[Legacy Of The Force] - 02(85)

“Free ale all around.”

“I like her,” Vevut said.

“Then teach her to play Cheg,” said Fett. He indicated the Cheg table in the center of the bar. “I want to talk to Beviin.”

Cheg was a remarkably noisy, violent pursuit for a tabletop game. Fett watched for a few moments as Mirta caught on to the rules rather too fast, whacking the small puck across the tabletop with her knuckles as she shoulder-charged Orade for possession of it.

“It’s okay, I told them to stay off the subject of Ailyn’s bounty in front of her,” said Beviin. “So how did you pick up a stray? Never known you to do that.”

“She offered to lead me to Ailyn because she’s done a job for her.”

“You can find Ailyn easily enough on your own. Solo’s been seen on Corellia. All you have to do is wait.”

“The kid’s got my wife’s necklace. I want to find out how.” Fett wondered whether now was the time to come clean with Beviin about his illness, but he decided yet again that it could wait. “And some other personal stuff I’m interested in.”

“You like that kid.”

“I ought to space her. She spent the flight here beating me up for being a rotten Mandalore.”

“So she’s not blind.”

“You got a problem with the way I do things?”

“Yeah, and so have a few others now. Don’t get me wrong. Nobody’s after the job-nobody that I know, anyway. But the Vong war was a wake-up call. We need more than a symbol.”

“Mandalores aren’t administrators. Mandalorians can run their own communities-anywhere. They just need … general leadership when it’s called for.”

“Well, maybe it’s called for now. Everyone’s still rebuilding across the galaxy and it’s time we did, too.”

Fett sat with his hands flat on the table. He could hear the guffaws of laughter and occasional exclamations in a language he should have understood but didn’t.

“Mandalore’s still in one piece. So is the rest of the sector.”

“Just. And you don’t spend much time there.”

“A lot of Mandos don’t,” Fett said.

“They’re not the Mand’alor.”

“Why does this matter now?”

“People get an idea and start to think differently. It spreads. We lost a lot of people in the war. Makes everyone think hard, that does.”

“Ask me straight. Don’t hint.”

“Come home and help our people.”

“How?”

“Shysa pulled us together once. Now it’s time for you to do the same.”

“I’m a soldier. The war’s over.” And I’m dying. I’m the one who might need to find a new Mandalore, not you. “You need someone who can run an economy.”

“Then what’s the use of being Mand’alor? No heir, no clan, no sense of duty. You’re not Mandalorian. You just wear the armor.”

It was a dangerous retort, but Beviin didn’t seem to care. Fett didn’t even take it as a challenge-just a Mandalorian’s forthright view that he felt fully entitled to express. There had always been a Mandalore, chief of clans, the leader anointed by the last Mandalore or the one who snatched the title from him, always on his deathbed, which was invariably in combat. The ancient mask that was the Mandalore’s mark of rank was always at risk.

Maybe it’s obvious I’m dying. Maybe they’re looking for who’ll lead them next.

“You’re saying I should be a conventional head of state. We don’t have a state like that.”

“These days we might need one.”

“Get a bureaucracy and sit in meetings and get slow and flabby like every other world?”

“There’s more to it than that and you know it.” It was oddly difficult to take offense at Beviin. “We need to make sure we’re warriors with a citadel to defend, so we can pick our battles and not rely on the whims of aruetiise. Foreigners. It’s the spirit of the times, like I said.”

It didn’t sound crazy put that way, but Fett felt it had nothing to do with him. Mandalorians were defined by family above all else, and that was one thing he’d sought and never found after his father was killed. I tried: Sintas, my Journeyman Protector days…

Thinking about his estranged family was painful. But remembering why he’d been exiled from Concord Dawn was something he couldn’t allow himself to do. He locked down his emotions. Death really messes you up. He was alone. He was fine that way.

Beviin seemed to be waiting for a reply.

“And who’s driving this spirit of the times?” Fett asked.