Star Wars_ Darth Bane 03_ Dynasty of Evil - Drew Karpyshyn [60]
“You’re certain the neurotoxin will still work after all this time?”
The Huntress was aware that most people would have inquired about the fate of the injured pilot, but she wasn’t most people. The only thing she cared about was the job she still wasn’t sure she was going to accept.
“It should be fine as long as the bottle was sealed,” Serra confirmed. “Once we get back to my ship I can test it for potency.”
“Do you know how to prepare it properly?” the assassin demanded. “How to administer it? How quickly it takes effect and how long it will last?”
“I am my father’s daughter,” the princess proudly declared. “He taught me everything he knew about healing and medicine.”
What would he say if he knew you were using his knowledge to seek revenge for his death? the Huntress silently wondered.
“I can show you how to use the senflax to keep the prisoner under your control,” Serra continued. “So, will you take the job?”
The Iktotchi took her time before answering. It wasn’t the money that intrigued her. It was the challenge; the knowledge that she would be pitting herself against a foe more powerful than any she had faced before. She couldn’t see the outcome of the mission; too many conflicting forces were at work for the future to be clear. Yet she sensed that this was the moment she had been training for her entire life.
“I’d need at least ten well-trained warriors under my command,” she said, speaking slowly.
“I’ll give you twenty.”
“Then we have a deal,” the Iktotchi replied, her faint smile making the dark lines tattooed on her lower lip curl up like an animal baring its fangs.
12
The return trip from Prakith to Ciutric IV was taking even longer than the original journey. It should have been quicker, of course; Bane had already plotted the hyperspace routes that would lead him back out of the Deep Core. But in the hours he had spent on the volcanic world acquiring the Holocron from Andeddu’s followers, several of the lanes he had used for the inbound flight had shifted and become unstable.
Two had already collapsed, forcing him to recalculate his journey. Statistically, the chances of this happening in such a short time span were astronomically small. However, statistics often fell by the wayside when events were influenced by the Force. There were too many accounts of those who had come into possession of powerful Sith artifacts falling victim to grim misfortune to dismiss the tales as mere coincidence.
Many believed the talismans of the dark side carried a curse; others claimed they were somehow alive, as if the inanimate materials used to make a ring, amulet, or Holocron could somehow achieve sentience. Those ignorant enough to believe in such superstition might have claimed that Andeddu’s Holocron was fighting Bane. They would have declared the collapsing hyperspace routes were evidence of Andeddu’s vengeful spirit trapped within the crystal pyramid seeking to destroy the thief who had defiled his sacred temple.
Bane knew there was no inherent malevolence in the Holocron; it was merely a tool, a repository of knowledge. Yet he also understood how far reaching the effects of the Force could be. A storm of violence swirled around items imbued with the magic of the ancient Sith; the strong could ride the storm to even greater heights, the weak would be swept up in its wake and destroyed.
Andeddu’s Holocron was a talisman of undeniable power; Bane could feel the waves of dark side energy radiating from it. It was possible the fragile matrix of the Deep Core’s space–time continuum had been subtly altered by these waves during his outbound journey, destabilizing the hyperlanes.