Keeping her gaze locked with Suran’s, Donatra slowly moved her right hand away from the butt of her disruptor, allowing it to settle instead on the jorreh-handled haft of the short-bladed ihl-senthat she kept right next to it, tucked into a scabbard on her belt. The ready room’s large desk concealed her careful manipulations.
Suran didn’t lower his weapon. “The fleet should already be back in Romulan space by now, Donatra. Instead, you’ve opted to stay here and involve us in matters that are none of our concern. Why?”
She continued to meet his hard, bloodshot stare squarely. “Riker and his crew aided us in staving off a civil war, Suran.”
“Riker and his crew are trying to save a population of refugees. Humanrefugees. It’s not our problem. We have an empire to defend from the Klingons and the Remans.”
“And the Reman attack against Romulus wasn’t Riker’s problem, either. Yet he acted on our behalf without any reservations. You and I, not to mention the empire we both revere, accrued a large debt to him that day, Suran. And I alwayspay my debts.”
“Do you owe Riker more loyalty than you owe me?”
She chuckled. “Your notions of loyalty are peculiar, Suran. Right now, Riker isn’t the one who has a weapon pointed at me.” Perhaps I should have followed my instincts and eliminated you long ago,she thought. If not for our mutual loyalty to Braeg, I very well might have already.
Suran’s weapon-hand showed no sign of lowering. “Your plan calls for jettisoning the warp cores of more than half the ships in our fleet, Donatra.”
“Our ships won’t be harmed.”
“As the S’harienwasn’t harmed?”
She ignored the comment. “The fleet will make it back through the anomaly and into Romulan space before their warp-field bubbles collapse. That’s built into the plan, Suran.”
“So you hope. But even if that’s so, some two dozen of our d’Deridex- and Mogai-class warbirds will be hamstrung. We can’t afford to let the Klingons who’ve set up camp inside our borders discover this. Or those savages on Remus and Ehrie’fvil.”
Donatra shook her head. “We’ll have all our vessels repaired and the fleet back to full strength by the time Colonel Xiomek or that idiot Khegh find out anything. I have already seen to it.”
“Cut the human asteroid colony loose and take the fleet to warp now,Donatra,” Suran said, an almost pleading expression crossing his pale features. “The crew need never know how close we came to crossing Honor Blades over this.”
She regarded him in silence for at least a full siure.Though he looked no less depleted than he had when he’d first entered the room, he also appeared no less determined. But Venora’s drugs were obviously still roiling within his blood, along with whatever counteragents Suran’s unknown confederates had used to get him back on his feet only a few dierhuafter she had last checked in on him.
This was indeed a formidable and highly dangerous man.
“All right,” Donatra said, rising from behind her desk. Using her left hand, she made a show of preparing to open a comm channel.
With her right she threw the ihl-senthat she had placed inside her tunic cuff. Suran gasped and gurgled and immediately fell to his knees. Donatra rose and strode confidently around the desk, then approached him. She saw that Suran had dropped his weapon. Even if he had managed to hold onto it, she would have been in no real danger; she’d had the Valdore’s security system deactivate it while he’d still been standing on the bridge.
The matter was moot now, however; both of Suran’s hands were presently clawing without effect at the wide, verdant wound that her serrated throwing knife had created. The short blade was lodged quite snugly in the man’s windpipe.
Suran pitched forward onto his face and lay unmoving in front of the desk. His blood spread out in a swiftly expanding pool, dyeing the carpet a rich, beryl-emerald green.
Donatra regained her feet, approached Suran, and rolled him over onto his back. His flinty eyes stared back at her, as lifeless as polished atlairiverstones. Like Donatra, Suran had served under Admiral Braeg, and they had both pledged Braeg their loyalty. Donatra had become Braeg’s lover, and both she and Suran had mourned him deeply after Braeg had fallen to Tal’Aura’s treachery. Now, with Suran dead, her last living link with Braeg had passed from the world. For good or ill, her destiny was fully her own at long last.
There will be no more power struggles between us, Suran,she thought, feeling unexpectedly wistful, but only for a moment. She knelt, picked up his weapon, then pulled her own free from the ghastly wound in his neck. She wiped the gore-spattered blade clean on Suran’s sleeve, then returned it to concealment beneath her tunic as she rose to her feet.
All the while, she wondered why she felt so detached from the grisly reality of her longtime colleague’s death. And from the fact that she had been its cause.
The comm unit on her desk chimed, startling her.
“Centurion Liravek to Commander Donatra.Titan is hailing us.”
Donatra realized that she had been holding her breath. Recovering her composure with no small amount of effort, she touched the reply key.
“Acknowledged, Centurion. I’ll take it here.”
U.S.S. TITAN
From the moment the Romulan commander’s face appeared on the bridge viewscreen, Deanna Troi was certain that Donatra was concealing something. Something terrible.
Will glanced toward Troi, who knew immediately that he had seen the look of alarm that had crossed her face. He had managed to keep his own “emotional tells” under control, however, like the master poker player he was.
“Commander Donatra, Titanand her crew are ready to go to warp. Our sensor networks are now fully tested and prepared to continue relaying real-time navigational hazard data to your fleet’s computer network, at our highest warp speeds.”
Donatra nodded, her face a mask of impassivity. But just below the surface, her emotions were in violent convection. Why?Troi wondered.
“Excellent, Captain. My crews stand ready to move at your signal. However, there is something I must tell you before we begin. Is this channel secure on your end?”
Troi watched as Will nodded toward Cadet Dakal, who entered a few swift commands, then nodded back at the captain.
“It is now, Commander,” Will said.
Donatra bowed her head briefly, and Troi sensed a wave of gratitude rising from her. “Captain Riker, what I’m about to tell you must be kept in the strictest confidence, at least until I am ready to announce it to my own people.”
“Of course.”
“Commander Suran is dead.”
Will’s feelings of surprise briefly overwhelmed anything Troi was able to sense from Donatra, whose gaze was moving back and forth between Will and Troi. She’s considering how hard it will be for her to dissemble in front of me,Troi thought as Will worked to tamp down his emotions.
“What happened?” Will said, breaking the lengthy, stunned silence that had followed Donatra’s revelation.
“He attempted to abort our fleet’s participation in this rescue operation. And because he did this by brandishing a weapon at me, I had no choice other than to respond in kind.”
Troi looked toward Will, who was casting a gently interrogative glance in her direction. She nodded, wordlessly informing him that Donatra was essentially telling the truth. Essentially,she thought. But not necessarily completely.
Rising and facing Donatra again, Will said, “You say your crew hasn’t been informed yet?”