Corran threw him a sideways look. “What do you mean?”
“I mean whatever it is that Skywalker picks up when he gets near a group of clones,” Karrde told him. “Whatever this disturbance is that it creates in the Force.”
For a long moment the only sound on the bridge was the argument going on behind them, now become three-way as Shish joined in on Bodwae’s side. “I don’t know what Luke senses when there are clones nearby,” Corran said at last, his voice barely audible. “All I felt here was the presence of something alien.”
Karrde nodded. “I see.”
Corran turned to face him. “My … talent … is not exactly public knowledge, Karrde,” he said, his tone somewhere between challenge and threat.
“Yes, I know,” Karrde replied evenly. “Wise of you to keep it that way.”
“I think so,” Corran countered. “Problem is, you’re in the business of selling information.”
“Ah, but I’m also in the business of survival,” Karrde said. “And in this big, dangerous galaxy one occasionally needs a helping hand.” He cocked an eyebrow. “I always think it’s nice when there are cards in that hand which the opposition doesn’t know about.”
Corran’s forehead furrowed slightly. “So that’s how it works, huh? You keep quiet, and I owe you one?”
Karrde looked back along the command walkway. From around the corner of the aft bridge Mirax and Valin had reappeared, Mirax looking cautious, the boy tugging impatiently at his mother’s hand with the obvious wish to run to Daddy. “Yes, you owe me one,” he told Corran. “But be assured that when I collect, it’ll be something safe. I owe Mirax that much.” He considered. “Either that, or something vital that absolutely has to be done.”
Corran snorted gently. “That covers a lot of ground.”
Karrde shrugged. “As I said. It’s a big, dangerous galaxy.”
CHAPTER
12
The west wall of the Resinem Entertainment Complex was dirty and salt-encrusted, discolored with age and pitted by the debris from the explosion fifteen years earlier that had leveled the rival gambling hall down the street. From the far side of the fifty-meter depression that marked the explosion’s center the Resinem’s west wall was said to be rather attractive, the random bits of damage weaving themselves into intriguing visual patterns, particularly in the shifting glow of a Borcorash sunset.
But sunset was long past, and Shada wasn’t on the far side of the pit, anyway. She was three-quarters of the way up the west wall, digging her climbing hooks carefully into the various cracks and cavities; and from this perspective, all she could tell was that the wall was dirty and not much fun. Join a smuggling group, she thought darkly for about the fifth time since beginning her climb. Visit a side of the galaxy the tourists never see.
It wasn’t fun, but it was necessary. Very soon now Mazzic and Griv would be escorted onto the Resinem’s ultra-private top floor for a meeting with a smooth-talking Kubaz who represented a shadowy Hutt crime cartel. Griv was carrying a small case full of ryll, the Kubaz would be carrying a similarly sized case full of Sormahil fire gems, and in theory the gathering would break up with a simple and mutually profitable exchange.
In theory.
Somewhere in the distance off to her right an airspeeder swung around in preparation for landing; and as its landing lights sent a brief splash of pale illumination across the wall in front of her, Shada felt a fresh surge of depression sweep through her. She hadn’t been home to Emberlene for over twelve years now, not since Mazzic had hired her on as his bodyguard, but the grime and deterioration of this wall had brought all those memories back as if it had been yesterday. Memories of growing up amid the ruins of what had once been great cities. Memories of the death that had struck so often around hen death by disease, by malnutrition, by violence, by hopelessness. Memories of pervasive hunger, of eking out an existence by the vermin she was able to catch and kill, and on her share of the meager foodstuffs that came in from what was left of the countryside’s arable land.
And on the outworld supplies that finally began coming in. Supplies not donated by caring offworlders or a generous Republic, but earned by the blood and sweat and lives of the Mistryl shadow guards.
They were the elite of what remained of Emberlene society, commissioned personally in their crusade by the Eleven Elders of the People; and from her earliest childhood Shada had wanted with all her heart to be one of them. The Mistryl roamed the starlanes, a sisterhood of exquisitely trained warrior women, hiring out their services and combat skills to the oppressed and powerless of the galaxy and receiving in exchange the money vital for keeping the remnants of their devastated world alive.