A slim hand plucked the unlit lightsaber from his grip. Ben caught a fleeting glimpse of Vestara in motion, flashing past him, before she dropped over the lip of the hill, his weapon in her hand.
Luke never lost consciousness, despite the head-sized rock that grazed his skull and toppled him down the hillside. He rolled and slid, his acrobatic skills keeping him from some of the pounding he might have experienced, and he stayed ahead of the majority of the rockfall. But dazed as he was, he could not avoid all harm. A rock slammed into his chest and he felt a pop in his sternum. Another slab of stone gave way under his weight as he came down upon it and slammed back-first onto a moving stone surface, the world spinning around him.
He leapt free but traveled only three or four meters before he hit another surface. The blow knocked the wind out of him. Stones continued to slide and clatter down toward him, but most of them stopped short of his position. Dimly, he could see the rancor he had been fighting; it was now between him and the base of the hill, lying still, tons of stone atop it.
And he could feel danger above and beyond the natural peril posed by the rockslide. Dark side Force energy was headed his way. He rolled forward, putting another two meters between him and the oncoming rockslide, pressing sharp stony points into his back and neck and legs, and sat up to see four Dathomiri women limned in blue energy running toward him. As they saw him struggling to rise, two slowed their forward pace and lifted their arms, beginning a series of intricate weaving motions.
Luke raised his lightsaber and tried to stand.
Lightning, Force lightning, erupted from the two spell-weavers. It crackled toward him, lethal amounts of energy.
He caught both bolts on his lightsaber blade. At such times, the weapon of the Jedi was more than a concentrated and constrained shaft of energy; it was an extension of himself through the Force, and the blade held the Force lightning at bay. Residual energy reaching him caused his hair to stand on end and the sheer force of the attack drove him back, forcing him down again.
The two nearest Witches were only meters away, and now Luke could see two more rancors break free of the tree line and charge toward him.
This was not good.
THE NEARER WITCHES CAME WITHIN TWO METERS OF HIM, THEIR ARMS raised and weaving spells in new patterns. Luke struggled to rise, could not do so against the press of the lightning and his own dazed condition.
Then there was a thump to his left as Vestara landed atop a flat stone the size of a tabletop. She was within reach of the nearer Witch on the left. She swung the lightsaber in her hand—blue, not the red one she’d wielded in the Maw—at that Witch.
The Witch, a redheaded woman of middle years with purpling blotches on her face, shifted the aim of her spell-weaving. Air superheated in a channel from her to Vestara. The Witches doubtless would have called it fire, but it was plasma.
Vestara took it on her lightsaber blade. She twisted, bracing herself on her right foot, and pivoted into a side kick. The blow took the Witch in the midsection, and Luke could hear ribs break. The Witch staggered back, her plasma attack sliding off sideways to play harmlessly against boulders and loose soil.
Vestara’s attack was more than a successful assault against one Witch. It distracted the others as well. The attention of the two lightning casters wavered. Luke felt the pressure against him falter just a bit—just enough.
He rolled rightward, carrying the lightning assault with him but deflecting more of its energy, and came to his feet—and more, leaping up and toward the nearest Witch to his right. His kick caught her in the chin. He felt bone break under his attack. The Witch fell back, her spell-weaving immediately at an end. She collapsed gracelessly and lay unmoving.
The ground shook as the onrushing rancors came near. They passed the two Witches in the rear. One headed for Luke, one for Vestara.
Luke traversed toward the right. The Witches’ lightning stayed with him. Too late, the Witches recognized his tactic. The crackling streams of lightning crossed over Luke’s rancor.
The lightning jittered over the beast’s body, illuminating it. The beast stumbled in its run, falling forward. Its inadvertent dive brought it below the lightning bolts, which returned to harry Luke. But he caught them on his blade again, and the damage had been done: the rancor lay still, smoke rising from its back. Luke grinned at the Witches, a smile not of humor but of warning.
To his left, Luke saw the second rancor tripping over something, falling toward Vestara—
The something was the Witch closest to Vestara. Somehow the girl had redirected the Witch, perhaps with another kick or an exertion through the Force, and had put her beneath the rancor’s feet. Now the Witch was down, trodden upon, and the rancor was in the middle of an awkward collapse.
Vestara showed it no mercy. With grace and speed worthy of a Jedi Knight, she sidestepped and brought up her blade in a blindingly fast slash. The blow intercepted the rancor’s throat. The beast’s shoulder came to ground centimeters from her feet.
One of the two rearmost Witches diverted her lightning to Vestara. The Sith girl caught it on her blade and was forced backward, taking slow steps and skidding slightly as the energy compelled her into unwilling retreat.
But that left only one on Luke. Pushing, summoning his willpower and technique in the Force, he walked toward his Witch at the same rate Vestara retreated before hers.
He felt the new attack in the Force before he detected its direct effects. There was a pulse of energy from all along the tree line. Then wind howled out of the forest and rushed against him, battering him, adding its strength to that of the lightning.
He couldn’t advance against it, so he rooted himself in place. The wind tore at his clothes and his hair, caused him to squint and shield his face with his free hand. But he could not be put down, could not be pushed back.
He saw winds hammer at the two downed Witches. In a moment the currents caught them up. They rose to an altitude of a couple of meters, the skins they wore rippling and tattering in the wind, and then they hurtled toward the forest. The two Witches pouring Force lightning against him and Vestara also retreated, but they kept their feet and backed away until they reached the tree line and disappeared within it.
Still the wind kept up. Luke saw Vestara pressed up against a sheer rock face at the bottom of the slope.
Now the four rancors that had passed him descended, too. All had blood on them, and clearly most of that blood was not their own. As they reached the base of the hill, they broke into a run and were, moments later, lost in the shadows of the trees.
Then, and only then, did the winds subside.
He looked over at Vestara, who could finally move free of the rock face she’d been pinned against. He gave her a little salute of the lightsaber before he deactivated it. “I’m surprised you came to my aid. Considering the determination you showed when you and your mistress fought me in the Maw.”
Vestara, too, deactivated her weapon—or, rather, Ben’s, as Luke now recognized it to be. She shrugged. “We were enemies then. Now we have a common goal.”
“Which is, exactly, what?”
“Defeat of the Nightsisters, of course. Do you wish me to stay with you?”
He shook his head. “I think Ben will need his lightsaber back.”
Vestara began a graceful ascent of the slope. “If I were you, I’d cut off one of the rancor heads and prop it up on a stone. Give the others something to think about. To fear.”
“Not my style.” After a moment, Luke began climbing up after her, returning to his halfway point.
Ben watched the girl climb. Emotions struggled within him. Gratitude that she’d helped Luke. Suspicion as to her motives. When Vestara clambered over the hill crest, he extended a hand to help her up, and she took it.
“I suppose I should thank you.”
She handed him his lightsaber and flashed him a knowing smile. “But you probably won’t. You’re too surly.”
“Thank you.”
&nbs
p; “Think nothing of it. Nice lightsaber, by the way. Too bad its color is so unfortunate.”
She moved away, back toward the nearest group of Raining Leaves Witches, and Ben hung his weapon from the hook at his belt.
He forced himself to turn his thoughts from Vestara. She was a problem, and likely a danger, but not the most pressing one.
Despite the fact that the Raining Leaves and Broken Columns had driven their attackers off again, despite the fact that three rancors lay dead or unconscious at the foot of the hill, the attack still constituted a loss for the clan members. Another dozen of them were dead, and more were injured. Morale was slipping, and the fact that Nightsisters had actually shown themselves, demonstrating that they would participate directly in the attack, was contributing to the clan members’ gradual loss of faith. Ben moved to join the conference of Kaminne, Tasander, and their subchiefs; Dyon was also there. Ben sat on a flat rock at the edge of that gathering.
Tasander looked worried, more uncertain than before. “I’m open to ideas. I’ve led the Broken Columns through a lot of engagements, but nothing like this. Rancors, Nightsisters—I don’t have any tactical experience with this sort of thing.”
Kaminne didn’t look any happier than he did. “Nor do I. Nobody does.”
Ben frowned as something occurred to him. “Not true. I have.”
Kaminne brightened. “This is like Jedi fighting you have done?”
“No, not Jedi fighting. Space navy battles.”
Tasander gave him a curious look. “How’s that again?”
Ben made a sweeping gesture that took in the entire hilltop. “Think of this emplacement as a Star Destroyer. Or a Hapan Battle Dragon, if you prefer.” He pointed at a couple of Broken Columns warriors, holding blaster rifles, outside the subchiefs’ gathering. “Those guys, they’re your long-range guns.” He pointed next at warriors with bows and blaster pistols. “Turbolaser batteries.” He gestured at the nearest group of Witches. “Ion cannons and other specialized ranged weapons systems like proton torpedoes.” He pointed at a cluster of Broken Columns men with spears and sharpened stakes. “Finally, your shields. And then the rancors coming against us are attacking starfighters.”
Tasander. “All right. But in the wise words of my father: So what?”
“We’re losing because our weapons and shield systems aren’t coordinated. Let’s say you get a group of Raining Leaves spearwomen on the left and one of Broken Columns spearmen on the right. A rancor pops up where the two groups join. It attacks, and they withdraw in slightly different directions, opening up a hole. Your shields no longer overlap, no longer reinforce each other. The rancor wades in, grabs and kills two or three people.”
“I get it.” Dyon nodded. “And your archers and blaster warriors. They’re spreading their fire across all the targets at once. Hitting everywhere equally.”
“Which is fine against human opponents.” Kaminne, too, was clearly caught up in rethinking their tactics. “Not so good against rancors.”
Tasander stood and looked across the hilltop, at all the disparate groups of warriors and Witches. “I think I have it. Kaminne, you trust me?”
“You know I do.”
“Then let me reorganize things, and back my play.”
Five minutes later, Tasander addressed the entire gathering of Raining Leaves and Broken Columns. He spoke loudly enough for those amassed before him to hear, but not so loudly that his words would carry clearly to the forest floor. “As before, we’ll be in four units. The main unit, here, will be half our total strength, and the other three units, where they were before, one-third the remaining strength.
“The spearmen and spearwomen are designated Shield. You’ll set up back from the crest. In front will be those with sharpened sturdy poles, and you’ll brace them against the ground. You are immobile. You neither advance nor retreat without orders. You let the rancors come up over the crest and impale themselves on your weapons. Those with actual spears, you stand behind them and stab at vulnerable points—their faces, armpits, wherever their hide does not protect them.
“Bow and blaster bearers are designated Turbo, which is short for ‘turbolasers.’ You’ll start out in front of the Shield formation. When targets come into view, you’ll harry them at range. Then, when you hear the command ‘Shields up,’ you fall back behind the spear lines. Re-form there and wait until the rancors hit the Shield line. Then, and only then, you open fire again. And if your unit commander designates a specific target, everyone fires at that target until you hear ‘Free fire’ or another target designation.
“Witches, you start and stay behind the Shield line, and give the Turbo formation enough space to line up in front of you. Your unit commander will also designate one specific target, and you use your spells on that target until it’s down or fled. And then your commander will choose a second target, and a third, and so on.
“All those who consider themselves sharpshooters are with the Snipers group. You’ll be set up at points along the crest that are too steep for rancors to attack. You’ll fire where your commanders tell you. Mostly at the rancors once they’re on the top, but if your commanders spot a Nightsister, they’ll point you to that new target.”
Tasander fell silent, but Kaminne spoke up before any conversation arose. “We chose not to let the Nightsisters govern us. That means we live as a fighting force or die as individuals. Live or die—you choose. And understand, Raining Leaves and Broken Columns will be intermixed in these new groups. When you line up, if you look to the right and left and see one of your fellow tribemembers there, you have failed. I want to see you intermixed, Leaf–Column, Leaf–Column. And if I see you abandon a fellow who is not of your tribe, I will personally kill you. If Tasander does not kill you first. This I swear.”
Now there was no chance of murmuring. No voice rose in the silence that fell after Kaminne’s words.
She waited a moment more, then nodded, satisfied. “Return to your original positions. Your new unit commanders will tell you what to do.”
Silently, even breathlessly, the members of the Broken Columns and Raining Leaves moved off to their positions.
Ben heaved a sigh. “Ever seen anything like this before?”
Dyon shook his head. “It’s the sort of thing that could only happen on a planet like this.”
“Do me a favor, would you? Since I’m supposed to stay up here for morale purposes.”
“Sure.”
“Go down and tell my dad not to do his usual thing of knocking out one of the rancors. The Nightsisters are starting to adjust to his tactic. We’re going to throw some new tactics at them, so he should, too. Tell him to do whatever he wants—so long as it’s something they haven’t seen before, something they can’t predict.”
Dyon grinned. “Consider it done.”
The loss of three rancors and injury to two Nightsisters had apparently caused the remaining Nightsisters to do some thinking themselves. The next attack did not come until an hour after the last one ended. Again Ben felt a twitch in the Force net overhead; again he and others raised the alarm.
But this time, only archers and blasterfighters crowded the crest of the hill. Ben, leader of the Shields at the southwest slope, stood among the pole wielders and did not move forward to see.
“Five of them—six, seven, eight!” That was the Turbo leader ahead, one of the Raining Leaves women. She sounded worried but not fearful.
The Turbos began firing.
Their concentrated fire lasted only a few seconds. Then their unit leader called out, “Shields up! Shields up!”
Ben pressed himself in close to the stake wielder to his left, a Raining Leaf. His change in position opened space between him and the pole to the right. Bow and blaster bearers streamed between them, flowed through the loose formation of spear warriors behind, and began re-forming. Ben stepped back to his original spot.
The ground shook and Ben saw rancor hands and heads top the hill crest. He raised his voice to be hear
d over the general clamor. “Shields, brace yourselves!”
Then the rancors heaved themselves up onto the hilltop and charged forward. Wielders of the braced poles aimed their sharpened ends at each of the five rancors in the front rank. The rancors hit; poles bent, one snapped. The rancors reached for men and women; spear fighters impaled their arms and hands as they grabbed. Ben lit his lightsaber and thrust it into a rancor knee all the way to its hilt.
“Turbo, center head, fire!” The women leading the Turbos was well chosen; her voice, shrill but commanding, cut through the tumult and was easy to hear.
Blasterfire and arrows poured into the face of the rancor in the center. In moments that face was unrecognizable. And yet the beast was not dead, not quite; howling, it staggered away, crashed through the line of three rancors in the rear, and toppled over the hill crest. The one Ben had kneecapped also staggered back, but only far enough to have its position in line filled by an uninjured rancor.
That left four in front, three behind. “Turbos, left center, face, fire!”
In moments another rancor staggered away, dying. Those remaining grabbed as viciously and as vigorously at the lines of spear and pole wielders, but the latter kept them from advancing and the former protected their fellow warriors.
And now the Witches entered the combat. A storm of assaults—lightning, hails of rocks, flashes of fire, bone-rattling sonics—hammered into the rancor line.
A rancor managed to get past prodding spears and sharpened poles to grab the woman to Ben’s left around the waist. He swung, put extra effort into the blow. Despite the sheer mass of the rancor’s arm, his lightsaber cut through the wrist, severing the hand entirely. The rancor stood straight up, looking at its cauterized injury, howling in dismay at the pain—and then its head ignited, set afire by a Witch’s spell. Clutching its head, it hurtled over the edge.
All of a sudden, of the eight that had come against them, three rancors remained. For the first time, Ben could feel an emotion from them that was not pain or rage, and that emotion was fear.
Fate of the Jedi: Backlash Page 25