Star Wars - Crystal Star

by The Crystal Star (by Vonda McIntyre)

  "Master Hanffwas Threepio said. "Are you hungry? I've prepared a light brunch. if we can rouse Master Luke." "I.was hungry," Han said. "Till I took a look at those flowers. Space the decoration, will you?" "But sir, they are quite intriguing--" "They're the ugliest damned things I've seen since @oe-trago." He sat down. "And they smell!" "They are flowers, sir," Threepio said in a pained voice. "They are supposed to smell.

  It was only my intent to bring some cheer into the room, and if I may say so, I had to bear our host's wrath to obtain them." Oh, fine, Han thought, but did not say aloud, another charge added to our bill.

  Han went to the terrace door. "Luke!

  Breakfast." Han sat at the table and opened his unappetizing ration pack. When's the last time I replaced this stuff? he thought. He glanced at the date on the package and winced.

  "Threepio, why didn't you bring some of the real food from the Falcon?" "Because, Master Han, it was no longer fresh." "Neither is this." "Of course not, sir. It is preserved." "This is ridiculous. I'll order us a decent meal." "That is impossible, sir. Our host, the lodge-keeper, insists that we pay as we go." Han sighed and resigned himself to a terrible, if sustaining, breakfast.

  "Hey, Lukeffwas Outside on the terrace, Luke rose slowly to his feet.

  I can go out to the Falcon myself, Han thought, and get whatever's left over in the galley. It might not be right out of the garden, but it'll be better than this.

  Luke's shadows fell across the table, shivering, darkening.

  "Sit down--" Han saw Luke's face.

  "What's the matter?" "Leave you alone for a bit? A bit?" "Huh? What are you talking about?" Han asked, baffled by Luke's tone. "Oh--y mean what Xaverri asked you? Did you want to talk some more? Sorry, I fell asleep." "And she didn't leave till this morning," Luke said with a dangerous edge in his voice.

  "No, she--wait a minute. What are you suggesting?" "Suggesting doesn't have anything to do with it." "Now look, kid--" "Don't call me "kid"'ffwas Luke's hand slipped beneath his robe, where he carried his lightsaber.

  "What the hell's the matter with you?" Han asked, poised halfway between laughing and losing his temper. "What are you going to do? Chop me into little pieces because I spent a few hours alone with an old friend?" He had not intended to sound defensive, but that was the way it came out. It offended him that Luke felt the need to chastise him for his behavior. It insulted him that Luke felt the need to remind Han of his vows to Leia.

  "I don't know what I'm going to do," Luke said.

  "Apologize. That would be a good start." Luke glared, without replying.

  "If you don't trust me," Han said angrily, "if you don't think Leia should trust me, why'd you come with me--or is that why you came with me?" The ration pack crushed between Han's fingers, littering the carpet with protein crumbs.

  "I'm going out," Luke said. "To try to cool down." He headed for the door. "And I hope I don't run into your "old friend"' while I'm at it." Threepio watched them, standing stock-st.

  "Leave Xaverri out of this!" Han said. "This doesn't have anything to do with her--" Luke laughed bitterly. his--x has to do with your opinion of me. Which obviously isn't nearly as high as I thought it was." "I can't talk to you right now," Luke said. The door opened for him. "I won't talk to you right now." He plunged through the doorway, jerking the door closed behind him. But it refused to slam; it shut silently.

  Han flung the crumpled ration pack on the floor among the protein crumbs.

  "Blockheaded, arrogant, Jedi--Jedi kid!" "Master Hanffwas Threepio said.

  "What in the world--?" "It's too complicated to explain," Han said, as he left Luke's room.

  "Did Master Luke not like his breakfast?" Threepio asked plaintively.

  Chapter 9

  Alderaan streaked through hyperspace.

  Lelila the bounty hunter sat in the cockpit, letting the fireworks display of hyperspace light lull her toward hypnotic sleep.

  It did not help. Hyperspace remained empty of any perceptible trail. Lelila sighed.

  Geyyahab her copilot joined her, and let himself collapse in the navigator's seat. The bandage on his leg displayed no warning sign of infection. Though the wound obviously pained him, he as obviously preferred to pretend he was all right. Lelila made no comment about it.

  "You're a very handsome color," she said, admiring his black and silver striped fur, with the hint of chestnut beneath.

  He touched the streaked brown hair hanging down before her face; he made a questioning sound, and looped a green strand around his finger.

  "No," she said, "it's boring, is what mine is. But the color will do for the moment." Her starship fell out of hyperspace and powered toward Chalcedon. Lelila transmitted a reservation to the landing field at their destination. The artificial-intelligence scheduler accepted her message.

  Leia gazed at the planet and several expanded displays. It was rocky, all right. Several great volcanic peaks rose from the flanks of the world, deforming the sphere. It was hard to imagine how the planet maintained a steady rotation.

  The world had an atmosphere that was barely, marginally breathable, thanks to the continuing volcanic activity. It had some weather, mostly dry violent storms, and erosion. It had some water.

  But it had no indigenous life. Here and there, scattered across the surface of the world, as far from the tremendous volcanic peaks as they could be, a few blue and green blots blemished the surface: two struggling colonies, and a way station.

  "Why would anyone want to live here?" Lelila said.

  Geyyahab did not try to answer her rhetorical question. He strapped himself in and impatiently motioned to Lelila to do the same.

  She complied, while she checked with Artoo-Detoo that Rillao, too, was safely secured in the medical couch.

  Her ship landed, a graceful fish settling to the scoured bottom of a river. The landing field was solid stone, blackened by spaceship exhaust.

  No dust scattered from the jets' exhaust. A few other ships stood on the field.

  Lelila jumped up when she heard Rlllao.

  She hurried to join her. The Firrerreo had wrapped the sheet around her. She walked slowly, carefully. She had gathered her long striped hair and braided the ends together into a loose clump at the back of her neck. Her wounds had healed, leaving silver scars on her tawny skin.

  "Do you have clothing?" she said to Lelila.

  Lelila blushed, embarrassed not to have offered her any.

  "Your unnamed friend--" "No friend of mine," Rillao snarled. his--didn't wear any, I thought your people don't--" "Nobody wears clothes in suspended animation," Rillao said. "Even if the Imperial overseers who put you to sleep leave you with any to wear." Lelila took Rillao into her cabin and dug through the closet. Most of the clothing was out of the question; some would simply look ridiculous. Rillao was considerably taller than Lelila. Finally she found a splendid long green silk robe, meant as a lounging outfit. The fabric was heavy enough to be worn outdoors.

  "Would this do?" "It will suffice," Rillao said. She shoved her long arms into the sleeves and unrolled the deep cuffso to their longest length, tied the sash twice around her waist, and kilted up the skirts of the robe between her legs to form makeshift pantaloons. She tucked the ends of the robe in the sash. "Better," she said. "Let's go." Geyyahab waited for them at the hatch.

  "Please stay and guard the ship," Lelila said to him.

  He growled in refusal.

  "Someone's got to stay," Lelila said.

  "No, not me, I'm the only one who hasn't been knocked around." She felt the need to keep the Wookiee hidden as much as possible.

  Why do you want to hide Geyyahab?

  Lelila the bounty hunter asked herself. So what if anyone sees him? He's just another brindled Wookiee.

  She shook her head, fighting off a wave of confusion.

  "Please," she said to him again.

  He sighed loudly and scuffed down the corridor to the cockpit.

  As Lelila and Rillao climbed down fr
om the ship, the ground quaked and rolled beneath them.

  Lelila gasped and grabbed the edge of the hatch for support.

  "Earthquake," Rillao said. "They're common here." With the ground still shivering, she set off. Lelila hurried after her.

  Soon they both slowed, for the air was thin and it had a bite. The volcanic trace gases hurt when Lelila drew them too deeply into her lungs. Rillao slowed to match Lelila's pace.

  "That droid is following us," Rillao said.

  Leia glanced back. A hundred paces behind, the little droid rolled toward them, making up the distance, beeping.

  "That's all right," Lelila said. "The galley stores are low. We can buy food and some more medical supplies. The droid can take them back to the ship." The quiet of the landing field gave way to the spaceport bazaar. The noise of sellers and a small flute band roiled and tweeted around Lelila.

  "What an impressive bazaar," Lelila said dryly.

  Rillao snorted. "We aren't here for the bazaar," she said. She strode on, but, like Lelila, she soon had to slow down. She coughed. "Foul air," she said.

  Several sellers offered their wares--fruit pockmarked with the acrid volcanic chemicals, vases and goblets and ornaments blown from local volcanic glass.

  "Looks like mud," Rillao said.

  A troop of Twi'leks danced in the shadows of the bazaar wall. Swinging their prehensile head-tentacles, they cavorted around Lelila and Rillao. One plucked a small harp, while another whisked the air above Lelila's head with a fan of insect wings. The wings traced pastel patterns, shedding glittery scales that stuck to Lelila's skin and caught in her hair to shimmer before her eyes. Rillao, too, glowed in the sunlight with a dusting of iridescent wing-scales. The dancers spiraled in toward them, circling closer till Lelila grew tense and angry.

  At the edge of the bazaar, the dance troop left them as suddenly as it had appeared: the spiral dance reversed and widened, and the troop disappeared between a canvas tent and a portable geodesic dome.

  Lelila followed Rillao into the cobblestone streets of the town proper. The buildings hugged the ground, low dwellings of black stone blocks, worked so carefully they fit without mortar.

  With every step, Lelila wanted to stop and demand that Rillao tell her where they were going, who they were looking for. But she suspected that asking for more explanations would cause her to lose face in Rillao's eyes. She walked in silence, driven by desperation that she forced to the back of her mind.

  The cobblestones gave way to rough glass brick. In this part of town even the houses were built of glass, the muddy native volcanic glass. The surrounding walls rose twice Rillao's height, a forbidding barrier.

  Lelila wondered if the volcanic glass could be made transparent enough to look through. So far she had not seen a single window.

  Rillao stopped in the spun-glass arch of a recessed doorway. The glass strands looked like streams of dirty water. A pattern of parallel glass rods decorated the door.

  Artoo-Detoo caught up to them and pushed into the recess beside them, crowding the space.

  Why don't they welcome us? Lelila asked herself. Then she thought, Who do you think you are, some princess who's welcome anywhere she cares to go?

  Rillao drew her fingertips across the glass rods. Each one hummed a different note. The crystalline music shimmered around them. A moment later the door swung open.

  The glass wall surrounded a huge shallow pool filled with polished agate gravel. Water flowed over the bright agates, sparkling and trickling like music. Cobbled paths twisted across the pool-bed, and above, a strange webwork of thick glass fibers--glass so clear and colorless that it disappeared at certain angles --rose from the pools, lifting into delicate peaks.

  The ground shivered gently. The glass webworks quivered and hummed.

  Several beings draped their boneless bodies and prehensile trunks across the webworks, lounging in the glass framework. A number of other, similar beings moved leisurely in the pools, splashing the shallow water on their skins or burrowing down into the agates till only their eyes and trunk-ends showed.

  One raised a radial trunk (it had five) and sprayed water high in the air. The sun glanced off the droplets and created a rainbow.

  One of the beings lounging on the web shook the spray off its skin and hooted in protest through two of its trunks.

  Rillao led Lelila and Artoo-Detoo past the ponds and between the supporting struts of the webwork.

  The person who lives here must be very rich, Lelila thought, to be so profligate with water on a world that's mostly bare volcanic plain. And the person must be very brave, to build so high, with glass, in an earthquake zone.

  The noon sun beat down through the webwork, surrounding Lelila with ethereal shadows and flecks of spectral color.

  "These people look nothing like the people in the bazaar," Lelila whispered to Rillao. Beyond that, they were a species of being with whom she was entirely unfamiliar.

  "Of course not," Rillao growled in an undertone. "No one is native to this world. Those were the peasants and traders. These are the bureaucrats." They followed a winding cobbled path, walking carefully on the slick places where water had splashed. No one spoke to them or took any more notice of them than they took of the ground tremors. Several of the beings pushed the agate gravel into new patterns, new contours.

  Artoo-Detoo bumped along behind, hooting in disgust at the design each time he had to navigate an acute angle of the pathway.

  Lelila and Rillao reached the center of the agate pool, directly beneath the highest point of the glass webwork.

  In a small deep agate nest, one of the boneless beings shifted back and forth. Water sloshed peacefully to its rhythm. Only two of its prehensile trunks projected, one high and taking in air, the other low and exhaling, occasionally dipping beneath the surface to blow bubbles.

  Rillao sat on her heels beside the agate nest, and waited.

  Powerfully disinclined to sit and wait, Lelila remained standing, gazing around curiously at the unfamiliar courtyard. She bent down and reached for one of the polished agates.

  Rillao grabbed her hand. The Firrerreo's scarred fingers clamped down with surprising force.

  "Have you no manners?" she whispered. "Sit down and be quiet and keep control of your eyes-- and your hands!" "Let go!" Lelila jerked her hand away.

  Rillao's nails scratched her skin.

  "Ouch!" One of the scratches cut deep enough to bleed. Lelila brought her hand to her mouth. She wondered if Rillao's nails contained venom or allergen. She thought, I'm a bounty hunter, where would I learn manners, and why should I be punished for not knowing any?

  "Your eyes, and your hands--and your voice!" Rillao said.

  All right, Lelila thought, I'm a bounty hunter, I can sit quiet and wait if I have to.

  She glared at Rillao, who gave no sign that she owed Lelila either explanation or apology. Lelila sat crosslegged and let her hair spread around her. The ends fanned out on the cobbles.

  I can still see, she thought with satisfaction, but now no one can tell where my eyes are looking.

  No one can tell where my eyes are.

  So she sat beside Rillao and watched the boneless beings lounge and spout and push agates into new swirls and patterns. Every so often she glanced at the being in the central pool. It breathed and blew bubbles and occasionally caressed an agate or two with its prehensile limbs.

  Rillao balanced on her toes, her forearms relaxed on top of her knees. Her eyes were closed. Lelila thought, This is hardly the time or place for a nap!

  She felt agitated. Anger and impatience trickled across her like the water in the agate pool. Beneath the surface, despair lurked.

  Don't get so involved in your prey, she said to herself. You're a bounty hunter, if this one gets away you'll always have another case to go after. Above all, you must stay calm.

  A spark of light ignited at the back of her mind. She came to full awareness, full attention, thinking, I'm here, who's calling for me-- T
he being burst upward, all its tentacles extended and twisting, and landed with a great gush of water. The fountain erupted from the agate pool and splashed Lelila from the top of her head to the ends of her hair.

  With a shout of surprise, Lelila pushed herself back from the edge of the path. Her hair was so thick that it had protected her clothing from being drenched.

  The spark of light vanished, forgotten.

  The wave soaked the path. Water flowed around her. She jumped up and sat on her heels like Rillao, out of the wet.

  Artoo-Detoo squealed and rolled backward and rotated its carapace back and forth, shaking off the water like a dog. Lelila grabbed the droid as its back wheels touched the edge of the path. It rolled a handsbreadth forward, no closer, and settled stolidly on the cobbles.