chapter seven

The Hall of Masters was as long and fancy as all the others down which the Solos had sneaked, with red qashmel carpeting and some of the finest artwork in the galaxy hanging on the walls. Between each masterpiece, an ornate trefoil arch led into another equally opulent corridor, while a white alabas staircase at either end of the hallway ascended a vaulted turret into the higher reaches of Tenel Ka’s immense palace.

“Oh, boy,” Han said. “Which way now?”

“Good question.”

Han frowned. “Can’t you just follow the Force or something?”

“I could, if I wanted Tenel Ka to feel me searching for her.” Leia glanced at the security card she had stolen from the guard she had left lying in the Queen Mother’s Special Salon, then started down the hall. “But I have a better idea.”

Han followed her to the end of the hall, where they found a small data terminal tucked away beneath one of the staircases. Leia inserted the security card and selected QUEEN’S PAGEANT: HER MAJESTY’S PUBLIC SCHEDULE from the menu that popped up.

Tenel Ka had finished the Preliminary Judging of Muscles half an hour earlier and was due to host a banquet in two hours, but there was nothing scheduled for the moment.

“Look for a private schedule,” Han suggested. “This doesn’t tell us anything.”

“Sure it does,” Leia said. She called up a map of the palace, then pointed to a blacked-out area marked simply ROYAL RESIDENCE. “That’s where we’ll find her.”

“I don’t mean to sound skeptical, but—”

“It’ll take her an hour to dress for the banquet,” Leia said. “And she’s been judging the pageant all day. Where do you think she’ll spend her one unscheduled hour?”

“With her kid,” Han agreed. He should have known better than to doubt Leia; having grown up in a palace herself, she would have an instinctive understanding of Tenel Ka’s life. “So where’s the playroom?”

“Good question.” Leia plucked the data card from the terminal, then turned her face upward and closed her eyes for a moment. “Stairway’s clear.”

Han and Leia ascended side by side, passing portrait after portrait of Tenel Ka’s royal ancestors. The staircase was wide enough to accommodate a landspeeder, with room left for pedestrians, and it seemed to go up forever. After a good minute of climbing, a muffled murmur began to spill out of an unseen doorway onto a landing above.

Thinking they would need to find another way, Han took Leia’s arm and started to pull her back down the stairs.

“No time,” she whispered. “If Tenel Ka’s going to see us, it will be after she’s visited Allana and before she starts dressing for the banquet.”

Leia pulled Han close to the wall and continued to ascend, slowly and silently. When they had drawn to within a few meters of the landing, she stopped and pointed out into the emptiness on the other side of the banister. An instant later a loud clunk echoed up the turret, as though something had fallen onto the floor of the lowest level.

A pair of royal guards rushed out onto the landing to investigate. As they peered over the balustrade, Han and Leia pressed their backs to the wall and crept up the last few steps in silence, then slipped into an extravagant waiting room filled with cologne-heavy Hapan males. They were attired in elegant shimmersilk tunics and fine tavella doublets. All were holding plasticlear cases containing orchids from across the galaxy—sometimes more exotic than beautiful.

Leia slipped her hand through Han’s arm. “They’re probably suitors hoping to escort the Queen Mother to tonight’s banquet,” she whispered, leading him into the room. “Tenel Ka certainly likes to play games with her nobles.”

“As long as they don’t play games with us,” Han answered. “I really wish you hadn’t made me leave my blaster aboard the Falcon.”

“This is supposed to be a friendly call.”

“Then how come you’re wearing your lightsaber?”

“That’s different,” Leia replied. “This is Hapes, and I’m female.”

As they moved deeper into the room, the young nobles turned to study them, sneering at Han’s travel-worn flight jacket or frowning at Leia’s Jedi robes. The Solos paid little attention, holding the gazes of the courtiers just long enough to suggest they belonged here as much as anyone—and for Leia to reinforce the idea with a Force prod.

The trick must have worked, because by the time the Solos reached the perimeter of the seating area, the courtiers were turning back to their sabacc games and private conversations. Han and Leia weaved through the crowd to a large, spitting-rancor fountain that dominated the center of the room. Opposite them, a dozen royal guards blocked the mouth of a large ceremonial arch, beyond which lay a long white corridor. The hall was lined with displays of antiquated weapons and ancient blast armor, but its most spectacular feature was a glistening wind-crystal chandelier the size of an A-wing fighter.

“Guess we know where the Royal Residence is,” Han muttered, looking away from the guards. “But to get past that bunch, it’s going to take a pretty big—”

Leia’s fingers bit into Han’s arm. “Han, she’s here.”

“Here?” Han glanced casually around the room and saw nothing out of the ordinary, just a couple of young nobles arguing over the stakes of a dejarik game and a middle-aged bachelor lecturing a pasty-skinned youth about the propriety of wearing a hat indoors. “Who’s here?”

“The assassin.”

Leia’s gaze went to the pasty-skinned youth and stayed there. With a slim beardless face and a bald head crowned by a fashionable—if ridiculously tall—top hat, he had a dangerous-yet-feminine appearance. His eyes were dark and sunken, his nose as straight as a knife, his mouth a small, ruby-lipped gash. He was wearing a ruffled dress jacket that had to be six sizes too large for him, and he was careful to keep his hands balled inside the outer pockets, as though afraid of what they might do on their own.

“You mean him?” Han whispered in disbelief. “He’s just a kid.”

The kid’s eyes slowly slid away from his lecturer and found Leia. When she did not look away, he gave her a short, almost imperceptible nod, then turned back to his conversation.

Leia grabbed Han’s arm. “That’s no kid.” She pulled him toward the guards waiting beneath the ceremonial arch. “In fact, she’s older than you are.”

“She?”

“It’s not important right now,” Leia said. “She’s not working alone. We need to warn Tenel Ka.”

As they neared the arch, a rough-featured guard wearing the golden cuff-hashes of a sergeant of the royal guard stepped out to meet them, blocking their way with a bulky Hapan power blaster.

“The Hall of the Wind Crystals is closed to visitors.”

“Of course it is.” Leia lifted her hand in one of those little waves that Jedi used when they were making a Force suggestion, then spoke so softly the sergeant had to lean down to hear her. “But the Queen Mother is in danger. You need to seal the chamber.”

The sergeant’s eyes widened, and he repeated, “The Queen Mother is in danger.” He was too well trained to react hastily, however—even under the influence of a Force suggestion. “What’s the nature of this danger?”

“From people in this chamber.” Leia’s voice was impatient. She made another little wave. “The Queen Mother is in danger. You need to seal the chamber and sound the alarm now.”

The sergeant nodded. “The Queen Mother is in danger.” His eyes flicked past Leia’s shoulder, and then he turned to face his subordinates. “Seal the chaaaraggh—”

The command ended in a strangled gasp when something long and white hissed past Leia’s head and planted itself in the side of the sergeant’s neck. Han cried out and instinctively shielded Leia, throwing himself onto her—and nearly losing an arm as her lightsaber blade snapped to life.

They had barely hit the floor when more of the strange projectiles hissed past overhead, coming from all corners of the chamber and filling the air with a sound like ripping cloth. An instant later the rest of the guards dropped to the floor amid a cacophony of strangled outcries and clattering armor.

Leia pressed her hand to Han’s chest. “Han, you’ve got to stop doing that.” She rolled him off with surprising ease and came up kneeling, then plucked at her robe. “Jedi, remember?”

“Sorry—old habits.”

Han rose to his knees. Half the suitors in the room—a couple of dozen—were charging across the chamber, leaping and dodging furniture, either holding a white throwing knife or drawing another from their sleeves. He spun around, reaching for the fallen sergeant’s weapon, and found the entire complement of guards lying in the archway, most dead already, but a few writhing in pain with a plastoid hilt protruding from their throats or faces.

A cold knot formed in the pit of Han’s stomach. The assassins were good—organized and well trained. He crawled forward and grabbed the sergeant’s bulky power blaster, then began to fumble with the unfamiliar Hapan safety.

“Blast! I don’t care what you say, next time I’m bringing—”

Leia’s lightsaber droned behind him, then the smell of burned flesh filled the air and a body thudded to the floor. The rest of the attackers were already racing into the archway to either side of the Solos. Most paid no attention at all to Han, simply grabbing weapons from the fallen guards and continuing up the corridor at a sprint. But one, a heavy-jawed man with blond hair, looked over and caught Han’s eye.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Uh, yeah,” Han answered. He finally found the power blaster’s safety catch—a small nub inside the trigger guard—and depressed it. “Thanks for asking.”

He pulled the trigger, blasting a fist-sized hole into the center of the man’s chest. The Hapan tumbled over backward, his brow still rising in surprise.

Han turned to find Leia behind him, standing over a dead Hapan and frowning in the direction of the man he had just killed.

“You ever get the feeling we don’t have the vaguest idea what’s going on here?” Han asked.

“We’re not the only ones.”

Leia pulled Han to his feet, in the process turning him back toward the waiting chamber. A dozen young noblemen were standing over the middle-aged bachelor who had been lecturing the pale-skinned “kid” about the hat.

Another fifteen suitors were watching in slack-jawed astonishment as the “kid” dived and rolled toward the same door through which the Solos had entered, dodging a constant stream of blasterfire from the guards posted there. Now that the assassin had discarded her oversized coat—revealing a skintight bodysuit and a utility belt lined with throwing knives—it was very clear Leia had been right about her being female. And she did have hair—at least a little of it. The top hat was also gone, revealing a bushy topknot that made her look wild, unpredictable, and very dangerous.

Han started to shoulder the power blaster, but Leia put a hand on the barrel.

“Not yet,” she said. “She’s Force-sensitive.”

“Force-sensitive?” Han understood what Leia was saying. The woman would not be a quick kill, and they could not afford to get tied up here. “Will someone please tell me what the blazes is going on?”

“Maybe later.” Leia turned up the corridor after the assassins. “After I have time to figure it out myself.”

Han grabbed a couple of spare power packs off the dead sergeant and raced after Leia. By the time he caught up to her, they were two dozen meters down the white stone corridor and not gaining on their targets. Han stopped and knelt at the side of the corridor, taking cover behind the pedestal supporting a blue-sheened suit of early durasteel blast armor.

“We need to slow them down,” he said.

“Good idea.” Leia continued running. “Try not to hit me!”

“Hey!” Han called. “Not what I meant!”

But Leia was well down the corridor, already passing beneath the great chandelier and picking up speed. Han cursed her foolhardiness, then took three deep breaths and shouldered the power blaster.

Before he could open fire, the assassins suddenly stopped running and glanced uncertainly back toward Leia. Even without the Force, Han could sense their confusion. Either they had come to an unexpected dead end, or they had not seen her attack their fellows and could not understand why she was charging them. Maybe both.

“What the blazes is going on?” Han asked again. He set his sights on the Hapan in front and blasted him between the shoulder blades, then swung the muzzle to the next man and fired again. That one bounced off a display pedestal, then staggered into the middle of the corridor and collapsed. The surviving assassins dived for cover, finally starting to return fire.

Leia caught up to the rear of the group and launched herself into a whirling lightsaber attack, cloaking herself behind a basket of sapphire light and batting blaster bolts back toward their source. Han dropped another assassin and she killed three; Han blasted a man’s leg and sent him somersaulting across the corridor; Leia used the Force to crush two more beneath a flying suit of heavy plexoid armor.

Then the deafening bang of a concussion grenade echoed down the corridor. Han was momentarily blinded by a brilliant flash of yellow. Leia cried out in surprise, and the air resonated with the piercing shriek of blaster-fire. Hapan voices began to scream and abruptly fall silent, and blaster bolts flew down the corridor so furiously it took a moment for Han to realize his vision had cleared.

Leia was Force-tumbling back toward him, somersaulting and twisting through the air, arcing from one side of the corridor to the other, batting blaster bolts aside and taking momentary shelter behind the display pedestals. Behind her, the surviving assassins—if there were any—were nowhere to be seen, and a wall of royal guards was charging into the far end of the corridor, power blasters blazing.

Han rose just high enough to show his shoulders and head above the pedestal he was using for cover. “Knock it off, you rodders!” he yelled. “We’re on—”

A volley of blaster bolts brought his protest to an end, blowing the armor display off its stand and sending him to the floor beneath a crashing avalanche of durasteel.

“Han!” Leia’s voice was barely audible over the screech of blasterfire, and the burned-meat stink of blaster combat had grown so thick in the hall that Han felt like retching. “Keep down!”

“Like I have a choice,” Han grumbled—or would have grumbled, had there been enough air in his chest to do so.

He pushed a twenty-kilo breastplate off his shoulders and head, then rolled to his knees. His breath still would not come, but the ache in his chest was dull and general, suggesting he’d simply had the air knocked out of him. Leia was on the opposite side of the corridor and a little ahead of him, trapped behind a display pedestal by a torrent of blasterfire so bright and constant it resembled an ion drive’s efflux.

Han looked back to the royal guards, who had already advanced halfway down the corridor. “Okay,” he growled. “I’ve had it with you guys shooting at my wife.”

He dropped back behind the display pedestal, pointed his blaster at the ceiling, and fired into the heart of the giant chandelier. It took only a handful of shots to bring the huge fixture down in a chiming crash of wind crystals and metal, and the torrent of blasterfire coming down the corridor immediately faded to a fraction of what it had been. He raised his head again and saw that the chandelier had landed squarely in the midst of the charging guards, leaving the largest part of the company sprawled on the floor—injured, trapped, or just too dazed to move.

But nearly a dozen guards had been far enough down the corridor to escape the chandelier. They were concentrating their fire on Leia, driving her back behind the pedestal every time she tried to make a break for Han’s side of the corridor. And Leia was not helping matters much, simply deflecting their bolts instead of batting them back into her attackers. Clearly, she was trying to avoid hurting Hapans still loyal to Tenel Ka.

Han cursed her scruples, then took aim at the guards’ feet and began to bounce blaster bolts off the floor. More than half of them immediately turned their attention to Han, but one—an angry-browed man with the weathered face of a veteran—repaid the Solos’ courtesy by pulling a concussion grenade off his equipment belt.

“No!” Han cried, more to himself than anyone else. “Don’t—”

The guard thumbed the activation switch, and Han had no choice but to take aim at the man’s chest.

Before he opened fire, a string of bolts flew up the corridor from behind him, catching the guard full-on and knocking him off his feet. The grenade tumbled from the Hapan’s hand and rolled free. Han swung around in shock—or maybe it was fear—and had just enough time to glimpse the pale-skinned assassin standing in the archway, firing a cumbersome Hapan power blaster with each hand.

Then the concussion grenade detonated behind him, filling the corridor with light and thunder and fire. The assassin barely blinked. She simply continued firing with one of her weapons and used the other to wave the Solos toward her.

“Come on!”

Too astonished to do anything else, Han looked across the corridor at Leia—who merely looked back and shrugged.

A few of the guards trapped beneath the fallen chandelier began to recover and fired down the corridor again, at the assassin as well as the Solos. She dropped into an evasive roll, then came up firing and suppressed their attacks to almost nothing. She gestured to the Solos again, this time leaving the power blaster pointed in Han’s direction when she finished.

“Come on,” she repeated. Her voice was high but cold. “If you want to live.”

Han glanced over at Leia.

She nodded vigorously. “Who doesn’t?”

Leia rose and raced toward the archway spinning and tumbling, batting the few blaster bolts that came her way back up the corridor. Han mirrored her progress, scrambling along sideways and laying suppression fire back toward the chandelier. He still had no idea what was happening here, but it was growing more and more apparent that nobody else did, either—and when that happened, the only rule became survival by any means possible.

As they passed through the archway, the pale woman pointed her chin toward the entrance by which they had arrived. “Stairs!”

“Fine by me,” Leia said, leading the way.

They met no resistance as they crossed the chamber, for the suitors who had not taken part in the attack were cowering behind furniture or cringing in corners, unwilling to risk their lives without weapons of their own. From what Han had seen of the assassin so far, it was probably a smart decision.

On the landing outside the chamber, the two door guards lay sprawled and motionless—as did two more on another landing on the opposite side of the turret. So far, there was no sign of any more guards—but Han knew that would be changing very shortly. He led the way down the stairs and into the corridor that led back toward the salon he and Leia had occupied earlier.

The assassin called out behind him. “Wait!”

Han stopped and glanced back to see her kneeling at the entrance to the turret. She was pointing both power blasters up the stairs, but looking toward Han and Leia.

“Where are you going?” she demanded.

“Back to the hangar,” Han answered. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

“No.” The pale woman glanced back into the turret and began to fire up the stairs. “We have a contract to finish.”

“We?” Leia asked.

“Maybe you’re not getting paid, but you’re part of this.” The woman continued to fire with one weapon, but pointed the other at Han’s chest. “And don’t look so surprised. This isn’t exactly the way I expected it to happen, either.”

The knuckles on Leia’s weapon hand went white, but luckily Han was the only one who saw. The royal guards had reached the top of the stairs, and the assassin was busy exchanging fire with them.

“Look,” Leia said. “I don’t know—”

“You obviously know who we are,” Han interrupted. He was beginning to see why the fight had seemed so crazy—the assassins had mistaken him and Leia for people who were supposed to help them get to Tenel Ka. “How about returning the favor?”

The assassin looked away from the stairs long enough to scowl at him. “You don’t know?”

“We haven’t exactly been in the loop,” Leia pointed out, picking up on Han’s strategy. “We just got in from Corellia.”

A flurry of blaster bolts flashed into the corridor, nearly taking off the assassin’s head. She merely rolled out of the doorway and pressed her back against the wall, then glanced over at Leia’s lightsaber.

“Why don’t you call me Nashtah?” She almost seemed to smile. “I’d like that.”

For some reason Han did not understand, the name sent a chill down his back—or maybe that was just the growing stream of blasterfire pouring through the doorway.

“All right, Nashtah,” he said. “In case you haven’t noticed, someone set us up.”

“Tenel Ka obviously knows about the assassination attempt,” Leia added. “And that means we have no chance of getting to her right now. All that can happen is we get trapped and killed.”

“I don’t think she knew we were involved until this started,” Han said. “But that’s changed. We’ve only got about two minutes to get back to the Falcon—if we’re lucky. After that, the hangar is going to be sealed up so tight even a lightsaber won’t be able to cut our way back inside.”

Nashtah’s eyes seemed to grow darker and more sunken as she considered this possibility. Suddenly she dropped into a squat, then whirled back into the doorway and poured a volley of blasterfire up the stairs. There was a chorus of anguished screams.

“Lead!” Nashtah rose and waved them down the corridor, then tapped Leia’s arm with a blaster barrel so hot that it singed the fabric of her robe. “And this had better not be a double cross. There is nothing I love more than killing Jedi.”