CHAPTER 29

BENJAMIN SISKO breathed deeply of the air of Bajor, picturing the molecules of it entering his bloodstream, becoming part of his body, just as his soul was part of this world.

“It's beautiful,” Kira said beside him.

Sisko looked out at the vista of the Cirran Mountains—bold, craggy, snowcapped peaks stretching to the northwest; gentle foothills to the southeast melting gracefully into green meadows tens of kilometers away; transparent clouds high brushstrokes on the scarlet sky as dawn changed to day, red turned to blue.

And the silence of this altitude, Sisko thought. So far removed from the cities and the farms, the roads and air-traffic corridors.

Perfect stillness. Perfect peace.

The peace of the Prophets.

“Beautiful,” Sisko agreed, knowing how insignificant that word was, how inadequate. “I can see why they built their monastery here.”

Kira nodded. “Not even the Occupation touched it. As if the Cardassians didn't even know it was here.”

They probably didn't, Sisko thought. And if any had discovered it, he doubted if Obanak's followers would have let them live long with that secret.

A brisk wind suddenly danced around them, and Sisko and Kira both secured more tightly the heavy coats they wore. Though they hadn't discussed doing so beforehand, when they had met at the airlock for this day's journey, they were both outfitted in civilian clothes. To each of them, it had seemed the right thing to do, coming here to this place of peace on Bajor.

“There,” Kira said, and she gestured with one hand toward the old stone path that led from the small parapet they had beamed to, to the entrance of the monastery, where two figures emerged from a small doorway and made their way down the path in a leisurely manner.

As the two figures came nearer, Sisko's gaze traveled beyond them to the monastery behind. The structure was enormous, built of hand-cut stone blocks that seemed to Sisko identical to those that had been used in the construction of B'hala's earliest buildings. Yet the quarries for that fabled city's stones were hundreds of kilometers away.

Sisko tried to comprehend the driving passion that would compel a people to transport the massive stone blocks from such a distance, then carry them up to this mountain peak.

To his surprise, after all he had been through, he found that he could.

The two figures were closer now and Sisko recognized one of them. His identity was unmistakable despite his flowing russet robes. Prylar Obanak's broad shoulders and powerful stride could not be disguised.

The second figure, though, who walked behind the prylar, cloaked in the simpler robes of a monk, was unfamiliar to him.

Sisko sensed rather than saw Kira's glance at him. He adjusted his shoulder bag, felt the Red Orb inside shift slightly to one side. “It's the right thing to do,” he said.

She nodded. “I know. I'm just surprised that . . . that you think so, too.”

“I'm not a Starfleet officer today.”

Kira's smile was thoughtful. “Oh, yes, you are. You were born a Starfleet officer, just as you were born the Emissary.”

“Is it possible to be both?”

“If it is, you'll find the way.”

Particle or wave. This time or another. His wasn't a quantum condition. Perhaps Kira had always understood that better than he had, Sisko thought. That his choice had never been to be one or the other. It had always been to find the way to be both.

“Captain Sisko,” Obanak said as he and his follower came up the path to the parapet on which Sisko and Kira were standing. “Welcome to Cirran.”

“Ben,” Sisko said. “Not Captain.”

“Ben,” Obanak said. He looked at Sisko's shoulder bag. “You once tried to give these to Kai Winn.”

“Before I knew what they were.”

“Do you know now?

Sisko shook his head. How could he? How could anyone? “If I thought that the entities in the wormhole were merely aliens, and these . . . devices were simply artifacts of an immeasurably advanced technology, I would destroy them.”

“And if the entities are gods?” Obanak asked quietly. “And the Orbs known throughout Bajor are their tears? What does that tell you about these Red Orbs and the entities who created them?”

Sisko looked deep into Obanak's eyes but saw only the prylar's conviction.

“Whatever they are,” Sisko said at last, “they belong here, because they've been here before.”

Obanak's face was unreadable. “Why would you say that?”

Sisko had had a long time to think on the trip from the station, to weave the final strands of the tapestry and complete the missing elements of the picture. “You, your order, are the keepers of these Orbs. You hid one on Jeraddo just before the moon was abandoned, then gave the map to Dal Nortron. And in the chaos of Withdrawal, you stole the Orb from Quark after he had stolen it from Terrell, watched over it for six years, then hid it in Quark's bar when you came back to Deep Space 9 just before all the Orbs were brought together.”

Sisko knew it was the only explanation. Where the Orbs were concerned, there were no other times. It all had happened. It all had been real.

“Emissary!” Kira said in surprise. “Do you know what you're saying?”

Obanak held up a hand to assure Kira. “It's all right, Nerys. I'm sure he does.”

And Sisko was certain, even more so now. “In fact,” he added, “I wouldn't be surprised if you had somehow arranged the sale of the third Orb to Vash, knowing it would start the search for the other two.”

Sisko heard Kira gasp as Obanak gave him an enigmatic smile before responding. “Oh, we would never sell an Orb, Ben.” But that was the only part of Sisko's suppositions that he bothered to deny.

“Prylar, I apologize,” Kira said hotly. She was about to continue when Obanak stopped her.

“Nerys, really, no offense is taken. But I am curious to know why it is you think what you do, Ben. How you could even consider such . . . manipulation of events to be possible.”

Sisko remembered back to his time-bending meeting with Prylar Rulan, in the Temple on DS9, just before he had first arrived at the station. To the way Rulan had read his pagh and how the prylar hadn't been surprised that the Sisko before him was out of time. I ask you to accept that there is a reason why the Will of the Prophets must sometimes be seen as difficult to interpret for the many, even while it is understood perfectly by the few.

“No one thing in particular,” Sisko said. He looked up at the magnificent edifice of the monastery, struck by the way it seemed almost to grow from the mountain, attesting to the length of time that had passed since it had been built and the centuries, the millennia, of weathering it had endured to blend its walls and parapets into the natural flow of the existing rock.

“But in that monastery,” Sisko said without rancor, without judgment, “I would suggest there exists the complete texts of the mystics of Jalkaree. Every word written by Shabren, Eilin, and Naradim. Not just the fragments known to Bajor at large, but everything—the details that you dare not reveal because if too many people knew the future, that future might change.”

Sisko saw Kira look from him to Obanak and back again, her eyes wide with an emotion he was not sure he could identify.

“An interesting theory,” Obanak said at last. “They must teach you well at Starfleet Academy.” He held out his hand.

Sisko gave him the shoulder bag with the first Red Orb.

“And the others?” Obanak asked.

Sisko reached inside his coat, pressed his combadge. “Sisko to Rio Grande. Mr. O'Brien, you may beam down the second Orb.”

“Energizing,” O'Brien replied.

A few moments later, a safe fifty meters farther down the path, a Starfleet packing crate shimmered into existence.

Sisko touched his combadge again. “Sisko to Defiant. Dax, you may beam down the third.”

“Energizing,” the Trill said.

The second packing crate took form halfway up the path toward the monastery.

“Thank you, Ben,” Obanak said. “They will be quite safe here.”

“As I'm sure they always have been,” Sisko replied.

Obanak glanced down at the time-smoothed stones of the path for a moment. “If it were true that we had the complete prophecies of the mystics, it would also be true that those prophecies extended to a particular time, to a particular set of events, and then . . . ended. As if the mystics could see no farther through the veils of the ages.” He looked up at Sisko again. “If it were true.”

Sisko nodded. I know because those who came before me knew, Prylar Rulan had told him, to explain how it was that he recognized Sisko as the Emissary. Because those who came before them knew, all the way back to the first writings of the great mystics in the time before Lost B'hala. “So they set forth their prophecies, and your order made sure they would come to pass,” Sisko said.

But Obanak betrayed no inclination either to agree or to disagree. “To respect the mystic texts to such a degree, that would be a worthy undertaking, I believe.”

Sisko smiled in defeat, accepting that Obanak would give him little

else. “Very worthy.”

Obanak bowed his head. “Again, we thank you, Ben. All of Bajor thanks you, even those who cannot know what you have done, or will do.”

“Will do?” Kira repeated, eager to finally seize her chance to ask her own question of the prylar. “So there are still prophecies to come?”

Obanak grinned. “The mystics of Jalkaree are not the only ones who have seen the future, Nerys. All you have experienced has been but the first chapter in a book that is still to be written.”

“Which book?” Kira asked, frowning.

“The Book of the Emissary.”

Kira stared at Obanak, puzzled, confused. “But you don't believe the Sisko is the Emissary.”

Obanak looked surprised. “Nerys, I never said the Sisko was not the Emissary.”

She waved a hand at Sisko. “But you won't even call him Emissary.”

“No,” Obanak agreed. “Not Ben.”

Sisko exhaled, at last understanding. “And not Jake,” he said.

Half-smiling, Obanak shook his head, as if to confirm Sisko had finally come to the right conclusion.

“But I don't understand,” Kira said.

“It's all right,” Sisko told her, and meant it. Maybe Kas and I will have to talk, he thought. Then he held out his hand to Obanak. “I look forward to our next meeting, if there is to be one.”

“After so many others at such interesting times, you can be sure of it,” Obanak said. Then he handed the shoulder bag to the monk at his side. “Rees, if you would. I'll get one of the others.”

Obanak started down the path, but Sisko reached out to the prylar's companion, pulled lightly on the hood of the monk's robe.

“Captain,” Arla Rees said. She looked at Kira. “Major.”

The former Bajoran commander's hair was cut short and ragged in the style of a novice. Her eyes were shadowed, her skin pale.

As if she saw and understood the concern in Sisko's eyes, Arla smiled reassuringly. “I'll be all right, Captain. I'm still taking Dr. Bashir's medications, to be . . . to be sure there's no trace left in me.”

“Is this the right place for you?” Sisko asked her quietly.

Arla nodded. “It always has been. I just didn't know it until . . . well, just until.”

Kira suddenly stepped forward and threw her arms around Arla and hugged her. Sisko saw the bright tears in Kira's eyes.

Arla lifted a hand to touch one of those tears with her finger. “ ‘I know why the Prophets weep,’ ” she said softly, and Sisko recognized the words from an ancient poem.

“ ‘For joy,’ ” Kira answered, smiling warmly at her former adversary.

Arla nodded and completed the quotation. “ ‘In time. In time.’ ” Then she stepped back from the major, pulled up her hood, turned, and followed after Obanak, who stood waiting for her on the path.

Sisko and Kira watched Arla walk past the prylar, carrying the Red Orb to the doors of the monastery. Then she stepped through those doors and into her new life. Carrying the second Orb a safe distance behind her, Obanak walked the same path up and into the monastery. The crate holding the third Orb remained on the path, awaiting its turn once the other two had been carefully put away.

Sisko took another deep breath of the mountain air of Bajor, each breath linking him closer to this world.

“Time to go home?” Kira asked after a while.

“We already are,” he told her, though he knew that until his part of that story still to be told was complete, he could not stay.

He took a final look at the monastery of Cirran, wondered about the mysteries still within it, thought of the Emissary named Sisko still to come, then called to his ship to return to the stars, to the Gateway to the Temple, to Deep Space 9.