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Han lifted an eyebrow. “Why’s that sound like some cryptic remark your uncle would make?”

“I only meant that Chewie would get a kick out of your using something he made.”

“Yeah, he probably would at that,” Han said, averting his gaze. “Thanks, kid.”

Anakin was about to speak when Roa called down to Han from the top of the ramp.

“We’re cleared for liftoff.”

Han turned to Anakin. “Time to go.”

“Sure, Dad. Take care.”

They embraced, stiffly and briefly. Han started for the Happy Dagger but stopped halfway up the ramp and swung back to Anakin. “It’s going to be all right, you know.”

Anakin stared at him, blinking back tears. “What is—the war, my feeling terrible about Chewie, or your taking off without letting anyone know where you’re going?”

TEN

Imposing in size, coloration, and carriage, Commander Tla paced back and forth at the foot of the rough-hewn command platform at the heart of Harrar’s ship. Dangling from the points of his broad shoulders, the commander’s long campaign cloak swished as he swung to face the priest and Nom Anor.

“Destroying the spawn ship was a profligate act,” Tla bellowed. “You should have found some other way to place Elan in their hands.”

“Other stratagems might have proved even more costly in the long run,” Harrar countered. “As it was, the crew of the spawn ship went willingly to their deaths, content to be ennobled by the importance of the sacrifice.”

Tla cast an angry glance at his tactician. Promoted in the wake of Shedao Shai’s death on Ithor, Tla wore his rank like a scowl.

“All respects, Eminence Harrar,” Raff said, “but this isn’t some game that can be decided by cleverness. We’re waging a holy war.”

“Ah, but any war is always a game of sorts. We needed to make certain that Elan’s flight from us appeared credible.”

Tla scoffed. “You’re newly arrived in this arena, priest. You don’t give the infidels enough credit. They will lay your artifice bare before long.”

“Indeed? Would it surprise you to learn that Elan has already been taken into protective custody?”

Tactician Raff showed Harrar a dubious look. “I would advise you not read too much into that, Eminence. Elan is the first of us they have managed to capture alive.”

“Of course. But the point is that I know where she is, and I know where she is to be taken next.”

Tla turned skeptically to Nom Anor. “Is this the doing of your dupes and agents, Executor?”

Nom Anor smiled faintly, but shook his head. “Unfortunately, no, Commander.”

“Then how do you know?” Tla demanded.

Harrar motioned to one of his acolytes, who carried forward, as one might a newborn, a light-brown and slightly oblate villip. Carefully, Harrar took the villip into his hands, then cradled it in his left arm.

“Elan’s captors were beguiled enough to bring this little one’s twin along with Elan. It has been most dutiful in reporting back to us.” Harrar stroked the villip’s ridge with his three-fingered right hand. “Come, little one, repeat what you told me earlier.”

Commander Tla and the tactician moved closer in interest.

The puckered tissue at the center of the nubby ridge expanded, and the villip began to turn inside out. Fully everted, the creature did its best to mimic Elan’s comely features.

“Way-land,” the creature said. “Way-llland.”

* * *

Slowed by braking thrusters, the civilian shuttle Segue coursed above the craggy northeastern uplands of Wayland’s principal continent. Dense, canopied forest cloaked the southern slopes of now truncated Mount Tantiss, but to the east lay vast areas denuded by the seismic explosion that had destroyed Emperor Palpatine’s storehouse more than fifteen years earlier.

One of three passengers in the shuttle, Belindi Kalenda, NRI’s deputy director of operations, pressed her face to the window to soak in as much of the view as possible. As the shuttle continued to descend, a small city came into view at the base of the mountain.

“I’m shocked,” Kalenda remarked to her seatmate. “I was picturing New Nystao as little more than a hamlet.” Slim and dark-complected, with widely spaced eyes and a husky voice,