very important. I have to go."
"Imagine finding you here," she repeated. "Is this destiny, or what?"
Isard's eyes were starting to throw sparks. Bracing himself, Hal took a
deep breath and got a firm grip on Allyse's ribs.
And abruptly froze. Faintly detectable with that incoming breath had been
two distinctive aromas: the pungent tang of cigarra smoke, plus the more
subtle scent ofGralish liqueur.
Moranda Savich?
He opened his mouth to speak; but before he could get the proper words
lined up, the arms pinioning the two of them together loosened and she stepped
back. He caught just a glimpse of the slender lockjim between her lips before
it vanished again into her mouth and belatedly noticed the pressure of the
choke-collar around his neck had disappeared-...
And with her grin still in place, Allyse backed full tilt into Isard.
"I'm so sorry," she gasped, twisting around with feline speed and
grabbing Isard's jacket in time to keep her from falling backward. "So very
clumsy of me," she added, busily brushing down Isard's jacket where her grip
had momentarily wrinkled it. "Are you all right?"
"Get away," Isard snapped, putting a palm against Allyse's chest and
pushing her away. The shove sent her sprawling back against the side of the
landspeeder, her hands scrabbling for balance and finding a grip across the
top of the door.
"Well, sure," Allyse said in a subdued tone.
"You don't have to be so rough," Hal reproved Isard gently, his eyes
probing Allyse's face. Usually he was able to pull Moranda's features out from
under the mask of her many and varied disguises, but here, at first blush,
anyway, he couldn't seem to find her anywhere in that indignant expression.
Maybe it wasn't her, after all.
"She should be thankful I didn't get rough," Isard countered acidly. "Now
get away from our landspeeder. We have business to attend to."
"I don't think so," a voice called from Hal's right.
He turned. Colonel Nyroska, flanked by two uniformed Defense officers,
was striding in their direction. All three had blasters drawn.
"Colonel Nyroska," Hal nodded. "What brings you down here?"
"Your friend there, Inspector Horn," Nyroska said, his gaze shifting over
Hal's shoulder. "She and I need to have a long talk."
"My friend?" Hal frowned, turning back to look at Allyse.
But she was not, as he'd expected, waiting with the wilted, defeated look
of a criminal or fugitive who'd finally been run to ground. Instead, she was
standing tall and proud, an almost haughty expression on her face. "I commend
you on your excellent timing. Colonel," she said in a voice that matched the
face as she gestured at Isard. "There's your thief, and my Rebel agent. Arrest
her."
The sheer effrontery of it caught Isard completely flatfooted. "What in
the-his" she sputtered. "You little- - back off!" she snapped as one of
Nyroska's men reached for her arm. "Back off, all of you."
Her hand dived beneath her jacket, then froze in place as three blasters
suddenly lined up on her face. "You're making a big mistake, Colonel," she
said quietly. "A big mistake. I'm Imperial Intelligence Field Operative Ysanne
Isard."
"Indeed," Nyroska said calmly. "You have ID, of course?"
"Of course," she said, shifting her hand elsewhere beneath her jacket.
Her hand paused, her face changed, and she spun her head around at Allyse.
"Give it back," she snapped. "My ID. Give it back."
"Nice try," Allyse said patronizingly, lifting her arms. "As you're
welcome to confirm. Colonel, I don't have anything of hers. However, if you'll
escort us back to your headquarters, I'll be happy to have my staff transmit
the credentials she mentioned."
Isard's mouth dropped open. "You'll what?"
"Present my credentials," Allyse said, turning a glacial look on Isard.
"You see. Colonel, I am Field Operative Ysanne Isard."
exactly who I am."
"Inspector Horn?" Nyroska invited.
Hal hesitated. "She did tell me she was Field Operative Isard," he
conceded. "But the only ID she showed me identified her as Darkknell Special
Security agent Katya Glasc."
"Did it, now," Nyroska said, his voice suddenly cold as he looked at
Isard with heightened interest. "Impersonating law enforcement personnel is a
class-one offense on Darkknell. And is she by any chance the one who put that
highly illegal device around your neck?"
Hal reached up and pulled the loosened choke-collar away. "Yes," he said,
handing it to the colonel.
Isard's eyes were simmering pools of death. "You're dead, Horn. Dead."
"I can only say what I know," Hal said. "Anything in the way of further
proof is up to you."
"Indeed it is," she breathed. "All right. Colonel, you win. Let's go to
your headquarters and sort this out." She looked at Allyse. "Let's all of us
go."
"Of course," Nyroska said softly. "I wouldn't have it any other way."
Bel Iblis waited five minutes after Moranda and the others had left the
scene before cautiously approaching the now abandoned landspeeder and letting
himself in. No one shouted in triumph at his appearance; no one, so far as he
could tell, even noticed him. Two minutes later, working awkwardly in the
cramped space, he had the inner door panel off.
The datacards were there, all right, jumbled together at the bottom of
the narrow space. Nestled in among them was an extra datacard, this one
bearing official Imperial markings. Ysanne Isard's missing Intelligence ID, no
doubt.
For a moment Bel Iblis considered taking it with him, decided it wasn't
worth the risk of getting caught with it, and left it where it was. Besides,
if Moranda was right about being able to talk her way out of detention- -
though how she was going to do that he couldn't even begin to imagine-she
might want to track down the vehicle and borrow the ID herself.
He refastened the panel loosely back in place, feeling a twinge of stung
conscience as he did so. Yes, this had all been Moranda's idea in the first
place, a challenge she'd seemed eager to take on, but this was his mission,
and the Rebellion's, and yet it was Moranda who had ended up doing most of the
work and taking all of the risks.
And not for the flat million in Imperial currency she'd demanded from
Isard, but for the relative pittance he and Arkos had been able to throw
together. Someday, if they all lived through this, he would have to find a way
to make it up to her.
And the first step in the survival process, he reminded himself, would be
to rendezvous with Arkos and get himself and these datacards off Darkknell and
back to the Rebellion. And there to find out what exactly Tarkin's Death Star
project entailed.
"Good luck, Moranda," he murmured as he climbed out of the landspeeder
and closed the door gently behind him. "May the Force be with you. May it be
with us all."
Hal would have bet money that Isard's eyes couldn't have gotten more wild
than they ha
d been outside the ClearSkyes Boutique. He was wrong.
"What do you mean she's gone?" she thundered, looming over Nyroska's desk
like a berserk storm cloud. "How could she be gone? You locked her in a cell,
for Pal patine's sake!"
"I'm sorry. Field Operative Isard," Nyroska said apologetically, clearly
trying to press as far back into his chair as he could manage. "My people
assured me she was properly secured. Apparently they were wrong."
"Apparently they were idiots," Isard shot back. "And what precisely are
you doing to recapture her?"
"We have an all-planet alert out," Nyroska told her. "If she's still on
Darkknell, we'll get her."
Isard's snort concisely delivered her opinion of that. "And you," she bit
out, turning her glare onto Hal. "If I find out that was Savich - comand that
you knew she was and didn't say anything-I'll have your head for shockball
practice. Clear?"
"Clear," Hal said. "And I repeat: I don't see how it could have been her
standing there hugging me when she was on the comlink at the same time giving
us directions to the warehouse. Best guess is that it was her ally running
interference for her."
"In that case, you'd better hope Nyroska catches her," Isard said.
"Because if she or anyone else gets off the planet with that datapack, I'll
have both your heads."
She turned back to Nyroska. "I'll be at my ship," she ground out. "You've
got my comlink frequency. Let me know if anything turns up on either woman.
Anything. Understood?"
"We will. Field Operative Isard," Nyroska said humbly.
Spinning around, she stalked to the door and stomped out.
Nyroska exhaled raggedly. "We're in trouble now, Inspector," he said
quietly. "The whole Empire may be in trouble if that datapack gets off-planet,
" Hal agreed. "At least, if her reaction to the whole situation is anything to
go by. But to be honest, I don't think you and I are going to take the brunt
of it, not from her anyway. Isard has about three TIE squadrons' worth of
pride, and bringing official Intelligence wrath down on us will put her in an
embarrassingly bad light."
"As bad a light as it would put us in?"
"Probably not," Hal conceded. "But people like that only risk losing face
if the potential rewards are worth it. Frankly, neither of us qualify." He
shook his head. "No, whatever shrapnel comes of this is going to hit
elsewhere."
"Against members of the Rebel Alliance, perhaps?"
Hal shrugged. "Or those Isard decides are members," he said. "Whether
they are or not."
Nyroska tapped his fingertips against the side of his desk. "A mess,
indeed," he said. "I wouldn't want to be in her boots when she has to go back
and report this to her father."
Hal nodded soberly. "I'll drink to that."
"What is this?" the barman demanded, frowning at the two small items
resting in the palm of his hand.
"They were inside the mug at that table over there," the young cleaner
said excitedly, pointing across the tapcafe. "The one where the dark-haired
woman was sitting."
"Which? The one involved in that Defense Agency to - do down the street?"
"Yes, her." The cleaner pointed at the comlink in the barman's hand.
"See, the comlink is still on. I tried talking, but no one answered."
"Cut off from the other end," the barman grunted.
"That's what I thought," the cleaner agreed. "But that recorder is the
really strange part. Go ahead-play it."
Throwing the kid a speculative look from under his bushy eyebrows, the
barman plucked the wafer-thin recorder from his palm and touched the play
button.
"Next, you're to cross the street and pick up a northbound transport," a
female voice came from the device. "If there isn't one there, just wait-there
will be. You ride it to the corner of Pontrin andJedilore, then get off and go
into the clothing store you'll find on the corner-was
"You hear that?" the cleaner said. "It's like a treasure hunt, isn't it?"
The barman sniffed. "It's a prank," he declared, shutting off the
recording and thrusting it and the comlink back at the cleaner. "Here-you can
keep them."
The kid took them uncertainly. "But what if it isn't a prank?"
"It is," the barman assured him with a sniff. "Trust me, lad. There's no
treasure worth hunting for on Dark knell. Never has been; never will be."
Epilogue
by Michael A. Stackpole
Armand Isard looked up from his desk, slightly more angry that his
daughter had left the door open behind her than that she had entered without
requesting permission to do so. She advanced toward him too quickly, her
mismatched eyes ablaze. He held up a hand, then pointed to the chair before
his desk. "Please, be seated."
She glanced at the chair, then looked at him. "Can I be sure it is safe?"
"If the result of this operation was for you to be killed, you'd already
be dead, Agent Isard." Armand tried to keep his voice as cold as he would when
addressing any insubordinate operative in his organization, but a hint of
anger bled into x anyway. "Please."
She settled herself onto its brown synthleather cushion, though her body
seemed as tense as if he were asking her to sit in a chair bristling with
sharp transparisteel fragments.
He tapped the datapad on his desk.
"I've read the report you sent about the action on Darkknell, and I have
spoken to the Emperor on your behalf. You won't be killed despite your
failure."
Her posture eased a bit, but not quite in the way he would have expected.
She leaned forward, less stiff, more supple, like a predator getting ready to
pounce. "I do not fear for my life at the Emperor's hands. Father."
"No?"
"No. He read the report on Darkknell, the full report on Darkknell."
Her words froze his heart in his chest, and the appearance of two Royal
Guards slipping in through the open doorway started it beating again, very
fast. "What do you mean? What full report?"
Ysanne snorted. "Did you think I wouldn't see what was going on, Father?
You send me off on a mission of incredible delicacy-one you clearly would give
only to an agent you had the utmost trust in. It was also a mission that would
get that operative killed if she failed, and that was your aim all along."
"This is nonsense!"
"Hardly." Ysanne let a smile slither across her lips. "You see, Father,
your plan succeeded. The information you wanted stolen has been communicated
to the Rebels, and we know you had a hand in it. I found fingerprints and
other trace evidence that identified the Rebel agent sent to retrieve the
plans. It was Garm Bel Iblis."
Armand Isard's stomach folded in on itself. "Bel Iblis? Impossible. He
was blown up. The bomb killed his whole family."
"Oh, well acted, Father, very well acted, but we both know that's not
true, don't we?" She laughed lightly. "You got word to Bel Iblis and got him
out of the bomb's range. You didn't mean it for him anyway: you wanted his
wife, Arrianya, dead. She was the last link he had to the Empire. She was
&nb
sp; devoted to the Emperor, so at the bidding of Rebel Masters you had her slain,
forcing Bel Iblis to ally himself fully to the Rebellion."
"That's absurd, completely untrue and absurd." Armand forced himself to
breathe normally. "You have no proof of any of this."
"You approved the operation that was supposed to kill Bel Iblis, so you
clearly knew how to thwart it. And you sent me out on a mission you knew would
fail so I would be eliminated. You would use my death at the Emperor's order
as an excuse to go over to the Rebellion. With you there to reveal the
Empire's secrets to them- - and the Death Star datacards were proof you could
de liver-they would welcome you. You would overthrow the Emperor, then betray
your Rebel companions and take the throne yourself. It's a brilliant plan.
Father, simple and yet so effective."
Armand shot to his feet and pointed at the Royal Guards. "Arrest her.
Clearly she has gone over to the Rebellion and has concocted this story to
remove me, crippling the effort to find and destroy the Rebels."
Neither of the scarlet-armored Royal Guards moved.
Ysanne Isard stood and slowly smoothed her tunic. "They're here, Father,