Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 05_ Allies - Christie Golden [29]
The turbolift opened on one level that was dimly lit, loud with voices and music, and thick with smoke. For a second Ben thought something was on fire, but then he realized it was simply the haze floating out from one of the establishments.
Vestara coughed, but moved forward. Dyon gently took her arm. “I don’t think Luke would be happy if I let you two poke around this level too much,” he said.
Ben extended his senses in the Force, was able to figure out the nature of some of the “entertainment” being offered in the various places, and glanced at Vestara. She hadn’t said much about her homeworld, but one thing was sure. Even though she was a Sith, and had by her own admission killed in cold blood, there was an innocence about her that denoted a sheltered life in many respects. He somehow thought she wouldn’t quite be prepared for some of the things she would see if she went into these seedy places.
Then again, she no doubt sensed, as he did, that the emotions of the beings within ran to the darker side of the Force. The proprietors of these taverns, gambling houses, and worse fed on greed, fear, despair, and loneliness. That had to execute a powerful pull for a Sith apprentice. His heart sank a little at the expression on her beautiful face, eager and curious. She was disappointed at Dyon’s words, but nodded and stepped back into the turbolift.
“Let’s see what’s on the ground level,” Dyon said. If he had noticed Vestara’s response to the pull of the dark side present on this floor, he gave no indication.
When the turbolift doors hissed open, Ben almost gaped. “Did we just step into a circus?” he asked, looking around at the noise, bustle, and colors, and inhaling a staggering variety of smells, not all of which were pleasant.
“I think it’s an open-air market,” Dyon said as they stepped forward into a crowd of beings. Ben’s feet encountered not duracrete, but hard packed soil. It actually made sense—produce and other market wares would come by air and by land. Judging from the smell, many of the natives of this world still relied upon living transport.
Like most originally arid worlds that still sported a fairly generous populace, Klatooine had learned to wrest sufficient moisture from the soil by means of technology in order to grow a decent amount of crops. It was cheaper, in the long run, to invest in droids, irrigation technology, and up-to-date vaporators and mechanics to take care of them than it was to import food. Especially, Ben mused, if you had been under the thumb of the Hutts for almost forever. He took a second to recall Hutt anatomy and then let it go, content with Yes, Hutts did have thumbs.
So it was that in the shaded marketplace, with artificially moist, cool air blowing about them and a few musicians standing about playing strangely complicated-looking instruments with cases looking sadly empty of credcoins, he, Vestara, and Dyon found themselves looking at a pretty impressive amount of fruits, vegetables, nuts, grains, and meats.
He liked to watch Vestara when she encountered new things, and this was much more to his liking than her curiosity about the goings-on occurring on Level 7. You like to watch Vestara whatever she’s doing, a little voice inside his head spoke up, but he pushed it down. For him, this was another market like dozens he had seen before. But while Vestara refused to say how many new worlds she had seen or species she had encountered, Ben could tell by her reactions that she was nowhere near as well versed with such a variety of beings and cultures as he was.
She was apparently insatiably curious, wanting to look at, sniff, touch, and if possible, taste everything. She asked question after question, listening intently to the answer, learning, always learning. Dyon’s interest seemed piqued by the marketplace, and he was engrossed in glancing at the list Luke had given them and stocking