A Burning House

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  “What do you mean, he never hired anyone? What was our money used for?”

  “I do not know, L’Kor, but Turok was found dead in his office following the announcement, a qutluch lodged in his heart. I would say he has paid the price for his betrayal.”

  “Whereas we shall pay the price for years to come.”

  …Gannik contacts him, furious…

  “You assured me—”

  “I suffered as much as you, Gannik.”

  “But you do not have my debts! When next we meet, I will kill you for this!”

  “You are welcome to make the attempt, Gannik, and I will kill you when you do. But we have no quarrel. We are both victims of Turok’s betrayal.”

  “I am scheduled to deliver goods to Khitomer in two months’ time.”

  …only one month later, a warrior named Mogh is assigned to Khitomer to supervise upgrades to the outpost’s defenses…

  “I wish to run a simulation on the new shields. I assume we have enough information on Romulan weaponry to do so?”

  “Do you think such an attack likely?”

  “I think such an attack is possible. After all, one praetor has been overthrown—who is to say another might not be? Politics are unpredictable.”

  “That is certainly the case. But I cannot imagine why Romulans would attack this base. There is much about them that is honorable.”

  …and then the very Romulan attack Mogh predicted occurs…

  “The shields have gone down!”

  “Get them back up!”

  “I am attempting to do so, but—”

  “What is that?”

  “Gas!”

  …being taken prisoner by the Romulans and not allowed to die, but nor do they give up any intelligence…

  “My name is Tokath. The Klingon Empire has refused to acknowledge that you still live. Your commanders, your loved ones—they all think you dead. Therefore I offer you the opportunity to live out your lives in secret on a planet outside both our empires. You will be cared for, you will be fed and housed. What say you?”

  …growing accustomed to life on Carraya, even taking a mate and having children, and giving his word to Tokath that he would remain, until the day a warrior named Worf arrived…

  “I am Worf, son of Mogh.”

  “Why have you come here?”

  “I have come to find my father. Is he alive? Is he here?”

  “Your father fell at Khitomer.”

  …Tokath confronting him after Worf, Toq, and the other children departed…

  “Why did you do it, L’Kor? Why did you stand with Worf? You gave your word that you would not betray me.”

  “I gave my word that I would remain your prisoner, Tokath. I never promised you that I would stop being a Klingon.”

  …Gi’ral leaving Tokath and later taking her own life; Tokath growing more distant; L’Kor caring for Ba’el…

  “There is an unauthorized ship in orbit! We must—”

  “This is madness!”

  A low hum that L’Kor had not even noticed suddenly stopped, filling the cave with a loud silence. Through bleary eyes, L’Kor saw the tall, gangly form of Gorrik, Gannik’s firstborn son.

  For days, they had done this dance. Somehow, Gorrik had gotten his hands on a mind-sifter, an old Defense Force tool that was banned by the Khitomer Accords. With a certain irony, L’Kor thought, My life seems to consist of betrayals related to that planet.

  But whatever memory Gorrik was attempting to pry out of L’Kor’s mind, he had yet to find it. Nor had he articulated what, precisely, it was he searched for.

  “You have stymied me at every turn, L’Kor, just as you stymied my father by dying on Khitomer.”

  “But…but I did not die.”

  The youth rolled his eyes. “Obviously.”

  “Then how did you know that I lived?”

  Gorrik started to pace back and forth in the cave. L’Kor wondered where they were, exactly. The House of Gannik had lands aplenty—or at least they had three decades ago. The Turok investments had hurt Gannik sufficiently that, for all L’Kor knew, the House had no lands left.

  Gorrik wore a one-piece brown suit that accentuated his slim form. Were L’Kor not strapped to the mind-sifter, he was quite sure he could break the boy in two, even at his advanced age. True, he was not in prime condition anymore—years of inaction on Carraya could sap any warrior’s strength, especially one who was, for all intents and purposes, dead—but this whelp had killed everyone L’Kor loved and those he had sworn to protect. The latest failure in a series of them, he thought bitterly.

  “There were always rumors,” Gorrik was saying, “that there were some who survived Khitomer. Father had always followed those rumors—I had assumed it was because he wished to learn if you were still alive, so he could at last avenge the wrong you perpetrated upon him. But it was more than that. He told me before he died that all those who survived Khitomer, if any there truly were, had to be found—but he did not tell me why!” Gorrik’s childish screams echoed weakly off the cave walls.

  Then he turned to face L’Kor. “There is a higher setting on the mind-sifter that might still be used. I have refrained from doing so, because that will leave you a mindless vegetable, and I want you to be aware of your suffering.” He moved closer, resting his hands on the sides of the chair to which L’Kor was strapped, his raktajino-laden breath burning L’Kor’s nostrils. “But I need to know Father’s secret.”

  L’Kor did not bother to point out that he had no secret to give Gorrik. The only dealings he ever had with Gannik were completely public, ending with the Turok investment. A cursory check of the information net would reveal anything that Gorrik needed to know.

  Again, L’Kor struggled against his bonds. He knew it to be futile—the restraints were made of rodinium. Were L’Kor at the peak of physical condition, he could not shatter these bonds.

  But he struggled anyhow. He had been a Klingon once, and if he was to die this day, he preferred to be one when he did so. The past thirty years of his life guaranteed he would ride the Barge of the Dead to Gre’thor, but at least his final act would be that of a warrior.

  He wasn’t sure how he could do that, exactly, but he hoped that the desire counted for something.

  As Gorrik walked to the controls, he said, “Feel free to scream all you like, L’Kor. We are alone on this world. If, by some miracle, anyone heard your distress call and managed to trace us here, there is a shield around this location that will prevent any from finding us, even if they do see my ship in orbit. And then—”

  An alarm cut off Gorrik’s rant. It echoed in L’Kor’s skull, convincing the old Klingon that the sound could be heard from Gorrik’s orbiting vessel. The youth pulled a padd out of a pocket and touched some controls.

  “Someone has penetrated the shield! But that’s impossible!”

  “Hardly,” said a very familiar voice from the cave entrance.

  L’Kor looked over and saw Tokath—alive! But Gorrik said that everyone else was killed.

  Tokath fired his disruptor even as Gorrik touched a control on his padd. While the green beam sliced into Gorrik’s arm, causing him to drop the padd and wince with pain, a beam fired from the cave ceiling and struck Tokath in the shoulder.

  Gorrik crabwalked behind the mind-sifter’s console, which was well for him, as Tokath, though he lay grimacing on the cave floor, sweat beading on his high forehead, still held his disruptor. He fired it at the console.

  While it did not have Tokath’s intended effect of striking Gorrik, it did damage the device’s controls enough that L’Kor’s bonds retracted into the chair, freeing him.

  He attempted to leap to his feet, but two days of sitting and having his mind scanned had left his body weak and impotent. Instead of leaping, he fell clumsily to the ground, no better than an old woman.

  Another beam struck Tokath from the ceiling.

  Pull yourself together, you old fool, L’Kor admonished himself. He gathered e
very muscle up and forced himself to his feet, using the mind-sifter’s chair to support his body.

  “Father!” Another familiar voice screamed from the cave entrance. It sounded like Ba’el. L’Kor wondered who else survived. Perhaps they all did, and Gorrik lied. But no, L’Kor recalled several dying in front of him.

  It does not matter. This must end, now.

  “I do not know who you people are,” Gorrik said from behind the console, “but you will not keep me from my destiny!”

  Yet another familiar voice: “Ba’el, get down!” Those words were immediately followed by an armored body knocking Ba’el to the floor. Gorrik’s damned weapon just missed both of them, firing harmlessly into the cave wall.

  L’Kor forced himself to put one foot in front of the other, abandoning the chair’s support but quickly grabbing the mangled console. Gorrik still hid behind it like a chuSwI’ in the dirt.

  Sparing a glance, L’Kor saw that it was indeed Toq—and in the armor of a Defense Force commander, no less—who had brought Ba’el down, saving her life. He had a beard now, did Toq, and had apparently risen quickly through the ranks. I am proud of you, Toq, as if you were my own son.

  Toq spoke from the ground, his own disruptor now unholstered, his body protecting that of Ba’el. “Show yourself, Gorrik!”

  “How do you know who I am?”

  “I know everything about you, son of Gannik. I know your father died with an unresolved feud. I know you killed virtually everyone on Carraya IV with information given you by a member of the High Council. And I know that today is the day you die.”

  The High Council? That information shook L’Kor. How could anyone on the council know of Carraya? L’Kor knew things must have changed in the years since Khitomer, and knew that the empire had allied with the Romulans in order to fight the Dominion—but if the council knew of Carraya, why would they let it stand?

  Unless, of course, the council didn’t know—simply one councillor, who wished to keep it secret.

  But why?

  L’Kor’s vision swam, and he realized that he would die never knowing the answer to any of these questions. His limbs again grew weak, and an odd acidic taste filled his mouth.

  I am dying. But I will take that honorless coward with me.

  Using his weakened arms, L’Kor pushed himself off the console, and he stumbled behind it, literally falling on top of a surprised Gorrik. Pinning the youth with his knees, L’Kor lifted his arms and let them fall on Gorrik’s face.

  Over and over again, he pummeled Gorrik, even though after a few times, gravity proved more powerful in bringing his fists down than any effort he expended. L’Kor felt the life drain out of him, began to lose feeling in his legs, but still he beat and beat and beat on Gorrik’s face.

  In his mind, he saw the faces of Pitzh and Q’Idar and Virlak and Maj and Klon and Hanril and Jurok and Tokath and all the others who had died because of Gorrik’s insanity. His fists became slick with the petaQ’s blood as L’Kor continued to pound his face into bloody mulch.

  “L’Kor, that is enough!”

  With a supreme effort of will, L’Kor stopped and looked up to see Toq, his face now partially obscured by a strong man’s beard. “Toq?”

  “He is dead, L’Kor. Vengeance has been satisfied.”

  “No,” L’Kor said, weakly, “it can never be completely satisfied. But it is enough.”

  Then L’Kor let go.

  Toq knelt next to the bodies of Gorrik and L’Kor.

  Of the former, he cared not a whit, but L’Kor had been as much of a father to him as Pitzh, and he died taking vengeance on his enemies, avenging those who died needlessly. He died as a Klingon.

  As with his mother, Toq didn’t care whether or not there really was a Black Fleet, whether or not Sto-VoKor really existed. He still pried L’Kor’s eyes open, growled low in his throat, then threw his head back and screamed to the heavens, his voice echoing off the stalactites.

  When he was finished, Ba’el said, “Is that the death scream you were telling me about?”

  Rising to his feet, Toq nodded.

  “But you don’t really believe it?” she asked.

  “No.” He turned to look at Ba’el. “But I could be wrong.”

  She looked down at Tokath. “What about my father?”

  “He is a Romulan. Romulans do not go to Sto-VoKor.” Toq smiled sadly. “And he would not wish to go even if he had earned the right to do so.” He walked over to Ba’el. “We will take his body with us. I will arrange to have it delivered to Romulus. Their military will take care of him.”

  “But he wasn’t in their military anymore.”

  “It does not matter. Romulans honor those who serve.”

  In a small voice, Ba’el said, “I didn’t know that.” She looked at Toq with sad eyes. “I never knew anything about either heritage, did I? And I never—” Her voice broke. “I never got to tell him I loved him.”

  “You must have told him,” Toq said.

  She shook her head, her curly auburn tresses bouncing. “Not recently.”

  Toq put a hand on her shoulder. “He knew, Ba’el. He leaped on top of you to save your life, fully expecting to die in the attempt. That was not the action of a man who did not know the love of a daughter.” He removed the hand and activated his communicator, standing close to Tokath’s body. “Computer—two people and one corpse to beam up.”

  They materialized on the D’jaq transporter platform a moment later. He and Ba’el stepped off and Toq walked to the console embedded in the shuttle wall. “I will put his body in stasis.”

  “What about L’Kor and the other one—Gorrik?”

  “L’Kor’s body is but a shell and can be disposed of. As for Gorrik—he is dead, and if there truly is an afterlife, then Fek’lhr is escorting him to the Barge of the Dead even as we speak.”

  “Good,” Ba’el said quietly.

  Once he finished taking care of Tokath’s body, Toq moved to the pilot seat and set a course for Qo’noS. Before going to warp, he armed the shuttle’s torpedo bay and fired upon Gorrik’s ship. It was consumed by fire that was in turn consumed by the vacuum of space, leaving only debris and dust.

  It gave him some small satisfaction.

  But it was not enough. The fire in his heart had not yet abated, and would not, until he returned to Qo’noS for the conversation he knew he must have with Lorgh.

  Twenty-one

  The Great Hall

  First City, Qo’noS

  When Klag entered the meeting room in the Great Hall, the faces of the previous six chancellors looked down on him.

  In the original Great Hall, this was the emperor’s study. As one came in, one passed through a gauntlet of statuary, three on each side, representing the six prior emperors. When the Great Hall was rebuilt after Morjod’s abortive coup d’état, Martok had a new version of the study constructed, now called the chancellor’s study. Battles were to be planned here and the fate of the empire decided. Continuing the old tradition, Martok lined both sides of the entrance with statues of the half dozen who’d preceded him in the chancellor’s chair. In order to save time, Martok had a different sculptor do each one.

  The first to stare down at Klag on the right was K’mpec. He had led the empire longer than anyone in history, even the great Emperor Sompek, and he had taken the empire to new heights of prosperity, taking advantage of the alliance with the Federation and his ability to bring consensus to good effect. His sculptor placed him on the chancellor’s chair—the only one of the six chancellors depicted sitting down—his arms on the armrests, looking both relaxed yet ready to leap forward without hesitation.

  Across K’mpec, to Klag’s left, was his successor, and Martok’s predecessor, Gowron. The sculptor had put him standing ramrod straight, his arms folded. Gowron had been a political agitator for many turns, feeling that K’mpec’s compromises had made the empire weak. Upon K’mpec’s death, Gowron had gained enough followers that he was considered a viable candid
ate to replace him. The statue represented Gowron as he was before he led the empire: a defiant agitator, who refused to accept things as they were.

  As he proceeded inside, he was then looked down upon by Kravokh and Ditagh. While his allowing the Romulans to attack first Narendra III and then the Khitomer outpost resulted in K’mpec challenging and defeating him, Kravokh was still primarily remembered as the chancellor who brought the empire out of the dark times following Praxis and made the Klingon Empire a force to be reckoned with in the quadrant again. Mindful of that, this sculptor had Kravokh standing straight, a bat’leth raised over his head.

  Facing Kravokh was Ditagh. Klag felt pity for whoever got that commission, for Ditagh was not a chancellor one cared to recall for very long. The sculptor portrayed him holding a disruptor pistol at an unseen foe, perhaps symbolizing Ditagh’s military career, which was more impressive than his political one.

  The last two were Azetbur and Kaarg, and one could not imagine two more distinct personalities. The only woman to serve on the High Council in any capacity, the daughter of the great Gorkon, Azetbur had served a tumultuous reign, having to deal with the catastrophic aftermath of the Praxis disaster, her father’s assassination, and the early days of the Federation alliance. She was considered the greatest and the weakest Klingon leader, sometimes at the same time. Her sculptor portrayed her with open hands, perhaps representing the role of peacemaker that Praxis forced her into. Klag couldn’t help but notice that she was portrayed as shorter than any of her male counterparts, yet her eyes were fiercer even than wide-eyed Gowron’s.

  Finally there was Kaarg, a reactionary who had dismantled many of the reforms Azetbur had put forward, including that of her very service: he decreed that no women could serve on the High Council forevermore. Kaarg was portrayed holding a d’k tahg, looking ready to insert it between the ribs of his foe.

  As Klag moved past the gauntlet of chancellors to take his seat on the far end of the table, four others entered. Two of them, dressed in formal cassocks, took their seats at the opposite end of the table from where Klag had gone to sit. Klag recognized them from the information net as two councillors, though he could not recall their names. The other two wore Defense Force armor and took up positions behind them—obviously, they were the councillors’ bodyguards. Only members of the High Council were permitted to have bodyguards in this structure.