VII. G'Kar

"Right this way, sir," his Ranger escort said. G'Kar nodded his thanks and, stretching stiff muscles, stepped out onto the landing pad. His breath caught in his throat as he took in the sight.

Dawn was breaking on Minbar, a million crystalline surfaces reflecting the light; the combined effect was so brilliant G'Kar was forced to shield his eyes. It was spring on this hemisphere, the pilot had told him, but still his breath formed puffs of vapor in the air in front of him. Crisp, fresh air, teeming with life. G'Kar drank it in greedily and, for the first time in months, felt almost like himself again.

Once, he would have called Minbar cold. Not just in temperature but in temperament, the discipline of its people as stark as the crystal spires crowding the horizon. Little about the Narn homeworld had ever been cool or disciplined, even before the Centauri stripped it bare. The heat of its sun had always been amply surpassed by the fire in its people's souls, and every other world had seemed frigid in comparison. But G'Kar knew better now. He had met Delenn and Lennier and the warriors of the Anla'Shok. The Minbari calm of spirit, he had learned, was less the absence of heat than the tempering of it. Not unlike the calm he had found for himself. Or thought he had found.

When he left Babylon 5 over three years ago, it had been Lyta's soul which needed mending. G'Kar had wanted to help her more than anything – to save her, like he himself had been saved. Like he had failed to save one Londo Mollari. As long as it had taken him to admit it, that particular failure still gnawed at him. Some nights on his travels he would think of Mollari, sitting on that loathsome throne which had become his penance. The day Mollari accepted the throne was the day he'd asked G'Kar to leave, and up till this day G'Kar wondered what would have happened had he refused. If staying would have made a difference.

But he had left, and only regretted it afterwards. He'd resolved not to let the same thing happen with Lyta: he would stay at her side for as long as he had to. Except Lyta had not asked him to leave. She had left him, to join her people in their fight for freedom. There had been nothing G'Kar could do or say to stop her. And yet, when he heard she was killed in a strike against Psi Corps, he had felt as shattered as if he'd killed her himself.

He'd wept like a pouchling when the news reached him. He had wept, and screamed, and damaged a heavy stone jar and two knuckles before he regained a measure of control. That was when he knew the peace in his soul was more fragile than he'd thought. Solitude had its value, but too much of it and the heart grew brittle. He needed a change, a fresh purpose. Most of all, he needed a friend.

"It is good to see you, G'Kar." Delenn joined him on the landing pad, robes fluttering in the breeze. "This is your first time on Minbar, is it not?"

"Quite so," G'Kar said. He gave her the traditional Narn greeting, hands pressed to his chest. "Already I am wondering why I waited so long to visit. In all my years on Narn, I've never seen such a sunrise."

"John told me the same during his first days here." Delenn's smile was warm and genuine. "He claims he used to be an evening person, but here on Minbar, mornings are his favorite part of the day." She pointed at a sleek open-topped vehicle which sat waiting beside the pad. "Come. You must be tired from the journey. We can watch the sunrise together on our way to Tuzanor, and then you can tell me how you have been."

G'Kar had expected a driver, but there was none. Delenn steered them through the city herself, rarely speaking except to point out the landmarks: temples, sculptures, a sprawling terrace garden. Later, she poured them tea in the spacious rooms that were her and Sheridan's living quarters. John was working, she explained, but they would see him when he came home tonight.

"My apologies for arriving ahead of time." G'Kar stirred his tea distractedly. "I was forced to leave Narn sooner than expected." He suppressed a smile as the youngest occupant of the room, three-year-old David Sheridan, bumped into his leg and Delenn scrambled to take hold of him. The child giggled and squirmed in her grip, and something inside G'Kar's chest clenched unexpectedly. He fought it down. "It's quite all right," he told David gravely. "It's difficult to keep one's balance while chasing battle cruisers across the room."

"It is," Delenn conceded, "but the Tenth Fane of Elleya is revered for its wisdom in religious matters, not for its prowess in battle. David does not share that view, I fear."

"How striking," G'Kar said. "You see, the reason I did not stay on my homeworld is that they still insist on revering me as something I have no desire to be. It is a frustrating burden to bear."

"Three years, and they still will not leave you in peace?" Delenn sidestepped his jest easily, but not without a glint of dry humor in her eyes. He had missed her, G'Kar realized. Her strength, her wisdom, that utter lack of pretense which he had never quite found in anyone else – apart from Na'Toth, perhaps, whose honesty was of a more brazen kind altogether. But Na'Toth was back home on Narn, and after his recent experience there, he did not know if he would ever see her again.

"One month, three years, there appears to be no difference." G'Kar steepled his hands with a sigh. "I went to see Na'Toth at her family home. I believed no one would have the impertinence to disturb us there, but it seems my followers are as zealous as ever. In the end, I left as much for the sake of Na'Toth's privacy as for my own." He drank deeply of his tea, which was hot enough to scald. The heat was a welcome distraction from the turmoil in his mind. "I suppose it is time to face the truth. One day there may be a place for me again on my homeworld, but that day is not likely to arrive soon. If ever."

"I'm sorry." Delenn pulled David against her, stroking his hair. For once, the boy submitted without protest. "Things must have been difficult after your return. I heard Lyta was killed in the Telepath War..."

"She chose her own fate." G'Kar cradled his teacup in both hands. The fragrance was clean and spicy, like humid soil after a rainstorm. He couldn't remember when he had last watched a rainstorm on Narn, but rain was common enough on Minbar, he knew. "I have tried to find comfort in that knowledge, but I…" He faltered. Even now, the thought of Lyta was an open wound, aching and raw. "I fought for her with every fiber of my being. I talked to her, worked with her, pleaded with her to find another way, a way that would not end with her drowning her rage in rivers of blood. But I underestimated her anger… and her stubbornness. Her powers changed her, Delenn, more than I had thought. Perhaps it was a losing battle from the start, who can say, or perhaps I tried too hard to turn her into something she was not. I believed I could sway her with words, but I was wrong. I still wish I had fought harder." His chest tightened; it was all he could do just to breathe.

Delenn reached out, brushing his sleeve with her fingertips. "If I were Lyta," she said softly, "there is no one I would have rather had fighting for my soul than you, G'Kar. No one would doubt you did all you could for her. And Lyta got her wish. The Psi Corps has been disbanded, and steps are being taken to reintegrate telepaths into society. But the price…"

"… was too high." G'Kar nodded. When he met Delenn's eyes, they were as bright as the morning sky, and filled with the same emotion he knew was burning in his own. "We would know about prices, you and I."

"It is said…" Delenn began, then hesitated. She let go of David, gazing after him as he darted away. "It is said one of those who joined Lyta, who lost their lives during the last days of the war… was Lennier." Her eyes were still averted. "Do you think… Is there any way it could be true?"

"All I heard were rumors, and vague ones at that." G'Kar made no attempt to hide the effort in his own voice. He'd wondered about Lennier too, but he had been afraid to ask Delenn, afraid to risk opening unhealed wounds. He did not dare to guess what had come between her and her one-time aide, but it was clear that something had. "I know Lennier was in a dark place after leaving the Anla'Shok. Lyta told me as much. But I never knew why he left, or what led him to join the telepath cause. I never asked Lyta, and once she returned to Earth, that was the last I heard of both of them."

"I see." Delenn grasped her own teacup, and for a moment she looked as vulnerable as G'Kar had ever seen her.

"Delenn," he began. "If there is some way I can help, any way at all..."

"I know," Delenn replied. "This… helps already. Simply to talk about him, to say his name again to someone who knew him…" The unspoken implication, that Lennier's name had not been mentioned in this room for a long time, was not lost on G'Kar. "I cannot tell you what caused Lennier to leave the Anla'Shok," she said softly. "That would be betraying his confidence. But he promised me one day he would earn my forgiveness, and I had hoped he would keep that promise. That I could have seen him again, talked to him once more before…"

"I understand," G'Kar said. He did, all too well.

"It has been less than five years since we won the Shadow war", Delenn murmured. "Can you believe it, G'Kar? Five years, and already the shadows are moving again. Except this time it's our own shadows coming to haunt us, our own anger and fear turning against us. It is happening everywhere." She let out an unsteady sigh. "You have heard the news from Centauri Prime?"

"Some of it," he said cautiously, "and none very heartening. I considered going there to see with my own eyes… but perhaps that would not be wise."

"It would not," Delenn agreed. "The Centauri have been withdrawing from interplanetary affairs, recalling their ships and traders, even evacuating some of their colony worlds. The word is they can no longer afford to maintain them. John and I pleaded with the rest of the Alliance to review the reparation demands, but they will never agree unless the Centauri ask first. And they are not asking. Some say it is death for an outsider to visit the Centauri homeworld these days."

"That has been said before," G'Kar said. "But you are right, things seem bleaker than I thought. Have you heard from Mollari at all?" He tried to keep his tone as neutral as he could, but Delenn must have caught the urgency behind it. She moved as if to grasp his hand, then drew back, hesitant.

"Not in person, no. The last time we saw Londo was almost four years ago. He visited us here, some time after you left with Lyta."

"Here? On Minbar?" G'Kar said, surprised.

"Yes. It was all quite strange," Delenn said. "He had heard we were expecting a child, and wanted to wish us well. I was suspicious at first, but he didn't act hostile or threatening at all. If anything, he seemed… lonely. He even brought a gift for David; I could not find it in my heart to turn him down." At G'Kar's perplexed expression, she called her son to her. "David, would you bring G'Kar the urn that's in your father's study? You know which one I mean."

David carried it in a few minutes later: a colorless, shapeless metal jar, strangely plain for a Centauri ornament but with nothing else to set it apart. Still, a trickle of ice was crawling down G'Kar's spine. "The bottom is sealed," he said, more to hide his distress than because it seemed like a useful observation. "What's inside?"

"According to Londo, water from a sacred stream," Delenn said. "He told us to give it to David when he turns sixteen." If she noticed the turmoil in G'Kar's eyes, she didn't call him on it. "You look tired. I can show you to your quarters, if you like."

G'Kar nodded gratefully. He was tired, that much was true. Tired and more than a little confused. Mollari had been here, on Minbar? The man G'Kar had left three years ago had seemed too resigned, too weighed down by duty to leave his homeworld on a whim, simply to bestow gifts on old friends. Or had he? Perhaps Mollari was not doing quite as badly as he imagined. Perhaps it was just him, aching to be useful, conjuring up demons just so he might help vanquish them. After Lyta, he was aching for a chance to do some good. And Delenn was right: this was not the time to go rushing to Centauri Prime. Not yet.

He would speak with Delenn, he thought later, as he sat in his quarters with the midday sun warming his face. She could help him find purpose again. The Rangers were the obvious choice, but perhaps there were others. His fate might be bound to Mollari's, but if they were truly, as Londo once said, comets which flared as they passed too near the sun, their orbits would not cross for many years yet.

Still, the years were growing shorter. And it was not as if he could ever forget. Closing his eyes against the brightness, he let the familiar image wash over him: brittle, white-gloved hands, squeezing his throat like an embrace.