Alliances (Star Wars: Thrawn, #2)(15)

“Yes, my lord,” Kimmund said. “How large a group do you wish to accompany you?”

Again, the black helmet turned to Thrawn, the invisible face behind it seeming to measure him. “None,” he told Kimmund. “The admiral and I will go alone.”

“Alone?” a gravelly voice came from behind Faro.

Despite her best efforts, Faro started. Damn that Rukh, anyway. Thrawn had already given him free run of the ship—why did he insist on using that damn invisibility gadget of his?

“Alone,” Thrawn confirmed, not reacting at all to Rukh’s sudden appearance. Maybe Chiss eyes could penetrate the disguise better than human ones.

Or maybe Rukh was here because Kimmund was here. Maybe Thrawn had ordered the Noghri to keep an eye on the First Legion’s commander.

Kimmund, she’d heard, was openly rooting for the Noghri to burn out his personal cloaking device with overuse. Faro was tending toward agreement on that one.

“Perhaps you do not believe your master and I can travel to a primitive village without your protection?” Vader demanded. He hadn’t reacted to Rukh’s sudden appearance, either.

Rukh growled something in his native language. “Unknown situations are exactly when the grand admiral needs me the most.”

“We go alone,” Thrawn said, his tone making it clear the discussion was over. “If you wish, you may accompany Commander Kimmund to the hangar bay and observe the preparations.”

Rukh turned his glare on Kimmund. Not that Kimmund probably cared. “It will be done, Grand Admiral,” the Noghri said. “I will watch very closely.”

“Then, with your permission, my lord,” Thrawn said, “I will go to my cabin and prepare.”

“I will await you in the hangar.” Vader gestured toward him. “I trust you will not be wearing your uniform?”

“That is indeed the preparation I spoke of,” Thrawn confirmed. “Even if the locals do not recognize the uniform of an Imperial grand admiral, they will nevertheless recognize that it is a uniform.”

“Very well. Do not be long.”

“With all due speed, my lord,” Thrawn promised.

He turned to Faro. “While we are gone, you will rig the Chimaera for darkness and stealth,” he ordered. “Keep a sharp watch, passive sensors only.”

“Yes, Admiral,” Faro said.

With a final look at Rukh, Thrawn turned and walked back down the command walkway. Kimmund waited until he’d passed, then also turned, following the admiral at two steps’ distance. Rukh slipped past Faro, eyed Vader measuringly as he passed, and started to follow the stormtrooper.

“Rukh?” Faro called.

The Noghri paused and looked back. “Commodore?”

“I want you to watch the freighter prep work very closely,” Faro said. “And make sure Lieutenant Xoxtin knows you’re watching.”

A malicious smile briefly crossed Rukh’s craggy face. “She will know, Commodore,” he promised. “Most certainly.”



* * *



—

The freighter was of a type Vader hadn’t seen before. Still, the controls were in the proper places and the handling was smooth enough.

It was Thrawn’s ship, and standard protocol was that the admiral would fly it. Vader hadn’t bothered to ask before taking the pilot’s seat. Thrawn, for his part, had had the good sense not to argue the point.

Black Spire hadn’t changed much since The Jedi had last been there, Vader noted as he brought the freighter in toward the landing field nestled into the forest three kilometers west of the settlement. The trading post with the attached cantina dominated the center of town, pressing up against the edge of the ruins of the ancient civilization that had once stood here. Some of the homes and businesses had been built into those ruins, though most were freestanding buildings. The petrified remains of the giant black trees that had given the outpost its name towered over everything, mysterious and brooding. The house directly behind the trading post, where the owner lived, stood out from the rest with evidence of real money.

“Those are new,” Thrawn murmured.

“What?” Vader asked.

“Those houses,” Thrawn said, pointing at a wooded area on the eastern side of the outpost, the side opposite the landing field, about three kilometers away from the edge of town. “They were not there the last time.”

Vader studied the houses. There were three of them, larger and better built than those in the town, hemmed in by the woods around them. Each house was surrounded by a small ring of garden space, which on some of the galaxy’s most prestigious city-worlds would be evidence of the owner’s wealth or leisure.

Here in the Outer Rim, though, a garden might simply be a frugal person’s attempt to stretch uneven finances by growing some of his own food. “I wonder why they chose to build amid the trees when other, more easily cleared ground surrounds the outpost,” the Chiss continued.

“Does it matter?” Vader asked. So far he wasn’t sensing the disturbance in the Force that the Emperor had spoken of. Did that mean whatever it was had left Batuu?

He hoped not. Every minute he stayed out here was a minute in which the rebels were free to plot and prepare and attack.

“I suspect it is for purposes of concealment,” Thrawn said. “Do you note the additions to that stone tree?”