Talon nodded. Marik said, “Yes but what if we could find something there? Something that would help us to win with less bloodshed and loss?”
Tara said, “Maybe we’re meant to find it.”
Blade’s laughter fell from his mouth but it held no humor. “I think you need more sleep. You’re talking in circles.”
Tara looked from face-to-face and then her eyes settled on his face again. Her fingers gripped his tightly. “Think of it, Blade. Look at the people gathered here. You are an assassin. Jenny is a woman who is capable not only of healing but of being a weapon that can blast death and light into something. Talon, the best captain in the universe. Jeval, who has a gift that can allow him to see things that nobody else can see. Jessica, a warrior unlike any other. Marik, who can heal the most grievous of wounds. There must be a reason for all of you being gathered this way.”
He stared at her. “Tara, you make it sound as if we were fated to embark upon some quest to find this place of which my father spoke. To which the old legends still speak, but not often and not loudly.”
Her smile trembled, and a tear slid down her face. “What if you were?”
Many hours later he stood guard, his shoulder leaning against the very tree that his father had died under. The world was quiet except for the sound of the wounded moaning or crying softly and the wind which blew hard from the east. He had settled Tara into bed, making love to her long and hard before leaving her to her slumber.
Everything felt strange and in disarray. His mind kept going back to Tara’s earlier words. Was there some type of cosmic fate at work here, one that he could not escape?
Footsteps sounded on the ground. His body went tense and rigid in his hands went to his weapons. A voice came across the wind. “Hold your weapons.”
He spun, fast weapons already at the ready and drawn. His voice was thick. “You tell me to hold? You are treading on rebel territory, and yet you come to me and say to hold my weapons from your flesh?”
The man regarding him took a slow step forward. A small beam of moonlight laid a stray finger across that man’s face. A face that Blade knew well because it was so like his own. Chiseled features, full lips, black hair, and high cheekbones. The man stepped forward again, moving easily despite his slow pace. His voice was low and calm. “Yes, I do. If for no other reason but for the fact that we are brothers.”
Blade snorted. “You are the son of the woman that my father betrayed his vows to my mother with. You are no brother to me. You are also a Federation officer, and so you are my enemy. What sort of irrationality would put you here in the sight of my weapon fire, Drake?”
Drake flashed him a broad smile. “You speak as if you would like to kill me.”
Blade admitted, “I have thought about it several times in my life.”
Drake shrugged. The gesture lifted one shoulder and dropped it again in a slow rolling motion. “I can understand that. I’d be a liar if I didn’t say I thought about killing you a few times in my life. That time you and your friends held me down and tried to drown me in the well was one of them.”
Blades eyebrows rose. “You had that coming.”
Drake snorted softly. “Because I bested you in a game and made you feel embarrassed?”
Blade said, “No, because you compared yourself to my father and the fact that that was a game that he won most often of anyone.”
Drake advanced again, just a single step. “Our father. You forget that. He is our father.”
Blades throat closed. “Was. He died earlier this very day. We set his body to burn in the way of the warriors of times past.”
Drake sighed. “I know. Before he died, he managed to send me a message saying that his death was imminent and that I must come.”
Blade said, “To do what? To try to figure out what we are doing so that you can run back to your commanding officers and give them information that would prevent us from moving forward with this war?”
Drake spoke softly, his voice hissing between his teeth. “How do you think that our father managed to keep you alive for so long? How do you think that you truly escaped more than once when he was across the universe from you, and there were Federation ships ranged all around you? Did you truly believe you had outflown them all? Do you not remember that time that there were two Federation ships, one a small single craft and one a warship?”
Blade did remember that. He studied Drake’s face carefully. “How could I forget it? I thought I was dead for sure.”
Drake said, “The only reason that you are not is because I was the person in that small craft. I fired upon the Federation ship, aiming for its weakest spot. I hit it and took it down so that you could escape. I know that you thought oh, an overeager pilot just accidentally shot down a Federation warship in its haste to kill me off. That is not what happened. It was deliberate. It was done to save you.”
Blades mouth hung ajar. “You are lying.”
Drake said, “I wish I were. I had friends on that ship.”
Blade did not holster his weapons. “You still have not explained to me what the hell it is you want.”
Drake said, “I don’t know if he had time to relay to you his last message.”
Blade said, “If you mean the riddle that he tossed out about Tralam, then yes. It made absolutely no sense, and it does nothing to help either side. Go back to your warship. There are still, as you can see, people here that you can kill.”
