Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 05_ Agents of Chaos 02_ Jedi Eclipse - James Luceno [64]
Opposite the arrival bay, at the far end of the cloyingly perfumed parade corridor, waited Commander Malik Carr and his chief subalterns, a coven of priests, and off to one side, Executor Nom Anor, all revealed in tattooed and modified splendor.
As the train of elite warriors neared the dais, the drumbeats and insect voices ceased and Malik Carr stepped to the lip of the raised platform.
“Welcome, Supreme Commander Choka,” he crowed, his augmented voice resounding from the arching ceiling and tympanic bulkheads. “The Yammka and all here gathered are yours to command.”
A wrathful droning filled the hold. Simultaneously, ten thousand fists snapped crisply to their opposite shoulders in salute.
Supreme Commander Choka, military commander of the recently arrived spiral-arm worldship, transferred himself from the dovin basal cushion to an elevated seat at the center of the dais. While the four trailing hover cushions lined up behind him, priests, shapers, and others arranged themselves on the floor to both sides. Only when they were seated did Malik Carr and his contingent follow suit. On the deck the warriors bade their amphistaffs to coil around their bare right arms and dropped ceremoniously to one knee, heads bowed in deference.
The drumming and stridulations resumed, playing to the body as well as the ear. With five loud fanfares, some of the insects rested; but heroic bursts were immediately loosed by other insects, as if in reply. The counterpoint continued for some moments. Then, as Choka raised an ophidiform baton of command, the hold fell preternaturally silent.
“I bring salutations from Warmaster Tsavong Lah,” he intoned. “He commends you on the work you have done in preparing the way, and he looks forward to the time when he may join you in battle.”
Choka’s modest stature did not lessen his power. Narrow-hipped but braced by thick, muscular legs, he sat rigidly on the provided chair of carved and polished coral like a statue himself, while black-feathered avians cooled the air around him with their great wings. Facial tattoos, flattened nose, and decurved eyes—above large bluish sacs—afforded him a regal demeanor. His unadorned tunic was offset by a bloodred command cloak that fell from the tops of his shoulders, and rings of gaudy variety grew from his fingers and banded his wrists and upper arms. Black throughout, his long, fine hair was combed straight back from a sloping forehead and reached nearly to his waist.
“I, too, congratulate you on your successful harvest,” he went on after a moment. “You have acquitted yourselves well. Your captives from Obroa-skai, Ord Mantell, and Gyndine will bloody your nomination. But before we enact the sacrifice of the captives or learn from Commander Malik Carr the status of the invasion, we will use this moment to reward some of you for the measure of your commitment.”
The high priest who accompanied Choka rose to his feet and spoke.
“We thank the gods for delivering us into this promised domain. May the blood you shed purify and cleanse it for the coming of Supreme Overlord Shimrra. We honor the gods with the nurturing sap that flows within us, so that they might thrive and grant that we might continue to caretake their creations. All we do, we do in emulation and in veneration of them.”
The priest turned to the cushions that hovered behind Choka and motioned with his hand. The flutters lifted off, exposing four meter-high religious statues. The first represented Yun-Yuuzhan, the Cosmic Lord, absent those parts of himself he had sacrificed to create the lesser gods and the Yuuzhan Vong. The second and third statues represented Yun-Yammka, the Slayer, and Yun-Harla, the Cloaked Goddess. The fourth, and undeniably the most grotesque, was Yun-Shuno, the many-eyed patron deity of the “shamed ones”—those whose bodies had rejected the living implants, due either to a lack of preparation or to ambitious overreaching