[Black Fleet Crisis] - 02(59)

Luke gestured with one hand. “And?”

“If I had gone, I would have been trapped there,” she said. “I would’ve been on Lucazec, yes, but I would’ve been poor again. On Carratos, at least, there were busy ports, and I knew how to earn enough to keep some. You saw Lucazec—there’s not enough wealth there to take by theft or marriage, much less by honest work.”

“So you waited.”

“There was really no choice,” Akanah said. “I realized I needed to buy myself more than passage off Carratos—I needed to buy myself freedom from ever living like that again. I have nothing but this ship, Luke, and a few credits—but I have this ship. Though with your perquisites as a hero, you may not understand how much that means to me.”

“No,” Luke said. “I understand. I remember what it felt like to be trapped on Tatooine.”

“Then have I answered your question? Do you understand now?”

Luke nodded. “All except for this—when you finally got the ship, why did you come for me first? Why Coruscant and not Lucazec?”

“Because when I dreamed of returning to Ialtra, you were always there,” Akanah said gently. “Which puzzled me, until I realized what it meant that I was supposed to take you with me. That I was to bring you to the circle. That you belong there.”

Almost to his surprise, though not to his displeasure, Luke found that he believed her answers. They had the simple directness of emotional truth.

But for some reason, they did not make it any easier for him to sleep.





Chapter 8


“-Talos Spaceport, Atzerri.”

Akanah glanced sideways at Luke. “May I? she asked.

“Of course,” Luke said with an offering gesture, settling back in the pilot’s couch.

“Talos Spaceport, this is Mud Sloth,” Akanah said.

“What’s your berth price for twenty meters and under?”

“What currency will you be paying in?”

“New Republic credits,” she said.

“Nine hundred for the first two days, including landing fees and topping your consumables. One hundred a day beyond that. But if you’re staying longer than ten days, we can start you with long-term rates from the third day.”

“Talos, you must have mistaken me for a rube,” said Akanah. “Because those can’t be anything but rube rates.”

“Those are the published rates as of the first of the month,” the spaceport controller said. “Nine hundred to plop and fill, a hundred a day for the lockup. I don’t have any latitude on that.”

“Talos, I said twenty meters, not two hundred,” said Akanah. “And I’m only renting the berth, not buy ing it. So why don’t you start again, and this time try not to be insulting.”

“Nine hundred to plop, a hundred a day for the lockup,” the controller repeated. “Do you want it, or not? There aren’t that many spaces available.”

“Really? I would have thought all your berths would be empty, seeing as Skreeka is landing the little stuff for six hundred, with five days’ lockup included.”

“Skreeka is run by thieves,” the controller said.

“Their lockups have the worst security on the continent.”

“You’ll have to give us a better reason than that not to go there,” Akanah said. “After all, you’ve already tried to rob me.”

“One moment, Mud Sloth.” A yellow light glowed on the comm display.

“Watch,” Akanah said to Luke. “He’ll come back with a better offer and say his supervisor authorized it.

But it’s all a matter of how much of his margin he’s willing to give up to keep us from going to Skreeka.

Whatever he comes back with, you can be sure it’s above the port’s internal rates-he’ll make sure he gets something out of this.”

“I didn’t think you were so well traveled.”

She smiled. “I stayed close to the ports on Carratos, and I listened well.”

“When did you get the quote from Skreeka?”

“Oh, I made it up.”

The yellow indicator winked out and was replaced by a green one.

“Talos Spaceport. We see this is your first visit here. My supervisor doesn’t want to see you taken advantage of by those scoundrels at Skreeka. He’s authorized a onetime courtesy rate–five hundred to land and load up, seventy-five a day. That’s the very best I can do for you, and I’d take it, if I were you. Trust me when I tell you, we’re not making a credit at those prices. And I don’t care where you go, anyone who asks you for less is gonna find some way to get the difference back from you.”