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Han nodded. “On Bonadan.”

The Rodian’s tapered snout wiggled in a kind of smile. “Terrific place.”

Team Meloque moved out. Four-member bands of Yuuzhan Vong patrolled Caluula City’s mostly unpaved streets, but the alleged scientists were allowed to pass without incident. On a lush common, two priests were overseeing a mixed group of locals and Yuuzhan Vong workers who were erecting a temple to Yun-Yuuzhan. Street and storefront electric lights had been ripped from their supports, and there wasn’t a droid or a speeder to be seen.

“Welcome to the new galaxy,” Kyp said.

“No slave coral,” Leia said quietly.

Sasso nodded. “That was one of the conditions of the surrender.”

“How’d everyone feel about the surrender?” Page asked carefully.

“Let me put it this way,” the Rodian said. “The governor no longer appears in public, and she’s had the walls of her compound reinforced.”

Han noticed that Page appeared to be right at home. He rode his timbu with practiced ease, and he knew which way to direct the beast even before the guides said anything. It was as if he had already memorized the layout of the streets and the topography of the planet. Han guessed that Page would be able to converse in Caluulan if necessary, eat the food and drink the water without getting ill, catch the eye of the local women, make do as if he had been born and raised there.

Wraw, in contrast, was clearly out of his element. The bristly-bearded Bothan had a habit of looking at everyone with what seemed like bemusement or mild derision, but his head fur betrayed none of the changes that were a characteristic of his species. But Han had encountered the style before in individuals who had built their lives around inveigling secrets from others, and then seeing to it that those secrets reached the proper ears.

“How far to the yammosk?” Kyp asked Sasso.

“The installation is practically the new city center—probably to discourage attempts at orbital bombardment. But our safest approach is from the south, which means crossing two ranges of hills to get there.”

“The weapons are cached along our route?” Page said.

“There are weapons buried everywhere,” Sasso told him. “As soon as it became obvious that the Vong were interested in occupying Caluula, we began hiding as much as we could: blasters, foods, droids, you name it. You can’t dig a hole in the hills without uncovering one supply dump or another. By the time Caluula Station fell and the Vong were coming down the gravity well, we were already living like homesteaders.”

“Surely the Yuuzhan Vong are aware of your actions,” Meloque said.

“They are. But so far they haven’t done much investigating. A few caches of arms and droids were discovered, and twenty Caluulans were sacrificed. But aside from that incident, things have been relatively quiet.” Sasso nodded his snout to indicate a change in direction. “We go this way.”

“How soon before we’ll begin to see winged-star shells?” Meloque asked.

“As soon as we gain some elevation.”

Sasso brought the train of eight timbus to a halt at the foot of a steep, uphill track that disappeared into a thickly forested ravine. A winged creature passed soundlessly overhead, disappearing into the trees before Han could get a good look at it.

“Yuuzhan Vong biot,” Ferfer said nervously. “We’re being watched.”

TWENTY-ONE

Mirroring the sweeping curve of the planetary ring, the war vessels of the armada were spread above bright-side Yuuzhan’tar like fine grains of crystalline sand. Arrayed in battle groups and reprovision flotillas, each cruiser, carrier, and tender analog had been branded with domain emblems and daubed with blood preserved from the sacrifice of the Alliance captives. Some of the vessels flew battle standards earned over countless generations. Others were necklaced hundreds strong with coralskippers. Behind the mica transparencies of observation blisters and resupply balconies, commanders and subalterns crouched on one knee, their heads lowered in obeisance, and their right fists pressed to the yorik coral decks.

There lazed