Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 08_ Edge of Victory 01_ Conquest - J. Gregory Keyes [92]
One problem at a time.
One of the Yuuzhan Vong slashed at Anakin’s left leg, while another did a whip-over toward his right shoulder. He leapt over the low attack and sliced his blade down the semirigid side of the high one. His blade hit the Yuuzhan Vong’s fingers, and two of them came off. From there Anakin lunged toward his second foe’s eye. The fellow jerked his head back and yanked his amphistaff up to parry. Anakin disengaged, avoiding the parry, and finished his blow right where a human sternum would be. The vonduun crab armor scorched but did not split, but the blow was strong. The Yuuzhan Vong was already off balance from avoiding the thrust to his eye, and now he sprawled heavily to the ground.
In those two or three seconds, Anakin’s other opponent whipped the amphistaff in such a way that it coiled around Anakin’s head and blade, the latter of which he had just drawn to an inner guard at his shoulder. Only turning the blade off kept him from being cut by his own weapon, but then there was nothing to prevent the amphistaff from closing around his neck like a garrote. Anakin reached reflexively for his throat, dropping his weapon. With a cry, the Yuuzhan Vong warrior turned his back, clearly intending to heave Anakin in a hard shoulder throw and snap his neck in the process. Anakin went with the throw and came down face-to-face with the warrior, his neck still intact.
Of course, he couldn’t draw the tiniest sip of air. Almost contemptuously, the warrior lifted him from the floor, both hands still gripping the ends of the amphistaff.
The Yuuzhan Vong didn’t see the lightsaber lift from the floor behind him, but he did notice when the purple blade appeared in his neck. He dropped Anakin, then.
Unfortunately, the amphistaff continued with the business of choking Anakin, and his second foe had found his feet. Anakin managed to get his blade in hand in time to block a dozen blows from the warrior’s staff, before he felt his lights going out. His blood screamed for air and his legs felt like they were made of wood.
He fell away from the attack, dropped like a rag doll, and in the minute pause when his enemy thought he had really collapsed, he turned the fall into a roll that took him past the Yuuzhan Vong, where he cut both legs behind the knee.
Then Anakin saw space.
“How long was I out?” Anakin asked Vua Rapuung. The Yuuzhan Vong dropped the amphistaff that had been coiled around Anakin’s neck.
“Only heartbeats.”
Anakin pushed himself up. “Are there more warriors?”
“None capable of fighting, not in this chamber. There may be more nearby.”
Anakin gingerly massaged his neck. “I thought you said there wouldn’t be warriors in here.”
“I was wrong. But they must be here for some purpose.”
“Maybe they knew we were coming.”
“Perhaps. I do not think so. These are the commander’s personal troops.”
“Wonderful. We’d better hurry this up, then.”
“Our guide fled, but we need him no longer. We must be near now.”
Anakin looked around at the fallen warriors. “Not that you seem to need it,” he said, “but why not take one of these amphistaffs?”
“I have sworn an oath to the gods,” Rapuung said. “Until I am redeemed before my people, I will not lift the weapon of a warrior.”
“Oh. That makes sense.” Anakin took a few steps and windmilled his arms, making sure everything worked.
“I don’t like the warriors being here,” Rapuung said.
“I’m not fond of it myself.”
“That’s not what I meant. If they are here without the permission of the shapers, it could mean they’ve come to arrest a shaper or to take something from them.”
“Can they do that?”
Vua Rapuung rasped a laugh. “You know too little of our ways, infidel, and too little about Mezhan Kwaad.”
“But what—” Anakin began, but then he got it. “Tahiri!”
“Come,” Vua Rapuung said. “There