Star Wars_ The Han Solo Adventures - Brian Daley [151]
He didn’t quite have time to conclude what went wrong; the next moment, Chewbacca and a splayed carcass were gyrating toward the lake’s surface. He caught a split-second flash of his own reflection before it parted for him with all the soft receptiveness of a fusion-formed landing strip.
The curt slap of the water galvanized him, though, helping him overcome the numbing cold. He fought to untwist himself, only to find that the soarer didn’t float well; its wings settled around him and the weight of the metal framework bore him down. Reaching and wriggling, he still couldn’t release himself from the improvised harness that held him to it. The bowcaster around his neck only complicated things.
He became snarled in slack cable and his giant strength meant nothing against the cushiony persistence of the lakewater. His breath, too much to retain, began to escape his lips in silvery bubbles as the Wookiee fought to free himself from the sinking glider. It became hard to see, and he found himself thinking about his family and his green, lush homeworld.
Then he realized a dark shape was circling him, making quick motions and weaving in and out among the tangled rigging with a sure ease and suppleness. A moment later the Falcon’s first mate was being tugged toward the surface of the lake, which came at him like an unending, flawed mirror.
Chewbacca broke into the air and drew a breath with such enthusiasm that he found himself choking on it, splitting and coughing and mouthing salty Wookiee expressions. Spray got around behind to support him, swimming with deftness and agility despite the pair of heavy cutters he held in one hand.
“That was fantastic!” gushed the skip-tracer. “I’ve never seen anything like that in my life! I came after you when I realized you’d overshoot and land in the lake, but I never thought I’d reach you in time. The land just isn’t my element.” He pulled at the Wookie’s shoulder to get him started.
Stroking for the nearby shore, Chewbacca decided he felt exactly the same way about the sky.
XI
“HIS name was Zlarb,” Han said to the Mor Glayyd in that fortunate young man’s study. “He tried to cheat me and kill me. He had a list of ships that were cleared through your clan’s agency, but I haven’t got the plaque with me right now. But if you could find his name in your records—”
“That isn’t necessary. I know his name well,” interrupted the Mor Glayyd, exchanging looks of extreme gravity with his sister.
“His bosses owe me ten thousand,” said Han with something akin to fervor, “and I want it.”
The Mor Glayyd leaned back, his conform lounger molding to him, and folded his hands. He no longer seemed quite so young; he was playing a role for which he’d been well groomed. Han wished he had hung on to one of those guns in the armory.
“What do you know of the clans of Ammuud and their Code, Captain Solo?”
“That the Code almost plotted your terminal orbit for you today,” Han answered.
The youthful Mor Glayyd conceded, “A possibility. The Code is what holds the clans together yet keeps us from one another’s throats. Without it, we’d revert to the backward, warring savages we were a hundred years ago. But betraying a trust or breaking an oath is also covered by the Code, and makes the violator a nonentity, an outcast, whatever his previous status. And not even a clan Mor is above the Code.”
Oh, let me guess where this is going, Han simmered, but he said nothing.
“Those dealings my clan had with Zlarb’s people fall into that category. We asked no questions; we accepted our commission for delivery and pickup of the ships without concerning ourselves with their use. Zlarb and his associates knew our practice; that’s why they were willing to pay us so well.”
“Meaning you’re not going to tell me what I want to know,” Han predicted.