The moment I meet Spock's gaze, I see the magnitude of my error.
His stillness is terrifying. Not a muscle moves, not an eyelash. But where his hands were relaxed when I began, they're steepled now in a familiar outward sign of his struggle for inward control. And his eyes--
I've had years to come to terms with my anger and grief, to learn how to bear the unbearable. But Spock is experiencing this tragedy here and now, and even his legendary control can't withstand the shock. An ocean of tears will never wash away this pain. I ought to have torn out my own heart rather than bring him to this point.
Cursing myself for my reckless stupidity, I then proceed to make things worse.
I reach across the expanse of couch that separates us and lay my hand on his sleeve, intending only a gesture of comfort such as one might offer a friend or even a stranger. But his arm tenses and then flexes, as though he wants to shake off my touch. I draw back my hand and move farther away from him.
"I'm sorry," I say, searching his face in the shadows. "I should have prepared you for this. I should have waited. But you have a right to know--"
"A right." His voice is a harsh, tight rasp. "I have a right to beg your forgiveness, nothing more."
"My forgiveness? Spock, what is there to forgive? We both believed it was impossible!"
"You cautioned me. I denied the risk. I told you that McCoy's theories were wrong, that our genetic material was incompatible--"
"You couldn't have known! Every Romulan scientist would have supported you! Every Vulcan scientist!"
"--and that no hybrid could beget a child without intervention."
"Spock, please--"
"'Engineered for fertility with one or both generative species,'" he quotes bitterly. "I studied the biology of numerous hybrid organisms, and I was certain that my extrapolation was correct. No one ever told me otherwise. No one ever spoke of it. Not Sarek, not Amanda, not the scientists who--who designed the template. T'Pring never asked, and I assumed that she did not care. And when I married again--our work separated us. We were seldom together, except for--for times of necessity. My wife never conceived. Perhaps she was just lucky." His voice breaks on the last word.
I've backed myself so far into the corner of the couch that the squared-off armrest is digging into my ribcage. "I'm sorry," I repeat helplessly, wondering which of a thousand things I'm most sorry for. "I should never have told you--" A sob escapes before I can suppress it, and it's impossible to hold back those that follow. My disgrace is complete: not only have I forced Spock to lose emotional control, I'm now weeping openly in front of him--to a Vulcan, the most repellent of spectacles.
I hide my face in my hands. Beside me Spock shifts, as if preparing to stand. "Leave me," I say, my voice muffled by tears and shame. "Please, just leave me--"
His hands cup my shoulders, drawing me towards him. The gesture is so utterly unexpected, and so welcome, that I cling to him as if he were life itself. My life. Oh, Spock, beloved--
"Aerlyn." His voice is barely a whisper in my ear. "Permit me to share this with you."
His mind is closed to me. The link between us was severed by distance and time long before Mutara, and despite his emotional distress his mental shields are well in place. Yet I grasp his meaning at once.
If it were up to me, I would never move from this position. To feel his arms around me, to feel his cheek against mine, wet from my tears and his own, to breathe his scent--oh, I want this longed-for embrace never to end. But right now what I want matters less than not at all.
I pull away from him and stand up. Having no handkerchief, I dry my eyes on the sleeve of my nightdress and hope that my nose will somehow take care of itself.
Spock follows me to the taboret and accepts the votive light I offer him. When I make a move to choose another for myself, he lays his hand over mine to stop me. "No," he says. "One, for both of us."
For this memorial we must make our own ritual: we have no likeness to awaken memory, no name to invoke or bless. But we have something--one fragment of identity I've cherished in dream and imagination ever since Hellguard.
"I made Pallon tell me," I say softly. "She didn't want to, but I made her. Oh, Spock--we would have had a daughter."
He says nothing, only bows his head. Then, as if he's come to a decision, he turns slightly towards me and extends his paired fingers.
Too much, says the voice of reason. Too soon. But nothing in the universe will stop me from meeting his touch with my own. Calling upon whatever self-discipline I still possess, I allow my fingers to rest lightly against his.
His presence in my mind--at once sweetly familiar and wholly alien--is no more than a sliver of light shining through the narrow space between a wall and a closed door. And though I want to throw myself at that door, to pound and push with all my strength until I break it down, I do my best not to let him know it. Instead, I accept what he offers--the chance to grieve together, as we were meant to do, in the way that we were meant to do it. In those few moments of temporary intimacy we give and take wordless comfort, and the pain is lessened a little because we are able--at last--to bear it together. But inevitably he withdraws from the link--slowly, gently, and with perfect control, leaving me alone again.
He kindles the arc light and places it beneath the mosaic, in the middle of the rail, so that it stands surrounded by all the others. When he speaks, his voice is low but steady.
"May she live like some green laurel," he says in Standard. "Rooted in one dear perpetual place."
I rub at my eyes with a knuckle. "A prayer, Spock?"
"In a way. It was a Terran poet's wish for his daughter."
"What does 'laurel' mean?"
Spock takes my hand in his, then draws me into his arms once again, bending to lay his cheek against my hair. The door opens a little wider, and a picture fills both our minds--a blue sea rising to meet a cloudless blue sky; a flower-carpeted hill; and at the hill's peak a low, spreading tree with glossy leaves of the color known to Romulans and Vulcans alike as heart's-blood.
A tree sacred to the sun-god Apollo. A symbol of joy after sorrow, expiation of guilt, and eternal life.
The tenor of our link has changed somehow. The grief and pain are still there; Spock will need time to assimilate and accept what he's learned tonight, and the knowledge of all that we've lost will remain with him forever. But I can sense something else in him, a feeling so foreign to us both that for a moment neither of us can name it.
Peace. The thought is as much question as answer. Aerlyn--
More for his sake than mine, I step out of his embrace. "Spock," I say, "will you light a votive to honor Sarek's memory?" I can't find the words to explain, even to myself, why I would make such a request. "For all of us," I add.
"I cannot." Then, as if he feels that I'm entitled to an explanation: "It is not the Vulcan way."
Nevertheless, you did it for our daughter. You even did it for my husband ... "I understand," I say, trying to put him at ease. "Sarek probably wouldn't thank you for remembering him in the house of a Romulan." A strong breeze blows through the open window; the rainstorm can't be far off now. Unable to repress a shiver--my hair is still wet from the shower, and my feet and hands are freezing--I cross the room and seal the casement. "Would you like some hot tea? I don't think I'll be able to get back to sleep for a while."
Oddly, the banality of the invitation in the wake of such extreme emotional upheaval seems not to trouble Spock. "Tea would be welcome," he says.
I hand him the small vial of water, offering him the courtesy of ending the ritual. Dutifully, he sprinkles the arc lights, which continue shining. I let him precede me into the hallway, and then I close the door quietly behind us.
* * *
We must talk, says Spock's remembered voice. What has just happened has, or ought to have, changed everything between us: now we should be speaking truth to each other at last. But Spock, seated across from me at the kitchen table, is lost somewhere in the past. Well, I've spent enough time there myself. Resolving to draw him out, I say the first thing that comes to mind: "Did Sarek ever meet Senator Pardek?"
Spock, who has been studying his empty teacup, looks up. "Yes," he says. "At Khitomer, and on a few other occasions."
"I can imagine what Sarek must have thought of him. Pardek isn't exactly the model of Vulcan decorum. It's probably just as well you didn't tell your father who it was that persuaded you to come here."
"Pardek was not the only person who maintained that I must go to Romulus." Spock pushes his chair back, stands up, carries his teacup to the cycler.
"So you said." I get up and dispose of my own cup. "Who was it, then? I'm curious to know."
"A friend."
"Ah, a cryptic reply. You're beginning to learn Romulan ways."
"A friend of yours," he says.
Perhaps it's the tone of his voice, or the emphasis he places on the last word, or the slightest change in his expression. Regardless, the truth imparts itself at once and entirely.
I should have guessed. If I were in my right mind, I would have guessed. "I told him I had nothing to say. Nothing!"
"You did not communicate your intention precisely. In Standard, 'I have nothing to say' is not the equivalent of 'Say nothing.'" Spock allows himself a sigh. "Where Doctor McCoy is concerned, I have learned that it is wise to maintain a literal cast of mind at all times."
"What--what did he tell you?" In memory, I'm replaying at lightspeed that encounter on Argo; I dread to think what McCoy might have divulged--or, worse, embellished.
"He said that you were well. That you were in the diplomatic service of your government." For a fraction of a second, a smile lights Spock's dark eyes, though his face is grave. "That you were even more beautiful than he remembered, and unless I was a bigger fool than he already knew me to be, I would haul my--I would go to Romulus at once and search for you. And he ... he wished me luck." He stops abruptly, but I can guess what McCoy's advice was: She never remarried. She lives by herself now. You hear me, Spock? Don't wait too long like I did. "McCoy made a compelling argument," he says. "I was forced to acknowledge his logic."
The mind-body disciplines are the work of a lifetime, I remind myself. But it's clear that I'll need more time than that to master them: this sudden wave of longing is no less intense than that which sent me fleeing from the kitchen two days ago. But this time I won't run from Spock, or from myself. Don't wait too long ...
Noting absently that my legs are shaking again, I move towards him, close the empty space between us, and touch his cheek.
His hand shoots up and captures my wrist. I've caught him off guard, and I can feel his reflexive intent to withdraw, to put himself at a distance from me. But his hand remains where it is, imprisoning my wrist in a grip not quite tight enough to hurt. That brief hesitation is all I need. I open my mind and heart to him and, as he once did for me, offer him truth.
In a lifetime of risk-taking I've never gambled for such high stakes. Yet, paradoxically, I know that I have nothing left to lose. Now, or not at all. With my free hand, I guide his fingers to the inner curve of my elbow so that he can feel the small contraceptive bionode that lies just beneath the skin.
At first I'm certain that he'll resist me, and so is he; I can sense his lingering shock at the unexpected physical contact. But in the next instant he turns his face into my open hand and presses his lips against my palm.
Once again I meet that wall, that closed door; and then I glimpse the bright, warm room beyond. He wants to let me in, oh, yes, he wants very much to trust himself and me. But it's been a long time since he's touched anyone--since anyone has touched him--in this deep, dangerous way. I show him my own fear and hope, and with gentle insistence I will the door to open, beckoning light with light, driving away the long darkness. He moves my hand against his face in a gesture that asks and gives permission; then he positions his fingers on my temple and cheek, and all the walls come down at last.
Stars and planets have altered their courses since we were parted. Billions of sapient lives have begun and flourished and ended. Tempered by time, separated by distance, transformed by death and life, Spock and I are no longer who or even what we were. And yet--here is recognition, here is knowing. Whatever else may have changed between us, this is the same, this communion of minds, as simple and natural as it was a lifetime ago. Still, there's strangeness here, too--new memories, different patterns of thought, decades of unshared experience. Curiosity distracts us momentarily: so much to see, so many questions. But this is not the time for learning or relearning. Something else is happening to us--
Spock suddenly shifts his weight, as if to keep his balance; his fingers move on my face, and with his free hand he cups the back of my neck. I realize with a faint shock that I'm dizzy, swaying, and that he's trying to steady me as well as himself. A distant cautionary voice--mine? his?--urges restraint: Too much, it warns. Too soon. But this is how it was with us, always, every time, from the moment he first touched me while we were aboard Eidolon, this wild, sweet, consuming fire--not with anyone else, never with anyone else this rightness, this utter certainty. I can feel his heart pounding in my side, my tears stinging his eyes: already our sensory perceptions have merged, and cognition and even identity are beginning to blur. This is who we are, beloved ... Does the memory belong to Spock or to me? It doesn't matter, for each of us is the other.
Someone moans softly. Someone reaches out, gathers in, fills empty, aching arms. Someone's fingers tangle in unbraided hair, someone's lips brush rough unshaven cheek. Some entity greater than the sum of its two spirits perceives in joyous wonder its reason for being, its long-forgotten purpose suddenly made manifest.
Too much, the voice insists. Too soon. But the body has a mind of its own, and now every physical sense demands gratification. When my searching lips find Spock's mouth, I savor the bitter sweetness of the tea he's been drinking, and beneath it the taste of him--a taste unique in the universe, a taste I didn't know I remembered. The sound I make draws a groan from him; his arms tighten around me, and his tongue meets mine. The sleeping-robe he wears is like water under my hands, fluid and formless--and hidden beneath it his body, naked and hard, the inconceivable miracle of his living body. I relinquish his mouth and bury my face against his throat. The pulsing rhythm of his lifeblood, the warm scent of his skin--I could weep with the ecstasy and wonder of it: That you should be alive, beloved! Alive and whole and in my arms--
His answer comes in an upwelling of wordless emotion--fierce, protective tenderness, the hunger of years, a sense of awe profound as prayer. And then, absurdly, dismay and wry amusement as he perceives a logistical problem: The cold slate floor? The stone dining-table? An uncushioned metal chair? I am not as young as I once was--
I draw back a little and clasp his hands in mine: My room is halfway down the next corridor--
We share the memory before we can verbalize it: A perilous journey, but we will make it together.
* * *
I have no idea how we manage to find my bedroom; I must be navigating on autopilot, for I'm barely conscious of where I am or where I'm going. Spock keeps tight hold of my hand during the brief transit, and the focus of the link narrows to that connection. We know that either of us could choose to stop; equally, we know that neither of us will.
As though leading me in the figures of a dance, he guides me to the bed.
No more need for words now, scarcely any need for thought. What one of us wants, so does the other. When he moves his hands hungrily over my legs and hips and breasts, pushing my nightdress up and then off, I suddenly see my face and body through his eyes. The sight makes me tremble with arousal--not with a woman's diffuse, encompassing desire, but with a man's need, his need, sharp and centered and urgent. More, I see the essence of myself, everything that I was and am to him, living in his heart and his dreams, just as he lives in mine. And when I reach up to unseal the fastening of his robe, I show him his own beauty, remembered and real--the eyes and mouth that haunt my dreams, the strong, graceful body I've embraced so often in lonely fantasy, the mind and spirit I'd thought lost to me forever. This is who we are ...
I want this to happen slowly. I want to take my time with him, to prove to both of us that we have all the time in this world. But I've been waiting too long, and now I can't wait at all. I'm so much more than ready for him that when he touches me with gentle skill, drawing down the wetness, I raise my hips and move hard, helplessly, against his hand. Release comes in a sudden flood, crashes in pounding waves through the mindlink, pulls him down with me in the undertow.
He lifts his wet fingers to my face and drives deeper into my mind. His familiar stranger's body covers me like shelter, fills me like completion. The pleasure of that first thrust is so intense that it's almost pain; the boundaries of our consciousness shift and shift again, so that neither of us knows who possesses and who is possessed. This is how it was meant to be, pleads the new being that is us. Let this never end. But when Spock begins to move inside me, lowering his mouth to mine to catch my cries, it's all too clear that it won't--can't--last much longer. I'm on fire now, burning out a lifetime of loneliness and need in this crucible of spirit and flesh, and though he wants to hold back, he can't; he can only follow me into the flames. T'hy'la, he whispers in my mind, and I come shuddering, sobbing, calling out the true name he entrusted to me so long ago. His rhythm falters then, his body goes rigid in my arms, and with a broken cry of triumph and surrender he pours his life into me. In that moment I know him for who he is. T'hy'la, I whisper, and imagine that I know too the source of the light that flares behind our eyes, blinding us with revelation: This fire. And all these burning bridges.
* * *
And this too is how it always was with us, this mutual annihilation, this transformation into some other form of energy, some other form of life. One day, we used to say, we'll kill ourselves doing this. Now all I can think is, May we live long enough to try.
Self-awareness returns slowly, one sense at a time. The scent of our lovemaking is all around us, like incense at a rite of worship. Wind-driven rain drums hard against the window, so loud that I can barely hear my own name on Spock's lips, breathed out in a long sigh. Let this never end ... But we're only mortal, and I can feel the effort he's making to keep his weight off me. Myself, I'm tangled up uncomfortably in the wet sheets. Common sense dictates that we must rearrange ourselves; nevertheless, I gasp with the shock of loss when he slips gently free of my body.
He pushes aside the sodden bedding and retrieves his sleeping-robe from the floor. Spread open like a blanket, the robe is large enough to cover us both, provided that we remain curled together in a close embrace. We used to sleep like this on Earth, wrapped in each other's arms like thurril nestlings seeking shelter from the night. Spock catches the thought, and a picture fills his mind: he's seen the little creatures for himself now, in a glade near the Chula Valley.
The image makes me smile, and at that moment I taste the faint coppery saltiness of blood. You bit my lip, I tell him, attempting sternness.
He tests the sensation, then touches the small wound with his fingertip: Unlikely. The position of the injury suggests that you did it to yourself. And in any case-- He turns slightly away from me, so that the soft light from the bedside lamp reveals the marks I've left on his throat and shoulders. It would seem unwise to assign blame in the matter.
No words for this rush of emotion that fills my heart, no possible way to describe this feeling that threatens to spill over into laughter and tears. Only You're still you! comes close: incredible, miraculous, that after and despite everything Spock should still be so fundamentally Spock--
He pulls me back into his arms and begins to consider the many ways in which he believes himself to have changed over the years, from his political opinions to his tastes in music. My hands wander idly over his body: I'm making a few comparisons of my own. Same strong arms, same curve of broad shoulders. Same mat of crisp dark hair--shot through with silver now--covering his chest. Same finely muscled back, marred only by the scar from a wound sustained on Deneva not long before we met ... But I can't find the scar. His skin is perfectly smooth.
"Why did you have it removed?" I ask aloud, running my hand over his back. "You used to think it wasn't worth bothering about."
He knows what I mean; he's been following my thoughts. But he says nothing, and I can feel him shielding lightly.
"Spock, what is it? Why did you--"
His tone is subdued, almost apologetic: "I never had it removed."
A sudden chill raises the hair on my scalp as an image flashes across my mind, or perhaps across his: white sands, jagged cliffs, lowering red sky. He makes a tentative attempt to share a memory of that time--a surreal impression of dissonant sounds, flaring braziers, faces and names drifting just beyond cognition's reach. But though a Romulan's curiosity, like a Vulcan's, won't be denied, something in me recoils instinctively from whatever eschatological secrets he keeps.
"It's all right," he murmurs, sensing the atavistic fear I can't explain or even name. "Don't be frightened, Aerlyn. It's all right." He repeats those meaningless, illogical, deeply un-Vulcan words of reassurance as he enfolds me in his arms. And so long as he holds me like this I'm ready to believe in any and all manner of miracles, not excluding so minor a phenomenon as life after death.
You are the miracle, he whispers.
We are the miracle, I answer. For the first time, and probably the last, I get no argument from him.
© 1999, 2000 Kathleen Dailey. All rights reserved.