The Devil's Heart - Carmen Carter [26]
“Robert would wait until our parents were asleep and the house was completely still, then he would whisper yet another impressively embellished tale of blood and gore. He developed quite a flair for the dramatic and considered himself amply rewarded if he reduced me to tears.”
“How charming,” said Crusher wryly, but then she was the mother of an only child. Picard could never explain to her the complex web of love and hate that bound him to his brother.
“However, as I grew older, my fear turned to fascination, and I would beg Robert for more stories.”
“Let me guess,” she said with a smile.
“At that point, Robert lost interest in the Ko N’ya.”
“Exactly.” Perhaps she understood the relationship between brothers after all. “So I began to read the original lore for myself, and when those books were exhausted, I moved on to others. That was the start of my lifelong passion for history and archaeology of all kinds.”
“Jean-Luc, do you really believe T’Sara could have found this object? Has myth turned out to be history after all?”
“I hardly dare believe it.” Yet he still could not shake the image of those mummified hands.
“Touching the Ko N’ya would be like touching history itself. For such an opportunity, I would …”
Picard groped for the limits of his desire but found them surprisingly difficult to define.
“Sell your soul?” said Crusher.
Her suggestion had been made in jest, so Picard answered in the same lighthearted vein.
“No, not sell … but perhaps rent it for a while.”
Once the words were uttered, however, he realized they were uncomfortably close to the truth.
CHAPTER 8
“There have been some new insights into the murders of the Vulcans on Atropos,” announced Picard. Then, with a nod, he signaled Beverly Crusher to recite the results of her autopsy findings.
As the assembled officers listened first to the doctor and then to Data, Picard watched the crew’s changing expressions. The revelation of each new facet of the deception on Atropos tightened the line of Riker’s jaw and deepened the sorrow in Troi’s eyes; Geordi La Forge grew still and silent, whereas Worf shifted in his chair as if ready to lunge at an approaching enemy.
When the reports were finished, a circle of grim faces turned toward the captain.
“Given the circumstances,” said Picard, “we must proceed under the assumption that all our communications with Starbase 193 are being monitored. I’ve prepared a report of our investigations for Admiral Matasu at Starbase 75, but it will take hours for him to even receive the message.”
“Which means we’re on our own for now,” said Riker, with an emphatic tug at his tunic.
The gesture, one he unconsciously borrowed from the captain, was a mixture of defiance and anticipation.
Picard was more ambivalent about this prospect than his first officer. One of the most invigorating challenges of command lay in making decisions that were his alone, but autonomy from Starfleet authority was accompanied by an equal measure of responsibility for the consequences of his judgment.
Nonetheless, he had already reached one firm resolution.
“Our first priority is to locate the intruders that we believe murdered the Vulcan archaeologists.”
“Agreed,” said Crusher. “Any delay in pursuit would give them more time to get away.” A supporting chorus of murmured assent quickly rippled around the table.
“There’s one thing I just don’t understand,” said La Forge. “Why would anyone be willing to kill for some dusty old relic?”
Picard smiled at the engineer’s naive description. “Oh, but it’s not just any artifact. This is a mythic icon of tremendous allure. Ko N’ya, the Devil’s Heart … it has been called many names in many languages throughout the galaxy.”
Data cocked his head, silently accessing information from a vast storehouse of knowledge. “The Belnarri call it Nota; the Andorians know it as Telev’s Bane; and to the Klingons it is the Pagrashtak.”
“Pagrashtak!