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She twisted her way through a maze of gnarltrees and then clambered quickly and silently up their cablelike roots. They had once been legs, those roots, as she’d learned when she came here less than a decade and more than a lifetime ago. The immature form of the tree was a sort of spider that lost its mobility in adulthood.

She’d been with Anakin, here to face his trial, to discover if having the name of his grandfather would bring him the same fate.

I miss you Anakin, she thought. More now than ever.

About four meters off the ground, she secreted herself in a hollow and waited. If she could simply avoid them, she would. At one level her instincts cried out for battle, but at a deeper level she knew that her Yuuzhan Vong fighting reflexes had inevitable connections with fury, and she was here to avoid becoming Anakin’s vision, not embrace it. There was a part of her plan that she hadn’t told Han and Leia about—the part where, if the cave confirmed her worst fears, she would cripple her X-wing beyond repair and spend the rest of her life on the jungle planet.

Perhaps, like the spiders, she would sink her limbs into the swamp and become a tree.

She reached out with the Force, to better assess her pursuit.

They weren’t there. And she suddenly realized that she hadn’t felt them in the Force, but with her Vongsense. It had come so naturally she hadn’t even questioned it.

That could only mean her pursuers were Yuuzhan Vong, maybe six of them, give or take one or two. Vongsense wasn’t as precise as the Force.

She reached for her lightsaber, but didn’t unhook it, and continued to wait.

Soon she actually heard them. Whoever they were, they weren’t hunters—they moved through the jungle clumsily, and though they pitched their voices low enough that she couldn’t actually understand what they were saying, they seemed to be gabbling almost constantly. They must be very confident of their success.

A dark shadow glided soundlessly through the undergrowth, and she snapped her gaze up in time to see something very large blot the fragments of sky not occluded by the distant canopy.

Native life, or a Yuuzhan Vong flier?

Pursing her lips, she waited. Soon the distant muttering became coherent. As she’d thought, the language was that of her crèche.

“Are you certain she came this way?” a raspy voice asked.

“She did. See? The impression in the moss?”

“She is Jeedai. Perhaps she left these signs to confuse us.”

“Perhaps.”

“But you think she is near?”

“Yes.”

“And knows we are following her?”

“Yes.”

“Then why not simply call out to her?”

And hope I answer the battle challenge? Tahiri thought, grimly. So they did have a tracker with them. Could she slip around them, back to her X-wing? Or must she fight them?

Moving very slowly, Tahiri shifted in the direction of the voices. She could make out several figures through the under-story, but not distinctly.

“At some point we must, I suppose,” the tracker said. “Else she will think we wish her harm.”

What? Tahiri frowned, trying to fit that into her presuppositions. She couldn’t.

“Jeedai!” the tracker called. “I think you can hear us. We humbly request an audience.”

No warrior would do that, Tahiri thought. No warrior would use such honorless trickery. But a shaper …

Yes, a shaper or a priest might, a member of the deception sect. Still—

She leaned out for a better view, and found herself staring straight into the yellow eyes of a Yuuzhan Vong.

He was perhaps six meters away. She gasped at the sight of him, and revulsion jolted through her. His face was like an open wound.

A Shamed One, despised by the gods. He dared—her hand went to her lightsaber.

Then the shadow was back, and suddenly something sleeted through the branches, shredding the leaves and vines around her. She snarled a war cry and ignited her weapon, swirling it up to send two thud bugs burning off through the jungle.

Above her, through the now open canopy, she saw a Yuuzhan Vong tsik vai, an atmospheric flier, huge and ray-shaped, and from it snaked long cables. To each cable clung a Yuuzhan Vong