"There is something moving here, something we cannot see," Eshkar Niin said.
He sat with his apprentice in his personal quarters. A long day of scouring over information on piled datapads had turned into night, and Draco was finally showing his long-rising frustration.
"Nothing seems suspect," Draco sighed. "No cash injections into Konrad Rus' accounts, or Seniac's."
"That it looks perfect is all the more reason to suspect it," Niin said. "What about the intelligence reports indicating a Vong fleet in the Unknown Regions?"
"Those are more suspect. We haven't found any verification and they haven't lead to anything solid."
"Those reports popped up just in time to sway an historic vote on the Moff Council. That can't be a coincidence."
"But we haven't found anything unusual about Seniac. No hints of secret meetings, no credits in his bank accounts, nothing."
"Look deeper, apprentice." Niin tapped one of the datapads. "Something moves here beneath the surface. Perhaps none of the Council members, not even Veed or Geist, are knowingly a part, but a game is being played."
Draco forced himself upright in his chair and look over the datapad. That one contained an index of the intel reports suggesting a Vong fleet buildup, with a focus on the provenance of each claim. "I see no pattern here," Draco said with a sigh. "Some of these reports come from third-parties not even affiliated with the Empire."
"So the reports claim. All those third-party sources in the Unknown Regions would be very hard to contact without Intel's know-how. Some might not even exist. Since we can't be sure, focus on what we can know. Look at Imperial agents who made the reports. Try to find a connection."
Draco looked markedly unenthusiastic about the prospect. Like too many young Imperial Knights, he was full of ardor and ambition but thought serving his Emperor came down to how well he swung a lightsaber. He wanted greatness and was impatient on achieving it. Niin had been much like Draco when younger, and even now, deep inside, he aspired to be greater than he now was. Niin had also learned that not all battles were fought with lightsabers; the most important were won by knowledge, careful planning, and long-term strategy. Their opponent here was a masterful player. Niin couldn't help but admire them for it.
Draco drew himself upright and began looking over the data again. With a faint smile, Niin said. "I'll get us both some caf."
Niin took his time preparing stimulant drinks for the two of them. After that he joined Draco at the table and began reviewing files. After an hour or so a pattern started to emerge, but he held back from speaking to see if Draco noticed as well. It took a while, but eventually his apprentice did.
"All of these intel reports came from either current or former subordinates to Moff Calixte,"
"Excellent," Niin said. "What can you tell me about her?"
"I know she's one of Seniac's top deputies. She has a ship of her own and she was the first one to report the Vongforming devastation."
"Yes, I thought that an interesting coincidence."
"You don't believe in coincidence." Draco reached for another datapad containing senior official profiles. He pulled up Calixte's biographical file and skimmed it over. "She's risen the ranks pretty quickly over the past decade. She's been with Intel all her adult life. A lot of this is still classified but it says she did lots of field work outside Imperial Space, mostly in the Corea and the Colonies."
"Where was she born? What about her family?"
"It says here she's from Jaemus. Mother dead in a speeder accident. Father dead from a congenital disease. No siblings. Married to Admiral Rulf Yage for a total of sixteen months, now divorced. One offspring, age ten. That's something to poke at quietly."
"Education?"
"Civilian schools on Jaemus, followed by Intel training. Details classified, naturally."
"Naturally," Niin echoed. "How does that all strike you?"
Draco's lips twisted in thought. "Except for her ascension over the past decade, everything seems very… normal."
"Too much so?"
Draco nodded. "Nothing in that record hints at someone whose career would rocket her to Seniac's right hand."
"No. It doesn't, does it?"
"Well," Draco said, "What do you suggest we do about her? All we've got is suspicion."
"I know. And Calixte might not have anything to do with any of this… But she might. We'll have to investigate her background and watch her without letting her know she's being watched. And anyone in Calixte's line of work will be very alert, so we must be careful."
"We should keep looking at our other options also."
"Very true, apprentice."
"This will be a lot of work, Master Niin. Have you thought about bringing more Knights on to help?"
The Iktotchi shook his head. "We can't afford the risk. It's hard enough for two men to keep a secret."
Draco's eyes went wide. "You doubt the loyalty of the other Knights?"
"No, but the more people are involved, the less safe any secret becomes. Calixte is the type of person who'd know that."
The young human nodded soberly. "I understand, Master. I guess this will be the whole of our activities for a while."
"For a while, yes."
Draco tried a faint smile. "Then I guess it's good the Emperor has pledged to keep us out of any fighting."
He said it like a man trying unsuccessfully to convince himself. Niin was not entirely convinced the rightness of the Emperor's choice, but that was not a doubt he'd voice to his apprentice. Doubts or not, they'd serve Roan Fel as they'd sworn to. Master and apprentice had that much, at least, in common.
-{}-
"The vote tally's come in from the Hapan Senate," Elliah told her husband. "They've decided to remain neutral in whatever comes."
"Good news at last," Roan said.
His tone was labored, bitter. He stood before the broad window of their personal chamber, a silhouette against the nighttime glow of Ravelin's skyline. Elliah approached her husband from behind and placed a hand on his shoulder. He didn't react visibly, but she detected a slight softening from him in the Force.
"The vote was bound to go that way," she told him. "The Hapans never rebuilt their military to what it was before. They couldn't throw in much to this fight even if they wanted to."
"Make sure they know the Empire doesn't hold their decision against them."
"I will." After a pause she asked, "Have Eshkar and Draco found anything?"
"Perhaps," he said, and nothing else. She knew she wouldn't get any more.
Since the vote at the Moff Council, Roan had entered a state of brooding quiet. After almost thirty years, Elliah knew her husband's tendency to withdraw. Emotions were not meant to be shared and flaunted; they were not meant to be seen at all, not when you were a royal figure held up as the symbol of power and righteousness for billions of beings. Having been raised by Hapan aristocrats, Elliah knew that well. But she also knew that there was humanity in Roan and his Imperials nurtured by their noble purpose; that was what had drawn her to the Imperial Knights, and Roan in particular.
She sidled next to him and hooked her arm around his. She sent feelings to him in the Force; soft, warm. He yielded just a little more.
"We are being pulled by an unknown hand," Roan said, almost in whisper. "I should have seen this coming. I should have prevented it. That I didn't is a black mark against me. An emperor should be stronger than that."
"No emperor can see everything. Even with the Force."
"It's still a failing. And for that the galaxy is led to a darker place." He allowed a tiny sigh. "I think I became… complacent. Soft."
"You've never been a soft man," she said, without judgment.
"For my whole reign, the Empire achieved victory without war. But this Empire- the empire my father and grandfather built- came through war. This next one will either destroy or preserve it. I can't let it fall. I have a legacy that must be passed on to Marasiah."
She felt the anger surge within him and combine with intent. "We can't fight darkness with darkness. We're Imperial Knights and sworn to the light."
"And will the light be enough to save our Empire? Look at the Jedi. They should have never launched the Ossus Project in the first place. Their idealism will drag the whole galaxy into darkness."
"But they still serve the light."
"Perhaps. But they've unwittingly aided the dark." As have I, she felt from him.
"That's no reason to wittingly invite the dark." She moved her hand down to grip his firmly. "Remember that, husband. If you do that, you betray everything your father and grandfather built. Then you destroy the legacy yourself, not your hidden enemy." Elliah felt her words get through to him; felt a flush of shame. She added, very softly, "Do not let your pride destroy you, husband."
"Your point is well taken." He squeezed her hand. "I'm fortunate to have you at my side, keeping me honest with myself."
"The way out of this won't come through pride, or fear, or anger," Ellih said. "I don't know where it will come from, but we can find it together. I promise."
-{}-
The Oyu'baat tapcafe had stood at the heart of Mandalore's capital Keldabe for centuries, maybe millennia. It looked the part, with stone walls, hand-carved wooden tables and chairs, an authentic flame furnace, and coverless windows through which strong wind whistled on cold, fire-warmed winter nights. Regardless of season, day, or hour, the storied watering hole was invariably packed with armored warriors who'd removed their T-visor helms to swig from bucket-sized cups of ale and swap outrageous lies about past exploits.
It was also, in the deliberately informal manner of Mandalorians, the site of countless history-changing parlays and decisions. This bout of deal-making took place in a private dining room, where three figures sat on either side of a low-slung wooden table laden-down with hot meals and cold beverages.
One on side: three women, unarmored. Chereth Calrissian was in the center; Marin had been surprised when she'd volunteered to come to Mandalore, but Chereth had insisted that for high-level business negotiations it would be critical to have a high-level businesswoman doing the talking. She'd been right, and she'd done most of the talking so far. Marin, who wore a similar suit and had been introduced as Chereth's assistant, mostly watched. The third woman, on Chereth's other side, wore a simple tunic instead of the black-and-blue beskar she'd once sported. Tamar Skirata had a turbulent history as a Mandalorian, but by now she'd settled into the role of respected matriarch for her clan. Marin knew she looked like her mother thirty years younger, and she hoped Tamar's short-cropped white hair and age-worn features obscured the resemblance.
On the other side: three men, all in beskar armor, helmets removed for the purpose of eating, drinking, and negotiating. In the center was the reigning Mand'alor, Chernan Ordo. The gleam of his silver-white armor was in stark contrast to the dark tone of his face but somehow matched the bright inquisitive glare in his eyes. He'd brought two of his lieutenants along. One was a red-haired man in green armor with violet highlights named Kral Vevec. Marin had never met him, but she'd heard of him spoken of as one of Ordo's long-time supporters.
The other man wore green and gold armor and had introduced himself as Yaga Auchs.
It took all Marin's effort not to stare. He had a lean face, with a brush of short-cut brown hair running down the middle of his head. She'd seen that face before, on a frightened soft-faced boy, twenty-seven years ago as she'd fought him and killed his father, Kaynar Auchs. She'd killed Yaga's uncle too, Mand'alor Gevern Auchs, eight years before that. She'd been defending her mother at the time and hadn't even meant to take Gevern's head from his shoulders; it had been the first time she'd killed anyone. With Kaynar it has been different. That had been blood for blood, retribution for Kaynar's murder of two Skiratas, which was in turn revenge for Gevern.
Marin had stopped calling herself a Jedi- or a Fel, or a Skirata- shortly thereafter.
That terrified boy's face had haunted Marin for years, hounding her with guilt and shame. It wasn't until she'd settled down with Benet and had Ania that she finally felt she'd escaped it. And now, just like the rest of her past lives, it was all coming back on her.
Blood feuds were an old custom on Mandalore, and they very often spun out of control. After Kaynar's death, a Mando magistrate had ruled the scales of vengeance balanced out: two dead Skiratas for two dead Auchs. The Skiratas had been in no mood to pursue things further. Yaga, just a teenager, with no other family members willing to back him, had slunk away, presumably to a life of petty bounty hunting or assassin work.
But now he was right here, at the Mand'alor's side, directly across the table from Tamar. That was the one small mercy; if Marin was forced to look directly into that face she didn't think she'd be able to take it. Tamar, to her credit, took his glares with aplomb. She didn't meet his eyes and didn't rise to any bait.
"I never thought I'd see Mandos doing dirty work for jeti," Auchs shook his head.
"They've worked for Sith before," said Tamar, "This is just the other side of the coin."
Auchs' scowl deepened. He didn't need any reminder that his uncle Gevern had been close to Sith and gotten killed over it. Ordo frowned as well and said, "Force-users are generally trouble, no matter which way it goes. But what really matters is whether they can pay."
"We've already agreed on a price," Chereth said evenly. It had taken thirty minutes of haggling and they'd ultimately agreed on a hefty fee.
"True, assuming you're good for it. Those jeti monastic robes don't scream excess wealth."
"The Jedi Order's finances are well in order and certainly capable of paying you for a one-time service."
"And you know this, how? You've told us you're no Jedi."
"I'm just their financial advisor." Chereth gave a confident, tightlipped smile.
"Interesting how they didn't send anyone to speak on their behalf." Ordo's eyes passed over the three women and lingered on Marin.
"Anissa is no Jedi," Chereth said. They'd agreed on Marin's pseudonym right before the meeting. "Just a valued assistant."
"So we can rest assured nobody's reading our minds," Auchs said sarcastically and looked at Tamar. That Marin's mother had had an unsuccessful stint at Ossus was no secret, not to a man with a lifelong vested interest in the Skirata family. Auchs might have also heard the rumor that Tamar had birthed a daughter with a Jedi.
"Think of it this way," Tamar said. "Once the Mandos ride to the Jedi's rescue, they can lord it over the Force-users for the next hundred years."
Vevec looked intrigued. Auchs snorted and kept glaring. Chereth broke the tension by removing a datacard from her vest and placing it in the center of the table, next to the remnants of Ordo's spiced nerf dish. "This contains access info for a special account. Twenty minutes after we leave here you'll see an initial deposit of twenty percent of the agreed fee. You'll get forty percent more if you bring the agreed-on number of Mandos to Ossus within three days. The remaining forty percent will be released if and only if your people get into a combat situation."
"You sounded pretty sure of that," Vevec said.
"What if the Alliance decides to ride to your rescue?" asked Ordo.
"It doesn't effect your payment. If your people engage the enemy at all, you'll get paid the last forty percent."
"I suppose we have to trust the jeti to be honest," groused Auchs.
"By my reckoning the Jedi are a lot more trustworthy than some of our other past employers," said Tamar.
That got her another glare from Auchs, but Ordo took the datacard delicately. "Twenty minutes," he said.
"I just need to get back to my ship and access my accounts," said Chereth.
The card disappeared into his palm. "Then you'd best get going."
Chereth didn't budge. "So we have a deal? Ten thousand warriors over Ossus within the next four days?"
"You've got it."
Auchs scowled again but didn't argue with his Mand'alor. Ordo stood up and extended a hand across the table. Chereth did the same and they shook. Two minutes after that the three women slipped out the front doors of the Oyu'baat into the narrow winding streets of Keldabe, making their fastest route to the spaceport where Runaround was parked.
As they walked Tamar took out a portable comlink and whispered a few words of Mando'a that Marin still, more or less, understood. A couple Skiratas were hanging in the street behind them, covering their backs and watching for tails.
"I wish I'd known Yaga Auchs was going to be there," Marin said once she was done.
Tamar shook her head. "I had no idea, I'm sorry."
"What is he, part of some rival clan?" asked Chereth.
"Something like that." Marin definitely wasn't getting into the details.
"I knew Auchs had been making overtures to the Mand'alor," Tamar said. "Trying to get into his good graces."
"Ordo has a reputation as a bridge-builder," Marin recalled.
"Exactly." Tamar threw Chereth a scrap of explanation. "Auchs' uncle used to be Mand'alor. He was the one who hired his people out as a Sith Lord's private army during the Senex-Juvex Crisis."
Chereth nodded. "I remember hearing about that from my father."
"Later Gevern worked with the Restorationists against Davek Fel and got killed over it. Ultimately, the Auchs fell into disgrace and obscurity. But I guess Yaga had enough backing to end up one of the Mand'alor's lieutenants. As you can see he's no fan of the Skiratas. Or the Jedi."
"I don't like him sitting on Ordo's shoulder," said Marin.
Tamar shrugged, noncommittal. "Like you said, Ordo builds coalitions. And you can bet having Auchs in the room today was a negotiating tactic."
"I thought as much," Chereth said. "He acted extra-hostile, Vevec was more conciliatory. Ordo got to present himself to us as a moderating authority figure."
"I don't think Auchs's hostility was an act, but that's about right. You pick Mando posturing pretty quick."
"Business is business. Some tactics are pretty universal."
"I still didn't like being there with him." Marin sighed and asked her mother, "Did you pick up anything from him in the Force?"
"You mean besides hostility?" The old woman shook her head. "He felt pretty straight-forward, actually. And his anger was directed at me more than you."
"That's something," Marin muttered. She ignored the question in Chereth's look.
"I think Vevec was putting on more of a front," Tamar continued. "Like you said, he was playing a pro-Jedi role. Inside he's more skeptical."
"What about Ordo?" asked Chereth. "He's the one that really matters."
"I didn't sense any duplicity. I sensed he was mostly worried about convincing his men to fight with Jedi. But Mandos will do anything for enough money."
They dropped into silence as they continued the brisk walk back to the spaceport. Eventually Chereth said, "Tendrandro needs to hire some Jedi as consultants."
"I'll pass that along to my dad." Marin allowed a small smile.
"If they're hard-up for cash, they just might slum for it," said Tamar.
"Well, we're doing what we can to alleviate that too," Chereth said as they passed through the checkpoint and into the spaceport complex. "As we speak, Volgma should be carefully distributing your liquid assets into stocks for maximum profit."
"War is good for business," Marin explained to her mother, not that an old Mando needed to be told.
"Furthermore," Chereth said, "You don't have to worry about forking over that initial twenty percent. My father insisted on taking care of that one."
"Wait, what?" Marin said as they approached Runaround's berth. "You can't use Tendrandro money to pay for-"
"Technically not Tendrando. This first payment's coming from one of my father's personal accounts."
"I… I don't know what to say. Thank you, of course. Thank you so much."
"Calrissians have always been friends to Jedi." Chereth smiled softly.
Once they reached the ship, Marin opened the airlock and ushered Chereth inside. As the businesswoman started up the communications system and got ready to transfer Chance's funds, Marin lingered at the rear of the cabin with her mother.
In a low voice she said, "Ten thousand Mando warriors armed and ready over Ossus. I still can't believe it's going to happen. Mom, are you sure we can trust them?"
"I didn't sense Ordo was lying."
"But things can change. Say, he can get a better offer and instead of showing up with his ten thousand to protect Ossus, he'll come along to slag it instead."
"That's a risk we have to take." Tamar put a hand on her shoulder. "I won't be going on that mission but Jind and some of your other cousins will. They'll keep their eyes and ears open, and if there's any sign of treachery, they'll let the Jedi know."
"That's good. Thanks, Mom."
"You could have used the Force on them too, you know. Gotten yourself a second opinion."
Marin exhaled. "Still trying to stay away from that."
"You have the Force. You can use it in little bits and pieces and it won't make you a Jedi. Or a Sith."
"That may be true for you. But I was raised to be a Jedi. It took me a lot of time to unlearn all that. It took a long time, but not using the Force is what feels natural now. I don't want to risk reversing all that." She didn't want to say that everything else- the Calrissians and Volgma, Keldabe and Mandalore, just talking with her parents- made her feel like she was backsliding hard.
"Do you want me to give your regards to Dad?" she asked instead.
The corner of Tamar's mouth tugged upward, creating that tight, ironic smile she usually got when Arlen was mentioned. "Sure. Has he gotten any joints or vital organs replaced recently?"
"Not that I know of."
"And he's not forgetting where he left the keys to the Champion?"
"He's doing fine."
"In spite of his advanced age? Well, tell him I asked."
"I will." More seriously she added, "Thanks for setting this up on short notice."
"You know, the way things were going, I had a feeling you'd make contact."
"A feeling? Or the Force?"
The old woman shrugged. "It doesn't matter. Major galactic crisis seems to draw our family together."
Marin knew them all, even the ones she hadn't been alive for: the Senex-Juvex Crisis, the Restoration War in the Empire, the liberation of Hapes, now this. Her mother had a point, but inside Marin revolted. "I'm not a Fel anymore, or a Skirata."
"I know. You've gone Solo." Tamar touched her daughter's long hair. "Old ties still bind. Even when you don't want them to."
-{}-
He emerged from rage as though from a dream. The Nagai once called Relik K'sharn found himself sitting among the smoldering ruins of some primitive village. Fire had made blackened husks of thatched-wood huts and alien corpses. Soft wind carried ash and the smell of roasted flesh. When he looked at his hands they were caked in soot and blood; some his own, some from others.
Just barely he remembered the dream of rage: endless motion, killing and killing with any weapon he could find and when those broke he'd used his hands. He'd been impelled by infinite anger and a need that could only be expressed through slaughter.
Beneath that was another layer, even fainter. Beneath the dream of rage was a dream of agony: endless writhing and screaming and pleading for mercy as strange Yuuzhan Vong bio-machinery kept him pinned and trapped and subjected him to one type of pain after another, unceasing in its vicious ministration. The Embrace of Pain, it had been called.
On liberation from that embrace, his first act had been a slaughter.
The Nagai tried to stand up. His weak legs gave out and dropped him on scorched earth and all he could do was look in stunned awe at what he'd wrought. As a warlord for his people he'd created countless scenes such as this, but always with a purpose in mind. Devastation had always been a means toward higher ascension. He'd never destroyed with no other purpose in mind, and never done it all with his own hands.
He was horrified at the powers that lay within him, but also, deep down, amazed at himself. He struggled to reconcile these emotions when a figure emerged from the smoke and stalked purposely toward him. The tall, long-limbed humanoid moved smoothly on birdlike reverse-articulated legs. When it stopped, three-toed feet splayed out a meter in front of the Nagai, Darth Vorkan looked down at him and said, "The first time I experienced the Embrace of Pain, I lashed out and killed the two servants who released me from it. Darth Krayt was impressed that I converted agony into power so easily."
The author of destruction looked into Vorkan's small eyes and tried to judge what he found there. "Are you afraid of me?" he rasped. He wanted to hear a yes.
The Blood Carver surveyed the damaged. "You have a talent for violence. However, to serve the Sith this talent must be tamed, honed, and forged into a useful weapon. You must master yourself. Until then, you cannot be Sith."
That wasn't an answer. "Are you afraid?"
The Blood Carver looked down at him. "You are no danger to me. You are nothing. Perhaps someday it will be different, but not now."
The Nagai felt rage within him resolve like a sharpening memory, but his body was too exhausted to rise. More, Darth Vorkan was right. His powers, for now, were inchoate and unrefined. As a warlord, he knew that training and discipline made an army as much as zeal.
But zeal was also important. He looked around and realized that this pointless, ugly manifestation of primal rage was also a mean of ascension.
"Where are we?" he asked Vorkan.
"A planet called Wayland."
He looked again at the corpses. Humanoid bodies, two legs, four arms. Though most of them had been charred to the bone a few still had flesh intact. He saw patches of rough skin like the coral growth Darth Maladi had shown while proudly explaining her plans.
"This world… Vong-formed?"
"Correct. Everything we've wrought began here. Darth Krayt thought it fitting that your journey begin here, too."
He remembered everything else he'd been shown by Maladi, Vorkan, and Krayt. "What is happening… elsewhere?"
"Events are moving swiftly." Vorkan said with faint pride.
"The fight… against the Jedi?"
"Proceeding, but we will not reveal ourselves. Not yet. There is no need to when our pawns are accomplishing their tasks so well."
"But what is happening?"
"Would you like to see?" Vorkan sounded curious.
The Nagai looked around once more. It seemed slightly absurd to be obsessed with events happening far away when surrounded by such carnage, carnage he had wrought while lost in unthinking rage. But he understood now that everything that had happened was connected; this slaughter on Wayland, the planet's ruination, the design against the Jedi that had taken decades to enact. He was a piece of that design and a small one, but just by being Sith his actions had more import than everything he'd done as a warlord in the Outer Rim. In losing his former power he was accessing a greater one.
"Yes," the Nagai rasped. "I want to be a part of everything. Show me what is happening."
"And you pledge to serve Darth Krayt's design in all things?"
"Of course."
Vorkan extended a three-clawed hand. The Nagai stared at it but did not take it. Instead he found strength to push off the scorched earth and rise on sore, shaking legs. The devastated world spun around him but he steadied himself, drew in a deep breath of ash-filled air, and waited for the scene he'd wrought to go still.
Darth Vorkan let his hands fall to his side. "Come," he said. "The next war is about to begin."