To Storm Heaven - Esther Friesner [70]
“Permission granted Mr. Worf.” Without another word, the Klingon strode from the room.
The gardens of Bovridash were lovely, a refuge from the world’s clamor, an inspiration to the poets of a dozen generations of Ne’elat. His body freed from the constraints of a Starfleet officer’s uniform, clad in the loose, flowing robes of the bovereem, Captain Picard admired his surroundings. As he walked the gardens’ winding paths of crushed stone and shell, breathing in their thousand perfumes, he wished that he could have come here to enjoy their beauty in peace, without the spectre of a dying world hovering at his back.
So much beauty… and so useless. He and young Hara’el had searched the library of the great spiritual center, questioned the bovereem—as the local priesthood styled themselves—searched the sanctuary grounds plant by plant, all with as little success. A few of the older bovereem had heard of n’vashal—that was something—but Picard knew that many people back on Earth had also heard of the philosopher’s stone, the fountain of youth, and pixie dust. They told him old folktales—some brought all the way from Skerris IVmin which the poor farmer’s clever daughter tucked a sprig of n’vashal into her bosom for luck and went on to make her fortune, but the plant itself remained elusive.
Picard picked a cluster of lacy orange flowers from a bush and let their spicy fragrance fill his mind. Such a little thing, a single plant. Fertile worlds like Ne’elat and Orakisa and Earth all teemed with green growth of infinite variety. What did it matter if one lone kind were destroyed or allowed to perish? What would be the harm?
What would be the harm? Let them ask the dying colonists of Skerris IV. “Captain Picard?” He wheeled around at the sound of his name, startled out of his joyless contemplation. “Hara’el, I didn’t hear you come up behind me.” The young Orakisan looked sheepish. “I apologize.
I have been practising walking the way the bovereem do. They do not make a sound, even when they’re walking over gravel. They call it drinking silence from the earth.” Picard could not help but smile. He had come to know the junior ambassador better since their arrival in Bovridash, and he genuinely liked him. Hara’el was dedicated and hardworking. He regarded every dead end in their search for some trace of n’vashal as a personal defeat. Given how quiet and meek he acted when in his father’s presence aboard the Enterprise, it was surprising to find so much fire and determination in the young Orakisan. “What will they teach you next?” Picard asked him jovially. “The power of invisibility?” It was a lighthearted jest, but Hara’el’s face fell.
“That is something I could teach them. There have been many times during this mission, Captain Picard, when I have wondered whether I exist at all, so thoroughly have I been ignored.” “What do you mean?” Picard was concerned. “If their has been a problem with one of my crew…” “Not any of your people,” Hare’el answered.
“Mine. My father told me before we undertook this mission that I was to remember my place and expect no preferential treatment from him. He has kept true to his word.” There was a fugitive note of bitterness in the young Orakisan’s voice. “I was prepared to tolerate that. But Ambassador Lelys—It is as if I were not even a part of our mission in her eyes. I may not have her level of professional experience, but I would not even be here if our superiors did not feel I had mastered the diplomat’s art. What will it take to make