Darth Plagueis (41 page)

“Would not actual wealth generate even greater envy?”

Gunray grew flustered. “How can I answer, when I know that you might strangle me should I refuse you?”

Sidious loosed an elaborate sigh. “Partners don’t strangle each other, Viceroy. I would prefer to earn your trust. Are you agreeable to that?”

“I might be.”

“Then here is my first gift to you: the Trade Federation is going to be betrayed. By Naboo, by the Republic, by the members of the directorate. Only you can provide the leadership that will be needed to keep the Federation from splintering. But first we must see to it that you are promoted to the directorate.”

“The current directorate would never welcome a Neimoidian.”

“Tell me what it would take—” Sidious started, then cut himself off. “No. Never mind. Let me surprise you by arranging a promotion.”

“You would do that and ask nothing in return?”

“For the time being. If and when I’ve earned your full trust, I will expect you to take my suggestions to heart.”

“I will. Darth Sidious.”

“Then we will speak again soon.”

Sidious deactivated the holoprojector and sat in silence.

“There is a world in the Videnda sector called Dorvalla,” he said to Maul a long moment later. “You will not have heard of it, but it is a source of lommite ore, which is essential to the production of transparisteel. Two companies—Lommite Limited and InterGalactic Ore—currently control the mining and shipping operations. But for some time the Trade Federation has had its sights on overseeing Dorvalla.”

“What is thy bidding, Master?” Maul asked.

“For now, only that you acquaint yourself with Dorvalla, for it may prove the key to ensnaring Gunray in our grasp.”

25: THE DISCREET CHARM OF THE MERITOCRACY

A more outlandish quartet hadn’t set foot, belly, claw, and jaw on Sojourn in twenty years. A half-breed Theelin female, her Hutt master, his Twi’lek majordomo, and his Chevin chief of security crossed the fort’s leaf-litterd courtyard and entered Plagueis’s reception room. With the exception of the Theelin, they looked as if they might have wandered in from the greel forests to consort with the creatures that had constructed nests and burrows in the fort’s dank corridors and lofty turrets.

Plagueis and 11-4D were waiting just inside the gaping entrance.

“Welcome, Jabba Desilijic Tiure,” Plagueis said through his transpirator mask.

Droids had restored some semblance of order to the room and installed tables and chairs. Morning light streamed through square openings high in the wall, and a fire crackled in the stone hearth.

“A pleasure to see you again after so many years, Magister Damask,” Jabba said in coarse Basic. The ageless criminal lolled his huge tongue and maneuvered his great slug body onto a low platform the droids had erected. Gazing around, he added, “You and your droid must visit my little place on Tatooine in the Western Dune Sea.”

“Someday soon,” Plagueis said as he lowered himself into an armchair across from the platform.

Like Toydarians and Yinchorri, Hutts were immune to Force suggestions. Had Jabba known how many of his species Plagueis had experimented on over the decades, he might not have been as sociable, but then the Hutt’s own penchant for ruthlessness and torture were legendary. As a tattoo on his arm attested, he cared only for members of his clan. He didn’t bother to introduce his subordinates by name, but as was often the case with many of the thugs and ne’er-do-wells with whom he surrounded himself, two of them had reputations that preceded them. The pink-complexioned Twi’lek was Bib Fortuna, a former spice smuggler whose own species had turned its back on him. Tall and red-eyed, he had sharp little teeth and thick, shiny lekku growing from a hairless cranium that looked as if it had been inexpertly stuffed with rocks. The Chevin—a two-meter-high snout that had sprouted arms, legs, and tail—was Ephant Mon. Celebrated as a warrior among his own kind—and mildly Force-sensitive—he wore a blanket someone might have thrown over him to hide his ugliness. Plagueis knew from contacts in the Trade Federation that Mon was involved in a smuggling operation on technophobic Cerea, supplying swoops to a gang of young upstarts.

The Theelin was unknown to Plagueis. Pale and shapely, she had lustrous orange hair and purple beauty marks that ran down her face and neck to disappear beneath a revealing costume.

“Diva Shaliqua,” Jabba said when he realized that Plagueis was studying her. “A singer in the band.”

“As her name suggests.”

“A gift from Ingoda, in place of credits owed to me.” Jabba’s big eyes settled on the Theelin. “She and Diva Funquita came as a pair, but I made Funquita a present to Gardulla in the hope of smoothing over our lingering rivalry.” He grunted. “My first mistake. The second: introducing Shaliqua to Romeo Treblanc, who would move worlds to possess her.”

Notorious for his gambling, Treblanc owned the Galaxies Opera House on Coruscant. Why Jabba chose to associate with gamblers and other lowlifes was a mystery to Plagueis. In some ways the Hutt’s illicit empire was the inverse of Hego Damask’s, where, if nothing else, the criminals were at least politicians, corporate honchos, and financiers. His coming to Sojourn was both uncharacteristic and unexpected.

“Are you here to talk about Treblanc or Gardulla?” Plagueis asked.

Jabba reacted in annoyance. “As always, straight to the heart of the matter. But I can appreciate the fact that you’re a busy Muun.” He wriggled to adjust his position on the platform. “I know you were instrumental thirty years ago in giving Gardulla the run of Tatooine, as a base for her slavery operations and Podracing events. I’ve come this far to inform you that Tatooine will soon have a new overseer.” He gestured to himself. “Me.”

Plagueis said nothing for a long moment. “I was under the impression that Tatooine was already as much yours as Gardulla’s.”

“Appearances can be deceiving,” Jabba said. “I’ve tried to undermine her influence by fomenting distrust among the so-called Sand People—the Tusken Raiders—but success at chasing her offworld continues to elude me.”

Plagueis made an adjustment to the breath mask. “How can I help?”

Jabba appraised him. “I happen to know that Gardulla hasn’t been able to make good on the loans you extended. What she earns from events like the Boonta Eve Classic, she loses to gamblers.”

“That much is true,” Plagueis said. “But what of it?”

“I want you to stop funding her, so I can starve her out.”

Plagueis shrugged. “Your information is incomplete, Jabba. I haven’t funded her enterprises in a decade.”

Jabba balled his hands in anger. “You have influence over members of the Banking Clan and the Trade Federation who are funding her.”

Plagueis lifted his head, as if in revelation. “I see. And what can I expect in exchange?”

“To start with, a better percentage of the profits from the races and other enterprises.”

Plagueis frowned in disappointment. “You must know that I’ve no need of credits, Jabba. And you wouldn’t have come
this far
, as you say, unless you had learned a few things that might sway me over to your side.”

Jabba wriggled, restraining his anger. “In return for your help, I will weaken Black Sun’s influence with the Trade Federation Directorate—”

“I need no assistance.” Plagueis leaned forward in the armchair. “What do you know that I may not know?”

Jabba inflated his body, then allowed the air to escape him in a protracted,
mirthless laugh. “I know something you may not yet know about the Bando Gora.”

Plagueis raised himself somewhat in the chair. Hideously masked Bando Gora assassins had become a growing concern in the Outer Rim, posing a problem to the leadership of some of the cartels Plagueis backed. “Now you have my interest, Jabba.”

“The cult has a new leader,” Jabba went on, happy to have the high ground. “A human female, she has entered into a plan with Gardulla, a Malastare Dug named Sebolto, and a Republic Senator to distribute contaminated death sticks, as a means of supplying the Bando Gora with brain-dead recruits.”

Plagueis stretched out with the Force to peer into the Hutt. Jabba wasn’t lying. “This human female,” he said.

“I’ve heard rumors.”

Again Jabba was telling the truth. “Rumors will suffice for now.”

The Hutt rubbed his meaty hands together. “Her name is Komari Vosa, and word has it that she is a former Jedi.”

Plagueis knew the name only too well. Some ten years earlier, Komari Vosa had been a Padawan of Master Dooku.

Behind each of the Rotunda’s hover platform docking stations extended wedge-shaped office complexes more than half a kilometer in length, where Senators met with one another, entertained guests, and, on rare occasions, carried out the work they had been elected or appointed to perform. Some of the offices were sealed environments, in which the atmospheres of member worlds were replicated; others, especially those belonging to hive species, were staffed by hundreds of beings who performed their duties in cubicles that resembled nectarcomb cells. By comparison, Naboo’s was rather prosaic in design and adornment, and yet unrivaled in terms of the number of high-profile visitors it received.

“I’m giving thought to leaving the Order,” Master Dooku told Palpatine in the windowless room that was the Senator’s private study. “I can no longer abide the decisions of the Council, and I have to be free to speak my mind about the wretched state of the Republic.”

Palpatine didn’t reply, but thought:
Finally
.

With Darth Maul traveling to Dorvalla on his first mission, Palpatine
had been preoccupied all afternoon, and now Dooku’s disclosure: long anticipated and yet still something of a surprise.

“This isn’t the first time you’ve been exasperated with the Council,” he said carefully, “and it probably won’t be the last.”

Dooku shook his head firmly. “Never more than this. Even after Galidraan. I’ve no recourse.”

Frigid Galidraan was years behind him, but for Dooku the incident remained an open wound. A local governor had succeeded in luring the Jedi into a conflict with Mandalorian mercenaries that had left eleven Jedi dead and the True Mandalorians—largely innocent of the charges that had been leveled against them—wiped out, save for one. Since then, and on each occasion he and Palpatine had met, Dooku had begun to look less and less like a Jedi Master and more like the noble he would have been on his native Serenno. Meticulously groomed, he carried himself like an aristocrat, affecting tailored tunics and trousers, and a velvety black cloak that gave him a dashing, theatrical look. His slightly curved lightsaber hilt, too, might have been a prop, though he was known to be one of the Order’s most skilled duelists. And behind a mask of arrogant civility, Palpatine knew him to be capable of great cruelty.

“By request from the Senate,” Dooku went on, “the Council dispatched several Jedi to Baltizaar, and my former Padawan somehow succeeded in accompanying them.”

Palpatine nodded soberly. “I know something of that. Baltizaar’s Senator petitioned for help in fending off attacks by the Bando Gora.”

“Sadistic abductors and assassins,” Dooku said in anger. “Military action was called for, not Jedi intercession. But no matter, the Council complied with the request, and now Komari Vosa and the others are believed to be dead.”

Palpatine raised an eyebrow. “The young woman who became infatuated with you?”

“The same,” Dooku said quietly. “At Galidraan she fought brutally against the Mandalorians, almost as if in an attempt to impress me. As a result I told the Council that she wasn’t ready for the trials and Jedi Knighthood. Compounding their initial error in dispatching Jedi, Master Yoda and the rest have refused to send reinforcements to search for survivors.”

Palpatine considered it. “If Baltizaar was meant to be another attempt
to impress you, all Komari Vosa did was prove that you were right about her all along.”

Dooku regarded him. “Perhaps. But the failure is mine.” He ran a hand over his short beard. “As skilled as I am with a lightsaber, I’ve turned out to be an ineffectual teacher. Master Qui-Gon Jinn has become a solitary and secretive rogue. And now Vosa …” He snorted. “I declined to be a member of the Council in order to devote myself to diplomacy, and look how that has turned out. The Republic is sliding deeper into chaos.”

“You’re one man against a galaxy full of scoundrels,” Palpatine said.

Dooku’s eyes flashed. “One man should be able to make a difference if he is powerful enough.”

Palpatine let the silence linger. “You would claim the title of Count of Serenno?”

“By right of birth. My family is agreeable. Now it’s simply a matter of informing the High Council.”

“Has anyone ever left the Order?”

“Nineteen before me.”

“Have you shared your discontent with any of them?”

“Only Master Sifo-Dyas.”

“Of course.”

Dooku looked up. “He worries that I’m going to do something rash.”

“Leaving the Order isn’t rash enough?”

“He fears that I will denounce the Council openly, and reveal how divided its members are about answering to the Senate.” He looked Palpatine in the eye. “I’ve half a mind to join your cause.”

Palpatine touched his chest.
“My
cause?”

Dooku adopted a sly smile. “I understand politics, my friend. I know that you have to be circumspect about what you say and to whom. But that the disenfranchised worlds of the Outer Rim enjoy any support at all is largely due to you. You speak honestly and you champion the underprivileged, and you may be the only one capable of bringing the Republic back from the brink. Unless, of course, you have been lying to me all these years.”

Palpatine made light of the remark. “Perhaps a few lies of omission.”

“Those I am willing to forgive,” Dooku said, “whether or not we become partners in addition to being allies.”

Palpatine interlocked his hands. “It is an interesting notion. We would have to deepen our conversations, become completely honest with each other, bare our innermost thoughts and feelings to determine whether we truly share the same goals.”