Star by Star (52 page)

“Master Skywalker, perhaps you fail to realize the damage your selfish antics have caused the New Republic,” she said. “In using new weapons aboard the
Mon Mothma
and
Elegos A ’Kla
prematurely, you have alerted the Yuuzhan Vong to the existence of two very powerful technologies we are in the process of deploying—two technologies that we had hoped might turn the tide of the war.”

This drew a fresh outburst from Shesh’s supporters, and the counterprotest began to sound halfhearted. Still finding his way blocked by Fyor Rodan, Fey’lya raised a hand to summon a security droid.

Shesh rushed to press her point home. “Master Skywalker, I am afraid this council must demand that the Jedi disarm and cease their irresponsible activities.”

“No.” Luke spoke softly but firmly, using the Force to project the word into every niche in the vast chamber. “The Jedi will not disarm.”

As he had hoped, the shock of hearing his calm voice quieted the chamber, and he continued, “We have in no way influenced any New Republic officer to disobey orders.”

“You expect us to believe you?” Shesh cast a meaningful eye over the suddenly tranquil gallery. “When you are so obviously using your mind tricks on us now?”

Luke allowed himself a wry smile. “No trick,” he said. “Only one calm voice.”

This drew a chuckle from many in the gallery, and, with the arrival of the security droid, Fyor Rodan feigned surprise and stepped aside.

“All the same, I insist,” Shesh said quickly. “If the Jedi will not disarm, the senate must prohibit the New Republic military from having any contact with them whatsoever.” The chamber broke into an uproar, but Shesh elevated the speaker volume and spoke over the tumult. “There will be no more ‘spare’ X-wings rotated into your hangars, Master Skywalker, nor will there be any more intelligence-sharing sessions. If you continue to abuse us—”

“You are exceeding your authority, Senator Shesh,” Fey’lya interrupted. The Bothan shouldered her aside and reclaimed control of his console. “Return to your seat, or I will have you removed from the chamber.”

Shesh gave him an acid smile and obeyed, but the damage had already been done. She had turned the Jedi’s moment of triumph into yet another senate-dividing issue—and Luke had to wonder why. As the supervising senator of SELCORE, the Kuati had certainly proven herself corrupt, and Leia’s accusations of misconduct had done nothing to endear the Jedi to her, but this seemed to go beyond even that level of depravity. This was more than opportunistic vengeance; this was treachery with a plan. Had Luke not been able to feel the woman’s darkness through the Force, he would have stepped onto the dais and started trying to remove an ooglith masquer; as it was, he vowed to watch this woman until he knew the source of the darkness and danger in her.

Fey’lya repeatedly called for order, then finally gave up and sank into his chair to wait for the tumult to yell itself out. Luke merely crossed his wrists and did likewise, knowing he would only play into Shesh’s hands by using another Jedi technique to calm the gathering. He saw no real hope of accomplishing what he had come to do, but he could not leave without appearing arrogant—and arrogance would only be another weapon for Viqi Shesh to use against the Jedi.

The tumult finally began to subside, but Fey’lya was staring so raptly at his vidconsole that he failed to notice. Fearing the Yuuzhan Vong were hurling some new disaster at the New Republic—and knowing them well enough to realize they would pick just such a moment—Luke reached out to get some sense of what was consuming the Bothan’s attention. Like any seasoned politician, Fey’lya held his emotions tightly, but what Luke sensed there seemed more surprise than dismay or panic.

Always quick to seize the initiative, Viqi Shesh rose. “I am very concerned about the Jedi problem—so concerned, in fact, that I propose a resolution.”

When Fey’lya remained transfixed by his vidconsole, Luke sent out a gentle Force nudge. The Bothan jerked and turned toward Shesh, but did not interrupt.

She continued, “May it be resolved: that the Jedi are henceforth named dangerous persons to the war effort—”

That was as far she made it before the chamber erupted again. She tried to continue over the din, then turned to Fey’lya, eyes flashing as though he had killed her sound feed.

“Chief Fey’lya, I have every right to make my motion.”

Fey’lya smiled. “By all means—but perhaps you would allow me to make a statement first.”

He flipped something on his console, and a row of holograms appeared on the chamber floor near the speaker’s rostrum. Luke had to step away before he could identify the figures as General Wedge Antilles, General Garm Bel Iblis, Admiral Traest Kre’fey, General Carlist Rieekan, and several other senior commanders. The chamber gradually quieted.

“A surprising number of high officers have contacted me in the past few minutes,” Fey’lya said. “After hearing what they have to say, I am directing—not authorizing, but
directing
—the New Republic military to cooperate and coordinate with the Jedi.”

The chamber grew even quieter—save for Shesh, who began to stammer, “Y-you can’t do that!”

“I can and I have.” Fey’lya locked his console out, then stepped down to Shesh’s. “If you feel I am exceeding my authority, you may, of course, call for a vote of no confidence at any time. Do you wish to do so now, Senator Shesh?”

Shesh looked into the stunned gallery, trying to gauge whether the Bothan’s autocratic mandate might have cost him enough support to lose such a vote. When even her own supporters could not tear their eyes from the holograms of the angry-looking commanders, she saw that she was the one who had overplayed her hand. She lowered her gaze and shook her head.

“No, and I withdraw my resolution.”

“Good. We’ll talk about your new committee assignments after we finish here.” Fey’lya left the high councilors’ dais and returned to Luke. “Now, where were we—”

“First, I’d like to ask something.” Luke put his hand over the rostrum’s microphone, then used the Force to send the sound droid whisking high into the galleries. “What did the generals say to you?”

“Nothing, actually. The communication was from NRMOC; the Yuuzhan Vong are moving on Borleias.” Fey’lya turned toward the commanders, his fangs bared in what Luke felt certain the Bothan intended to resemble a smile. “These are file holos.”

In the Solo apartment, the cheers were still ringing off the sitting room walls, and Gavin Darklighter was already planning joint missions with Saba Sebatyne and Kyp Durron. New Republic pilots were pouring bubblezap all around—and putting C-3PO into a dither by spilling far too much on the sanibuffed floor. Lando and Tendra were on their comlinks lauding the virtues of YVH war droids to suddenly receptive New Republic procurement officers. If anyone noticed that Wedge Antilles, one of the senior command officers supposedly in contact with Borsk Fey’lya, was actually sitting on the couch with Han and Leia, they did not think the matter worth mentioning.

Feeling far less gleeful than her guests, Leia turned to Han. “Am I the only one who noticed?”

Han gave her a crooked smile. “I noticed.” He glanced past her to Wedge, who was continuing to stare at his image on the holovid, his expression somewhere between anger and approval. “Borsk bluffed.”

“In politics, it’s called misconduct,” Leia said. “He had no authority to issue that directive alone.”

“Maybe not, but he did the right thing. I seem to recall your telling him to do that.”

“He didn’t do it because he likes Jedi,” Leia retorted. “Borsk wouldn’t take the risk. He could have lost his post—he still can, if Viqi finds out what he did and stirs up enough outrage.”

“Isn’t going to happen,” Wedge said, finally stirring himself out of his shock. “Borsk is the one who sent us to help you at Talfaglio. None of the commanders you saw on the chamber floor is going to contradict him—at least not to Viqi Shesh.”

A half-dozen comlinks chimed simultaneously, among them Wedge’s. He shut off the audible alarm, then he and several other New Republic officers stood and started for a quiet room.

“You’ll have to excuse us,” he said. “It sounds like General Bedamyr has lost his pet mynocks again.”

Han and Leia laughed dutifully. When he was gone, they looked at each other and shrugged.

“I guess we’ll find out soon enough,” Han said.

Leia’s thoughts had already returned to Fey’lya. “First, he wins the commanders over by sending a task force to Talfaglio, then he gives the credit to us.” She looked back to the holovid, where Fey’lya was making a great show of presenting Luke with an encryption card that would allow him to navigate the planetary mine shell. “He’s solidifying his power base, Han. He needs the Jedi supporters on his side.”

“And the Jedi need him,” Han said. “We’re in this together.”

“I know.” Leia was mortified to find her own purposes aligned with those of Borsk Fey’lya. “That may frighten me more than the Yuuzhan Vong.”

Fixing his mind on the driving rhythm of Vaecta’s chanting voice, Tsavong Lah thought of Yun-Yuuzhan’s sacrifices, of the eyes he had surrendered to light the stars and the tentacles he had given to make the galaxies. As the gods had done in their time, now the Yuuzhan Vong must do in theirs. Today’s victory would establish the left pincer of his final attack, so it was his left hand that he laid on the cutting block. He understood the place of faith as his predecessors had not; that was why he would succeed where they had died or floundered.

That was why Tsavong Lah had requested the return of the priest Harrar, his own spiritual guide and the only person he would trust to advise him on the offerings necessary to ensure victory to the Yuuzhan Vong. He would have liked to have Harrar lead the ritual himself, but it would not do to insult Vaecta. Today, Harrar would stand at his side as a witness and a friend, not a priest.

As Vaecta blessed the radank claw the shapers would attach in place of his sacrificed hand, Tsavong Lah gazed out at the steamy blue-green disk of Borleias, now swaddled in a flashing meshwork of energy bolts and plasma streaks. By all accounts a world completely lacking in resources useful to the enemy, it was nevertheless an ideal staging area for a strike against Coruscant itself and therefore fortified both heavily and cleverly. The infidels had arranged their orbital defenses in three layers, with the heavy platforms on the exterior, the smaller fast-targeting platforms on the interior, and a dense shell of space mines between.

A plasma ball the size of a small moon finally overloaded the shields of a heavy platform and reduced the unliving abomination
to a melting mass of metal, but the island-ship that had made the attack paid dearly for success. A cone of meters-thick turbolaser bolts converged on the vessel, overwhelming its singularity projectors and blasting four huge breaches into the hull. The ship began to bear away, the life inside gushing into open space, a swarm of infidel missiles streaking out from the heavy platforms to complete the kill.

Seef, his communications attendant, stepped into his view bearing the already everted villip of Maal Lah, a shrewd officer from the warmaster’s own domain and the supreme commander charged with securing today’s victory. Though Tsavong Lah could see the alarm in his subordinate’s face, he waited in humbleness until Vaecta finished her blessing, then gestured at the villip.

“Is it permitted?”

Vaecta nodded. “The gods are never offended by one who answers to his duty.”

The priestess immediately began to make the obeisances that would be required to Yun-Yuuzhan and the other gods before dedicating the warmaster’s sacrifice to the Slayer, and Tsavong Lah turned to the villip.

“Your commanders grow too bold,” he said.

“They are eager to win your praise,” the villip replied. The image was that of a square-jawed warrior with so many battle swirls that he been forced to start laying red tattoos over blue. “I have warned them that they will not do so by risking their vessels here.”

“But you favor bolder tactics yourself,” Tsavong surmised.

“I understand the need to conserve ships, Warmaster. Coruscant is well defended.”

Tsavong Lah was surprised. After the loss of the great ship, he had expected the supreme commander to argue for an insertion assault to lay dovin basal gravity traps in the inner ring of defense platforms. Costly as the tactic was, it would quickly clear their way to the planet by pulling the minefield down onto the inner ring of orbital platforms. Provided enough of the assault force survived to actually execute the plan, it would also telegraph the tactic he intended to use to clear the far more formidable defenses around Coruscant.

“You are to be commended on your patience, Maal Lah.” The warmaster looked out at the battle, where Borleias’s dark moon was just swinging around the horizon, tiny flecks of crimson fire erupting in a jagged line down its murky face. “How are matters on the moon?”

“The infidels are putting up a stiff resistance, but they cannot hold much longer,” Maal Lah assured him. “The dovin basal will be on the surface within the hour.”

They had sent three assault divisions to install a giant dovin basal on Borleias’s dark moon. Instead of crashing the satellite into its planet as the Praetorite Vong had done on Sernpidal, however, the dovin basal would be used to sweep the planetary defenses out of position. Given the moon’s thirty-two-hour orbit, the stratagem would take more than a day to execute fully, but it would also conserve ships and avoid alerting the infidels to his plan for Coruscant.

Vaecta took Tsavong Lah’s coufee from its sheath and began to cut a ritual offering from the thigh of the shaper who would attach the radank claw to his wrist. Realizing he had only a few moments before he would be fully consumed by the ceremony, the warmaster returned his attention to Maal Lah’s villip.

“You have matters well in hand, my servant.” Tsavong Lah could not help being secretly disappointed. As the warmaster, it was his privilege to decide
what
was to be done and how, but once the battle started, the actual doing fell to his subordinates. “But I doubt that is what you wished to report.”