Star Wars - Thrawn Trilogy - Dark Force Rising 02

  "Your plans," the maitrakh said. "How do they go?"

  Leia glanced at Chewbacca. "We're making progress," she said. It was true enough, after a fashion: the elimination of every approach they'd come up with did technically qualify as progress. "We still have a long way to go, though."

  "Yes," the maitrakh said. She looked out past the buildings. "Your droid has spent much time with the other machines."

  "There isn't as much here for him to do as I'd thought there would be," Leia said. "You and many of your people speak Basic better than I'd anticipated."

  "The Grand Admiral has taught us well."

  "As did my father, the Lord Darth Vader, before him," Leia reminded her.

  The maitrakh was silent a moment. "Yes," she conceded reluctantly.

  Leia felt a chill run up her back. The first step in a betrayal would be to put emotional distance between the Noghri and their former lord.

  "That area will be finished soon," the maitrakh said, pointing to the laboring decon droids. "If they finish within the next ten days, we will be able to plant there this season.

  "Will the extra land be enough to make you self-sufficient?" Leia asked.

  "It will help. But not enough."

  Leia nodded, feeling a fresh surge of frustration. To her, the Empire's scheme was as blatant as it was cynical: with careful tuning of the whole decontamination process, they could keep the Noghri on the verge of independence indefinitely without ever letting them quite make it over that line. She knew it; the maitrakh herself suspected it. But as for proving it:

  "Chewie, are you familiar at all with decon droids?" she asked suddenly. This thought had occurred to her once before, but she'd never gotten around to following up on it. "Enough that you could figure out how long it would take the number of droids they have on Honoghr to decontaminate this much land?"

  The Wookiee growled an affirmative, and launched into a rundown of the relevant numbers clearly, the question had occurred to him, too. "I don't need the complete analysis right now," Leia interrupted the stream of estimates and extrapolations and rules of thumb. "Have you got a bottom line?"

  He did. Eight years.

  "I see," Leia murmured, the brief flicker of hope fading back into the overall gloom. "That would have put it right about the height of the war, wouldn't it?"

  "You still believe the Grand Admiral has deceived us?" the maitrakh accused.

  "I know he's deceiving you," Leia retorted. "I just can't prove it."

  The maitrakh was silent for a minute. "What then will you do?"

  Leia took a deep breath, exhaled it quietly. "We have to leave Honoghr. That means breaking into the spaceport at Nystao and stealing a ship."

  "There should be no difficulty in that for a daughter of the Lord Darth Vader."

  Leia grimaced, thinking of how the maitrakh had effortlessly sneaked up on them a minute ago. The guards at the spaceport would be younger and far better trained. These people must have been fantastic hunters before the Emperor turned them into his private killing machines. "Stealing a ship won't be too hard," she told the maitrakh, aware of just how far she was stretching the truth here. "The difficulty arises from the fact that we have to take Khabarakh with us."

  The maitrakh stopped short. "What is that you say?" she hissed.

  "It's the only way," Leia said. "If Khabarakh is left to the Empire, they'll make him tell everything that's occurred here. And when that happens, he and you will both die. Perhaps your whole family with you. We can't allow that."

  "Then you face death yourselves," the maitrakh said. "The guards will not easily allow Khabarakh to be freed."

  "I know," Leia said, acutely aware of the two small lives she carried within her. "We'll have to take that risk."

  "There will be no honor in such a sacrifice," the old Noghri all but snarled. "The clan Kihm'bar will not carve it into history. Neither will the Noghri people long remember."

  "I'm not doing it for the praise of the Noghri people," Leia sighed, suddenly weary of banging her head against alien misunderstandings. She'd been doing it in one form or another, it seemed, for the whole of her life. "I'm doing it because I'm tired of people dying for my mistakes. I asked Khabarakh to bring me to Honoghr-what's happened is my responsibility. I can't just run off and leave you to the Grand Admiral's vengeance."

  "Our lord the Grand Admiral would not deal so harshly with us."

  Leia turned to look the maitrakh straight in the eye. "The Empire once destroyed an entire world because of me," she said quietly. "I don't ever want that to happen again."

  She held the maitrakh's gaze a moment longer, then turned away, her mind twisted in a tangle of conflicting thoughts and emotions. Was she doing the right thing?

  She'd risked her life countless times before, but always for her comrades in the Rebellion and for a cause she believed in. To do the same for servants of the Empire-even servants who'd been duped into that role-was something else entirely. Chewbacca didn't like any of this; she could tell that much from his sense and the stiff way he stood at her side. But he would go along, driven by his own sense of honor and the life-debt he had sworn to Han.

  She blinked back sudden tears, her hand going to the bulge of her belly. Han would understand. He would argue against such a risk, but down deep he would understand. Otherwise, he wouldn't have let her come here in the first place.

  If she didn't return, he would almost certainly blame himself.

  "The humiliation period has been extended for four more days," the maitrakh murmured beside her. "In two days' time the moons will give their least light. It would be best to wait until then."

  Leia frowned at her. The maitrakh met her gaze steadily, her alien face unreadable. "Are you offering me your help?" Leia asked.

  "There is honor in you, Lady Vader," the maitrakh said, her voice quiet. "For the life and honor of my thirdson, I will go with you. Perhaps we will die together."

  Leia nodded, her heart aching. "Perhaps we will."

  But she wouldn't. The maitrakh and Khabarakh might die, and probably Chewbacca beside them. But not her. The Lady Vader they would take alive, and save as a gift for their lord the Grand Admiral.

  Who would smile, and speak politely, and take her children away from her.

  She looked out at the fields, wishing Han were here. And wondered if he would ever know what had happened to her.

  "Come," the maitrakh said. "Let us return to the house. There are many things about Nystao which you must yet learn."

  "I'm glad you finally called," Winter's voice came over the Lady Luck's speaker, distorted slightly by a not quite attuned scrambler package. "I was starting to worry."

  "We're okay-we just had to run silent awhile," Han assured her. "You got trouble back there?"

  "No more than when you left," she said. "The Imperials are still hitting our shipping out there, and no one's figured out what to do about it. Fey'lya's trying to persuade the Council that he could do a better job of defense than Ackbar's people, but so far Mon Mothma hasn't taken him up on the offer. I get the feeling that some of the Council members are starting to have second thoughts about his motivations for all of this."

  "Good," Han growled. "Maybe they'll tell him to shut up and put Ackbar back in command."

  "Unfortunately, Fey'lya's still got too much support to ignore completely," Winter said. "Particularly among the military."

  "Yeah." Han braced himself. "I don't suppose you ve heard from Leia."

  "Not yet," Winter said; and Han could hear the underlying tension in her voice. She was worried, too. "But I did hear from Luke. That's why I wanted to get in touch with you, in fact."

  "Is he in trouble?"

  "I don't know-the message didn't say. He wants you to rendezvous with him on New Cov."

  "New Cov?" Han frowned down at the cloudspeckled planet turning beneath them. "Why?"

  "The message didn't say. Just that he'd meet you at the, quote, money-changing center, unquote.

  "T
he-?" Han shifted his frown to Lando. "What's that supposed to mean?"

  "He's talking about the Mishra tapcafe in Ilic where he and I met while you were following Breil'lya," Lando said. "Private joke-I'll fill you in later."

  "So that means there's no question Luke sent the message?" Winter asked.

  "Wait a minute," Han put in as Lando started to answer. "Didn't you talk to him personally?"

  "No, the message came in printed," Winter said. "Not on any scrambler, either."

  "He doesn't have a scrambler on his X-wing, does he?" Lando asked.

  "No, but he could get a message coded at any New Republic diplomatic post," Han said slowly. "Is this private joke something only you two would know about?"

  "Us two, plus maybe a hundred bystanders," Lando conceded. "You think it's a trap?"

  "Could be. Okay, Winter, thanks. We'll be checking in more often from now on.

  "All right. Be careful."

  "You bet."

  He signed off and looked at Lando. "It's your ship, pal. You want to go down and take a look, or give it a miss and go check out this swimming casino of yours?"

  Lando hissed a breath between his teeth. "I don't think we've got much choice," he said. "If the message was from Luke, it's probably important."

  "And if it wasn't?"

  Lando favored him with a tight grin. "Hey, we've run Imperial traps before. Come on, let's take her down."

  After the way they'd blasted out of Ilic a few days earlier, it was doubtful the local authorities would be especially overjoyed to see the return of the Lady Luck to their city. Fortunately, he'd put the past two days' worth of leisure time to good use; and as they set down inside the domed landing area, the spaceport computer dutifully logged the arrival of the pleasure yacht Tamar's Folly.

  "It's just terrific to be back," Han commented dryly as he and Lando started down the ramp. "Probably ought to snoop around a little before we head down to the Mishra.

  Beside him, Lando stiffened. "I don't think we're going to have to bother with the Mishra," he said quietly.

  Han threw a quick glance at him, dropping his hand casually to his blaster as he shifted his gaze to where Lando was looking. Standing five meters from the end of the Lady Luck's ramp was a bulky man in an ornate tunic, chewing on the end of a cigarra, and smiling with sly innocence up at them.

  "Friend of yours?" Han murmured.

  "I wouldn't go that far," Lando murmured back. "Name's Niles Ferrier. Ship thief and occasional smuggler."

  "He was in on the Mishra thing, I take it?"

  "One of the key players, actually."

  Han nodded, letting his eyes drift around the spaceport. Among the dozens of people moving briskly about their business, he spotted three or four who seemed to be loitering nearby. "Ship thief huh?"

  "Yes, but he's not going to bother with anything as small as the Lady Luck," Lando assured him.

  Han grunted. "Watch him anyway.

  "You bet."

  They reached the foot of the ramp and, by unspoken but mutual consent, stopped there and waited. Ferrier's grin broadened a bit, and he sauntered forward to meet them. "Hello there, Calrissian," he said. "We keep bumping into each other, don't we?"

  "Hello, Luke," Han spoke up before Lando could reply. "You've changed."

  Ferrier's smile turned almost sheepish. "Yeah-sorry about that. I didn't figure you'd come if I put my own name on the message."

  "Where's Luke?" Han demanded.

  "Search me," Ferrier shrugged. "He burned out of here same time you did-that was the last I saw of him."

  Han studied his face, looking for a lie. He didn't see one. "What do you want?"

  "I want to cut a deal with the New Republic," Ferrier said, lowering his voice. "A deal for some new warships. You interested?"

  Han felt a tingle at the back of his neck. "We might be," he said, trying to sound casual. "What kind of ships are we talking about?"

  Ferrier gestured to the ramp. "How about we talk in the ship?"

  "How about we talk out here?" Lando retorted.

  Ferrier seemed taken aback. "Take it easy, Calrissian," he said soothingly. "What do you think I'm going to do, walk off with your ship in my pocket?"

  "What kind of ships?" Han repeated.

  Ferrier looked at him for a moment, then made a show of glancing around the area. "Big ones," he said, lowering his voice. "Dreadnaught class." He lowered his voice still (further. "The Katana fleet."

  With an effort, Han kept his sabacc face in place. "The Katana fleet. Right."

  "I'm not kidding," Ferrier insisted. "The Katana's been found : and I've got a line on the guy who found it."

  "Yeah?" Han said. Something in Ferrier's face-

  He turned around quickly, half expecting to see someone trying to sneak up over the edge of the ramp into the Lady Luck. But aside from the usual mix of shadows from the spaceport lights, there was nothing there. "Something?" Lando demanded.

  "No," Han said, turning back to Ferrier. If the thief really did have a line on Bel Iblis's supplier, it could save them a lot of time. But if he had nothing but rumors-and was maybe hoping to wangle something a little more solid : "What makes you think this guy has anything?" he demanded.

  Ferrier smiled slyly. "Free information, Solo? Come on-you know better than that."

  "All right, then," Lando said. "What do you want from us, and what are you offering in trade?"

  "I know the guy's name," Ferrier said, his face turning serious again. "But I don't know where he is. I thought we could pool our resources, see if we can get to him before the Empire does."

  Han felt his throat tighten. "What makes you think the Empire's involved?"

  Ferrier threw him a scornful look. "With Grand Admiral Thrawn in charge over there? He's involved in everything."

  Han smiled lopsidedly. At last they had a name to go with the uniform. "Thrawn, huh? Thanks, Ferrier."

  Ferrier's face went rigid as he suddenly realized what he'd just given away. "No charge," he said between stiff lips.

  "We still haven't heard what we're getting out of the deal," Lando reminded him.

  "Do you know where he is?" Ferrier asked.

  "We have a lead," Lando said. "What are you offering?"

  Ferrier shifted a measuring gaze back and forth between them. "I'll give you half the ships we take out," he said at last. "Plus an option for the New Republic to buy out the rest at a reasonable price."

  "What's a reasonable price?" Han asked.

  "Depends on what kind of shape they're in," Ferrier countered. "I'm sure we'll be able to come to an agreement.

  "Mn." Han looked at Lando. "What do you think?"

  "Forget it," Lando said, his voice hard. "You want to give us the name, fine-if it checks out, we'll make sure you're well paid once we've got the ships. Otherwise, shove off."

  Ferrier drew back. "Well, fine," he said, sounding more hurt than annoyed. "You want to do it all by yourselves, be my guest. But if we get to the ships first, your precious little New Republic's going to pay a lot more to get them. A lot more."