CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

For Jaina Solo, the absurdities of the reception would not end. To begin with, the reception was a formal affair that took place on the Tafanda Bay, one of the Ithorian herd ships, cities that drifted lazily above the jungle. The transparisteel-domed ships, with their own ecosystems and loaded with plant life, were kept warm and very humid. In everyday clothes she didn’t mind it, but dressed up in formal Jedi robes, she found the atmosphere heavy and oppressive.

Just having such a formal affair on a planet that was going to be the focal point for an enemy assault struck her as wrong. She would have preferred to be up on the Ralroost with the rest of Rogue Squadron. It annoyed her, too, that she had been invited because of her status as a Solo and a Jedi, not as a member of Rogue Squadron. Colonel Darklighter had been chosen to represent the squadron, and Jaina got a distinct impression that the New Republic’s protocol experts were afraid the pilots might actually speak their minds and disrupt things.

The tension of those gathered in the room seemed almost as oppressive as the humidity. They had been gathered into a large hall that was open, though overarching tree branches made glimpses of the night sky through the dome few and far between. More impressive than the trees, though, was the way the wood covering the floor and paneling the walls had been fitted together. A rich gold in color, with dark streaks of grain, the strips formed a mosaic through which the lines flowed effortlessly. Jaina could have followed the grain with her eyes forever, but knots of diplomats kept eclipsing it.

From years of watching her mother attend—and attend to—such functions, she knew diplomatic contacts operated in an unreal world. Mortal enemies would be unfailingly polite face-to-face while plotting ruthlessly behind closed doors. Even Admiral Kre’fey and Colonel Darklighter would withhold criticism of political limits placed on their operations so the impression could be created that all was well.

She sighed. At least that means people will be polite to the Jedi.

“Such a sigh. Did it relieve the weariness in your spirit?”

Jaina turned and smiled, recognizing the voice. “Yes, Ganner, a bit.” She kept the smile in place despite the little shock she felt at seeing the livid scar on his face.

The older Jedi sipped a cup of wine, then gave her a little nod. “I suppose, perhaps, I should try a sigh.”

“Why? Oh.” She glanced past Ganner in his robes of blue and black, toward a knot of Jedi paying court to Kyp Durron. “I had heard there was some trouble.”

Ganner gave her a wry grin that made him a different sort of handsome in her eyes. “My experiences on Bimmiel and especially Garqi were . . . sobering. Since many Jedi have been called here to help oppose the Yuuzhan Vong, and are eager to do so, my sharing rather frank views about how dangerous the Yuuzhan Vong are is not welcome. Realism becomes synonymous with defeatism in their eyes.”

“Probably didn’t help that you saved Corran’s life on Bimmiel.”

Ganner snorted a quick laugh. “No, it didn’t. I don’t regret it, however. The lessons I’ve learned working with him are lessons I needed to learn. I’m glad I lived long enough to do it.”

She glanced down for a moment. “I’m sorry you got hurt.”

“I’m not.” His blue eyes narrowed. “Before I got this scratch, it was easy to believe in my own invincibility. I was arrogant enough to think of myself as perfect. That’s a trap Kyp, Wurth, Octa, and others in his cabal are falling into. They think that because they’ve not been hurt, they can’t be hurt. That’s not an illusion I harbor anymore.”

“I don’t think I have many illusions anymore, either.” Jaina shifted her shoulders to relieve some of the stiffness in them. “We have been simming a lot to prepare us for the Vong assault. I must end up dead half the time I fly.”

Ganner winced. “Not good.”

“Well, not as bad as it might sound. Part of the time we sim flying skips, to help train the others. The Imps we are able to smoke, but the Chiss are just deadly.”

“I’ve felt their presence, but haven’t seen any of them.”

“Neither have I, except on my aft scope, drilling my X-wing or skip.” She glanced toward the front of the grand courtyard in which people had been gathered. Up there had been raised a dais, with Relal Tawron and his attendants greeting the various New Republic functionaries. “Looks like home team introductions have started. The Remnant’s people will be next and then, maybe, the Chiss.”

“It will be interesting to get a look at them.” Ganner waved his hand in the direction of the dais. “After you.”

“Thanks.” Jaina almost hesitated, both because of Ganner’s courtesy—which she had not expected—and because of her desire to see the Chiss herself. It’s their leader I want to see.

She started to blush for a moment, but chased that sensation away with a burst of irritation. In all of the simulations she had flown well. Perhaps she hadn’t always been the best pilot in the squadron, but she’d been close to it. Every time she’d simmed against the Chiss and been shot out, their leader had been the one to kill her. She never had the sense that he was picking on her specifically, but to double-check that she pulled the statistical data from the simulator battles.

Over and over again the Chiss leader had gone after the hottest of the enemy pilots, picking them off in descending order. None of them made it easy for him, and both Wedge and Tycho had managed to kill him once, but in every statistical category the simulators measured he was skewing the bell curve to the high side. And that would not have been so bad, she decided, if he and the Chiss didn’t keep to themselves. She didn’t mind being shot out, but she hated the idea of being dismissed for dying.

She and Ganner slipped toward the front of the crowd as Luke and Mara Skywalker were welcomed. Polite but muted applause arose from the assembled dignitaries, with most of it coming from the Ithorians. They clearly welcomed a Jedi presence on their world, though Jaina sensed that Borsk Fey’lya would be perfectly happy if those Jedi died in the defense of Ithor.

Next came the Imperial Remnant’s contingent. Admiral Pellaeon came first and moved down the long line of dignitaries with an economy of motion that suggested he wanted nothing but to be back planning Ithor’s defense. A wave of emotional warmth rolled off him as he greeted Admiral Kre’fey, Colonel Darklighter, Luke Skywalker, and Wedge Antilles. It lessened slightly as he shook hands with Jaina’s mother, then took his place beside her as the other Imperials were introduced.

Several moffs had made the trip to Ithor, and all of them looked like tired functionaries save for Ephin Sarreti, the moff from Bastion. What impressed Jaina about him was the genuine sense of enthusiasm pouring off him as he greeted Borsk Fey’lya and the New Republic’s other ministers. He exchanged comments with each of them, apparently impressing them with his knowledge of their lives or homes. Shock exploded from most of them, with tendrils of suspicion snaking out in its wake.

Ganner half smiled. “Well, now, there’s a plaything to keep Chief of State Fey’lya occupied.”

“Good, give him less time to advise the military about the defense of Ithor.”

Any comment Ganner might have been about to offer died as a new and strong presence sent ripples out through the Force. Jaina knew from having been around people like her father and Wedge Antilles that these ripples didn’t come from any conscious use of the Force; some people just so brimmed with life and confidence that they shone like a magnesium flare in darkest night. She rose up on tiptoes to see who it was, then felt a shock run through her.

At the head of a dozen blue-skinned Chiss came a human walking along with a crisp formality to his step. Taller than she was, but not as tall as Ganner, he had a wiry muscularity about him that his black uniform could not hide. His black hair had been cut short, which showed off a white lock that traced the line of a scar that started at his right eyebrow and ran back into his hair. His pale green eyes seemed tinged with a chill that matched his manner. Only the red stripes along his pants legs and cuffing his sleeves seemed at odds with his solemnity.

He mounted the dais at a step, leaving the Chiss in their white uniforms to file along the front of the platform and stand at attention. He bowed sharply to Relal Tawron and shook his hand. The Ithorian high priest turned to introduce him to Borsk Fey’lya, but the Chiss leader bypassed the chief of state and the rest of his cabinet. He marched along until he met Admiral Kre’fey, again executed a stiffly formal bow, and shook hands. He repeated this process with Colonel Darklighter and Luke Skywalker.

As he moved down the line, gasps and hubbub began to rise in the crowd. It increased as he bowed before Wedge, then smiled and allowed the older man to enfold him in a hug. Before Jaina could figure out what was happening there, the Chiss leader greeted Admiral Pellaeon. Ignoring the Remnant moffs, the young man then stepped off the front of the dais.

He’s coming straight at me!

He drew himself up before her, straight of limb and muscularly taut, then snapped his head and upper body forward in a bow that was not as deep as that given the others, but was nonetheless respectful. “I am Jagged Fel.” He straightened, and she started to blush as his green-eyed gaze raked her over. “A Jedi, too. Fascinating.”

Jaina blinked. “Too?”

“In addition to being a superior pilot. You are a difficult kill.”

She wasn’t sure why, but she smiled at him. “You meant that as a compliment.”

Jag Fel nodded. “Among the Chiss it is high praise indeed. I was only a bit better than you at your age.”

“Which was what, about two years ago?” Ganner asked mockingly.

Neither Fel’s expression nor his sense in the Force betrayed any embarrassment at Ganner’s question. “Yes, just before I took command of my squadron.”

Wedge Antilles stepped down from the dais and approached them. “Colonel Fel.”

“Yes, Uncle?”

“You should return to the dais and greet those people you bypassed.” Wedge nodded toward Borsk Fey’lya and his confederates. “They’re fairly important.”

Fel shook his head. “They’re politicians.”

Wedge lowered his voice. “The impression is that you skipped them because they are not human.”

Fel turned to face the dais and raised his voice. “If they believe I did not greet them because they are not human, they are stupid. I did not greet them because they are politicians.”

A Sullustan senator stepped forward. “A convenient label behind which you hide your xenophobia.”

Surprise stiffened Fel’s spine, and disbelief flooded his words. “You are accusing me of having an antialien bias?”

Pwoe, A Quarren senator, opened his hands. “It floods from you, Colonel Fel. Your uniform is cut on Imperial lines, harkening back to the uniform of your father’s 181st Imperial fighter group, one of the most effective Imperial units at suppressing the Rebellion. Your formality. Greetings like that were last seen at the Imperial court. The disdain with which you bypassed us makes it more than obvious.”

Fel shook his head. “Where I come from—”

Borsk Fey’lya cut him off. “Where you come from is an archaeo-Imperial community. Grand Admiral Thrawn gathered his most staunch and reactionary followers and set them up like a pocket of infection. You’ve festered out there, hating every moment we have been in control of what was once your empire. You’ve inherited the attitudes that oppressed us for ages, and now, here you are, ready to resume control, all under the guise of helping us.”

“Stop, please.” The Chiss leader held up a hand. “Don’t make even more of a fool of yourself.”

Borsk Fey’lya’s violet eyes blazed. “How patronizing! You have to tell me what is best for me! You, born to privilege, have no idea what it is like to be discriminated against because of your species. You have no idea what it is like to sacrifice to win freedom.” He flicked a hand at the dozen Chiss before the dais. “You even dare parade your nonhuman subordinates before us, reminding us of how Imperials should always be in the lead.”

Jaina felt a cold calm come over Jag Fel as his hands slowly unknotted. “Where I come from, Chief Fey’lya, I am in the minority. I am the alien. If you remember anything from the history of your precious Rebellion, it is that Thrawn was uncompromising, and that is a trait of his people. I was raised among them, raised with them, judged by their standards. I met those standards. I exceeded those standards.”

He took a step forward and pointed at the Chiss men and women who had accompanied him. “I won command of my squadron. These people competed to join that squadron. They wanted to fly with me, not because I am a man or because I am an Imperial, but because I am a superior pilot and leader.

“And as for fighting for my freedom, I’ve been doing that in the Unknown Regions for all my life. My mother gave birth to five children. My older brother died fighting, as did a younger sister. Why are we out there? Why are we fighting? A threat to the New Republic like the Yuuzhan Vong has long been anticipated. You remember the devastation of the Yevethan Great Purge? There were things in the Unknown Regions that would have made it look insignificant, save we were there and stopped them.”

Fel pressed his hands together. “You accuse me of xenophobia, but you ignored the fact that I greeted my host, an Ithorian, and immediately greeted Admiral Kre’fey, a Bothan. You saw what you wanted to see. This is what you accuse me of, accuse Imperials of: that we saw only bestiality where there was sapience and nobility. I have come here to help defend you against the Yuuzhan Vong, and yet what you choose to see is some specter of the past.”

He looked around the room. “That is why I bypassed you. I came to fight a war, not to play political games. My mission is to help you maintain your freedom, not to help you gather more power to yourself, or to take it from you.”

Leia Organa Solo stepped forward, holding a hand out to forestall any rebuttal by the New Republic’s Bothan leader. “We want that help. From you, from the Remnant, from all the peoples of the New Republic. Working together is the only way we will defeat the Yuuzhan Vong and save Ithor.”

People began applauding her mother’s words, and Jaina joined them. With public agreement, the politicians retreated a bit, and it would have been easy to imagine the situation had been solved. Still, Jaina found herself haunted by what Fey’lya and the others had said. The vehemence in their words had previously been directed at her mother, with similar accusations of her desire to take power away from nonhumans. And whispers about the Jedi, blaming them for the loss of Garqi and Dubrillion, somehow suggesting the Jedi brought the Yuuzhan Vong down on the New Republic. They make me wonder if we’re not being positioned to take the blame if Ithor falls.

Jag Fel turned and looked at her, and Jaina wondered if, somehow, he were reading her mind. She met his stare unflinchingly. “We will save Ithor.”

He nodded. “We will win the battle for Ithor. Its salvation, well . . .” He spared a glance for the knot of New Republic politicians. “Its salvation is in other hands and, I am afraid, is beyond our ability to control.”