“A mercenary for your own people.”
“The irony isn’t lost on me.”
“You’re out of touch. More Mandalorians are heading back home.”
Home. “There aren’t that many. And what’s home?”
“You’ve no idea how many Mando’ade there are, have you? Plenty. Not just your troops and bounty hunters. People who’ve kept their culture alive all across the galaxy. Just like your father was adopted by Jaster Mereel, the culture gets passed on.”
“You know a lot about me.”
“More than you know about yourself, obviously.” Mirta was actually angry. Fett could see the color in her cheeks. Her voice had tightened and raised a pitch. “My dad said a Mand’alor should be like a father to his people.”
“I don’t need a lecture in responsibilities from a kid.”
“Well, your daughter wanted to kill you because you walked out on her and her mother, so I’ll take it that responsibility isn’t your strong suit.”
Fett was used to fear, deference, or awe. He hadn’t seen much defiance in his adult life—not for long, anyway. Mirta didn’t seem to care if he dumped her out of the air lock.
My own kid. I had what Dad wanted so badly, and I threw it away.
“I was sixteen,” he said. “Sintas was eighteen. The only females I knew as a kid were a Kaminoan and a changeling bounty hunter. Doesn’t equip you to be a family man. I tried.”
“Yeah.”
Fett never let himself get angry. To be angry, you had to care; and the only person he had ever cared about was his father.
But this girl had touched a nerve. “Maybe I’d have grown up a nice guy if a Jedi hadn’t cut my dad’s head off in front of me.”
“It’s hard to lose a parent.”
“Where are yours?”
“Dad’s dead.”
“Mother?”
“Haven’t seen her in a while.”
“You’ll grow up as bitter as me, girl.”
“Already have,” said Mirta. “Already have.”
There was nothing more to say. He’d already said too much; and he had to warn Beviin not to mention that they all knew that Ailyn was hunting Han Solo. He laid in a course for Drall and wondered what he would say to Ailyn when he finally caught up with her.
For the first time in his life, he suspected it would be Sorry.
HIGH COUNCIL CHAMBER, JEDI TEMPLE, CORUSCANT.
Luke knew events had reached the point where he could do nothing to pull the Alliance back from confrontation with Corellia; there was only damage limitation. A blockade was the least destructive option.
He had already decided not to press Cal Omas to step back from the brink. He wasn’t even sure that Omas could do that if he wanted to. The Jedi council sat in a grim circle, as it must have done many times in the face of war over the millennia, and seemed to look to him for an answer.
Corran Horn—Corellian, stubborn, unperturbed—was there. At least Jacen had the decency not to round up a senior Jedi Master in his purges.
“I think we’ve exhausted diplomacy,” Luke said.
“A blockade is simply going to rally other worlds to Corellia’s cause,” said Horn. “And don’t think I’m saying that as wish fulfillment because I’m Corellian. I’m just reading the mood like everyone else.”
“Attacking Corellia directly isn’t going to achieve anything different. And letting Corellia have its way is going to encourage every other government to follow suit.”
“Then the only question is to ask what the role of the Jedi council is going to be in this.”
“Same as it’s always been,” said Kyle Katarn. “Looking for a peaceful solution, but ready to fight for the Alliance if called upon.”
Cilghal interrupted. “With respect, Master Skywalker, there is a question we all appear to be unwilling to mention.”
“Which is?”
“The actions of Jacen Solo.”
Luke avoided Mara’s eye. She was sitting to one side, staring intently at her datapad on the table in front of her, and she didn’t use her standing as secretary of the council to ask Cilghal to table the question formally. Mara had never been one for slavish adherence to procedure.
“If you want to raise that, let’s be specific.” Luke fought down a reflex to turn to Mara and say, See? They noticed it, too! He knew perfectly well what he saw. The only reason he wasn’t doing something about it was his own family interests, his own need for peace with Ben and Mara. And that’s not good enough. “I think we’ve all noted the prominence of Jacen in events involving the Corellian community.”
“Since you’re frank enough to say so, then may I ask if you have misgivings about a Jedi being seen to act against civilians like this?” Cilghal squirmed visibly, but Luke admired her courage for confronting him when nobody else seemed willing to point out that his nephew was behaving badly by Jedi standards—by any standards. “With your own son accompanying him?”
I’m the Grand Master. I have a duty. Sorry, Mara.
“I’m deeply troubled by it.”
There was a collective intake of breath.
“Is that it?” said Kyp Durron.
“I have no control over Jacen. He exists outside the Jedi order, and he isn’t Ben’s Master, and Ben is not his apprentice.”
Luke could feel—and see—eleven pairs of eyes turning to Mara. Luke knew it was unfair to expose a family argument to high council scrutiny, but this was no longer just a couple disagreeing over their child’s education. Jacen is turning dark. I have to have the courage of my convictions.
Mara looked up and her expression was set like permacrete in neutral calm. “I’m not sure if I should take part in this discussion. I have to declare an interest.”
“Let’s put this another way,” said Katarn. “It’s an embarrassment for the Jedi order to see the son and nephew of the Grand Master kicking down doors with the boys in black.”
“But you accept that the Galactic Alliance Guard is acting legally?”
“Unpalatably but legally, yes.” Katarn and Cilghal had now formed up into a definite but respectful attack, as if they were relieved that they weren’t imagining it all. “It’s the involvement of Jedi in it that we’re most uncomfortable with.”
Ah. We. Luke was ripped apart at that moment: he had either to humiliate his wife or deceive the high council because of his own personal fears. It didn’t matter that his word was law here. He knew he was on thin ice.
“I am, too,” he said at last. “I’ll be asking Ben to withdraw from operations with the Guard.”
“He’s thirteen,” said Durron. “You should be telling him.”
Mara said nothing, but Luke could feel her boiling inside. He knew what would happen when the meeting was over. But she had the grace not to argue with him in front of the high council.
“Jacen’s clearly popular with the public,” Durron added carefully. “And more than one of us in this chamber has gone to some extremes and come back okay, so maybe we should be making an effort to help him identify more with the order.”
“Meaning?” said Luke.
“It’s time he became a Master. We all know what he can do.”
Luke had a sudden image of his father. His sense of déjà vu was both comforting, because his father had been redeemed, and terrifying—terrifying because Vader had once been a Jedi prodigy, too, a decent young man, but the dark side had claimed him nonetheless. And it might well claim Jacen. Luke could taste it.
It’s not frustration at not being a Master. He’s gone dark. And he’s not the only darkness I can feel.
Luke wondered why Lumiya had come back and knew it wasn’t to see how much her old homeworld had changed since she’d been away.
But it wasn’t the time to mention Lumiya. He turned his mind back to Jacen’s status in the order.
“Let me think about that,” said Luke.
The meeting broke up shortly afterward. Mara said nothing to Luke until they were well out of ea
rshot, sitting in their speeder on the way back to the apartment.
“I want Ben away from Jacen,” Luke said at last.
“Honey, we’ve discussed that …”
“I’m sorry it came up in the meeting, but I can’t turn a blind eye to it any longer. It stops now. No thirteen-year-old should be out on raids with Jacen’s secret police.”
“Or with Jacen at all, right?”
“Mara, everyone sees it.”
“He’s having a bad affair.”
“Bad affair? He’s interning Corellians! You heard Cilghal. I’m not delusional. Have you spoken to Leia? Han?” Don’t mention Jaina. “I haven’t heard a word from my sister and my best friend in days. If you genuinely believe there’s nothing odd or worrying about Jacen right now, then open up that comlink and call Leia and ask her what she thinks.”
“Okay, and if she says yes, her son’s turning into Palpatine, what do we do? Drag Ben away from him kicking and screaming?”
“If need be, yes.”
“When did you last talk to Ben?”
Too long ago. “When he came back after being gassed.”
“Well, I speak to him most days and he’s a changed kid. He’s happy, he’s respectful, he’s calm. He’s grown up, Luke. Jacen did that.”
“Well, bully for Jacen. I still don’t want our boy being trained by him.”
“So you can tell Ben he’s back to square one, then.”
“I will.”
“And then you can work out who’s going to take him on.”
“Maybe I’ll have to do it for a while.”
“Oh, that’ll work …”
And this was why they had come to this point: because there was nobody else who could handle Ben like Jacen could. Luke was no further forward. But he could ask Jacen not to take him on raids.
As for Jacen being seen as the Jedi who kicked down doors … he couldn’t touch him. People were reassured by his hard line. And even if the Jedi order threw him out—by whatever mechanism they might have to draw up for that—Jacen would still be a massively powerful Force-user, and nothing could take that from him.
It was probably better to have him inside the tent than outside throwing rocks. For the time being, anyway.
Mara wasn’t stupid. So why wouldn’t she concede that Jacen was dangerous?
“There’s something else you need to know, honey,” said Luke. “And it’s not good.”
“It can’t be worse than this.”
“It could be.” It was time. Luke couldn’t hold it back any longer. He was grateful for the autonavigating skylanes of Coruscant, because he doubted if he could have flown straight unaided right then. “Lumiya’s back. I don’t know where, or how, but she’s back.”
chapter thirteen
Unless Corellia reconsiders its intention to make Centerpoint Station operational again, in contravention of the Senate instruction to all member states to disarm, I have no option but to authorize sanctions against Corellia in the form of traffic interdiction. A naval blockade of Corellia will begin at 0500 tomorrow unless undertakings are given that Corellia will not rearm. This means that no vessel will be permitted to enter or leave Corellia or any of its industrial arbiters.
—Chief of State Omas,
to the Senate and the Corellian ambassador
ALLIANCE FLEET FLAGSHIP OCEAN, CORELLIAN SYSTEM, 0459 HOURS CORUSCANT TIME.
Admiral Cha Niathal checked her personal chrono and then looked up at the bridge bulkhead to check the ship’s readout.
“Any signals?”
Jacen hadn’t seen Flag Lieutenant Vio’s eyes leave the comm console for an hour. If Corellia had backed down, he’d have known.
“None, ma’am,” said Vio.
“I’ll take that silence as a get lost, then,” she said. “Flag, make this to all ships. Interdiction measures are now in force. Corellia is under blockade.”
The ships had taken up stations in two distinct zones, one encircling Corellia at two hundred thousand kilometers, the other between the surface of the planet and the orbiting factory complexes and shipyards where Corellia’s industrial heart lay. Corellia was cut off now from outside traffic and—more significantly—from its own factories and power stations.
Jacen watched the deployment of the ships, from destroyers to fast patrol craft, on the tactical holodisplay that mirrored the larger chart in Ops. Nearly three hundred small craft now patrolled the inner cordon, ready to stop traffic movement from Corellia’s surface to the industrial orbiters. Beyond the orbital ring, destroyers and cruisers waited for the inevitable.
“Anyone laying bets as to who comes to Corellia’s aid first?” Jacen asked Vio. He knew that crews couldn’t resist that kind of thing.
Vio didn’t blink. “Jabiim and Rothana are obviously favorites …”
“Rothana?” Jabiim was always swimming against the tide. Its national sport was intransigence. “Why Rothana?”
“More to observe than support. Shipyard rivalry thing.”
Niathal eyed the holochart and waited. There were a million flights a day through inner Corellian space; the first confrontation would come very soon.
“I was going to ask why the Supreme Commander is out here and not back at Fleet Ops running the show from there,” Jacen said quietly.
“Same reason the head of the Galactic Alliance Guard is on the front line.” Niathal watched the unnaturally frozen chart that should have been showing the transponder icons of thousands of commercial vessels going about their business. “To be seen.”
Ocean hummed and throbbed with the mechanical voices of a thousand systems, feeling almost like a living creature to Jacen. It was fascinating to be close to something that had no living substance and so wasn’t transparent to his Force-senses. He could only influence Ocean using the physical Force. He couldn’t feel her.
He sought Ben in the Force, magnifying his own presence to reassure him. The boy was back on Coruscant, safe in the care of Captain Shevu. He’d wanted to accompany Jacen, but, as Jacen pointed out, he needed his liaison to stay with the Guard. Ben was enjoying his newfound status as part of a team that respected his skills, and took little persuading.
He had shaken off his father’s shadow for the first time. Ben now truly believed he was a person in his own right, and not just the Skywalker kid. Jacen admired his resilience: he knew what it was to be the child of political celebrities, but being a Solo carried nothing like the stifling expectation of being Luke Skywalker’s son.
“Ansta has contact at five hundred thousand klicks, ma’am,” the comm officer announced.
Niathal didn’t move a muscle. “So Admiral Cheb gets first bite.”
Jacen could feel Jaina’s anxiety, many decks below in the hangar. He knew she couldn’t feel his, because he had withdrawn from the Force, cloaking himself against detection. For a moment he considered reaching many light-years away, into the Hapes Cluster to brush gently against Tenel Ka’s presence, but he didn’t dare. He tried not to think of her at all. Even thought might put her at risk of discovery if he was careless. Lumiya’s Force skills were still not to be taken for granted, and Tenel Ka and Allana were in a far more dangerous position than he would ever be.
It was time to make his impressions on the thousands of officers and ratings in the interdiction task force. “Permission to put Rogue Squadron on alert five, ma’am?”
“Carry on, Colonel Solo.”
Reputations spread like wildfire in ships. Jacen knew what he wanted his to be: the officer who would never shirk his responsibility, and who would never ask anyone to do what he wouldn’t do himself.
It made you friends. Jacen knew he would need every one of them in the months to come.
HIGH-SECURITY CELL BLOCK, GALACTIC ALLIANCE GUARD HEADQUARTERS, CORUSCANT.
Ben checked his comlink and saw that he now had five calls waiting from his father. When he was with Jacen, he felt shielded from the weight of Luke’s presence, but now he felt very alone and hunted.
Ben concentrated on the matter at hand, which was learning from Captain Shevu. Shevu was head-to-head with another captain, Girdun, having one of those whispered angry fights that adults had.
“We have rules,” said Shevu. “And until the Senate tells me those rules have changed, I live by them.”
“Yes, and let’s hear you taking that fine moral stance when someone gets assassinated and we might have stopped it.”
“Prisoners get five hours’ break from questioning in twenty-four. You want to do it different? Not on my watch.”
The man and woman they had detained in the apartment block were in separate holding cells. The man was a smalltime Corellian agent—possibly called Buroy, possibly not—who had been identified from the NRI’s database. The woman was probably Kiffar, judging by her facial tattoo, and her name was Ailyn Habuur. Shevu had taken a comlink from her and it had stored three messages since she’d been captured, all from someone called Mirta Gev.
Shevu got his way. Girdun stalked off.
“You don’t have to stay,” said Shevu, tapping the security code into the cell’s lock.
Ben was afraid that if he went back to the apartment, his father would find him and confront him, and that he wouldn’t have the will to stand up to him. Either that—or they’d fight, and Ben hated having fights. “I might be able to help.”
The doors slid open. Shevu gave him a dubious look. “This is just a regular interrogation, the way we did it in CSF. If you can mind-influence, great. If not, don’t worry.”
“You know we do that?”
“I don’t think it’s classified information somehow.”
Ailyn Habuur was sitting at a table, hands on the surface in front of her. She was handcuffed, and her face still bore the marks of the scuffle when she was arrested. The tattoo that surrounded her left eye was unnerving, and she was the hardest-looking woman Ben had ever seen: wiry and unsmiling, with thin, sinewy forearms that made her look as if she spent her time strangling people.
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