While Pilcher was starting down the rocky road of a nervous breakdown, Lord Marone had granted Manutaai permission to dock with his ship.
If anything, he was curious about this woman and Manutaai’s fantastic claim about the mythical Chosen One. Manutaai had explained that Talokta’s mission was to protect and escort her to Kalvich. Was this a trick by Manutaai? Perhaps Talokta had been using Manutaai to get to him all along.
If this so called Chosen One meant so much to Kalvich, why did he not fetch her himself? Or, why did Talokta not simply deliver her via the Door of Endless Light to Heliostronus?
Their Supreme Ruler was a brutal, complex, and cunning man and would do anything to make a mockery out of Marone. Or was this all a ploy directly from Talokta. He was on full alert for anything.
Whatever the case, he would play along with this game. Besides, Marone’s burning curiosity wanted to see how far this would go.
In the back of his mind, an opportunity to destroy Talokta once and for all was irresistible.
He was still furious at losing out on Sataal and the stones, but it would be very interesting to see how far the great Lord Talokta would go to save a female. This, so called Queen Leah who was–what was it–reincarnated in this human called Kate Willard. Well, as the fable went the stones were useless without the true owner. Talokta could not deliver the stones to Kalvich without the Chosen One to operate them.
Naturally, Marone, like all Trimadians, was very familiar with the Chosen One saga, but this happened six thousand years ago, and time had a way of proving the difference between fact and fable. He was not a believer in reincarnation, and was a natural born cynic. Supposedly, this Queen Leah was meant to rise up in the future and be a link for humans to god-hood or the next step of human evolution or something or other. That part was never clarified. If this was all true, he wished he had paid more attention to the story that was told to him as a boy.
Kate had sat silently listening to her captor tell this Lord Marone character about her visions, her powers in the presence of the stones, her disappearing act on Ahmadeus, and the priority that Talokta placed on her.
He would make a brilliant salesman. He’s sold me out, Kate fumed. And like a naïve fool, I gave him one of the stones.
Well, Kate, babe, if you get out of this, trust no one!
Marone was still considering his options as the escape pod glided effortlessly into dock.
The scanners acknowledged only one gloctol weapon was aboard, with two organic life forms. So far so good. Still, a full detachment of security was deployed to greet them.
Even if this Kate was a fraud, he would have fun with her. She was very pretty and it had been a long time. Perhaps she would enjoy some rough play.
Maybe even let his physicians do some experiments on Manutaai before getting rid of him. His mouth twitched into a small sadistic smile.
A very important fact that could not be overlooked was Talokta had not bothered to retrieve the pod, or blatantly threaten to attack his own domain ship.
“My lord, a transmission from the Sotoid ship is coming through.”
“Put it on main screen.”
Talokta’s face appeared and he passively asked if Marone was still interested in Sataal, and perhaps the stones, which he would be glad to transfer over in exchange for the female.
Marone sat back and smiled nefariously. He took great delight knowing he had Talokta by the balls. Marone suspected he had hit a gold mine as he sensed Talokta was holding back quiet desperation. The look in Talokta’s eyes told him so. Marone’s confidence was growing.
Still, Marone would tread carefully until he was satisfied just how valuable this woman was. He knew not to push Talokta too far. The fact the Sotoid leader had never lost a battle to date was always a healthy reminder of just how careful the Empyream leader had to be. Mercy and patience were not his strongest point, something they both shared.
The thought slammed into him. If he had all the aces, why not hit Kalvich where it hurts and show his so called subjects just who had the real power. Oh to oust him from his lofty perch and bring in his own loyal men.
He glared back at the Sotoid Commander. “I will contact you with my decision in a day.”