Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 08_ Edge of Victory 01_ Conquest - J. Gregory Keyes [72]
“Got it.”
So Anakin let the Yuuzhan Vong warrior prick the thing into his flesh, tried not to wince as it rooted. He concentrated on recognizing the first sign—any sign—that his will was being taken from him.
When Rapuung was done, he felt violated, as if his own flesh had become a hateful thing, but he still felt in control. For the moment.
“Where can I hide my lightsaber?” Anakin asked. Rapuung had made him shed his clothes and gear back in the jungle. The broken weapon was the only possession he retained.
“It does not work.”
“I know. Where can I hide it?”
Rapuung hesitated for a moment. “Here,” he said. “In the far corner of the succession pool. It will be unnoticed in the organic material on the bottom.”
Anakin reluctantly followed Rapuung’s advice. It was a hard thing to watch the lightsaber he had built with his own hands sink into the water. But right now, it could only get him caught.
Moments later, Anakin was suddenly surrounded by Yuuzhan Vong, hundreds of them. They’d exited the larger compound at the same point the boat creature entered it, walking along the quay that ran parallel to the canal. The latter he could see curved off to join the river.
Between the river and the damutek complexes was the shantytown he had observed from the ridge. Unlike the orderly compounds, the dwellings here seemed placed almost at random, a series of organic domes and hollow circles pierced by openings. Most seemed barely large enough to sleep in, and he didn’t see many people coming in or out of them. Most of the Yuuzhan Vong he saw were like the angler Rapuung had killed. They were unscarred or had very few scars. Some had malformed or festering scars like Vua Rapuung, and they wore the same sort of loincloth that Rapuung and now Anakin had donned.
Of course it wasn’t a cloth at all, but something alive. If he pulled it away from his flesh, it slowly sealed itself there again.
He also had a tizowyrm secreted in his ear, and the speech of those around him reached him in little starts and flurries. But almost no one was talking. They went about their business quietly, rarely making eye contact.
He wasn’t the only non–Yuuzhan Vong either, he saw. There were a fair number of them, all with the coral restraining implants. Their expressions he readily recognized; they ranged from utter hopelessness to mere misery. Now and then he caught a glimmer from one that suggested he or she still hoped for escape. Like the Yuuzhan Vong, none gave him more than a glance.
“You!” a voice called from behind. Rapuung turned toward it, and Anakin shambled around more slowly, trying to keep the expression of the humans he had seen.
The Yuuzhan Vong who had addressed them was a warrior, the first Anakin had seen here. He struggled to keep still; up until now being this close to a warrior meant a fight to the death, and he had had more than his share of those.
The warrior twitched when he saw Rapuung’s face, and for a brief moment he looked almost as if he were about to genuflect. Then his eyes turned to obsidian.
“It is you. They told me at the port you had returned.”
“I have,” Rapuung answered.
“Many thought you had fled your shame. Many were glad not to have to look upon it.”
“The gods know no shame is on me,” Rapuung answered.
“Your flesh says otherwise,” the warrior answered.
“So it may be,” Rapuung replied. “Do you have a command?”
“No. What task has your executor given you?”
“I go to speak to him now.”
“The trawling schedules are filled for another four days. Perhaps you may spend that time in sacrifice and penitence begging Yun-Shuno to intercede for you. A word could be planted in your executor’s ear.”
“That is most generous, Hul Rapuung. But I do not require favor.”
“It is no favor to be given time to beg, even of the gods,” Hul Rapuung answered. “Go.”