Dark Force Rising (Star Wars)

CHAPTER

5

"You'll forgive me," Mara said conversationally as she finished the last bit of wiring on her comm board, "if I say that as a hideout, this place stinks."

Karrde shrugged as he hefted a sensor pack out of its box and set it down on the side table with an assortment of other equipment. "I agree it's not Myrkr," he said. "On the other hand, it has its compensations. Who'd ever think of looking for a smuggler's nest in the middle of a swamp?"

"I'm not referring to the ship drop," Mara told him, reaching beneath her loose-flowing tunic sleeve to readjust the tiny blaster sheathed to her left forearm. "I mean this place."

"Ah. This place." Karrde glanced out the window. "I don't know. A bit public, perhaps, but that, too, has its compensations."

"A little public?" Mara echoed, looking out the window herself at the neat row of cream-white buildings barely five meters away and the crowds of brightly clad humans and aliens hurrying along just outside. "You call this a liulc public?"

"Calm down, Mara," Karrde said. "When the only viable places to live on a planet are a handful of deep valleys, of course things are going to get a bit crowded. The people here are used to it, and they've learned how to give each other a reasonable degree of privacy. Anyway, even if they wanted to snoop, it wouldn't do them much good."

"Mirror glass won't stop a good sensor probe," Mara countered. "And crowds mean cover for Imperial spies."

"The Imperials have no idea where we are. He paused and threw her an odd look. "Unless you know differently."

Mara turned away. So that was how it was going to be this time. Previous employers had reacted to her strange hunches with fear, or anger, or simple bald-faced hatred. Karrde, apparently, was going to go for polite exploitation. "I can't turn it on and off like a sensor pack," she growled over her shoulder. "Not anymore.

"Ah," Karrde said. The word implied he understood; the tone indicated otherwise. "Interesting. Is this a remnant of some previous Jedi training?" She turned to look at him. "Tell me about the ships." He frowned. "Excuse me?"

"The ships," she repeated. "The capital warships that you were very careful not to tell Grand Admiral Thrawn about, back when he visited us on Myrkr. You promised to give me the details later. This is later." He studied her, a slight smile creasing his lips. "All right," he said. "Have you ever heard of the Katana fleet?" She had to search her memory. "That was the group also called the Dark Force, wasn't it? Something like two hundred Dreadnaught-class Heavy Cruisers that were lost about ten years before the Clone Wars broke out. All the ships were fitted with some kind of new-style full-rig slave circuitry, and when the system malfunctioned, the whole fleet jumped to lightspeed together and disappeared."

"Nearly right," Karrde said. "The Dreadnaughts of that era in particular were ridiculously crew-intensive ships, requiring upwards of sixteen thousand men each. The full-rig slave circuitry on the Katana ships cut that complement down to around two thousand."

Mara thought about the handful of Dreadnaught cruisers she'd known.

"Must have been an expensive conversion."

"It was," Karrde nodded. "Particularly since they played it as much for public relations as they did for pure military purposes. They redesigned the entire Dreadnaught interior for the occasion, from the equipment and interior decor right down to the dark gray hull surfacing. That last was the origin of the nickname 'Dark Force," incidentally, though there was some suggestion that it referred to the smaller number of interior lights a two-thousand-crewer ship would need. At any rate, it was the Old Republic's grand demonstration of how effective a slave-rigged fleet could be." Mara snorted. "Some demonstration."

"Agreed," Karrde said dryly. "But the problem wasn't in the slave circuitry itself. The records are a little vague-suppressed by those in charge at the time, no doubt-but it appears that one or more of the fleet's crewers picked up a hive virus at one of the ports of call on their maiden voyage. It was spread throughout all two hundred ships while in dormant state, which meant that when it suddenly flared up it took down nearly everybody at once." Mara shivered. She'd heard of hive viruses leveling whole planetary populations in pre-Clone Wars days, before the medical science of the Old Republic and later the Empire had finally figured out how to deal with the things. "So it killed the crews before they could get to help."

"Apparently in a matter of hours, though that's just an educated guess," Karrde said. "What turned the whole thing from a disaster into a debacle was the fact that this particular hive virus had the charming trait of driving its victims insane just before it killed them. The dying crewers lasted just long enough to slave their ships together ... which meant that when the Katana command crew also went crazy and took off the entire fleet went with them."

"I remember now," Mara nodded slowly. "That was supposedly what started the big movement toward decentralization in automated ship functions. Away from big, all-powerful computers into hundreds of droids."

"The movement was already on its way, but the Katana fiasco pretty well sealed the outcome," Karrde said. "Anyway, the fleet disappeared somewhere into the depths of interstellar space and was never heard from again. It was a big news item for a while, with some of the less reverent members of the media making snide wordplays on the 'Dark Force' name, and for a few years it was considered a hot prospect by salvage teams who had more enthusiasm than good sense. Once it finally dawned on them just how much empty space was available in the galaxy to lose a couple hundred ships in, the flurry of interest ended. At any rate, the Old Republic soon had bigger problems on its hands. Aside from the occasional con artist who'll try to sell you a map of its location, you never hear about the fleet anymore."

"Right." It was, of course, obvious now where Karrde was going with this. "So how did you happen to find it?"

"Purely by accident, I assure you. In fact, it wasn't until several days afterward that I realized what exactly I'd found. I suspect none of the rest of the crew ever knew at all."

Karrde's gaze defocused, his eyes flattening with the memory. "It was just over fifteen years ago," he said, his voice distant, the thumbs of his intertwined hands rubbing slowly against each other. "I was working as navigator/sensor specialist for a small, independent smuggling group. We'd rather botched a pickup and had had to shoot our way past a pair of Carrack cruisers on our way out. We made it all right, but since I hadn't had the time to do a complete lightspeed calculation, we dropped back to realspace a half light-year out to recalculate." His lip twitched. "Imagine our surprise when we discovered a pair of Dreadnaughts waiting directly in our path."

"Lying dead in space.

Karrde shook his head. "Actually, they weren't, which was what threw me for those first few days. From all appearances, the ships seemed to be fully functional, with both interior and running lights showing and even a standby sensor scan in operation. Naturally, we assumed it was part of the group we'd just tangled with, and the captain made an emergency jump to lightspeed to get us out of there."

"Not a good idea," Mara murmured.

"It seemed the lesser of two evils at the time," Karrde said grimly.

"As it turned out, we came close to being fatally wrong on that account. The ship hit the mass shadow of a large comet on the way out, blowing the main hyperdrive and nearly wrecking the rest of the ship on the spot. Five of our crew were killed in the collision, and another three died of injuries before we could limp back to civilization on the backup hyperdrive." There was a moment of silence. "How many of you were left?" Mara asked at last.

Karrde focused on her, his usual sardonic smile back on his face. "Or in other words, who else might know about the fleet?"

"If you want to put it that way.

"There were six of us left. As I said, though, I don't think any of the others realized what it was we'd found. It was only when I went back to the sensor records and discovered that there were considerably more than just the two Dreadnaughts in the area that I began to have my own suspicions."

"And the records themselves?"

"I erased them. After memorizing the coordinates, of course." Mara nodded. "You said this was fifteen years ago?"

"That's right," Karrde nodded back. "I've thought about going back and doing something with the ships, but I never had the time to do it properly. Unloading two hundred Dreadnaughts on the open market isn't something you rush into without a good deal of prior preparation. Even if you have markets for all of them, which has always been problematic."

"Until now."

He cocked an eyebrow. "Are you suggesting I sell them to the Empire?"

"They're in the market for capital ships,"' she reminded him.

"And they're offering value plus twenty percent." He cocked an eyebrow at her. "I thought you didn't much care for the Empire."

"I don't," she retorted. "What's the other option give them to the New Republic?"

He held her gaze. "That might be more profitable in the long run. Mara's left hand curled into a tight fist, her stomach churning with mixed feelings. To let the Dreadnaughts fall into the hands of the New Republic, successor to the Rebel Alliance that had destroyed her life, was a hateful thought. But on the other hand, the Empire without the Emperor was only a pale shadow of its former self, hardly even worthy of the name anymore. It would be pearls before swine to give the Dark Force to them. Or would it? With a Grand Admiral in charge of the Imperial Fleet again, perhaps there was now a chance for the Empire to gain some of its old glory. And if there was..."What are you going to do?" she asked Karrde.

"At the moment, nothing," Karrde said. "It's the same problem we faced with Skywalker, after all: the Empire will be swifter to exact vengeance if we go against them, but the New Republic looks more likely to win in the end. Giving Thrawn the Katana fleet would only delay the inevitable. The most prudent course right now is to stay neutral."

"Except that giving Thrawn the Dreadnaughts might get him off our exhaust trail," Mara pointed out. "That would be worth the trade right there." Karrde smiled faintly. "Oh, come now, Mara. The Grand Admiral may be a tactical genius, but he's hardly omniscient. He can't possibly have any idea where we are. And he certainly has more important things to do than spend his resources chasing us down."

"I'm sure he does," Mara agreed reluctantly. But she couldn't help remembering how, even at the height of his power and with a thousand other concerns, the Emperor had still frequently taken the time to exact vengeance on someone who'd crossed him.

Beside her the comm board buzzed, and Mara reached over to key the channel. "Yes?"

"Lachton," a familiar voice came from the speaker. "Is Karrde around?"

"Right here," Karrde called, stepping to Mara's side.

"How's the camouflage work going?"

"We're about done," Lachton said. "We ran short of flash-netting, though. Do we have any more?"

"There's some at one of the dumps," Karrde told him.

"I'll send Mara to get it; can you have someone come in to pick it up?"

"Sure, no problem. I'll send Dankin-he hasn't got much to do at the moment anyway.

"All right. The netting will be ready by the time he gets here." Karrde gestured, and Mara keyed off the channel.

"You know where the Number Three dump is?" he asked her. She nodded. "Four twelve Wozwashi Street. Three blocks west and two north."

"Right." He peered out the window. "Unfortunately, it's still too early for repulsorlift vehicles to be on the streets. You'll have to walk."

"That's all right," Mara assured him. She felt like a little exercise, anyway. "Two boxes be enough?"

"If you can handle that many," he told her, looking her up and down as if making sure her outfit conformed to local Rishi standards of propriety. He needn't have bothered; one of the first rules the Emperor had drummed into her so long ago was to blend in as best she could with her surroundings. "If not, Lachton can probally make do with one."

"All right. I'll see you later."

Their townhouse was part of a row of similar structures abutting one of the hundreds of little market areas that dotted the whole congested valley. For a moment Mara stood in the entry alcove of their building, out of the busy flow of pedestrian traffic, and looked around her. Through the gaps between the nearest buildings she could see the more distant parts of the city-vale, most of it composed of the same cream-white stone so favored by the locals. In places, she could see all the way to the edge, a few small buildings perched precariously partway up the craggy mountains that rose sharply into the sky on all sides. Far up those mountains, she knew, lived loose avian tribes of native Rishi, who no doubt looked down in bemused disbelief at the strange creatures who had chosen the most uncomfortably hot and humid spots of their planet in which to live.

Dropping her gaze from the mountains, Mara gave the immediate area a quick scan. Across the street were more townhouses; between her and them was the usual flow of brightly clad pedestrians hurrying to and from the market area to the east. Reflexively, her eyes flicked across the townhouses, though with each window composed of mirror glass there wasn't a lot there for her to see. Also reflexively, she glanced across each of the narrow pedestrian alleyways between the buildings.

Between two of them, back at the building's rear where he was hardly visible, was the motionless figure of a man wearing a blue scarf and patterned green tunic.

Staring in her direction.

Mara let her gaze drift on as if she hadn't seen him, her heart thudding suddenly in her throat. Stepping out of the alcove, she turned east toward the market and joined the flow of traffic.

She didn't stay with it long, though. As soon as she was out of the mysterious loiterer's line of sight, she began cutting her way across the flow, heading across the street toward the townhouse window. She reached it three buildings d,own from the loiterer, ducked into the alleyway, and hurried toward the rear. If he was indeed monitoring Karrde's place, there was a good chance she could take him from behind.

She reached "The rear of the buildings and circled around ... only to find that her quarry had vanished.

For a moment she stood there, looking around her for any sign of the man's whereabouts, wondering what to do now. There was none of the insistent tingling that had gotten them away from Myrkr at the last second; but as she'd told Karrde, it wasn't a talent she could turn on and off. She looked down at the ground where the man had been standing. There were a few faint footprints in the thin coating of dust that had collected at the corner of the townhouse, giving the impression that the man had been there long enough to shuffle his feet a few times. A half dozen steps away, right in the center of another layer of dust, was a clear footprint pointing toward the west behind the row of townhouses.

Mara looked in that direction, feeling her lip twist. A deliberate lead-on, obviously-footprints in dust never came out that clear and unsmudged unless carefully planted. And she was right. A hundred meters directly ahead, strolling casually along the rear of the buildings toward a north-south street, was the man in the blue scarf and patterned tunic. A not-very-subtle invitation to follow him.

Okay, friend, she thought as she started off after him. You want to play? Let's play.

She had closed the gap between them to perhaps ninety meters when he reached the cross flow of traffic and turned north into it. Another clear invitation, this time to close the gap further lest she lose him. But Mara had no intention of taking him up on this one. She'd memorized the geography of the city-vale their first day here, and it was pretty obvious that his intention was to lead her up to the more sparsely populated industrial areas to the north, where presumably he could deal with her without the awkward presence of witnesses. If she could get there first, she might be able to turn things around on him. Double-checking the blaster beneath her left sleeve, she cut through an alley between the buildings to her right and headed north.

The valley stretched for nearly a hundred fifty kilometers in a roughly east-west direction, but at this point its north-south dimension was only a few kilometers. Mara kept up her pace, continually revising her course to avoid crowds and other impediments. Gradually, the houses and shops began to give way to light industry; and, finally, she judged she'd come far enough. If her quarry had kept with the leisurely pace of a man who didn't want to lose a tracker, she should now have enough time to prepare a little reception for him.

There was, of course, always the possibility that he'd shifted to one of the other north-south streets somewhere along the way, changed direction east or west, or even doubled back completely and returned to Karrde's townhouse. But as she looked carefully around the corner of a building into the street he'd first turned onto, she discovered that his imagination was as limited as his surveillance technique. Halfway down the block, he was crouched motionless behind a row of storage barrels with his back to her, his blue scarf thrown back out of the way across his patterned green tunic, something that was probably a weapon clutched ready in his hand. Waiting, no doubt, for her to stroll into his trap. Amateur, she thought, lip twisting in contempt. Watching him closely, not even bothering with her blaster, she eased around the corner and started silently toward him.

"That's far enough," a mocking voice said from behind her. Mara froze. The figure crouched by the barrels ahead of her didn't even twitch ... and it was only then that she belatedly realized that it was far too still to be simply waiting in ambush. Far too still, for that matter, to even be alive.

Slowly, keeping her arms stretched straight out to her sides, she turned around. The man facing her was of medium height, with a somewhat bulky build and dark, brooding eyes. His undertunic hung open to reveal a lightarmor vest beneath it. In his hand, of course, was a blaster. "Well, well, well," he sneered. "What we got here? `Bout time you showed up was startin' to think you'd gotten lost or somethin'"

"Who are you?" Mara asked.

"Oh, no, Red, I'm the one what's askin' the questions here. Not that I need to, `course. That fancy stuff on top pret' well tells me aw I need t'

know." He gestured with his blaster at her red-gold hair. "Shoulda gotten rid o' that-hide it or dyed it, y'know. Dead give'way. Pardon the `spression." Mara took a careful breath, forcing her muscles to unknot. "What do you want with me?" she asked, keeping her voice calm.

"Same thin' every man really wants," he grinned slyly. "A pile o'

hard cold cash."

She shook her head. "In that case, I'm afraid you've picked the wrong person. I've only got about fifty on me."

He grinned even wider. "Cute, Red, but you're wastin' your time. I know who y'are, aw right. You 'n' your pals are gonna make me real rich. C'mon-let's go."

Mara didn't move. "Perhaps we can work a deal," she suggested, feeling a drop of sweat trickle down between her shoulder blades. She knew better than to be fooled by the other's careless speech and manner-whoever and whatever he was, he knew exactly what he was doing.

On the plus side, she still had the blaster hidden beneath her sleeve; and she would give long odds that her assailant wouldn't expect that a weapon that potent might be small enough to conceal there. The fact that he hadn't already searched her seemed to confirm that assessment. But whatever she was going to do, she had to do it now, while she was still facing him. Unfortunately, with her hands spread apart there was no way for her to get at her weapon without telegraphing the movement. Somehow, she needed to distract him.

"A deal, huh?" he asked lazily. "What kind o' deal you got in mind?"

"What kind of deal do you want?" she countered. If there'd been a box anywhere near her feet, she might have been able to scoop it up with her foot and throw it at him. But though there was a fair amount of junk littering the street in this part of town, nothing suitable was within reach. Her half-boots were firmly fastened around her ankles, impossible to get loose without him noticing. Rapidly, she ran through an inventory of items she was carrying or wearing-nothing.

But the Emperor's intensive training had included direct manipulation of the Force as well as the long-range communication abilities that had been her primary value to his regime. Those skills had vanished at the moment of his death, reappearing only briefly and erratically in the years since then. But if the sensory tingles and hunches had started again, perhaps the power was back, too ...

"I'm sure we can double whatever you've been offered," she said.

"Maybe even throw in something extra to sweeten the pot." His grin turned evil. "That's a real generous offer, Red. Real generous. Lotta men'd jump on that right away, sure `nough. Me"-he lifted the blaster a little higher-"I like stayin' with a sure thing."

"Even if it means settling for half the money?" Two meters behind him, piled carelessly up against a retaining wall, was a small stack of scrap metal parts waiting to be picked up. A short length of shield tubing, in particular, seemed to he rather precariously positioned on one edge of a battered power cell case.

Setting her teeth, clearing her thoughts as best she could, Mara reached her mind out toward the tubing.

"On my pad, half a sure thing's better than twice o' nothin'," the man said. "Anyway, I don't 'spect you can outbid the Empire." Mara swallowed. She'd suspected it from the first; but the confirmation still sent a shiver up her back. "You might be surprised at our resources, she said. The length of tubing twitched, rolled a couple of millimeters "Now, don't think so," the other said easily. "C'mon, let's go." Mara tilted a finger back toward the dead man crouched at the box behind her. "You mind telling me first what happened here?" Her assailant shrugged. "What's t' tell? I needed a decoy; he was wandering' around the wrong place at the wrong time. End o' story." His grin suddenly vanished. "Enough stalling Turn around and start walking...unless you're looking' to spite me by making me settle for the death fee instead."

"No," Mara murmured. She took a deep breath, straining with every bit of strength she possessed, knowing that this was her last best chance And behind her captor, the tubing fell with a muffled clank onto the ground.

He was good, all right. The tubing had hardly even finished its fall before he'd dropped to one knee, spinning around and spraying the area behind him with a splattering of quick cover fire as he searched for whoever was sneaking up on him. It took less than a second for him to recognize his mistake, and with another spray of blaster fire he spun back again. But one second was all Mara needed. His desperate blaster spray was still tracking toward her when she shot him neatly in the head. For a long moment she just stood there, breathing hard, muscles trembling with reaction. Then, glancing around to make sure no one was running to see what all the commotion was about, she holstered her weapon and knelt down beside him.

There was, as she'd expected, precious little to find. An ID-probably forged-giving his name as Dengar Roth, a couple of spare power clips for his blaster, a backnp vibroblade knife, a data card and data pad, and some working capital in both local and Imperial currency. Stuffing the ID and data card into her tunic, she left the money and weapons where they were and got back to her feet. "There's your twice of nothing," she muttered, looking down at the body. "Enjoy it."

Her eyes shifted to the piece of shield tubing that had saved her life. She'd been right. The twitches of power, as well as the hunches, were back. Which meant the dreams wouldn't be far behind.

She swore under her breath. If they came, they came, and there was nothing much she could do except endure them. For the moment she had other, more pressing matters to deal with. Taking one final look around, she headed for home.

Karrde and Dankin were waiting when she arrived back at the townhouse, the latter all but pacing the floor in his nervousness. "There you are," he snapped as she slipped in through the back door. "Where the blazes-?"

"We've got trouble," Mara cut him off, handing the Dengar Roth ID to Karrde and brushing past them to the still largely disassembled communications room. Pushing aside a box of cables, she found a data pad and plugged in the card.

"What kind of trouble?" Karrde asked, coming up behind her.

"The bounty hunter kind," Mara said, handing him the data pad. Neatly framed in the center of the display, under a large 20,000, was Karrde's face.

"We're probably all in there," she told him. "Or at least as many as grand Admiral Thrawn knew about."

"So I'm worth twenty thousand now," Karrde murmured, paging quickly through the card. "I'm flattered."

"Is that all you're going to say?" Mara demanded. He looked at her. "What would you like me to say?" he asked mildly.

"That you were right and I was wrong about the Empire's interest in us?"

"I'm not interested in laying blame," she told him stiffly. "What I want to know is what we're going to do about it."

Karrde looked at the data pad again, a muscle tightening briefly in his jaw. "We're going to do the only prudent thing," he said. "Namely, retreat. Dankin, get on the secure comm and tell Lachton to start pulling the drop apart again. Then call Chin and his team and have them go over and repack the stuff in the equipment dumps. You can stay and help Mara and me here. I want to get off Rishi by midnight if at all possible."

"Got it," Dankin said, already keying the encrypt codes into the comm board.

Karrde handed the data pad back to Mara. "We'd better get busy." She stopped him with a hand on his arm. Ànd what happens when we run out of backnp bases?"

He locked eyes with her. "We don't give up the Dreadnaughts under duress," he said, lowering his voice to just above a whisper. "Not to Thrawn; not to anyone else."

"We may have to," she pointed out.

His eyes hardened. "We may choose to," he corrected her. "We will never have to. Is that clear?"

Mara grimaced to herself. "Yes."

"Good." Karrde flicked a glance over her shoulder to where Dankin was speaking urgently into the comm. "We have a lot of work to do. Let's get to it."

Mara would have bet that they couldn't reassemble their equipment in less than twenty-four hours. To her mild surprise, the crews had everything packed and ready to go barely an hour after local midnight. With suitably generous applications of funds to spaceport officials, they were off Rishi and to lightspeed an hour after that.

And later that night, as the Wild Karrde drove through the mottled sky of hyperspace, the dreams started again.

CHAPTER

6

From a distance it had looked like a standard-issue Bulk Cruiser: old, slow, minimally armed, with very little going for it in a fight except its size. But as with so very much of warfare, appearances in this case turned out to be deceiving; and if Grand Admiral Thrawn hadn't been on the Chimaera's bridge, Pellaeon had to admit that he might have been caught a bit by surprise.

But Thrawn had been on the bridge, and had recognized immediately the unlikelihood that the Rebellion's strategists would have put such an important convoy under the protection of such a weak ship. And so, when the Bulk Cruiser's bays suddenly erupted with three full squadrons of A-wing starfighters, the Chimaera's TIE interceptors were already in space and swarming to the attack.

"Interesting tactic," Thrawn commented as the gap between the Chimaera and the Rebel convoy began to sparkle with laser flashes. "If not especially innovative. The idea of converting Bulk Cruisers to starfighter carriers was first proposed over twenty years ago."

"I don't recall it ever being implemented," Pellaeon said, feeling a twinge of uneasiness as he eyed the tactical displays. A-wings were faster even than those cursed X-wings, and he wasn't at all sure how well his TIE

interceptors would handle them.

"Excellent fighters, A-wings," Thrawn said, as if reading Pellaeon's thoughts. "Not without their limitations, though. Particularly here-high-speed craft like that are far more suited to hit-and-fade operations than to escort duty. Forcing them to remain near a convoy largely neutralizes their speed advantage." He cocked a blue-black eyebrow at Pellaeon. "Perhaps we're seeing the result of Admiral Ackbar's removal as Supreme Commander."

"Perhaps." The TIE interceptors did indeed seem to be holding their own against the A-wings; and the Chimaera itself was certainly having no trouble with the Bulk Cruiser. Beyond the battlefront, the rest of the convoy was trying to huddle together, as if that would do them any good. "Ackbar's people are still in charge, though."

"Obviously."

"We've been over this territory already, Captain," Thrawn said, his voice cooling slightly. "Planting a vacuum-tight collection of evidence against Ackbar would have ruined him far too quickly. The more subtle attack will still neutralize him, but it will also send ripples of uncertainty and confusion through the Rebellion's entire political system. At the very least, it will distract and weaken them just at the moment when we'll be launching the Mount Tantiss campaign. At its best, it could split the entire alliance apart." He smiled. "Ackbar himself is replaceable, Captain. The delicate political balance the Rebellion has created for itself is not."

"I understand all that, Admiral," Pellaeon growled. "My concern is with your assumption that that Bothan on the Council can be relied upon to push things so close to your theoretical breakup point.

"Oh, he'll push, all right," Thrawn said, his smile turning sardonic as he gazed out at the battle blazing on around the enemy convoy. "I've spent many hours studying Bothan art, Captain, and I understand the species quite well. There's no doubt at all that Councilor Fey'lya will play his part beautifully. As beautifully as if we were pulling his strings directly." He tapped a key on his board. "Starboard batteries: one of the Frigates in the convoy is easing into attack position. Assume it's an armed backup and treat it accordingly. Squadrons A-2 and A-3, move to protect that flank until the Frigate has been neutralized."

The batteries and TIE wing commander acknowledged, and some of the turbolaser fire began to track on the Frigate. "And what happens if Fey'lya wins?" Pellaeon persisted. "Quickly, I mean, before all this political confusion has a chance to set in. By your own analysis of the species, any Bothan who's risen as high as Fey'lya has would have to be highly intelligent."

"Intelligent, yes, but not necessarily in any way that's dangerous to us," Thrawn said. "He'd have to be a survivor, certainly, but that kind of verbal skill doesn't necessarily translate into military competence." He shrugged. "Actually, a victory by Fey'lya would merely prolong the whole awkward situation for the enemy. Given the kind of support Fey'lya's been cultivating among the Rebellion military, the politicians would have to go through another polarizing struggle when they realized their mistake and tried to replace him."

"Yes, sir," Pellaeon said, suppressing a sigh. It was the kind of tangled subtlety that he'd never really felt comfortable with. He just hoped the Grand Admiral was right about the potential gains; it would be a shame for Intelligence to have engineered such a brilliantly successful bank job and then not get anything of real value out of it.

"Trust me, Captain," Thrawn said into his unspoken worries. "I dare say the wasting of political effort has already begun, in fact. Ackbar's staunchest allies would hardly have left Coruscant at this critical point unless they were desperately searching for evidence to clear him." Pellaeon frowned at him. "Are you saying that Solo and Organa Solo are headed for the Palanhi system?"

"Solo only, I think," Thrawn corrected thoughtfully.

"Organa Solo and the Wookiee are most likely still trying to find a place to hide from our Noghri. But Solo will be going to Palanhi, firmly convinced by Intelligence's electronic sleight-of-hand that the trail leads through that system. Which is why the Death's Head is on its way there right now."

"I see," Pellaeon murmured. He'd noticed that order on the daily log and had wondered why Thrawn was pulling one of their best Imperial Star Destroyers off battle duty. "I hope it will be equal to the task. Solo and Skywalker have both proved hard to trap in the past."

"I don't believe Skywalker is going to Palanhi," Thrawn told him, his face settling into a somewhat sour expression. "Our esteemed Jedi Master apparently called it correctly. Skywalker has decided to pay a visit to Jomark."

Pellaeon stared at him. "Are you sure, Admiral? I haven't seen anything from Intelligence to that effect."

"The information wasn't from, Intelligence," Thrawn said. "It came from Delta Source.

"Ah," Pellaeon said, feeling his own expression go a little sour. The Chimaera's Intelligence section had been nagging him for months now to find out what exactly this Delta Source was that seemed to feed such clear and precise information to the Grand Admiral from the very heart of the Imperial Palace. So far all Thrawn would say was that Delta Source was firmly established and that the information gained through it should be treated as absolutely reliable.

Intelligence hadn't even been able to figure out whether Delta Source was a person, a droid, or some exotic recording system that was somehow able to elude the Rebellion's hourly counter intelligence sweeps of the Palace. It irritated them no end; and Pellaeon had to admit he didn't much like being kept in the dark about it, either. But Thrawn had personally activated Delta Source, and long years of unwritten protocol in such matters gave him the right to keep the contact confidential if he chose. "I'm sure C'baoth will be pleased to hear it," he said. "I presume you'll want to give him the news yourself."

He thought he'd hidden his irritation with C'baoth reasonably well. Apparently, he'd thought wrong. "You're still upset about Taanab," Thrawn said, turning to gaze out at the battle. It wasn't a question.

"Yes, sir, I am," Pellaeon said stiffly. "I've been over the records again, and there's only one possible conclusion. C'baoth deliberately went beyond the battle plan Captain Aban had laid out-went beyond it to the point of disobeying a direct order. I don't care who C'baoth is or whether he felt justified or not. What he did constitutes mutiny."

"It did indeed," Thrawn agreed calmly. "Shall I throw him out of the Imperial service altogether, or simply demote him in rank?

Pellaeon glared at the other. "I'm serious, Admiral.

"So am I, Captain," Thrawn countered, his voice abruptly cold. "You know full well what's at stake here. We need to utilize every weapon at our disposal if we're to defeat the Rebellion. C'baoth's ability to enhance coordination and battle efficiency between our forces is one of those weapons; and if he can't handle proper military discipline and protocol, then we bend the rules for him."

"And what happens when we've bent the rules so far that they come around and stab us in the back?" Pellaeon demanded. "He ignored a direct order at Taanab-maybe next time it'll be two orders. Then three, then four, until finally he's doing what he damn well pleases and to blazes with the Empire. What's to stop him?"

"Initially, the ysalamiri," Thrawn said, gesturing at the odd-looking tubular frameworks scattered around the bridge, each with an elongated furry creature wrapped around it. Each of them creating a bubble in the Force where none of C'baoth's Jedi tricks would work. "That's what they're here for, after all."

"That's all well and good," Pellaeon said. "But in the long run-"

"In the long run, I will stop him," Thrawn cut him off, touching his board. "Squadron C-3, watch your port-zenith flank. There's a blister on that Frigate that could be a cluster trap."

The commander acknowledged, the TIE interceptors veering away in response. A second later, half a heartbeat too late, the blister abruptly exploded, sending a withering hail of concussion grenades outward in all directions. The rearmost of the TIE interceptors was caught by the edge of the fiery flower, shattering in a brilliant secondary èxplosion. The rest, out of range, escaped the booby trap unharmed.

Thrawn turned his glowing eyes on Pellaeon. "I understand your concerns, Captain," he said quietly. "What you fail to grasp-what you've always failed to grasp-is that a man with C'baoth's mental and emotional instabilities can never be a threat to us. Yes, he has a great deal of power, and at any given moment he could certainly do considerable damage to our people and equipment. But by his very nature he's unable to use that power for any length of time. Concentration, focus, long-term thinking-those are the qualities that separate a warrior from a mere flailing fighter. And they're qualities C'baoth will never possess."

Pellaeon nodded heavily. He still wasn't convinced, but there was clearly no use in arguing the point further. Not now, anyway. Yes, sir." He hesitated. "C'baoth will also want to know about Organa Solo." Thrawn's eyes glittered; but the annoyance, Pellaeon knew, wasn't directed at him. "You will tell Master C'baoth that I've decided to allow the Noghri one last chance to find and capture her. When we've finished here, I'll be taking that message to them. Personally."

Pellaeon glanced back at the entrance to the bridge, where the Noghri bodyguard Rukh stood his usual silent vigil. "You're calling a convocate of the Noghri commandos?" he asked, suppressing a shiver. He'd been to one such mass meeting once, and facing a whole roomful of those quiet gray-skinned killers was not an experience he was anxious to repeat.

"I think matters have gone beyond simply calling a convocate," Thrawn said coldly. "You'll instruct Navigation to prepare a course from the rendezvous point to the Honoghr system. The entire Noghri populace, I think, needs to be reminded of who it is they serve."

He shifted his glare out the viewport at the battle and tapped his board. "TIE command: recall all fighters to the ship," he ordered.

"Navigation: begin calculations for a return to the rendezvous point." Pellaeon frowned out the viewport. The modified Bulk Cruiser and backup Frigate were pretty much dead where they lay, but the convoy itself was largely undamaged. "We're letting them go?"

"There's no need to destroy them," Thrawn said. "Stripping them of their defense is an adequate object lesson for the moment." He tapped a key, and a tactical holo of this section of the galaxy appeared between their two stations. Blue lines marked the Rebellion's main trade routes; those sheathed in red marked ones the Imperial forces had hit in the past month. "There's more to these attacks than simple harassment, Captain. Once this group has told their story, all future convoys from Sarka will demand upgraded protection. Enough such attacks, and the Rebellion will face the choice of either tying up large numbers of its ships with escort duty or effectively abandoning cargo shipment through these border sectors. Either way, it will put them at a serious disadvantage when we launch the Mount Tantiss campaign." He smiled grimly. "Economics and psychology, Captain. For now, the more civilian survivors there are to spread the tale of Imperial power, the better. There'll be time enough for destruction later." He glanced at his board, looked back out the viewport. "Speaking of Imperial power, any news on our ship hunt?"

"We've had five more capital ships turned in to various Imperial bases in the past ten hours," Pellaeon told him. "Nothing larger than an old Star Galleon, but it's a start."

"We're going to need more than just a start, Captain," Thrawn said, craning his neck slightly to watch the returning TIE interceptors. "Any word on Talon Karrde?"

"Nothing since that tip from Rishi," Pellaeon told him, tapping the proper log for an update. "The bounty hunter who sent it was killed shortly afterward."

"Keep up the pressure," Thrawn ordered. "Karrde knows a great deal about what happens in this galaxy. If there are any capital ships lying unused out there, he'll know where they are."

Personally, Pellaeon thought it pretty unlikely that a mere smuggler, even one with Karrde's connections, would have better information sources than the vast Imperial Intelligence network. But he'd also dismissed the possibility that Karrde might be hiding Luke Skywalker out at that base on Myrkr. Karrde was turning out to be full of surprises. "There are a lot of people out there hunting for him," he told the Grand Admiral. "Sooner or later, one of them will find him."

"Good." Thrawn glanced around the bridge. "In the meantime, all units will continue their assigned harassment of the Rebellion." His glowing red eyes bored into Pellaeon's face. "And they will continue, too, to maintain a watch fur the Millennium Falcon and the Lady Luck. After the Noghri have been properly primed for their task, I want their prey to be ready for them." C'baoth awakened suddenly, his black-edged dreams giving way to the sudden realization that someone was approaching.

For a moment he lay there in the darkness, his long white beard scratching gently against his chest as he breathed, his mind reaching out through the Force to track along the road from the High Castle to the cluster of villages at the base of the rim mountains. It was hard to concentrate-so very hard-but with a perverse grimness he ignored the fatigue-driven pain and kept at it. There ... no ... there. A lone man riding a Cracian Thumper, laboring over one of the steeper sections of the roadway. Most likely a messenger, come to bring him some news from the villagers below. Something trifling, no doubt, but something that they felt their new Master should know. Master. The word echoed through C'baoth's mind, sparking a windblown tangle of thoughts and feelings. The Imperials who pleaded for him to help them fight their battles-they called him Master, too. So had the people of Wayland, whose lives he had been content to rule before Grand Admiral Thrawn and his promise of Jedi followers had lured him away.

The people of Wayland had meant it. The people here on Jomark weren't quite sure yet whether they did or not. The Imperials didn't mean it at all. C'baoth felt his lip twist in disgust. No, they most certainly did not. They made him fight their battles for them-drove him by their disbelief to do things he hadn't attempted for years and years. And then, when he'd succeeded in doing the impossible, they still held tightly to their private contempt for him, hiding it behind those ysalamiri creatures and the strange empty spaces they somehow created in the Force.

But he knew. He'd seen the sideways looks among the officers, and the brief but muttered discussions between them. He'd felt the edginess of the crew, submitting by Imperial order to his influence on their combat skills but clearly disliking the very thought of it. And he'd watched Captain Aban sit there in his command chair on the Bellicose, shouting and blaspheming at him even while calling him Master, spitting anger and impotent rage as C'baoth calmly inflicted his punishment on the Rebel ship that had dared to strike at his ship.

The messenger below was approaching the High Castle gate now. Reaching out with the Force to call his robe to him, C'baoth got out of bed, feeling a brief rush of vertigo as he stood erect. Yes, it had been difficult, that business of taking command of the Bellicose's turbolaser crews for the few seconds it had required to annihilate that Rebel ship. It had gone beyond any previous stretch of concentration and control, and the mental aches he was feeling now were the payment for that stretch.

He tightened the robe sash around him thinking back. Yes, it had been hard. And yet, at the same time, it had also been strangely exhilarating. On Wayland, he had personally commanded a whole city-state, one with a larger population than that which nestled beneath the High Castle. But there, he'd long since gone beyond the need to impose his will by force. The humans and Psadans had submitted to his authority early on; even the Myneyrshi, with their lingering resentment of his rule, had learned to obey his orders without question.

The Imperials, as well as the people of Jomark, were going to have to learn that same lesson.

Back when Grand Admiral Thrawn had first goaded C'baoth into this alliance, he'd implied that C'baoth had been too long without a real challenge. Perhaps the Grand Admiral had also secretly thought that this challenge of running the Empire's war would prove too much for a single Jedi Master to handle.

C'baoth smiled tightly in the darkness. If that was what the glowing-eyed Grand Admiral thought, he was going to be in for a surprise. Because when Luke Skywalker finally got here, C'baoth would face perhaps the most subtle challenge of his life: to bend and twist another Jedi to his will without the other even being aware of what was happening to him. And when he'd succeeded, there would be two of and who could tell what might be possible them then?

The messenger had dismounted from his Thumper and was standing beside the gate now, his sense that of a man prepared to await the convenience of his Master, no matter how long that wait might be. That was good: exactly the proper attitude. Giving his robe sash one final tug, C'baoth headed through the maze of darkened rooms toward the door, to hear what his new subjects wished to tell him.

CHAPTER

7

With a delicacy that always seemed so incongruous in a being his size, Chewbacca maneuvered the Falcon into his precisely selected orbital slot above the lush green moon of Endor. Rumbling under his breath, he switched over the power linkages and cut the engines back to standby. Seated in the copilot seat, Leia took a deep breath, wincing as one of the twins kicked her from inside. "Doesn't look like Khabarakh's here yet," she commented, realizing even as she said it how superfluous the comment was. She'd been watching the sensors from the moment they dropped out of lightspeed; and given there were no other ships anywhere in the system, there wasn't much chance that they could have missed him. But with the familiar engine roar now cut back down to a whisper, the silence felt strange and even a little eerie to her.

Chewbacca growled a question. "We wait, I guess, Leia shrugged.

"Actually, we're almost a day early-we got here faster than I'd expected." Chewbacca turned back to his board, growling his own interpretation of the Noghri's absence. "Oh, come on," Leia chided him. "If he'd decided to make this meeting into a trap, don't you think they'd have had a couple of Star Destroyers and an Interdictor Cruiser waiting to meet us?"

"Your Highness?" Threepio's voice called from down the tunnel. "I'm sorry to disturb you, but I believe I've located the fault in the Carbanti countermeasures package. Could you ask Chewbacca to step back for a moment?" Leia raised her eyebrows in mild surprise as she looked at Chewbacca. As was depressingly normal with the Falcon, several bits of equipment had gone out early in the flight from Coruscant. Up to his elbows with more important repairs, Chewbacca had assigned the relatively low-priority work on the Carbanti to Threepio. Leia had had no objections, though given the results the last time Threepio had tried to work on the Falcon, she hadn't expected very much to come of it. "We'll make a repair droid out of him yet," she said to Chewbacca. "Your influence, no doubt."

The Wookiee snorted his opinion of that as he got out of the pilot's seat and headed back to see what Threepio had found. The cockpit door slid open, closed again behind him.

Leaving the cockpit that much quieter.

"You see that planet down there, my dears?" Leia murmured, rubbing her belly gently. "That's Endor. Where the Rebel alliance finally triumphed over the Empire, and the New Republic began."

Or at least, she amended silently to herself that was what the histories some day would say. That the death of the Empire occurred at Endor, with all the rest of it merely a mopping-up action.

A mopping-up action which had lasted five years, so far. And could wind up lasting another twenty, the way things were going. She let her eyes drift across the brilliant mottled green world turning slowly beneath them, wondering yet again why she'd chosen this place for her rendezvous with Khabarakh. True, it was a system that practically every being in both the Republic and Imperial sections of the galaxy had heard of and knew how to find. And with the major planes of contention long gone from this sector, it was a quiet enough place for two ships to meet. But there were memories here, too, some of which Leia would just as soon not bring to mind. Before they'd triumphed, they'd very nearly lost everything.

From down the tunnel, Chewbacca roared a question. "Hang on, I'll check," Leia called back. Leaning over the board, she keyed a switch. "It reads 'standby/modulo,"" she reported. "Wait a minute-now it reads `system ready." Do you want me-?"

And abruptly, without any warning, a black curtain seemed to drop across her vision...

Slowly, she became aware that there was a metallic voice calling to her. "Your Highness," it said over and over again. "Your Highness. Can you hear me? Please, Your Highness, can you hear me?"

She opened her eyes, vaguely surprised to discover they were closed, to find Chewbacca leaning over her with an open medpack gripped in one huge hand, an agitated Threepio hovering like a nervous mother bird behind him.

"I'm all right," she managed. "What happened?"

"You shouted for help," Threepio put in before Chewbacca could answer. "At least, we thought it was for help," he amended helpfully. "You were brief and rather incoherent."

"I don't doubt it," Leia told him. It was starting to come back now, like moonlight through the edge of a cloud. The menace, the rage; the hatred, the despair. "You didn't feel it, did you?" she asked Chewbacca. He growled a negative, watching her closely. "I felt nothing either," Threepio put in.

Leia shook her head. "I don't know what it could have been. One minute I was sitting there, and then the next-"

She broke off a sudden horrible thought striking her. "Chewie-where does this orbit take us? Does it ever pass through the position where the Death Star blew up?"

Chewbacca stared at her a moment, rumbling something deep in his throat. Then, shifting the medpack to his other hand, he reached past her to key the computer. The answer came almost immediately.

"Five minutes ago," Leia murmured, feeling cold. "That would be just about right, wouldn't it?

Chewbacca growled an affirmative, then a question. "I really don't know," she had to admit. "It sounds a little like something Lake went through on-during his Jedi training," she amended, remembering just in time that Luke still wanted Dagobah's significance to be kept a secret. "But he saw a vision. All I felt was ... I don't know. It was anger and bitterness; but at the same time, there was something almost sad about it. No-sad isn't the right word." She shook her head, sudden tears welling inexplicably up in her eyes. "I don't know. Look, I'm all right. You two can go on back to what you were doing." Chewbacca rumbled under his breath again, clearly not convinced. But he said nothing else as he closed the medpack and pushed past Threepio. The cockpit door slid open for him; with the proverbial Wookiee disdain for subtlety, he locked it in that position before disappearing down the tunnel into the main body of the ship.

Leia focused on Threepio. "You, too," she told him. "Go on-you still have work to do back there. I'm all right. Really."

"Well...very well, Your Highness," the droid said, clearly no happier than Chewbacca was. "If you're certain."

"I am. Go on, scat."

Threepio dithered another moment, then obediently shuffled out of the cockpit.

And the silence resumed. A silence that was thicker, somehow, than it had been before. And much darker.

Leia set her teeth firmly together. "I will not be intimidated," she said aloud to the silence. "Not here; not anywhere." The silence didn't reply. After a minute Leia reached over to the board and keyed in a course alteration that would keep them from again passing through the spot where the Emperor had died. Refusing to be intimidated, after all, didn't mean deliberately asking for trouble.

And after that, there was nothing left to do but wait. And wonder if Khabarakh would indeed come.

The topmost bit of the walled city Ilic poked through the clutching trees of the jungle pressing tightly around it, looking to Han for all the world like some sort of domed topped, silver-skinned droid drowning in a sea of green quicksand. "Any idea how we land on that thing?" he asked.

"Probably through those vents near the top," Lando said, pointing at the Lady Luck's main display. "They read large enough for anything up to about W-class space barge to get into."

Han nodded, fingers plucking restlessly at the soft armrest of his copilot seat. There weren't a lot of things in the galaxy that could make him nervous, but having to sit there while someone else made a tricky landing was one of them. "This is even a crazier place to live than that Nomad City thing of yours," he growled.

"No argument from me," Lando agreed, adjusting their altitude a bit. Several seconds later than Han would have done it. "At least on Nkllon we don't have to worry about getting eaten by some exotic plant. But that's economics for you. At last count there were eight cities in this part of New Cov, and two more being built."

Han grimaced. And all because of those same exotic plants. Or to be specific, the exotic biomolecules that could be harvested from them. The Covies seemed to think the profit was worth having to live in armored cities all the time. No one knew what the plants thought about it. "They're still crazy," he said. "Watch out, they may have magnetic airlocks on those entrance ducts.

Lando gave him a patient look. "Will you relax? I have flown ships before, you know."

"Yeah," Han muttered. Setting his teeth together, he settled in to suffer through the landing.

It wasn't as bad as he'd expected. Lando got his clearance from Control and guided the Lady Luck with reasonable skill into the flaring maw of one of the entrance ducts, following the curved pipe down and inward to a brightly lit landing area just beneath the transparisteel dome that topped the city walls. Inbound customs were a mere formality, though given the planet's dependence on exports, the outbound scrutiny would probably be a lot tighter. They were officially welcomed to Ilic by a professional greeter with a professional smile, given a data card with maps of the city and surrounding territory, and then turned loose.

"That wasn't so hard," Lando commented as they rode a sliding spiral ramp down through the spacious open center. At each level walkways led outward from the ramp to the market, administrative, and living areas of the city.

"Where are we supposed to be meeting Luke?"

"Three more levels down, in one of the entertainment districts," Han told him. "The Imperial library didn't have much detail on this place, but it did mention a little tap cafe called the Mishra attached to some half-size version they've got of the old Grandis Mon theater on Coruscant. I got the impression it was kind of a watering hole for local big shots."

"Sounds like a good place, to meet," Lando agreed. He threw Han a sideways look. "So. You ready to show me the hook yet?" Han frowned. "Hook?"

"Come on, you old pirate," Lando snorted. "You pick me up at Sluis Van, ask for a lift out to New Cov, send Luke on ahead for this cloak-and-blade rendezvous-and you expect me to believe you're just going to wave goodbye now and let me go back to Nkllon?"

Han gave his friend his best wounded look. "Come on, Lando-"

"The hook, Han. Let me see the hook."

Han sighed theatrically. "There isn't any hook, Lando," he said. "You can leave for Nkllon any time you want to. `Course," he added casually, "if you hung around a little and gave us a hand, you might be able to work a deal here to unload any spare metals you had lying around. Like, oh, a' stockpile of hfredium or something."

Carefully keeping his eyes forward, he could still feel the heat of Lando's glare. "Luke told you about that, didn't he?" Lando demanded. Han shrugged. "He might have mentioned it," he conceded. Lando hissed between clenched teeth. "I'm going to strangle him," he announced. "Jedi or not, I'm going to strangle him."

"Oh, come on, Lando," Han soothed. "You hang around a couple days you listen to people's jabberings, you maybe dig us out a lead or two about what Fey'lya's got going here, and that's it. You go home and back to your mining operation, and we never bother you again."

"I've heard that before," Lando countered. But Han could hear the resignation in his voice, "What makes you think Fey'lya's got contacts on New Cov?"

"Because during the war, this was the only place his Bothans ever seined to care about defending-"

He broke off, grabbing Lando's arm and turning both of them hard to the right toward the central column of the spiral walkway. "What&mdahs;" Lando managed.

"Quiet!" Han hissed, trying to simultaneously hide his face and still watch the figure he'd spotted leaving the ramp one level down. "That Bothan down there to the left-see him?"

Lando turned slightly, peering in the indicated direction out of the corner of his eye. "What about him?"

"It's Tav Breil'lya. One of Fey'lya's top aides."

"You're kidding," Lando said, frowning down at the alien. "How can you tell?"

"That neck piece he wears-some kind of family crest or something. I've seen it dozens of times at Council meetings." Han chewed at his lip, trying to think. If that really was Breil'lya over there, finding out what he was up to could save them a lot of time. But Luke was probably sitting in the tapcafe downstairs right now waiting for them ... "I'm going to follow him," he told Lando, shoving his data pad and the city map into the other's hands.

"You head down to the Mishra, grab Luke, and catch up with me."

"But-"

"If you're not with me in an hour I'll try calling on the comlink," Han cut him off stepping toward the outside of the ramp. They were nearly to the Bothan's level now. "Don't call me-I might be someplace I wouldn't want a call beep going off." He stepped off the ramp onto the walkway.

"Good luck," Lando called softly after him. There was a good scattering of aliens among the humans wandering around Ilic, but Breil'lya's cream-colored fur stood out of the crowd enough to make him easy to follow. Which was just as well. If Han could recognize the Bothan, the Bothan could probably recognize him right back, and it would be risky to have to get too close.

Luckily, the alien didn't seem to even consider the possibility that anyone might be following him. He kept up a steady pace, never turning around, as he headed past cross streets and shops and atria toward the outer city wall. Han stayed with him, wishing he hadn't been so quick to give the city map to Lando. It might have been nice to have some idea where he was going. They passed through one final atrium and reached a section of warehouse-type structures abutting a vast mural that seemed to have been painted directly on the inner city wall. Breil'lya went straight to one of the buildings near the mural and disappeared through the front door. Han ducked into a convenient doorway about thirty meters down the street from the warehouse. The door Breil'lya had gone through, he could see, carried the faded sign Amethyst Shipping and Storage above it. "I just hope it's on the map," he muttered under his breath, pulling his comlink from his belt.

"It is," a woman's voice came softly from behind him. Han froze. "Hello?" he asked tentatively.

"Hello," she said back. "Turn around, please. Slowly, of course." Han did as ordered, the comlink still in hand. "If this is a robbery-"

"Don't be silly." The woman was short and slender, perhaps ten years older than him, with closecut graying hair and a thin face which under other circumstances would look friendly enough. The blaster pointed his direction was some unfamiliar knockoff of a BlasTech DL-18-not nearly as powerful as his own DL-44, but under the circumstances the difference didn't matter a whole lot. "Put the comlink on the ground," she continued. "Your blaster, too, as long as you're down there."

Silently, Han crouched down, drawing his weapon out with exaggerated caution. Under cover of the motion, with most of her attention hopefully on the blaster, he flicked on the comlink. Laying both on the ground, he straightened and took a step back, just to prove that he knew the proper procedure for prisoners. "Now what?"

"You seem interested in the little get-together yonder," she said, stooping to retrieve the blaster and comlink. "Perhaps you'd like a guided tour."

"That would be great," Han told her, raising his hands and hoping that she wouldn't think to look at the comlink before putting it away in one of the pockets in her jumpsuit.

She didn't look at it. She did, however, shut it off. "I think I'm insulted," she said mildly. "That has to be the oldest trick on the list." Han shrugged, determined to maintain at least a little dignity here.

"I didn't have time to come up with any new ones.

"Apology accepted. Come on, let's go. And lower ycur hands-we don't want any passersby wondering, now, do we?"

"Of course not," Han said, dropping his hands to his sides. They were halfway to the Amethyst when, off in the distance, a siren began wailing.

It was, Luke thought as he looked around the Mishra, almost like an inverted replaying of his first visit to the Mos Eisley cantina on Tatooine all those years ago.

True, the Mishra. was light-years more sophisticated than that dilapidated place had been, with a correspondingly more upscale clientele. But the bar and tables were crowded with the same wide assortment of humans and aliens, the smells and sounds were equally variegated, and the band off in the corner was playing similar music-a style, obviously, that had been carefully tailored to appeal to a multitude of different races.

There was one other difference, too. Crowded though the place might be, the patrons were leaving Luke a respectful amount of room at the bar. He took a sip of his drink-a local variant of the hot chocolate Lando had introduced him to, this one with a touch of mint-and glanced over at the entrance. Han and Lando should have been only a couple of hours behind him, which meant they could be walking in at any minute. He hoped so, anyway. He'd understood Han's reasons for wanting the two ships to come into Ilic separately, but with all the threats that seemed to be hanging over the New Republic, they couldn't really afford to waste time. He took another sip And from behind him came an inhuman bellow. He spun around, hand automatically yanking his lightsaber from his belt, as the sound of a chair crashing over backwards added an exclamation point to the bellow. Five meters away from him, in the middle of a circle of frozen patrons, a Barabel and a Radian stood facing each other over a table, both with blasters drawn.

"No blasters! No blasters!" an SE4 servant droid called, waving his arms for emphasis as he scuttled toward the confrontation. In the flick of an eye, the Barabel shifted aim and blew the droid apart, bringing his blaster back to bear on the Radian before the other could react.

"Hey!" the bartender said indignantly. "That's going to cost you-"

"Shut up," the Barabel cut him off with a snarl. "Radian will pay you. After he pay me.

The Radian drew himself up to his full height which still left him a good half meter shorter than his opponent-and spat something in a language Luke didn't understand. "You lie," the Barabel spat back. "You cheat. I know." The Radian said something else. "You no like?" the Barabel countered, his voice haughty. "You do anyway. I call on Jedi for judgment." Every eye in the tapcafe had been riveted to the confrontation. Now, in almost perfect unison, the gazes turned to Luke. "What?" he asked cautiously.

"He wants you to settle the dispute," the bartender said, relief evident in his voice.

A relief that Luke himself was far from feeling. "Me?" The bartender gave him a strange look. "You're the Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker, aren't you?" he asked, gesturing at the lightsaber in Luke's hand.

"Yes," Luke admitted.

"Well, then," the bartender concluded, waving a hand toward the disputants.

Except that, Jedi or no Jedi, Luke didn't have a drop of legal authority here. He opened his mouth to tell the bartender that And then took another look into the other's eyes. Slowly, he turned back around, the excuses sticking unsaid in his throat. It wasn't just the bartender, he saw. Everyone in the tapcafe, it seemed, was looking at him with pretty much the same expression. An expression of expectation and trust.

Trust in the judgment of a Jedi.

Taking a quiet breath, sternly ordering his pounding heart to calm down, he started through the crowd toward the confrontation. Ben Kenobi had introduced him to the Force; Yoda had taught him how to use the Force for self control and self-defense. Neither had ever taught him anything about mediating arguments.

"All right," he said as he reached the table. "The first thing you're going to do-both of you-is put away your weapons.

"Who first?" the Barabel demanded. "Radians collect bounty-he shoot if I disarm."

This was certainly getting off to a great start. Suppressing a sigh, Luke ignited his lightsaber, holding it out so that the brilliant green blade was directly between the opposing blasters. "No one is going to shoot anyone," he said flatly. "Put them away.

Silently, the Barabel complied. The Radian hesitated a second longer, then followed suit. "Now tell me the problem," Luke said, shutting down the lightsaber but keeping it ready in his hand.

"He hire me for tracking job," the Barabel said, jabbing a keratin-plated finger at the Radian. "I do what he say. But he no pay me." The Radian said something indignant sounding. "Just a minute I'll get to you," Luke told him, wondering how he was going to handle that'part of the cross-examination. "What sort of job was it?"

"He ask me hunt animal nest for him," the Barabel said. "Animals bothering little ships-eating at sides. I do what he say. He burn animal nest, get money. But then he pay me in no-good money." He gestured down at a now scattered pile of gold-colored metal chips.

Luke picked one up. It was small and triangular, with an intricate pattern of lines in the center, and inscribed with a small "100" in each corner. "Anyone ever see this currency before?" he called, holding it up.

"It's new Imperial scrip," someone dressed in an expensive business coat said with thinly veiled contempt. "You can only spend it on Imperial-held worlds and stations."

Luke grimaced. Another reminder, if he'd needed one, that the war for control of the galaxy was far from over. "Did you tell him beforehand that you'd be paying in this?" he asked the Radian.

The other said something in his own language. Luke glanced around the circle, wondering if asking for a translator would diminish his perceived status here. "He says that that was how he was paid," a familiar voice said; and Luke turned to see Lando ease his way to the front of the crowd. "Says he argued about it, but that he didn't have any choice in the matter."

"That is how the Empire's been doing business lately," someone in the crowd offered. "At least around here."

The Barabel spun toward the other. "I no want your judgment," he snarled. "Only Jedi give judgment."

"All right, calm down," Luke told him, fingering the chit and wondering what he was going to do. If this really was the way the Radian had been paid..."Is there any way to convert these into something else?" he asked the Radian.

The other answered. "He says no," Lando translated. "You can use them for goods and services on Imperial worlds, but since no one in the New Republic will take them, there's no official rate of exchange."

"Right," Luke said dryly. He might not have Lando's experience in under-the-plate operations, but he hadn't been born yesterday, either. "So what's the unofficial exchange rate?"

"No idea, actually," Lando said, looking around the crowd. "Must be someone here who works both sides of the street, though." He raised his voice.

"Anyone here do business with the Empire?"

If they did, they were keeping quiet about it. "Shy, aren't they?" Luke murmured.

"About admitting Imperial dealings to a Jedi?" Lando countered. "I'd be shy, too."

Luke nodded, feeling a sinking sense in the pit of his stomach as he studied the Radian's tapirlike snout and passive, multifaceted eyes. He'd hoped that he could simply smooth out the problem and thereby avoid the need to pass any kind of real judgment. Now, he had no choice but to rule on whether the Radian was in fact deliberately trying to cheat his partner. Closing his eyes down to slits, he composed his mind and stretched out his senses. It was a long shot, he knew; but most species showed subtle physiological changes when under stress. If the Radian was lying about the payment-and if he thought that Luke's Jedi skills could catch him at it-he might react enough to incriminate himself.

But even as Luke ran through the sensory enhancement techniques, something else caught his attention. It was an odor: a faint whiff of Carababba tabac and armudu. The same combination Lando had called his attention to on the Sluis Van space station...

Luke opened his eyes and looked around the crowd. "Niles Ferrier," he called. "Will you step forward, please."

There was a long pause, punctuated only by Lando's sudden hissing intake of air at Ferrier's name. Then, with a rustle of movement from one side of the circle, a familiar bulky figure pushed his way to the front. "What do you want?" he demanded, his hand resting on the butt of his holstered blaster.

"I need to know the unofficial exchange rate between Imperial and New Republic currencies," Luke said. "I thought perhaps you could tell me what it is."

Ferrier studied him with ill-concealed scorn. "This is your problem, Jedi. Leave me out of it."

There was a low rumble of displeasure from the crowd. Luke didn't reply, but held Ferrier in a level gaze; and after a moment, the other's lip twisted. "The last time I did business on the other side, we settled on a five to four Empire/Republic conversion," he growled.

"Thank you," Luke said. "That seems straightforward enough, then," he continued, turning to the Radian. "Pay your associate with New Republic currency at a five/four exchange rate and take the Empire scrip back for the next time you work in their territory."

The Radian spat something. "That is lie!" the Barabel snarled back.

"He says he doesn't have enough in New Republic currency," Lando translated. "Knowing Radians, I'd tend to agree with the Barabel."

"Perhaps." Luke stared hard into the Radian's faceted eyes.

"Perhaps not. But there might be another way." He looked back at Ferrier, raised his eyebrows questioningly.

The other was sharp, all right. "Don't even think it, Jedi," he warned.

"Why not?" Luke asked. "You work both sides of the border. You're more likely to be able to spend Imperial scrip than the Barabel could."

"Suppose I don't want to?" Ferrier countered. "Suppose I don't plan to go back any time soon. Or maybe I don't want to get caught with that much Imperial scrip on me. Fix it yourself, Jedi-I don't owe you any favors." The Barabel whirled on him. "You talk respect," he snarled. "He is Jedi. You talk respect."

A low rumble of agreement rippled through the crowd. "Better listen to him," Lando advised. "I don't think you'd want to get in a fight here, especially not with a Barabel. They've always had a soft spot for Jedi."

"Yeah-right behind their snouts," Ferrier retorted. But his eyes were flicking around the crowd now, and Luke caught the subtle shift in his sense as he began to realize just how much in the minority his opinion of Luke was. Or perhaps he was realizing that winding up in the middle of an official flap might buy him more attention than he really wanted to have. Luke waited, watching the other's sense flicker with uncertainty, waiting for him to change his mind.

When it happened, it happened quickly. "All right, but it'll have to be a five/three exchange," Ferrier insisted. "The five/four was a fluke-no telling if I'll ever get that again."

"It is cheat," the Barabel declared. "I deserve more from Radian."

"Yes, you do," Luke agreed. "But under the circumstances, this is probably the best you're going to get." He looked at the Radian. "If it helps any," he added to the Barabel, "remember that you can pass a warning to the rest of your people about dealing with this particular Radian. Not being able to hire expert Barabel hunters will hurt him far more in the long run than he might cost you now."

The Barabel made a grating noise that was probably the equivalent of a laugh. "Jedi speak truth," he said. "Punishment is good. Luke braced himself. This part the Barabel wasn't going to be nearly so happy about. "You will, however, have to pay for the repair of the droid you shot. Whatever the Radian said or did, he is not responsible for that." The Barabel stared at Luke, his needle teeth making small, tight biting motions. Luke returned the cold gaze, senses alert to the Force for any intimation of attack. "Jedi again speak truth," the alien said at last. Reluctantly, but firmly. "I accept judgment."

Luke let out a quiet sigh of relief. "Then the matter is closed," he said. He looked at Ferrier, then raised his lightsaber to his forehead in salute to the two aliens and turned away.

"Nicely done," Lando murmured in his ear as the crowd began to break up.

"Thanks," Luke murmured, his mouth dry. It had worked, all right...but it had been more luck than skill, and he knew it. If Ferrier hadn't been there-or if the ship thief hadn't decided to back down-Luke had no idea how he would have solved the dispute. Leia and her diplomatic training would have done better than he had; even Han and his long experience at hard bargaining would have done as well.

It was an aspect of Jedi responsibility that he'd never considered before. But it was one he'd better start thinking about, and fast.

"Han's following one of Fey'lya's Bothan pals up on Level Four," Lando was saying as they moved through the crowd toward the exit. "Spotted him from the west central ramp and sent me to-"

He stopped short. From outside the Mishra the sound of wailing sirens had started. "I wonder what that is," he said, a touch of uneasiness in his voice.

"It's an alarm," one of the tapcafe patrons said, his forehead wrinkled in concentration as he listened. The pitch of the siren changed; changed again..."It's a raid."

"A raid?" Luke frowned. He hadn't heard of any pirate activity in this sector. "Who's raiding you?"

"Who else?" the man retorted. "The Empire." Luke looked at Lando. "Uh-oh," he said quietly.

"Yeah," Lando agreed. "Come on.

They left the Mishra and headed out into the wide avenue. Oddly enough, there were no signs of the panic Luke would hayed expected to find. On the contrary, the citizens of Ilic seemed to be continuing about their daily business as if nothing untoward was happening. "Maybe they don't realize what's going on," he suggested doubtfully as they headed for one of the spiral ramps.

"Or else they've got a quiet agreement with the Empire," Lando countered sourly. "Maybe the leadership finds it politically handy to align themselves with the New Republic, but they also want to keep in the Empire's good graces. Since they can't pay anything as overt as tribute, they instead let the Imperials come in every so often and raid their stocks of refined biomolecules. I've seen that sort of thing done before." Luke looked around at the unconcerned crowds. "Only this time it might backfire on them."

"Like if the Imperials spot the Lady Luck and your X-wing on the landing records."

"Right. Where did you say Han was?"

"Last I saw, be was on Level Four heading west," Lando said, digging out his comlink. "He told me not to call him, but I think this qualifies as an unforeseen circumstance."

"Wait a minute," Luke stopped him. "If he's anywhere near this aide of Fey'lya's-and if Fey'lya is working some kind of deal with the Empire...?"

"You're right." Lando swore under his breath as he put the comlink away. "So what do we do?"

They'd reached the ramp now and stepped onto the section spiraling upward. "I'll go find Han," Luke said. "You get up to the landing area and see what's happening. If the Imperials haven't actually landed yet, you might be able to get into the air control computer and erase us from the list. Artoo can help if you can get him out of my X-wing and over to a terminal without being caught."

"I'll give it a try."

"Okay." A stray memory flicked through Luke's mind-"I don't suppose the Lady Luck's equipped with one of those full-rig slave circuits you talked about back on Nkllon, is it?"

Lando shook his head. "It's rigged, but only with a simple homing setup. Nothing much more than straight-line motion and a little maneuvering. It'd never be able to get to me through the middle of an enclosed city like this."

And even if it could, Luke had to admit, it wouldn't do them much good. Short of blasting a huge hole through the outer wall, the only way out of Ilic for anything the size of a spaceship was through the exit ducts above the landing area. "It was just a thought," he said.

"Here's where Han got off," Lando said, pointing. "He headed that way.

"Right." Luke stepped off the ramp. "See you soon. Be careful."

"You, too."

CHAPTER

8

The graying woman took Han to a small office-type room in the Amethyst building, turned him over to a couple of other guard types there, and disappeared with his blaster, comlink, and ID in hand. Han tried once or twice to strike up a conversation with the guards, got no response from either of them, and had just about resigned himself to sitting quietly, listening to the sirens outside, when the woman returned.

Accompanied by another, taller woman with the unmistakable air of authority about her. "Good day to you," the tall woman said, nodding at Han.

"Captain Han Solo, I believe?"

With his ID in her hand, there didn't seem much point in denying it.

"That's right," he said.

"We're honored by your visit," she said, her tone putting a slightly sardonic edge to the polite words. "Though a bit surprised by it."

"I don't know why-the visit was your idea," Han countered. "You always pick people up off the street like this?"

slightly. "You want to tell me who you are and who sent you?" Han frowned. "What do you mean, who am I? You've got my ID right there.

"Yes, I do," the woman nodded, turning the card over in her hand.

"But there's some difference of opinion as to whether or not it's genuine." She looked out the door and beckoned And Tav Breil'lya stepped past her into the room. "I was right," the Bothan said, his cream-colored fur rippling in an unfamiliar pattern. "As I told you when I first saw his ID. He is an impostor. Most certainly an Imperial spy."

"What?" Han stared at him, the whole situation tilting slightly off vertical. He looked at the alien's neck piece-it was Tav Breil'lya, all right.

"What did you call me?"

"You're an Imperial spy," Breil'lya repeated, his fur rippling again.

"Come to destroy our friendship, or even to kill us all. But you'll never live to report back to your masters. He turned to the tall woman. "You must destroy him at once, Sena," he urged. "Before he has the chance to summon your enemies here."

"Let's not do anything rash, Council-Aide Breil'lya," Sena soothed.

"Irenez has a good picket screen in position." She looked at Han. "would you care to respond to the Council-Aide's accusations?"

"We have no interest in the ravings of an Imperial spy," Breil'lya insisted before Han could speak.

"On the contrary, Council-Aide," Sena countered. "Around here, we have an interest in a great many things." She turned back to Han, lifted his ID. "Do you have any proof other than this that you're who you claim to be?

"It doesn't matter who he is," Breil'lya jumped in again, his voice starting to sound a little strained. "He's seen you, and he must certainly know that we have some kind of arrangement. Whether he's from the Empire or the New Republic is irrelevant-both are your enemies, and both would use such information against you."

Sena's eyebrows lifted again. "So now his identity doesn't matter," she said coolly. "Does that mean you're no longer certain he's an impostor?" Breil'lya's fur rippled again. Clearly, he wasn't as quick on his verbal feet as his boss. "He's a very close likeness," the other muttered.

"Though a proper dissection would quickly establish for certain who he is." Sena smiled slightly. But it was a smile of understanding, not of humor ... and suddenly Han realized that the confrontation had been as much a test of Breil'lya as it had been of him. And if Sena's expression was anything to go by, the Bothan had just flunked it. "I'll keep that recommendation in mind," she told him dryly.

There was a soft beep, and the gray-haired woman pulled out a comlink and spoke quietly into it. She listened, spoke again, and looked up at Sena.

"Picket line reports another man approaching," she said. "Medium build, dark blond hair, dressed in black"-she threw a glance at Breil'lya-"and carrying what appears to be a lightsaber."

Sena looked at Breil'lya, too. "I believe that ends the discussion," she said. "Have one of the pickets meet him, Irenez, and ask him if he'll join us. Make it clear that's a request, not an order. Then return Captain Solo's weapon and equipment to him." She turned to Han, nodded gravely to him as she returned his ID. "My apologies, Captain. You understand we have to be cautious. Particularly given the coincidence of this." She gestured toward the outside wall.

Han frowned, wondering what she meant. Then he got it: she was indicating the sirens still wailing outside. "No problem," he assured her.

"What are the sirens for, anyway?"

"It's an Imperial raid," Irenez said, handing him his blaster and comlink.

Han froze. "A raid?"

"It's no big deal," Sena assured him. "They come by every few months and take a percentage of the refined biomolecules that have been packaged for export. It's a covert form of taxation the city governments have worked out with them. Don't worry, they never come any farther in than the landing level."

"Yeah, well, they may change the routine a little this time," Han growled, flicking on his comlink. He half expected someone to try to stop him, but no one even twitched. "Luke?"

"I'm here, Han," the younger man's voice came back. "My escort tells me I'm being brought to where you are. You all right?"

"Just a little misunderstanding. Better get in here fast-we got company.

"Right."

Han shut off the comlink. Sena and Irenez, he saw, had meanwhile been having a quiet conversation of their own. "If you're as touchy about Imperials as Breil'lya implied, you might want to find a hole to disappear into," he advised.

"Our escape route's ready," Sena assured him as Irenez left the room.

"The question is what to do with you and your friend."

"You can't just firm them loose," Breil'lya insisted, trying one last time. "You know full well that if the New Republic learns about you-" The Commander is being notified," Sena cut him off. "He decide."

"But-"

"That's all, Council-Aide," she cut him off again, her voice suddenly hard. "Join the others at the lift shaft. You'll accompany me on my ship." Breil'lya threw one last unreadable look at Han, then silently left the room.

"Who's this Commander of yours?" Han asked.

"I can't tell you that." Sena studied him a moment. "Don't worry, though. Despite what Breil'lya said, we're not enemies of the New Republic. At least, not at the moment."

"Oh," Han said. "Great."

There was the sound of footsteps from the hallway outside. A few seconds later, accompanied by two young men with holstered blasters, Luke stepped into the room.

"Han," Luke greeted his friend, giving Sena a quick once-over.

`You all right?"

"I'm fine," Han assured him. "Like I said, a little misunderstanding. The lady here-Sena-" He paused expectantly.

"Let's just leave it at Sena for now," she said.

"Ah," Han said. He'd hoped to get her last name, but clearly she wasn't' in the habit of giving it out. "Anyway, Sena thought I was an Imperial spy. And speaking of Imperials-"

"I know," Luke nodded.

"Lando's gone up to see if he can clear our ships from the landing record."

"He won't be able to," Han shook his head. "Not in time. And they're bound to pull the landing list."

Luke nodded agreement. "Then we'd better get up there."

"Unless you'd all rather come with us," Sena offered. "There's plenty of room on our ship, and it's hidden away where they won't find it."

"Thanks, but no," Han said. He wasn't about to go off with these people until he knew a lot more about them. Whose side they were on, for starters. "Lando won't want to leave his ship."

"And I need to get my droid back," Luke added. Irenez slipped back into the room. "Everyone's on their way down, and the ship's being prepped," she told Sena. "And I got through to the Commander." She handed the tall woman a data pad.

Sena glanced at it, nodded and turned back to Han. "There's a service shaft near here that opens up into the west edge of the landing area," she told him. "I doubt the Imperials know about it; it's not on any of the standard city maps. Irenez will guide you up there and give you what help she can."

"That's really not necessary," Han told her. Sena held up the data pad. "The Commander has instructed me to give you whatever aid you require," she said firmly. "I'd appreciate it if you'd allow me to carry out my orders."

Han looked at Luke, raised his eyebrows. Luke shrugged slightly in return: if there was treachery in the offer, his Jedi senses weren't picking it up. "Fine, she can tag along," he said. "Let's go."

"Good luck," Sena said, and disappeared out the door. Irenez gestured to the door after her. "This way, gentlemen." The service shaft was a combination stairway and liftcar tube set into the outer city wall, its entrance almost invisible against the swirling pattern of that section of the mural. The liftcar itself was nowhere to be seen-probably, Han decided, still ferrying Sena's group to wherever it was they'd stashed their ship. With Irenez in the lead, they started up the stairs.

It was only three levels up to the landing area. But three levels in a city with Ilic's high-ceilinged layout translated into a lot of stairs. The first level ran to fifty-three steps; after that, Han stopped counting. By the time they slipped through another disguised door into the landing area and took cover behind a massive diagnostic analyzer, his legs were beginning to tremble with fatigue. Irenez, in contrast, wasn't even breathing hard.

"Now what?" Luke asked, looking cautiously around the analyzer. He hasn't breathing hard, either.

"Let's find Lando," Han said, pulling out his comlink and thumbing his call. "Lando?"

"Right here," the other's whispered voice came back instantly.

"Where are you?"

"West end of the landing area, about twenty meters from Luke's X-wing. How about you?"

"About ninety degrees away from you toward the south," Lando answered. "I'm behind a stack of shipping boxes. There's a stormtrooper standing guard about five meters away, so I'm sort of stuck here."

"What sort of trouble are we looking at?"

"It looks like a full-fledged task force," Lando said grimly. "I saw three drop ships come in, and I think there were one or two on the ground when I got here. If they were fully loaded, that translates to a hundred sixty to two hundred men. Most of them are regular army troops, but there are a few storm troopers in the crowd, too. There aren't too many of either still up here-most of them headed on down the ramps a few minutes ago.

"Probably gone to search the city for us," Luke murmured.

"Yeah." Han eased up to look over the analyzer. The top of Luke's X-wing was just visible over the nose of a W-23 space barge. "Looks like Artoo's still in Luke's ship."

"Yeah, but I saw them doing something over that way," Lando warned.

"They may have put a restraining bolt on him."

"We can handle that." Han scanned as much of the area around them as he could see. "I think we can make it to the X-wing without being spotted. You told me on the trip here that you had a beckon call for the Lady Luck, right?"

"Right, but it's not going to do me any good," Lando said. "With all these boxes around, there's no place I can set it down without opening myself to fire."

"That's okay," Han told him, feeling a tight smile twist at his lip. Luke might have the Force, and Irenez might be able to climb stairs without getting winded; but he would bet heavily that he could outdo both of them in sheer chicanery. "You just get it moving toward you when I give the word." He switched off the comlink. "We're going over to the X-wing," he told Luke and Irenez, adjusting his grip on his blaster. "You ready?" He got two acknowledgments, and with a last look around the area headed as quickly as silence permitted across the floor. He reached the space barge lying across their path without incident, paused there to let the others catch up "Shh!" Luke hissed.

Han froze, pressing himself against the barge's corroded hull. Not four meters away a stormtrooper standing guard was starting to turn in their direction.

Clenching his teeth, Han raised his blaster. But even as he did so, his peripheral vision caught Luke's hand making some sort of gesture; and suddenly the Imperial spun around in the opposite direction, pointing his blaster rifle toward a patch of empty floor. "He thinks he heard a noise," Luke whispered. "Let's go.

Han nodded, and sidled around to the other side of the barge. A few seconds later they were crouched beside the X-wing's landing skids. "Artoo?" Han stage-whispered upward. "Come on, short stuff wake up." There was a soft and rather indignant beep from the top of the X-wing. Which meant the Imperials' restraining bolt hadn't shut the droid down entirely, just blocked out his control of the X-wing's systems. Good. "Okay," he called to the droid. "Get your comm sensor warmed up and get ready to record."

Another beep. "Now what?" Irenez asked.

"Now we get cute," Han told her, pulling out his comlink. "Lando? You ready?"

"As ready as I'm going to be," the other came back.

"Okay. When I give the signal, turn on your beckon call and get the Lady Luck moving. When I tell you again, shut it off. Got that?"

"Got it. I hope you know what you're doing.

"Trust me." Han looked at Luke. "You got your part figured out?" Luke nodded, holding up his lightsaber. "I'm ready."

"Okay, Lando. Go."

For a long moment nothing happened. Then, through the background noise of the landing area, came the distinctive whine of repulsorlifts being activated. Half standing up, Han was just in time to see the Lady Luck rise smoothly up from among the other docked ships.

From somewhere in the same general vicinity came a shout, followed by the multiple flash of blaster fire. Another three weapons opened up almost immediately, all four tracking the Lady Luck as it made a somewhat ponderous turn and began floating south toward Lando's hiding place.

"You know it'll never get there," Irenez muttered in Han's ear. "As soon a, they figure out where it's going, they'll be all over him.

"That's why it's not going to get to him," Han countered, watching the Lady Luck closely. Another couple of seconds and every stormtrooper and Imperial soldier in the place ought to have his attention solidly fixed on the rogue ship..."Ready, Luke ... now."

And suddenly Luke was gone, a single leap taking him to the top of the X-wing. Over the commotion Han heard the snap-hiss as Luke ignited his lightsaber, could see the green glow reflected from the nearest ships and equipment. The glow and sound shifted subtly as Luke made a short slice "Restraining bolt's off" Luke called down. "Now?"

"Not yet," Han told him. The Lady Luck was about a quarter of the way to the far wall, blaster bolts still scattering off its armored underside.

"I'll tell him when. You get ready to fly interference."

"Right." The X-wing rocked slightly as Luke moved forward and dropped into the cockpit, its own repulsorlifts beginning to whine as Artoo activated them.

A whine that no one else out in all that confusion had a hope of hearing. The Lady Luck was hallway to the wall now..."Okay, Lando, shut down," Han ordered. "Artoo, your turn. Call it back this way." With full access again to the X-wing's transmitters, it was a simple task for the droid to duplicate the signal from Lando's beckon call. The Lady Luck shuddered to a halt, reoriented itself to the new call, and started across the landing area again toward the X-wing.

It wasn't something the Imperials had expected. For a second the blaster fire faltered as the soldiers chasing the yacht skidded to a halt; and by the time the fire resumed in earnest, the Lady Luck was nearly to the X-wing.

"Now?" Luke called.

"Now," Han called back. "Put her down and clear us a path." Artoo twittered, and the Lady Luck again halted in midair, this time dropping smoothly to the ground. There was a shout that sounded like triumph from the Imperials ... but if so, it was the shortest triumph on record. The Lady Luck touched down And without warning, the X-wing leaped into the air. Pulling a tight curve around the Lady Luck, Luke swooped back down, wingtip lasers spitting a corridor of destruction across the startled soldiers' line of approach. Given time, the Imperials would regroup. Han had no intention of giving them that time. "Come on," he snapped to Irenez, leaping to his feet and making a mad dash for the Lady Luck. He was probably on the ramp before the soldiers even noticed him, and was up and through the hatch before anyone was able to get off a shot. "Stay here and guard the hatch," he shouted back as Irenez charged in behind him. "I'm going to go pick up Lando." Luke was still roaring around creating havoc as Han scrambled into the cockpit and dived into the pilot's seat, throwing a quick look at the instruments as he did so. All the systems seemed to be ready; and anything that wasn't was going to have to do so on the way up. "Grab onto something!" he shouted back to Irenez and lifted.

The stormtrooper Lando had mentioned as being near his position was nowhere in sight as Han brought the Lady Luck swinging over to the pile of shipping boxes. Luke was right with him, the X-wing's lasers making a mess of the landing area floor as he kept the Imperials pinned down. Han dropped the ship to within a half meter of the floor, entrance ramp swiveled toward the boxes. There was a flicker of motion, visible for just a second through the cockpit's side viewport "We've got him," Irenez shouted from the hatch. "Go!" Han swiveled the ship around, throwing full power to the repulsorlifts and heading upward into one of the huge exit ducts overhead. There was a slight jolt as he cleared the magnetic seal on the end, and then they were out in clear air, screaming hard for space.

Four TIE fighters were skulking around just above the city, waiting for trouble. But they apparently weren't waiting for it to come this quickly. Luke got three of them on the fly, and Han took out the fourth.

"Nothing like cutting it close to the wire," Lando panted as he slid into the copilot's seat and got busy with his board. "What have we got?"

"Looks like a couple more drop ships coming in, Han told him, frowning. "What are you doing?"

"Running a multisensor airflow analysis," Lando said. "It'll show up any large irregularities on the hull. Like if someone's attached a homing beacon to us.

Han thought back to that escape from the first Death Star, and their near-disastrous flight to Yavin with just such a gadget smuggled aboard. "I wish I had a system like that for the Falcon."

"It'd never work," Lando commented dryly. "Your hull's so irregular already the system would go nuts just trying to map it." He keyed off the display. "Okay; we're clear."

"Great." Han threw a glance out to the left. "We're clear of those drop ships, too. They don't have a hope of catching us now.

"Yes, but that might," Irenez said, pointing at the midrange scope. Which showed an Imperial Star Destroyer behind them, already leaving orbit and moving into pursuit.

"Great," Han growled, kicking in the main drive. Using it this close to the ground wasn't going to do New Cov's plant life any good, but that was the least of his worries at the moment. "Luke?"

"I see it," Luke's voice came back through the comm speaker. "Any ideas besides running for it?"

"I think running for it sounds like a great idea," Han said. "Lando?"

"Calculating the jump now, the other said, busy with the nav computer. "It ought to be ready by the time we're far enough out."

"There's another ship coming up from below," Luke said. "Right out of the jungle."

"That's ours," Irenez said, peering over Han's shoulder. "You can parallel them by changing course to one twenty-six mark thirty." The Star Destroyer was picking up speed, the scope now showing a wedge of TIE fighters sweeping along ahead of it. "We'd do better to split up," Han said.

"No-stay with our ship," Irenez said. "Sena said we've got help coming."

Han took another look at the ship climbing for deep. A small transport, with a fair look of speed but not much else going for it. Another look at the approaching TIE fighters "They're going to be in range before we can make the jump," Lando murmured, echoing Han's thought.

"Yeah. Luke, you still there?"

"Yes. I think Lando's right."

"I know. Any way you can pull that Nkllon stunt again? You know-scramble the pilots' minds a little?"

There was a noticeable hesitation from the comm. "I don't think so," Luke said at last. "I-don't think it's good for me to do that sort of thing. You understand?"

Han didn't, really, but it probably didn't matter. For a moment he'd forgotten that he wasn't in the Falcon, with a pair of quad lasers and shields and heavy armor. The Lady Luck, for all Lando's modifications, wasn't anything to take on even confused TIE fighter pilots with. "All right, skip it," he told Luke. "Sena just better be right about this help of hers." The words were hardly out of his mouth when a flash of brilliant green light shot past the Lady Luck's cockpit canopy. "TIE fighters coming in from portside," Lando snapped.

"They're trying to cut us off," Luke said. "I'll get rid of them." Without waiting for comment, he dropped his X-wing below the Lady Luck's vector and with a roar of main drive swung off to the left toward the incoming TIE fighters. "Watch yourself," Han muttered after him, giving the rear scope another look. The pursuing batch of fighters was still closing fast. "Your ship got any weapons?" he asked Irenez.

"No, but it's got good armor and plenty of deflector power," she told him. "Maybe you should get ahead of them, let them take the brunt of the attack."

"Yeah, I'll think about it," Han said, wincing at the woman's ignorance of this kind of fight. TIE pilots didn't much care which ship was first in line when they attacked; and sitting close enough to another ship to hide in its deflector shield was to give up your maneuverability. Off to portside, the incoming group of TIE fighters scattered out of the way as Luke drove through their formation, wingtip lasers blazing away madly. A second wave of Imperials behind the first closed to intercept as Luke pulled a hard one-eighty and swung back on the tails of the first wave. Han held his breath; but even as he watched, the X-wing managed somehow to thread its way unscathed through the melee and take off at full throttle at an angle from the Lady Luck's vector, the whole squadron hot on his tail.

"Well, so much for that group," Irenez commented.

"And maybe for Luke, too," Lando countered harshly as he jabbed at the comm. "Luke, you all right?"

"I got a little singed, but everything's still running," Luke's voice came back. "I don't think I can get back to you.

"Don't try," Han told him. "As soon as you're clear, jump to lightspeed and get out of here."

"What about you?"

Luke's last word was partially drowned out by a sudden twitter from the comm. "That's the signal," Irenez said. "Here they come." Han frowned, searching the sky outside the front viewport. As far as he could see, there was nothing out there but stars And then, in perfect unison, three large ships suddenly dropped out of hyperspace into triangular formation directly ahead of them. Lando inhaled sharply. "Those are old Dreadnaught cruisers."

"That's our help," Irenez said. "Straight down the middle of the triangle-they'll cover for us."

"Right," Han gritted, shifting the Lady Luck's vector a few degrees, and trying to coax a little more speed out of its engines. The New Republic had a fair number of Dreadnaughts, and at six hundred meters long each they were impressive enough warships. But even three of them working together would be hard pressed to take out an Imperial Star Destroyer.

Apparently, the Dreadnaughts' commander agreed. Even as the Star Destroyer behind the Lady Luck opened up with its huge turbolaser batteries, the Dreadnaughts began pelting the larger ship with a furious barrage of ion cannon blasts, trying to temporarily knock out enough of its systems for them to get away.

"That answer your question?" Han asked Luke.

"I think so," Luke said dryly. "Okay, I'm gone. Where do I meet you?"

"You don't," Han told him. He didn't like that answer much, and he suspected Luke would like it even less. But it couldn't be helped. With a dozen TIE fighters currently between the Lady Luck and the X-wing, suggesting a rendezvous point on even what was supposed to be a secure comm channel would be an open invitation for the Empire to send their own reception committee on ahead. "Lando and I can handle the mission on our own," he added. "If we run into any problems, we'll contact you through Coruscant."

"All right," Luke said. Sure enough, he didn't sound happy about it. But he had enough sense to recognize there was no other safe way. "Take care, you two."

"See you," Han said, and cut the transmission.

"So now it's my mission, too, huh?" Lando growled from the copilot's seat, his tone a mixture of annoyance and resignation. "I knew it. I just knew it."

Sena's transport was into the triangular pocket between the Dreadnaughts now, still driving for all it was worth. Han kept the Lady Luck with them, staying as close above the transport's tail as he could without getting into its exhaust. "You got some particular place you'd like us to drop you?" he asked, looking back at Irenez.

She was gazing out the viewport at the underside of the Dreadnaught they were passing beneath. "Actually, our Commander was rather hoping you'd accompany us back to our base," she said.

Han threw a look at Lando. There had been something in her tone that implied the request was more than merely a suggestion. "And just how hard was your Commander hoping this?" Lando asked.

"Very much." She dropped her gaze from the Dreadnaught. "Don't misunderstand-it's not an order. But when I spoke to him, the Commander seemed extremely interested in meeting again with Captain Solo.

Han frowned. "Again?"

"Those were his words."

Han looked at Lando, found the other looking back at him. "Some old friend you've never mentioned?" Lando asked.

"I don't recall having any friends who own Dreadnaughts," Han countered. "What do you think?"

"I think I'm being nicely maneuvered into a corner here," Lando said, a little sourly. "Aside from that, whoever this Commander is, he seems to be in contact with your Bothan pals. If you're trying to find out what Fey'lya's up to, he'd be the one to ask."

Han thought it over. Lando was right, of course. On the other hand, the whole thing could just as easily be a trap, with this talk about old friends being designed to lure him in.

Still, with Irenez sitting behind him with a blaster riding her hip, there wasn't really a graceful way to get out of it if she and Sena chose to press the point. They might as well be polite about it. "Okay," he told Irenez. "What course do we set?"

"You don't," she said, nodding upward. Han followed her gaze. One of the three Dreadnaughts they'd passed had now swung around to fly parallel with them. Ahead, Sena's ship was heading up toward one of a pair of brightly lit docking ports. "Let me guess," he said to Irenez.

"Just relax and let us do the flying," she said, with the first hint of humor that he'd yet seen from her.

"Right," Han sighed.

And with the flashes of the rear guard battle still going on behind them, he eased the Lady Luck up toward the docking port. Luke, he reminded himself had apparently not sensed any treachery from Sena or her people back in the city.

But then, he hadn't sensed any deceit from the Bimms on Bimmisaari, either, just before that first Noghri attack.

This time the kid better be right.

The first Dreadnaught gave a flicker of pseudomotion and vanished into hyperspace, taking the transport and the Lady Luck with it. A few seconds later, the other two Dreadnaughts ceased their ion bombardment of the Star Destroyer and, through a hail of turbolaser blasts from still-operating Imperial batteries, made their own escape.

And Luke was alone. Except, of course, for the squadron of TIE

fighters still chasing him.

From behind him came an impatient and rather worried-sounding trill.

"Okay, Artoo, we're going," he assured the little droid. Reaching over, he pulled the hyperdrive lever; and the stars became starlines, and turned to mottled sky, and he and Artoo were safe.

Luke took a deep breath, let it out in a sigh. So that was it. Han and Lando were gone, to wherever Sena and her mysterious Commander had taken them, and there really wasn't any way for him to track them down. Until they surfaced again and got in touch with him, he was out of the mission.

But perhaps that was for the best.

There was another warble from behind, a questioning one this time.

"No, we're not going back to Coruscant, Artoo," he told the droid, an echo of déjà view tugging at him. "We're going to a little place called Jomark. To see a Jedi Master."

CHAPTER

9

The little fast-attack patrol ship had dropped out of hyperspace and closed to within a hundred kilometers of the Falcon before the ship's sensors even noticed its presence. By the time Leia got to the cockpit, the pilot had already made contact.

"Is that you, Khabarakh?" she called, slipping into the copilot's seat beside Chewbacca.

"Yes, Lady Vader," the Noghri's gravelly, catlike voice mewed. "I have come alone, as I promised. Are you also alone?"

"My companion Chewbacca is with me as pilot," she said. "As is a protocol droid. I would like to bring the droid along to help with translation, if I may. Chewbacca, as we agreed, will stay here." The Wookiee turned to her with a growl. "No," she said firmly, remembering just in time to mute the transmitter. "I'm sorry, but that was the promise I made to Khabarakh. You'll stay here on the Falcon and that's an order."

Chewbacca growled again, more insistently this time ... and with a sudden prickly sensation on the back of her neck, Leia became acutely aware of something she hadn't really thought about for years. Namely, that the Wookiee was quite capable of ignoring pretty much any order he chose to.

"I have to go alone, Chewie," she said in a low voice. Force of will wasn't going to work here; she was going to have to go for logic and reason.

"Don't you understand? That was the arrangement.

Chewbacca rumbled. "No," Leia shook her head. "My safety isn't a matter of strength anymore. My only chance is to convince the Noghri that I can be trusted. That when I make promises I keep them."

"The droid will pose no problem," Khabarakh decided. "I will bring my ship alongside for docking."

Leia switched the transmitter back on. "Fine," she said. "I also have one case of clothing and personal items to bring along, if I may. Plus a sensor/analyzer package, to test the air and soil for anything that might be dangerous to me."

"The air and soil where we shall be is safe."

"I believe you," Leia said. "But I am not responsible only for my own safety. I carry within me two new lives, and I must protect them." The comm speaker hissed. "Heirs of the Lord Vader?" Leia hesitated; but genetically, if not philosophically, it was true enough. "Yes.

Another hiss. "You may bring what you wish," he said. "I must, be allowed to scan them, though. Do you bring weapons?"

"I have my lightsaber," Leia said. "Are there any animals on your world dangerous enough for me to need a blaster?"

"Not anymore," Khabarakh said, his voice grim. "Your lightsaber, too, will be acceptable."

Chewbacca snarled something quietly vicious, his wickedly curved climbing claws sliding involuntarily in and out of their fingertip sheaths. He was, Leia realized abruptly, on the edge of losing control ... and perhaps of taking matters into those huge hands of his "What is the problem?" Khabarakh demanded. Leia's stomach tightened. Honesty, she reminded herself. "My pilot doesn't like the idea of me going off alone with you," she conceded. "He has a-well, you wouldn't understand."

"He is under a life debt to you?"

Leia blinked at the speaker. She hadn't expected Khabarakh to have ever heard of the Wookiee life debt, much less know anything about it. "Yes," she said. "The original life debt was to my husband, Han Solo. During the war Chewie extended it to include my brother and me."

"And now to the children you bear within you?" Leia looked at Chewbacca. "Yes."

For a long minute the comm was silent. The patrol ship continued toward them, and Leia found herself grip ping the seat arms tightly as she wondered what the Noghri was thinking. If he decided that Chewbacca's objections constituted betrayal of their arrangement...

"The Wookiee code of honor is similar to our own, Thabarakb said at last. "He may come with you."

Chewbacca gave a throaty rumble of surprise, a surprise that slid quickly into suspicion. "Would you rather he have said you had to stay here?" Leia countered, her own surprise at the Noghri's concession quickly covered up by relief that the whole thing bad been resolved so easily. "Come on, make up your mind."

The Wookiee rumbled again, but it was clear that he'd rather walk into a trap with her than let her walk into one alone. "Thank you, Khabarakh, we accept," Leia told the Noghri. "We'll be ready whenever you get here. How long will the trip to your world take, by the way?"

"Approximately four days," Khabarakh said. "I await the honor of your presence aboard my ship."

The comm went silent. Four days, Leia thought, a shiver running up her back. Four days in which to learn all that she could about both Khabarakh and the Noghri people.

And to prepare for the most important diplomatic mission of her life. As it turned out, she didn't learn much about the Noghri culture during the trip. Khabarakh kept largely to himself, splitting his time between the sealed cockpit and his cabin. Occasionally he would come by to talk to Leia, but the conversations were short and invariably left her with the uncomfortable feeling that he was still very ambivalent about his decision to bring her to his home. When they'd set up this meeting back on the Wookiee world of Kashyyyk, she had suggested that he discuss the question with friends or confidants; but as they neared the end of the voyage and his dark nervousness grew, she began to pick up little hints that he had not, in fact, done so. The decision had been made entirely on his own.

It was not, to her way of thinking, a very auspicious beginning. It implied either a lack of trust in his friends or else a desire to absolve them from responsibility should the whole thing go sour. Either way, not exactly the sort of situation that filled her with confidence.

With their host generally keeping to himself, she and Chewbacca were forced to come up with their own entertainment. For Chewbacca, with his innate mechanical interests, such entertainment consisted mainly of wandering through the ship and poking his nose into every room, access hatch, and crawlway he could find-studying the ship, as he ominously put it, in case they needed at some point to fly it themselves. Leia, for her part, spent most of the trip in her cabin with Threepio, trying to deduce a possible derivation of Mal'ary'ush, the only Noghri word she knew, with the hope of at least getting some idea of where in the galaxy they might be going. Unfortunately, with six million languages to draw on, Threepio could come up with any number of possible etymologies for the word, ranging from reasonable to tenuous to absurd and right back again. It was an interesting exercise in applied linguistics, but ultimately more frustrating than useful. In the middle of the fourth day, they reached the Noghri world ... and it was even worse than she'd expected.

"It's incredible," she breathed, a hard knot forming in her throat as she pressed close to Chewbacca to stare through the ship's only passenger viewport at the world they were rapidly approaching. Beneath the mottling of white clouds the planetary surface seemed to be a uniform brown, relieved only by the occasional deep blue of lakes and small oceans. No greens or yellows, no light purples or blues-none of the colors, in fact, that usually signified plant life. For all she could tell, the entire planet might have been dead. Chewbacca growled a reminder. "Yes, I know Khabarakh said it had been devastated in the war," she agreed soberly. "But I didn't realize he really meant the whole planet had been hit." She shook her head, feeling sick at heart. Wondering which side had been most responsible for this disaster. Most responsible. She swallowed hard at the reflexively defensive words. There was no most responsible here, and she knew it. Khabarakh's world had been destroyed during a battle in space ... and there had been only two sides to the war. Whatever had happened to turn this world into a desert, the Rebel Alliance could not avoid its share of the guilt. "No wonder the Emperor and Vader were able to turn them against us," she murmured. "We have to find some way to help them."

Chewbacca growled again, gestured out the viewport. The terminator line was coming up over the horizon now, a fuzzy strip of twilight between day and night; and there, fading through to the darkness beyond was what looked like an irregular patch of pale green. "I see it," Leia nodded. "You suppose that's all that's left?"

The Wookiee shrugged, offered the obvious suggestion. "Yes, I suppose that would be the simplest way to find out," Leia agreed. "I really don't know if I want to ask him, though. Let's wait until we're closer and can see more of-"

She felt Chewbacca go stiff beside her a split second before his bellow split the air and left her ears ringing. "What-?" And then she saw it, and her stomach knotted abruptly with shock. There, just coming over the curve of the planet, was an Imperial Star Destroyer.

They'd been betrayed.

"No," she breathed, staring out at the huge arrowhead shape. No mistake-it was a Star Destroyer, all right. "No. I can't believe Khabaralth would do this.

The last words were spoken to empty air; and with a second shock, she realized that Chewbacca was no longer beside her. Spinning around, she saw a flash of brown as he vanished down the corridor leading to the cockpit.

"No!" she shouted, pushing away from the bulkhead and taking off after him as fast as she could run. "Chewie, no!" The order was a waste of air, and she knew it. The Wookiee had murder in his heart, and he would get to Khabarakh even if he had to tear down the cockpit door with his bare hands.

The first clang sounded as she was halfway down the corridor; the second came as she rounded the slight curve and came within sight of the door. Chewbacca was raising his massive fists for a third blow When to Leia's amazement, the door slid open. Chewbacca seemed surprised, too, but he didn't dwell on it long. He was through the door before it was completely open, charging into the cockpit with a ululating Wookiee battle yell. "Chewie!" Leia shouted again, diving through herself.

Just in time to see Khabakakh, seated at the pilot's station, throw up his right arm and somehow send Chewbacca spinning past him to crash with a roar into the underside of the control board.

Leia skidded to a halt, not quite believing what she'd just seen.

"Khabarakh-"

"I did not call them," the Noghri said, half turning to face her. "I did not betray my word of honor."

Chewbacca thundered his disbelief as he fought to scramble to his feet in the cramped space. "You must stop him," Khabarakh shouted over the Wookiee's roar. "Must keep him quiet. I must give the recognition signal or all will be lost."

Leia looked past him at the distant Star Destroyer, her teeth clenched hard together. Betrayal...but if Thabaraich had planned a betrayal, why had he let Chewbacca come along? Whatever that fighting technique was he'd used to deflect Chewbacca's first mad rush, it wasn't likely to work a second time.

She focused again on Khabarakh's face; on those dark eyes, protruding jaw, and needle-sharp teeth. He was watching her, ignoring the threat of the enraged Wookiee behind him, his hand poised ready over the comm switch. A beep sounded from the board, and his hand twitched toward the switch before stopping again. The board beeped again-"I have not betrayed you, Lady Vader," Khabarakh repeated, a note of urgency in his voice. "You must believe me." Leia braced herself. "Chewie, be quiet," she said. "Chewie? Chewie, be quiet."

The Wookiee ignored the order Finally back on his feet, he roared his war cry again and lunged for Thabaraldi's throat. The Noghri took the charge head-on this time, grabbing Chewbacca's huge wrists in his wiry hands and holding on for all he was worth.

It wasn't enough. Slowly but steadily, Khabarakh's arms were bent steadily backwards as Chewbacca forced his way forward. "Chewie, I said stop," Leia tried again. "Use your head-if he was planning a trap, don't you think he'd have timed it for when we were asleep or something?" Chewbacca spit out a growl, his hands continuing their unwavering advance. "But if he doesn't check in, they'll know something's wrong," she countered. "That's a sure way to bring them down on us."

"The Lady Vader speaks truth," Khabarakh said, his voice taut with the strain of holding back Chewbacca's hands. "I have not betrayed you, but if I give no recognition signal you will be betrayed."

"He's right," Leia said. "If they come to investigate, we lose by default. Come on, Chewie, it's our only hope."

The Wookiee snarled again, shaking his head firmly. "Then you leave me no choice," Khabarakh said.

And without warning, the cockpit flashed with blue light, dropping Chewbacca to the floor like a huge sack of grain. "What-?" Leia gasped, dropping to her knees beside the motionless Wookiee.

"Khabakakh!"

"A stun weapon only," the Noghri said, breathing rapidly as he swiveled back to his board. "A built-in defense." Leia twisted her head to glare at him, furious at what he'd done ... a fury that faded reluctantly behind the logic of the situation. Chewbacca had been fully prepared to throttle the life out of Khabarakh; and from personal experience, she knew how hard it was to calm down an angry Wookiee, even when you were his friend to begin with.

And Khabarakh had tried talking first. "Now what?" she asked the Noghri, digging a hand through Chewbacca's thick torso hair to check his heartbeat. It was steady, which meant the stun weapon hadn't played any of its rare but potentially lethal tricks on the Wookiee's nervous system.

"Now be silent," Khabarakh said, tapping his comm switch and saying something in his own language. Another mewing Noghri voice replied, and for a few minutes they conversed together. Leia remained kneeling at Chewbacca's side, wishing she'd had time to bring Threepio up before the discussion started. It would have been nice to know what the conversation was all about. But finally it ended, and Khabarakh signed off. "We are safe now," be said, slumping a little in his seat. "They are persuaded it was an equipment malfunction."

"Let's hope so," Leia said.

Khabarakh looked at her, a strange expression on his nightmare face.

"I have not betrayed you, Lady Vader," he said quietly, his voice hard and yet oddly pleading. "You must believe me. I have promised to defend you, and I will. To my own death, if need be."

Leia stared at him ... and whether through some sensitivity of the Force or merely her own long diplomatic experience, she finally understood the position Khabarakh was now in. Whatever waverings or second thoughts he might have been feeling during the voyage, the Star Destroyer's unexpected appearance bad burned those uncertainties away. Khabarakh's word of honor had been brought into question and he was now in the position of having to conclusively prove that he had not broken that word.

And he would have to go to whatever lengths such proof demanded. Even if it killed him.

Earlier, Leia had wondered how Khabarakh could possibly understand the concept of the Wookees life debt. Perhaps the Noghri and Wookiee cultures were more alike than she'd realized.

"I believe you," she told him, climbing to her feet and sitting down in the copilot seat. Chewbacca she would have to leave where he was until he was awake enough to help her move him. "What now?" Khabarakh turned back to his board. "Now we must make a decision," he said. "My intention had been to bring you to ground in the city of Nystao, waiting until full dark to present you to my clan dynast. But that is now impossible. Our Imperial lord has come, and is holding a convocate of the dynasts."

The back of Leia's neck tingled. "Your Imperial lord is the Grand Admiral?" she asked carefully.

"Yes," Khabarakh said. "that is his flagship, the Chimaera. I remember the day that the Lord Darth Vader first brought him to us," he added, his mewing voice becoming reflective. "The Lord Vader told us that his duties against the Emperor's enemies would now be taking his full attention. That the Grand Admiral would henceforth be our lord and commander." He made a strange, almost purring sound deep in his chest. "There were many who were sad that day. The Lord Vader had been the only one save the Emperor who cared for Noghri well-being. He had given us hope and purpose." Leia grimaced. That purpose being to go off and die as death commandos at the Emperor's whim. But she couldn't say things like that to Khabarakh. Not yet, anyway. "Yes," she murmured. At her feet, Chewbacca twitched. "He will be fully awake soon," Khabarakh said. "I would not like to stun him again. Can you control him?"

"I think so," Leia said. They were coming in low toward the upper atmosphere now, on a course that would take them directly beneath the orbiting Star Destroyer. "I hope they don't decide to do a sensor focus on us," she murmured. "If they pick up three life-forms here, you're going to have a lot of explaining to do."

"The ship's static-damping should prevent that," Khabarakh assured her. "It is at full power."

Leia frowned. "Aren't they likely to wonder about that?"

"No. I explained it was part of the same malfunction that caused the transmitter problem."

There was a low rumble from Chewbacca, and Leia looked down to see the Wookiee's eyes glaring impotently up at her. Fully alert again, but without enough motor control yet to do anything. "We've cleared outer control," she told him. "We're heading down to-where are we going, Khabarakh?" The Noghri took a deep breath, let it out in an odd sort of whistle.

"We will go to my home, a small village near the edge of the Clean Land. I will hide you there until our lord the Grand Admiral leaves." Leia thought about that. A small village situated off the mainstream of Noghri life ought to be safely out of the way of wandering Imperials. On the other hand, if it was anything like the small villages she'd known, her presence there would be common knowledge an hour after they put down. "Can you trust the other villagers to keep quiet?"

"Do not worry," Khabarakh said. "I will keep you safe." But he hesitated before he said it...and as they headed into the atmosphere, Leia noted uneasily that he hadn't really answered the question. The dynast bowed one last time and stepped back to the line of those awaiting their turn to pay homage to their leader. Thrawn, seated in the gleaming High Seat of the Common Room of Honoghr, nodded gravely to the departing clan leader and motioned to the next. The other stepped forward, moving in the formalized dance that seemed to indicate respect, and bowed his forehead to the ground before the Grand Admiral.

Standing two meters to Thrawn's right and a little behind him, Pellaeon shifted his weight imperceptibly between feet, stifled a yawn, and wondered when this ritual would be over. He'd been under the impression they'd come to Honoghr to try to inspire the commando teams, but so far the only Noghri they'd seen had been ceremonial guards and this small but excessively boring collection of clan leaders. Thrawn presumably had his reasons for wading through the ritual, but Pellaeon wished it would hurry up and be over. With a galaxy still to win back for the Empire, sitting here listening to a group of grayskinned aliens drone on about their loyalty seemed a ridiculous waste of time.

There was a touch of air on the back of his neck.

"Captain?" someone said quietly in his ear-Lieutenant Tschel, he tentatively identified the voice. "Excuse me, sir, but Grand Admiral Thrawn asked to be informed immediately if anything out of the ordinary happened." Pellaeon nodded slightly, glad of any interruption. "What is it?"

"It doesn't seem dangerous, sir, or even very important," Tschel said. "A Noghri commando ship on its way in almost didn't give the recognition response in time."

"Equipment trouble, probably," Pellaeon said.

"That's what the pilot said," Tschel told him. "The odd thing is that he begged off putting down at the Nystao landing area. You'd think that someone with equipment problems would want his ship looked at immediately."

"A bad transmitter isn't exactly a crisis-level problem," Pellaeon grunted. But Tschel had a point; and Nystao was the only place on Honoghr with qualified spaceship repair facilities. "We have an ID on the pilot?"

"Yes, sir. His name's Khabarakh, clan Kihm'bar. I pulled up what we have on him," he added, offering Pellaeon a data pad. Surreptitiously, Pellaeon took it, wondering what he should do now. Thrawn had indeed left instructions that he was to be notified of any unusual activity anywhere in the system. But to interrupt the ceremony for something so trivial didn't seem like a good idea.

As usual, Thrawn was one step ahead of him. Lifting a hand, he stopped the Noghri clan dynast's presentation and turned his glowing red eyes on Pellaeon. "You have something to report, Captain?"

"A small anomaly only, sir," Pellaeon told him, steeling himself and stepping to the Grand Admiral's side. "An incoming commando ship was slow to transmit its recognition signal, and then declined to put down at the Nystao landing area. Probably just an equipment problem."

"Probably," Thrawn agreed. "Was the ship scanned for evidence of malfunction?"

"Ah ..." Pellaeon checked the data pad. "The scan was inconclusive," he told the other. "The ship's static-damping was strong enough to block-"

"The incoming ship was static-damped?" Thrawn interrupted, looking sharply up at Pellaeon.

"Yes, sir.

Wordlessly, Thrawn held up a hand. Pellaeon gave him the data pad, and for a moment the Grand Admiral frowned down at it, skimming the report.

"Khabarakh; clan Kihm'bar," he murmured to himself.

"Interesting." He looked up at Pellaeon again. "Where did the ship go?"

Pellaeon looked in turn at Tschel. "According to the last report, it was headed south," the lieutenant said. "It might still be in range of our tractor beams, sir.

Pellaeon turned back to Thrawn. "Shall we try to stop it, Admiral?" with Thrawn looked down at the data pad, his face tight concentration. "No," he said at last. "Let it land, but track it. And order a tech team from the Chimaera to meet us at the ship's final destination." His eyes searched the line of Noghri dynasts, came to rest on one of them. "Dynast Ir'khaim, clan Kihm'bar, step forward."

The Noghri did so. "What is your wish, my lord?" he mewed.

"One of your people has come home," Thrawn said. "We go to his village to welcome him."

Ir'khaim bowed. "At my lord's request." Thrawn stood up. "Order the shuttle to be prepared, Captain," he told Pellaeon. "We leave at once.

"Yes, sir," Pellaeon said, nodding the order on to Lieutenant Thchel.

"Wouldn't it be easier, sir. to have the ship and pilot brought here to us?"

"Easier, perhaps," Thrawn acknowledged, "but possibly not as illuminating. You obviously didn't recognize the pilot's name; but Khabarakh, clan Kihm'bar, was once part of commando team twenty-two. Does that jog any memories?"

Pellaeon felt his stomach tighten. "That was the team that went after Leia Organa Solo on Kashyyyk."

"And of which team only Khabarakh still survives," Thrawn nodded. "I think it might be instructive to hear from him the details of that failed mission. And to find out why it's taken him this long to return home." Thrawn's eyes glittered. "And to find out," he added quietly, "just why he's trying so hard to avoid us."