Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order_ Dark Tide 02_ Ruin - Michael A. Stackpole [122]
Luke felt the Force wreathing Corran. It strengthened him and quickened him, but could not predict for him what his enemy would do. The amphistaff cut and stabbed, always missing Corran by centimeters, or being parried aside. The Yuuzhan Vong managed to whirl his amphistaff around in time to parry Corran’s lunges, or to bat away slashes. They seemed, the two of them, to be perfectly matched. Defeat will come from a single mistake.
The argent lightsaber whirled in a grand arc, then sliced in at Shedao Shai. The Yuuzhan Vong warrior moved to block the cut, but Corran dipped the blade beneath the staff. He whipped his lightsaber up in a stroke that should have split the Yuuzhan Vong from groin to throat, but Shedao Shai danced back, leaving only the smoking tails of his loincloth fluttering to the ground in his wake.
Corran closed and lunged at Shedao Shai’s upper chest. With two hands on the amphistaff, the Yuuzhan Vong parried the argent blade high, then ducked his head and whirled around in a circle. The amphistaff snapped straight against Shedao Shai’s right forearm, then he lunged.
Pain exploded from the Jedi as the amphistaff’s tail stabbed deep into his guts. The tip tented the back of the robe over Corran’s right hip, then the Yuuzhan Vong yanked the amphistaff free, spinning the Jedi to the ground. Corran curled around the holes in his right flank, drawing his knees up. His lightsaber lay smoking on the grass.
Luke wanted to reach out, to help quell Corran’s pain, but he held himself back. The Jedi Master drew some small comfort from the fact that the strike had not severed Corran’s spine. Could have gotten arteries, and his guts are holed, but he could survive this, if Shai gives him a chance.
Shedao Shai drew back several steps, then tugged off his mask and tossed it aside. He raised the gore-streaked amphistaff to his lips and harvested incarnadine fluid with his tongue. His lips closed for a moment, his eyes following, then he nodded.
“I vowed I would taste your blood as you die, and now I have done that.”
Corran coughed once, pain flaring through the Force, then rolled up to his knees. “Good for you, pal, glad you’re happy.” He winced as he scooped up his lightsaber and staggered to his feet. “Had I been in your boots, I would have vowed something else.”
“Oh?” The Yuuzhan Vong’s eyes opened a slit. “And what would that have been?”
“I’ve have vowed to taste my blood after I was dead.” All sense of pain vanished from the Jedi as the Force again enshrouded him. Corran waved the invader forward with his bloody left hand. “So, is this inability to make a clean kill a Vong thing, or just a Domain Shai thing? You’re so sloppy those bones won’t want to come home with you.”
Shedao Shai’s eyes snapped open. Though Luke could not read him through the Force, the fury and hatred coursing through the Yuuzhan Vong was unmistakable. The warrior darted forward, bringing the amphistaff up and around in a two-handed overhead blow. He smashed it down on Corran’s upraised lightsaber, driving the Jedi back a step.
Again and again he rained the blows down with bone-jarring impact. Corran retreated, giving up a step or two with each attack. As Shedao Shai’s fury built, so did his strength, forcing Corran to raise his left hand from the hole in his side to the hilt of his lightsaber. Another blow battered the silver blade, and another, buckling Corran’s legs, dropping him to his knees.
Shedao Shai towered over him, rising up on his tiptoes to deliver that final blow. The amphistaff rose and crashed down, set to bash the lightsaber back into its wielder, slaying an infidel with the blasphemous weapon he embraced.
With a flick of his thumb, Corran killed the blade and sagged forward.
Overbalanced because his weapon met no resistance, Shedao Shai buried his amphistaff deep in the ground and stumbled a half-step