Kirk had asked Spock more than once if he wanted him to accompany him to his parents' house, but Spock had refused each time. He had set off from the city at dawn, clad in light clothes and sand-proof boots, determined to walk across the raw edges of the desert to his childhood home rather than taking a skimmer. He was not entirely sure why he had chosen to walk. Perhaps it was something as simple as delaying the moment of contact until the last possible minute. But that idea had no logic to it, because he could simply have deferred his departure until five minutes before his arranged arrival time, and stepped into a skimmer and crossed the miles so swiftly that the rock and sand beneath him would have been a blur. Instead he had risen well before his preferred hour, packed water and a small amount of food, and stepped out into the pre-dawn cool so that he could spend five or more hours on a journey that could be made in as many minutes.
Perhaps it was a penance, or a pilgrimage. Those ideas were just as illogical, but they seemed to settle more comfortably in the Vulcan's mind. He recalled many such trips out into the desert as a child, and later as a troubled teenager, very often without notifying his parents as to his intentions. Vulcans had a history of using the desert as a testing ground. He had survived his Kahs-wan in land like this, and proved his fitness to move forward into Vulcan adulthood. He had lost his beloved sehlat at that time.
I-Chaya...
He had not thought about the sehlat in a long time, and he allowed himself a moment of grief. It was considered a rite of passage in many cultures for a child to endure the death of a pet, but death had never become easier.
Spock fixed his eyes on the horizon, and carried on walking. The sun was strong overhead now and he could see the walls of his parents' house appearing against the rising hills behind. Perhaps this was penance. Perhaps in arriving at Sarek's door dusty and hot and wearied from the desert he would feel that he had in some way atoned for the shame that he also brought to the door.
Shame. He knew that any person he spoke to about this would protest that he should not feel shame; that he had no reason to feel shame; that shame should be lodged in the attacker's mind, not the victim's. But still, the shame was there. He felt as if he would walk into his parents' home naked and besmirched, and their pity – or perhaps his mother's pity and his father's disgust – would only confirm his shame.
But now he was here. He was pushing open the gate with a dusty hand and walking up the path to the front door. His parents were expecting him. Perhaps his mother was even looking out of the window to see him arrive. But when he looked he could see no face at any of the narrow windows, narrow to keep the desert heat from billowing into the house in the day and the cold from infiltrating at night.
He stepped up to the door and raised his palm to the chime. His mother must have been watching for him, because the door swung inwards instantly, and Spock looked up to see his mother's face, her eyes wide with the pity that he had been dreading.
He stepped through the door and she closed it very quickly behind him, but as soon as they were assured of privacy she reached up to tighten her arms about him. Her voice was muffed by his clothes as she said, 'Oh, Spock. Oh, my baby...'
'Mother,' Spock murmured, but she only held him more tightly, her emotions spilling over into his mind and pushing at his poorly maintained shields. To his horror he felt moisture starting at the corners of his eyes, and he pushed his face into her shoulder, trying to control the sudden racking urge to sob.
'Oh, Spock,' she said again, pulling away from him.
Spock tried to turn his face away, but she caught his expression, and stroked a hand down his cheek.
'Spock, my poor boy.'
'Do not let Sarek see me like this,' Spock pleaded. Although he was holding back tears, he felt as if he were about to break.
'Your father is running a little late at a council meeting,' she said, pushing as much control into her own voice as he was trying to exercise in his. 'He isn't here yet.'
Spock felt the relief surge in him, and he stumbled further forward into the house, looking left and right, unsure of where to go. His mother put her hand on his arm and led him into the sitting room, where a couple of low and stylish couches were arranged around a natural wood coffee table. He sank down on the seat and his mother sat beside him, putting her arms around him again.
'Mother,' Spock said again in a stronger tone of protest. He did not know how to keep his shields in place against this constant barrage of feeling.
'I'm sorry, Spock,' she said, looking him up and down, seeming to be trying to see every part of him and judge how he was. 'Oh, Spock, you're so thin. It must have been such a terrible, terrible – '
'Yes,' Spock cut across in a low voice. 'Yes. I – do not wish to speak of it.'
'You never would let yourself cry, even as a little boy,' she said sadly, her eyes not leaving his face. 'Even as a five year old you would stand there, bruised maybe, or bruised inside after those – bullies – had gotten to you, and you would not cry.'
'Mother, it is not our way,' Spock insisted. 'You are aware of that. You do know that.'
'Yes, I do know that,' she said, smiling through her own tears. She took his hand, turned it over, catching sight of the scar on his wrist that was reddened with desert dust. 'But I hated those children for doing that to you. I thought I would never have cause to hate anyone more, but how I felt then, when you came to me at five, holding everything back inside, is nothing – nothing – to how I hate the men who did this to you. I would see them flayed alive.'
'Mother!' Spock said, shocked at the vehemence of her tone. She had always counselled him to repay violence with peace, taunts with logic.
'No, Spock,' she said. 'I won't apologise for that. The only thing that I regret about the Vulcan justice system is that they outlawed corporal punishment so long ago.'
Spock shook his head slowly. In some way this helped. Despite his own flashing urges to break Robert Heaton's neck, to hear his own mother advocate something that was so utterly against the ethics of any civilised society was to shock him into realising how wrong that would be.
'Mother, would you have them whipped for whipping me?' he asked. 'Would you starve them for starving me? Would you – '
No. He could not say it. He could not form the word rape in front of his mother. Perhaps he would never speak that word to her.
'Yes,' she said in a voice like brittle ice.
'Mother, please,' Spock said.
She smiled and took his hands again. 'I am sorry, Spock. You will have to forgive your flawed human mother for her anger at anyone who could hurt her son.'
Spock favoured her with the smallest of smiles. 'Vengeance has its appeal,' he admitted. 'But ultimately that would be a betrayal of everything that I have learnt to be. This is our way of life, Mother. For me to betray that by exacting physical harm on one who harmed me would be the worst violation of my self of all.'
She looked down at his hands, turning them over in his, staying silent as if she did not wish to continue to contradict him aloud.
'Spock – surely you didn't walk here?' she asked suddenly, rubbing some of the dust from his fingers.
Spock inclined his head. 'I did,' he said.
'That's why I didn't hear you arrive.' She leant forward and kissed his dark crown of hair. 'Only my son would walk miles through the morning heat rather than choosing the logical alternative of hiring a skimmer or taking a cab. Did you enjoy your walk, Spock?'
Spock lifted an eyebrow. 'I did,' he realised. He had not thought about it, but it had been good. He had had a chance to think and a chance to unwind in the open desert air that he never would have got by sitting in the hotel for hours and then spending a few minutes in a skimmer.
'And are your pockets full of plants and geological samples to show me?' she asked with a mischievous smile.
Spock shook his head gravely. 'Not this time, mother,' he said.
He turned sharply at the sound of the door opening in the hall. He had just begun to relax. They had just managed to turn their talk away from what had happened and on to other things. But now Sarek was here. He could feel him, feel the presence of his mind like a broad and heavy thing filling the house.
'That's your father,' his mother said unnecessarily, getting to her feet.
Spock stood too, locking his hands behind his back and standing with his legs a little apart as if he were in line on the ship, waiting for the captain's inspection. When Sarek walked into the room he stood very still, waiting for his father to speak. He kept his head upright, not meeting his father's eyes directly but refusing to drop his head or look away.
Sarek stood in the doorway for a moment, his gaze travelling over his son. He reminded Spock of a bird of prey when he looked like that, and he instantly felt small and vulnerable. There was no logic to the feeling, but it was there.
'Spock,' Sarek said simply.
Spock inclined his head, and then said, 'Sarek, I must express my gratitude for all that you have done.'
'It is illogical to offer thanks when the service was quite necessary,' his father replied, and Amanda said softly, 'Sarek.'
The corners of Sarek's mouth tightened in the hint of an apologetic smile.
'I accept your profession of gratitude,' he said rather awkwardly. 'Have you been in the house for long, Spock?'
'Eleven point seven three minutes,' Spock said automatically, and Sarek murmured, 'Terran standard.'
Spock closed his eyes briefly. Was this how it was to be?
Amanda looked between father and son and then said in a falsely bright voice, 'I should go see that the sprinklers are working properly in the rose garden. One of them was a little blocked this morning.' Then she added pointedly, 'Sarek, your son walked here from the city.'
As she left the room she said in an undertone, 'Go easy on him, Sarek.'
Spock pretended he had not heard. Sarek watched his wife leave the room and then turned back to his son.
'Spock, is it true that you walked here?' he asked, giving Spock another appraising look. Spock could read neither approval nor disapproval in his face.
'I did,' Spock nodded.
'You may use the main bathroom,' Sarek said. 'When you return I will have arranged refreshment.'
'Of course,' Spock said, understanding suddenly that his mother had mentioned his walk so that Sarek would be forced to follow the proper custom and offer due hospitality to his son. There were rituals that had to be followed when one welcomed a visitor in from the desert, and the first of those was offering them the chance to clean themselves of dust.
He left the room to find the peace of the bathroom, where he washed his hands and face in cool water and brushed the dust from his clothes. Then he returned to the sitting room to find that Sarek had shaded the windows and put out a pitcher of water and a platter of fresh fruit on the table.
'Sit, eat, and refresh yourself,' Sarek said in the ritual way.
Spock sat and poured himself a glass of water, but he could not make himself eat. He took a bite of one fruit but it felt like rock in his throat as he tried to swallow, so he returned the fruit to the plate and concentrated instead on sipping the water slowly to cool his body and rehydrate his tissues.
Sarek sat in silence. After some time Spock said, 'Do you intend to speak at all?'
He regretted those words instantly. If sitting in silence was awkward, he was sure that speaking would be a hundred times more so.
'We expected you to come to the house to stay, rather than take a hotel in the city,' Sarek said after another moment's silence.
'The hotel was the most convenient,' Spock said rather lamely. 'My captain is also staying with me.'
'It takes five point two minutes – Terran standard – to reach the city from here,' Sarek reminded him. 'And we have guest suites.'
'Nevertheless, we are staying at the hotel,' Spock said.
Sarek sat in silence again. The platter of fruit lay untouched. Spock sipped water again, and put the glass down noiselessly.
'My son, I do not know what to say, so I am – skirting the issue – with meaningless utterances,' Sarek said suddenly.
Spock's head jerked up in surprise. Sarek was sitting very still on the couch, his hands clasped before him, his back straight. He was looking at his son no more than Spock was looking at him, but Spock felt suddenly as if a layer had been peeled away or a shell removed, and he was more vulnerable than he was before. Sarek was looking at him as one who had been enslaved and raped, and Spock had no more idea of what to say than Sarek did.
'There is little to say,' Spock responded finally.
'You have suffered greatly,' Sarek said.
'I am healing,' Spock replied.
Now Sarek did turn to look at Spock, taking in the thinness of his face and hands, no doubt noticing the smallest traces of the scars that McCoy had been working so hard to remove. Perhaps the evidence was there in other things; in the way Spock sometimes moved with a degree of awkwardness because of the occasional pain in his joints from what McCoy had told him was a form of arthritis which would take time to heal. It was there when he found himself with posture that was slumped slightly as a relic of months of working in harness or carrying impossibly heavy loads. Perhaps Sarek could see the last traces of that hunted look that Spock had seen when he had first looked in a mirror on his return to the ship. He certainly felt hunted now. He could feel the echoes of the injuries that he dared not mention, the tearing and bruising that Master Robert had left him with time after time, and rivulets of shame ran through his mind.
'Was there nothing you could do?' Sarek asked suddenly.
Spock closed his eyes, feeling as if he were crumpling inside.
'Do you not believe that if there was, I would have done it?' he asked. 'My priority was to stay alive.'
'I know,' Sarek said, sounding curiously human. After a moment he repeated, 'I know, my son. I am sorry. I had been cautioned against – '
'Cautioned?' Spock asked, startled.
'Your esteemed physician, McCoy, took it upon himself to renew our acquaintance,' Sarek replied rather dryly.
Spock nodded. Why had he not expected that? McCoy was very much like a mother hen or a le-matya who had just given birth at the moment.
'But you still saw fit to ask me that question,' Spock said relentlessly.
'Even your father can make mistakes, Spock,' Sarek reminded him gently. 'Dare I say it, even your father can be prey to emotion at some – extreme – times. This is one such time. I have experienced such – anger – '
Despite himself, Spock flinched. Sarek had never admitted to such a thing in front of his son before, and he knew that Sarek's anger would be a formidable thing. It was terrible to know that his experience had provoked Sarek to such emotions. The memories flashed over him again, being held, chained, ripped into by that boy, and he struggled to quell the closing down of his vision that heralded an attack of panic. It was as he had feared. He felt utterly naked in front of his father. He had no defences left.
He fought the clenching panic and gradually pushed it away.
'I should not have brought my shame to this house,' he said, preparing to stand up.
Sarek's hand gripped about his wrist to stop him moving, reminding him so forcefully of a manacle that another wave of panic pushed through his mind. His father loosened his hold abruptly, as if he had sensed that panic, then said, 'You have brought no shame to this house, my son. There is no shame for the victim – only for the perpetrator. I will see that the perpetrator receives all that is due to him under our system of law.'
His hand was still loosely around Spock's wrist, and Spock could feel the pulse of his blood in his fingertips and the cool of his skin against Spock's skin that had been heated by his long walk. A sudden memory came to him of being very small and being folded against his father's chest, and feeling that he was the largest and safest thing in the world. How he wished that he could reclaim that place now.
'I offer my thanks, Sarek,' he said in a rather formal voice. He could not think how to form any other words.
Sarek's hand tightened again on his wrist, and Spock was suddenly assailed with a powerful sense of longing and regret from his father's mind, as if Sarek too was remembering the small child that he could no longer hold and protect from the world. There was a wall now that could not be breached, no matter what the circumstances were. For Sarek to hold his son would be an impossibility.
'You will receive justice,' Sarek said in a such a voice that Spock did not doubt it for a moment.
Spock did not reply. He sat very still with his eyes on the table before him, and the fruit that had barely been touched. He could feel Master Robert all over him, in him, defiling him, making him base and unclean. The memories were so strong they seemed to overwhelm his sight, his hearing. They made his skin crawl.
'Forgive me,' he said in something approaching a whisper.
Sarek stiffened as if he had received an electric shock. 'I cannot forgive you when you have done nothing wrong,' he said. 'But if I could offer you forgiveness, I would.'
