Shadows of the Empire Read Online Free PDF Page B

Jedi Knight, a man who had gone one-on-one with Darth Vader and lived to tell of it, vaporized when his faulty lightsaber blew up. So far he’d been very careful constructing the thing, triple-checking each step, and to get this far had taken almost a month. The book said a Jedi Master in a hurry could construct a new lightsaber in a couple of
days
.
    Luke sighed. Maybe after he’d built six or eight of them he might be able to speed it up, but he obviously had a long, long way to go to get there—
    Suddenly he felt something.
    It was like hearing and smelling and tasting and seeing somehow combined, and yet it was none of those things. Something … impending, somehow.
    Could it be something coming from the Force? Ben had been able to sense events happening light-years away, and Yoda had spoken of such things, but Luke wasn’t sure. His own experiences in his X-wing and in his practice had been so limited.
    He wished Ben were here to tell him.
    Whatever it was grew stronger. For a moment, he had a flash of recognition: Leia?
    He had been able to call to her when he was about to fall from beneath Cloud City after his encounter with Vader. She had somehow received his cry for help.
    Was it Leia?
    He buckled on his blaster, adjusted the belt on his hip so he could draw the weapon quickly if needed, and went outside. Normally the Tusken Raiders—the Sand People—stayed clear of Ben’s house. They were superstitious, Ben had told him, and with his control of the Force, he had shown them a few tricks, enough so they marked his place as haunted. But Ben was gone, and whatever he had done might not work forever. Luke didn’t have Ben’s control; the Raiders might not be so impressed with him picking up a few rocks with the Force. Then again, there was nothing wrong with his aim, and however inelegant it was, a blaster bolt splashing off a rock next to them would make just about anybody stop and think.
    Once he got the lightsaber built and working, he hoped he could put the blaster away. A true Jedi did not need any other weapon to protect himself, Ben had told him.
    He sighed. He had a way to go to get to that level, too.
    A hot wind blew grit off the desert, abrading and drying his skin. In the distance, he saw a thin dust cloud. Somebody approached across the barrens from Mos Eisley, probably in a landspeeder. Since nobody else was supposed to know he was here, it was probably Leia or Chewie or Lando—if the Empire had located him, they would have dropped on him from the air, raining ships and stormtroopers. In that case, he’d be lucky to get to his camouflaged X-wing before they blasted the place to a smoking ruin—as they had blasted Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru at the farm …
    Luke felt his jaw muscles go tight at the memory.
    The Empire had a lot to answer for.
    T he protected corridors in the core of the Imperial Center were available only to those with proper identification, and admissions were, supposedly, strictly limitedand enforced. Such corridors were large, well lighted, lined with fanciful botanicals, such as singing fig trees and jade roses, and often patrolled by hawk-bats, which preyed on the rock slugs that sometimes infested the granite walls. These corridors were designed to be pathways in which the rich and famous could stroll without being bothered by the rabble.
    But as Xizor walked along one such enclosed path, his four bodyguards ahead of or behind him, an interloper appeared in front of them and started shooting at the Dark Prince with a blaster.
    One of the pair of bodyguards in front took a bolt in the chest that pierced his concealed hardweave armor and dropped him. Xizor noticed the chest wound smoked as the guard groaned and rolled onto his back.
    The second guard, whether through skill or luck, returned fire and scored a direct hit on the assassin’s blaster, knocking it from his hand. The threat was over.
    The attacker screamed and charged at the remaining guards and Xizor