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  “Right,” Luke said. “I’ll talk to CorDuro Shipping. Unless I’m wrong, that’s where Jacen has headed.”

  “Do that.” An idea was forming at the back of Mara’s mind. She’d brought along other disguises. Other people could have come to Duro fishing for well-formulated reasons not to open their worlds to refugees. The Kuati senator Viqi Shesh certainly hadn’t established SELCORE’s main camp anywhere near Kuat. Maybe Mara could scare up some information on who else here had antirefugee leanings.

  She hauled one of her duffels into the refresher.

  When she stepped out half an hour later, Anakin grabbed his cot’s edge with both hands. His eyebrows rose so far that they almost vanished under his dark hair.

  Laughing inwardly, she tilted up her chin and stared down at him. “You may kiss our palm,” she said in a languid Kuati accent.

  “Wow,” he choked.

  Luke folded his arms and leaned against the blank view-wall, grinning. He’d seen her in many guises, but this one was spectacular. She’d tinted her red-gold mane a deep reddish brown and pulled it back severely into a tail at the crown of her head, securing it with a circlet of false émeraudes. Bits of masking putty raised the bridge of her nose; shadowing gel gave her cheeks a prominent hollow. More émeraudes rimmed her ears and dangled halfway down her neck. The amethyst-colored tunic, belted in what would pass for gold, had a spatter of green gems on one shoulder, and the cutout beneath the high collar plunged drastically. Her elevated shoes were tapered to give the illusion that the extra height was all her own, but the heels could be kicked off if she needed to make a fast getaway.

  She cuffed Anakin’s shoulder. “Don’t drool on the carpet,” she said. “I’m surprised you’re still here.”

  “We won’t be for long.” Luke pushed off the wall.

  Mara smiled ruefully, sensing that he’d like her to stick around for another hour or so. Actually, that sounded good to her, too—but after putting on all this gear, she wanted to keep it unrumpled.

  “We have an appointment,” Luke said. “That is, two Kubaz have an appointment.”

  Anakin frowned, still massaging life back into his face from wearing the rubbery mask.

  “I’m just going to nose around,” Mara said. “See what I can get from that crowd down at Port Duggan, where the performance is going on.”

  She read Be careful in his eyes. Respecting his restraint, she didn’t promise that she would. She simply nodded.

  His lips twitched.

  She enjoyed that—communicating without words or the Force. “I’ll send Artoo a message if I end up elsewhere,” she promised.

  Then she realized that she wanted to say, You two take care—simply as a parting nicety. She was getting soft.

  She offered Luke her palm. He seized her hand, touched it with his lips, then tugged her close enough to whisper, “Come back soon.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  An aide ushered Luke into CorDuro Vice-Director Durgard Brarun’s sumptuous office. Lit by crisscrossed strips on the ceiling and walls, its focal point was a decorative air-circulation grille. Other black grilles reached from floor to ceiling in freeform designs. At the room’s front was a narrow counter, like something out of a tapcaf. A lone Duros sat behind it. The triangular CorDuro insignia on his right breast had a gold edging. Gray-green skin hung in folds under his chin. Over his ears, his hairless scalp was turning pale.

  He stood to greet the pair of imitation Kubaz. “Gentles, how may I serrrve you?”

  Luke wasn’t sure what information might be available. He meant to convince Vice-Director Brarun that he and Anakin were harmless, trying to bluff their way into dangerous circles.

  It mattered more than ever that he succeed. Everything mattered more, now. He was helping to shape the future in which his child would grow up.

  In his best Kubaz whirr-overlaid Basic, he said, “Many of our people are homeless. We have set up a colony on Yag’Dhul, but we need supplies. I was told there were basic goods to be bought here, for a price.”

  The Duros reached toward his countertop. “The price could be more than you wish to pay, gentles,” he said.

  Two large humans appeared from behind a brown wall screen. Luke recognized the determination in their eyes, then the hopelessness behind it. He’d seen that mixture before—in Peace Brigade collaborators, humans who were already convinced the Yuuzhan Vong would win this war.

  That was an unwelcome complication. Had CorDuro been corrupted? Or had Thrynni Vae vanished because she detected collaboration on an even wider scope?

  A second thought hit him like an ion cannon blast, disrupting his other thoughts. Were the Yuuzhan Vong already targeting Duro, and were these their advance agents?

  He scrambled to regain his composure. “We are prepared,” he whirred, “to offer New Republic credits, Kubindi bonds redeemable offworld, or—”

  A tone sounded through the room, and their host straightened. “One moment, gentles.”

  Brarun touched something in front of him, eyed a readout, and half smiled. Luke sensed an urge to send the strangers away. He countered it subtly, suggesting that Brarun perceive his Kubindi guests as neutral witnesses. After all, their world was already gone.

  Brarun appeared to consider the new thought, then said, “Gentles, please lingerrr for a few minutes. I am reminded of a guest that my staff has kept waiting, so that he will know his place. I shall admit him now. Keep still, or your escorrrts will have to see you out.”

  “Gladly,” Luke whirred, “for my people’s sake.”

  He gestured Anakin back toward the brown wall screen. As they backed away, Luke evaluated the big human guards again: commanding in size, but not devastatingly brilliant. They shouldn’t present two Jedi much challenge if this came down to blows—which it shouldn’t.

  Luke sensed Jacen as he walked in, wearing a soft blue cap and a brown flight suit. To his deep concern, Jacen neither probed nor reached out with the Force. In fact, Luke sensed a deliberate damping of the Force all around his elder apprentice, worse than before.

  He’d told Anakin that Jacen must find his own path. He knew it with all his heart and mind, but seeing Jacen like this hurt badly. Luke had made mistakes. He knew how painful the consequences might be.

  Especially here and now.

  He stretched out and nudged Jacen.

  Jacen had spent most of the last hour in an anteroom, waiting for the vice-director to admit him. He’d tried to sit patiently and reflect on his vision. It hadn’t exactly called him to diplomacy, but this didn’t seem like a wrong path.

  Now, like an echo out of his vision, he sensed his uncle—there, one of the two Kubaz in the corner, between muscular bodyguard types.

  The other Kubaz was Anakin.

  From his uncle, he thought he sensed a nudge to get the Duros talking.

  Straightening, he faced Vice-Director Brarun. What an opportunity! He could show his uncle and his brother the direction his vision and conscience and experiences were taking him.

  “Jedi Jacen Solo.” The vice-director, like other CorDuro employees, wore a red-trimmed brown flight suit. “This is unexpected.”

  “Thank you for—” Jacen stepped toward the desk.

  “Stop,” the Duros said. “That’s close enough.”

  Jacen halted. Did Brarun want him standing on this exact spot? Testing, he edged sideways. The vice-director didn’t object.

  He deduced that the Duros wasn’t trying to stand him over or under a Greenie-trap, but was simply frightened of Jedi and trying to protect himself.

  “Sir, I’m here on behalf of some very needy people. The refugees inside my mother’s dome—”

  “She is Leia Organa Solo. Corrrect?”

  Jacen’s ear for accents and languages had almost adjusted to the Duros’ tendency to gargle their Rs. “Yes, sir. Those refugees are living under unbelievably primitive conditions. They—”

  “Where are your Jedi robes, Jacen Solo? Are you here as an infiltrator?
”

  “No.” Jacen spread his hands. “Not at all.”

  The Duros pointed a long, knobby hand down at Jacen. “Your supply problems are not our concern. Perhaps SELCORE is shorting you.”

  “Why would SELCORE do that?”

  The Duros shrugged eloquently. “Why not? SELCORE decided for us that we wanted our planet reclaimed.” He raised a hand before Jacen could answer. “We were consulted, but only nominally.”

  “Why is this a problem?” Jacen asked. “Don’t you want it habitable, down there?”

  “We,” the vice-director said, “are content with our roots pulled free. That sphere of stone once anchored us. Its factories became places to send malcontents and gutter-grubbers. Now those citizens are returning to our well-run cities, upsetting our social balances.” He tilted his long head. “And if you restore a habitable planet, the Yuuzhan Vong could choose to move in. If they do, the blame will rest solely on SELCORE.” He shot a glance toward the Kubaz.

  Jacen shifted his feet on a deep, soft carpet. “Sir, if our supply shuttles don’t get through, people will start to go hungry. We need your help. It’s urgent.”

  The Duros reached for the edge of his counter. A high tone sounded. The door behind Jacen swished open. Two armed Duros stalked in.

  What was this? Jacen kept his hands lowered. “Sir, I’m just asking for the chemicals we need to grow food. I have no intention of threatening you.”

  “No?” the vice-director asked. “Your enabling of Centerpoint Station, our near neighbor, changed the power balance in our region. Jedi make me nervous. Especially young ones who use words like urrrgent. Often they don’t have the maturity to know when to back down.”

  Thank you, Kyp Durron, Jacen muttered to himself. He hoped Anakin was paying attention. “Sir, it was no Jedi who fired Centerpoint Station.”

  “A new sentiment is spreading through the New Republic. Surely,” Brarun said, “you have heard the Jedi philosophy challenged.”

  “I have,” Jacen admitted. “Most recently, down at Port Duggan. When I arrived.”

  “Ah,” he said. “You met my sister, Ducilla.”

  “An eloquent speaker,” Jacen said, though the woman’s philosophy might have come straight from the Yuuzhan Vong’s propaganda offices. On second thought, they probably never bothered with subterfuge.

  Still, if Master Luke wanted information, this was going well. Now he needed to state his position. “You have nothing to fear from me, Vice-Director. You asked where I left my Jedi robes. At the moment, I have stood down from my status as a Jedi in training.”

  The Duros bowed his long head and laughed bitterly. “Any Jedi whose mother is a Skywalker cannot stand down. Ever.” His red eyes glimmered. “It’s time you learned that.”

  Jacen clenched his hands at his sides. “I’m learning to be my own man. Not just my mother’s son.”

  This time, the four guards laughed, too.

  “All right … man,” the vice-director said. “What is it you want to offer CorDuro Shipping in exchange for this missing cargo?”

  “You don’t understand,” Jacen insisted. “Those supplies belong to us. They were sent by Coruscant.”

  “So really,” Brarun said, “you have come here to accuse my people of robbery.”

  Again, at the back of his mind, Jacen saw the galaxy tip toward darkness. He spread his hands and backtracked. “I have little to offer,” he admitted.

  The Duros folded long, knobby hands on the bar-desk’s surface. “Well said, Jedi Solo. Now let me tell you some things.

  “I am old enough to remember Emperor Palpatine. There was a human who could keep order. Maybe he carried some programs too far, such as trying to wipe out your kind, but I doubt that the Yuuzhan Vong would’ve stuck a tattooed toe into this galaxy if they arrived while he was in power.”

  Jacen stood silently, wondering what else the Duros meant to tell him.

  Brarun seemed to have forgotten the two Kubaz. “Some of our orbital cities retain drive units,” he said, “from the days when our ancestors first steered them into place. Our homes aren’t locked to Duro. We could leave and take home with us.”

  In that case, Jacen wouldn’t put it past them to divert and stockpile refugee supplies, though they could not admit that publicly. “In the face of a possible invasion,” he said softly, “you do have to consider your own people first.”

  The Duros raised his head, then cocked it in surprise.“Exactly. What use would the Yuuzhan Vong have for mechanical habitats?”

  Jacen straightened. At last, the Duros was listening—because instead of pushing his demands, Jacen had sympathized. “I agree,” he said. “But they destroy what they despise. There are things you don’t know about the Yuuzhan Vong. I’ve even been their prisoner. I’ve—”

  “How did you get away?” Brarun demanded.

  Jacen exhaled heavily. He looked down at the floor, then raised only his eyes. “My uncle came for me.” It had been spectacular. Since Master Luke was undoubtedly tracking his feelings, he sent a pulse of gratitude.

  “There, you see?” Brarun drew up taller. “Anyone whose mother is a Skywalker cannot stand down from being a Jedi.”

  “I’m trying,” Jacen said. “I am seriously trying to find out what I am, apart from all that.”

  Brarun rubbed his gray-green thumbs together over his folded hands.

  “I’ve seen terrible things,” Jacen continued. He related some of them: the slave-taking, the preoccupation with pain. “And death,” he finished. “We’ve seen them sacrifice whole shiploads of prisoners. We know it’s sacrifice, not simply elimination. I’ve spoken with a woman who was also their prisoner.” Danni Quee’s sad face flitted through his mind. He hoped she was safe, back on Coruscant. “I don’t think you’d be safe, even if you took these habitats to another world. They’d shoot to destroy your technology.”

  “Is that a threat, Jedi?”

  “No,” Jacen exclaimed. “I’m trying to help you, Vice-Director. To warn you, not threaten you. We have to stand together.”

  “The old symbiosis dogma. Did you know that even as your water-treatment settlement tried to become symbiotic with the Gateway dome, Gateway was trying to develop more-dependable water sources of its own and become independent of you? That was in your mother’s weekly report.” He tilted his head triumphantly. “She, a Skywalker, was not working toward symbiosis at all.”

  “We are interdependent,” Jacen insisted. “Every settlement’s work will contribute to making the surface habitable again.” A bizarre idea drifted into his head. He wasn’t authorized to do this … but … “Vice-Director, if we settlers, the first people of a new Duro, offered to pay a tariff, a percent of all future goods, would that help ensure delivery? Say … two percent?” That seemed plenty generous.

  The Duros stared over his clasped hands. Jacen held his breath. They both knew Jacen wasn’t authorized to offer this. If other settlements called this a betrayal, they’d come braying for Jacen’s blood, not the vice-director’s.

  “Twenty.” Brarun waved one hand. Out one corner of his eye, Jacen saw those big human security guards relax.

  “Too much.” Jacen felt increasingly awkward. His mother had authorized him to try diplomacy, but did that include giving away goods? “SELCORE negotiated with CorDuro for delivery of supplies,” Jacen insisted. “Your people are already being paid.”

  “And you,” the vice-director said, “have been sent to me as a negotiator. Fascinating.” He raised a finger, beckoning one bulky aide away from the two inoffensive Kubaz. “Jedi Solo, I would like to continue these negotiations. Please consider yourself my guest, for the time being. Until I can contact your mother, and Coruscant.”

  Did the Duros mean to hold him for ransom, or as a hostage? Or would Brarun really negotiate? Jacen was glad there’d been witnesses in here, though no one could call them impartial. He couldn’t wait to tell Master Skywalker about his vision, too. Finally, he might get some help settling his mind.<
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  “I’ll ask one condition, though.”

  Brarun’s brow ridge rose. “I do not believe you are in a position to set conditions.”

  “Wait. Listen. Deliver all the supplies you contracted to take groundside, as long as I’m your … guest.” His uncle would like that, even if Anakin was too young to understand.

  “You have no way of checking that, Jedi.”

  “Don’t I?” Jacen looked hard into the Duros’ large eyes. In fact, he didn’t. But Brarun didn’t know that. “You must help us hold back the Yuuzhan Vong. If we can’t maintain a strong front against them, they’ll pick us off, one system at a time. They’re already doing it.”

  “We’ve heard that story,” the Duros said, but he waved the second guard forward. “Escort young Solo to my guest room,” he said. “Stay with him—outside, in the hallway. I will speak with him later.”

  Jacen glanced toward the brown wall screen on his way out. Hope you got what you wanted, Uncle Luke, he thought, knowing his uncle would recognize only an unspoken query.

  One Kubaz barely nodded. The other turned away.

  Mara dropped her datapad on a console as she reentered the rental unit. A quick check of both rooms confirmed that they were empty, and her practiced eye saw no sign that anyone else had entered.

  Sporting her new disguise around Bburru, she’d had no trouble finding a Duros willing to talk, especially when she explained that she was afraid she’d wake up one morning to find Kuat pocked with refugee camps.

  The Duros merchant talked freely, sensing a potential convert. She recorded his philosophy on her datapad, pressing harder and deeper for clarification on doctrinal points. Finally, convinced by her eagerness, he promised to forward her the very latest “word of wisdom,” which should arrive in two days.

  At that point, her ear for intelligence pricked. How, she asked casually, could he know so exactly?

  He shrugged. That was always the day it arrived.