Han looked a bit dismayed, "Yeah, but?" Thunder rumbled over the clouds, echoed from the mountain wall. Purple lightning spat at the cliff face above, exploding like a blaster bolt, sending splinters of magma flaming down in an arc.

"You don't get it, do you?" Leia said. "The Nightsisters are coming for the Falcon because they know it's a sure ticket off of this planet. The best thing we can do for these people is to get that ship fixed as fast as possible and fly it out of here so that there's nothing left to squabble over!"

"I know that," Han said in a hurt tone. "I can see that! I'm right with you!" But Luke knew that in his heart, Han couldn't stand the thought of deserting a friend who was in need.

Chewbacca and Threepio climbed off the larger female and sat uncomfortably behind Isolder and Teneniel. On the huge rancors, even four riders could fit easily on the bony headplates above the eyes. Luke did not worry so much about overburdening the rancors with riders as he worried about the heavy packs with the generators and coolant. The rancors would have to climb the mountain with those packs.

"Will you be okay?" he asked the rancors, and the two small males grunted rea.s.suringly.

He looked up, saw Leia's face lit in a sudden splash of lightning. He could feel her concern.

"Don't worry," Luke said. "I'll take out those Imperial walkers for you."

"That's not what I'm worried about," Leia answered. "Just take care of yourself. No heroics. There are some bad people out here. Even I can feel it." The silence stretched out between them, and Luke didn't quite know what to answer. If ever there was a day when they'd need heroics, this was it.

"I'll try to be careful," Luke said.

Luke nudged Tosh back, left the others behind in the forest as they remounted. Tosh ran for a hundred meters up a gently sloping hill, then stopped, stood tall and sniffed the air. The thick brush ahead was a solid black ma.s.s. Tosh grumbled softly, and Luke felt her sense of urgency. She wanted him to get off so she could move quickly in a fight.

She crouched low, and Luke leaped to the ground.

He probed the darkness ahead. He could see nothing, smell nothing?even when probing with the Force, he felt nothing. Yet the rancors quietly crept to their left, circling the brush. Luke followed noiselessly, using the Force to guide his footsteps.

They came to a trail that led into the deeper brush, and the ground was lit with reflected firelight. Luke could see scuff marks. Only the clawed metal toes of Imperial walkers left the ground so gouged and trampled. He peered toward the brush again. It was lighter here, the foliage above somewhat bare, and Luke realized he was on a little promontory, and no brush could be that thick.

A stormtrooper ahead shouted over his helmet mike, "Look! Up on the cliff!" Luke glanced over his shoulder. The two male rancors were scurrying up the nearly vertical rock, grasping ancient handholds with their huge claws. Luke could barely see the shapes that were Han, Leia, and the others.

Almost immediately, blaster cannons opened ahead of him, and in the blinding flash of the guns, Luke saw that what he'd thought was brush was really an Imperial camouflage net, hiding a gun emplacement. A dozen stormtroopers, four Imperial walkers, and a single Nightsister hunkered there. Luke knew that there must be dozens of outposts like this, hoped that taking out this one would afford Leia and the others enough of a chance to make it up the mountain.

Tosh and her daughter gripped their halberds and ran forward, using the sound of cannonfire to cover their a.s.sault. Luke nervously watched Leia, saw both rancors on the cliff swing magically away from the attack, placing a rock outcrop between them and the gunfire. It took Luke a moment to see that they had swung away by grasping ropes of whuffa hide that hung like creepers.

Luke charged in behind Tosh and her daughter. Tosh met the Imperials first, smashing into two Imperial walkers at once, knocking them into the gun emplacement. Frightened stormtroopers fired into her with blaster rifles, and Tosh roared in pain as the shots bounced off her thick hide.

Luke pulled off three rapid shots, putting the Imperials down. Tosh's daughter swung her great halberd, cleaving a third walker in half.

The fourth Imperial walker spun malevolently and fired its twin blaster cannons into the young rancor. Ichor spattered across the installation, and the rancor's right arm fell away at the shoulder, splinters of yellow bone protruding through the dark tangle of meat. The rancor stared at her wounds in shock, grabbed her net with her good hand and hurled it at the last Imperial walker, then collapsed and died. The weight of its throwing stones bowled the walker over, and Tosh jumped up, slapped a retreating stormtrooper into oblivion with one paw, then rushed to the Imperial walker and slammed a fist into its cannons.

Flames and blue sparks erupted from the crumpled walker as its power plant melted down, yet Tosh smashed her fist into it again and again, crumpling the hull. No one could be alive in there, yet Tosh screamed and pried at the metal, seeking to rip out the gunner's corpse.

Luke fired into two more stormtroopers, and heard the Nightsister singing. She was huddled near the ground, frightened, retreating from Tosh and the carnage. Luke drew his lightsaber.

"You!" he shouted, and the Nightsister turned to him, her hood falling back. She was young, nothing more than a child really, perhaps sixteen.

Luke could not imagine her being truly evil. He could feel her terror.

She began singing, and Luke raised his free hand with a gesture, used the Force to close her windpipe. The singing stopped, and she stood frozen, horror etched on her face.

"Don't make me kill you!" Luke said. "Promise me you'll leave Gethzerion and her clan forever!"

The girl stared at him, lit by the fires of burning Imperial walkers, eyes wild with terror, strangling. She nodded dumbly, and Luke could taste her animal fear. He let her go.

She dropped to the ground, looked up at him with rage. Luke could feel her surprise at her own impotence. With a single swatting gesture she cast a spell, knocking the lightsaber from Luke's hand.

Luke pulled out his blaster, fired. The girl screamed a curse, tried to ward the bolt away with her palm, but she was young and too weak. The blaster bolt tore into her flesh, leaving the hand blackened and burned.

The girl looked at her own hand in horror, shouted.

The lightsaber leaped from the ground, swung at Luke's head. Luke channeled the Force, turned it off just before the blade arced into his face, then grabbed his weapon in midair.

"Please!" Luke shouted, but the girl began singing another spell.

Suddenly Tosh reared up behind her, smashed the Nightsister with one great blow that thundered into the ground with the wet smack of pulping flesh and the crackling of bones.

Luke stood in shock, unable to comprehend his foe's own self-destructive behavior, unwilling to believe that one so young could have turned so completely to the dark side.

Tosh grabbed Luke in one claw, swung him up on her back, and raced through the jungle.

Luke could see black scorch marks in her flesh along the bony ridge behind her head. Some of them were deeply pitted, bleeding. Tosh was roaring in pain, not the pain of battle, but the pain of having watched her own daughter die. The rancor dodged through the trees, took him to the cliff and began climbing up in the darkness toward the clouds of fire-lit smoke.

Fires ringed the mountain, and thunder pealed around him. When Tosh reached the clifftop, Leia and the others were off in the distance, rancors standing hip-deep in a cane field. Leia was watching to make sure he got up all right, then she took the reins to her rancor, ordered it forward. The rancors raced, running through grain fields on their knuckles across the bowl-shaped valley toward the south rim and the fortress carved of stone. Old Tosh roared a battle challenge, and the rancors ahead joined her cry. Han and Isolder took up the cry for the human hosts.

As Luke reached the south side of the valley, he saw fifty rancors standing like shadowed monoliths along the sides of the cliff, wielding great poles and maces. A small army of men and juveniles dressed in their simple leather ap.r.o.ns slaved to carry huge throwing stones to the lip of the bluff, setting them beside the rancors.

When Leia reached the cliff, she urged her rancors upstairs to the great fortress. The rancors could not make it through the doorways, so Han, Leia, Isolder, the droids, and Teneniel stopped, began lugging the generators up the stairs. Yet Luke could still feel the urgency behind Augwynne's call of nearly an hour ago, and he left the others, rushed upstairs three steps at a time, pa.s.sing room after room where huddled children and the village's invalids squatted in fear, until he reached the warriors' hall.

The clan sisters waited inside, dressed in their robes and headgear, standing above the sculpted maps of the terrain, intoning the words, "Ah re, ah re, ah suun corre. Ah re, ah re, ah suun corre."

Augwynne greeted Luke soberly, her face a carefully controlled mask, "Welcome, Luke Skywalker," she said as the others continued chanting.

"I'd hoped you would hurry. We are doing a reading, trying to learn the locations of the Nightsisters so that we can discover their strategy."

She used the end of her carved wood staff to nudge a scale model of Gethzerion's hover car closer to the fortress. If Augwynne were right, Gethzerion was only two kilometers from the mountain, moving between two groups of warriors. Luke guessed that Gethzerion must be using the hover car to take orders to each group personally. "Was your trip successful?"

"As well as can be expected," Luke said.

"Good," Augwynne breathed. "How long will it take for Han to repair his ship?"

"Two hours," Luke answered. "He's up there now, trying to mount the generators. Gethzerion knows he has a repairable ship."

"She was bound to figure that out," Augwynne said. "We'll try to fend off the Nightsisters until Han finishes."

One clan sister bent down, placed seventeen black stones at the western foot of the mountain. Luke studied the map. The Nightsisters' strategy seemed so odd as to be freakish. They had placed guard posts consisting of one sister each at twelve points of the compa.s.s. Since Luke had recently taken out such a post, he knew exactly what each installation contained. But in addition, Gethzerion had placed three a.s.sault squads evenly around the mountain. One was directly in front of the main stairs?the only easily accessible entrance?and two more teams were at 120-degree angles. Gethzerion's a.s.sault plans apparently did not take into account such mundane notions as terrain, fortifications, defensibility of the clan's positions. She seemed instead to expect her troops to swarm over any barrier. But Luke knew the power of the Force, and knew that her plans could work.

"Many of the Nightsisters are unaccounted for," Augwynne commented, looking at the map. "We shall have to beware." She moved the figure representing Gethzerion's hover car nearer the southern base of the mountain, then went out to wait on the balcony.

Luke ambled up beside her, and the other witches filed behind. It was almost sunrise, and the clouds above had begun to lighten. Still, there was so much smoke above them that Luke was not sure if a real sunrise would dawn this morning. They had traveled so much in the last night, with only two brief stops, that Luke felt he hadn't slept in days. Down in the forest, he could see Imperial walkers deploying in the woods, stormtroopers like white rats scurrying about for cover. Augwynne said, "Do you have any words of wisdom for us, Jedi? Any advice?"

"Use your powers only in the service of life," Luke said, "to protect yourself or those around you."

"Do you mean to say that we should not kill the Nightsisters?" one of the women asked.

Luke looked down at the forces ma.s.sing at their feet. "If you can avoid it, yes. In this case though, I have already warned Gethzerion and her band."

"As have we," Augwynne said. "Those who fight against us this day will die with their blood on their own hands. I for one will show no mercy."

They waited, and Teneniel came to Luke and held his hand. "They're working up there on the ship as fast as they can. I felt as if I were in their way. I thought I might be more help down here."

Luke looked at her, and the firelight brought out the color of her copper eyes, reflected red highlights in her hair.

Teneniel swallowed hard, and a breeze gusted. Luke had thought that perhaps Gethzerion would come forward, make some sort of speech to announce her presence, but the only announcement came from Augwynne: "Here they come!"

The clan sisters around Luke began chanting, and far below, down in the shadows of the wood, the Nightsisters sang loudly. The air swirled around the balcony, and Luke felt dust sifting in his hair, suddenly realized that something was dropping on him from above. He looked up, and the clouds of soot were raining down around him. He reached into his utility belt, grabbed some goggles, and then felt a tremor rip through the Force.

The winds surged, and Luke found himself in a maelstrom of blowing soot and gravel. He put on his goggles, and the clan sisters hid their eyes as they backed away from the balcony toward the shelter of their stronghold.

Teneniel Djo began singing, "Waytha am quetha way. Waytha ara quetha way . . ." Blaster fire ripped into the parapet beneath Luke, and a lone Imperial walker rose into view, blasters blazing. The Nightsisters were using the Force to levitate it.

Teneniel threw her hand out, fingers splayed, focusing her spell. The dust around them swirled off like water in a drain. Grit and pebbles surged against the Imperial walker, and the static charge that they built caused a bolt of lightning to erupt from the mountain, reaching out like a finger to touch the walker. It exploded into flames and the Nightsisters let it fall so that it suddenly screamed out of sight, crashed in a blinding flash that showed Imperial walkers and stormtroopers rushing up the path to the fortress.

Luke leaned out for a better view, and through the swirling smoke glimpsed rancors at the top of the stairs, rolling boulders down the path like marbles. He watched the first boulder smash into an Imperial walker, sending it sprawling backward so that the walkers and soldiers behind it were swept over the cliff.

He marveled at the brazenness of Gethzerion's a.s.sault. It was a phenomenal waste of lives and equipment. Two clan sisters gazed down at the wreckage, muttering spells. Behind him, Augwynne shouted orders, "Ferra, Kirana Ti, go to the front doors. The Nightsisters are upon us!"

Luke looked about, saw no sign of Nightsisters, but used the Force, felt a tremor from above. He glanced up, saw three Nightsisters clinging to the rocks three meters overhead as if they were spiders. As one they dropped to the balcony.

Luke shouted a warning, whipped out his lightsaber and danced back a step. One witch beside him did not have time to react; a Nightsister landed beside her, shot the girl in the face with a blaster, then flipped a somersault as she leaped off the balcony.

Luke dodged a similar shot, sliced a Nightsister in half as she touched down beside him. On the far side of the balcony, Augwynne struggled with a Nightsister and Luke drew his own blaster. Augwynne pushed the woman over the balcony, and Luke jumped after the Nightsisters in hot pursuit.

The air was a gritty maelstrom, and as he fell past the stairs he saw Imperial stormtroopers spread out on a death road like pieces of white confetti. Blaster fire ripped past him as Imperial walkers shot at the stone-hurling rancors above.

He saw the ground coming up fast, two black-robed Nightsisters standing on the rocks. Luke dropped beside one of them. He shouted in warning. A Nightsister turned, readying a spell. Luke fired. She stood as if angered, flames smoldering from her cloak, and he realized that the Force must be strong in this one. The other ran off into the haze.

The lone witch glared at Luke. Gethzerion pulled back her hood to show the purpled veins in her face. Her red-glowing eyes were wide with surprise. "So," she said loudly to be heard over the sounds of battle, "we meet. I have been aware of the stirrings of your Force. I have always wanted to meet a Jedi, yet here I pa.s.sed one in the halls of my own prison and never recognized him." She studied Luke momentarily, as if waiting to confirm that he was a Jedi.

"I've met your kind before," Luke said. "Listen to me, Gethzerion: turn away from the dark side before it is too late!"

Gethzerion nodded thoughtfully. "Pardon me if I say that I don't find you to be very impressive, young Jedi. It's a shame that you must die before you have a chance to witness how I make your friends writhe."

She pointed a finger at Luke, and before Luke even recognized her evil intent, a ripple of Force slammed into him. White lights exploded behind his eyes, and the right side of his face felt as if it had been smashed by a hammer. His left arm and right leg crumpled under their unbearable weight, and he dropped to the ground on one knee, stunned. All the noise and blaster fire and screams of pain died away, became a distant roaring.

Gethzerion pointed at him again, twitched her finger, and his eyes lost focus. He felt the hammer blow to his left temple, dropped to his side and rolled over to his back, gasping. Luke stared up at the sky, watching streams of rocks hurtling above him?some propelled by the Force, others hurled by rancors.

Time seemed to slow. His head throbbed, pounding to the same rhythm as the beating of his heart. His face had gone cold, numb, and Luke realized distantly that Gethzerion's spell had ripped open blood vessels in his brain, and he was about to die, one among hundreds of fatalities on this battlefield.

So this is how it would have been, if Vader had tried to kill me. Who had Luke been kidding? Teneniel had been right, Luke was no warrior. Ben, Luke thought. I failed you. I've failed you all. And suddenly there was a wave of pain, and Luke tried to remember who he'd just been talking to, tried to think of a name, someone he could call for help, but his mind was numb, empty, like the vast deserts of Tatooine lying naked beneath setting suns.

Chapter 23.

Isolder hurried to grab the new sensor array window. Chewbacca was already using the power wrench to pull off the old window, while Leia and Han labored in the cramped s.p.a.ce of the Falcon's hold to get the anticoncussion field generators in place. The droids were inside the Falcon, dumping coolant for the hyperdrive. Outside the fortress, a war was in full swing. The stone floors rumbled and shook under the a.s.sault of blaster fire and hurtling rocks, while a wind sang through the honeycombed corridors.

It felt to Isolder as if the whole mountain would shake down to dust at any moment. He almost wished that the room had a window, a parapet like so many of the other rooms here in the fortress, so that he could see what was happening outside. But at the same time he felt safer secluded here in this sealed room, with only one door to guard.

Isolder carried the window to Chewbacca, held it up for a moment as the Wookiee searched with his hairy paws to grab a bolt so that he could fasten the new window to the Falcon. The Wookiee's hands were shaking in fear.

Behind them, Isolder heard a voice that sounded almost distant, even though the woman shouted, "Gethzerion, I've found them!"

Isolder spun, dropped the window. A Nightsister stood in the doorway, panting. Isolder pulled his blaster, fired, and the Nightsister waved her hand, knocked the blaster bolt away.

"Well," she said. "You're a pretty one. I think I'll keep you."

Chewbacca roared and leaped at the Nightsister, and she backed up a step.

Chewie dodged aside as if to pa.s.s her while retreating from the room, and the Nightsister lurched back. The Wookiee had s.n.a.t.c.hed off the Nightsister's arm so fast that Isolder had never even seen it.

She gazed at the b.l.o.o.d.y stump of her shoulder, and Isolder fired again.

The Nightsister went down.

Chewbacca howled, began looking frantically on the floor. Even though Isolder didn't understand Wookiee, he realized that Chewie had dropped the bolts. "Go inside and get some more!" Isolder shouted. "Hurry!"

Chewbacca scrambled to the Falcon. Isolder followed him up to the gangplank, nervously fingering his blaster.

He heard a hammering sound above his head. The stone walls burst open as if a giant fist had slammed against them. Isolder put his hands over his head to shield himself from falling rock, and a swirling hurricane of choking dirt and smoke whipped through the room.

Through the scream of the wind, he heard women's voices singing all around. He squinted his eyes and hit the close b.u.t.ton on the Falcon's hatch, shouting, "Go! Save yourselves!"

And in that moment, he knew that Rell's prophecy would come to pa.s.s. If he stayed here a moment longer, he would die. In the red glowing skies outside, he saw shadow shapes of women crawling along the rock, dropping through the rent in the torn wall.

Isolder ducked under the Falcon, rolled away, and made a run for the door, hoping to reach safety. A Nightsister came through the door to meet him.

She held up her hand, and an invisible force hammered into him.

Teneniel had watched Luke leap over the edge of the balcony, following the Nightsisters into the swirling mists, but she dared not follow. She heard screaming within the fortress, children shrieking in terror, and she rushed down a flight of stairs, leaving six of her sisters to fight on the balcony.

There had been three guards at the doors, and Teneniel followed hard on the heels of Ferra and Kirana Ti down the winding stairway. Ferra rushed around a corner and shouted in horror as her head suddenly, and without apparent cause, twisted around sharply, snapping her neck.

Kirana Ti stopped, pointed a blaster, waiting for someone to come up the stairwell, but a madness took Teneniel. Without voicing her spell, Teneniel sent a wind screaming through the stairwell powerful enough so that Ferra's corpse tumbled away. Below her, the Nightsisters shouted in dismay and Teneniel rushed down around the corner, saw two Nightsisters clinging to the handrails in order to avoid being swept downstairs.

A black rage filled her mind, and Teneniel pounded the hags with the Force wind, ripped the handrail from the stone walls so that the Nightsisters went shrieking into oblivion, bouncing down the winding stairway.

She let the wind fade, and Kirana Ti sat hunched on the floor, looking up at Teneniel's face in fear, weeping. Teneniel wondered why the stupid girl didn't get up, go out and fight.