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.Even a source with the same combination of sulfurand antimony could have a number of outlets.""You take a whole lot of convincing."Leia grinned at him."I deal with politicians all day.""Yeah." Han glanced toward the wrecked gate through which Jevax had passed."I think you just gotto deal with another one."In one of the cliff-cut rooms Chewbacca found an old ladder, which they dragged up after them, floorby floor, to climb the remains of the tower, Leia picking her way carefully through the broken-outdoorways, the thick embrasures of what had been windows, the curve of the broken stair.From thehighest room the view out over the valley was breathtaking, mist filling the land like swirling water in adark basin, the white or green plastic roofs of the packing plants rising through on the far end like a floeof bizarrely regimented icebergs where the greater heat stirred the fogs at the dark cliff's base.Above them, the gondola beds of vine-coffee moved along their tracks, homegoing boats headed forthe small wooden wasp's nest of the Supply Station, curtained in vines like everything else, clinging to thecliff.From the far end of the broken remains of the tower floor, Leia gazed down at the miniatureecosystem of the rift, a steaming jungle snuggled in the midst of some of the most vicious icefields in thegalaxy, fed by the heat of the planet's core.What had the place been like, she wondered, when they'd been here, those children whose shrill voicesshe could almost hear? Those families whose wisdom and love had soaked, it seemed, into the verystone of the walls?Intermittently colder, without the dome, she thought--necessitating the building of the rock houses ofthe old town over the hot springs.Wilder jungles near the warm vents, bare tundra perhaps away fromthem.Why had the Jedi Master Plett come here in the first place, deliberately seeking a world wherenone could easily follow? Who had convinced him to offer sanctuary, and how?A pair of strong arms circled her waist from behind.Han said nothing, just gazed out past her, and Leialeaned back into his strength, closing her eyes and letting her mind drift.To Ithor, green and graceful and busy.To the curious, meaningless death of a woman in the Senex Sector, killed by a man too expensive forthe job.To the fact, relayed to her that morning, that the head of the House Vandron, in whose territory thecrime had taken place, was obstructing any investigation of Draesinge's death.To Drub McKumb.They hid the children down the well.The voices of the children floated up to her.They were playing in the big, square room below; she sawthem darting among the heavy tables of shalaman wood set along the inner wall, a whole pack of them:mostly human, but including an Ithorian, Wookiees, a Twi'lek, Bith.A woman repairing a half-dissectedsterilizer at one of the tables called out an indulgent warning to one toddler who'd ventured too near thebronze, flower-shaped grille that screened the well in the floor's center, though the grille's openings weretoo small to admit anything except the smallest of the toys with which they played.Steam floated upthrough the openings, warming the room, as did the dim sunlight magnified by the angled crystalplex set ineach keyhole window.A dark-haired man played a red-lacquered mandolin.Pittins of every color thatpittins came in dozed on the windowsills or tracked the occasional myrmin across the floor.The door in the rear wall opened, and an old Ho'Din came in, two and a half meters tall and graceful inhis black cloak of Jedi mastership, his flowerlike headstalks faded with age.Calm seemed to flow fromhim, and a deep sense--such as she sometimes felt from Luke--of vast strength bought at a terrible price.She opened her eyes.The roofless chamber below her at the base of the tower was empty, full ofshadows as the feeble daylight waned.There was no door in the rear wall."They sealed it somehow." Han passed his palms along the smooth dark stone where the rear wall ofPlett's House had been cut into the rock of the cliff."Even the best patch jobs will leave a join, but this iswatertight.""It was about here, though." Leia half closed her eyes again, recapturing the scene.There was a kind ofpain in the memory, a sense of having lost or mislaid something treasured, a long time ago.The happiness she had felt rising from that room? The peace of being loved unconditionally, which haddissolved in searing laser violence when someone on the Death Star had thrown a final switch?Looking at the man beside her, she wondered if Han had ever known that kind of peace, that sense ofbelonging, in his childhood.Chewie growled a query; Han gave it some thought."Yeah, I think we've still got the echolocator--ifLando didn't borrow it the last time he flew the Falcon for some cockamamie treasure-hunting scheme.""I wouldn't bet on even an echolocator finding the tunnel that Master came out of," said Leia.Sheturned to survey the empty chamber once again."The Jedi." She hesitated, thinking about the thingsLuke had taught her, the things the old Jedi Vima-Da-Boda had said."If the Jedi could cover their tracksto the extent of having everybody in the valley just forget they'd ever been there in the face of some prettysevere bomb damage, I don't think an echolocator's going to do us a lot of good.""I think you're right." Han caressed the stone again, as if he half believed it was illusion rather thantechnology that concealed it.And perhaps, thought Leia, it was."But at least now we know two things.""Two things?""That there was an entrance here," said Han grimly, his.and that it wasn't the entrance Drub used."Chapter 6The Jedi Knights had murdered his family.A band of them had descended on the town where he'd grown up, summoning fog by the power of theForce in the dead of night and moving through it in cold and shadow, wraiths of power and silence witheyes glowing green as marshfire in the dark.He'd fled, gasping, the icy pressure of their minds clutchingat his, trying to cripple him and bring him back.He'd lain in the trees outside of town.(trees?).andseen them line up the women, laughing at their screams as they pulled their babies from their arms andsliced them to pieces with their lightsabers
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