Sacrifice

declared himself Mandalore while Fett was gone, and probably found a lot of support among the clans, but he hadn't; he'd gone on shoveling dung and running his farm. He was happy with his life as it was. The galaxy would have worked better with a few more Beviins around.

"Okay," Fett said. "Amaze me."

Beviin beckoned and trudged through the mud toward the farm buildings. The fine drizzle was turning into rain, and the land looked bare—not in the ruined sense of the postwar devastation that blighted so much of the planet, but as if it had settled down to sleep for the coming winter. Despite the derivation of the Fett surname—derived from the word for "farmer" —and his father's childhood on his parents' Concord Dawn farm, Fett knew nothing about agriculture. He wished he could learn, sometimes, to better understand who his father had once been.

"Mirta behaving herself?" Beviin didn't look back over his shoulder. "Well, at least she hasn't tried to kill you again. It's a good sign. Kids can be such a handful."

Fett felt the mud suck at his boots. "She's a useful pair of fists in a fight."

"She'll produce wonderfully ferocious great-grandchildren for you, Bob'ika." Beviin paused a few beats. Fett tried to take in the phrase great- grandchildren, and it left him stranded. "So whatever it was you went to do ended in a fight, did it?"

"Just had to ask questions emphatically"

"You going to tell me about it?"

It seemed as good a time as any, and Fett didn't see the point of sugarcoating it. "I'm terminally ill. Two years, tops. Eight, nine months if I carry on like this."

Beviin still didn't turn around. He walked on for a few more meters, head lowered against the rain, and then stopped in his tracks and finally faced Fett. He looked genuinely upset. Fett couldn't recall anyone being upset for