“Yes, sir, I have permission.”
“It doesn’t say so on your file.” There was a short, accusatory silence. The rest of the carriage had gone silent. Glancing around, Rugal saw that nobody was looking their way. People were staring at the floor, at their padds, out the window. “You know that it’s an offense for an unparented minor to travel without the permission of its guardian or sponsor, don’t you?”
Penelya nodded. She had gone very white. “What’s going on?” Rugal said. “We’re taking a shuttle home, what’s wrong with that—”
“Unfortunately, your companion shouldn’t be on this shuttle if her guardian hasn’t given her permission.”
“My uncle has to confirm every month that I’m allowed to travel unaccompanied,” Penelya whispered. “Sometimes he forgets, he’s so busy—”
“You’ll have to come with us,” the senior officer said. Rugal couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Check my file again,” he said angrily. “Take a proper look at my father’s name.” There was a pause while the officers did so. And then, smoothly, as if the whole prior exchange hadn’t happened, the senior of the two said, “Apologies for disturbing you, sir. Enjoy the rest of your journey.” Then they both moved on.
The rest of the carriage relaxed. Penelya turned away from him to the window, and she shook him off when he tried to put his arm back around her. They didn’t speak when they reached their stop, nor as they walked along the curved avenue that led up toward the Khevet house. They stood outside awkwardly for a while and then Penelya said, politely, “Thank you for your help on the shuttle.”
Rugal took her hand, but it was limp and unresponsive. He almost screamed. It was as if acid had been poured on their friendship. “I’m sorry,” he said, stroking his thumb along her finger. “I didn’t understand. I promise I’ll never do that again.”
She nodded. Cautiously, he leaned in and kissed her on the cheek. “It was a lovely day,” he said. “Thank you. I’m sorry I’m such an idiot.” He felt her fingers curl round his hand and he sighed in relief.
“You’re not so bad,” she said softly. “You mean well.” She let go of his hand and walked over to the gates. Before going inside, she said, “Go and make friends with Kotan.”
“All right! I will! For you. But I’m still going home!”
She gave him a smile that sparkled with life and laughter. His heart soared. That was the real Penelya. “I’d be disappointed if you didn’t. Good night, Rugal. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
So when Kotan told him he was going away for a few days to visit friends at their house in Perok district, and invited Rugal to join them, Rugal kept his promise to Penelya and said he that would.
Kotan was delighted, which gave Rugal a pang of guilt. “I think you’ll find these people interesting,” he said, nodding when Rugal tilted his head in a silent question. These friends were, presumably, more dissidents.
The journey out to Perok took most of a day. Kotan worked steadily for the first leg while Rugal sat and looked out across flat arid country. This was Lorikal district, once farmland, now dusty from drought and overuse. In the late afternoon, the red sun boiling in a slate sky, the road began to rise, and they entered moorland, treeless and gray. Kotan put aside his work and, as if a switch had been flicked, he opened up, more than he had ever done before. It all poured out—his hopes, his ambitions, his belief that the Cardassian military had become too powerful and how it was the duty of the civilian political bodies urgently to address this imbalance. The people they were going to meet shared this belief, he said. They had worked tirelessly for years to reach positions of power—across all parts of government, within the judiciary, even in the military itself—in order to be able to bring about reform.
“But they are not only colleagues and fellow travelers,” Kotan said. “They are my friends. I’ve known Meya and Gerat Rejal”—it was their house that they were visiting—“since I was a young man. Gerat introduced me to your mother. I’m very glad that you were willing to come and meet them. Thank you.”
Rugal gave a curt nod and looked away. Of course, it was Penelya he should be grateful to, since it was only through her efforts that Rugal was here. Would Kotan still be glad if he knew it was the orphan girl he had to thank for his son’s being here?
The Rejals’ country house, spacious and comfortable, lay in a bowl formed by two gray hills. As the skimmer drew to a halt in front, a man and woman came out to greet them. They were accompanied by four huge jetblack hounds. The couple waited by the big front doors; the hounds, however, did not stand on ceremony. They leapt around the skimmer and yelped as if this was the most exciting thing ever to have happened in Perok. When Rugal got out, one of the hounds bounded up to him. He bent to stroke its dark wiry hair, and it shoved its head within his hands and looked up at him with unqualified love. It was beautiful.
Gerat Rejal watched on with amusement. “You didn’t say he liked hounds, Kotan.” Kotan, pained, replied, “I didn’t know.”
A short silence followed. Rugal briskly rubbed the fur behind the animal’s ears, thereby winning its neverending devotion and saving him from having to look at Kotan. Then Meya Rejal came over to him. “This beast’s called Leirt,” she said, patting its side, “after the hound in the Hebitian legend. Don’t give your heart to him, Rugal, he falls in love easily. But he loves the hunt, and he loves to be ridden. You’ll see tomorrow. In the meantime—please, come inside!”
Rugal was grateful for both the welcome and the tact. So was Kotan, by the look of him. He followed his hosts up into the house, Leirt padding alongside him, to meet, one by one, Kotan’s friends and fellow dissidents, all eager for a sight of the son who had come back from the dead. As well as the Rejals, there were three others present: a cheerful man called Erek Rhemet, who thumped his palm hard against Rugal’s; a more reserved individual named Ithas Bamarek; and an elderly man whom Kotan hurried to introduce to Rugal. As Kotan and the old man pressed palms, Kotan said, “Is Alon not here yet?”
“He’ll be with us in the morning. Natima Lang’s due to join us then too.”
Kotan turned to his son. “Rugal, I’m very honored to introduce you to my dear friend, and my mentor, Legate Tekeny Ghemor.”
Rugal held up his palm. Tekeny pressed his own palm against it and then, unusually, he curled his fingers round so that he was clasping Rugal’s hand within his own. The legate smiled, but his eyes were unspeakably sad. “So this is the lost child that came back from Bajor,” he said. “Welcome home, Rugal. Welcome home.”
After dinner, the party settled down in the sunroom to conversation and kanar, but Rugal went outside in search of quiet. He found it in a particularly elegant stone garden, where he sat down in the night’s dry heat to consider his impressions of the company. Leirt lay panting at his feet.
The company had gone out of their way to make him feel at home, and their delight on Kotan’s behalf had been genuine and unforced. There had been plenty of palm pressing and back slapping, and over dinner they had cheerfully slandered mutual and absent acquaintances from across the whole of Cardassia’s political and intellectual elite. Only Tekeny Ghemor had spoken as little as Rugal. Altogether, they reminded Rugal of Tret and Colat Khevet: personable and intelligent, well-meaning, taking evident pleasure in their wealth and status. On the whole, Rugal liked them, but he did not believe for a moment that they would do anything seriously to alter the nature of Cardassia. They were too invested in the status quo. Perhaps tomorrow, when the missing members of the party arrived, it would be different.
Rugal leaned down to rub the rough hair behind the hound’s ears. It gave him that heart-stopping look of pure love. “Beautiful beast,” he told it, and then he heard a quiet laugh behind him. He turned to see Tekeny Ghemor leaning on the garden gate, watching him and smiling. “You like hounds?” he said.
“Yes, although I’ve never owned one.”
“Perhaps your father could be persuaded,” Ghemor said. Rugal was certain tha
t Kotan could, but he wouldn’t ask. “May I join you?”
Rugal shifted along the bench. “Please do.”
Ghemor sat down beside him and studied Rugal openly and curiously. “So. What do you think of our little group?”
“Do you want my honest answer?”
“By all means.”
“They’re hardly the Bajoran Resistance, are they?”
Ghemor laughed out loud. “Kotan said you were distressingly frank. Not a quality much valued on Cardassia, I’m afraid. Obfuscation is more the order of the day.”
“Perhaps that’s part of the problem.”
“Perhaps you’re right.” He gave Rugal a look that was sharp but not hostile. “Wait till Natima arrives. I suspect you’ll like her more.” He stretched out his legs. “Myself, I think all this scheming is a game for the young. The older I get, the more I crave the truth. Tell me, Rugal, are you glad to be back among your people?”
“My people are on Bajor, sir.” The honorific slipped out before he knew he was going to say it. Ghemor seemed to deserve it. “I intend to go back there one day.”
Ghemor showed no horror or dismay. “I understand. You were gone for a long time. My daughter has been gone for a long time. She has been on Bajor, like you. Stolen too, I’d say—although others claim she went of her own free will. I think they stole her mind before they stole her body. She went to Bajor, and she was lost.” His face darkened. “I wonder if she’s been there too long...” He collected himself and leaned forward, gently placing his hand against Rugal’s face. It was a grandfatherly gesture, kind. “I was sorry for Kotan when I heard you were gone. I’m glad you’ve returned, and not just for Kotan’s sake, although he deserves some happiness. But I’m glad for my own sake too. Because if you can return from the dead, Rugal, it’s not so hard to convince myself the same could happen one day with my dear Iliana. She might yet come back from Bajor. Come back from the dead.”
Rugal did not know what to say. Leirt, watching him, whined. Then Kotan arrived, having come to look for them. He was carrying a bottle of kanar and was keen to join them. Rugal sat and listened to the two men talk. He was not sure he had fully understood Ghemor’s story, but the old man’s tender grief had touched him.
“What happened to his daughter?” he asked Kotan later, after Tekeny had retired for the night. “Was she killed like—” He stopped himself. He had nearly said: like my mother.
Kotan sighed. “It’s a sad story. She was going to be married, but then the boy was killed on Bajor. The Obsidian Order stepped into the gap—they do that, find the hole in someone’s life and fill it. She went undercover on Bajor—they altered her memories and her appearance—and she hasn’t come back. Tekeny’s convinced she’s still there living under her false identity.” Kotan shook his head. “It’s difficult to believe that’s true. The conditioning would surely have broken down by now. But he keeps on hoping that one day she’ll come home.” He gave his son a wry look. “Stranger things have happened.”
Rugal lay awake for a long time that night, thinking about the girl, Iliana, and her father, Tekeny. He did not know what to wish for. Tekeny had been kind, and he was an old man wanting peace and resolution at the end of his life. But surely Iliana ought to stay where she thought she belonged? Perhaps she was married; perhaps she loved Bajor deeply and even now was working to bring about its regeneration. Who could win, in such a situation? There could only be victims.
Rugal turned and sighed. Leirt, lying at the foot of the bed, cracked open an eye to check that all was well. The more he saw of Cardassia, the more it seemed to Rugal that the Bajorans were not the only ones damaged by that foolish, futile policy. True, the Bajoran people had suffered more—that should never be forgotten. But Cardassians too had been harmed, and many of those had played no part in the decision to invade Bajor. Iliana Ghemor had been driven offworld by the death of her mate and the loss of the children they might have had. Tret Khevet too was a victim in a way, told lies that kept him narrow-minded and unthinking. And then there was himself, caught between two worlds, neither one thing nor the other, never at home.
The next day they went hunting and, for the first time, Rugal discovered something about Cardassia that surpassed Bajor. At home, he had loved watching the grace-hounds, admiring their lithe speed and beauty. But to ride with the hounds on the hunt, to be part of the pursuit rather than simply a spectator—it was better in every way. Leirt was magnificent: dark and powerful, tolerant of his rider’s inexperience, pleased with his readiness to take risks. Rugal fell off once and barely noticed the thump. His hound glanced back at him as if to say, Hurry up or you’ll miss the good bit, and he scrambled straight back on. Even the kill at the end thrilled him. He was still talking about it when the party gathered for drinks before dinner, and he could even forgive Kotan for being so pleased that the day had been such a success.
That night, too energized to be able to sleep, Rugal got up and explored the house. He found the library, a large basement room where the temperature was kept at a moderate level for the sake of the books. The collection was a lot more heavy-going than Kotan’s; the volumes had titles like: Between Liberty and Security; Retooling Political Discourse; Common Failures in Rhetorical Performance. Rugal was thinking of going back to bed when his eye fell on a series of books written by Natima Lang. Tekeny had said he would like her. Rugal ran his finger along the line of books, choosing the narrowest. Its title was: The Ending of “The Never-Ending Sacrifice.”
That would do. With any luck, it would tell him what happened and he would never have to wrestle with Corac’s deadly prose ever again. He took the book with him to one of the armchairs, palmed on the reading lamp, and read: “‘For Cardassia!’ So begins what many would call our greatest novel. In truth, it is our greatest lie.”
It was very late when Rugal finished reading, by which time his whole world had changed. Natima Lang saw what he saw when he looked at Cardassia. She too had diagnosed its sickness, but more than that, she had described a cure. Lang argued that for generations, Cardassians had taught themselves that they had to take from others in order to live. Cardassia devoured everything, but not only was it blind to these tendencies, it even glamorized them. This was the lie Lang saw at the heart of The Never-Ending Sacrifice: Cardassians told themselves that their history was one of glory, when in fact it was an uninterrupted pattern of murder and destruction, passed down the generations, and masquerading as a romantic ideal of duty to secure the survival of the state.
In the second half of the book, Lang set out her political program. The drive for expansion had taken on its own momentum, and that had to be stopped. She argued for military retrenchment, for power sharing across the whole of Cardassian society, for greater cooperation and openness with Cardassia’s neighbors. Cardassians had to learn to curb themselves if they wanted to survive. The book ended on a warning. Bajor was the symbol of the old order, the old way, and Cardassia had been utterly defeated there. If Cardassia could not control its appetites, but could now no longer so casually take from others, then it would eventually start to consume itself. That was the inevitable end of the never-ending sacrifice. Was that the future that Cardassians wanted? Was it the best they could imagine?
Lang’s was the first truthful voice Rugal had heard since coming here. She had reflected his thoughts back to him, almost as if she had access to them, and then she had taken them further than he had thought possible. He had never had such an experience with a book before; he had not known such a thing could happen. Rugal got up from the chair and wandered around the room, his body processing all that his mind had just encountered. What amazed him most was that Lang was—undeniably, absolutely—Cardassian. In no way could she be called Bajoran. For the first time since his arrival, Rugal felt that it really was possible for him to have sprung from the soil of this barren unpromising world. Were there others like Lang on Cardassia? Others who spoke this kind of language? Where could he find them? He checked the back of the b
ook. She was professor of ethics at the Institute of State Policy. If he worked hard and got accepted into the institute, could he study with her?
Rugal halted by the doors of the library. Beyond, the hallway was dimly lit, and, with his head buzzing from all these new ideas, it took him a moment or two to realize that there were people standing out there, conferring in low tones. He frowned and listened. Kotan was there, and Tekeny Ghemor and Meya Rejal and a fourth—another man—whose voice he didn’t recognize. When somebody said the word “defection,” Rugal decided that eavesdropping on this conversation was definitely a bad idea. He took a step or two back from the door, started whistling, then pushed the doors open and went out into the hall.
It had given them all the warning they required. All four turned to look at him, guiltily, like conspirators caught plotting. Exactly like conspirators caught plotting, in fact. “Rugal!” Kotan said, in falsely jovial tones, glancing back at the newcomer. This was a tall man in a smart suit who looked like he had been having a truly terrible day. “Allow me to introduce my friend Alon Ghemor,” Kotan said. “The legate’s nephew. Alon—my son, Rugal.”
Alon Ghemor looked at Rugal with sudden interest. He was about Kotan’s age, Rugal thought, although he didn’t have Kotan’s permanent air of endurance, and that made him seem younger. He took a step forward, pressed his palm firmly against Rugal’s, all the while looking directly into his eyes. “Welcome home. I’m sure your father must be...” Rugal watched him struggle to find a socially acceptable way of saying, sorry that you didn’t do the decent thing and stay dead.
Kotan came to his aid. “His grandmother and I are delighted to have him home. Gul Dukat”—he gave Alon a meaningful look—“went to a great deal of trouble on Rugal’s account. I was most grateful.”
“Ah. Yes.” Alon gave a dry smile. “I see.”
“What are you doing up so late, Rugal?” Kotan said.
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