Star Wars_ I, Jedi - Michael A. Stackpole [120]
Once outside the speeder, I realized that the distant view of the building had failed to convey its actual size. My grandfather’s house had only ever been a modest two-story affair, with all the spare capital and his spare time going into maintaining the gorgeous sunken gardens in the back. The building I stood before now occupied three times the footprint of the old house, and rose another whole level above the old house’s roof. In its construction I could see bits and pieces of things my grandfather would love, but if he’d had the money to build this house, he would have just expanded his gardens even further instead.
I walked up to the door, but before I could ring the bell, a small, wiry man with olive skin pulled the door open. He wore a black uniform festooned with white buttons. White gloves encased his hands and he eyed me suspiciously. He gave me no smile and looked me over carefully before he stepped aside and let me into the home’s grand foyer.
The man spoke in the same clipped tones I’d heard over the comlink. “Director Horn is waiting for you in the garden.” He set off at a brisk pace, his shoes clicking sharply against the rose and black granite flooring. In the center of it, fashioned out of black marble and slices of malachite, the old CorSec logo had been rendered beautifully. I hopped over it, breaking my stride, which brought the man’s head back around to see what I was doing.
It didn’t surprise me that my grandfather was in the garden. When he retired he said he wanted to dig and plant there, until he was dug in and planted. After a long walk, we emerged onto a veranda that was amply shaded from the noontime sun. Beyond it, down a short green pathway leading to a central fountain within an amphitheatre of colorful flowerbeds, stood my grandfather.
Taller than me, taller even than my father had been, Rostek Horn had a lean, aristocratic bearing about him. Despite his age, his white hair grew in full and thick. His grey eyes never seemed to rest, and while I had only ever seen love and affection in them, colleagues who had chanced to be disciplined by my grandfather said they could be colder than the darkest iceball in the galaxy. While he seemed thinner than when I had last seen him, he was no less vital and, for the first time, I saw him as the predator colleagues had reported he could be.
What struck me as most unusual was that there he stood, full in the noon sun, wearing a formal black suit, with a high, stiff collar. He was not dressed for a day in the garden, but a day dealing with the variety of things that had occupied him during his days with CorSec. With his right flank toward me—providing less of a target, perhaps?—he brought his head around to look at me. Those cold grey eyes sent a jolt through me.
I started past my guide and onto the path, but the small man pressed a hand against my stomach, stopping me.
I looked at my grandfather and half-closed my eyes. I projected into his mind an image of my running and screaming and falling and laughing as a child on the same expanse of green that separated us now one from another. Opening my eyes fully, I said, “It has been a long time, Director. Perhaps you do not remember me.”
My grandfather remained rock still for a moment, then nodded. “Tosruk, he is known to me. You are dismissed.”
Tosruk’s brown eyes narrowed. “He scanned cleanly on his approach, but he might have skills.”
“I have nothing to fear from Halcyon here, do I?”
I shook my head. “No, sir.”
My grandfather slowly smiled. “You see, Tosruk, I am safe. Go about your other duties. Have the cook prepare us a light luncheon—and I mean light, not just with less gravy.”
Tosruk snapped his head forward in a bow, then spun on his heel and retreated.
I approached my grandfather slowly, not daring to break into the run I would have preferred to use in greeting him. I extended my hand to him and he took it, then