Danse Macabre/Part 15

Narasi felt a brush on her mind, a hint of disquiet. She looked up at Prince Taylo, but he was still smiling gallantly, though sweat shone on his forehead and glistened in the roots of his luxuriant blond hair. He dipped her and Narasi laughed as the world turned upside down, but when he drew her up against the feeling was still there. She tried to get a better sense of it, but it was hard to concentrate while also keeping track of her steps; Prince Taylo was a superb dancer, and when she had shown she knew enough not to trip over her own feet, he had started to expand beyond what Tirien had taught her, and Narasi had to really focus to keep up. She heard the bang of doors closing, but couldn't see where before she had to focus on her steps again.

As they circled one another, hands on each other's waists, the disquiet returned, and Narasi slowed. She was used to combat precognition, the sixth sense that put her lightsaber where the blaster bolt would be even before the shooter pulled the trigger, but this was different. She couldn't recall ever having a real premonition—usually it was Tirien who sensed danger and got them in position—but she couldn't shake the sense of wrongness. She stopped on the dance floor.

"Are you all right, Narasi?"

"I…could you just excuse me for one second, Your Highness?" she pleaded. She was sure someone else would steal him for the rest of the waltz if she was gone too long.

"Certainly." He coughed, turning his lips against his cloak. "I could use a rest myself."

He barely seemed winded, so Narasi thought it was just a courtesy, though she appreciated it all the same. Stepping away from him, she raked the ballroom with her eyes, trying to find something out of place, reaching out with the Force and jumping mind-to-mind to sift through the cacophony of thoughts. There was too much, too jumbled, too close together…

As her frustration mounted and her concerns solidified, Narasi thought of the keffis and Tirien urging her to patience. Taking a deep breath, she slowed her search, trying to look more carefully with her mind. She was here to protect the Chancellor, so it made sense to start there.

Master Phnyong stood by one set of windows, speaking with a few senators; he still had his four Blue Guards around him, and they all felt of vigilance in the Force. Most of the senators were male, but one woman stood among them. Her…bodyguard? aide?—somebody stood past her, a tall, powerful Human. He looked around the room in a way Narasi didn't like—it was the same way she studied the room, noting where people were, committing details to memory.

His eyes fell on her, and Narasi had a sudden and jarring sense of déjà vu. With the woman between them and his thick hat pulled halfway down his forehead, all Narasi could see was his eyes, which narrowed in contempt when their gazes locked. Narasi had endured enough loathing gazes tonight that she could appreciate the difference at once. In the other partygoers there was disgust, superiority, even the collateral debt of hatred her species had racked up and which she was expected to pay, but this man's look spelled danger.

She cast about automatically for Tirien, but she couldn't see him; as her head swept the room on a swivel, she couldn't see Raven Kaivalt or Doli Umbgul either. By the time she looked back the man had moved closer to the Chancellor, and Narasi's feeling of unease sharpened to alarm.

"Narasi…" Prince Taylo coughed behind her, sounding concerned now.

"Stay here!" she warned him; she didn't want him mixed up in the middle of this. She started pushing through the crowd, ignoring the cries of the dancers she broke up.

Khofin of Knylenn stepped into her path out of nowhere, radiating disapproval. "Padawan Rican, I thought we discussed—"

"The Chancellor!" Narasi warned him. "We have to—"

"The Chancellor was already kind enough to extend his greetings to you," Khofin interrupted her; the tautness around his eyes showed how little he thought of that. "You can't prey upon his time for your own—"

The danger increased, and Narasi's heart told her that to argue it out would be deadly. Gritting her teeth, trying not to imagine what Tirien would say, she swiped her hand, blowing Khofin off his feet and sending him rolling through the dancers so hard his robes got pulled up over her head. People cried out in shock and dismay, and Narasi barked, "Move!"

Everyone looked at her—everyone except the big man, who was slipping behind one of the Blue Guards. Narasi's eyes widened and she broke into a flat sprint, reaching under her sari and drawing her blade. Men and women alike screamed at the snap-hiss, and she was dimly aware of the orchestra dying out behind her. The Blue Guards raised their force pikes off their shoulders in surprise as the big man reached beneath his robe, but the Chancellor simply fell back, raising a clawed hand and dropping the wine from his other.

The big man was almost within arm's reach of Phnyong when Narasi sprang, but self-preservation turned him away at the last second. Casting off his robes with a flourish to reveal the combat-ready bodysuit beneath, he drew a red-bladed lightsaber from his belt and deflected her stab sideways; she nearly maimed one of the Senate Guards until she awkwardly wrenched her blade back. She caught the man's followup attack at her neck, but her arms trembled from the force of the blow, and he knocked her to the ground with a kick.

She rolled up at once to find three of the Blue Guards stabbing and slashing at the man as the fourth pressed the Chancellor back. Narasi didn't know why Master Phnyong himself didn't join the fray, now that he knew what was happening; he was a Jedi Master, after all, probably even better than Tirien. But she didn't have time to puzzle it out; as she watched, the Dark Jedi parried a force pike sideways and cut both the hands off the Blue Guard wielding it. As the man fell, howling, the Dark Jedi caught a second force pike at the center of the shaft between the Blue Guard's hand; deflecting the third Guard's strike, he punched the second Guard in the face with the fist clutching the force pike, wrenched it high, and swung his blade in, splitting the Guard in half from groin to skull in a shower of blood that steamed against cauterized organs. Tangled in her sari, Narasi cut it off with her lightsaber and charged.

People were screaming all around her as she got back into the fight, engaging the Dark Jedi along with the remaining two Blue Guards; there was no point in the other one lurking by the Chancellor to be picked off. The Dark Jedi was much taller and stronger, and Narasi was terrified to face him without another Jedi, but she forced herself to take the point in the fight. Where at least she had the Force, the Senate Guards were relying on nothing but training; they would die without her help. Adding her lightsaber to the mix stymied the Dark Jedi's initial blitz of slaughter, but he raised his free hand and one of the fallen force pikes came up into his grip. He wielded the long weapon with ease in one hand, slashing with his lightsaber with the other. He was as dexterous as he was strong, but after Toprawa, Narasi expected nothing less from the Dark Vanguard.

Some part of her mind realized it, put together the clues. She had gotten an uncomfortably close-up view of them in the Toprawan caves, but with their masks and hoods, only that thin strip of face across their eyes had been visible. This man had the same eyes—the same structure and depth, not to mention the same hateful glare in matching colors of fire.

A Blue Guard on either side of her, Narasi had little room to maneuver with the wide slashes Kenza would have favored. Tirien's tight Makashi lines would have been perfect, but she did not want to try to fight this juggernaut one-handed. But neither could she adopt Slejux's purely defensive style, waiting for the Vanguardian to exhaust himself against her; he was powerful enough to cut through, and the Senate Guards could not carry the fight without her, so she was left with a cautious offense that barely seemed a distraction.

The Guard on her left lunged high while the other jabbed low; the Vanguardian blocked the left Guard into Narasi as he deflected the right one, and in the second it took her to angle her blade sideways and untangle herself, the Dark Jedi jabbed with the tip of his own force pike. The right Guard grunted as the electric shock took him in the chest; his limbs spasmed, and the Dark Jedi stabbed with the pike so hard that it went in the Guard's chin and burst out the back of his helmet.

Narasi managed to catch the followup lightsaber strike that would've struck down the last Guard, and now she pressed the attack; she had more room to maneuver, but she also dared not let the Vanguardian seize the initative. She and the last Guard attacked in unison, and for one, heart-stopping moment Narasi thought they actually had the Dark Jedi on the retreat. Then he parried her blade into the Guard's force pike and backhanded her across the face so hard she blacked out.

Narasi didn't remember hitting the ground; she came to at once to a terrific pain in the back of her head and the feeling of the last Guard dying. Sitting up, she found him in midair, clawing at his chest as his armor buckled into his ribs. The Vanguardian stood only meters away, one fist raised, a cruel smirk on his lips. Narasi struggled to her feet and ignited her lightsaber, coming in swinging. The Vanguardian turned to meet her, and she realized too late that she was against him alone.

He released the Blue Guard to counterattack, and Narasi was thirteen again on Gizer Battlestation, hurtling into battle against an enemy woefully beyond her. She reverted to a tight defense, trying to keep her blade close, but she didn't have the strength Slejux did, and a cut singed her right shoulder. She snarled and counterattacked, but the Dark Jedi dodged and kneed her in the stomach so hard her legs turned to water. Heaving on the ground, she felt more than saw the blade coming down on her back.

There was a hiss of plasma on cortosis-woven metal rather than pain and oblivion, and Narasi rolled over; a force pike hovered in midair, checking the Vanguardian's killing blow. They both looked, and Narasi saw Chancellor Phnyong lying on the ground, leaning on one elbow, his other, trembling hand raised. The force pike wobbled, but there was a sudden kaboom from the far room. Narasi heard screams, but the Vanguardian looked that way and snarled, and Narasi sucked in as much air as she could; it seemed to stop at the back of her throat without making it all the way to her lungs, but she still rolled and kicked the Dark Jedi in the shin.

It wasn't hard enough to break the limb, but a gasp of pain got past his lips and he staggered back, favoring his leg for a second. In that second, Narasi pulled the Force to herself and struggled up; her lightsaber flipped into her hand. The Vanguardian raised his blade, but a new hum joined the mix, and then Raven Kaivalt was there on the Dark Jedi's other side.

Raven's left forearm was smoking, his robes charred where he had been cut, and his face was contorted with pain. But that was all right, because he wielded his lightsaber in his right hand, and it only took two quick stabs for Narasi to recognize his style and adapt accordingly. She and Tirien had rarely had occasion to fight two-on-one, even in practice, but she had fenced her master many times, and she had learned how Makashi worked. Ignoring the burn in her shoulder, she used broad slashes to force the Vanguardian to stand his ground, leaving him in one spot for Raven's lunges. After a few close calls the Dark Jedi switched to fighting one-handed as well for speed, but that only gave Narasi some breathing room and put Raven in his element.

Raven committed to a lunge that the Dark Jedi deflected, but as he wound up for a counterattack, Narasi threw caution to the wind and tried a lunge herself, skipping forward and nicking the Vanguardian in his kidney. The man gasped in pain, but dragged a Force push halfway around the room, blowing Narasi off her feet and pelting her with debris. She rolled and rose to find the fallen force pikes streaking toward her like arrows; she dodged one and stopped two with the Force, but had to drop her lightsaber and physically catch the last, bringing its humming end to a halt three centimeters from her throat.

The Blue Guard with the half-buckled armor threw himself forward, caught one of the falling pikes as the others clattered to the marble floor, and swung it by the handle one-handed like a bat; the buzzing end sheared through the Vanguardian's boot and the tendon beneath. As he screamed, Narasi leapt in, spinning her own pike around and ramming it into the Vanguardian's thigh so hard it buzzed through his femur and out the front of his leg. His legs had only started to give out when Raven cut his throat.

As the dead Dark Jedi fell, Narasi felt a flash of danger, but Raven knocked her back into the Blue Guard with the Force and they fell over one another. There was an explosion so close the heat curled her hair and the edges of her dress were singed; when she looked up, the Vanguardian had been replaced by a black spot of char on the floor.

Sitting up slowly, Narasi became conscious of the larger world again. She was panting, her right shoulder was on fire, and there were screams and cries coming from all directions—the maimed Blue Guard nearby, officers and guests in the next room. All around her people were choking and gasping, their dates either doubled over beside them or frantically striking their backs and chests while crying out for help. Overwhelmed, Narasi didn't know what to do, where to even start.

She saw Taylo Organa collapsed against an overturned table, his flesh paling, the tablecloth slipping under his hand as he tried to pull himself up. Narasi started toward him, but the look on Raven Kaivalt's face froze her. She turned, and her heart leapt into her throat.

Supreme Chancellor Phnyong was shaking and retching, coughing and hacking with an insectoid buzz; something blue was leaking out of his mouth. The lone Blue Guard left standing raced to his side, but seemed overwhelmed. Raven fell in on his other side, and aides and medical staff started to crowd toward him. Narasi moved in their direction, but froze as the Force rattled her.

Narasi!