"Shut up, you. Jaina, it's uncomfortable."

"Yeah, I know. Jag and I are partners, too, and something more besides, and you're here, and you were sort of chasing after me for a while, and it's got to be confusing. It is to me as well. Is it going to make you leave?"

"It should."

"Then you should leave now and stop wavering."

Kyp stood. "You're right. I'm sorry I-"

"Sit down!"

Surprised at the strength in her voice, Kyp sat before he realized it. He gaped at her.

"That's better," Jaina said. "Jag, why are males so stupid?"

"Biological predisposition. Here's an example." Jag took another sip. Even in the darkness, the ripple of anguish that moved from his neck to his feet was clearly visible.

Jaina sat up, her pose a mirror of Jag's. "Kyp, it's uncomfortable because partnerships are uncomfortable. Families are uncomfortable. I know mine is. You have to put up with the discomfort because the only alternative is to lose everything.

"Once upon a time, you were kind of a kid brother to rny father. I don't care about that. That relationship didn't make you my uncle. You have a relationship with me. It's not boyfriend-girlfriend. It's no longer Master-apprentice. I think we both know that neither of these is right. It's partners, whatever that means. Whatever we figure out for it to mean. If we're partners, it's something that lasts until one or the other of us is dead. And whether that pains Jag or not, he's keeping it to himself, because he's smart enough to know that he can't control my relationships for me.

"So-once again-are we partners, or do you go off to die alone?"

Kyp sighed. "I see you inherited your father's considerable powers of negotiation."

She ignored the jibe at Han's style, so very different from her famous mother's.

"That's right. So?"

"So we're partners."

"Good." She hoisted her glass. "Drink to it."

"Do we have to?"

"We have to."

Jag chuckled. "It's a drink that makes death-duels with Vong pilots pale in comparison."

TWELVE.

Borleias Commander Eldo Davip, captain of the Lusankya, the greatest New Republic ship engaged in the defense of Borleias, took the turbolift down to the Beltway.

The Beltway was a central corridor running the length of the Super Star Destroyer, from stern to prow. It was not a corridor for pedestrian traffic; the octagonal shaft featured a tracked hauler at the top, allowing it to be used for transportation of heavy equipment. It was wide enough that skilled pilots could have flown paired X-wings wing-to-wing along its length.

As the turbolift slowed to a halt, he pulled on a pair of darkened goggles. When the lift doors opened, the precaution proved to be an appropriate one; directly in front of him, mechanics were welding another section onto the apparatus that now filled the forward portions or the Beltway, blocking all movement forward of this Point.

The outer shell of the apparatus was rolled metal meters thick.

Each section of the shell was a hundred meters long, open at either end, with the prow end slightly narrower than the stern, allowing the sections to he installed in an overlapping fashion. The mechanics welded them together at the overlaps.

Inside the shell were metal cables drawn in intricate weavelike patterns through hardy metal rings on the interior surface of the shells.

The pattern of the cahles, their carefully monitored tensions, was not only to keep the shell straight and durable along its length; as soon as they were in place, cargo-box-sized containers were situated among them, tied off by more cables, instrument packages attached and carefully attuned.

The apparatus now stretched a third of Lusankya's length, hidden away in this access shaft. None of the Vong's extraordinary visual sensors could detect its fabrication; none of their strategists could anticipate its use.

Davip sighed. Its use would mark the end of his most prestigious command. But prestige wouldn't mean a thing if the Yuuzhan Vong won, so he watched the continued manufacture of the apparatus, and wished it well.

On the planet below, on the second floor of the biotics building, Captain Yakown Reth set his dinner tray down at a table, allowing it to clatter, and sat heavily on the bench before it. He didn't bother to keep his disgruntle-ment from his face.

Opposite, Lieutenant Diss Ti'wyn, who flew in Reth's squadron as Blackmoon Two, smoothed down fur that had suddenly risen on his neck. A brown-and-gold-furred Bothan, Diss was unusually attractive by both Bothan and human standards, and received an enviable amount of attention in social situations. "What crawled down your flight suit and stung your butt?" he asked.

Reth snorted, amused despite himself. "We're in real trouble here on Borleias."

Ti'wyn gaped at him. "Really? I thought we were winning."

"Stop kidding. I mean, in trouble worse than being outnumbered, besieged, and doomed."

"Oh." Ti'wyn speared a cooked slice of hardy local tinfruit and popped it into his mouth. "So vent already."

"Don't talk with your mouth full. No, Diss, this is no joke." He lowered his voice so his words would not carry to the next table. "I think we're in real trouble at the command level."

"General Antilles? He has a great reputation."

"Bear with me. You know who's commanding Lusankya."

"Eldo Davip."

"A first-rate foulup if ever there was one."

"Granted... but he did do all right during the big Yuuzhan Vong push a few weeks back."

"A fluke, I'm sure. Anyway, Ninora Birt escorted a shuttle out to Lusankya's repair station. She said that repairs weren't going well.

Whole banks of turbolasers and ion cannon batteries were still out of commission. I didn't think Lusankya got that badly hammered in the last engagement. Did you?"

"Not really."

"Which points to colossal mismanagement on Corn-Zander Davip's part, which General Antilles either doesn't know about, or hasn't corrected, which doesn't speak well of his skills."

Ti'wyn shrugged, noncommittal, but he no longer looked as cheerful.

"That's just the start. You remember when the Advisory Council visited?"

"Very hush-hush. They had a meeting with Antilles and his general staff, then rushed off."

"A mechanic who's just been transferred to Black-moon Squadron was in the hallway when they left. He says Counselor Pwoe was furious. Pwoe was saying that Antilles had refused command of Borleias, and only relented after making demands to the Council."

"What demands?"

"I don't know. What demands would you make?"

"Pleasure yacht, a lifetime pass to the Errant Venture..."

Reth eyed the sliced sausage swimming in spice sauce on his plate.

That, as much as this talk, was going to cost him his appetite. "Stop kidding around. And then there's this Jaina Solo thing."

Ti'wyn nodded in agreement. "If we have to circle one more time just because her squadron always gets first clearance to land-"

"She and her pilots are getting special treatment in every category there is. First access to spare parts, first access to bacta, full proton torpedo loads, first repairs to starfighters and astromechs... Have you ever seen one of them eating here?" Reth gestured around at the rest of the mess hall, crammed with tables, ringing with noise.

"No."

"They have their own lounge, and rumor says they have their own chef off Rebel Dream."

"Her mother's old ship."

"Her mother's old ship. Twins Suns hasn't done anything Blackmoon Squadron hasn't, and can't do anything we can't, except show off names of important mommies and daddies."

"Keep it calm, Yak. There have got to be political reasons behind this. With politics, nothing runs right... but without politics, nothing runs."

Reth nodded grudging agreement. "It just keeps piling up, and I have to question Antilles's competence."

"Keep it down, will you? You're starting to sound like a mutineer in training."

Reth flashed his second-in-command a broad grin. "Nothing like that. I'm just trying to figure out whether I should put in for a transfer, try to get in with a squadron in one of the other fleet groups.

I'm not sure what to do yet. If you hear anything along the lines of what I've been saying... well, you'll just keep your ears open, won't you?"

Ti'wyn waggled his pointed, oversized Bothan ears. "Always do."

Transport Ship Fu'ulanh, Coruscant Orbit Wrapped in the concealing folds of her cloakskin, willing her shaper's headdress to remain still so as not to give away her caste to observers, the Shaper Nen Yim followed the Warmaster Tsavong Lah out onto the gana-dote tongue.

Ganadotes were immobile creatures. Born as a flat, long shell about five paces long and wide and a pace high, they were little more than a mouth, an anus, a large canal connecting them as well as opening into side stomach chambers, and a tongue.

But when grown to maturity and trained in their masters' wishes, they made magnificent entryways and vie wing-boxes. Kept fed by servants bringing clip beetle shells and other nutritious waste and dropping those foods straight through their stomach valves, shaped by hormones to change their dimensions, ganadotes could be transformed into domed or spherical vestibules. The tissues that lined their intestinal tracts were beautifully iridescent, and a proper diet kept excretion to a rare event.

But it was the tongue that made the ganadote such a charming architectural feature. One trained in its use could step out onto it and, by leaning or toe pressure, cause it to extend, lower, raise, position its tip anywhere in relation to the creature's body.

And that was what Tsavong Lah did. Once Nen Yim was in place, he coaxed the ganadote tongue out over the large chamber at the heart of this living ship, over the crowd, short of the fibrous leaves that blocked off the far exit from the chamber.

Tsavong Lah threw up his hands, tossing his cloak back over his shoulders. "Priests and shapers, devotees of the Great God Yun-Yuuzhan, I salute and welcome you. Soon, you will be taken from this place to nearby Borleias, where my sire, Czulkang Lah, drives the infidels into dejection and defeat."

The listeners, perhaps thirty, castes evenly divided between shapers and priests of Yun-Yuuzhan, raised their voices in noises of celebration, appreciation.

Nen Yim could make out the faces of many, including the shaper Ghithra Dal, whom she had accused, and Takhaff Uul, the priest who had been in Ghithra Dai's constant, if surreptitious, company these last many weeks.

"As you know," Tsavong Lah said, "you travel there to take possession of Borleias once it falls. That green, rich world, almost free of the touch of the infidel, will be your reward for service to the gods, service to the Yuu-zhan Vong. Half will be the domain of the priests, half of the shapers, all united in the worship of Yun-Yuuzhan. All you need to do to claim it is raise your mighty temples, your gloriously crafted domains upon her.

"Sadly, you will fail to do this."

And there it was, the start of the warmaster's revenge, expressed in a handful of calmly expressed words.

The crowd quieted, with many of its members turning to one another, muttering questions.

"I look forward to waking each day without being assailed by the smell of sickness, the odor of the decay of my own arm. I look forward to rising each morning in the sure knowledge that I have not displeased the gods-only a few rogue priests and shapers who dared to misappropriate the god's will." Tsavong Lah's voice turned thunderous, and Nen Yim saw his broad back shake with the emotion of his words. "I look forward to knowing that those who remain behind are united in their hatred of the infidels, not in their greed for what they may obtain at the expense of others. I rejoice to think that you will soon be gone."

"No, Warmaster." That was the voice of the priest, Takhaff Uul, young for his posting, ambitious beyond his years. "There has been no such treachery. You must not think it. Only in the true service to Yun-Yuuzhan can ' you save your arm, save yourself from the company of the Shamed Ones."

"There are some who say that trust is a matter of faith," Tsavong Lah replied. "I say that trust is a matter of knowledge, of observation.

Find one who is trustworthy, and there is trust. Find one who is not, and there is none. But I will give you a chance at life. Takhaff Uul, do you trust our gods?"

The youthful priest cried up to him, "I do, Warmaster."

"Do they trust yow?"

"What? I don't understand."

"If they trust you, trust that your motives have been true, trust that you have thought only of their honor and not your own, I am certain they will save you. From this." He raised his radank claw arm, pointing its pincer at the enormous leaves covering the chamber's far entryway.

That was Nen Yim's cue. Beneath her robe, she stroked a tiny kin to that enormous plant, coaxing it to act. It did; it curled into a tube.

So did the ones in the distance, revealing a dark gap in the wall beyond; the gap was four times the height of a Yuuzhan Vong warrior, four times as wide.

A snuffling noise emerged from the gap, then something like a low, muted roar. Then something emerged.

Like a Yuuzhan Vong, it had two arms, two legs. But its stance was low, crouching, animalistic. It had tremendous muscles, hard and corded enough to support its tremendous weight, for it was as tall as the gap through which it emerged. Its face was tusked, its teeth were huge, and its head swiveled as it spotted the Yuuzhan Vong on the chamber floor. Its eyes followed these small creatures with the avidity of a hungry beast.

"This is a rancor," Tsavong Lah said. "A beast of this galaxy. You do not deserve honorable death at the hands of one of our own living weapons. When you die here, it will not be as fighters, but as food to sate the creature's appetite."

"What if we kill it?" That was the voice of Ghithra Dal, filled with spite.

"Then you live for a while longer," said the warmaster. "A short while."

Through the gap emerged another rancor, then a third, and a fourth.

They spread out from the gap, moving along the walls of the chamber, circling their tiny prey.

Tsavong Lah leaned back, and the tongue retracted, carrying him and Nen Yim into the ganadote mouth. As the first screams began, as the first roars echoed from the chamber walls, they turned away from the feasting scene below and the warmaster led the shaper out through the back way.