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Crushed in among the rerouted mixed-species thousands off-loaded from the transport ships, and still wet and possibly poisoned from Ruan’s cursory decontamination process, Melisma read the sign aloud and aimed a worried glance at Gaph, who had Droma’s nephew balanced atop one of his shoulders.

“ ‘Last chance to turn back’?”

“Someone’s idea of a joke,” Gaph said in dismissal. “Come, child, how bad can it be? We have pleasing countryside all around, fresh air in place of scrubbed oxygen, the promise of food and drink, ten thousand melancholy sentients for company.” He grinned and lowered his voice to add, “And where there are melancholy sentients, there are opportunities galore for the Ryn.”

Melisma smiled uncertainly, though what Gaph said about the surroundings was undeniably true, for Ruan was nothing if not one of the Core’s beauty marks.

One of eighteen agricultural worlds administered by Salliche Ag, Ruan—or at least that part of the planet the refugees had been delivered to—had the manicured look of a park. The undeviating road that linked the planet’s bustling spaceport to Refugee Facility 17 was bordered by tall, topiary hedges, and beyond those hedges, as far as the eye could see, stretched scrupulously maintained fields of crops, in varying states of maturation. Unlike Orron III, Ukio, Taanab, and most of the other breadbasket worlds on which the Ryn had sought employment from time to time, Ruan did not merely rely on axial tilt and fertile soil, but was climate controlled and agriformed to maximize output. Also there were far fewer harvester droids, agribots, and work droids than Melisma had expected to see, which meant more occupational opportunities for sentients.

She breathed deeply of the sweet air. Gaph was right. Arriving on Ruan, especially after spending more than a standard week in the cramped and fetid living conditions aboard the transport, was like being delivered to paradise itself. But vague concerns continued to rankle her. How long would they be required to remain on Ruan, and where would they end up afterwards? Princess Leia had made it clear that their stay on Ruan would be temporary, but with the Yuuzhan Vong already in the Expansion Region, how long before they carried their invasion into the Core? And what then?

Processing the newly arrived exiles was a painfully tedious business. With everyone pressed so tightly together there was nowhere to sit much less recline, and no escape from the potent sunshine that climate supervision had apparently ordered for the day. The crowd seemed to extend endlessly to the front and rear. But at last the five of them—Gaph, Melisma, her two female clancousins, and the infant—reached a processing checkpoint attended by armed security guards sporting Salliche Ag arm badges.

A human male with a scarred jaw appraised them from the window of the checkpoint booth. “What in the galaxy are these?” he asked someone out of view.

Instantly, a no-less-sinister-looking uniformed female appeared at the window and aimed a spherically shaped optical scanner directly at Melisma. “Could take the system a moment to recognize them,” she told the first guard. When the scanner emitted a single tone, she glanced at its display screen. “Ryn.”

“Ryn? What rock are they from?”

The woman shook her head. “Planet of origin unknown. But what’s the difference, they arrived from Gyndine. See if we’ve got any more like them.”

Melisma’s misgivings returned. SELCORE advocates and Ruan officials at the spaceport had been cordial and accommodating, but these guards, both in their bearing and manner of dress, brought to mind the Espos who, years back, had policed many of the Corporate Sector worlds.

“Yeah, we actually do have some others,” the first guard was saying. “Thirty-two, at last count.” He sneered down at Gaph. “Sec 465, Ryn. Behind the communal refreshers.”

Gaph heard Melisma’s sharp intake of breath and turned to her. “All right, so forget what I said about fresh air. We’ll still have food and drink to slack our appetites and a roof over our heads.”

“We could have