“Has he communicated-has he sent terms for her return?”
Isolder’s expression became even more sour. “He left a message. A datachip handed to me by the little girl who acted as Allana’s double. I’ll play it for you.” He rose and moved to a table to activate the monitor upon it.
“Who is the girl?”
“A Coruscanti orphan named Tika. Solo promised that if she would do this one thing for him, he’d take her to a world where there were thousands of beautiful women, one of whom would become her new mommy.”
Tenel Ka clapped her hand over her mouth. It was just one more horror, and the least of the ones she had endured in just a few waking minutes, but it somehow pointed more starkly to Jacen’s inhumanity than all the murders he had Perpetrated to seize Allana.
Isolder stepped away from the monitor. Jacen Solo popped up on the display, somber, dressed in his Galactic Alliance Guard colonel’s uniform.
“Greetings to the esteemed Queen Mother of the Hapes Consortium.” His voice did not exactly drip with sarcasm, but the excessive formality he employed, treating Tenel Ka as some distant ruler, ignoring all that they had been to each other, was just as hurtful. “At Kuat, you put me into an untenable situation. Being abandoned to my enemies, abandoned by one for whom I once had considerable affection and respect, was like being murdered. … and surviving.
“So I’m going to repay the favor. You have a choice to make, like the one you tried to force upon me. You will put all Hapan military forces under my command, with ships’ senior officers to be supplied by the Galactic Alliance … or your daughter will die.”
Jacen leaned forward so that his face more completely filled the monitor screen. His eyes were bright, inhuman in their intensity and focus. They even seemed lighter in color than usual. “By doing what you did to me, you changed me into someone capable of doing exactly what I have promised. This threat is not a bluff, and if it takes place, it will be your doing. Something to keep in mind the next time you play the Hapan cultural game of backstabbing and bloodletting.”
The screen went dark.
Tenel Ka let out the breath she realized she’d been holding since Jacen first appeared on screen. Isolder said nothing.
Finally, she turned to him. She struggled to keep her voice even, but it wasn’t easy; her breath wanted to come in pained gasps. “Prince Isolder. In your opinion, is he capable of carrying out his threat?”
“I don’t know him nearly as well as you, Queen Mother.
But… . yes.” He glanced at the monitor. “I’ve watched the recording a dozen times, and each time I see a man whose humanity has been utterly extracted from him.”
Tears came to Tenel Ka’s eyes. “He was right, you know. It’s like being murdered and surviving.”
Chapter 7
KASHYYYK, MAITELL BASE. HANGAR HOUSING THE MILLENNIUM FALCON
Waroo set the oversized metal case down on the sabacc table. The Wookiee offered a mild growl of a question.
Han looked down at the case. It looked like the sort wealthy travelers used to transport delicate, expensive clothing. Outfitted with foam inserts, a case like this was also ideal for transporting weapons, and this one was large enough to hold several blaster rifles with folding stocks or a couple of squadrons’ worth of blaster pistols.
Han, opposite the Wookiee, shook his head. “You got me, pal. You sure it’s for me?”
Waroo nodded.
Leia looked closely at the case. “I don’t feel any sense of menace from it. Did you do a routine scan?”
Waroo grunted an affirmative.
“Clean, huh. But no indication who sent it.” Han gave the top seam locks another look. In the shadow cast by the case itself, the broad locking tabs glowed slightly. “That’s not too comforting.”
“It’s a scanner.” Jag, leading Jaina and Zekk, was walking in from deeper in the hangar, where their X-wings had their bays. Just back from a routine patrol, he had reported that the firebreak lines carved by Lillibanca with the help of the Solos and other pilots, including Lando Calrissian, were holding. “They read thumbprints.”
“Huh.” Experimentally, Han placed his thumbs over the tabs, but did not touch them. He glanced at Leia. “I assume you’ll give me a push if this starts to blow up.”
She affected disinterest. “Probably.”
“Yeah.” He placed his thumbs on the tabs.
They beeped, shrill little noises, then gave way under the pressure of his thumbs. He pressed harder and they clicked into place. Gingerly, Han lifted the case’s lid.
The case did indeed have foam inserts, but it did not hold firearms. In the bottom was the front piece of a breastplate, shaped in a stylized representation of a male human chest, well muscled. In the top of the case were two metal gauntlets, nearly elbow-length. All three items were made of a dull metal, something like brushed silver or burnished iron.