The Devil's Heart - Carmen Carter [70]
“I see there was no hurry to bring me this honor,” said Kessec as he rose from his throne.
The Pagrashtak was cradled in the crook of one arm.
“We were far from home, Father,” muttered Tagre, Fourth-born. “Travel was difficult.”
“No doubt.” Kessec stepped down from the circular base. Several of his sons were taller and broader of frame, yet to Halaylah they lacked his presence and gravity. She wondered if he had been born with that quality or whether it was another gift of the stone.
With one hand Kessec brushed aside a lock of Durall’s hair. The gentle gesture seemed to bring Kessec pain, a physical pain that stiffened his body; it lacked the aroma of grief. His fingers sought out the young man’s throat.
Time passed, but the emperor’s ragged breathing was the only sound in the chamber. Halaylah had never mastered the Klingon Discipline of Waiting, but she was too frightened to move. She could smell the changes in the body before she saw its skin darken with the warmth of flowing blood.
When Durall finally stirred, Kessec dropped his hand away.
“Is there anything the Pagrashtak can’t do?” cried Gistad, Second-born. Alone among his brothers, he met the restoration of life with a smile of wonder and joy. A politic reaction, noted Halaylah, for a man who might be the next to die.
She also noted the slump in Kessec’s broad shoulders, the effort with which he kept his head raised. The arm holding the Pagrashtak was drooping by his side.
“You are tired, Father,” said Mohtr, taking a step closer to the emperor. He averted his gaze from the stone, but his body twitched ever so slightly when Kessec shifted the talisman to his other hand.
“I will be fit enough by morning, as will Durall. And then we shall hear his account of this accident that befell him.”
“Hearing him speak again will be a miracle, but miracles are taxing; you must keep up your strength through eating.” Mohtr bellowed out for food. His call had barely stopped echoing before servants came running into the chamber with brimming bowls of meat, steaming pies, and jugs of ale.
“Such concern for my welfare is touching, Mohtr.”
His hand signal was weak, lightly sketched in air, but Halaylah had been waiting for the emperor to summon her. She scrambled out of the shadows to Kessec’s side.
“I’m partial to the rougath,” he said, scooping out a ball.
She leaned forward and sniffed his choice. The smell of the food itself was pure, but the tart glutinous paste had been handled by someone who had smeared his fear like icing over the top. Halaylah glanced up to the emperor and blinked her eyes in a gesture of rejection. Better not.
Kessec sighed. “Perhaps I will eat later.”
“You let this slave’s whelp run your life?”
“An eccentricity of mine. You, on the other hand, are welcome to ignore her warning.” He proffered the morsel to his First-born.
“I’m not hungry.”
“No, of course not.” Kessec dropped the food back onto a tray and carefully wiped his fingers on the rough fabric of his robe. “Leave me. All of you.”
The words were softly uttered, but even an emperor’s whisper had to be obeyed. The servants fled, dropping the tainted bowl, and everything else they had carried, onto the flagstones. His sons were less quick to abandon their dignity, but they too edged away without protest.
As they retreated from the chamber, Kessec called out to Mohtr one last time.
“Take a deep breath, First-born.
Deeper! That tightness you feel in your chest is from a bout of Gorault’s fever that you contracted as a boy. Few children survive that illness.”
“My survival is a sign of my strength!”
Mohtr cried in defiance, then marched out of the chamber.
“Ah. Of course.”
Halaylah stayed. She knew when Kessec did not want her with him, and this was not one of those times.
“Come closer, child.” In the early days of her service to the emperor, Kessec had tried to wrap his thick Klingon tongue around the delicate syllables of her name, then joined in her laughter at the clumsy result; but he had not laughed for over a year now, and there was no one else to