Star Wars_ The New Rebellion - Kristine Kathryn Rusch [136]
Maybe if he didn’t move, it wouldn’t harm him. Most creatures, when faced with a monster like this one, Shrieked and ran. The first best gamble was always to wait it out.
The creature came closer. Drool dripped off its mouth, landing in giant puddles near its feet. It continued snuffling, following the path that Luke had made to the door and then to the straw.
Luke worked to control his own breathing, keeping it shallow. He willed himself invisible, but he didn’t know how to send that vision to the thing in front of him. He couldn’t yet tell if it had any real intelligence.
It followed his scent from the straw to the pallet, and it stopped in front of him, sniffing the air. Drool landed on his feet, soaking them in warm, slimy liquid. He didn’t move.
The creature kept sniffing. Its size was amazing. If he stood, he might be able to reach its barrel chest. Fortunately its mouth was small, or he would be eaten in one chomp.
The creature followed the scent downward, finally focusing on Luke. It shoved its muzzle at him. The cold nose covered him from forehead to stomach. He resisted the urge to shove it away, but instead he sat, forcing himself to remain calm. It sniffed him, pausing for a moment at his back. He closed his eyes. The wet nose-slime slid down his arms, and pooled near his feet. He could drown in this creature’s bodily fluids.
Then it pulled back. He let out a small sigh. It hadn’t registered him as anything different from the straw or the pallet. If he could remain still a little longer, he would be all right.
The creature tilted its head, its eyes glinting at him. Luke made eye contact.
That was his mistake.
With one quick movement, the creature took him in its jaws, and bit down.
Hard.
Thirty-five
Luke’s legs disappeared into the Thernbee’s mouth. Kueller turned away from the screen. Except for his new assistant, Kueller was alone in Femon’s control room. The masks glimmered at him from the wall. He didn’t like this place. He could still feel her presence. He would need to make some other place the center of his command.
“I want a guard on him at all times.”
His new assistant, Yanne, a slender man whose lined face and gray hair marked him as years older than Kueller, leaned forward. “I don’t think we’ll need it.”
Kueller had chosen Yanne because Yanne was one of the few of his people who actually expressed the opinion he had rather than the one Kueller wanted to hear. For the moment, it was a refreshing trait.
“Really, sir, only a miracle would save that man now. The Thernbee will toy with him, crushing one bone at a time, giving him the occasional illusion of escape, but never allowing him to disappear.”
“I know how a Thernbee kills,” Kueller said. He had grown up around them, large white menaces in the Almanian mountains. “I want that guard.”
“It’s a waste of manpower,” Yanne said.
Kueller nodded as if he had heard. “You’re right. We’d best put four guards on the Thernbee cages.”
“Four! Sir, you can’t be serious. Even if the man survived the Thernbee, he’d be too weak, too debilitated to do any harm. We’d be better off placing most of our people in battle positions. There are reports—”
“I’ve heard the reports,” Kueller said. “I’m prepared for them. But we have Luke Skywalker below. I only put him with the Thernbee because I need him alive until his sister arrives. But, as long as Luke Skywalker is alive, there is always the risk that he will defeat his adversary. We must be prepared for this risk.”
“He was wounded when we put him in there. A few bats from the Thernbee and he’ll be dead.”
“It won’t be that simple,” Kueller said.
“No man is that powerful,” Yanne said.
Kueller turned to him, no longer amused by Yanne’s mouth. He stared at the man