Tempest: Star Wars (Legacy of the Force) (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force)

by Troy Denning

  “I think you’re getting yourself shot up again for no reason.” Leia laid her lightsaber in her lap, then ordered, “Sit down and keep her covered until the Noghri get here.”

  Han dropped into the navigator’s seat. “What do you mean, no reason?” A cloud of gray smoke was hanging over the control board, rising from half a dozen holes that Morwan had shot through the durasteel. “She was going to kill me!”

  “I don’t think so,” Leia said. “She wouldn’t have had any reason.”

  Han noticed they were still headed toward the battle. “Don’t tell me you were going to send that message!”

  “Actually, I still am,” Leia said.

  Even Morwan was surprised. “You are?” Her voice was muffled and nasal. “Why?”

  “Never mind,” Leia said. She cocked her head, looking into the canopy reflection, then raised her voice so it projected down the access corridor. “It’s okay, Cakhmaim. We have things under control.”

  She had barely spoken before Cakhmaim and Meewalh rushed onto the flight deck, Cakhmaim holding a deadly fighting sickle and Meewalh a capture net. When they saw Han sitting in the navigator’s seat with the blaster and Morwan hunched over with her head in her hands, their saurian faces looked almost disappointed.

  “It’s okay, guys—you get to lock her up.” Han motioned for them to take her away. “And use the stun cuffs.”

  “After you see to her nose,” Leia added. “We don’t want her choking to death on her own blood.”

  Han looked down at the furrows charred across his wounded palm. “Speak for yourself.”

  “Han!”

  Han shrugged. “You’re the one who’s always telling me to be honest about my feelings.” He waited until the Noghri had taken Morwan away, then asked, “You’re not serious about that message, are you?”

  “I am—and we need to do it now.” Leia nodded at the tactical display, which showed Tenel Ka’s formations starting to fall back in preparation for a ship-to-ship free-for-all. “Open a channel.”

  Han studied his display, trying to see what Leia was talking about. Unfortunately, he was distracted by an irregular pattern of flickering and blinking.

  “Blasted woman!” he said. “She hit something in the control panel.”

  “Which is all the more reason to send the message now, Han,” Leia said. “Tenel Ka can’t let this battle degenerate into a ship melee, or the Alliance won’t be able to spring its trap.”

  “Trap?”

  Something popped in the control panel, and smoke began to pour out of a hole in front of the copilot’s station. Han cursed and, ignoring all the blood Morwan’s broken nose had sprayed everywhere, slipped into the copilot’s seat. The tactical display there was no better than the one at the navigator’s station, but he could see clearly enough to tell it did not show any Alliance fleets.

  “I don’t see a trap.”

  Leia fell silent for a time, then said, “Listen, Han, if you can’t do this, just say so.”

  Now Han was growing really confused. “Do what?”

  “It’s okay,” Leia said. “I’ll understand.”

  “Good,” Han answered. “That makes one of us.”

  Leia dropped her chin and glanced over, giving him one of her patented I-know-you’re-lying looks.

  “Leia, what are you talking about?”

  “Once you send the message, we both know our names will be Hutt slime in Corellia,” Leia said. “Gejjen will know we were working against them here, and you’ll be branded a traitor.”

  Leia’s words hit Han hard, up near the heart, and he realized she was right. If they helped Tenel Ka now, it could only be in the open, and the Corellian High Command—Wedge, Gejjen, all of them—would know he had chosen Hapes over his homeworld.

  But how could Han not choose Tenel Ka? Corellia was in the wrong here, trying to assassinate a sovereign leader and expand the war just to win a more favorable negotiating position—trying to plunge sixty-three worlds into a civil war that would make the Corellian conflict with the Alliance look like a spitball fight.

  “Leia, my reputation doesn’t matter,” he said. “My conscience does.”

  Leia smiled in relief. “I’m so glad,” she said. “That’s what I thought, but I didn’t want to make the decision for you.”

  “Great, I appreciate that,” Han said. “But I still don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.”

  “I told you I had a feeling,” Leia said. “And then you made a grab for Morwan’s blaster.”

  Han frowned, remembering that Leia had said something about a feeling. “Oh, that kind of feeling. Why didn’t you tell me that’s what you meant?”

  Leia rolled her eyes. “What could I say? Trust me?”

  “I guess not,” Han admitted. He felt a little foolish for missing the hint, but he couldn’t be expected to read Leia’s mind all the time—after all, he wasn’t the Jedi. “But look, I can’t just open a channel to Tenel Ka and say, Hang tight, kid—the Solos are on their way. What kind of trap did you sense?”

  Leia shook her head. “I don’t know exactly. Back at the comet, I sensed someone watching us.”

  Han remembered Leia’s distant expression, when he thought she was trying to warn Tenel Ka. “A Jedi?”

  Leia nodded. “I think it was Tesar, but he wasn’t sure about me and closed down pretty fast.”

  Han frowned in concentration. “And since you felt Jaina watching us back at the Kirises—”

  “Exactly,” Leia said. “Chances are that whoever was watching the Kiris fleet there—”

  “—followed it here.”

  Han switched the comm unit to the hailing channel, which they would need to use since they didn’t have the codes or frequencies for Tenel Ka’s fleet. Another streamer of smoke began to rise from the shield array panel, and when he tried to adjust the glides, the readout did not change.

  “Uh, before I send this message, maybe you’d better put yourself into a Jedi flying trance or something.”

  “Han, I’ll be open to the Force,” Leia said. “But there really is no such thing as a Jedi flying trance.”

  “Too bad—because I think our shields are stuck.” Han looked over at Leia and blew her a kiss, then activated his microphone and began to broadcast on the general hailing channel. “This is a message for Queen Mother Tenel Ka from Han Solo. Listen up, kid—I’ve got something important to tell you …”

  chapter twenty-one

  Outside the viewport of the depot cantina hung a glorious aurora, a luminous explosion of green and violet and scarlet fanning across the face of the Transitory Mists from the direction of the star Roqoo. The spectacle was a testament to the vast sweep of the mists and the ferocious power of a blue giant’s solar wind, but today Mara found it more eerie than awe inspiring. Today its dancing beauty was only the barrier that prevented her and Luke from making comm contact with their son.

  Mara turned away from the viewport and looked across the table, where Luke sat nursing his third hot chocolate of the afternoon. “We might as well face it. Ben’s not coming.”

  Luke continued to gaze out at the shimmering curtain of light.

  “He’s way overdue,” Mara continued. “And when I reach out to him in the Force, he doesn’t feel anywhere near here. Either Jacen didn’t send the rendezvous message, or Ben didn’t get it. But something went wrong.”

  Luke nodded and took another sip from his mug. “And something wrong is coming,” he added. “Don’t you feel it?”

  Now that Luke had mentioned it, Mara could feel something. It wasn’t much—just a faint prickle easily mistaken for a chill—but it was there.

  Mara turned back to the viewport, but this time she studied the reflections in its corners instead of the aurora outside. Most of the customers she could see in the murky cantina were good-looking humans—typical Hapans—and without exception they seemed more interested in their meals or the Falleen glimmik singer on stage than in the Skywalkers. The nonhumans—a
dozen blue-skinned Duros, some anvil-headed Arcona, and a couple of Mon Calamari—seemed transfixed by the aurora beyond the viewport. And the Twi’lek family who ran the place was being kept far too busy to pay attention to anyone not ordering something.

  Mara looked back to Luke. “You think Jacen set us up?”

  “I do.” Luke’s voice was steady, but their Force-bond was permeated by sadness—and by a sense of bewilderment and failure. “If Tenel Ka hadn’t verified it, I wouldn’t even believe he had sent Ben to find Jaina and Zekk.”

  Mara sighed. “I have to admit, I’m beginning to feel a bit like a fool for placing my faith in Jacen.”

  “Don’t,” Luke said. “We both trusted him—and I’m still not sure we were wrong. Jacen helped Ben overcome his fear of the Force. We can’t forget that.”

  “How could I?” Mara asked. “But if he has set us up—if he’s leading Ben into the dark side—”

  “Now who’s leaping to conclusions?” Luke leaned across the table and took her hands. In a low voice, he added, “Look, even if Jacen is working with Lumiya, I don’t think it’s been for long. And it doesn’t mean he’s becoming a Sith.”

  “It doesn’t mean he isn’t,” Mara countered. “We can’t know what’s going on between him and Lumiya.”

  “I know Jacen,” Luke said quickly. “Whatever he’s doing, it’s because he thinks it’s right for the galaxy. Once he realizes he’s mistaken, he’ll be easy to bring back.”

  Mara considered this, trying to recall when she had ever seen Jacen do anything selfish, trying to think of anything—even after assuming command of GAG—that Jacen had done out of self-interest rather than for the good of the state.

  After a few moments, she nodded. Her fear for Ben—and her anger at feeling deceived by Jacen—were beginning to affect her judgment.

  “You’re right,” she said. “But we’d better work fast. Jacen is too powerful already, and if Lumiya has her hooks in him, it won’t be long before he reaches the point of no return. We can’t let that happen, Luke. We can’t let him drag the galaxy down with him.”

  “We won’t,” Luke assured her. “We stopped Raynar, didn’t we?”

  “You’re not inspiring much confidence,” Mara said. After crash-landing near a nest of Killiks, Raynar Thul had joined their culture, eventually rising to become the leader of a powerful insect civilization. Under his guidance, the Colony had expanded to the edges of the Chiss Ascendancy, provoking a border war that Luke had averted only by capturing Raynar in personal combat. “Look how well that worked out. He’s been locked in the Temple basement for how long?”

  “Raynar is making progress,” Luke said defensively. “He’s accepted a prosthetic arm and is considering cosmetic surgery to repair the burn scars.”

  “That should come in handy when he escapes,” Mara said. “He won’t scare so many little children on the way to the undercity.”

  Luke frowned at her sarcasm. “The surgery will help Raynar see himself differently,” he said. “Cilghal says that will be a big step in his recovery.”

  “Okay—so maybe he’ll be cured in another two or three years.” Mara rose and hiked up her equipment belt, which tended to slip down on her hips now that she was carrying the extra weight of the shoto she had built in anticipation of meeting Lumiya. “Let’s catch up with the Anakin and stick close to Jacen. Ben will show up there sooner or later.”

  “If he hasn’t already.”

  Luke rose and started toward the door, and suddenly the uneasy prickle he had been feeling blossomed into full-blown danger sense. He glanced around the room, trying to locate the source of the threat. He felt nothing menacing from the other patrons, but that didn’t stop him from pulling his lightsaber off his belt as casually as possible.

  Mara already had her weapon in her hand, though, like Luke, she held it down at her side to avoid sparking a panic. “You feel it, too?”

  “Let’s go,” Luke said. He weaved through the crowd toward the nearest exit hatch, and Mara stayed close on his heels. If they allowed a fight to start in here, a lot of innocent beings would suffer.

  They were a few paces from the exit when a hunched figure appeared in the bare durasteel corridor outside the cantina, hobbling out of an intersection about six meters up the way. She was wearing a bulky black cloak with the hood pulled up, and she was being careful to keep her face turned away from the ceiling lights.

  Luke had just enough time to realize that he did not feel her presence in the Force before she brought her arm forward and sent a silver tube tumbling down the gray corridor toward him. A set of flashing diodes midway down its length confirmed the cylinder’s nature. He raised his arm and used the Force to hurl the tube back up the corridor.

  “Grenade!” he yelled.

  The grenade was almost back to the intersection when the corridor erupted into silver brilliance. A tremendous bang shook the cantina, and Luke found himself tumbling backward over a table, ears ringing and spots dancing before his eyes.

  He hit the floor amid a torrent of spilling drinks and flailing customers. His eardrums popped painfully as the air pressure dropped, and the exit hatch fell with a deafening clang. An instant later half the cantina’s lights flickered out, leaving the stunned crowd bathed in shadows. A hull-breach alarm began to whistle overhead.

  Luke reached out in the Force and sensed Mara lying about three meters away, surprised but unharmed and already recovering her wits. He sprang to his feet and saw that the area closest to the exit had taken the brunt of the explosion, with perhaps two dozen beings lying on the debris-strewn floor in various states of injury. Most of the yelling seemed to be coming from deeper in the cantina behind him, where the patrons had been far enough from the blast to become panicked instead of stunned.

  Mara stepped to Luke’s side. “Nice save.” She nodded out the viewport, where a cloud of flotsam from the damaged corridor was already drifting past. Fortunately, there seemed to be only a few bodies—but none was dressed in a black cloak.

  “That was just the opening salvo.” As Luke spoke, the first frightened patrons began to crowd toward the cantina’s other exit, their cries turning impatient and angry when everyone could not squeeze through the hatch at once. “There’s a reason she attacked before we were—”

  A long hissing crackle sounded from the second exit, drawing a frenzy of screams from fleeing patrons. Luke had not heard the sizzle of a striking lightwhip in decades, and the sound sent a hot prickle up his spine. He reached inside his robe and withdrew the shoto he had been carrying in anticipation of just this moment.

  “Well, I’d say this proves it.” Luke’s heart ached with disappointment. “Ben’s not here. Lumiya is.”

  “Yeah.” Mara’s voice was angry. “Jacen set us up.”

  She snapped the shoto off her own equipment belt and started for the cantina’s inner wall, moving into position to flank their attacker. Luke started toward the hatch and saw snakes of light crackling into the crowd ahead. A leathery, anvil-shaped head went flying and two human arms dropped to the floor. A dozen voices cried out in pain as ribbons of bloody cloth flew from their tunics.

  “Back, you kreetles!” The icy voice belonged to Lumiya. “Get back! Only one man can save you now!”

  The whip struck again, and the confused patrons began to fall back. A dark-cloaked figure appeared in the hatchway. Her hood had been pushed back off her head, but her face was swaddled in black cloth. Her lightwhip trailed at her side, its half a dozen strands divided evenly among energy, leather, and crystal-studded metal. Luke started to push toward her, using the Force to subtly move people aside as he fought against the retreating crowd.

  “You!” Lumiya pointed a long finger in Luke’s direction. “Lay down your blades and kneel.”

  “Not a chance.”

  Luke ignited his blades—one short and one long, to counter the dual nature of her weapon—and watched the crowd part before him. It would have been quicker and safer to launch himself at
Lumiya in a long arc of Force tumbling, but she did not seem to be aware of Mara sneaking up on her flank, and Luke wanted to keep her attention fixed on him until Mara was in position to strike.

  Lumiya was in no mood to be patient. Her lightwhip crackled out again and shredded a Duros down one whole flank. Her victim fell, warbling in pain, and the blaster he had been trying to pull clattered to the floor in front of him.

  The crowd froze in terror, staring gape-mouthed at the still-writhing victim.

  “The Jedi has decided your fate!” Lumiya yelled over the screeching Duros. Her whip lashed out again, this time wrapping its tendrils around the waist of a lithe Hapan beauty and cutting her nearly in half. “Because of him, you all die!”

  Cantina patrons began to whirl on Luke, many pulling blasters or vibroblades. Their eyes were distant and their mouths uniformly twisted into the same angry snarl, and Luke realized that Lumiya was using the Force to redirect their fear and anger toward him. Clearly, she did not intend this to be a fair fight … any more than he and Mara did.

  Luke danced forward, shoving patrons out of his way with the Force and using his light blades to return the bolts of those who made the mistake of firing on him. He hated to wound Lumiya’s unwitting minions and did his best to avoid injuring them seriously, but he had to defend himself. If he allowed the situation to get out of hand and they tried to mob him, a lot of people were going to lose arms, legs, and maybe worse.

  Luke had closed to within striking range of the lightwhip when a Twi’lek male in a clean kitchen apron stepped out to block his way.

  “You’re a Jedi!” The Twi’lek’s head-tails were twitching in anger, and if he was troubled by the two blades hissing in front of him, his lumpy face showed no sign of it. “You can’t let my customers die just to save yourself!”

  Luke used the Force to shove the Twi’lek aside. Though Mara was no longer in his line of sight, he could sense through their Force-bond that she was in position and ready to strike—and Lumiya continued to seem unaware of her.