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“You haven’t changed since yesterday. Have you slept?”

She shook her head. “I don’t need sleep to deal with these pretenders.” She looked over Wedge’s shoulder and her expression became even more mournful. “You’d best go. Someone might grow suspicious … for no good reason at all.” She turned her back on him and moved into the crowd.

Wedge turned to look. Immediately behind him was Tycho, alert and intent as ever. That didn’t make sense; why would Tycho “grow suspicious”?

But over his shoulder, a few meters back, doing a very good job of looking innocuous, stood Iella.

Wedge froze and continued to scan the crowd in that direction. Who else could have provoked such a response from Cheriss? He noted and dismissed a double dozen faces. No, she had to have been referring to Iella.

But she shouldn’t have known Iella’s face. To know it, she had to have … Wedge calculated the times any of the New Republic pilots had been in contact with Iella. No, Cheriss had to have seen it last night. She had to have been the quiet stalker Janson had heard. She must have been outside Wedge’s quarters when he and Janson returned from the Allegiance last night, must have followed them to their meeting with Iella, must have later gotten a look at Iella’s face by some means.

And now she was—

“We are doubly blessed,” called the announcer. “Ground Champion Cheriss ke Hanadi, not content with a single victory this day, accepts a title challenge from Lord Pilot Phalle ke Seiufere.”

The crowd moved out to open another circle, and there stood Cheriss, this time opposite a squat plug of a man who looked as though he had tremendous upper body strength. Blond, with shoulder-length yellow hair and a mustache that trailed and swayed limply, the new challenger stared at Cheriss with real anger in his sea-green eyes.

Wedge swore to himself. The fight was already under way by the time he was able to maneuver himself to the front of the crowd. Nor was this a quick and easy battle like the last one; Wedge saw Cheriss and her opponent exchange assault after assault, each time deflecting blastsword blows with deft parries or by the more punishing method of catching the explosive blows on the guards of their swords. Within moments the air was thick with the delicate, colorful traceries of the movements of blastsword tips and with the acrid smell of blaster impacts, which became almost strong enough to overpower the perfumes.

Cheriss’s opponent, strong and fast, seemed to have no problem swatting aside Cheriss’s assaults before her blade point endangered him. Some of her thrusts, breathtaking in their speed and intricacy, snaked around the guard on his left-hand dagger, but these he took with equal skill on his blastsword guard, always disengaging immediately and moving forward in aggressive attack, driving Cheriss into retreat. Soon both Cheriss and her opponent were breathing heavily, sweat running from beneath their heavy and elaborate clothing.

Cheriss, slowing, swept her opponent’s point aside with the knife she still held in her distinctive reverse grip and leaped forward into a lunge. Her opponent riposted, his blastsword moving her tip out of line while his remained in line—but her lunge took her body lower than it customarily did, and suddenly she was skidding past him on her knees. Cheriss struck backward without looking and her blastsword point took her opponent behind the left knee. He yelped loud enough to drown out the blaster sound of impact, and collapsed onto one leg; before he could begin to recover, before he could force his body to work through the pain and shock of blast impact, Cheriss rose, spun, and tapped him once on each arm. He shrieked once more and slammed to the floor. Smoke rose from his wounds and the air filled with the smell of burned flesh.

The audience applauded. Cheriss, looking far more tired and shaky than Wedge had ever seen her, bowed her head to the crowd, then looked to the perator.

This time the ruler did not