no longer content to hide away.
“I am who I am,” she said to Mikor. “And for the first time in my life, I am not afraid to say that in public. And I think . . . I think that people are ready to understand. I think that they are able to do what’s needed to show us we are safe here, accepted here.”
He nodded. “I think you’re right.”
Breakfast over, she called out to the boys. “Hey. Let’s go for a walk.”
They jumped off their seats. Evrek, the older, looked at her curiously. “Are you going to wear that outside, Ma?”
She tugged gently at her earring. “Is that okay with you?”
“Sure,” he said, and shrugged, and moved on. She and Mikor shared a smile above their heads. See? he s
eemed to be saying. No problem.
She wasn’t sure, yet, whether that was true, but she was ready to take the risk. “Come on,” she said. “We’re going to temple.”
The boys sighed.
“And then there’ll be ikri buns,” she promised, to great cheers. They went out onto the street. Most people hurried past without a second glance. Every so often someone noticed the earring. Most of them smiled.
Here we are. Part of your history. Part of your heritage. We are here, and we are not going away.
* * *
Garak left the meeting with Lang feeling more upbeat than he had in some time. Mhevet was waiting for him in his office, and he greeted her cheerfully. “Good morning, good morning!”
“You’re in a good mood,” she said. She sat by his desk, leafing through a book that he had left there.
“The future,” he said, “looks unusually rosy.” He saw what she was holding and said, “Do you like enigma tales?”
“I’ve not read many,” she confessed. “Are these any good?”
“I can’t say,” said Garak with some irritation. “I haven’t had a chance to read them.”
“This is quite a busy job, sir.”
He took his seat behind his desk. “I know. But I do miss reading. I guess the day will come again when I have time on my hands.” He stared at the book. “I suppose they must seem silly compared to what you do every day. I played a holosuite game about spies once. It was ludicrous.”
“It’s partly that, but also . . .” Mhevet put the book back down on his desk. “I don’t really read much fiction.”
He fell back in his seat.
“I don’t understand the appeal—all those made-up places and people. There are enough real places and people in the universe. I’ll never get the chance to see or meet most of them. Why add made-up ones to the mix?”
Garak was shaking his head. “I didn’t know you felt that way,” he said, his voice mournful. “I would never have promoted you if I’d known you felt that way.”
“I’m sure we’ll carry on somehow,” Mhevet said equably.
Akret put her head around the door. “The legate is here.”
“He’s early,” Garak said. He turned to Mhevet. “Do you mind?”
She nodded and stood up. “I’ll wait outside.”
Garak remained sitting while Legate Renel was brought in, and gestured for him to sit down. He skipped the formalities. “You’ve heard about Telek?”
“I heard he wasn’t well,” Renel replied.
“No, not well at all. He broke into my home and attempted to . . . I’m not sure, exactly. Dissuade me from taking action that I thought was right.”
Renel’s jaw dropped.
“He wasn’t armed, thank goodness. Or else he wouldn’t be in the hospital now. He’d be in prison. Did you put him up to it?”
“What? No!”
“Good,” Garak said, although he’d known that. “You listen to me, Renel—now you have a choice. You can play this as dirty as you like. I’m not going to fight on those terms. So go ahead. Do your worst! Attack me, vilify me, dig up whatever you can and make it stick. Who knows what you’ll find! When I said that nobody would be above the law, I meant it. But never come into this room again and threaten the castellan. Those days are gone. They’re not coming back. You have no power over me that I recognize.”
He turned to his computer. Dismissed.
“Garak—”
Garak looked up, a surprised expression on his face, as if to say, Are you still here?
“Castellan Garak, I did nothing. I most certainly did not ask Telek to threaten you—”
“I am extremely glad to hear that.”
“But you’re not going to bully me into giving up this fight,” Renel said, shaking his head. “These prosecutions are unfair—”
“You are free, Legate, to do whatever you think is right. As I am. That is the joy of our new Cardassia.”
He looked back at his padd and pretended to be busy. Eventually, he heard Renel stand and leave. Mhevet slipped back into the office and took her seat.
“The legate looked as if someone had set him on fire,” she said.
“I merely expressed myself warmly,” Garak said. “I can’t help it if he has a thin skin.”
“No more suggestions of the military showing its displeasure?”
“I sincerely hope I will never hear such a thing said again,” said Garak. “Not as long as I hold this office.” He thought about that. “Not ever.”
“Do you want us to arrest Telek?”
Garak shook his head. “He’s a victim here too. And he had to suffer a conversation with me.”
“I hope you didn’t do your worst.”
“By no stretch of the imagination did I do my worst. But he’s not the man he was, and I don’t imagine he’ll be returning to his post in a hurry.” Garak sighed. “Poor man. It’s sad to see someone blighted in their prime.” His eyes prickled suddenly. He rubbed at them, and was glad when Mhevet’s personal comm chimed, so that she was no longer focused on him.
“Sorry,” she said. “I should take this.”
“By all means.” He busied himself while she took the message, and when she turned back to him, he was able to face her with equanimity.
“News,” she said.
“Oh good,” he deadpanned. “I adore news.”
“The man we arrested is human.”
Garak sat back in his chair. “Now, that I wasn’t expecting.”
“He’s also gone.”
Garak shook his head. “And I was having such a good day.” He reached for his comm. “Akret, could you get me Ambassador T’Rena, please?”
“Shall I go?” said Mhevet.
“No. You don’t want to miss this. Ambassador!” he said brightly. “And how are you today?”
“Very well. Is there a problem, Castellan?”
“Yes. I’d like him back, please.”
“I’m afraid, Castellan, that I don’t know what you mean—”
“Oh, please! You know exactly who I mean. Your operative!”
“Castellan, I do not know what you’re talking about.”
He frowned. He could very well imagine that they would not have consulted the ambassador. They would have done what they wanted and left her able to deny it. It had happened to him, once or twice, when he was an ambassador. He hadn’t liked it then, and he liked it even less now. “The man who took Pulaski and Antok, and killed Lang’s aide. He was human. And he has been removed from our custody.”
“I see. But if there are failings in your police security, why are you speaking to me?”
“Oh come on! Starfleet Intelligence has taken him, for whatever reason—”
“I am unable to do anything about that.”
“I want him back,” said Garak. “I want him tried under Cardassian law—”
“I understand that your own people believe that he was unstable. Unwell.”
“Nevertheless, he has committed crimes here—kidnap, of a Cardassian citizen, as well as a Federation citizen. Murder—of a Cardassian citizen. I am not happy, Ambassador.”
“No,” she said. “I’m sure you’re not. But now that you are at last concerning yourself with the fallout of your actions during the Occupation, perhaps you’ll allow the Federation to deal with ours.”
Touché, he thought. Mhevet, across the desk, was mouthing, Ouch.
“I am not unsympathetic to your position,” T’Rena said unexpectedly, and Garak listened closely. “Intelligence agencies do have a tendency to take initiative where perhaps they should not. I imagine you know more about that than I do.”
He took that on the chin. If she was offering him some tidbits of information, he was prepared to swallow the pious reprimand that came with it.
&
nbsp; “I understand . . .” she said, “that this individual had been on Cardassia for some time. Our man in your dissident movement at the university. I believe”—she raised an eyebrow—“that he was tasked with pushing forward Natima Lang as a possible head of state.”
That was ironic, thought Garak, given how far he’d gone trying to discredit her.
“Beyond that I can tell you no more than that he has been here throughout your most recent and rather dramatic history, and that his survival was unknown until recently. I doubt he has enjoyed the past fifteen or so years, and I suspect he went rogue some time ago. This,” she said pointedly, “is, of course, conjecture on my part.”
So they’d found him out and gotten him back. How reluctant he was, Garak would probably never know. He would have to be grateful with these crumbs. “Thank you,” he said.
“One last thing, Castellan,” she said. “I do not appreciate diplomacy to be warped by the activities of other government entities. But they have acted, and now we must live with that. We have had rather a rocky start. I hope this is the end of that. I look forward to speaking to you next week about the Carnis report, Castellan. Good day.”
She cut the comm.
“Well,” said Mhevet. “Starfleet Intelligence ran rings around us.”
“Don’t,” said Garak, putting his head in his hands. “Don’t.”
“Sorry.”
“And now I have to go and watch someone put a medal on Katherine Pulaski.”
Mhevet stood up. “Some days are better than others, sir.”
* * *
Pulaski enjoyed receiving her medal, of course, but she was ready now to go home. One last evening among her Cardassian friends, and then she and Alden would be leaving. She’d come back, she thought as she lay down on the bed. She liked it here. Besides, she thought as she fell asleep, it would annoy Garak.
Enigma Tales Page 24
