“That,” Hokan said, “was punishment for Cailshh. It’s a warning for the rest of you. Now, is the difference clear? It’s very important.”
“Yes sir.” Fewer voices joined in this time, and they wavered.
“Then go and find our visitors. And you, Mukit. Clear up this mess. You’re Ubese. You understand the proper way to dispose of the remains.”
The group began filing out, and Mukit edged over to the neatly sundered body of Cailshh. Hokan caught the arm of his senior Weequay lieutenant as he tried to slip through the door.
“Guta-Nay, where’s your brother and his friend?” he asked. “They haven’t shown up for two meals, and they haven’t signed off shift.”
“Don’t know, sir.”
“Are they making a few credits on the side with that Trandoshan? A bit of freelance slaving?”
“Sir—”
“I need to know. To work out if anything… unusual might have happened to them.”
Guta-Nay, no doubt recalling what Hokan had done to him when he chased that farm girl, moved his lips soundlessly. Then his voice managed to surface above his fear. “I never seen, sir, not at all, not since yesterday. I swear.”
“I chose you as my right-hand… man because you could very nearly express yourself in several syllables.”
“Sir.”
“That makes you an intellectual among your kind. Don’t make me doubt my judgment.”
“Not seen him, sir, honest. Never.”
“Then get out on the route they were patrolling and see what you can find.” Hokan reached across his desk and took out the electroshocker. It was only an agricultural instrument for herding, but it worked fine on most nonanimal species. Guta-Nay eyed it cautiously. “This is why I disapprove of undisciplined acts like thieving and drinking. When I need to be certain of someone’s whereabouts, I can’t be. When I need resources, they’re already committed. When I need competence, my staff is … distracted.” He pushed the shocker up into the Weequay’s armpit. “There is a Republic presence here. We don’t know the size of the force, but we do have a speeder down and a large black crater at Imbraani. The more data I have, the more I can assess the size of the threat and deal with it. Understood?”
“Yes sir.”
Hokan lowered the shocker and the Weequay shot out the door, his enthusiasm for his career refreshed. Hokan prided himself on motivational skills.
It’s started, he thought. He shut himself in his room and switched on all the comlink screens. They’re coming to take Qiilura.
Hokan had some idea of what kind of deal Ankkit had with the Separatists. There had been a significant amount of construction work carried out to convert a grain store into the kind of building that had triple-sealed doors, and the type of walls that could be sterilized with extreme heat. Then he’d had to try to make credible bodyguards out of the rabble he employed because important Separatist scientists came and went, and the Neimoidians saw conspiracy everywhere they looked. They weren’t always wrong about that.
Then the Jedi came to Imbraani, and it all fell into place, as neatly as the arrival of the Republic forces now on the planet. There was a military target here.
I’m my father’s son, though. I’m a warrior. Hokan wondered if all cultures separated from their heritage were unable to move on, doomed to relive old glories. I’d rather be fighting a worthy opponent than terrorizing farmers who haven’t got the guts to stand up for themselves.
Fighting soldiers also commanded a higher fee, of course.
And the greater the fee, the quicker he would be off this planet and heading … somewhere.
There was no longer a home for him, and few of his kind left. But things could change. Yes, they very well might one day.
Hokan leaned back in the chair and let the chatter of comlinks wash over him.
6
You want to know how clones tell each other apart? Who cares? They’re here to fight, not to socialize.
–Sergeant Kal Skirata
“Get out,” Birhan yelled. “Get out and don’t come back! You’ve brought all this on us. Go on, clear off.”
The farmer shied a clod of dirt at Etain, and she sidestepped it. It broke into dust behind her. The old woman—who wasn’t Birhan’s wife, she’d discovered—came up from behind and grabbed his arm.
“Don’t be a fool,” she said. “If we take care of the Jedi, then they’ll take care of us when the Republic comes.”
Birhan was still staring at Etain as if he was debating whether to go and grab his pitchfork. “Republic my rump,” he said. “Them’s no different to Neimies when it comes to it. We’ll still be bottom of the pile whoever runs the show.”
Etain stood with her arms folded, wondering how the old woman, Jinart, had managed to attach herself to Birhan’s sprawling family. She was an appalling cook and couldn’t have been much help with heavy farm labor. Etain imagined she earned her keep spinning merlie wool like the rest of the elderly Qiilurans she’d met.
But right now, Etain doubted even Jinart’s powers of persuasion. She decided to try her own again.
“Birhan, you want me to stay,” she said carefully, concentrating as Master Fulier had taught her. “You want to cooperate with me.”
“I rotten well don’t want to cooperate with you, missy,” he said. “And say please.”
She’d never quite mastered Jedi persuasion when under stress. Unfortunately, that was always the time when she needed it.
Jinart nudged Birhan roughly, no mean feat for such a short woman. “If them Jedi have landed, fool, then she’ll bring them around here to sort you out,” she said. “This is no time to make new enemies. And if they haven’t—well, it’ll all blow over and then you’ll have someone who can make things grow. That’s right, innit, girl? Jedi can make crops grow?”
Etain watched the display of rustic logic with growing respect. “We can harness the Force to nurture plants, yes.”
That was all too true: she had heard the stories of Padawans joining the agri corps when they didn’t perform well during training. That was all she needed—life on a backwater planet, talking to fields of grain. It wasn’t just the intelligence data she had hidden in her cloak that made her want to get off the planet as fast as she could. Agriculture spelled failure. She didn’t need further reminding of her inadequacy.
“Yah,” Birhan spat, and trudged off, muttering profanities.
“We all get nervous when Hokan’s thugs start burning down farms,” Jinart said. She took Etain’s arm and steered her back to the barn that had become her home. No, it wasn’t home. There could never be home for her. No loves, no attachments, no commitments except the Force. Well, at least it wouldn’t be hard to tear herself away from here. “And killing farmers, of course.”
“So why aren’t you nervous?” Etain asked.
“You’re a cautious child.”
“I have a dead Master. It encourages you somewhat.”
“I have a broader view of life,” Jinart said, not at all like a wool-spinning old woman. “Now you keep yourself safe and don’t go wandering about.”
Etain was developing a Neimoidian level of paranoia and wondered if even her own instincts were deceiving her. She had at least always been able to sense another’s emotions and condition. “So they know where to find me?” she said quietly, testing.
Jinart stiffened visibly. “Depends on who they might be,” she said, wafting the pungent scent of merlie as she walked. “I don’t care for urrqal much, and at my time of life there’s little left to covet.”
“You said they were coming.”