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Maybe that was all they wanted. His instincts certainly told him that this was a decoy of some kind, not what he was fighting for. Solusar seemed to concur. But if they couldn’t be sure …

“First fighter wave in thirty seconds,” H’sishi said tonelessly.

“Get ready, people.”

A good crew. They would die if he asked them to.

“Tahiri,” Solusar breathed. His face was beaded with sweat.

“What’s that?”

“Tahiri. And Valin. Sannah. Anakin. They’re all down there.” His voice dropped lower, into a register of anguish. “Tahiri’s been tortured.”

“But they’re down there.”

“Yes. I’m sure of it.”

“Thank you, Jedi Solusar. Dankin, break off the attack. We’re letting this one go. Lay down minimal cover fire and tell the other ships to burn jets. We’ll fight another day, people—when it really counts.” Karrde took a deep breath, trying to release the pent-up tension in his neck and shoulders.

“And hope those Solo kids find that rogue Terrik before we have to fight that fight. After this, I’m definitely looking into getting my own Star Destroyer.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Anakin arched his back and tried not to cry out as whatever the Yuuzhan Vong put on his wound sent cosmic flares of pain through his body.

“You hate pain,” Vua Rapuung said with evident disgust.

Anakin couldn’t and didn’t disagree. He just gritted his teeth and waited for it to pass. He knew the Yuuzhan Vong venerated pain in themselves and others. It was one of many unlikable tenets of their unhealthy religion.

“What hit me?” Anakin asked instead.

“A nang hul,” the warrior grunted. “Thud bug.”

“Poison?”

“No.”

The two sat in a damp cave behind a waterfall. It was slick with fungus and moss. The Yuuzhan Vong had evidently been hiding in the cave for a day or two, for various of his possessions were already in it, including the patch he had just applied to Anakin’s shoulder. He’d peeled it from a pale green, roughly rectangular pad several centimeters thick. The pad consisted of many thin layers, like leaves of flimsiplast glued together. Rapuung had pressed one of these detached skins over Anakin’s wound. Like everything else the Yuuzhan Vong used, it was alive. Anakin could feel it squirming, digging into his wound. It occurred to him that the warrior might be poisoning him or something even worse. But if Vua Rapuung wanted him dead, he could have accomplished that anytime. After all, he had made short work of two Yuuzhan Vong warriors, and Anakin didn’t have the strength to fight off a wokling.

“You saved my life,” Anakin said reluctantly.

“Life is nothing,” Vua Rapuung said.

“Yeah? Then why take the trouble?”

Vua Rapuung’s black eyes glimmered murkily. “You, Jeedai. You fight your way toward the shaper compound. Why?”

“Your people have a friend of mine. I’m going to get her back.”

“Ah. The female Jeedai. You wish to save her life. How pitiful. What a pitiful goal.”

“Yeah? Well, I didn’t ask for your help, you offered it. So explain or kill me. I haven’t got time to waste.”

“Revenge,” Vua Rapuung said, his voice low, his eyes slitted. “Revenge, and to prove that the gods—” His eyes suddenly went hard and glittering. “I need not tell you, human. I need explain nothing to you, unsanctioned offspring of machines.” He spat the last word out as if it were poison he’d suddenly discovered in his mouth.

“You need know only this,” he continued. “I will stand at your side or your back. Your foes are my foes. We will kill together, embrace pain together, embrace death together if such is Yun-Yuuzhan’s wish.”

“You’ll help me rescue Tahiri,” Anakin said dubiously.

“It’s a stupid goal, but finding her will serve my purposes well.”

Anakin searched that black diamond gaze, trying to understand. There was nothing there, nothing. The Yuuzhan Vong was more like a holo than a person, an image, an appearance. How could such a thing have feelings to be understood? Without the Force, how could he hope to comprehend such an alien creature?

“I don’t understand,” Anakin said. “What did your people do to you? Why do you hate them so?