Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 08_ Edge of Victory 01_ Conquest - J. Gregory Keyes [80]
“Who’s there?” a voice asked, from the shadows around the pool. Anakin stepped back quickly, heart running toward lightspeed, and withdrew into the darkness in the far corner of the compound.
“Your pardon,” he rasped, grateful for the tizowyrm in his ear. He tried to make his voice sound as much like a Yuuzhan Vong’s as possible. “I am no one, a Shamed One.”
The figure in the darkness shifted, and he could suddenly see more of her silhouette. Something was strange about her head. It wriggled like a nest of snakes, like nothing he had yet seen among the Yuuzhan Vong.
“This is the compound of the shapers,” the woman’s voice said. “You have no business here, Shamed One.”
“I beg pardon, great one,” Anakin said. “I wished only—I had hoped the waters of the succession pool would inspire me to beseech Yun-Shuno persuasively.”
The silence stretched. “I should report you, you know. Only those Shamed Ones with passage pheromone are allowed here. I—” He heard a little gasp of pain.
“Is anything the matter, great one?”
“No,” she replied in a strained voice. “It is only my suffering. I came here to contemplate it. Go, Shamed One. I would not interrupt my reverie over you. Go, leave me in peace, and count yourself fortunate.”
“Thank you, great shaper. As you will.”
And with that, he withdrew. Sweat was coursing down his brow, and his limbs trembled slightly, but triumph was a supernova inside of him. He had what he needed, now.
The supernova cooled a little as he left the damutek and padded back into the village of the Shamed Ones. He needed more than the lambent and the lightsaber. He needed time, and solitude, and even the lenient Uunu wasn’t likely to give him that. But he also couldn’t wait for Vua Rapuung any longer. Uunu was suspicious of him. Hul Rapuung had voiced a similar suspicion, that very first day.
And Vua Rapuung might be dead.
So he needed to hide somewhere. Where?
Puzzling over that, he ran headlong into someone. A Yuuzhan Vong cursed, and a strong hand knotted in his hair. Startled, Anakin dropped both his lightsaber and the lambent, which flared into sudden light.
In the illumination, a mutilated face stared down at him.
“Vua Rapuung!” he gasped.
“Yes,” the other growled. “Quiet that lambent.”
“Let go of me, then.”
The Yuuzhan Vong did so, and Anakin dropped to one knee, retrieving both items. Be still, he thought at the lambent, picturing it dark.
The light paled and vanished.
“What are you doing with that?” Rapuung snarled.
“Never mind. I’m glad to see you. I’ve heard—”
“They tried to kill me,” Rapuung said shortly. “We must act now. Tonight, or never.”
“We can’t!” Anakin said. “There’s something I still have to do.”
“Impossible.”
“No, listen. You said one reason you wanted me was because of my lightsaber, right?”
“It would help us a great deal,” Rapuung growled reluctantly. “Without it I am not certain how we will circumvent the portals and safeguards.” He cocked his head. “You lied to me? You have the weapon?”
“It doesn’t work. But I can fix it. With the lambent I can fix it.”
“Do so, then, and hurry.”
“Even if I hurry, it could take a day or two.”
“Again, impossible. We cannot hide for two days here, and if we go beyond the perimeter, we will never come back in.”
“I need two days,” Anakin said stubbornly.
“Tomorrow they will realize I am alive,” Rapuung said. “Unless you have a Jeedai sorcery to make us invisible …”
“No,” Anakin said, “but—listen. The temple that was here, the one built of stone. How was it destroyed?”
“What? A damutek was landed on it. Its substance was dissolved and used to nourish the coral.”
“But did they fill in the caverns below it?”
“Caverns?”