A Time for War, a Time for Peace - Keith R. A. DeCandido [96]
Kahless chuckled. Martok cut off his diatribe and had to use all his willpower to keep himself from strangling the emperor right there. If all these witnesses were not here, willpower might not be enough.
In a low voice, Martok slowly asked, “What is so funny?”
“You speak of politics, Martok. There will always be politics. But I was needed because politics had become more important than honor, and I think that even you must admit that that is no longer the case.”
Picard said, “Such things are cyclical, Emperor.”
“All things are cyclical, Captain. And if that cycle comes around to a point where I am needed again, then so be it.”
Silence then blanketed the office. Emotions roiled within Martok’s gut. His throat had gone dry, and he was desperate for a mug of bloodwine, but he could not drink now without offering the same to his guests, and he did not have a sufficient quantity for the task.
While the chancellor was flattered that Kahless considered him a strong enough leader that he made the emperor’s own function irrelevant, he did not appreciate being lied to or being a puppet in someone else’s game. He had enough of those feelings during the final days of the war. Gowron’s egotistical need to dishonor Martok as a means of dimming the latter’s popularity dictated his tactics against the Dominion, leading Worf to challenge him and install Martok as chancellor when he was victorious. Even now, four years later, he sometimes felt like a puppet on other people’s strings—the very thing Rov and his Klahb fools accused him of being.
Now Kahless was doing it again.
It was Riker who broke the silence. “What will you do now, Emperor?”
“My intention, Commander, is to return to the glade where you came upon me.” He smiled. “I have not yet completed the landscape.”
“That’s it?” Riker asked. “Just go back, and leave the empire without their emperor?”
“Millennia ago, the original Kahless united the Klingon people. When that work was done, he gathered his belongings and went to the edge of the city to depart. The people pleaded, saying they needed Kahless. But he said—”
” ‘You are Klingons. You need no one but yourselves.’ ” Martok, Worf, and even Alexander said the words. It was from the Story of the Promise, a tale every Klingon was told practically from birth. Martok had few memories of his very difficult childhood that he could truly call happy, but one such was when his father told him many stories of Kahless on their first hunt together in the Ketha Lowlands. The hunting itself was poor, and the weather awful, but he still recalled old Urthog telling him stories all the night long, ending with the Story of the Promise.
“Those words,” Kahless said, “are as true today as when they were first spoken. Kahless left you then, and you flourished. I will leave you now, and I have no doubt that you will still flourish.”
Snarling, Martok asked, “And what are we to tell the people? I will not lie to them, but we cannot tell them the truth.”
Picard said, “The wisest move, Chancellor, would be to do neither. Condemn Rov and his terrorists as madmen, but neither confirm nor deny that Kahless has been a hologram for six months.”
“I will also address the people one final time,” Kahless said. “I will tell them what I have just told you—that it is time for me to once again leave our people. If I am needed again, I will return.” He grinned. “Or perhaps the true Kahless will.”
Martok shook his head. “I hope you are correct, Excellency.”
“Hope is the first step on the road to victory.”
“That,” the android said, “is one of Kahless’s tiresome aphorisms.”
Unable to stop himself, Martok burst out laughing. “Indeed it is, Commander, indeed it is. Very well, Excellency, if that is truly what you wish, it shall be done. You will address the people immediately—I will have no more accusations against our allies, nor will I let the empire be governed by rumor and supposition. You will participate in the vIt ‘Iw tay.”
Picard and Riker