11

Martok had set the transporter to deposit him a hundred meters away from the edge of the monastery grounds in order to give him a chance to survey the area from a place of concealment. Had he conducted a meteorological scan, he would have known that there would be no problems with concealment. Situated on a mountaintop near the planet’s only sizable ocean, the monastery was periodically pounded by fierce blizzards, and one of these was currently under way. Martok could barely see more than a meter in front of his face. If not for the survival suit and the tricorder to point the way, he would have died of exposure in minutes. As it was, half the devices in his pack began to beep before he had crossed more than fifty meters, all of them warning him that they would crack open and die if not soon treated with tender, loving care. Martok ignored the cacophony and plowed ahead through the knee-deep snow.

[140] By the time he reached the front gates, half the electronics, including, unfortunately, the heavy disrupter, had died. Pausing only long enough to toss away the weapon and remove the cover from his bat’leth, Martok moved forward, carefully picking his way across the broken, snow-covered square.

Gothmara had been very thorough. Not a single building or section of wall remained whole. Though they were covered by six inches of new snow, Martok recognized that most of the irregular hard-angled shapes before him were chunks of stone, slabs of concrete, and spars of structural steel. From previous visits, he recalled that many of the buildings in the square between the gate and the mountainside caverns had stood four or five stories high; now none was higher than his shoulder.

Wasting precious breath, Martok cursed Gothmara and Morjod, moisture condensing inside his mask and freezing in his whiskers. Was no act too dishonorable? This sacred place had been the seat of the Klingon soul for centuries. Down through the ages, whatever conflicts there were within or outside the empire, always this place had been protected, honored, because legend had it that the original Kahless had vowed to return to his people from here. To destroy the temples of learning built around that promise was an unthinkable act of desecration.

During a momentary lull in the wind, Martok heard a sharp snap as he stepped gingerly over a chunk of ice-encrusted stone. He trod on graves, he knew. He wanted to dig beneath the snow, to announce each of Gothmara’s victims before the gates of Sto-Vo-Kor. Standing erect, Martok swung the bat’leth before him, [141] and the blade glowed dully in the fading sun. Snowflakes danced and swirled in the wake of its passage.

“Revenge,” he hissed. “For all of you.”

The door to the caverns gaped wide. After scanning the area, Martok slipped between the doors and stepped quickly into the shadows within. Once he was indoors, low torches guttering in sconces and oil lamps hanging from the ceiling lit the way, but Martok knew that many of these were holographic effects. After all, what was the sense of depending on burning oil on a planet with no natural resources? Obviously the monks had wished to project an image to their visitors. Still, for Martok’s purposes, a few real, oil-burning lamps might save him, should the monastery lose power.

Holding his breath, Martok listened intently, but heard only the wind whistling through the door and the rhythmic clinking of the lamp chains as they swung to and fro. Satisfied for the moment that he was unobserved, Martok slid along the wall from pool of shadow to pool of shadow until he came to the narrow stone staircase that led deeper down into the bowels of the mountain. A faint whiff of drier, warmer air greeted him as he began his descent, reminding him to remove his face mask and lower his hood. Half-melted snow slipped off his head and shoulders and plopped onto the stairs. Unbidden, memories of Sirella in the dungeon under the imperial palace and his vain attempt to rescue her slunk out to assail him, and he felt unequal to his task. Why not just wait for Worf and the others?

Then, remembering the pitiful sound of the bone cracking under his foot, Martok gripped his bat’leth and moved down the stairway, stopping on every third or [142] fourth step to listen. Halfway down, he heard a soft, wet rasping, the sound of someone desperately trying to breathe, but afraid to inhale deeply. Martok doubled his pace, but continued to move cautiously. Ambush was very much on his mind. He had not forgotten how Morjod had concealed the Hur’q in a pocket of subspace, and though he doubted the equipment to do this again was easily transportable, he watched every shadow carefully.

At the bottom of the stairs, in a pool of shadow beneath a guttering lamp, a monk lay facedown, his back rising and falling rapidly. After scanning the area and finding nothing, Martok moved to the monk’s side and pulled out a field medkit from his pack. He was not experienced enough with a medical scanner to do anything more than search for injuries, take vital signs and receive suggestions for treatment. Unfortunately, the wretched machine offered a prognosis without hope, but Martok tried to make him comfortable.

He was an older man, white-haired, but with a strong chin and a noble brow. Martok thought he recognized him as he helped the man into a half-seated position, and said so.

“I’m Korath,” the old cleric said, his words coming between gasps. He wouldn’t lower his arms from his gut, and Martok’s quick scan told him it was because his arms were the only things keeping his internal organs inside him. The pain must have been indescribable and Martok was impressed that the man hadn’t passed out from shock. “I was once a master of this place.” He shook his head. “No more.”

“Who did this? Was it Morjod? Gothmara? Did they have soldiers or Hur’q?”

[143] Korath, alas, was too far gone. His eyes moved wildly from side to side, not focusing on anything, but saw only who knew what strange and terrible sights. “I welcome the end,” he murmured. Blood coated his gums and teeth. “An empire that would turn on itself deserves to fall. It’s an offense to Kahless. ...”

“Kahless is coming,” Martok said, hoping the monk would take some comfort from the idea.

Korath either didn’t understand him or wasn’t listening at all. “Why?” he asked. “Why return to rule over fools and madmen? What is the point?” He lifted his head and stared up at the oil lamp. “Better,” he murmured, “to let it all burn. Let fire take it all.”

Then, deep in Korath’s chest, something wet tore loose or burst under unknown internal pressures. The cleric gasped, tried to inhale, and a viscous bubble of blood and bile burst out from between his lips. The scanner beeped furiously and the recommendation screen flickered and flipped through half a dozen unavailable resuscitation regimens before finally freezing on the “Stasis not an option” screen. Martok considered holding open the old man’s eyes and screaming for him, but recognized it would certainly alert anyone nearby of his location. No, better to find the remaining monks, assuming there were any, and permit them to perform the death rites.

Putting away the medical scanner, Martok was unprepared for the oppressive silence. Following after the usual shipboard noise on the shuttle, then Pharh’s chatter and the howling winds upstairs, the gloomy stillness felt ominous. The long, narrow hallway was to his back and, feeling a tingling at the base of his spine, Martok looked over his shoulder. Another lamp hung from the [144] ceiling ten meters away, barely bright enough to light the circle of hallway directly beneath it. No one was there.

Turning back to the cleric, Martok considered searching him. Possibly he was carrying a useful key or passcard, something Martok could use to find his way deeper into the caverns.

Behind him, Martok heard the sound of a sharp click on stone and a throaty hiss. He closed his eye, almost sighed with resignation, but fought down the urge and turned around to look.

Gothmara stood just inside the small ring of light the oil lamp projected, casting a long shadow before her. Two Hur’q, both hunched over almost double in the low-ceilinged corridor, flanked her. “Hello, Martok,” she said, her voice calmly casual.

Martok lifted his bat’leth with one hand into the first defense posture and loosened his sheathed knife with the other. “You killed my daughters,” he said flatly. “You killed my wife. I will kill you now.”

“I didn’t kill your wife,” she replied. “She killed herself. Too bad, really, because I rather liked her. Did she tell you we talked for quite a while when I had her? She seemed clever—cleverer than you at any rate. You’re so predictable, Martok. Would that hunting you down were more challenging.”

In the narrow, low hallway, Martok knew he had some advantages. The Hur’q were built for long, sweeping attacks, and the constricted quarters would be a liability to them. They probably had energy weapons, though Martok couldn’t see them from where he stood. A disrupter would even the odds, and he once again began to internally curse the idiot who had built the [145] battery pack on his abandoned weapon. He needed more time to consider his options and that meant making her talk more. “Sirella indeed was wise, though much too kind. She pitied you, the scorned woman, cast aside and unwanted.” None of this was true, of course. Sirella would have judged Gothmara even more harshly than Martok did, but he wasn’t going to mention that at the moment.

As she took a step forward, Gothmara’s shadow became longer and more tenuous, less humanoid and more akin to the monsters she had bred. “Your targ-bitch’s pity means nothing to me,” she snarled.

“Of course not. The small offering of a noble lady’s pity matters little when your son sits on the throne!”

Gothmara tilted her head to the side and touched her chin. Martok was shocked to realize he remembered this peculiar gesture as a sign of genuine confusion. “My son?” she asked. “My son?” Shaking her head back and forth in disbelief, Gothmara said, “You still don’t see, do you? Morjod is a tool, an instrument, and a blunt one at that. He was never meant to rule. I created him so that he would lay waste to the empire. Without my restraining hand, he’s out there right now ...” She waved her hand generally toward the far horizon. “... randomly destroying whatever crosses his path.” She laughed, then said conspiratorially, “Recently, I’ve been playing a game that I’d like to share with you. Games are never fun unless someone else plays, don’t you think?”

“I don’t play games,” Martok muttered. She had stopped moving and her pets weren’t showing any signs of initiative, so he knew he still had a few seconds to plan.

[146] “You should. Games might make you less of an old grouch. Look at yourself, Martok. You’re younger than I am, but you’re weak, scarred, beaten down. Wouldn’t death be a relief now? A little quiet time?”

“Have you forgotten your game?” He didn’t like the direction the conversation was going.

“My game! Of course.” She seemed to suddenly realize how far away from the Hur’q she had moved and crooked a finger at them. “Here,” she said, and the pair moved up to flank her. When one of them moved, Martok saw a telltale glint of polished metal. One of them at least has a disrupter. “I’ve been trying,” she continued, “to figure out who will kill Morjod. Will it be the Federation, the Romulans, or ‘his people’? Sooner or later, one of the other powers will have to step in. Maybe Morjod will attack their ships. Maybe he’ll even convince the Defense Force to attempt an invasion of Romulus or Earth. He can be very persuasive if he wishes, you know?”

“You altered his voice the way you altered your own?”

Gothmara laughed delightedly, then said, “You figured that out? How clever of you.” Her tone of voice for that sentence was different than for any previous and Martok felt a shiver run up his spine. He had been prepared for it, expected it, knew what it meant, yet still he felt a jolt of pride in having her tell him he was clever. Clutching her throat, Gothmara coughed. “Maintaining my voice can be difficult if I don’t treat my vocal cords with the proper compounds.”

“You expect him to fail?” Martok asked. “What foolishness! A strategy that anticipates failure? A Klingon battles to victory. You have no plan, Gothmara.” He glanced up at the lamp above him and wished there were [147] some way to know for sure whether it was real or holographic—and, if it was the latter, then whether it carried its own battery pack.

“This is my plan: To do to you what you did for me. For you to die, but before you die to strip everything away from you. To see you suffer. Is there anything left that I can do to you? Have you suffered enough yet?”

For the rest of his life, Martok never knew if he chose that second to attack because it was the right moment or because he could not face the thought of answering her question. He flipped the knife up into an overhand grip and threw it. Naturally, both the Hur’q leaped in front of Gothmara, as they no doubt had been programmed to do, precisely as Martok had expected. His throw was flawless, and the blade flew straight and true into the metal plate that held the oil lamp behind them to the ceiling. He had concluded that this was the plan least likely to fail. If the lamp was real, the plate would break and the lamp would fall to the ground. If it was a hologram, the plate was the likely power source and he might be able to short it out.

Not stopping to see which was the case, Martok swung his bat’leth over his head and struck at the lamp above him. It was, in fact, real, and his blow, in addition to smothering the flame, cracked open the basin, spilling the oil into the path of the oncoming Hur’q. The lamp behind the creatures was also extinguished, so suddenly the hallway was quite dark.

Martok flattened against the wall, waited for the predictable two or three shots up the hall, then ducked and ran as fast as he could up the stairs. The satisfying crash behind him followed by screeching and hissing could only be one or both of the creatures slipping in the spilled oil.

[148] Tempted though he was to turn and take his chances with the monsters in the dark, Martok ran as fast as he could, taking two or three steps in a bound. Yes, the desire to stay, to have an end to it all, was almost overwhelming, but a strangely familiar voice—an old woman’s voice—spoke silently into his ear. It said, “Not here. If there is to be a last stand, make it under the naked stars.”

Martok gulped air and felt the thrill of battle sing through his veins. Let them come, he thought. Maybe she has taken all that I held most dear, but as long as I live, I can still deal death. Elated, he cleared the last three steps without touching them. The sharp bite of the wind from the open door burned his face, but he ran swiftly into the night, to battle beneath a canopy of stars.

Below, down the stairs, through the narrow door, in the dark hall, Gothmara struggled to her feet. Unfortunately, the only way she could manage was to grasp hold of her creature’s powerful limbs, which were covered in short, spiky guard hairs that she loathed to touch, especially now that they were coated in oil. Letting go of the Hur’q’s quivering leg, she gripped the rough wall, scraping her hands and arms. “Go,” she ordered, her voice low and ominous. “Kill him.”

The monsters growled their ascent and bounded up the stairs baying, their blades and other weapons jangling against the stones. And though no one remained behind to hear her words, she repeated them with the reverence of sacred text. “Kill him.”

Night had fallen. Crossing the snow-covered square, Martok stepped in a crack between two stones and [149] almost broke his ankle, but the heavy boots saved him by keeping his ankle stiff. He tumbled to the ground, cracked his shoulder on a rock, but then rolled to his feet and was off again, running in long, loping strides, running low, trying to weave in and out of the wreckage. His breath came hard—fighting was one thing but running something else again, and he was an old man, or so he kept telling himself. Old man, old man, old man, he repeated inside his head over and over, each word the beat of his heart.

Passing out through the arch, he heard the large double doors slam open behind him. Two hundred, maybe two fifty meters behind me, he thought. With their stride and speed over open ground, the Hur’q would close that distance in less than two minutes. He had to find a spot to make a stand, someplace where they wouldn’t be able to attack him in tandem or, better yet, somewhere he could stop long enough to call Pharh. If he trusted the Ferengi’s technical ability more, he would have considered stopping now, but it would be too close a thing.

Out in the open field, with no broken stones beneath him, Martok tried lengthening his stride, putting more power into every step, but the snow was too deep and before he had gone more than five meters, he did little more than hop from hole to hole. The drifts wouldn’t slow the Hur’q down, he knew; he had to reconsider trying to call Pharh. Martok slid to a halt and patted his pockets, searching for the communicator. All the bulges felt the same to him through the thick cloth and so he began to randomly unzip pockets, yanking out whatever he found, then tossing it into the snow when it wasn’t what he wanted. The swirling winds drowned [150] out every other sound so he couldn’t hear how close behind his pursuers were, but then there came a hideous, ululating shriek that was whipped and spun through the frosty air.

The sound was like an electrode applied to the base of his spine; Martok leaped forward, almost helpless before the impulse to run. More biochemical tinkering, his calm and rational core explained, but muscle and sinew and instinct shouted, Run!

Boreth’s small moon was barely bright enough to cast a sliver of light through the thick cloud cover. Between the wind and the thick blanket of snow, Martok’s world narrowed down to the two meters he could see in front of him and the soft explosions of every footfall sinking into the white powder. His heart slammed against his chest wall and his breath came in ragged gasps as sweat poured off his face, freezing as it trickled into his beard. Three more steps and I turn, he thought, rationality almost lost. Two more steps and I lift my weapon. He anticipated a claw slashing through the back of his coat, then his skin, then his spine. A step more ...

One leg sank into the powder up to the hip and there came a lurching, stumbling sense of space beneath him. The bank crumbled away and only the thick sheet of older packed snow around his leg prevented Martok from tumbling over the cliff. Thrusting back with the leg that was still on solid ground, he rolled onto his back and stabbed the bat’leth into the ground. Snow slid down around him, slithered from under him, disappeared into white space and twirling night. Gasping, he dragged himself back from the precipice, looking back over his shoulder as he felt the ground rumble beneath [151] him. The Hur’q pounded across the field toward him. Did they know about the cliff? Could they see him where he lay? Perhaps if he kept his head low, they would run right past him right off the cliff. ...

Despite his gasping for air, despite his fear, Martok tilted his head back and laughed up into the pitiless black sky. Of course they won’t run off the cliff. ... Weary beyond his ability to express, weighed down with snow, the tips of his fingers numb, Martok rose, shook his wet hair out of his eyes, and found his stance. If they ran headlong at him at least he would take one with him.

He felt rather than saw the first one coming, a sudden increase in air pressure before him, and then two giant eyes, black as obsidian, emerged from the white curtain. Without thinking, Martok threw himself back, bracing the bat’leth with both arms, point against the ground, and kicked up just as the giant’s body fell on him. The point of the blade slashed into the pelt just below the creature’s throat and ripped a hole down the length of it as Martok tossed it over his head toward the cliff. The monster’s viscous blood gushed down over his head, making him feel warm for what seemed the first time in months. It screamed as it tumbled away, not an animal cry, but a screech filled with anger and fear and frustration.

The momentum from the blow took Martok back to the edge of the cliff and it was only the point of the bat’leth stabbed into the ground that kept him from falling over. Slick with blood, pummeled by the Hur’q as it had run over him, Martok pushed himself into a sitting position, then realized he might not have the energy to do any more. His fingers and toes were numb and his knees wobbled when he tried to stand.

[152] Somewhere in front of him, screened by the thickening curtain of snow, Martok heard a hiss, then something like a muttered curse. This Hur’q, it seemed, was not too anxious to get closer, almost as if they had met once before. Martok wondered if this was one of the band that had been in the First City for his aborted execution. He had killed two of its brothers that day and now a third. Hur’q, he suspected, were not accustomed to being daunted.

Holding the bat’leth like a cane, Martok pushed himself up, feeling ribs shift inside his chest. One of them must have pierced a lung, too, because he struggled in taking deep breaths. Last, and worst, the leg he had shattered the day he was forced to flee Qo’noS was fractured again. He could barely set any weight on it.

The Hur’q circled to his right, looking for an opening. Martok saw the steam of its breath rising in the frozen air and heard the crunch of snow beneath its feet. Martok lifted his blade and the beast growled. It prowled around to the left, suddenly feinted in at him, then swiftly withdrew when Martok did not swipe at its head.

“You’re going to have to do better than that.” He coughed, spitting black spots out onto the snow, though the lung puncture might be the least of his worries. With each passing second, strength drained out of him and he felt a strange, unaccountable pressure in his chest around his heart.

Off in the distance, another creature howled; more of Gothmara’s pets on the prowl. Almost as if it could not control itself, the Hur’q before him threw back its head and howled in response, and Martok knew he had his chance.

[153] When the distant voice echoed across the plain again and the beast before him lifted its head to respond, Martok struck. If not for the deep snow and his shattered leg, the blow would have been perfect, but as it was, all he did was slash the monster’s jugular. Blood jetted out onto the snow, but life did not flee the Hur’q’s body. Snapping its head forward, the beast launched itself at Martok, who was ready for it. He aimed to deflect its attack, to give its heart time to finish the job, flutter and fall silent, but the edge of the cliff was too close and his body too battered.

The pair of them, monster and warrior, scraped to a halt at the lip of the precipice and, for a brief, thrilling moment, Martok thought he might be able to keep the blade pressed against its nose, to hold it, just long enough. Its eyes grew dim and he could feel its breaths coming shorter and shorter. Death would come. Its head would drop onto the ground and Martok would climb up over the corpse, find his communicator, and Pharh would get him out of there before the other Hur’q found him.

And then the ice shelf crumbled from beneath them both.

Falling, tumbling backward, Martok curled himself into a ball and felt the monster’s body close around him. It was dying, of course, or dead and its muscles were contracting, but there was still something so strange about it. When they found him—if they found him at all—it would look like the Hur’q had taken him into its arms. What will they make of that? he wondered, and then they hit the first outcropping of rock and he thought no more.

On the lip of the ragged ice shelf, Gothmara shone a light down into the dark vale and said to two of her [154] creatures, “Find him. Bring back his body.” One of the Hur’q made a questioning noise and she replied, “Don’t be ridiculous. If you eat him, what will we have to show to his son?”

The monster made a contrite noise, then slowly, carefully began to creep headfirst down the steep, icy cliff wall.

Below, in the Hur’q’s embrace, Martok felt life ebbing away. He was warm again and part of his mind knew that this was a bad thing, but he didn’t care. Warmth felt delicious or, at least, not being cold was soothing. On his face, each snowflakes kiss felt like a tiny coal. As his heart began slowing, the seconds lengthened. He refused to die with his eyes closed and so he exerted all his will and gazed up into the night sky. Each flake of falling snow looked like a star. Searching for breath within his chest, he tried screaming, to let Sirella know he was coming, but the wind outside stole his last breath.

The night sky was unexpectedly eclipsed by a ragged shape, and then he felt two strong arms pull him up from the Hur’q’s embrace.

“Is he alive?” a voice asked, and Martok found he was ever so slightly surprised that he could understand the language.

“Barely,” another replied. “The monster’s body protected him or he wouldn’t be.”

“We have to get him back. We have to keep him alive.”

“I know that,” the second one replied. “I’ll have to move carefully, though. Two more of her beasts are coming down the cliff.”

[155] “Then you go. I’ll stay and take care of them.”

“Are you sure? Against two of them? I could send help.”

“Don’t be insulting,” the first one said. “Go.”

As the second speaker began his journey, Martok felt consciousness fade. He would die now, he knew, and that was fine. Death would be warmer than being alive.

Let the fire come, he thought. Let it all burn away.