by Timothy Zahn
Ardiff frowned. “What do you mean?”
Pellaeon gazed out at the stars again. “There’s something she wasn’t telling me,” he said. “Something important—that much I’m sure of. But what exactly it was …” He shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Private information having to do with the Bothans, perhaps?” Ardiff suggested. “Or something more personal? She’s been in political trouble on Coruscant before—could it be that she’s about to lose her influence there entirely?”
“I hope not,” Pellaeon said. “Political problems between her and Coruscant would make this process far more difficult than it already is. They might reject any proposal simply because she was involved with it.”
“Or might support it because she was involved,” Ardiff pointed out. “The polarization we’re already seeing over the Caamas issue could easily bleed over into something like this.”
“That’s one of my biggest concerns,” Pellaeon agreed grimly. “That peace will be rejected by some for no better reason than that their political enemies are for it.”
He stepped past Ardiff onto the command walkway. “But all of us have only the cards the universe has dealt us,” he said. “If Organa Solo refuses to show us some of her cards, we’ll just have to play the game that way.
“And in the meantime,” he added, “we have other matters to attend to. Set course for Bastion, Captain. It’s time Moff Disra and I had a long, serious talk.”
In front of the Falcon, the stars flared into starlines, and Leia slumped a little in her seat. “Do you think he really meant it?” she asked, turning to look at Elegos.
Elegos gave one of his full-body Caamasi shrugs. “I believe Admiral Pellaeon himself is sincere,” he said. “As I presume you know with more certainty than I do. I suspect the question you really wish to ask is whether his sincerity can be trusted.”
“I don’t know,” she said. “You’re right, I don’t sense any duplicity in Pellaeon himself. But with Thrawn back on the scene …” She shook her head. “Nothing was ever the way it seemed with him, Elegos. He could maneuver you into doing exactly what he wanted you to do, despite the fact that you knew he was trying to do it. Thrawn may be using this peace initiative of Pellaeon’s for some other end entirely.”
“Is that why you didn’t tell him that Captain Solo was on Bastion?” Elegos asked.
Leia started. “How did you know about that?” she demanded. “I didn’t tell you Han had gone there.”
Elegos shrugged again. “You’ve dropped hints,” he said. “As have the Noghri. It hasn’t been difficult to put the pieces together.” His blue-on-green eyes bored into her face. “Why didn’t you tell Admiral Pellaeon that?”
Leia turned away from that gaze, pretending to study the Falcon’s engine monitor. “We know that Imperials are encouraging at least some of the violence that’s been occurring in the New Republic,” she said, fighting through the sudden dryness in her throat “That riot on Bothawui, for one—my Noghri guard found evidence that the shots that started it came from a rare Imperial sniper weapon.”
“Interesting,” Elegos murmured. “You didn’t tell Pellaeon about that either.”
“The problem is we have no real proof of any of it.” Leia said, shaking her head tiredly. “And even if we did … fighting Thrawn is like fighting a shadow, Elegos. He’s never where you think he is, doing what you expect him to do. Everything he does is circles within circles within circles.”
“Yet you cannot allow uncertainty to paralyze you,” Elegos pointed out. “That path allows him to win by default. At some point, right or wrong, you must take action.” His eyes seemed to bore into hers. “You must decide who you can trust.”
Leia blinked back sudden tears. “I can’t trust Pellaeon,” she said bluntly. “Not yet. If Thrawn is orchestrating this whole operation, Han would be a terribly useful hostage or bargaining chip for him. I couldn’t take the chance he’d find out from Pellaeon that Han was there.”
“Yet you trusted him enough to allow him to take Ghent into a situation of potentially equal danger,” Elegos pointed out.
“Ghent wanted to go,” she said, knowing even as she spoke that such an argument was dangerously slippery ground. “Besides, he wouldn’t be of any use to Thrawn.”
“You know better than that, Councilor,” Elegos said, the soft reproach in his voice a painful jab in Leia’s heart “Ghent is highly knowledgeable about New Republic encrypt and decrypt techniques. In a war situation, such knowledge would be of immense value to the Empire.”
“We’ve already been over this,” Leia reminded him, the first stirrings of anger coloring the guilt rumbling within her. Who was this Caamasi to tell her what was right or not right for her to do? “There’s no way for us to avoid taking risks here.”
“I agree,” Elegos said. “And I don’t suggest that your decisions were necessarily wrong.”
Leia frowned, the growing anger turning to suspicious uncertainty. “What are you suggesting, then?” she demanded.
“That you’re worried you used your power and authority to protect your husband more than you did a relative stranger,” Elegos said. “That you’re worried you’ve betrayed the trust that is yours as a High Councilor, a diplomat, and a Jedi.”
“She does not need to answer to you, Trustant A’kla,” a harsh Noghri voice came from behind them.
Leia turned her head to see Sakhisakh standing in the open cockpit door. “Trouble?” she asked him.
“No trouble,” the Noghri assured her, stepping forward and taking up a position just behind her. “I came to report that no one is in pursuit, and that Barkhimkh is shutting down the weapons systems.” He turned his dark eyes on Elegos. “If she chooses to protect her clan from danger, that is no concern of yours.”
“I agree,” Elegos said calmly. “As I’ve already said, I’m not here to pass judgment.”
“Then why do you press her about it?” Sakhisakh demanded.
“Because as I also said, she herself is not convinced she did right,” Elegos said, turning his gaze back to Leia. “It’s important that she think this matter through and come to a conclusion, one way or another. Either to accept her decisions as right and continue on, or to acknowledge them as wrong and also continue on.”
“Why must she do this?” Sakhisakh asked.
The Caamasi smiled sadly. “Because she is a High Councilor, and a diplomat, and a Jedi. Only when she is at peace with herself will she have the insight and wisdom we will all need to rely on in the days ahead.”
For a long moment none of them spoke. Leia stared out at the mottled sky of hyperspace rushing past, the acrid bite of shame adding to the rest of the emotions swirling within her. Once again, Elegos was right. “You should have been a Jedi, Elegos,” she said with a sigh as she unstrapped from her seat and stood up.
“I do not have a Jedi’s ability to touch the Force,” Elegos said, an odd note of regret in his voice. “And yet, you speak more truly than perhaps you know. It is a legend among my people that, at the very dawn of their age, the first of the Jedi Knights came to Caamas to learn from us the moral use of their power.”
“I don’t doubt the legend is true,” Leia said, gesturing to the seat she’d just vacated. “Sakhisakh, if you’d take control here, I’ll be in the cargo hold. I have some serious thinking and meditating to do.”
CHAPTER
20
“Good day, citizen-scholars of the M’challa Order of the Empire,” the ancient SE2 service droid behind the reception desk wheezed its usual greeting. “How may I and the Imperial Library serve you this morning?”
“Just assign us a computer station,” Han said, putting a firm restraining bolt on his already grouchy mood. Already it was shaping up to be a hot, muggy day, and he felt both uncomfortable and stupid parading around the city streets in the traditional M’challa scholar’s robe he and the others had been wearing ever since landing here on Bastion. The last thing he wanted to do was waste tim
e trading banter with an SE2 droid. “We can handle our own data search, thanks.”
“Certainly.” The droid peered at him, then at Lando, then at Lobot. His gaze lingered on the latter, as if wondering why he was wearing his hood so close about his head on such a warm day. “You citizens have been in here before,” he said. “Each of the past three days, if my memory has not degraded.”
“We’re doing a long-term study,” Lando stepped in smoothly. “It takes a great deal of time.”
“Would you like assistance?” the droid asked helpfully. “We have several research droids and interface counterparts available for hire at a purely nominal fee.”
“We’re doing fine,” Han told him, striving mightily to keep from shouting in the droid’s metal face. “Just assign us a station, all right?”
“Certainly, citizen-scholar,” the droid said affably. “Station 47A. Go through the double doors to your left—”
“We know where it is,” Han said, turning on his heel and stalking toward the indicated doors.
“And thank you,” Lando added.
He and Lobot caught up with Han just inside the double doors. “You think you can draw a little more attention to us?” Lando growled as Han headed off through the maze of individual and group booths that filled the huge room, only a handful of which were currently occupied. “Maybe you should try kicking the droid back and forth across the desk a few times—that ought to do it.”
“A lot of Imperials don’t like droids,” Han growled back. “Even scholars. Let’s just get on with it, okay?”
Lando didn’t answer, and Han felt a twinge of guilt for snapping at his friend that way. After all, Lando was doing him a big favor by even being here in the first place.
But his mood was already too sour for the guilt to make much headway against it. Three days of softfooting around the Imperial capital city having to put up with smarmy Imperials, overcharging tapcafe owners, and idiot SE2 droids was starting to get to him.
Especially considering how much progress they’d made so far in getting into the Special Files section. Namely, none.
They reached Station 47A and Han snagged a third chair from an unused booth to supplement the two already there. “All right,” Lando said, activating the booth’s privacy field as he sat Lobot down in front of the keyboard and then took the chair beside him. “You have a good contact with Moegid?”
Lobot’s answer was to place his fingers on the keyboard. For a moment, nothing happened. Then, slowly, he began tapping the keys.
Hitching his chair up behind Lando, stifling a sarcastic remark that wouldn’t have done anyone any good and was probably uncalled for anyway, Han sat down and tried to settle in. Maybe this time, they’d get lucky.
The ship had been quiet for nearly an hour before Karoly decided that, once again, she had guessed wrong.
It was aggravating. No, actually, it was infuriating. To have come all this way with Solo and Calrissian—to have spent days buried alive in this cramped smuggling compartment beneath the elegant living section of Calrissian’s yacht—and then to not even find Karrde and Shada waiting at the end of the ride was maddening.
She took a deep breath in the darkness, ordering herself sternly to settle down. Maybe Karrde and Shada had simply been delayed, and were still on their way. She would just have to be patient and wait them out.
In the meantime, there was clearly nothing to be gained by hanging around in this hole feeling sorry for herself. Reaching above her, she worked the catch that popped the hidden access panel and eased it carefully to one side.
For a moment she remained motionless in a half crouch, listening for any indication that she might have been heard. Then she eased up and out into the corridor, breathing deeply as she flushed the stale air of the compartment out of her lungs.
No one was visible. Not that that was surprising, really. Solo, Calrissian, and that biocomp-wired cyborg they called Lobot had all gone off together that morning, leaving the Verpine presumably in his usual place in the aft control room. That had been the procedure every day since they’d landed here, and there’d been nothing in the snatches of conversation she’d overheard that might indicate the routine had been changed. Briefly, she considered sneaking aft to again try to figure out what the Verpine was doing, but decided against it. Her last two efforts in that direction had failed to discover anything useful, and she couldn’t see wasting any more time on it.
Which left her with the question of what exactly she should be wasting her time doing.
There weren’t all that many options, actually. For the past three days, she’d followed Solo and the others to what the SE2 on desk duty had identified as an Imperial Library. The first two days she’d sneaked in behind them to watch; yesterday, tired of staring through a privacy field watching them punch computer keys all day, she’d left them inside and scouted around the building and neighborhood.
Now, having sneaked back aboard the ship last night, she had tested the theory that Shada might actually be meeting with the Verpine while Solo and the others were out. But that one had fallen through, too … and as far as Karoly could see, she was out of options. For all the evidence to date, Shada might not be coming here at all.
And that was an immensely irritating thought. It would mean she had completely misinterpreted that conversation she’d eavesdropped between Solo and Calrissian, and had come out here on a total wild tresher hunt.
Wherever “here” actually was. It was Imperial space—that much had been obvious from the all-human populace even before she’d spotted her first Imperial Security uniform. But where in the Empire it actually was, she didn’t know.
Not that it mattered all that much, except for the fact that if Solo and Calrissian managed to give her the slip it might mean trouble getting back home. Unlikely, though—from the way they’d been talking this morning, whatever their objective was they were still a long way from achieving it.
Still, Karrde had been mentioned in that conversation, so maybe he was just being cagey. Another quick scout around the library’s neighborhood, she decided, then tag Solo again when they took their usual early-afternoon meal break.
And maybe this time they would actually say something worth listening to. Easing down the corridor, alert for any sounds, she headed for the hatchway.
· · ·
“Another report from your new Empire, Your Excellency,” Tierce said, laying a pair of datacards on Disra’s desk. “The Ruurian governments have forwarded a copy of the fully executed treaty between their systems and the Empire.”
“Systems?” Disra asked, picking up the datacard and frowning at it. “I thought our treaty was only with their home system.”
“It was,” Tierce said smugly. “Apparently, our little demonstration against those Diamalan Marauders convinced three of their independent colonies that they wanted to be on the winning side, too.”
“Did it, now,” Disra said, looking at the datacard with new interest. The Ruurian independent colonies were joint efforts with a half-dozen other species. “Did the other co-owners of those worlds agree?”
“Apparently so,” Tierce said. “The treaties speak of the colony systems in their entireties, with no mention of specific regions or districts.” He smiled. “Of course, the Ruurians are quite good at persuasion.”
“They’re not the only ones,” Disra said, looking across the room to where Flim was hunched over in a chair, staring moodily out a window. “Congratulations, Admiral. You’ve picked up three more systems.”
Flim didn’t answer, and Disra felt his lip twist with contempt. Apparently, the con man was still sulking.
“Don’t worry,” Tierce said, following Disra’s glare. “He’ll get over it soon enough.”
“Or else he’ll soon find himself impaled on a sharp pole somewhere out in Unknown Space,” Flim growled without turning around. “Right next to the two of you.”
Disra looked up at Tierce. “What’s his problem?”
“No
thing serious,” Tierce said, dismissing the con man with a wave of his hand. “He’s worried about that alien ship, that’s all.”
“Ah,” Disra said, smiling tightly. Yes—the mysterious alien ship which that sleeper cell pilot had spotted and made a recording of off Pakrik Minor. “What’s the status on that, anyway?”
“The analysts should be finished anytime,” Tierce assured him. “I have a feeling this may be it, Your Excellency.”
Disra felt a shiver ripple up his back. “You really think that was the Hand of Thrawn in that ship?”
“You saw the design,” Tierce pointed out. “Part TIE fighter, part something else. Yes, I think that’s the Hand, or else his agent, or else someone from Captain Parck. Whichever, I think we may finally have lured our target into the open.”
Flim made a rumbling noise in the back of his throat. “Like you might lure out a Death Star,” he muttered.
“You’re overdoing the melodrama just a bit, Admiral,” Tierce said, his patience starting to sound a little strained. “Whoever they are, there are a dozen ways we can keep them from getting close enough to figure out you’re a fraud.”
“And what if they want to say hello?” Flim countered. “What are you going to say then? That I’ve got laryngitis? That I just stepped out for a week?”
“Hold it, both of you,” Disra cut them off as the comm light on his desk began to blink. “This may be it.”
He keyed the comm. “Moff Disra,” he said.
The man on the display was middle-aged, with the slightly nearsighted look of someone who has spent long years staring at a computer display. “Colonel Uday, Your Excellency: Imperial Intelligence Analysis. I have the final report on that record you sent me.”
“Excellent,” Disra said. “Send it immediately.”
“Yes, sir,” Uday said, glancing down and working keys off-camera. Another light on Disra’s display winked on and then off again, marking the transfer. “I’m afraid there wasn’t much we could get on the ship itself,” Uday continued. “But what there was is in there.”
