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“Do it!” Myda reached out and clutched one of Wedge’s hands in her own. “Please, don’t leave her with him.”

Kassar’s hands settled on his wife’s shoulders and drew her back. “Myda, we can’t do that. She has made her decision.”

“But it is a bad one.”

Inyri’s father slowly shook his head. “And so this means we can deny her freedom? Making bad decisions is not a crime, not even under the Empire.”

“But I’ve seen plenty of people end up headed for Kessel because of making bad decisions.” Corran saw the pain in Myda’s eyes, and saw no small amount of it reflected in her husband’s expression. “I know Thyne—he is as bad as they come. Your daughter’s choice will land her in trouble.”

Kassar straightened up. “Only if she acts on it.”

“But she’s leaving with him.”

Kassar shrugged helplessly. “She has found something to value in him. Perhaps she can save him from himself.”

Corran winced. “Thyne’s pretty much a black hole as far as saving is concerned.”

“My whole life has been spent here training people how to live away from Kessel. That is all I can do, though. I cannot make their choices for them. I cannot live their lives for them.” Kassar looked down and wiped tears from Myda’s face. “We gave our daughter—all of our children—all the love and support we could. We trust them. Just as we trusted Lujayne to go off and join the Rebellion, we must trust Inyri.”

Corran shook his head. “I’m not liking this at all, Commander.”

“It doesn’t thrill me, either, Corran, but it’s not our fight and not one we can win, not right now anyway.” Wedge looked down at his fists, then opened them slowly. “Perhaps she will serve as a brake on him.”

“And when the brake burns out?”

“I expect you to have something arranged to cover that contingency.”

“As ordered, sir.” Corran started going through the list of criminals on his datapad. The original list had been drawn from Imperial files and annotated with rankings that determined the value of each individual to the Rebellion. Out of thousands of convicts, only seventeen had been identified as useful by New Republic officials. Those seventeen—now reduced to sixteen since Doole had eliminated Arb Skynxnex from consideration—clearly had been rising stars in the Black Sun organization. While none of them had achieved upper-level status, they had shown the sort of initiative and drive that made it clear, had their careers not been interrupted by arrest and conviction, the best of them would have been on a rough par with Jabba the Hutt in terms of power and influence.

Corran remembered his father having complained about the changing nature of organized crime. Once upon a time Black Sun had been an honorable organization—with its own morality, of course, but with a code that its members lived by. Black Sun had always been ruthless—dump a load of spice and blaster-packers would worry about collecting the cost, or its equivalent, from the smuggler in question. Members who informed on others would be killed in a most grisly manner, and law enforcement officers were legitimate targets for reprisals, but these things were all done on an individual basis.

The new breed was willing to use a bomb in a crowded cantina just to get one individual. The idea of killing an informer and his family became standard. The spice that started to be sold was stronger than ever before and the assassination of political figures who opposed the crime cartel became the rule, not the exception. Hal Horn had assumed the Rebellion’s success in defying the Empire had contributed to a general easing of moral standards that carried into Black Sun and allowed savages like Zekka Thyne to thrive.

Three silhouettes appeared on the other side of the airlock’s translucent inner seal. The soldier inside the tent opened the airlock and tugged Thyne through first. The hobbles on the man’s feet made him stumble, but Thyne managed to recover his balance despite having his arms bound behind him. He shook off his breathing mask, then held his head up defiantly. “I am Zekka Thyne.”

Five years on Kessel hadn’t done anything