Star Wars - Edge of Victory - Book 1: Conquest

by Greg Keyes

  Karrde leaned toward the screen, eyes glittering dan­gerously. "You are a liar, Captain, and a poor one. I see no reason for us to play games."

  "I trust you've noticed you're outnumbered."

  " I trust you noted I was able to drop in on you in, shall we say, an unannounced fashion. Do you really think I brought only one ship?"

  Imsatad glared at him, then cut his visual. Karrde waited patiently until, a few moments later, the image returned.

  "This is none of your business," the man said.

  "Profit is always my business."

  " There is no profit here, and if there were, you would already be too late."

  "Oh, I don't think so. Why are your ships still on the sur­face? Why do my sensors show what seems to be pro­tracted search activity? You've let your quarry slip through your fingers, Captain." Karrde smiled and leaned back in his chair. "Consider my offer of help. I ask little in return, and I could be a nuisance if you spurn my kindness."

  " That sounds like a threat."

  Karrde spread his hands. "Take it however you please. Shall we discuss this further or not?"

  "You say you ask for little. What, exactly, would that be?"

  "A few kind words in the ears of the Yuuzhan Vong. An introduction. You see, Captain, for some years now I've been retired from my chosen profession. But these are very interesting times, exactly the sort of times my kind thrives on, if you know what I mean. I'd like to come out of retirement."

  "Go on."

  Karrde stroked his mustache thoughtfully. "The Yuu­zhan Vong have promised a truce if the Jedi are delivered to them. I would like to bargain for passage through Yuu­zhan Vong space, once the borders are established."

  "Why should they allow a smuggler to use their space?"

  "There may be things they need. I can get them. If not, I would be doing them no harm; all of my activities would be aimed at the scattered remnants of the New Republic. But those remnants are separated, at times, by Yuuzhan Vong-occupied systems. The cost of circumventing them, frankly, would be prohibitive."

  Imsatad nodded, and a brief look of disgust wrinkled his features. "I see. You realize I can promise none of that."

  "I only asked for a mention of my help in this affair. You can promise that."

  "I could," Imsatad acknowledged. "What exactly can you offer me?"

  "Better sensors than you have, for one thing. Detailed knowledge of Yavin Four that I believe you lack. A crew that is very, very good at finding things. Certain special defenses against Jedi—and the means of finding them."

  Imsatad stiffened, and his voice dropped low. "I was with Thrawn at Wayland. You still?. . ."

  "Ah. You know what I mean, then."

  "I know you betrayed him."

  Karrde rolled his eyes. "How tiresome. Very well,

  Captain, if you don't wish my services, there are others who will."

  "Wait!" Imsatad chewed his lip for a moment. "I need to consult with my officers on this."

  "Take a few moments," Karrde said, lifting a finger. "But do not bore me." He cut the transmission.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  "Hutt slime!" Remis Vehn snapped, as the transport scraped along the wall of the pit. "Watch my ship!"

  "The controls have too much play in them," Anakin complained.

  "No, you're flying like a Twi'lek on spice," Vehn replied.

  "Quiet," Tahiri said, "or we'll restrain your mouth, too."

  Vehn yelped again as they scraped stone. The fit was tighter than Anakin had thought it would be.

  Still, a moment later, they settled into the steaming water of the underground pool. Anakin dropped the landing ramp, and an instant later Ikrit and the two Jedi children were on board.

  "Strap in, everyone," Anakin told them. He hit the lifts and back up they started.

  An instant later, the whole ship shuddered and their ears were filled with the screech of metal.

  "The landing ramp, you vac-brain!" Vehn screamed. " You didn't pull up the ramp!"

  Belatedly Anakin flipped the appropriate switch, but all he got was a grinding noise.

  "Great," he muttered.

  "Anakin," Tahiri said, "I think we may have trouble."

  "We'll make it, even with the ramp down. We'll figure out what to do about that later."

  76

  "That's not what I meant." She pointed up through the cockpit.

  Something dark was eclipsing the morning light.

  "Sith spawn. They've moved one of the big freighters over the hole."

  "Continue," Master Ikrit murmured.

  "But—"

  "Continue." The diminutive Master was crouched on the floor, eyes closed, his voice a serene purr. Anakin felt a powerful surge in the Force.

  "You should strap in, Master."

  "No time."

  Anakin nodded. "As you say, Master Ikrit." He throttled up. Banging, sparking, and shaking, they shot up toward the belly of their enemy.

  "He's pushing it up," Tahiri said in awe. "Master Ikrit is pushing the freighter up."

  And indeed, when they emerged, rather than sitting right over the hole, the freighter was some eighty meters off the ground. Its thrusters were burning, pushing it down, but it wasn't budging. Anakin darted his gaze about. The other ships and people on foot had sidled in on all sides but one, so he cut toward the hole as a brutal barrage struck them.

  "My ship!" Vehn howled, as the deck pitched wildly. Not blinking, Anakin took them through the storm, just as two more ships closed in, completing the trap.

  "Help Master Ikrit," Anakin told the Jedi candidates. "Push the freighter up farther."

  "Master Ikrit is gone, Anakin," Valin said. "He jumped out of the hatch." "He what?" "There he is!" Tahiri shrieked, pointing ahead of them.

  There Ikrit was indeed, walking toward the blocking ships, a corvette and a light freighter. As he approached them, they were parted as if by two gigantic hands. "I don't believe it," Anakin said. But he gunned for-

  ward, nevertheless, aimed at the gap the Jedi Master had created for them. Blaster bolts and laser beams sizzled and hissed in the air, but every shot that might have hit either Ikrit or the ship bent away, missing by centimeters, and still the small Jedi strolled sedately along.

  They were almost free now, passing over Ikrit.

  "He can't keep that up," Anakin said. "Tahiri, use the Force. Snag him as we go by."

  "You bet," she answered. Her confidence rang false; Anakin heard a tremor in her voice.

  That was when the first bolt slipped through and struck Master Ikrit. Anakin felt it in the Force, a spike of clarity. No pain, no fear, no remorse, only... understanding.

  Two more shots hit Ikrit in quick succession, and then fire was pounding their ship again. With a sob of an­guish, Anakin jetted the ship through the hole and spun. At the same moment, with an inarticulate growl, Tahiri leapt from the open hatch, lightsaber glowing, and ran toward the downed Master.

  " No!" Anakin howled. He brought the forward guns— the only ones under his direct control—to bear, and opened up on the ships that were suddenly closing between him and Tahiri. They returned fire. He caught a glimpse of her, Ikrit's body in her arms, dodging back toward him. Ab­surdly, his eyes were drawn to her bare feet, white against the brown soil.

  The transport turned halfway over under a barrage, and every light in the ship went out. Cursing, Anakin started furiously trying to reroute, and then the power whined back on. The shields were gone.

  "Valin, Sannah, one of you!" he shouted. "Get to the laser turret! Now!"

  He did the only thing he could. In seconds they would be cooked. If he stood any chance of getting Tahiri back on board, he needed a plan.

  He spun and fired the jets, leaping above the other

  ships, strafing them as he went. He was absorbed now, his senses in the Force stretched to their limits, dodging shots before they were fired, sensing the weakest spots to place his own rounds, pinwheeling and jagging above them.
r />   The ships came up with him. He fought for altitude, all the time aware that Tahiri was farther and farther below him. He could still feel her. She was still alive.

  Master Ikrit was not. Anakin felt the old Jedi's life go, felt it pass through him like a sweet wind.

  / am proud of you, Anakin, it seemed to say. Remember—together, you are stronger than the sum of your parts. I love you. Good-bye.

  Gritting his teeth against another concussion, Anakin clenched the tears in his skull. Cry later, Anakin, he thought. Right now you have to see.

  One of his engines was limping. He couldn't win this, not here, not now. With a curse that bordered on being a sob, he flipped, slid between two ships that collided an instant later, and punched toward the upper atmosphere.

  Below him, Tahiri's presence dwindled.

  Like Chewie. Just like Chewie.

  He jerked the ship back around and aimed it at the nearest ship, a corvette, and went to full throttle.

  "What the—" Vehn gasped. "You're going to kill us!"

  Anakin fired. The other ship held steady, steady.

  Anakin pulled up, just slightly, and skipped off the top of the corvette the way a hurled stone might skip across a lake. The collision tossed them up with a terrible shriek­ing of metal.

  The counterforce hurled the corvette down, not far, but far enough to slam it nose-first into the Great Temple. An orchid of flame uncurled from its engines.

  A gasp later, the turbolaser in the turret began talking as Sannah took control of the gun. Anakin put the ship into a climb, fighting for distance though every meter he put behind him tore another stitch from his heart.

  "I'll be back, Tahiri," he said. "That I swear. I'll be back."

  Kam Solusar gasped and sagged against the damp stone wall of the cave. Tionne, nearby, stifled a cry of an­guish. Some of the children, the more sensitive ones, be­gan to cry, probably not even sure what they were crying about.

  He groped through the darkness until he found Tionne and took her in his arms. He could smell the salt on her cheeks, feel the torn place in her.

  Tionne felt things so deep, so strong. She had no fear of the pain that such openness could cause. It was one of the things he loved about her. While he put on armor against the universe, she took it all in and gave it back as something better. Her wound would heal, and from it a song would come. Others thought she was weak, be­cause her powers in the Force weren't so great.

  Kam knew better. Ultimately, she was stronger than he.

  "Master Ikrit," she whispered.

  "I know," Kam replied, stroking her silver hair. "He knew all along."

  They stood that way for a few precious seconds, drawing strength and comfort from each other. It was Tionne who moved away first.

  "The children need us," she said. "We're all they have, now."

  "No," Kam whispered back. "Anakin is still out there."

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Talon Karrde was a hostage, but he wasn't supposed to know that. Imsatad probably thought himself clever and subtle for maneuvering Karrde into joining the search party on the moon's surface and equally clever to make certain that there were twenty of his own people to Karrde's four.

  Karrde was quite content to allow him that illusion of shrewdness.

  "We've already searched here," Maber Yeff, the leader of the Peace Brigade segment of the team, said in his shrill little voice, waving his hand at a long row of vine-smothered ruins.

  "I'm sure you did," Karrde replied. "But not with vornskrs."

  Yeff's pale, ax-nosed face turned dubiously toward the long-limbed beasts loping ahead of the group. "How do you know they don't just smell womp rats or some­thing? " he asked.

  "If they could do that, they would be valuable in­deed," Karrde replied. "As there are no womp rats on Yavin Four, it would require hyperwave noses to sniff them out all the way over on Tatooine."

  "You know what I mean."

  "Vornskrs sense the Force, and especially those crea­tures that use the Force. They are particularly suited for hunting Jedi."

  "Yeah? Where can we get some? That would be useful in our line of work."

  "Alas, mine are the only tame ones in existence. You don't want to meet a wild one, I promise you."

  "Still. We've got plenty more of these Jedi to hunt down, and with all of the advantages their sorcery gives them—and if these things do what you say—"

  "Observe," Karrde said. The beasts had pricked up their ears and were panting eagerly. They darted through a crumbling entranceway.

  "But we looked in there," Yeff repeated.

  "How many Jedi do you estimate are hiding in there? Based on my information, at least two adults and per­haps thirty children. Do you think you could see them if they didn't want to be seen? Or that you would re­member them if you did see them?"

  "Can they really do that?"

  "They can really do that."

  "That's what Captain Imsatad said. He also said you have a way around that."

  Karrde smile thinly. "Indeed. A certain creature from the same planet as the vornskrs. It projects a bubble that repels the Force."

  "That's what your pretty lady has in the covered cage."

  From the corner of his eye, Karrde saw Shada's brows lower dangerously, but she continued to play her part. "Exactly. My sweet Sleena is as delicate as they are. She understands their needs."

  "Yeah." Yeff spared "Sleena" another leer. "Can I see it?"

  "Sunlight harms them, and they are easily agitated. If you wish, after the hunt, I'll show them to you. For the time being, I suggest you have your people ready their weapons. The children shouldn't put up much of a fight, but the adults will be formidable, even without their Jedi powers."

  They followed the vornskrs into the ruins, through crumbling galleries incensed with the crushed-spice scent of blueleaf and the grainy, wormy smell of rotting wood. At first the light was dim but sufficient, falling in shards through gaps in the wall and roof, diffused by mist, leaves, and stringy mosslike stuff. But as they followed the vornskrs, it grew darker, and eventually they reached the opening to a stairwell that dropped steeply down into the bedrock foundations of the place.

  Karrde drew his blaster and nodded to Shada, on his right. Most everyone else already had theirs out.

  "After you," Karrde suggested.

  "Your beasts," Yeff told him. "You go ahead."

  "As you wish."

  The tunnel took them down through ages of stone scribed now and then in alien figures and script. Eventu­ally it debouched into a large cavern. The vornskrs stood snarling and spitting at the darkness.

  "Sit," Karrde commanded, the hair on his neck prick­ing up. Had he just seen a motion, part of a face, or was he just fooling himself? His own life depended on the answer.

  He looked again at the vornskrs, at the way their eyes moved. As if watching something walking, very near.

  "Where are they? I don't see anything." Yeff swung his lamp around.

  "No," Karrde said. "Neither do I." He raised his blaster and stunned the Peace Brigader.

  He managed to nail another one before the return fire came, and by then he was already diving for the rocks. Team members Halm and Ferson, alert for his signal, were already doing the same. Shada, on the other hand, was a gyroscoping blur in the midst of their enemies. Too bad Yeff was already stunned; otherwise he would be learning a whole new appreciation for the "pretty lady" right now.

  When they had allowed him only three of his crew,

  they hadn't known exactly how good Shada was. How could they? Now it was too late.

  The air went thick with energy, and the cave strobed.

  By his count it was now four to fifteen.

  He heard Halm cry out, and regretfully amended his own forces to three. He pulled his other blaster and leapt up, both weapons blazing, searching for better cover.

  "Come on, come on," he shouted. "I know you're here! Regards from Luke and Mara's wedding!"

  A bo
lt singed across his arm, and he stumbled on the uneven floor. I'm getting too old for this, he thought, rolling on his back. Without cover he would last a few seconds, maybe long enough to shoot two more. Shada might still manage to kill them all, but that would leave the galaxy short one Talon Karrde, which would be a ter­rible tragedy.

  Grimly, he raised his weapons and pointed over his feet. Muzzles flashed.

  And suddenly a glowing wand of energy appeared above him, cutting complex hieroglyphs in the air. The blaster bolts that had meant to end the glorious career of Talon Karrde whined off into the cavern.

  Karrde blinked up at the man standing over him. "Nice to see you, Solusar. What took you so long?"

  Then he opened up on the Peace Brigaders, climbing to his feet as he did so. Solusar was his cover now, deflecting the fire directed at them with that eerie Jedi certainty.

  Another lightsaber flashed into existence across the room. That would be Tionne.

  Karrde now counted five for his side, an estimated ten on the other.

  When the Peace Brigaders were down to three, they fled back up the passageway.

  "We can't let them get away," Karrde said.

  "They won't," the shadowy figure beside him prom­ised. Then he was gone.

  And somewhere behind him in the cavern, Karrde heard the voices of children.

  Kam Solusar returned a few moments later. Karrde made out his stern face and receding hairline in the dim light of a glow lamp. Solusar walked up to Karrde and regarded him for a moment.

  "You're lucky I didn't cut you down," he said. "Bring­ing those men down here where the children are. Using your vornskrs against us. What if they had attacked the students?"

  Karrde cocked his head. "My pets are very well trained. They attack only on my order. Look, Solusar. I had to find you. I couldn't do it without the interference of those fools, and when I did find you I had to get rid of them. They thought I had an ysalamiri with me, that your Jedi powers would be blocked."

  " But you didn't bring one."

  "It's an empty cage."

  "So you turned on them, not knowing if we were really here or not."

  "I know my pets. I was certain you were down here, and I didn't want to cripple you by actually bringing an ysalamiri."