Reza was warmed but amused by his friend’s determination to keep him from the hangman’s noose. He shook his head. “My friend Tony, you know far better than I that the Council will do no such thing. They cannot. I killed Belisle and the soldier, but not Melissa Savitch. To try and convince anyone otherwise would be to lie. And what of the charge of treason?”
Braddock shook his head, wishing that this were all a bad dream and that he would wake up in a warm bed next to Nicole. Even if he could get the murder charges dropped or reduced, the treason charge would not be let go. “How could you have done this Reza?” he asked more to himself than his doomed friend. All Tony could do now was to ensure that due process was given and the procedures themselves were legal. “You don’t have a prayer with the judges. You may as well have just stayed there and died.”
“I tried,” Reza said quietly.
Braddock frowned. “The only other alternative I can think of is to ask the president to pardon you. I mean, since you are the only real authority on Kreelan affairs, maybe–”
“Impossible,” Reza said quietly. “I am accused of capital crimes, Tony, two of which I am guilty by my own admission. How can it be that your society, which claims to hold justice so high, could simply allow me to go free? I do not well understand the politics of the Confederation, but I do not see how even the president could manage such a thing without devastating repercussions. He would not pardon me; he could not. And I do not wish it. I knew what I was doing when I took Belisle’s head. I simply did not intend to survive to receive the punishment I must under Confederation law.”
“You could escape,” Tony said quietly. He was not suggesting it as a counsel, but as a friend. He knew that Reza would not have done what he did without good reason, but that would not hold up in a court, especially if Reza confessed. “It would be easy for you,” he said. He knew as well as anyone that Reza could disappear like a ghost if he wished.
Reza shook his head. “And go where, Tony? To the hills of this planet? To the desert? Even if I could whisk myself to Eridan Five and dwell among the saurians there, I would not. What would be the point? Even without a trial, I am an outlaw among your kind, having forsaken the cloth of the Corps and the Regiment, and I cannot return to my own people without disavowing the oath I made that banished me. And that is something I can never do, even at the price of my own head.”
Braddock did not say anything for a while. He felt like his guts had been ripped out and stomped on.
“What about Nicole?” If Reza had resigned himself to death, then so be it. There was nothing more he could do for him. Now he had to worry about Nicole. His wife. “How will she handle your death?” Tony asked, imagining the metal cable tightening around Reza’s neck, Nicole writhing in agony as it happened, filling her with the same grisly sensations that Reza would feel. “What is this bond, or whatever it is, between you going to do to her?”
Reza had been devoting a great deal of thought to that, but he had no answer. He simply did not know. Even the memories of the Ancient Ones that only seemed to unlock themselves in his dreams had left him no clue. “I do not know,” he said helplessly. “There is no way to undo what has been done.”
“Does this link still exist?”
Reza shook his head. “I do not know. I have not sensed her since I awakened, but that means nothing. The Blood that flows through her is much diluted, for there is little enough in me. The bond has always been little more than a filament between us. Perhaps the shock of what happened broke it…” He shrugged helplessly at Braddock’s uncertain expression, his own heart filled with fear on her behalf. “Tony, if there was any way at all to guarantee her safety, I would do it. But I just do not know.”
“Sometimes, when she dreams, she speaks in a strange language. Would that be the language… your people speak?”
Reza nodded. “It would be the Old Tongue,” he explained, “the language used in the time of the First Empress. She would only speak it if the bond was unbroken.”
Braddock’s heart sank. He was afraid that would be the case. “She spoke that way last night.”
Reza closed his eyes, his heart beating heavily in his chest with grief. “Then I fear that whatever I feel, so shall she.”
“She’ll die, Reza.”
Opening his eyes, Reza looked his old friend in the face, his own twisted in a mask of emotional agony. “I know,” was all he could say.
“Now tell me, Markus,” Borge said cheerfully, “isn’t this far better, even after having had to wait so long?”
Markus Thorella smiled as he cut a strip of sirloin that was among the usual delicacies served at Borge’s table. “Yes, your Honor,” he said honestly. “I have to admit that I thought you were wrong all this time, but now…” He shrugged. “I was wrong. Publicly humiliating Gard has been more fun than I possibly could have imagined.”
In many ways, an outside observer might have thought that the two were like father and son. It was a comparison that would not have been lost on Borge, although Thorella would have chosen to ignore it. Borge had sponsored the younger man, getting him out of trouble when required – as in the nasty incident on Erlang – while developing him into the political and military tool that he needed. He was daring, ruthless, and bloodthirsty, all characteristics that suited Borge’s needs most satisfactorily. It had been a lengthy struggle to keep Thorella from following his passions when he should have been following orders, but it had been worth it. Borge’s plans demanded such an individual, and the time was drawing near for him to put Thorella to his ultimate use.
The fact that he would eventually have to kill Thorella was entirely beside the point. He could never allow such a powerful weapon to exist after its usefulness had ended.
“So,” Borge asked, “tell me, how goes the war?”
Thorella looked startled. “You haven’t heard?”
Borge shook his head as he carefully set down his fork. He was not in the mood for surprises. He never was. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he said. “Is there something the General Staff hasn’t been telling us?”
“I don’t know, Senator. But Admiral Zhukovski–”
“That Russian bastard,” Borge hissed under his breath. I’ll make Zhukovski eat gravel one day, he vowed to himself. “He’s a meddler and a fool.”
“Well,” Thorella went on, “my little network found out that there’s been something strange going on. Zhukovski’s people apparently believe that the Kreelans have slacked off heavily in the last few days in their overall offensive, and a lot of their fleet units have mysteriously disappeared.”
“Are you telling me that those witches are retreating?”
“I don’t know, sir,” Thorella said carefully. He was not about to stick his neck out on the basis of someone else’s information, no matter how valid it might be. “But that was the word I got. Unfortunately, I assumed that it would have already made its way to the Council by now.”
Borge nodded. He was furious, boiling inside, but not with Thorella. The Council should have been informed immediately, and he was determined to find out why it had not. “Not your fault, colonel,” he said graciously, actually meaning it, “not at all. But I am afraid that this will cut our dinner date a bit short.”
“I understand, sir,” Thorella said, relieved that Borge’s wrath would be directed away from him. Without hesitation, he rose from the table after Borge and followed him to the hall that led to the front door of the senator’s mansion.
“Be standing by, Markus,” Borge said. “I may need your services very soon.”