Read Online Clone Wars Gambit: Siege by Karen Miller - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Karen Miller
Ads: Link
to dive back outside again, deflecting blaster bolts left and right—they gave themselves over to the madness of urban battle.
The Greens lost another two team members to droids in the last desperate push to reach the tower and its beacon ahead of the Blues. Taria’s team had taken its own route into the city and was racing to take the prize at its center.
The teams reached the tower at the same time. “
Go on!
” Ahsoka shouted to Chivas and Veneka, her last two Padawans. “That beacon isn’t going to light itself!”
Breathing hard, aware of sore muscles and scrapes and bruises, she watched the Padawans scale the tower’s external wall. Taria had three Blue team members still standing. They took off after the Greens, leaving Taria to cheer them on.
Ahsoka looked the older Jedi over. Slushed with muck from the quagmire the Greens had managed to avoid, Taria was scraped and bruised, too, with several rips in her sedate dark gray bodysuit. After what had happened rescuing the scientist’s mother, probably she shouldn’t be taking part in this game. But Master Damsin was a stubborn law unto herself.
“I’m fine, Ahsoka,” Taria said, not shifting her gaze from the race up the tower. “So you can stop looking at me like—oh. Stang.”
One of the Blues had misjudged a handhold and was tumbling not very tidily to the street below. Her command of the Force to cushion the fall proved far from perfect.
“Sorry, Michka,” said Taria to the winded Padawan. “I think that has to count as dead.”
The Padawan groaned and let her yellow-scaled head thud to the ground.
Ahsoka stared again at the tower where two Greens and two Blues were scrambling to the top with a lot more enthusiasm than finesse. She couldn’t help smiling.
“You were right, Taria. This is an excellent way for Padawans to learn.”
“And what have you learned?”
“Me?” she said, surprised.
Oh. Right. I’m still a Padawan, too
. She thought of Anakin. “That nothing’s ever as easy as it looks.”
Taria smiled. “Don’t worry, Ahsoka. No matter who wins this, you haven’t let your Master down.”
The lurking unease she’d managed to outrun came surging back. “Taria…” She felt her breathing hitch.
Say it, say it. You know you have to say it
. “I’ve got a bad feeling. About Master Skywalker.”
Taria’s greenish-blue hair, stuck through with twigs and unraveling from its long braid, caught the flickering streetlights and shone like living ice. For the first time since they’d entered the dojo, Ahsoka saw a hint of discomfort in her eyes as her terrible illness made itself felt. Atop the tower the Padawans reached the competition beacon together, and ignited it together with loud triumphant hollering. A tie.
Applauding their effort, Taria slid her tawny, topaz gaze sideways. “I’ve got one, too. About Master Kenobi.”
“Oh.” Ahsoka swallowed. “Really? And what does that mean?”
Taria snorted. “You’re too smart for a question like that, Ahsoka. You know as well as I do what it means.”
She did. Oh, she did.
Skyguy… where are you? What’s going on?
Chapter Four
Anakin sat up, shifting between heartbeats from deep sleep to waking. Even as he looked around his unfamiliar surroundings—a storeroom, its walls lined with prefab durasteel shelves not even a quarter filled with cans and boxes—he could feel his senses unfurl and test the cool, dry air for danger. Nothing. At least, nothing immediate. Only the same clouding anxiety and tension he and Obi-Wan had felt as they approached the village. And he sensed Teeba Jaklin, the woman who’d warily given them permission to enter the village, brought them back here to her home, and offered them tea and soup and rough beds on her floor. Vaguely, he remembered drinking something bitter, swallowing some kind of gritty gruel, then afterward falling facedown on this thin mattress. And then lights out.
So. Look on the bright side, General Skywalker. And
The Greens lost another two team members to droids in the last desperate push to reach the tower and its beacon ahead of the Blues. Taria’s team had taken its own route into the city and was racing to take the prize at its center.
The teams reached the tower at the same time. “
Go on!
” Ahsoka shouted to Chivas and Veneka, her last two Padawans. “That beacon isn’t going to light itself!”
Breathing hard, aware of sore muscles and scrapes and bruises, she watched the Padawans scale the tower’s external wall. Taria had three Blue team members still standing. They took off after the Greens, leaving Taria to cheer them on.
Ahsoka looked the older Jedi over. Slushed with muck from the quagmire the Greens had managed to avoid, Taria was scraped and bruised, too, with several rips in her sedate dark gray bodysuit. After what had happened rescuing the scientist’s mother, probably she shouldn’t be taking part in this game. But Master Damsin was a stubborn law unto herself.
“I’m fine, Ahsoka,” Taria said, not shifting her gaze from the race up the tower. “So you can stop looking at me like—oh. Stang.”
One of the Blues had misjudged a handhold and was tumbling not very tidily to the street below. Her command of the Force to cushion the fall proved far from perfect.
“Sorry, Michka,” said Taria to the winded Padawan. “I think that has to count as dead.”
The Padawan groaned and let her yellow-scaled head thud to the ground.
Ahsoka stared again at the tower where two Greens and two Blues were scrambling to the top with a lot more enthusiasm than finesse. She couldn’t help smiling.
“You were right, Taria. This is an excellent way for Padawans to learn.”
“And what have you learned?”
“Me?” she said, surprised.
Oh. Right. I’m still a Padawan, too
. She thought of Anakin. “That nothing’s ever as easy as it looks.”
Taria smiled. “Don’t worry, Ahsoka. No matter who wins this, you haven’t let your Master down.”
The lurking unease she’d managed to outrun came surging back. “Taria…” She felt her breathing hitch.
Say it, say it. You know you have to say it
. “I’ve got a bad feeling. About Master Skywalker.”
Taria’s greenish-blue hair, stuck through with twigs and unraveling from its long braid, caught the flickering streetlights and shone like living ice. For the first time since they’d entered the dojo, Ahsoka saw a hint of discomfort in her eyes as her terrible illness made itself felt. Atop the tower the Padawans reached the competition beacon together, and ignited it together with loud triumphant hollering. A tie.
Applauding their effort, Taria slid her tawny, topaz gaze sideways. “I’ve got one, too. About Master Kenobi.”
“Oh.” Ahsoka swallowed. “Really? And what does that mean?”
Taria snorted. “You’re too smart for a question like that, Ahsoka. You know as well as I do what it means.”
She did. Oh, she did.
Skyguy… where are you? What’s going on?
Chapter Four
Anakin sat up, shifting between heartbeats from deep sleep to waking. Even as he looked around his unfamiliar surroundings—a storeroom, its walls lined with prefab durasteel shelves not even a quarter filled with cans and boxes—he could feel his senses unfurl and test the cool, dry air for danger. Nothing. At least, nothing immediate. Only the same clouding anxiety and tension he and Obi-Wan had felt as they approached the village. And he sensed Teeba Jaklin, the woman who’d warily given them permission to enter the village, brought them back here to her home, and offered them tea and soup and rough beds on her floor. Vaguely, he remembered drinking something bitter, swallowing some kind of gritty gruel, then afterward falling facedown on this thin mattress. And then lights out.
So. Look on the bright side, General Skywalker. And
Similar Books
