Deceived Read online

  A sliver of moon cut a narrow slit in the dark sky, painted everything in grays and blacks.

  The stone wall of the compound, eight meters tall, rose before him, its surface as rough and pitted as Malgus’s mien. Drawing on the Force, he augmented a leap that carried him up and over the wall. He landed in a well-tended garden courtyard. Sculpted dwarf trees and bushes cast strange, malformed shadows in the moonlight. The gentle sound of a fountain mixed with the night hum of insects.

  Malgus moved through the garden, a deeper darkness among the shadows, his boots soft on the grass.

  A few lights lit the windows of the rectangular manse that sat in the center of the grounds. The manse, the garden, the fountain, all of it, looked similar to some soft world in the Republic, some decadent Jedi sanctuary where so-called Force scholars pondered peace and sought tranquillity.

  Malgus knew it was folly. Empires and the men who ruled empires could not stay sharp when surrounded by comfort, by peace.

  By love.

  Low voices sounded from ahead, barely audible in the stillness. Malgus did not slow and made no attempt to hide his approach as he emerged from the darkness of the garden.

  They saw him immediately, two Imperial troopers in half armor. They leveled their blaster rifles.

  “Who in the—”

  He drew on the Force, gestured as if he were shooing away insects, and sent both of the troopers flying against the wall of the manse hard enough to crack bone. Both sagged to the ground, unmoving. The black eyes of their helmets stared at Malgus.

  He walked between their bodies and through the sliding doors of the manse, reminded of his attack on the Jedi Temple back on Coruscant.

  Except then Eleena had accompanied him. It seemed a lifetime ago.

  Thinking of Eleena blew oxygen on the embers of his anger. In life, Eleena had been his weakness, a tool to be exploited by rivals. In death, she had become his strength, her memory the lens of his rage.

  He resided in the calm eye of a storm of hate. Power churned around him, within him. He did not feel as if he were drawing on the Force, using it. He felt as if he were the Force, as if he had merged with it.

  He had evolved. Nothing split his loyalties any longer. He served the Force and only the Force, and his understanding of it increased daily.

  The growing power whirling around him, leaking through the lid of his control, made the suppression of his Force signature impossible. All at once he lowered all of the mental barriers, let the full force of his power roil around him.

  “Adraas!” he shouted, putting enough power into his voice to cause the ceiling and walls to vibrate. “Adraas!”

  He strode through the rooms and hallways of Adraas’s retreat, toppling or destroying everything within reach—antique desks, the bizarre, erotic statuary favored by Adraas, everything. He left ruin in his wake, all while shouting for Adraas to show himself. His voice rang off the walls.

  He rounded a corner to see a squad of six Imperial troopers in full armor, blaster rifles ready, the front three on one knee before the other three.

  They had been waiting for him.

  His Force-enhanced reflexes moved faster than their trigger fingers. Without slowing his pace, he pulled his lightsaber into his hand and activated it as the blasters discharged. The red line of his weapon spun so fast in his hand it expanded into a shield.

  Two of the blaster shots ricocheted off his weapon and into the ceiling. He deflected the other four back at the troopers, putting black holes through two chests and two face masks. Another two strides and a lunge brought him upon the surviving two troopers before they could fire again. He crosscut, spun, and crosscut again, killing both.

  He deactivated his lightsaber and continued on through the manse until he reached a large central hall, perhaps fifteen meters wide and twenty-five long. Decorative wood columns that supported upper balconies lined its length at even intervals. A pair of double doors stood on the far side of the hall, opposite those Malgus had entered.

  Lord Adraas stood within the open doorway. He wore a black cloak over his elaborate armor.

  “Malgus,” Adraas said, his voice showing surprise, but his tone turning Malgus’s name into an insult. “You were in the Unknown Regions.”

  “I am in the Unknown Regions.”

  Adraas understood the implication. “I knew you would come one day.”

  “Then you know I am here for you.”

  Adraas ignited his lightsaber, shed his cloak. “For me, yes.” He chuckled. “I understand you, Malgus. Understand you quite well.”

  “You understand nothing,” Malgus said, and stepped into the room.

  Malgus felt the hate pouring off Adraas, the power, but it paled in comparison to the rage and hate roiling in Malgus. In his mind’s eye, he saw Eleena’s face as she died. It poured fuel on the flames of his rage.

  Adraas, too, stepped into the room. “Do you think that your presence here is a surprise? That I have not long foreseen this?”

  Malgus chuckled, the sound loud off the high ceiling. “You have foreseen it but you cannot stop it. You are a child, Adraas. And tonight you pay. Angral is not here to protect you. No one is.”

  Adraas scoffed. “I have hidden my true power from you, Malgus. It is you who will not leave here.”

  “Then show me your power,” Malgus said, sneering.

  Adraas snarled and held forth his left hand. Force lightning crackled from his fingertips, filled the space between them.

  Malgus interposed his lightsaber, drew the lightning to it, and started walking toward Adraas. The power swirled around the red blade, sizzling, crackling, pushed against Malgus, but he strode through it. The skin of his hands blistered but Malgus endured the pain, paid it as the price of his cause.

  As he walked, he spun his blade in an arc above his head, gathering the lightning, then flung it back at Adraas. It slammed into his chest, lifted him bodily from the ground, and threw him hard against the far well.

  “Is that your power?” Malgus asked, still advancing, cloaked in rage. “That is what you wished to show me?”

  Adraas climbed to his feet, his armor charred and smoking. A snarl split his face.

  Malgus picked up his pace, turned the walk into a charge. His boots thumped off the wood floor of the hall. He did not bother with finesse. He vented his rage in a continuous roar as he unleashed a furious series of blows: an overhand slash that Adraas parried; a low stab that Adraas barely sidestepped; a side kick that connected to Adraas’s side, broke ribs, and flung Adraas fully across the narrow axis of the hall. He crashed into a column and the impact split it as would lightning a tree.

  Adraas growled as he climbed to his feet. Power gathered around him, a black storm of energy, and he leapt at Malgus, his blade held high.

  Malgus sneered, gestured, seized Adraas in his power, and pulled him from the air at the apex of his leap.

  Adraas hit the ground in a heap, his breath coming in wheezes. He climbed to all fours, then to his feet, favoring his side, his blade held limply before him.

  “You hid nothing from me,” Malgus said, and the power in his voice caused Adraas to wince. “You are a fool, Adraas. Your skill is in politics, in currying favor with your betters. Your understanding of the Force is nothing compared to mine.”

  Adraas snarled, started to charge toward Malgus, a last-ditch attempt to salvage his dignity if not his life.

  Malgus held forth his hand and the rage within him manifested in blue veins of lightning that discharged from his fingertips and slammed into Adraas. The power stopped Adraas’s charge cold, blew his lightsaber from his hand, caught him up in a cage of burning lightning. He screamed, squirming in frustration and pain.

  “End it, Malgus! End it!”

  Malgus unclenched his fingers and released the lightning. Adraas fell to the ground, his flesh smoking, the skin of his once handsome face blistered and peeling. Again he rose to all fours and looked up at Malgus.

  “Angral will avenge
me.”

  “Angral will suspect what has happened here,” Malgus said, and strode toward him. “But he will never know, not for certain, not until it is too late.”

  “Too late for what?” Adraas asked.

  Malgus did not answer.

  “You are mad,” Adraas said, and leapt to his feet and charged. He pulled his lightsaber to his fist and activated it. The attack took Malgus momentarily by surprise.

  Adraas loosed a flurry of strikes, his blade a humming, red blur as he spun, stabbed, slashed, and cut. Malgus backed off a single step, another, then held his ground, his own blade an answer to all of Adraas’s attacks. Adraas shouted as he attacked, the sound that of desperation, filled with the knowledge that he was no match for Malgus.

  Finally Malgus answered with an attack of his own, forcing Adraas back with the power and speed of his blows. When he had Adraas backed up against the wall, he crosscut for his head. Adraas ducked under and Malgus cut a column in two. As the huge upper piece of the column crashed to the floor and the balcony lurched above them, Adraas fell to one knee and stabbed at Malgus’s chest. Malgus spun out of the way and rode the spin into a chop that severed Adraas’s arm at the elbow. Adraas screamed and clutched his arm at the bicep while his forearm fell to the floor along with the column.

  Malgus had taught the lesson he’d come to teach.

  He deactivated his lightsaber, held up his left hand, and made a pincer of his fingers.

  Adraas tried to use his own power to defend himself but Malgus pushed through it and took telekinetic hold of Adraas’s throat.

  Adraas gagged, the capillaries in his wide eyes beginning to pop. Malgus’s power lifted Adraas from the floor, his legs kicking, gasping.

  Malgus stood directly before Adraas, his hate the vise closing on Adraas’s trachea.

  “You and Angral caused this, Adraas. And the Emperor. There can be no peace with the Jedi, no truce.” He clenched his fist. “There can be no peace, at all. Not ever.”

  Adraas’s only answer was continued gagging.

  Seeing him there, hanging, near death, Malgus thought of Eleena, of Adraas’s description of her. He released Adraas from the clutch of his Force choke.

  Adraas hit the ground on his back, gasping. Malgus had a knee on his chest and both his hands on his throat before Adraas could recover. He would kill Adraas with his bare hands.

  “Look me in the eyes,” he said, and made Adraas look at him. “In the eyes!”

  Adraas’s eyes showed petechial hemorrhaging but Malgus knew he was coherent.

  “You called her a mongrel,” Malgus said. He removed his gauntlets, took Adraas by the throat, and began to squeeze. “To my face you called her that. Her.”

  Adraas blinked, his eyes watering. His mouth opened and closed but no sound emerged.

  “You are the mongrel, Adraas.” Malgus bent low, nose-to-nose. “Angral’s mongrel and you and those like you have mongrelized the purity of the Empire with your pollution, trading strength for a wretched peace.”

  Adraas’s trachea collapsed in Malgus’s grip. There was no final cough or gag. Adraas died in silence.

  Malgus rose and stood over Adraas’s body. He pulled on his gloves, adjusted his armor, his cloak, and walked out of the manse.

  THE RISING SUN PEEKED over the mountains on Dantooine, and the thin clouds at the horizon line looked to have caught fire. Shadows stretched over the valley, gradually receding as the sun rose higher. The trees whispered in a breeze that bore the scent of loam, decaying fruit, and the recent rain.

  Zeerid stood in the midst of the damp dirt and tall grass, under the open sky, and faced the fact that he had no idea whatsoever about what he should be doing.

  Probably sowing seeds, he supposed, or grafting vines, or testing the soil or something. But it was all a guess. He glanced around as if there might be someone nearby whom he could ask for assistance, but the next nearest farm was twenty klicks to the west.

  He was on his own.

  “Same as always,” he said to himself with a smile.

  After getting clear of Coruscant, he’d flown to Vulta, scooped up Nat and Arra, and fled deeper into the Outer Rim. There, he’d sold Razor and its cargo on the black market and, with the credits he’d earned, bought Nat her own home and bought him and Arra an old vineyard—long unused for growing—from an elderly couple.

  He’d become a farmer, of sorts. Or at least a farm owner. Just as he’d told Aryn he would.

  Thinking of Aryn, especially her eyes, made him smile, but the smile curled down under the weight of bad memories.

  He had never seen her again after leaving Coruscant. For a time he’d tried to learn what had happened to her, but a search of the HoloNet turned up nothing. He knew, however, that Darth Malgus had lived. He presumed that meant Aryn had not, and he’d been unable to tell Arra why Daddy sometimes cried.

  And he still secretly hoped the presumption was wrong, that she’d escaped somehow, remembered who she was.

  He thought of her every day, her smile, her hair, but especially her eyes. The understanding he saw in them had always drawn him to her. Still did, though he was drawn only to her memory now.

  He hoped she had found whatever she’d been seeking before the end.

  He looked around his new estate, at the large home he and Arra rattled around in, at the various outbuildings that held equipment he did not know how to operate, at the row upon row of trellises that lined the fallow vine fields, and he felt … free.

  He owed no one anything and The Exchange would never find him, even if they somehow realized that he was still alive. He owned land, a home, and had enough credits left over to hire a crew that could help him turn the land into a decent winery within a year or two. Or maybe he’d convert the farm and grow tabac. Months earlier, he could not have imagined such a life for himself.

  Grinning like a fool, he sat down in the center of his plot of dirt and watched the sunrise.

  A black dot above the horizon drew his eye.

  A ship.

  He watched it, unconcerned until it started to get larger. He could not yet make out its lines, but he could see its course.

  It was heading in his direction.

  A flash of panic seized him but he fought it down. His eyes went to the house, where Arra slept. He turned his gaze back to the ship.

  He disliked unidentified ships descending from the sky in his direction. They always reminded him of the gully jumper he’d watched crash into the Jedi Temple. They always reminded him of Aryn.

  “They could not have found us,” he said. “It is nothing.”

  The ship grew still larger as it closed the distance. It was moving fast.

  From the tri-winged design he made it as a BT7 Thunderstrike: a multi-use ship common even out on the Rim. He stood as it closed. He could hear the deep bass hum of its engines.

  “Daddy!”

  Arra’s voice turned his head around. She had come out of the house and sat in the wooden swing chair on the covered porch of the house. She smiled and waved.

  “The rain’s gone!” she said.

  “Get in the house, Arra!” he shouted, pointing at the door.

  “But Daddy—”

  “Get inside right now.”

  He did not bother to see if she complied. The ship probably had not seen him yet. The trellises and their veins of browning vines would have concealed him from an airborne viewer. He ducked low and darted toward the edge of the field, sheltering as best he could behind one of the trellises. He pulled some dead vines from it so that he could look through to the open area at the edge of the field where the ship was likely to put down.

  If it was coming to his farm.

  He spared a glance back at the house and saw that Arra had gone back inside. He reached down to his ankle holster and pulled out the E-3 he kept there, then reached around to the small of his back for the E-9 he kept there. He chided himself for not wearing his ordinary hip holster with its twin BlasTech 4s. Arra disliked se
eing the weapons, so he’d taken to wearing only those he could carry in concealed holsters. But little E-series popguns would have trouble doing much to someone in ablative armor.

  Again, if the ship was coming to his farm.

  The ship came into view, and he noted its lack of markings. Not a good sign. It slowed, circled the farm, and he tried to make himself small. Its engines slowed and its thrusters engaged. It was coming down.

  He cursed, cursed, and cursed.

  Tension coiled within him but he still felt the habitual calm that always served him well in combat. He reminded himself not to shoot until he knew what he was facing. It was possible that whoever was in the Thunderstrike intended him no harm. Another local, maybe. Or an official in an unmarked ship.

  But he doubted it.

  If they were agents of The Exchange, he wanted to take at least one alive, to find out how they’d tracked him down.

  The ship set down, its skids sinking into the wet ground. The engines wound down but did not turn off. He could see the pilot through the transparisteel canopy—a human man in the jacket, helmet, and glasses that seemed to be the bush pilot uniform out on the Rim. He was talking to someone or someones in the rear compartment, but Zeerid could not see who.

  He heard the doors on the far side of the ship slide open, then close. He still could not see anyone. The ship’s engines wound back up slightly, the thrusters engaged, and it started to lift off. He gave it a few seconds to get up in the air and engage its engines fully then stepped out from behind the trellis.

  A single figure walked toward his home, a human woman with short hair, dressed in baggy trousers and a short coat. He leveled both blasters at her back.

  “Do not take another step.”

  She stopped and held out her hands to either side.

  He started to circle so he could see her face.

  “Are you going to shoot at me every time we meet?”

  The sound of her voice stopped him in his tracks, sent his heart racing, stole his breath. “Aryn?”

  She turned, and it was her. He could not believe it.

  The first words out of his mouth were ridiculous. “Your hair!”