"W. Michael Gear - Forbidden Borders 1 - Requiem for The Conqueror" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gear W Michael)

state of semitrance, her brain directly interfaced with the nav-computer as it
fed her data on course and velocity. The engineers monitored the huge ship's
power plant and support systems, vigilant attention on the readouts. The
communications officer sat before the comm boards, leaning back with arms
crossed while the logistics officer spoke quietly into his mike, coordinating
with his subordinates.
Surrounded by the muted whispers and hushed comm chatter, Staffa kar Therma
remained alone. Hidden to all eyes but his, the instruments of the command
chair projected a holo image of an emerald planet against a background of hazy
flickering stars. Scenes formed on the monitors of gleaming white cities,
laughing men, women, and childrenтАФof a carefree society.
Myklene. How many years have passed since they turned on me? Despite the lies
I've told myself, was I ever happy there? That verdant world, Myklene, had
borne him, taught him, and finally betrayed him. Even the man he'd loved and
devoted himself to had turned against him; but that had been long ago. The
angry youth who had been expelled from Myklene now returned as a hardened man,
as a conqueror come back to repay an old debt. Emotions conflicted within
Staffa's muscular chest.
He pulled absently at his smooth chin, eyes thinning to slits. He'd come a
long way since the day the Praetor had smuggled him off Myklene in defiance of
the Council's wishes. They'd destroyed his happinessтАФsuch as it was.
Happiness? When was I really happy? Once. Once. . . . The memory tried to slip
through the tungsten-steel tough rein Staffa kar Therma kept on his thoughts.
A beautiful woman's face with soft amber eyes and gleaming auburn hair formed
in his mind and to avoid the pain he banished it like a ghost of floating mist
on a hot sunny day. The
terrible cry of a newly born child drifted through his memory. And with it
came the haunting longing for the son he'd never known, the son who had been
stolen from him.
My fault. My failure. He'd slipped, allowed himself to feel, to share his life
with another. Chrysla, the name cast honeyed tones through his soul. He'd
loved her, known happiness for those few brief years before she'd been
abducted. And to what fate? By whom?
She'd borne him a son just before her kidnapping; and for the second time in
his life, his heart had been broken. He'd searched, employed the finest
investigators to find her, offered rewards. But Chrysla had vanished without a
trace. In the years that followed, he'd exacted his revenge on a heedless
humanity. Never again had he allowed himself to falter, to feel, or to share
that sense of identity which was human. Instead, he'd fallen into the old
patterns taught him by the MykleniansтАФand the only other human he'd ever
loved.
Love led to pain . . . and failure. Do not love. Allow no vulnerability of the
soul. Strength was the only virtue. No other heritage belonged to humankind.
Survival meant power, no matter how much blood had to be spilled.
"Staffa?" her soft voice drifted through the veiled memories of shattered
dreams.
First, she taught me how to loveтАФthen she taught me how to grieve. Staffa
glanced up at the main bridge monitor which displayed fleet status as the
Companions readied for the first assault. In a matter of hours Myklene would
reap the rewards of Staffa kar Therma's homecoming.