And abruptly he got it. Nodding his understanding, he ignited the weapon and turned the blade to point down.
And began cutting the stairway free from the balcony.
The action hadn’t gone unnoticed. Someone in the crowd roared, and a pair of blaster bolts lanced out, missing Han by bare centimeters as he ducked away. The Noghri at Han’s side-the second Noghri, Leia noticed with mild surprise, had somehow pulled a vanishing act-fired back, and the other blaster went silent.
Something brushed the back of Leia’s head. She twisted around, her mind flashing back to the deadly vine snakes of Wayland&mdash
But it wasn’t a vine snake, or for that matter any other kind of creature, it was a length of synthrope, dangling from one of the windows directly above her.
With Barkhimkh’s anxious face looking down at her from behind it.
Grabbing the rope, she started to climb. She was nearly to the window when, behind her, the stairway crashed to the floor.
***
“Admiral Pellaeon?”
With a jolt, Pellaeon snapped awake, the disturbing dream vanishing into the darkness of his quarters. “Yes?” he called.
“Major Tschel, sir,” the bridge officer’s voice came from the intercom. “There’s a transmission coming in for you, marked with your personal encrypt.”
“Understood,” Pellaeon said, heaving himself wearily from his bed and padding over to the computer station. “Transfer it down here, Major,” he ordered, dropping into the chair.
“Yes, sir.”
The comm light went on, confirming the connection, and Pellaeon began keying in the proper decrypt code. Traveling around the Empire trying to beg, argue, or cajole acceptance of his peace initiative was tiring enough; but having to then endure these nightmares on top of it was only making the situation worse. Tonight’s edition had featured Grand Admiral Thrawn, reproving him in a calm but bitter voice for allowing what he’d created to slip away …
The computer beeped acceptance of the decrypt, and a quarter-sized image appeared on the hologram pad. “Admiral Pellaeon, this is Commander Dreyf,” the figure identified himself. “I have a preliminary report for you on my backtrack of Lord Graemon and his finances.”
“Very good,” Pellaeon said, suddenly fully awake. “Continue.”
“To be blunt, sir, the man’s a snake,” Dreyf said, not even bothering to hide his contempt. “He looks to have a finger in every stewpot from Muunilinst to Coruscant and back again. We’ve already uncovered fifteen separate lines to New Republic financial and commodities interests, and we haven’t even scratched the surface yet.”
Pellaeon nodded grimly. Yes, that fit the expected pattern. For Moff Disra to operate this way they had to have equally shady counterparts to Graemon on the New Republic side of the political borders. “What about connections to known pirate gangs?”
“Nothing specific with Graemon yet,” Dreyf said. “But we have a pretty solid connection between General Kyte and someone who is definitely linked to the Cavrilhu Pirates. Kyte sent a transmission to the contact right after your meeting with the Muunilinst defense hierarchy eleven days ago. We’re following it up.”
“I see.” So Kyte was indeed a part of this. Despite all the indicators, Pellaeon had hoped he was wrong. To have Fleet officers involved in treasonous activity was doubly painful. “Have you been able to backtrack Graemon’s contacts the other direction?”
“Not yet,” Dreyf said. “He’s not the top of the stack, though-that much I’m sure of.”
“No, he’s not,” Pellaeon agreed. Still, whatever the connection was between him and Disra, it would be well hidden. Too well hidden, perhaps, for Dreyf and his limited resources to dig out. “Keep at it,” he continued. “I want the facts, and I want the evidence.”
“Yes, sir,” Dreyf said. “If I may make a suggestion, Admiral, all these business connections to the New Republic ought to be enough to bring down Lord Graemon, if that’s what you want.”
“I have no particular interest in bringing any specific person down,” Pellaeon said, not entirely truthfully. “Trade with the New Republic may be technically illegal, but you know as well as I do that we need the resources too badly for anyone to actually bother enforcing the laws.”
Besides which, he added silently to himself, if and when his peace initiative succeeded all that official isolationism would have to be changed anyway. But of course Dreyf had no idea any of that was in the works. “What I want-and all that I want-is to find out who’s been manipulating Imperial personnel and funds this way and have them stopped,” he added aloud. “Clear?”