[Thrawn Trilogy] - 02(95)

But the captain wasn’t as easily bullied as his junior officers. “Really,” he said dryly. “According to our sources, you’re a member of Talon Karrde’s smuggling gang.”

“And you don’t believe such a person could tell the Grand Admiral anything useful?” she countered, letting her tone frost over a bit.

“Oh, I’m sure you can,” the captain said. “I simply don’t see any reason why I should bother him with what will be, after all, a routine interrogation.”

Mara squeezed her left hand into a fist. At all costs she had to avoid the kind of complete mind-sifting the captain was obviously hinting at. “I wouldn’t advise that,” she told him, throwing every bit of the half-remembered dignity and power of the old Imperial court into her voice. “The Grand Admiral would be extremely displeased with you. Extremely displeased.”

There was a short pause. Clearly, the captain was starting to recognize that he had more here than he’d bargained for. Just as clearly, he wasn’t ready yet to back down. “I have my orders,” he said flatly. “I’ll need more than vague hints before I can make you an exception to them.”

Mara braced herself. This was it. After all these years of hiding from the Empire, as well as from everyone else, this was finally it. “Then send a message to the Grand Admiral,” she said. “Tell him the recognition code is Hapspir, Barrini, Corbolan, Triaxis.”

There was a moment of silence, and Mara realized she’d finally gotten through to the other. “And your name?” the captain asked, his voice suddenly respectful.

Beneath her, the Etherway jolted slightly as the Adanant’s tractor beam locked on. She was committed now. The only way out was to see it all through. “Tell him,” she said, “that he knew me as the Emperor’s Hand.”

They brought her and the Etherway aboard, settled her with uncertain deference into one of the senior officers’ quarters : and then headed away from Abregado like a mynock with its tail on fire.

She was left alone in the cabin for the rest of the day and into the night, seeing no one, speaking with no one. Meals were delivered by an SE4 servant droid; at all other times the door was kept locked. Whether the enforced privacy was on the captain’s orders or whether it came from above was impossible to tell, but at least it gave her time to do such limited planning as she could.

There was similarly no way of knowing where they were going, but from the labored sound of the engines, she could guess they were pushing uncomfortably far past a Victory Star Destroyer’s normal flank speed of Point Four Five. Possibly even as high as Point Five, which would mean they were covering a hundred twenty-seven lightyears per hour. For a while she kept her mind occupied by trying to guess which system they might be making for; but as the hours ticked by and the number of possibilities grew too unwieldy to keep track of, she abandoned the game.

Twenty-two hours after leaving Abregado, they arrived at the rendezvous. At the last place Mara would have expected. At the very last place in the galaxy she would have wanted to go. The place where her universe had died a sudden and violent death.

Endor.

“The Grand Admiral will see you now,” the stormtrooper squad leader said, stepping back from the opening door and motioning her ahead. Mara threw a glance at the silent Noghri bodyguard standing on the other side of the doorway and stepped through.

“Ah,” a well-remembered voice called quietly from the command center in the middle of the room. Grand Admiral Thrawn sat in the double display ring, his red eyes glowing at her above the glistening white uniform. “Come in.

Mara stayed where she was. “Why did you bring me to Endor?” she demanded.

The glowing eyes narrowed. “I beg your pardon?”

“You heard me,” she said. “Endor. Where the Emperor died. Why did you choose this place for the rendezvous?”

The other seemed to consider that. “Come closer, Mara Jade.”

The voice was rich with the overtones of command, and Mara found herself walking toward him before she realized what she was doing. “If it’s supposed to be a joke, it’s in poor taste,” she bit out. “If it’s supposed to be a test, then get it over with.”

“It is neither,” Thrawn said as she came to the edge of the outer display ring and stopped. “The choice was forced upon us by other, unconnected business.” One blue-black eyebrow raised slightly. “Or perhaps not entirely unconnected. That still remains to be seen. Tell me, can you really sense the Emperor’s presence here?”

Mara took a deep breath, feeling the air shuddering through her lungs with an ache as real as it was intangible. Could Thrawn see how much this place hurt her? she wondered. How thick with memories and sensations the whole Endor system still remained? Or would he even care about any of that if he did?