No. Theirchild was dead.

In the short time she had known Elizabeth, she was astonished at the instinctual bond she’d shared with the tiny creature. The girl had laughed and cooed several times, but mostly she had just stared at T’Pol and Trip with those dark, round eyes, a sense of nearly complete serenity radiating from the core of her being. Even while in the throes of her terminal fever and sickness, if T’Pol and Trip were both present, Elizabeth had barely cried. It was as if she suppressed only the negativeemotions, allowing only the positive ones to come through.

Was that happiness and calm related to the synthesis of her parents’ Vulcan and human DNA, or had it been a function of her individual personality? The answer to that question would never be known.

T’Pol felt herself trembling, could hear a keening sound she knew was coming from within her. The waves of loss rolled through her mind, washing over every emotional barrier she possessed.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, and opened her eyes. Through the blur of unshed tears, she saw Trip in front of her, tears streaming down his own face. This was a recently familiar sight; he had cried in her quarters last week, and then again several times during the Coridanite ship’s flight from Earth to Vulcan. But this time, she was crying with him.

Every part of her wanted him to enfold her in his arms, wanted him to protect her from her own feelings. But he was more emotional than she was. She knew that the more she was with him, the more she would lose control of herself, of the carefully constructed mental barriers she had erected, of the intense passions they kept at bay.

She was broken inside, and she knew that both now and in the future, Trip would only keep the fractures open.

Their child was dead.

And she knew that their feelings for each other must, by necessity, by logic,die as well.

And yet, through her tears, she saw her own arms reaching out for him, saw him moving toward her, felt the comfort of his embrace, the strength within him.

For a long time, they held each other and cried, for all the losses of their past, their present, and, perhaps, of their future.

Four

Day Eleven, Month of Tasmeen

Dartha City, Romulus

THE HEAVY TIMBER DOOR suddenly banged open to admit a pair of hulking, ill‑tempered Reman soldiers into the dank gloom of the cell. Valdore i’Kaleh tr’Irrhaimehn felt his stomach rumble in anticipation of yet another of the imperial dungeon’s meager and infrequent meals–until he noticed that the guards were carrying neither food nor drink.

“Thank Erebus,” Valdore said, seated on the edge of the rude stone cot where he had slept for the past several weeks. “Waiting down here for my appointment with the executioner had begun to grow tedious.”

Neither of the spectral white faces confronting Valdore betrayed any sign of amusement. Of course, Remans weren’t known for their keen sense of humor. “Come with us,” the guard on the right growled as his silent counterpart bared his fangs, manhandled Valdore to his feet, and affixed a set of stout manacles upon his wrists. Valdore looked up from his shackled wrists and noticed that both Remans stood a full head taller than he did.

“Let’s not make this take any longer than it has to, my brothers‑in‑arms,” Valdore said. Being executed was by far preferable to slowly rotting away or starving in such a godsforsaken place as this.

As his armed escorts marched him through the convoluted stone drabbikwarren of the cell block, Valdore closed his eyes, walking blindly as he listened to the echoing clatter of the uniformed Remans’ boots, which utterly drowned out his own rag‑wrapped footfalls. Concentrating on the sounds, he tried to imagine exchanging his tattered, ill‑fitting green prison attire for a standard military uniform, but couldn’t quite get his mind around the idea. The realization threatened to overwhelm him with despair. Has confinement so diminished me that I can no longer even visualize what I once was?

Valdore had lost track of the exact number of weeks that had passed since the start of his confinement, no doubt partly because of the windowless cell to which the First Consul had banished him. Being spared a return to those cramped confines was a blessing, no matter the reason; the prospect of his own imminent death gave the disgraced Romulan admiral only a sense of relief.

Next came a growing hollow pang of disappointment as the guards conducted him up from the intricate maze of subsurface catacombs into the vast, cathedral‑like spaces of the Hall of State. Valdore knew by then that his disgrace was not destined to end in so tidy and merciful a fashion as he had allowed himself to hope.

Unless First Consul T’Leikha had lately taken up the practice of dispatching her political prisoners in the midst of the finery of her richly appointed audience chamber.

Valdore said nothing as he was marched roughly toward the silver‑haired, aquiline‑faced woman who was seated in an attentive, almost vigilant pose on the raised dais before which he and the guards had come to a halt. Still bound in wrist shackles and flanked by the armed Remans, Valdore was made to stand perhaps a dozen long paces away from the First Consul.

Somewhat closer to the First Consul, and guarded closely by another pair of raptor‑eyed Reman soldiers, stood a second prisoner. Valdore blinked for several moments before he realized that he recognized him, despite the man’s thinning white hair, averted gaze, and defeated, stoop‑shouldered posture.

Senator Vrax?Valdore thought, not willing to tempt fate by speaking aloud unbidden in the presence of the First Consul. I, too, am only a prisoner now,he reminded himself.

“ Jolan’tru,Admiral,” said First Consul T’Leikha.

A bitter laugh escaped Valdore’s lips in spite of himself. “I am no longer an admiral, First Consul. Perhaps you read of it in the newsfeeds.”

T’Leikha chuckled, her smile gleaming like a burnished Honor Blade. “I have decided to correct that injustice, Valdore. As has a majority of my colleagues in the Senate, several of whom have the ear of the Praetor, just as I do. It seems, Admiral, that the Romulan Star Empire once again urgently needs your service.”

The First Consul appeared content to wait silently for his reaction. Valdore said nothing, hoping that he wasn’t revealing just how nonplussed he was by this dramatic change of fortune. Remus had circled the Motherworld several times since he and Vrax had been removed from their respective posts and imprisoned as punishment for their discovery and defeat by the Earther‑allies against whom they had been working in secret. Neither the Senate nor the First Consul were known to reverse such precipitous decisions lightly. All Valdore understood with any certainty was that circumstances must have changed greatly since he and Vrax had been incarcerated. Something has gone terribly wrong,he thought, glancing at Vrax and wondering just how much his erst‑while colleague knew.

Valdore nodded in the direction of the broken former senator. “And what is to become of him?”

“Your restoration to the admiralty cannot come without a price, Valdore,” T’Leikha said, as though lecturing an obtuse servant who lacked a grasp of the intuitively obvious. “Someone still must take the blame for the calamity that befell your prototype drone ships. The Senate will back my recommendation that he be executed for betraying the Praetor’s military secrets.”

Despite her unconcealed contempt for the miserable wreck of a man who slouched before her with downcast eyes, Valdore could feel only pity for his old colleague. Whatever Vrax’s failures–whatever disagreements they’d had in the past–Valdore knew that Vrax deserved better than this.