Twilight tdts-3

by Кристи Голдэн

  "That is the temple," Vartanil said reverently. He, too, was gazing almost hungrily out the window at the mammoth structure that was slowly moving out of their field of vision.

  "Oh? Like what Jake found?"

  "Yes and no," said Selendis. "Both bear the mark of the Ihan-ril's, the xel'naga's, guidance. But the temple which you and Jacob explored is something quite different from this. Such a thing is more —organic. Wild." Something in the tone of Selendis's mental voice indicated she did not approve of wildness. "The temple you see below you is mathematically precise and orderly."

  "Like the Golden Mean. One to one point six."

  A flicker of surprise from Selendis. "You know of the ara'dor? The perfect ratio?"

  "Jake did. That's how he found Zamara in the first place—she'd left a note, which of course we couldn't read, and sealed herself inside the temple somehow. So Jake was at even more of a disadvantage than a protoss would have been. But he made the connection. He.. .doesn't think like other people do."

  "Obviously."

  The temple and its flickering, oddly haunting lights was gone. Rosemary leaned back in the chair. "Selendis—can you tell me what I'll be facing when I go in there? I'm not really a people person, in case you hadn't noticed."

  At that, Selendis ducked her head and half closed her eyes and laughed more heartily than Rosemary would have given her credit for. "Yes, Rosemary Dahl, this thing I had noticed." She sobered slightly. "Yes. I will prepare you, because I believe in this cause, if not the messenger of it."

  That stung more than Rosemary expected, but she brushed it aside. "All I want is for us to find and help Jake and Zamara."

  "I know this now. And—they will know that as well. Be prepared to have your mind read immediately upon entering the hall. By everyone present. For the entire duration."

  Rosemary's fists clenched and she almost literally growled.

  "Rosemary...do you know about Matriarch Raszagal?"

  "Raszagal...Jake met her through Zamara's memories. She was just an adolescent when she left Aiur. She's still alive?"

  "No. And let me tell you why."

  Jake stared at Zeratul. "You...you killed her?" Zamara—why did you bring me to this guy? He betrayed his world and killed his leader! We 're supposed to put my life and the fate of this secret of yours in those kind of hands?

  Patience, Jacob. To know all is to understand all.

  Jake's voice revealed his shock, abhorrence, and trepidation. Zeratul did not cringe from it. He stood straight and nodded confirmation.

  "Yes. By my own hand, I murdered our beloved matriarch." "In God's name, why?" "Because she asked it of me."

  Jake's mind continued to reel, and Zamara continued to be silent. Jake thought about why someone might ask such a thing. "She... was she ill? Wounded beyond healing?"

  "In a manner of speaking, yes. Raszagal... our beloved matriarch.. .powerful and wise.. .was being used. Used to betray herown people. Used by one so cunning and unscrupulous that to this day, I cannot fathom the depths of that mind."

  Jake thought he'd gotten it. "Ulrezaj!"

  "No." Glowing eyes bored into blue ones. "Though I am intrigued as to how you know that name. But that question is for another time. No, I do not refer to Ulrezaj, but to Sarah Kerrigan. The Queen of Blades. She who had once been human and is now the leader of the zerg."

  Jake grimaced slightly. "Zamara and I were once discussing her. From what I understand, the zerg turned her into one of them."

  Zeratul nodded. "They infested her, but somehow did not destroy her individuality. Kerrigan came to us seemingly in good faith, proposing a plan that would aid the protoss and Kerrigan both. But even before she arrived on our world, Kerrigan had gotten to Raszagal and perverted her to her will."

  The words were flooding out of Zeratul now, as if a dam of some sort had been broken. Jake listened intently.

  "It was all a trick. A ploy. Kerrigan planned to turn on us the moment she had gotten what she needed. We would never have listened to her at all, no matter how reasonable she sounded, had not our own matriarch urged us to do so. Kerrigan knew that was the only way to get what she wanted from us. She kidnapped Raszagal, and I managed to rescue her."

  He looked away for a moment. Protoss facial muscles did not reveal much. It was through their thoughts, so much more nuanced and subtle than human thoughts, and the movements of their graceful and powerful bodies, that they communicated. While Zeratul's expression did not change, the pain and outrage of his thoughts and the slight hunching of his powerful form told Jake as much as—more than—if he had been a human speaking. Zeratul was in torment.

  "It was only my matriarch's powerful will that enabled her to speak as herself in that moment," Zeratul continued. "In that moment...as she died. Kerrigan knew that I believed I could free her from the zerg queen's influence. And...so I had hoped, too."

  He turned back to Jake. "But in the end, I was mistaken. I could not liberate her—at least, not that way. Death was the only freedom I could grant to one I respected with all my heart. And in that moment, she thanked me."

  He bowed his head and shuttered his thoughts from Jake. But not, it would seem, from Zamara.

  "’You have freed me from her vile control at last,'" Zamara said softly, gently, and Jake knew she was quoting the ill-fated Raszagal's last words. '"You have always served me with honor... Thus I must ask you—"'

  "No!" Zeratul cried violently, spinning around to face Jake and Zamara. "You will not say those words!"

  Oh crap, what the hell did Raszagal say? Jake thought, panicked that in his outrage and hurt Zeratul might forget that he wasn't supposed to kill preservers and throttle Jake right on the spot.

  Zamara ignored him and implacably continued. "Thus I must ask you to watch over my tribe.. .Zeratul. ..into your hands I give the future.' That's what she asked of you."

  The anger seemed to bleed out of Zeratul and he turned away again, hunching over, looking much smaller and more vulnerable.

  "I thought Kerrigan would kill me. I expected it. I., .planned on it. Instead, she praised me, calling me a worthy warrior." His eyes narrowed, and the anger—no, not anger, it was deeper, larger than that—the offense returned to him. "She said she had already taken my honor. She was going to let me live because my every waking moment would be torture. Because she knew that I would never be able to forgive myself for what she forced me to do. That, Kerrigan said, would be the best revenge she could imagine."

  "You shouldn't let her win like that," Jake said softly.

  The lambent eyes focused their full outrage on him. "Watch what you say, human."

  "Kerrigan was wrong. She didn't take your honor," Jake continued, wondering where in the world this sudden rather reckless courage was coming from. "You let her take it."

  Jacob—

  Zamara was warning him to back off. Jake ignored her. "Kerrigan didn't force you to do what you did. Sure, she set up the situation, and it was a horrible one. But you decided what to do about it. You chose to kill Raszagal. Don't blame Kerrigan for that."

  Jacob, I would advise you to cease this line of conversation.

  Zamara, I don't have a lot of time left to me if we don't convince Zeratul to get off his ass and help us. He's wallowing in self-pity right now.

  "You didn't lose your honor. You kept it. Raszagal was at peace with what you did."

  Zeratul had been stunned into mental silence at Jake's words, but the mention of Raszagal startled him into erupting. "You did not know my matriarch! How dare you speak for her!"

  "But I did know her, in a way." The words were spilling out of him now, as they earlier had from Zeratul himself. "I was Vetraas, and Vetraas knew Raszagal, and that girl, that gutsy little spitfire, was proud of who she was and what she believed in. I bet that didn't change when she got older and became the leader of the dark templar. I bet she just got smarter and wiser and stronger, developed a rational head to go along with that passionate heart. I bet she was a terrific
matriarch and loathed every nanosecond of being under Kerrigan's control. You didn't kill your matriarch, Zeratul. Kerrigan did that the minute she forced her way into Raszagal's brain and used her as a puppet to betray her own people. All you did was cut the strings. Raszagal died free. If you don't think there's honor in helping her do that, then I gotta say, you are not the protoss Raszagal thought you were."

  Zeratul jerked as if slapped.

  "Her last words were a duty you're failing to discharge. You're letting her down, big time. She asked you to watch over her tribe. She put the future in your hands, and right now, you're just sitting on them. My individual future and that of your people—hell, if Zamara's hints are right, the entire universe—is ticking past while you sit here on this out-of-the-way planet and feel sorry for yourself. You want that to be Raszagal's legacy?"

  Zeratul moved so fast that Jake didn't realize he'd gone just that extra smidge too far until he was flat on his back with the protoss's hands on his throat. Zamara took over at once, forcing herself into Jake's body and fighting back, flipping Zeratul over, wriggling free, and dropping into a crouching stance.

  When she had done this before, Jake's body had been able to defeat a master assassin in hand-to-hand combat. He didn't underestimate Zamara's prowess—she knew every fighting technique every protoss had ever known, after all—but he knew the limits of his own body, and there was no way a human could win this particular fight. Not even a human with a protoss at the wheel.

  After all this, I didn 't think I'd die at the hands of a protoss, Jake sent wildly to Zamara.

  But he didn't.

  Exerting a mental control Jake could only marvel at, Zeratul regained his composure. Calm draped him like a cloak. That stillness, so profound as to be almost unreal, settled over him and he rose to his full intimidating height.

  "Leave. Now. And do not return."

  Rosemary whistled, soft and low. "Wow. So a human woman warped the matriarch of all the dark templar into serving her will and ultimately forced a loyal subject to kill her. Okay, I see your point. I'm surprised that this Hierarchy of yours is even willing to talk to me after that. I'd heard some about Kerrigan. But not that."

  "You do have a great prejudice to overcome," Selendis agreed. "The amount of pain Kerrigan has caused my people cannot be underestimated. Bear in mind also that protoss are unfamiliar with your culture. It may well have been that all females of your species are untrustworthy, and only the males are capable of actions of merit and compassion."

  "Well, that's not true. We're all individuals."

  "Your past does not exactly lend itself to our believing that."

  Rosemary sighed. "I know. But there's nothing I can do about it. I can't and won't deny it or pretend it didn't happen."

  Selendis eyed her, and yet again Rosemary felt her measure was being taken. The protoss continued.

  "As I said, your thoughts will all be read. That is one thing you must be prepared for. The other thing is, they will do their best to unsettle you, to keep you off balance. Do not permit yourself to be intimidated, and if you do, in Tassadar's name do not become adversarial. Yet also, do not be overly meek. If you win their respect, they will be more likely to give credence to your request."

  "Great. Diplomacy. I'm not good at it."

  "They will know that too. There are those who will be ready to take your side and those who will be ready to oppose you. We are... not quite yet the united people Adun and Tassadar had hoped we would become." The executor's thoughts were laced with just the barest hint of pain and regret, quickly covered. "But even the dark templar respect preservers. You have an advantage in that the truth of what you say can be verified. Engage them, do not alienate them, and I am hopeful of the outcome."

  Engage, but don't alienate. Rosemary made a wry face. Much, much easier said—or in this case thought—than done. She settled back in the overlarge chair, still facing the window but no longer seeing the images that passed below her.

  She'd been before the Heir Apparent to the Terran Dominion and stood her ground. She'd killed—or at least thought she'd killed—a man she'd loved in cold blood. She'd lobbed grenades at zerg, piloted a ship under attack, and done any number of other things that required nerves of paristeel.

  Why, then, did anticipating this audience make her stomach knot?

  She realized it was because before, the only thing that had been at stake was herself. Her life, her fortunes, her feelings. But this time, more—much more—than that rested on how she'd impress this High Muckety-Muck Hierarchy. This time, maybe the whole universe rested on her shoulders.

  And even more than that.. Jake's life rested on that.

  "Fighting zerg was easier," she muttered.

  CHAPTER 13

  ROSEMARY PACED IN THE ANTECHAMBER OF what Selendis had told her was the dark templar's citadel. It had been fascinating to watch the ship maneuver in for a landing—the entire citadel was erected atop a gigantic hovering disk. She'd been shunted off to this room, and had been told to wait. And wait.

  Vartanil watched her in sympathetic silence. "Protoss protocol moves at a glacial pace," she muttered.

  "I must agree with you, Rosemary," Vartanil said. "I have spent the last four years on Aiur, where sometimes a fraction of a second meant life or death. There was no option for hesitancy or slow deliberation. Not even among the Tal'darim, where we were somewhat safer than our brethren on the surface." He added, "Safer, of course, being a relative term. We did not need to fear the zerg, only our own Xava'tor."

  She nodded absently, wondering if she'd made the right decision in coming in her worn, stained leather outfit rather than the graceful protoss clothing. She shook her head at herself, her silky, gleaming black hair flying with the gesture. It wasn't like her to second-guess her decisions. This whole situation had put her off her stride. It was time to pull herself together. Too much was at stake for her to walk into that hall rattled and fretting about clothing choices.

  "Rosemary Dahl, they will see you now." The mental voice belonged to one of Selendis's templar who had accompanied her in the ship. Rosemary turned and nodded. She took a deep breath and forced composure on herself as she had so many times in the past.

  "Let's do this thing."

  The templar turned to the Furinax. "Vartanil, you also are requested to appear."

  "I?" Vartanil's hands fluttered in agitation. "But...I am no one important! Why do they want to see me?"

  "Because you know firsthand what Ulrezaj did to those who followed him. And because you have chosen to support Rosemary. Your experience is important in their decision."

  Vartanil turned lambent eyes to Rosemary. For her mind alone, he sent, "It is my greatest hope that nothing I bring to this meeting jeopardizes your chances of recovering Professor Ramsey."

  "I know," Rosemary said. She couldn't hide her own worry, and unfortunately that did nothing but add to Vartanil's agitation. "But hey, you could be a great help too. Let's just go find out, okay?"

  Vartanil nodded. The templar beckoned, and Rosemary and the former Tal'darim followed him.

  They strode down a long corridor that was wide and yet somehow confining. Little decor was on the walls here; this was a purely functional route, merely an entrance to the chambers. Wide but oddly cramped feeling, the design of the corridor was a security measure, she realized. Petitioners or perhaps even honored guests would be monitored every step of the way.

  When they emerged, Rosemary blinked at the sight that met her eyes.

  She had seen displays of wealth and power before, and she was not one to be easily intimidated by such things. Ethan's compound had dripped wealth on lavish display, and Valerian's private study, while more tasteful and understated, was filled with items that were actually even more valuable than anything Ethan possessed.

  But this...

  The door, deceptively modest and undecorated on this side, opened onto something straight out of a dream. The dark templar obviously fostered craftsmen every bit
as talented as the khalai. She couldn't take a guess at how old this building was, nor how long it had taken to erect, but it was magnificent. Where the corridor had felt narrow, this room was cavernous. Soft black carpeting rendered her footfalls silent as she moved forward, not breaking stride despite the shock of the place's grandeur.

  The enormous room, large enough to be a building on its own, was circular. Above arched a dome made of faceted crystals. Unlike most of the crystals Rosemary had seen so far, these were not opaque and radiant but translucent, to let in as much natural light as possible. More illumination was provided by the more familiar crystals, scattered throughout the hall on intricately crafted metal stands. Alcoves ran the entirety of the circular hall, and in each one sat a protoss on a huge chair, surrounded by several attendants. Rosemary's eyes darted around, finally coming to rest on a figure at the far end on a dais. Standing beside him was Selendis, who turned to Rosemary. Though she appeared tiny because the place was so damn big, Rosemary recognized her immediately; her armor was distinctive, and she was the only female present in any position of authority.

  Selendis's thoughts brushed hers. "They will not read your thoughts until you are formally introduced. Do not be afraid, Rosemary Dahl. All here are aware of the situation, and many are already sympathetic toward your goal."