In the center of Tolar’tu, Kahless held Shurin’s battered body in his arms and roared at the gathering storm. Rain fell in heavy, warm drops, mixing with Shurin’s blood and marking the dirt at the rebel’s feet.
“This was my friend,” Kahless cried. “Shurin, who never knew his father or mother, who lost an eye fighting Molor’s wars. Yet he saw more clearly than most men, for he was among the first to turn against the tyrant.”
With a sudden heave of his powerful arms, the outlaw raised Shurin’s loose-limbed corpse to the heavens. More importantly, he made it visible to the vast mob gathered before him—an assemblage of rebels that packed the square from wall to wall and squeezed into the narrow streets all around.
Nor was he the only one with a dead man in his hands. There were hundreds of others clasped by friends and kin, grim evidence of the efficiency of Molor’s soldiers and the sharpness of their swords.
But for every rebel that fell, two of the tyrant’s men had gone down as well. For every one of Kahless’s outlaws, two of Molor’s soldiers. And in the end, that had been enough to save Tolar’tu from destruction.
Not all of it, unfortunately. Not the outer precincts, where the enemy had smashed and burned and gutted at their warlord’s command. But thanks to the courage of these rabble and riffraff, this square and the buildings around it had gone unscathed.
“What will I tell this man of courage,” Kahless raged, “when I see him on the far side of Death? What will I say took place after he left us? What tale will I bear him?”
There were responses from the crowd, guttural demands of vengeance and promises of devotion. He couldn’t make out the exact words for the echoes. But he could see the expressions on the rebels’ faces, and by those alone he knew he was reaching them.
Strange, the outlaw thought. He had always been able to reach them this way, hadn’t he? He had just never paused to reflect on it. Kahless raised Shurin’s body a little higher.
“Will I tell him his comrades came as far as Tolar’tu, then faltered? That at the last, they spit the bit and allowed his death to come to nothing? Or will I tell him we persevered, and went on to Qa’yarin, and trampled the serpent there under our heel?”
This time the answer was so deafening, so powerful, Kahless thought the buildings around him might crumble after all. It was like being in the center of a storm, the likes of which the world had not known since its beginnings—a tempest made of men’s voices and clashing swords and a yearning so fierce no enemy could stand against it.
Truth to tell, Shurin had broken his neck falling off his s’tarahk in the midst of the battle. Kahless himself had seen the beast stumble and throw the man to the ground, and he had seen Shurin lie still as other beasts came and trampled him.
It might not have been that way if the man hadn’t had too much bloodwine the night before. Or if he had slept more instead of rolling gaming bones halfway to morning.
But that was not the picture the outlaw wished to paint—and since he had been the only witness to Shurin’s death, he could paint it as he liked. The one-eyed man would be an asset in death as he was in life. A hero if necessary, a martyr if possible. Shurin himself would have laughed at the notion, but he was no longer alive to have a say in the matter.
Lowering Shurin’s corpse, he laid it on the ground. Then he stood again and waited for just the right moment.
“Wait!” Kahless shouted suddenly, as the cheers began to die down. “Stop! What in the name of our ancestors are we doing?”
The throng grew quiet, peering at him through faces caked with dirt and blood. What sort of question is that? they must have wondered.
“Are we insane?” the outlaw asked. “Just because we have triumphed in a few small skirmishes, does that make us think we can win a war? Molor is no petty despot, cowering in his keep. He is the master of all he sees, power incarnate, the hand that clutches the throat of the world entire!”
There were protests, some of them heartwarmingly savage. But Kahless had more to say. As it happened, a lot more.
“And who are we to dare this?” he bellowed. “Not soldiers, not warriors, only old men and children who have become skilled at pretending. We have learned to fool ourselves. We have learned to believe we can tear down the mightiest tree in the forest, when all we have in our hands are our fathers’ rusted d’k tahgmey!”
“No!” cried a thousand voices.
“Lies!” thundered a thousand more.
“We are warriors!” they rumbled. “Warriors!”
“For that matter,” Kahless roared, “why should we fight at all? For honor? For dignity? We have none of these things—and we deserve none! We are outlaws and worse, less than the dirt beneath the tyrant’s feet!”
“More lies!” came the thunderous reply.
“We are Klingons!” they stormed.
“Molor will fall!”
“For honor!”
“For freedom!”
And on and on, one shout building on another, until they were all one cry of rage and purpose, one savage chorus with but a single idea burning in their minds—to tear down the one who had brought them so much misery. To pry Molor loose from his empire and grind his bones to dust.
And as if in support, the skies answered them, crashing and lightning and pelting them with rain. But the rebels didn’t budge. They stood there, their hearts raised as high as their voices, and let the water from the heavens run over them and cleanse them.
Kahless smiled, but only to himself. They had needed their spirits bolstered after such a hard fought and bloody battle. And with the power he had discovered in himself, he had done what was necessary.
Molor might beat them yet. He might show them the depth of their foolishness at Qa’yarin. But it would not happen because the rebels’ courage had not been fanned to a fever pitch. If they failed, it would not be because Kahless had not done his part.
And who knew? Perhaps in ages to come, warriors would sing of the battle at Tolar’tu, and the speech a rebel had made there. Not that it mattered to Kahless if he was remembered or not.
He glanced at Morath, who was in the first rank of onlookers. The younger man remained calm and inscrutable as ever, as the rain matted his hair and streamed down his face.
Morath was truly the backbone of this rebellion. Kahless might have been its voice, its heart, but it was his friend who made it stand straight and tall and proud.
Well done, Morath told him, if only with his eyes. You have put the fire in them. You have spurred them as no one else could.
Had he been aware of the way Kahless had ennobled Shurin’s clumsiness, he would no doubt have disapproved. But he did not know, and the outlaw had no intention of telling him.
In his own way, he had kept his vow, made in the depths of weariness and madness in the hills north of Vathraq’s village. And he would continue to abide by it a little longer, until either he died or Molor did.
Then, either way, his work would be done. If the outlaw succeeded, Morath could have Molor’s empire, to do with as he wished. And if Kahless fell short, Morath could make of that what he wanted as well.
Feeling a hand on his shoulder, he turned. It was Porus, who had suffered a cut to his brow during the battle. Rain was already dripping from his chin and the end of his nose.
“Enough,” he said. “The troops are gnashing their teeth in anticipation of Qa’yarin. Right now, we have to dispose of poor Shurin.”
Kahless nodded. “You’re right. I will see to it.”
Porus waved away the suggestion. “I can do it. You have done the work of a thousand men this evening.”
The outlaw shrugged. “If you say so.”
Still standing there in the center of the square, he watched as Porus began organizing the construction of a funeral pyre. Of course, they would need a great many of them. Tolar’tu had never seen so much blood.
Nor had An’quat before it. Or Serra’nob. Or any of the other places where they had clashed with Molor’s forces.
As Morath joined him, Kahless grunted. “Once the rain stops, there will be a fire that will be seen for a hundred miles around.”
“And bodies enough to keep it going for a day and a night,” Morath added. “But that is the price of victory. Of freedom. Of honor. Nor will it compare to the flames that will rage outside the tyrant’s citadel.”
The outlaw nodded. “One way or the other.”