Star Wars_ The New Rebellion - Kristine Kathryn Rusch [188]
But she sensed someone else close, someone precious. She turned. Han was at the mouth of the alley, his blaster out, his face hidden in shadow. Chewbacca was behind him. She wanted to run to Han, but she couldn’t. Not yet.
Something was happening to Luke.
At first she had thought he was going to die, as Obi-Wan did, but he didn’t. Kueller didn’t hit him. Instead, Kueller backed away and pulled out a small device. It was scanning his face.
She had a bad feeling about this.
“Luke!” she shouted, but Luke seemed to be ignoring her. He was trying to hold his lightsaber.
He was missing his chance. Kueller was going to do something awful and then get away.
The light stopped scanning Kueller’s face.
Leia raised her hand, and called Han’s blaster to her. It left his hands and zoomed toward her.
The Thernbee saw her, and its tail started to wag. It changed direction and came toward her.
The blaster clipped in the air. She was losing her mental grip on it. She pulled it to her faster. It hit her hand as a blanket dropped across her mind. She stumbled backward, then pulled the blaster aloft.
Kueller was still holding the device up. She saw his fingers move against the light the device gave off.
Even without feeling him through the Force, she knew what he was going to do. He had told her when he arrived. It didn’t matter that some of the droids had been turned off.
So many hadn’t.
Those waves of cold …
The concussion of the instant bomb …
The laughter of her children …
Leia raised the blaster, closed one eye, and lined the weapon up with Kueller. He didn’t see her. He couldn’t even feel her.
But Luke could.
“Leia!” he shouted.
Kueller turned, and Leia didn’t hesitate. The shot went directly for his head.
He raised a hand to ward it off, but the hand did no good. The blaster shot knocked him backward.
“Leia!” Luke shouted again.
The Thernbee was coming toward her, a giant furry ghost in the darkness.
Kueller sat up, and Leia shot him one more time. He fell back, the device falling out of his hand. She crossed the tile, the heavy feeling growing stronger with each movement.
“Leia!” Luke was beside her now. He took the blaster from her. She could feel his concern. Had she shot Kueller out of hatred and anger? Probably. Would she be going to the dark side now?
She didn’t know.
She couldn’t feel the Force at all anymore.
Maybe it didn’t count if she couldn’t feel the Force.
She stopped over Kueller’s body. He looked smaller now, his arms raised above his head. Luke reached for her, but she moved out of his way, and bent over Kueller. She slipped her fingers under his mask and ripped it away.
He was a boy, his features only beginning to show the signs of wear that Palpatine’s had at the end. His dark eyes were open and lifeless, his mouth slack, but his features still had the roundness of youth, a sort of chubby charm that should have radiated joy instead of hatred.
No wonder he had used the mask. A face like that would have terrified no one.
“He was just a child,” she whispered.
Luke crouched beside her. He took the mask from her hand. “No, Leia. He lost his childhood before he came to Yavin 4. He knew what he was doing, what he had become.”
He set the mask on Kueller’s destroyed chest, stood, and helped Leia up. The Thernbee was right beside them, its tongue out.
“There’s that blasted thing!” Han said from behind them. “I’d have been able to help if it hadn’t eaten my ysalamiri.”
“So that’s what that feeling is.” Luke brought a hand to his face and laughed shakily. “You helped, Han, old buddy. Let’s just hope the Thernbee here starts to digest the ysalamiri quickly.”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Han said. “It swallowed the cages too.”
“The Thernbee has eaten stranger things in the recent past,” Luke said.
Leia didn’t care about the Thernbee. She took one last look at the man who had threatened her entire family.
Then she turned around.