Star Wars - Lost Tribe of the Sith 03 - Paragon Read Online Free PDF Page B

hot night. Arriving before a wall of water, Tilden donned the robe he was carrying, raised the hood, and stepped into the downpour.
    Or, rather, through it.
    Tilden walked, dripping, down the dark passage leading deep into the stone structure. He followed hushed voices to the end of a passage. There was no light—but there was life. Tilden heard agonized chatter as he approached: the horrible news from the south had begun to arrive. The superstitious Keshiri would probably be expected to absorb the horror quietly, a voice said from the shadows. The Destructors would probably be blamed.
    “It is done,” Tilden spoke to the darkness. “Seelah has rid the Skyborn of the Fifty-seven. Of the people not like them, only the bumpy man, Gloyd, remains.”
    “Seelah doesn’t suspect you?” returned a husky female voice from the blackness. “She doesn’t
read your mind
?”
    “She doesn’t think I’m worth it. And I speak of nothing but the old legends. She thinks me a fool.”
    “She can’t tell our great scholars from our fools,” said a male voice.
    “None of them can,” said another. “Good. Let’s keep it that way. Seelah has done us a favor, reducing their numbers. She may do more.” A blinding flash appeared as an old Keshiri man lit a lantern. There were several Keshiri there, huddled in the cramped space—their attentions not on Tilden, but on the figure steppingfrom the shadows behind him. Tilden turned to recognize the woman who had first addressed him.
    “Stay strong, Tilden Kaah. With your help—and with the help of all of us here—the Keshiri will finish the job.” Anger glistened in Adari Vaal’s eyes. “I brought this plague upon us.
And I will end it
.”

Read on for an excerpt from

Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi: Backlash
by Aaron Allston
Published by Del Rey Books
    The rainforest air was so dense, so moist that even roaring through it at speeder bike velocity didn’t bring Luke Skywalker any physical relief. His speed just caused the air to move across him faster, like a greasy scrub-rag wielded by an overzealous nanny-droid, drenching all the exposed surfaces of his body.
    Not that he cared. He couldn’t see her, but he could sense his quarry, not far ahead: the individual whose home he’d crossed so many light-years to find.
    He could sense much more than that. The forest teemed with life, life that poured its energy into the Force, too much to catalogue as he roared past. He could feel ancient trees and new vines, creeping predators and alert prey. He could feel his son Ben as the teenager drew up abreast of him on his own speeder bike, eyes shadowed under his helmet but a competitive grin on his lips, and then Ben was a few meters ahead of him, dodging leftward to avoid hitting a split-forked tree, the recklessness of youth giving him a momentary speed advantage over Luke’s superior piloting ability.
    Then there was more life,
big
life, close ahead, with malicious intent—
    From a thick nest of magenta-flowered underbrush twice the height of a man, just to the right of Luke’spath ahead, emerged an arm, striking with great speed and accuracy. It was humanlike, gnarly, gigantic, long enough to reach from the flowers to swat the forward tip of Luke’s speeder bike as he passed.
    Disaster takes only a fraction of a second. One instant Luke was racing along, intent on his distant prey and enjoying moments of competition; the next, he was headed straight for a tree whose trunk, four meters across, would bring a sudden stop to his travels and his life.
    He came free of the speeder bike as it rotated beneath him from the giant creature’s blow. He was still headed for the tree trunk. He gave himself an adrenaline-boosted shove in the Force and drifted another couple of meters to the left, allowing him to flash past the trunk instead of into it; he could feel its bark rip at the right shoulder of his tunic. A centimeter closer, and the contact would have given him a serious friction