No sooner did the holoimage dissolve than two of the security men began to advance on him. Sidious readied himself for action. A Force blow to send them reeling back toward the holoprojector, then a leap, arms extended, hands curled into claws, one for each windpipe, which he would tear from their throats—
The Force intruded, drawing his attention to the windows in the upper walls.
At once, the sound of repeating blasters and pained cries echoed from adjacent rooms; then a nerve-jangling shattering of glass as Sun Guards crashed through the high windows and began to rappel to the filthy floor, firing as they slid down on their microfilament lines, catching the Santhe men and the Rodian with so many bolts that their bodies were left quartered by the volleys.
Other towheaded Echani rushed into the landing from both sides, some carrying force pikes, others blasters. Sidious had yet to move a muscle when a silver-eyed female hurried over to him.
“You’re safe now, Senator Palpatine.”
He smiled at her. “I can see that.”
An Echani male standing alongside the holoproj was using a handheld device to extract information from it. A moment later, an image of Hego Damask dressed in a ceremonial robe genied into view where Teem’s had been; the droid 11-4D stood behind him.
“We have the source, Magister,” the Sun Guard said. “Panoply Orbital Facility.”
Damask nodded. “Rendezvous with the rest of your team and execute the assault.”
The Sun Guard nodded briskly. “Shall I leave personnel with Senator Palpatine?”
“No,” Damask told him. “Senator Palpatine doesn’t require your protection. Leave us.”
Sidious could hear airspeeders hovering outside the factory. Without further word, the Sun Guards began to race from the room.
“You’ve obviously been keeping a close eye on me,” Sidious said as he approached the projector.
Darth Plagueis nodded. “Your abduction has been in the planning stages for some time.”
“Ever since you made it a point to greet me openly at the Senate.”
“Even before that. Veruna alerted me to the fact that a group of disgruntled nobles had made contact with the Gran.” Plagueis paused a moment. “You might consider using Sate Pestage to settle the score with them.”
“The thought occurred to me.”
“As for our public meeting, I needed to dangle you in front of them.”
“Without my knowledge.” The ruddiness that had come to Sidious’s face deepened. “Another test?”
“Why should I need to test you?”
“Perhaps you thought I was becoming so enthralled with life on Coruscant that I wouldn’t recognize danger.”
“Clearly you weren’t. I could see that you were aware from the start. You were determined to please me, and indeed you have.”
Sidious inclined his head in a respectful bow.
“Even in partnership with Santhe Security, Teem and the other Gran are rank amateurs,” Plagueis continued. “Our agents persuaded them to use the eatery in Uscru, and the factory in which you find yourself — owned by us, as it were, through a holding company called LiMerge Power. We were unable, however, to determine where the Gran would be taking refuge.”
“And now you know,” Sidious said. “But why go to such lengths to set them up? Why not simply kill them?”
“This isn’t Sith business, apprentice. For the sake of appearances we need to justify what we are about to unleash on them. They failed to understand our message and now they must be taught a lesson. Still, other interests need to be convinced of our reasoning.”
“How can I help?”
“You’ve already played your part. Now go about your usual business. We’ll speak again when the ceremony at the Order of the Canted Circle is concluded.”
Sidious fell silent for a long moment, then said, “Is there an end to these trials?”
“Yes. When there is no further need of them.”
20: THE CANTED CIRCLE
The stage was set.
A perfect circle, twenty meters in diameter, had been cut from a single slab of imported stone and constructed so that one end touched the floor while the other was held ten degrees above it by concealed antigrav generators. This was the Canted Circle, known only to members of the order — which, throughout its long history, had never numbered more than five hundred in any given period — and was housed in the clear-domed summit of the esoteric society’s monad in the heart of Coruscant’s Fobosi district. Legend had it that the round-topped building — thought to be one of the oldest in that part of the planet — was built over an ancient lake bed and had been the sole survivor of a seismic event that had tipped it ten degrees to the southwest. A century after the quake, the structure had been righted to vertical, except for the central portion of the canted floor of its uppermost story, which later supplied the name for a clandestine organization founded by influential beings who had purchased the building sometime during the reign of Tarsus Valorum.
Just then, Larsh Hill, draped in black robes, was standing at the raised end of the circle, and Plagueis, 11-4D, and ten other Muuns — also wearing black garments, though different from the order’s hooded garb — stood at the other. Scheduled to begin at the top of the hour, the initiation ceremony would commence with the high official joining Hill on the circle, initiating him, and placing around his neck the order’s signature pendant. Plagueis had declined an offer of enrollment twenty years earlier, but had continued to do business with the Grand Mage and many of the order’s most prominent members, several of whom were regulars at the Gatherings on Sojourn. The Order of the Canted Circle was content to serve as an exclusive club for some of the galaxy’s most influential beings; its aims were narrow in focus and its rituals universally allegorical, replete with secret phrases and handshakes. Plagueis understood the need to instill members with a sense of furtive fraternity, but he couldn’t risk having the high officials dig too exhaustively into his background. Larsh Hill’s past, on the other hand, was exemplary — even the decades he had spent working with Plagueis’s father. Once initiated, Hill would become Damask Holding’s principal agent on Coruscant, and his son, San, would become Hego’s right hand, in preparation for his eventual role as chairman of the InterGalactic Banking Clan.
Returned from the short holocommunication with Sidious, Plagueis was filled with a sense of triumph. Before night fell on the Fobosi district, the members of the Gran Protectorate would cease to be a concern. Pax Teem and the rest believed they had found shelter aboard one of Coruscant’s orbital facilities, but the Sun Guards — save for a pair Plagueis had kept in reserve in the order’s initiation room — were on the way to them now, in forces sufficient to crush whatever defenses Santhe Security might be providing. Sidious had played his part perfectly, and had redeemed himself fully in Plagueis’s eyes. The time had come to bring his apprentice deeper into the Sith mysteries he had been investigating for most of his life; to introduce him to the miracles he was performing on Aborah.
From a series of arch-topped doorways lining the circumference of the room came the sounds of solemn chanting as perhaps three dozen of the order’s black-robed members began to file in and take their places along the perimeter of the Canted Circle. Last to emerge was the high official, who wore a mask and carried the circular, emblematic pendant draped over both hands, which he held as if in prayer. Rituals of a similar sort had been enacted by the ancient Sith, Plagueis thought, as Larsh Hill genuflected before the high official.