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Daala sighed. She had been leaning toward him in an affectionate manner, but sorrow seemed to settle upon her fine features and she turned away slightly. Facing toward the window, the bright, multicolored lights dancing on her skin, she said quietly, “You spoke of absent friends, Nek. Gil was one of them. So was Cha Niathal. I know too many, now.”

Understanding shone in his dark eyes. “Ah … I see. Well, we all do, Natasi. That’s the price of growing old, I suppose.”

“Speak for yourself,” she said with forced lightness.

“I do. You, my dear, will never grow old. Ambition keeps you young.” He lifted his glass in mock salute.

She smiled halfheartedly. “I’m not sure about that. The last few weeks have aged me quite a bit, I’m afraid.”

“The situation with the Jedi, and the Mandos,” Nek said knowingly.

She turned to him, an old friend and more than an old friend who, thank any deities there might and might not be, was not yet absent. Not yet.

“I feel no qualms about any decisions I’ve made in that area so far. I was right in how I handled Skywalker. And the mad Jedi. Still feel comfortable with what’s going on there. But … these uprisings.”

Her eyes were intense as she spoke. “These are fires, Nek. They’re little fires right now, barely more than wisps of smoke on worlds that most people haven’t even heard of, and if they have heard of them, they wouldn’t care—at least, that’s how it’s been. Even Klatooine is far enough away so that it doesn’t affect most peoples’ day-to-day lives in the Galactic Alliance. They shouldn’t care about what’s going on. But now—”

“Needmo’s little Devaronian girl is bringing them right into the living rooms.”

Daala nodded. “That she is, and handily, too. Javis Tyrr, I could at least manipulate to an extent. Control some of what he did, what he learned and when he learned it.”

“He was playing you,” Nek pointed out.

“He’s not anymore,” Daala said simply.

Nek had to laugh. “Quite true. How did you muzzle the barking dog at last?”

“The invaluable Wynn Dorvan. He contacted Tyrr’s cam operator, who had been his accomplice. She had all kinds of video documentation on what he’d been up to, and apparently Wynn used both the carrot and the stick to get her to cooperate. If she cooperated, her name would be unsullied. If she didn’t, she’d be sharing the same cell as Tyrr.”

“Elegant, simple, and effective. Perhaps I should borrow Dorvan from time to time.”

“Only on his days off.” She sighed. “So yes, I’m pleased Tyrr’s no longer being a pest. But this Madhi Vaandt … she’s out of my reach. And the story’s too big. I can’t silence the coverage.”

His ears swiveled forward, catching the subtle nuance in how she said the word coverage. “What can you silence, then?”

She looked at him levelly. “The uprisings themselves. I can stop them. Frankly, I should have done this at the outset. Then Vaandt wouldn’t have had anything to cover because it would have been all taken care of—quietly, behind the scenes, and beings could get on with their daily lives. Dorvan has been marvelous about sniffing out possible sites where there could be trouble. I can put Mandos there before things erupt. Lock it down.”

“Natasi,” Bwua’tu said slowly, considering every word before he spoke it, “it’s possible that some of those uprisings need to happen. I doubt there are beings out there fomenting rebellion simply to ruin your day—even if that does happen to be the end result.”

Few beings could have spoken to Daala like that and not roused her ire. Dorvan was one, Nek was the other. The rest were no longer counted among the living.

“One of the recurring themes I keep hearing about is how long the institution of slavery has persisted on many of these worlds. Frankly, if it’s existed on these worlds for this long, it can wait a little longer. Wait until I’ve brought the Jedi to heel, wait until there’s a little more stability. I’m not a dictator, Nek, you know that. But I can’t lose control over this situation. I can’t even be perceived as losing