Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 04_ Backlash - Aaron Allston [103]
Ben turned. The other two rancors on the southwest crest were being harried and forced backward by a combination of mass spear charges and winds from the Witches. Elsewhere on the hilltop, Dathomiri men and women were collecting themselves, improvising bandages, kneeling over the dead and badly injured. The rancors that had attacked the steeper slopes were already gone.
Dead and badly injured—Ben counted at least twenty Dathomiri who lay still or moved so feebly that they clearly would not be able to return to the fight.
That was 8 to 10 percent of the active fighters. Not good. He sought out Firen, who stood with the Raining Leaves Witches at the southwest crest. “How many of the rancors have been put out of commission?”
She shook her head. “Maybe one.”
“You’re kidding.”
“The first time, five came against us and five returned to the forest. The second time, eleven—all fresh, I think—came against us, and eleven returned to the forest. One was crawling and had to be hauled by two others, so it may not return to the fray. But even now the Nightsisters, if they follow the same habits we do, will be using their skills and their spells to bandage and heal their rancors, to raise their spirits and fire up their instincts for destruction.”
“Where are our rancors?” That was Drola, anger and even suspicion in his voice.
“By our you mean those of the Raining Leaves.” Firen shot the Broken Columns warrior an ugly look. “You men have none of your own. We released ours to graze before we came up the hill. Because they would take up too much room, consume too much food and water. Ours … are probably far from here, or may be among theirs, but I have recognized none so far.”
Drola nodded. “How convenient that we are deprived of our greatest weapon against the rancors.”
“We could not have known that they would send rancors against us!” Firen’s hand curled into a fist. Little flickers of what looked like lightning crackled around it, making popping and snapping noises.
“Stop it.” Kaminne forced herself between Firen and Drola. “If you have nothing to suggest that will improve our situation, then you have nothing to say.” She looked between them, stared each down in turn.
“Nightsister!” That was not one cry but many from those at the southwest crest. Pushing through the crowd in that direction, Ben saw several Dathomiri raising blasters.
When he got to the edge, he could see their target. A single human-sized silhouette had emerged from the forest verge and was walking toward the hill. She held a gleaming pole taller than she was.
“Hold your fire.” That was Tasander, so calm as to seem almost disinterested. “She carries the white spear.”
Ben shot him a curious look. “Some sort of truce thing?”
Tasander nodded. “Not even Nightsisters attack a bearer of the white spear—that anyone knows of, anyway—because they would never again be safe when they carried one.”
The Nightsister marched to the bottom of the hill slope, stopping where soil mostly gave way to stone. She plunged the point of the spear into the ground, then turned and, at a rate so slow as to seem insulting, walked back into the forest.
Ben saw movement on the slope—the white garments of his father made him dimly visible. Luke descended toward the spear.
Ben started down the slope, carefully picking his way among boulders and rock faces in the dark. By the time he reached the midway point, Luke had climbed to that altitude again, the spear in his hands. “How are you doing, Dad?”
“Just another ordinary day at the Temple.” Luke seemed neither hurt nor winded. In fact, he wasn’t even dirty. He held the butt end of the spear toward Ben. “There’s a note attached.”
Ben unwrapped it from the spear butt. It was a piece not of flimsi, but of tanned animal hide, the words painted onto it—recently, to judge by the tacky