“Yes, I do,” she said. “My name is Arkadia Calimondra. I’m a Sith Lord—and I’m here to help.”
Part Three
THE
ARKADIANATE
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Hyperspace had become a haven for Kerra; her only one, since arriving in Sith space. Suffering might hold sway on either side, but the weird region between stars was something even the Sith could not ruin.
In the past, when she had traveled between worlds under duress, Kerra had always chosen to make the journey. Diligence, instead, had been compelled to follow the crystalline flagship and part of its fleet into the hyperspace lane, under threat of disintegration. She’d wanted to object, but Rusher wasn’t about to deviate from the course he’d been provided. The day in the Dyarchy had simply been too much. The fight had gone out of everyone—herself, included.
They hadn’t been boarded. But before jumping, they’d been ordered to provide information about how many warriors and refugees were aboard Diligence. Kerra disliked admitting there were hundreds of students on board, but she was more worried the invaders might destroy their warship outright. The woman in the hologram somehow seemed to already know their situation anyway.
The new Sith Lord was a puzzle: serious and direct. Kerra had spent part of the hours in hyperspace parsing Arkadia’s few words. Rusher seemed to know nothing of her and her realm. What had the woman’s comm officer called it? The Arkadianate. Another would-be warlord with an eponymous empire. Just what the galaxy needed.
But while Rusher had not recognized the emblem on her flagship—seven interlocking chevrons, one for each color in the visible spectrum—he had recognized the vessel’s name. New Crucible related to Ieldis, a peculiar ancient Sith Lord who was the favorite of a number of philosophical descendants—including, of all people, Odion. The Crucible of Ieldis had been a novel military institution, created by him to transform peaceful subject peoples into talented warriors; several Sith Lords in more recent times had tried to put their own spin on it. Kerra’s heart had sunk on hearing Rusher’s explanation. From one slave pit to another.
Early in the journey, Rusher had gone to his quarters for sleep, or perhaps back to his solarium for fortification. Kerra didn’t know. Fearful of leaving Quillan alone—Diligence had no formal brig—she’d tried to rest on the plush floor nearby, where she could keep an eye on him. She’d found it impossible to sleep for more than an hour at a time, given the bustle of the command pit. But at least one person had remained quiet: Quillan had calmed down with every light-year Diligence put between itself and Byllura.
Kerra gave partial credit for that to Tan. Visiting the bridge to see her former roommate, the Sullustan had spied the distraught Quillan, curled up at the front of the room before his yawning guards. Before Kerra could object, Tan had plopped down on the carpet near the boy, assuming he was just another refugee. In a sense, of course, he was. And as Tan sat chattering away about the sights and sounds of hyperspace around them, Quillan had stopped quaking and started watching her instead.
Kerra had initially feared that the boy was trying to find another potential puppet, but she’d perceived nothing of that in the Force. Rather, the young girl simply seemed to be a calming influence for the troubled teen. Tan was close to Dromika’s age, Kerra realized—and just as child-like, in her own bubbly way. From studying in the shadows of the Tengos’ apartment one week, to serving as playmate to a Sith Lord the next; it made as much sense as anything else.
The rest of the trip had been an exhausted slide. Momentum had carried Kerra far from that first trip to Chelloa all the way to Byllura. But as Diligence and its escorts emerged from hyperspace into a bluish pocket of newborn stars, she was filled with dread. She hadn’t been in control of her destination during the flight to Gazzari, but at least she’d had a plan for after her arrival. Seeing the white world laced with pink striations looming ahead, she knew nothing but the planet’s name. And that had come from their captors.
Syned. Reading what passed for star charts aboard his ship, Rusher had said it rhymed, roughly, with lie dead. She’d thought that was a strange choice of expressions until they got closer. It fit. Syned was a frigid lump. Near to but little warmed by its adolescent star, the globe spun quickly, weak sunlight racing across its surface of water and carbon dioxide ice.
But while that surface had seemed smooth and featureless from orbit, on approach Kerra had seen mammoth slabs tilted diagonally, remnants of tectonic fractures. Elsewhere, bright smears marred the surface, evidence of ancient cryovolcanism. Syned might be lying dead now, but it hadn’t always been a quiet place.
Diligence had been directed to land near an icy outcropping just across a wide basin from what appeared to be a small cluster of green houses. Several other starships sat on the ice nearby. New Crucible didn’t follow them down, instead expelling a shuttle to the A-frame building across the frosty plain.
That had been their cue. Now Kerra and Rusher stood, as commanded, on the surface of Syned, both wearing the space suits the brigadier had produced from the hold. A whisper of oxygen clung to Syned’s surface, but given the temperature, removing the environment suits would have been the first step in a slow suicide.
Weary from her broken sleep, Kerra looked across the terrain for any clues. The basin was one big parking lot. Tracked vehicles had been out on the ice, running between the ships and the hothouses—if that’s what they were. Warmth and Syned didn’t seem to go together.
But neither did the pair at the foot of Diligence’s ramp. Kerra had simply thought it before; now she knew it for certain. Rusher was no ally. She glared at him, holding that silly cane of his, even out here. His space suit was clunky and copper-colored, just like hers—and both would have been considered antiques in the Republic. The man shifted back and forth on the ice; Kerra thought he was trying to find which footing would make him look the most statuesque. No wonder he was working for Daiman.
He looked up at Syned’s tiny star, visibly traversing the sky. “Join Rusher’s Brigade and see the galaxy,” he said over the comlink.
Another joke. Kerra took a step forward, keeping her back to him. “I’m not talking to you,” she said.
“And yet, you are.”
“We didn’t have to follow these people,” Kerra said. “We could have dropped out of hyperspace before getting here!”
“You know that’s not true,” Rusher said, poking his walking stick against the pink ice at his feet. “We had no idea who else was in the lane. We could have collided. Or worse.”
Kerra exploded. “Worse? We’ve just gone from one Sith Lord to another. Again.” She turned to find Rusher chipping at the ground and trying not to chuckle. “Tan and her friends hate to go to sleep anymore! Another day and they could wake up … gaaahh!” Rage outpacing her mouth, Kerra shook her fists theatrically. “They might be running Odion’s deathmills. Or back where they started, shining statues for Daiman!”
Rusher shook as he laughed. “I like this whole not-talking-to-me part,” he said. “Look, kid—Jedi—we were never going to find a place that wasn’t run by Sith. Let’s just be patient and check this one out.”
“I’d like to check it out! I can’t,” Kerra said, opening her fists and looking at her hands. New Crucible had ordered Kerra and Rusher to wait outside, unarmed. Using the hated stealth suit wasn’t an option, either. The Mark VI had a remarkable operating range, but Syned’s temperature was well outside it.
Kerra looked back toward the west and squinted. Just a few minutes earlier, it had been noon in this high latitude; now Syned’s sun was dropping behind the settlement. The two conical tractor beam generators they’d spied from orbit cast the longest shadows, reminding her that, what ever else might happen, Diligence wasn’t going far without permission. Its external weapons were simply too weak.
Squinting against the icy glare, she made out movement. The brigadier had seen it, too. Stepping forward, Rusher flipped the cane into a surprised Kerra’s hands and raised his macrobin
oculars. Kerra looked at the stick and smoldered. I’d like to crack that faceplate with—
“Wow,” Rusher said, lowering the unit. “You have to get a load of this!”
Curiosity trumping annoyance, Kerra reached out and yanked at the macrobinoculars, still looped around Rusher’s armored neck. Pulling the brigadier down, she angled the glasses toward the approaching blur.
Lord Arkadia Calimondra rode across the ice sheet toward them, looking every bit like one of the winter warrior princesses Kerra had seen in her story-holos as a child. Above the furs and armor from before, Arkadia now wore a silvery cape that caught the frigid air as her mount loped across the tundra. The great three-limbed reptile bounded along on clenched fists, its forked tail snaking back and forth behind it.
And amazingly, Arkadia’s face and forearms were exposed to Syned’s cruel climate. Even the creature she rode had a heated air supply, Kerra saw. Arkadia’s sole nod to the elements was the addition of the cape and a museum relic of a headdress. Pulling at the reins with one hand, Arkadia seemed to be enjoying just a brisk day out.
Kerra released the macrobinoculars abruptly, causing Rusher to nearly pitch over. The woman was halfway to them, now. Kerra tried to wipe the fog from her faceplate, to no avail. “What was it the Krevaaki said? A dowager. What’s a dowager?”
“A widow,” Rusher said. “An old woman who owns her late husband’s property, like an estate.”
“She doesn’t look like a widow to me.”
“Maybe. I sure don’t think I’d survive a shore leave with her,” Rusher said, rubbing his gloved hands together. “But it wouldn’t be a bad way to go.”
“Please,” Kerra said. “Try to grow up.”
Before them, the ice-lizard slid to a stop, splaying its palms wide to get a purchase against the ice. Towering above them, Arkadia yanked at the reins. As the Sith Lord twisted atop the creature, Kerra spied a meter-long, ornamented staff, bound to Arkadia’s back.
“Sorry about the circumstances,” Arkadia said, her words precipitating into snow. “Our landing bays aren’t yet large enough to accommodate vessels like yours.” She leaned over and patted the chuffing creature’s snout. “And I can only get the beralyx out for a ride in the summer.”
This is summer? Kerra stared at the newcomer. The woman was twenty-five, maybe thirty at most—and healthy. And for the first time among the Sith Lords she’d met here, Kerra saw face paint: light silvery streaks beneath her eyes, setting off her frost-speckled cheeks and completing the whole warrior-queen look. It was quite a getup.
Arkadia seemed equally bemused. She looked down at Kerra and smirked. “I said no weapons, Jedi.”
“What?” Kerra looked down to see Rusher’s cane, still in her left hand. “Oh,” she said, lifting it in both hands. “Fine.” Abruptly, she brought the care down over her space-suited knee, snapping it in two. She pitched the halves to Rusher, who glared at her and tossed them to the ice.
Arkadia noticed him. “Kerra Holt of the Republic, I spoke to earlier. But who are you, sir?”
“Jarrow Rusher, of Rusher’s Brigade.” He saluted. “That’s my ship you forced down. Diligence.”
“Diligence,” Arkadia repeated. “Like Admiral Morvis’s vessel?”
“The same,” Rusher said, visibly impressed.
The Sith woman spoke matter-of-factly. “His exploits in the First Battle of Omonoth were a fraud, you know.”
Rusher’s smile froze. “You must know something I don’t, then.”
“Probably.”
With thigh-high boots, the woman kicked the reptile into motion. As it loped in a studious circle around the pair, Kerra watched Rusher. The man was dumbstruck, for a change. Arkadia had punctured one of his historical heroes and sounded authoritative in the process.
I’m going to have to study up so I can do that, Kerra thought.
“You wanted us here, ma’am,” Rusher said. “What can I do for you?”
“It’s what I can do for you,” Arkadia said, bringing the beralyx to a stop. “It’s as I said. I’m here to help. You were leaving Byllura when we found you. I understand you have refugees aboard.”
Kerra studied the woman as she dismounted. The Jedi only came up to Arkadia’s chin. “The refugees weren’t from that conflict,” Kerra said. “We’re just passing through.”
“I know,” Arkadia said, raking ice from the nodding beralyx’s eyes. “You told us that. And I am aware of what happened in the Daimanate. To the arxeum they were bound for,” she said.
Rusher looked at Kerra, puzzled. They hadn’t mentioned where their passengers had come from in their transmissions.
Arkadia continued, not looking at them. “I am willing to help your students—and to provide for your ship’s needs, Brigadier. But I need something first.”
Abruptly, she turned toward them. “You do have a refugee from Byllura,” she said, piercing eyes focused on Kerra. “What I really need right now … is to see Quillan.”
Kerra stiffened. “I’m sorry?”
“Don’t toy with me, Kerra Holt,” Arkadia said, looking down. “I know you have Lord Quillan of Byllura aboard your ship. I am prepared to render aid, but only if the boy is produced first.”
Rusher started to move toward the ramp, but Kerra grabbed his arm. “Hold it,” she said. Eyeing Arkadia, she waved her hand. “Look, what ever the boy once was—he isn’t now. I saw what your people did to the Dyarchy ships. I know he was a rival. But he’s not a threat to you now.” She wondered what she was doing, speaking for a Sith—but the pathetic creature under guard didn’t seem to be that. Not anymore. “You don’t have to kill him.”
Arkadia looked down at Kerra, her face betraying no emotions. After an icy moment, she burst into laughter.
“Kill him? Of course, I’m not going to kill him!” she said, smiling broadly. “I’m his sister.”
Still under construction, Arkadia’s citadel had been built inside a series of connected ice calderas. With the collapsed underground reservoirs’ contents having long since boiled off to space, Arkadia’s builders had simply erected a thatch of ice pillars above, topped with a layer of transparisteel. The result had been a massive airtight compartment inside the ice, far larger than it appeared on the surface and roomy enough for an entire city. A creature hiding under a shell, Kerra thought.
And Calimondretta, as Arkadia called it, was as alive as the surface was dead. Emerging from the cab of the trundle car—the tracked ground transport Arkadia had sent to Diligence—Kerra surveyed the great atrium. Hundreds of workers thundered past, crisscrossing artificial flooring stacked with orderly piles of supplies. With Arkadia’s starships forced to park outside, Patriot Hall served as a massive depot. Several ramps led gradually downward from the main floor to large galleries hewn into the glacier.
Only stars shone through the transparent ceiling; night had fallen for the second time in four hours. Syned was the complete opposite of Darkknell and its endless days and nights. But the place was bright, nonetheless, thanks to long tubes embedded in the ice walls. Effervescent blue liquid coursed through them, giving off a warm light. “Our lifeblood,” Arkadia said, turning over the beralyx to a wary green-skinned handler. “Synedian algae.” The seas under the ice sheets were full of the stuff, she explained, drawing energy from thermal vents. Whole sections of Calimondretta were devoted to cultivating and processising the algae, which provided both fuel and food for the settlement. “We use every molecule of it. Nothing is wasted.”
Kerra observed her own breath. “It still doesn’t keep it very warm here.”
“Some guest you are,” Rusher said, stepping out of the trundle car. “Don’t criticize someone living in an ice house for not turning on the heat.”
At least he had that overcoat of his, Kerra saw. He hadn’t bothered to find anything more for Kerra to wear, nor had he spoken to her on the ride over. She figured he was still stinging over the cane incident. But at least she hadn’t done that in front of his crew. What wa
s he upset about?
Her eyes darted to the foot traffic, now flowing around their parked vehicle. After the dismal streets of Darkknell and the robotic misery of Byllura, Syned had plenty of energy to it. The citizens in Patriot Hall looked up and around as they walked, not down at the floor. And most of their clothing was brand new: uniforms of varying colors and styles. Those clearly didn’t all come from the algae.
“We have something for you,” Rusher said, slapping the side of the trundle car. Trooper Lubboon emerged from inside, pushing Quillan down the ramp in a brown hoverchair. His hands fastened to the handles of the antiquated model, Quillan appeared nearly catatonic.
Stepping to the foot of the ramp, Arkadia looked down at the teenager. No trace of emotion crossed her face, and Quillan didn’t respond, either—not even when Arkadia knelt beside him, cape flowing on the chilly floor. Kerra studied the two together. Beyond the high foreheads, she couldn’t see much resemblance—nor a lot of big-sisterly warmth coming from Arkadia. But at least it was a peaceful meeting. Arkadia had assured her earlier that not all Sith siblings were like Daiman and Odion.
“Still hiding in there, little Quillan?” Arkadia said, searching his eyes.
Suddenly the boy moved in his chair. Arkadia appeared startled for a moment before noticing that Tan had scampered up behind her. “Ah. Hello, girl,” Arkadia said. She looked up at Kerra. “Why is she here?”
“I didn’t want to bring her,” Kerra said, grabbing at Tan’s shoulder and pulling her back. “She’s one of the students—I mean, the refugees. But we need to calm Quillan down to move him, and she seems to help.”
Arkadia nodded to the girl and stood, directing Beadle toward an ice portal where her aides waited to take care of Quillan.
“Why did you bring Beadle?” Kerra whispered to Rusher.
“We’re trying to be as unthreatening as possible, remember? The worst thing Lubboon might do is run over her foot with the chair.”
Star Wars: Knight Errant Page 24