Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 06_ Vortex - Denning Troy [170]
Luke tried to spin away … and found himself still entangled in Abeloth’s tentacles. But his vision was returning, and he saw the cascade of tiles and cross-supports as it continued unabated, pummeling him, Abeloth, and everyone else.
He could also see about half a meter of crimson blade protruding from Taalon’s chest, slicing left, then right as the wielder made certain of a kill. To his astonishment, when the blade came free and the High Lord’s lifeless body tumbled away, the hand holding the hilt belonged to Vestara.
In the next instant, the girl went cartwheeling across the room. The blow had been so quick that Luke did not even realize Vestara had been struck until Abeloth’s tentacle retracted and began to twine itself around his forearm.
By then, it was too late for Abeloth to recover. The Force net had sizzled away with Taalon’s death, and Ben’s blood-sheeted form was already leaping in to attack. He ducked a lightning-fast tentacle slash, then spun into an ankle-high heel-kick that had Abeloth’s feet flying off the floor before she could coil the tentacle for another strike.
Luke and Abeloth landed hard, with Luke purposely slamming his head back into her face. In the next heartbeat he drove his elbows into her ribs. The blows clearly stunned her, for suddenly he had room to fight. He grabbed the tentacle around his throat and rolled, turning away from his son so she would be forced to release her choke hold—or present her back to Ben.
Abeloth released Luke. He rolled to his feet coughing and staggering, his chest aching and his knee trembling with pain.
But Abeloth was advancing on his son now, lashing high and low. When Ben extended a hand to summon Taalon’s lightsaber, her tentacle caught his wrist before it arrived, and she spun him into her grasp.
So Luke extended his hand, summoning the weapon into his grasp and stepping in to attack in the same instant. As the blade crackled to life, it was already descending toward her collarbone.
Abeloth would not be killed so easily. She spun around, swinging Ben like a club. It was all Luke could do to shift his strike and cleave through her shoulder instead of his son’s head, and even then Ben’s swinging hips caught him under the arms, and Abeloth sent them both tumbling toward the fiery cleft in the stage pit.
Luke caught his son in one arm and grabbed for the front wall with the Force. They came down on the first seating tier, more or less on their feet, and facing Abeloth.
If she had ever been anything but a monster, she did not look it now. Her eyes were blazing pits of silver fire, her wide mouth a gaping cave of fangs. The tentacles on her remaining shoulder were lashing around her in a wild tempest that was either a defensive pattern or an expression of immortal fury, and she was surrounded by a knee-high ring of shimmering Force energy that seemed to be pouring from her wound.
Luke slapped a hand against his belt and found, as he had expected, that his lightsaber was somewhere else. Without looking away from Abeloth, he asked, “Ben, do you know where your lightsaber is?”
“Uh … yeah.”
“Not on you?”
“Taalon took it,” Ben replied. “You?”
“No idea.” Luke passed the one lightsaber they had—Taalon’s—to his son. “Wait for my signal.”
“As if I’m going anywhere without you.”
They began to edge apart, forcing Abeloth to divide her attention. To Luke’s relief, she seemed no more eager to re-engage than they were—at least not yet. Even with the gruesome wound, Luke knew she would be replenishing her strength much faster than any human could … even a Jedi human.
The Skywalkers had put about five meters between them when a Sith lightsaber crackled to life on the far side of the stage. Luke cursed under his breath and hazarded a glance in that direction, anticipating another last-moment betrayal. Instead, he found Vestara tossing her lightsaber in his direction.