The Crystal Star (35 page)

should have recognized you--" Suddenly shy, Leia began twisting and plaiting her hair into a messy heap

on top of her head.

"I was traveling incognito," she said.

Leia hugged Chewbacca when he boarded Alderaan and came to her cabin to assure himself that Jaina

and Jacen were safe.

Under Grake's watchful eye, the other stolen children slept on the worldcraft, which was programmed to

travel to Munto Codru. There, the children would be safe, and the work of finding their homes and

families could begin.

"Will you stay in my cabin with Jaina and Jacen?" Leia asked Chewbacca. "I don't want to leave them

alone." Chewbacca snorted a question.

"Yes," Leia said. "You are an excellent navigator. But Rillao knows the route to Asylum Station."

Chewbacca growled his opinion of a navigator who had not flown for at least five years, but the growl

was just for show. He laid one huge hand gently on Leia's head, and sat on the end of the bunk where the

twins were sleeping.

Leia hurried to her pilot's seat. She lifted Alderaan off the worldcraft. The worldcraft vanished into the

brightness of hyperspace, on its way to refuge. Leia gave the controls over to Rillao.

They were on their way to Asylum Station, and Anakin.

Han strolled happily along the quiet path. What a great evening. No one bothering him, the razor edge of

his concentration sharpened rather than dulled by the excellent ale, nothing to worry about, nothing to

think about, playing cards on instinct and nerve. Winning.

He felt terrific.

And he knew what to do about Waru.

The lobby of the lodge was deserted. He was rather disappointed. If the host had shown up and

harassed him for the rent, he could have laughed and thrown hard cash money at the whirlwind's feet.

No, not feet. Whatever the whirlwind used instead of feet. He could have pitched the credits into the

host's twisty gullet.

He slipped on the flagstone floor and nearly fell.

What the--? he thought. I'm not that drunk.

He glanced at the spot that had tripped him up. A cracked floor tile was littered with thick, ugly flower

petals. He had stepped on one and it had squashed under his heel. The petals looked like they came from

the same flowers Threepio had pilfered for the breakfast table.

Probably the cleaning droid mistook them for garbage and took them away, Han said to himself.

Then dropped them on the floor.

Han climbed the stairs two at a time. He would give the rent money to Threepio. Only fair to let the droid

pay the host, since Threepio had been the one to explain and excuse their being late with the payment.

He felt cleanly and completely tired. He looked forward to sleeping late. By afternoon, evening anyway,

Luke would have cooled off.

And I've cooled off, too, Han thought.

If the kid doesn't jump down my throat again, everything will be fine.

His code would not open the door to his room.

"Hey!" He banged on the door. "Let me in!" After a moment, the door-screen lit up with the image of a

beautiful woman, wrapped in a robe, her hair disheveled.

"This is no time for trading," she said. "Come back at a civilized hour. We'll go to my ship and I'll display

the new merchandise." "Trading? Merchandise? Huh? Who are you?

What are you doing in my room?" He thought, If Luke sees her, I'll never be able to make him

understand about me and Xaverri. I'll never get him to believe this is a misunderstanding.

"This is my room, sir, and I am sleeping in it." Peering close, he rechecked the room number. No, he had

made no mistake.

"I've been here for days!" he said. "My stuff is in the closet!" "My things are in the closet. Go away. I

have called the host." The door-screen faded away and she would not reply to Han's knocking, or his

shouts.

A couple of large droids trundled toward him, one from each end of the corridor. They looked like

Artoo-Detoo on growth hormones. With a pincer maneuver, they herded him toward the stairs, bumping

him roughly despite his protests, then trundled on thick treads after him, one before him, one behind.

In the lobby, the lodge's host waited for him.

"What's going on?" Han said. "Who's that in my room? Where are my colleagues? Where's our stuff?"

"My establishment has been reserved by a conference," the host said. "You and your colleagues have

consistently been late with your rent, so I required them to find other shelter." Han threw a handful of

credits at the host.

The credits fluttered through the whirlwind image and scattered over the pool's surface.

"There." "Too late." The two overgrown droids nudged up against Han's back and pushed him toward

the door, rolling over the crushed flower petals and releasing a powerful cloud of their fetid odor.

"Wait! Hold on!" Han pushed at the droids. He had no effect. Their pressure increased and their

progress continued unhampered.

"Dammit, where did my friends go?" "I do not know," the whirlwind said.

"Furthermore, I do not care." The droids bumped Han outside so roughly that he nearly fell on the steps.

The door slammed shut behind him. Catcalls followed him through the darkness.

In the warm damp night, Han swore.

Where did they go? he wondered. They didn't have any money..

As Han walked, the crystal star dawned.

First dawn and second dawn no longer occurred in opposition, second dawn blasting first sunset out of

the sky. The crystal star had plummeted past Crseih Station, falling closer to the black hole. It rose,

creating first dawn.

Nearly in conjunction, the blazing whirlpool of the black hole exploded over the horizon.

Between the interference of the burning whirlpool and the haphazardly effective barriers of the radiation

shields, Han's comlink was unreliable. He tried to reach Luke or Threepio, but received no answer.

He tried to force himself to think clearly.

Of course: they must have gone back to the Falcon. Too much trouble to come and find me, not that I

exactly left ^w where I'd be. I'll have to go all the way back to the landing field..

He tramped back down the path.

Suddenly the light around him dimmed a bit.

Han glanced upward.

The white dwarf plunged behind the accretion disk of the black hole. For a moment, communication

cleared slightly. Han called the Falcon.

No one answered except the Falcon's automatic systems. No one had entered the ship since Threepio

fetched the emergency rations.

Neither Threepio nor Luke had left him a message.

As Han tried to call Luke directly, the white dwarf appeared from behind its companion. The interference

increased again, blasting Han's connection to the Falcon.

Could Luke have gone back to Waru? Han thought. Maybe he doesn't even know we're thrown out of

our room. Maybe Threepio went to find him..

The daylight brightened again.

Instead of soaring outward from the black hole, the white dwarf sailed around in front of it. Its eccentric

elliptical orbit had changed phase, to an orbit nearly circular. The black hole drew the crystalline white

dwarf closer. As the crystal star spun around the black hole, a stream of glowing plasma ripped from its

surface. The dying star whirled around the black hole, plasma surging from it as it spun. The two stars

formed a double whirlpool of light.

As the binary rose higher in the sky, the strange harsh light mottled the dome and the ground.

Han blinked, wishing for a clearer, warmer, more ordinary light. He did not even want to know the

strength of the X-ray flux.

Threepio was right about the radiation, Han thought.

Han reached the welcome dome, where the lights of the signs and shops obliterated the burning of the

black hole. The welcome dome was as active, bright, and noisy now, at double-dawn, as it had been at

star-dusk, and at midnight.

Han sighed. He was not interested in anything the welcome dome had to offer. All he wanted was a few

hours' sleep. Instead, he trudged away toward Waru's compound, thinking, Haven't these folks ever

heard of public transportation?

Alderaan's molten skin shivered beneath the assault of X rays as it dove into the strange system.

Asylum Station spun in space, a chaotic cluster of irregular, cratered asteroids, held together with

communicating tunnels and gravity fields.

Leia frowned. She had never been to Asylum Station, yet she recognized it. There could not be two such

strange stations.

"It's Crseihffwas she exclaimed, as Artoo-Detoo whistled the same conclusion.

"Crseih Stationffwas "Yes," Rillao said. "Its real name is Crseih. In the trade, it is known as Asylum. Do

you know it?" "My husband and my brother are here," she said.

She felt both hope and joy. "If Anakin's here, Luke will know it!" She might land on Crseih Station and

find her little boy waiting to meet her, safe and free.

She imagined him running toward her, imagined his arms wrapped around her neck, imagined hugging him

to her.

She imagined the empty spot in her heart, filling with his presence.

She tried to reach Han, to contact the Millennium Falcon, but the same radiation flux that had prevented

her calling him from Munto Codru now blasted her communications out of the sky.

Crseih Station was cut off from the rest of the galaxy by the frenzy of the double star.

"Be patient," Rillao said. "Soon we will find out. Soon we will know." "You sound like my brother!" Leia

sighed in distress. For all she knew, Han and Luke had finished their investigation--theirthe vacation--and

headed back home before Hethrir brought Anakin to Crseih.

Near tears, Leia caught her breath. She pressed her hands against her eyes and extended her perceptions

as far as she could.

She felt nothing.

She let her hands fall.

Rillao, beside her, patted her shoulder gently.

"We're still a distance from Crseih," she said.

"Let's not distress ourselves quite yet." Leia saw that Rillao had searched for Tigris, as Leia had searched

for Anakin, and failed to find him.

Leia shook herself and tried to take Rillao's advice.

Before Leia, beyond Crseih, a binary system blazed. A white dwarf star plunged around a whirlpool of

glowing debris. The black hole within the whirlpool ripped at the surface of the white dwarf, drawing

star-stuff into explosive destruction.

Leia gazed at its wild beauty.

"This is the oddest system I've ever been in," Leia said, searching for something to distract her attention.

"The oddest, and the most violent." Artoo-Detoo beeped, and a geyser of information burst into the air

above his carapace. He warbled with excitement.

Leia deciphered Artoo's display of information.

"He says they're odd indeed," Leia said.

Artoo amplified a portion of the information and pushed it toward her.

"Dying?" Leia exclaimed. "The star is dying?" Leia looked closer, interpreting what Artoo showed her.

"All white dwarf stars are dying. The star--it's freezing." "A freezing star?" Rillao said skeptically. "I think

your droid is joking with us." "Artoo has a lot of good qualities," Leia said, "but he doesn't have much in

the way of a sense of humor. What's happening is, the star's so dense it's nothing but a quantum plasma.

It's very, very old, so old it's stopped burning. It's giving up its heat to the universe.

Freezing into one huge quantum crystal." Leia heard a whimper from the far end of the companionway.

She jumped up and ran from the cockpit to her cabin, to her children. Chewbacca sat beside them,

looming over them protectively.

Jaina and Jacen awakened, Jaina with a cry, Jacen pale and silent.

"It's all right, dear ones," Leia said.

She and Chewbacca hugged them. She wished she had left them back on the worldcraft, safe and sound,

yet she was desperately grateful to have them with her.

"Is Hethrir back?" Jaina whispered.

"No," Leia said. "He's nowhere near.

I'll never let him near you. Did you have a dream? A nightmare?" Jaina nodded somberly from the safety

of Chewbacca's arms.

"My head hurts, Mama." Jacen held Leia tight.

Leia rocked him, crooning. After a while, they fell back into uneasy sleep. Leia tucked them in;

Chewbacca fastened a safety guard around them.

Alderaan was about to land on Crseih Station.

* * * Tigris entered the meeting hall of Crseih Station's travelers' lodge. The long stone pews were filled.

Shimmering white velvet backed the dais upon which Lord Hethrir would stand.

Against the brilliant white, Hethrir's gold and red hair would blaze like flame, and his dark eyes would

burn.

Tigris recognized most of the people who waited for Lord Hethrir. Lady Ucce sat in the place of honor

reserved for the most generous donor to the Empire Reborn. Lord Qaqquqqu sat among Lord Hethrir's

lesser supporters. Many of the guests had visited the worldcraft, either as members of the trade or as

supplicants for Hethrir's favor. Others had been promoted from Proctor to Empire Youth and sent out to

work in secret on behalf of the Empire Reborn. Their reunion was unique in Tigris's experience. The

Youths set themselves off with their pale uniforms, their medals, their elegant long coats.

Every free person at the meeting was devoted to the memory of the Empire, and to Lord Hethrir's plan

for the Empire Reborn.

They had never before gathered like this. Something new and strange was happening. Tigris was proud