Flanked by two Elementals in black armor. Phelan Wolf marched to the small dais just to the side of the high bench. Taking his place on the black marble stand added at least another head to his height, but still left him that much shorter than the armored figures to either side. A shiver ran down his spine as he looked out at the Khans gathered in the dimly lit, semi-circular chamber.
Though not nearly as large as the Clan Council Chamber of the Wolf Clan, the dark room seemed much more oppressive. The places for member Khans were carved from granite, with red velvet cushions on the seats and backs. They were arranged in five rows of eight, with the center aisle splitting the rows in half. The black stone used for their desktops was streaked with a pattern of white that reminded Phelan of the luminescent nebula clouds and stars seen from the observation deck of a JumpShip.
The slate wall paneling and recessed lighting increased the gloom and deepened his anxiety. Even the seventeen colorful banners hanging down from the ceiling did not break the graveyard mood of the room. Three obvious breaks in the spacing and six empty seats in the Khans' area suggested to Phelan that three of the original twenty Clans no longer existed. Phelan shuddered to realize that a people able to destroy parts of their own society would surely have no qualms about destroying the states of the Inner Sphere.
Even more unsettling was the style of clothing the Khans wore here in the Grand Council. Except for Phelan, the only other person whose face was not hidden by a mask was Conal Ward. Each Khan wore an exquisite headpiece that transformed him from a human into an anthropomorphic representation of his or her Clan. Phelan had seen the masks worn by the Smoke Jaguars, Jade Falcons, Ghost Bears, and Wolves during his adoption into the Wolf Clan warrior caste, but a baker's dozen new images confronted him in the Chamber. It brought home to him again that it was much more than mere distance separating the Clans from the Successor States.
Phelan glanced over at Conal Ward and gave him a slight nod.
Ward, whom the assembly had chosen to act as Loremaster while they elected an ilKhan, replied with a nod of his own, then turned to face the assembled Khans. "Let the chamber be sealed so that none of this debate may escape. If the accusations prove baseless, the questions we ask will blow away and be forgotten like ashes. Otherwise, the accused will have thirty days to prepare a defense."
In unison, the assembled Khans intoned, "Seyla."
The two Elementals split up and left Phelan alone on the dais. One took up a position by the side door through which the Loremaster and Phelan had entered the room. The other mounted the stepped aisle that split the chamber in two and stood with his back to the chamber's double doors.
The self-importance in Conal's voice did nothing to ease Phelan's mind. "Phelan Wolf, do you know why you have been summoned here before the Khans?"
The look on Conal's face told Phelan the Loremaster had something up his sleeve. Still, Phelan refrained from telling the Khans what Natasha had instructed him to answer. "It is not my ken to know the will of the Khans, Loremaster, but only to do all I may to fulfill their wishes."
Conal's face settled into a mask of superiority. "The Clans are without an ilKhan during this most important time. The ilKhan is the war leader of all the Clans and is chosen by the Council of Khans as the instrument of their combined will.
He is charged with the duty of fulfilling their mandate. More important, he rules until his replacement or his death to safeguard the Clans from the folly that has destroyed the Successor States."
"That I understand, Loremaster."
"Good, then your tutors have taught you well." Conal gave him a patronizing nod. "All Khans are eligible for election, but before that election can begin, charges against any Khan must be resolved or set aside for later judgement. In this case, we have called you to answer a most serious charge against Khan Ulric of the Wolves."
Phelan's eyes narrowed. No surprise. Cyrilla was right. The battleground has shifted."I vow not to rest until justice in this matter has been done." Phelan saw Ulric nod as his response anticipated the Loremaster's next question.
Conal recovered after only a heartbeat's hesitation. "Very good, very good, indeed. The charge against Ulric is this: that he knowingly engineered the death of the former ilKhan, Leo Showers of the Smoke Jaguars. To your knowledge, is there any truth in this charge?"
The bald-faced affront of the question shocked Phelan. He instantly shook his head with vehemence. "Not only is the charge baseless, I must call it ludicrous as well." He felt his temper rising, but fought to keep it under control.
A Khan from the Steel Viper Clan stood. "But you do not deny that the ilKhan died when Khan Ulric did not?"
"No, of course I do not deny it." Phelan swallowed hard and forced his hands to remain clasped behind his back. "I was there. I was the first person onto the bridge after the Rasalhague fighter hit it. The hull had a hole in it bigger than this dais, and anything that wasn't hitched down had been sucked into space. Debris had ricocheted like shrapnel through the area. That there were any survivors at all was a miracle."
He took a deep breath and tried to calm his racing heart. "When I found Khan Ulric, he was buried beneath the panels of the holotank. He had blacked out and was unable to leave the bridge without assistance."
A Smoke Jaguar Khan stood up under the banner of his Clan. "Such a state could be feigned."
Phelan's nervousness and disbelief boosted into his anger.
"You can't fake cyanosis. His skin and lips were blue from oxygen deprivation and he came around only after I fitted him with an oxygen mask."
Phelan's ire peaked at Conal's expression of contempt. He drew in a deep breath. "But that is less important than the idiocy of what is suggested by these charges. A fighter slammed into the hull of the ship and breached it. Fifteen meters higher and it would have shattered the bridge bulkhead, purging vast chunks of the ship's atmosphere. If Khan Ulric wanted to use such a risky method to kill the ilKhan, it would have been stupid for him to remain on the ship, quiaff?Why would he endanger the Dire Wolfat all when he could have had a supposed 'sniper' from the Rasalhague resistance troops shoot the ilKhan on the ground?"
The Smoke Jaguar Khan slammed his fist into his marble bench. "I will not be lectured by a freebornwhelp!"
"Show respect!" Conal snapped at Phelan.
Phelan's nostrils flared. "You demand a vow of my ceaseless pursuit of justice, then you seek to hobble me. I submit, Khan, that you would not need a lecture from a freebornwhelp if you had the brains of the average surat!"
The Khan trembled with rage at being compared with a bat-winged monkey native to one of the Clan worlds. He started to sputter, but Phelan gave him no chance to speak. "Face it. This charge is born of the fact that Khan Ulric and his Wolves ripped through one of the most densely populated regions of the Inner Sphere while the rest of you moved at the speed of a stunned snail. And now your spite makes you want to strip the Wolves of their best leadership. Instead, you should be choosing Ulric as your ilKhan. He's the only Khan who accomplished anything in the invasion of the Inner Sphere, and those of you with stravagbrains between your ears should see that."
Conal's eyes blazed. "This is the Council of Khans! You are a visitor here. Watch your language and your tone!"
Phelan folded his arms across his chest. "I mean no disrespect, but I cannot fulfill the oath I have sworn to serve my Khan and the Clans if I do not protest this idiocy, Quiaff?"He turned to face the Khans. "As for my language, Natasha Kerensky once told me, 'Slavish adherence to formal ritual is a sign that one has nothing better to think about.' I might suggest that within this, a warrior society, the same applies to those who fight with politics when what is called for are a warrior's skills."