Star Wars, page 5
“My name is Marda Ro. I am looking for more of us.”
“Isren is not my name,” he corrected, and saluted me with the bowl before sipping from it. I waited. He studied me. “You’re pretty. Young. Alone.”
I wanted to tell him I was not alone. I had people—and a warship waiting just outside the territory of the Ryloth system security. I said, “I’m not alone now.” Soft-spoken, tempting.
“Old uncle,” he said.
“What?”
“Isren means ‘old uncle’ in the language of our lost planet.”
I curled my hands into fists in my lap, letting the sting of my sharp nails cut my palms. “Tell me more.”
Isren did. Unfamiliar elders were old uncles, old aunts. We made a veneer of family with polite greetings for each other. He told me we came from a planet of storms, a planet that hated us. It felt like a story I’ve always known. Do you recognize it? We tamed that storm for a long time, but finally the planet nearly destroyed itself to kick us off, and we took instead to the stars. We fought everyone we met, assuming they hated us as much as our homeworld did. We hunted. We spread out and learned to survive with tooth and claw.
“Why have we not made a new home?” I asked, drifting high and eager from that single bowl of liquor. The old uncle snorted into his fifth.
“You can’t trust a home, girl,” he said.
It cut into me so sharply I gasped. I stared.
“Everything falls away,” Isren explained. “Eventually.”
I asked, “Then what can you trust?”
“Only yourself.”
“Not even other Evereni?”
That is when he told me what the word meant on the planet that hated us: caretakers. Maybe, he joked, the planet itself was called Take Care.
But Evereni is our name. Taking. Fine. Fine—I can do that. You certainly can. I will take so that you will.
The old uncle told me a few other phrases in Evereni. I bought him meat and soup; he bought me more liquor. I told him about my cousin Yana, the flashes I knew of our mothers. He had never heard the name Ro. But he knew what it meant. He wouldn’t tell me. He did say we pass our family names down like a command. How many of us are there? A handful, scattered. Is there a place we meet? Only death.
I asked him, leaning near to whisper, if he saw the faces of people he’d lost, who mattered—if they spoke to him.
Isren said no. He sometimes saw those who would be dead, whose deaths were to come. I asked if that meant he killed them—to make his visions true.
He laughed and squeezed my shoulder. “Now I believe you are a grandchild of ours. Riferi. A legacy. The future cut of a knife we forge now. That I trust. Go forth, pretty Marda Ro. Go make your visions true.”
A legacy, he said. In all his talk, that was the only thing my old uncle admitted to trusting besides himself.
“Go with me, old uncle,” I said.
He would not. “But,” he said, “Evereni take care of our own.”
It sounded like a threat. It sounded like the name of a home planet.
I liked it.
Someday I will be gone.
Someone must sit on this throne. Outside the galaxy turns, the Force rages and flows, but the Gaze Electric is peace at the center—my planet at the heart of a great galactic storm.
You.
This is for you.
Riferi. My legacy. Take care.
I continue to search for Evereni. I want to know them. More of them. Some of them. I want to show them what I am doing. I—
I want their approval.
I wish I did not. I wish I could carve that last wet chunk of heart out of my gut, the part that longs for someone to say, Yes, Marda, that is good. What you have done is good.
Perhaps you will think so. Or if not good—useful.
May what I build for you be useful, my love.
I hunt, and because it is what I do, it is what my guests on the Gaze Electric do, too. I hunt Evereni; they hunt anything they like, so long as it brings us power: food, credits, raw materials, droid parts, cloth, alloys, anything we can use. What we cannot use we hoard or sell.
We have three small ships that live in the hold of the Gaze now. One left over from the Mother’s reign, one belonging to Fori Nagor, and one a retrofitted exploratory shuttle Esstrop and Kortanio had been using to spread the word of the Path.
Esstrop and Kortanio easily turned over their faith to me. They are my best raiders—always moving, always seeking, always taking what they can and bringing it back to the belly of the Gaze, happy to display their prizes for me.
Milan and Fori work together, taking Fori’s ship in different directions to find smuggling work, or more often opportunities for simple theft. I do not know the details of how the Mother sent her Children to steal Force artifacts, but I know they used the cover of the Path to get into the best locations. We do not use the name, or the philosophy, but we use the cover of pilgrims sometimes to gain access to the places we need. The frontier is a banquet table for pilgrims—or those pretending to be genuine.
I think sometimes about how devoted I was to gifts freely given, how in some ways I deserved to have it all taken from me. I—
I gave even myself away.
Rox and Alirya stay with me on the Gaze. Rox settles supplies and takes care of our mundane needs. Alirya has given herself the job of secretary and leans into strategy, star maps, plotting courses to find opportunities. I frustrate her often by insisting we split in a new direction to chase another rumor. She obeys.
Rarely, but when the opportunity arises, all four raiders take two or even all three of the small ships to go on a quick mission of destruction and pillaging. I have encouraged them, told them to take what they like: that is our new way. It is the natural progression from gifts freely given, I say, often enough they believe me—or pretend to. The Mother—Elecia—always sent her Children to steal, didn’t she?
This time they returned to my ship with a prize of people. Refugees. Poor sentients who had gathered together to trade among other such refugees. A bad target for treasure seekers, as the refugees had little to steal. So my raiders had brought the people here.
I was furious.
I stood before my throne and stared out at the kneeling people. Their lowered heads, all different colors, lekku and horns and eyestalks and hair and scales and antenna, reminded me of the Path, of myself kneeling. My Littles, my friends and Elders, and—
What did they expect me to do with people? Sell them? To the Hutts? I could not trust prisoners or let them loose on my ship. I could not—I did not—one thing I would not take was freedom. How can we be free, riferi, if we take it from others?
Except.
I curled my fists so hard my nails cut my palms and I bled through my fingers. Slowly, I released my hands. I studied the kneeling people. “Can any of you touch the Force?”
Nothing.
I could hear everyone breathing.
Making my voice as kind as possible, as if I were talking to my Littles, I persuaded, “If you tell me, I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Fori flipped a lekku behind her shoulder, a scoffing gesture.
I ignored her and waited.
Alirya walked toward me. She put herself at my shoulder, then slowly sank to her knees, too, showing the prisoners she trusted me. She was safe at my side. Maybe that’s what she was doing. Maybe she only wanted to be closer to me.
“If none of you can touch the Force,” I said, “then they can have you. To keep or sell or eat for all I care.”
A hand raised. It belonged to a young man, humanoid with green skin. “I can,” he said hoarsely.
“Thank you,” I said as I approached. I reached out but did not quite touch him. A cut down his cheek bled thick purple.
“The rest of you will be given a choice,” I called out. “Bargain with my captains to join one of their teams, or we’ll drop you off at the next port.”
Then I moved close to Fori. She was taller than me, but only because of her crown of lekku. Her eyes and mine were level. “Do not bother me with this sort of thing again. If you want to recruit, recruit. I am not interested in sentient prizes.”
She opened her mouth, but before she spoke she realized I had put the tip of a very small knife against the bulbous line of her lekku. If I leaned in, the blade would very likely sheer it off. Remember when she wanted to have me? To touch me and kiss me? How do you think she felt about this?
I jutted my chin higher. I do not know what she saw in my black eyes. Madness? Hunger? Hope?
“Fine,” Fori said.
“Get out, and take all of them but this one.”
They obeyed. I was left alone with the young man and Alirya. His breath echoed harshly in the cavernous hall.
“Thank you,” he said.
I glanced down at him. “Come with me,” I said.
And I took him down to the Great Leveler.
I lost months chasing after a single rumor, until I heard the Evereni I tracked had only one hand.
Of course, of course I would be hunting my own cousin, whose hand I took. Who—
I loved her. I love her still. I think we love deeply, riferi.
I am glad I see only the dead of my past and not those who are to come.
Once someone told me he was not allowed to grow attached to things. I did not understand, and I still do not. Life is nothing but attachments. Ligaments, air, skin against skin, alloys holding a ship together against the pull of hyperspace. Family. Stories. Rumors. History. That’s all attachment.
I told him having no attachments cut him off from the living Force. The Force is life; life continues through families. It wants families. It wants relationships, which are nothing but attachment.
He’s gone, and not even part of the Force anymore, but I am still attached.
And I’m attached to you.
You don’t even exist yet, but I know you.
Fori lost two of her team in a firefight, escaping from some cheap system security. We took the Gaze far from any known system to hide for a while. Alirya brought me tea. She put the tray on top of the small console beside the throne, disregarding the buttons and controls. She poured steaming copper liquid for both of us and handed me a cup.
I took it. I studied her. She wanted something. I supposed she would tell me.
“What are we doing, Marda?” she asked, sitting on the floor beside my throne. I had my legs folded beneath me. The seat was built for someone larger, longer, stronger. I take up as much of its space as I am able.
Perhaps you will fit.
I said, “We are drinking tea, Alirya.”
The thin human girl narrowed her eyes at me. She had cut off her luxurious hair and pulled the rest into spikes. It was a red-brown similar to the crusting red-brown of that Jedi’s blood where it still smears in a few places against the sleek, glittering walls behind me.
“I mean,” she said with needles in her voice, “there are thirty-seven of us on board now. When I joined you, there were six. What is your plan? What are your goals? What do you want? What are we?”
My surprise gained strength with each question, and it showed on my face. “My plan is to take what we need. My goal is to find more of my people. You know that is what I hunt.”
“And then?”
“Find more. Take more,” I said. “Enough so we can do anything we want.”
“I want—”
“Wait.” I cut her off.
She stared at me, eyes wide. She licked her lips. Her teeth were small and blunt. It would have required a lot of pressure for them to break flesh. The same could have been said for her nails. I could have torn open her throat with a flick—an accident.
I said, “If you tell me what you want, I can keep you from getting it.”
“Why would you do that?” she asked softly.
I set the cup of tea down with a metallic tink. I leaned toward her to ask, “Why wouldn’t I?”
“Marda.” She said my name with disapproval.
She did not understand. Perhaps she couldn’t.
I held my hand out to her. Alirya took it immediately. I tugged her to her feet but remained seated. “What do you think we are?” I asked her.
“Lost,” she answered. “You never speak of the Force. Or the Mother. Not of what really happened to you. To all of us.”
“We are not the Path any longer.” I twined my fingers with hers. “I have said that before.”
“What are you making us?”
I thought of star maps, and storm planets. I thought of bodies flaking into stone, crumbling sand sifting through my fingers. I thought of everything falling away beneath my feet.
I thought of my old uncle, of legacy. Isren. Riferi.
I thought of taking and taking, a ravenous need to pull back at the Force.
I used to believe I could exist in harmony with it. Two melodies woven together. Isn’t that a pretty thought?
But the galaxy is not pretty.
I used to believe the Force gives and gives, and we give back. If I just gave enough of myself, I would be part of something greater. Loved.
But the Leveler has shown me, the Jedi have shown me, that the Force takes, too.
My people come from a storm. Our people. Caretakers.
“I’m making us into a beginning,” I told her.
I found them. They refueled on a space dock hanging over the gas giant Siquay. I caught up to them because they were slow, or lazy, or relaxed, or pursuing business there. I don’t know. I don’t care. I caught up.
Their ship was sharp and jagged, stuck together from different styles; the oldest part of the engine glowed eerie green. It was, I have learned, Evereni technology.
I sent all three of the Gaze’s little parasite ships to surround them, call out to them, project my invitation like a clarion.
For a moment, as I watched from the throne, I thought they would run.
For a moment, I thought I might blast them out of the stars if they did.
They must have realized I could.
So instead they signaled acquiescence.
I waited in my throne room.
Behind me a bright red storm planet glistened fresh against the wall, the height of ten Evereni—a swirling red vortex painted by my own hand, curling lines arcing away like the bend, the turn, the millennial movement of the entire galaxy. Me at the center.
I stood with my legs against the seat of the throne in my too-white flight suit, my scarf and my cowl, hair shining from oil and brushing, makeup transforming my eyes into pits, black on my mouth. I held nothing in my hands. Once, I might have brought a bouquet of welcome, lompop and fallen leaves and field roses. Once, I would have painted blue waves across my forehead, or blue lightning streaks down my face.
Now I am vibrant Evereni. I do not wear the storm; I stand before it.
My raiders entered, a team at a time, and it was Esstrop and Kortanio who escorted the Evereni twins. The others spread out and lined up in a crescent. The throne hall was dim, lit with the hazy blue light of holo-suns and holo-torches.
Alirya strode past them to me but stopped an arm’s reach away, beside the console.
My eyes were locked onto them.
I bit my tongue hard enough to smear my dark gray blood between my sharp white teeth.
They were beautiful.
A man and a woman. Their stride was sleek, predatory. Their clothing was complementary gray and red. Soft-soled boots let them walk quietly, while my raiders stomped. Black eyes trained on me only—two pairs, reflecting the red of the storm planet at my back.
The shape of their faces and their gait told me they were related. Siblings, I guessed, for they looked more alike than Yana and I ever did.
The two came to a stop in the center of the hall.
“Welcome to the Gaze Electric.” I spoke evenly, quietly—so they would have to listen.
The woman Evereni tilted her head so her wild hair fell to one side and her scalloped gray ear was freed. Barbs of metal wove in and out of the lobe.
The male Evereni did not move.
I said, “I am Marda Ro, and this is mine.”
“Is it?” the woman asked.
“I took it,” I answered.
She grinned. “And if we take it from you?”
“I suppose it will be yours.” I think I managed to sound unconcerned. The tension of my raiders, arrayed around the hall, tightened. Alirya looked at me, but I did not take my eyes off the Evereni. “Instead,” I offered, “be my guests for a while. I have been looking for you.”
“Ro,” the man said, his first word to me.
“Yes.”
“To look.”
I did not understand.
The woman said, “My name is Vika Faer, and this is my brother, Velya. Our grandmother knew Ro.”
“Join me for a meal, and tell me,” I said.
They did.
Our name means “to look, to see.” Theirs means “to know.” Evereni, the siblings told me, name our families for action.
We ate alone, just the three of us—rich sauce and thin cuts of meat, boiled grain with a chemical spice reminiscent of Dalnan pepper. Alirya made the meal after my taste—the taste I am giving to myself now that I consume what is delicious instead of what is freely given. I was glad to know I liked meat before Vika and Velya arrived.
They do not know much about the Ro family, except that they are gone besides myself. I tell them I have a cousin, too. There are six other Faers spread in the galaxy, most of them together on a three-hundred-year-old ship. They know Evereni called Espri—“to have”—and Rad—“to laugh.” But their grandmother has a list of Evereni names that goes all the way back to the storm planet, and the record of the family who led us away from death: the Xouri family.
“To survive.”
It is so much that I did not know before, so much to tease my longing, whip my imagination into a frenzy.
I wanted to touch them both, to grasp their hands, to dig my nails into their shoulders. I wanted to put my nose in their hair. I wanted them to want the same from me. Touch me, take me. See me. Know me.
After the food was cleared away, after Alirya had shot me concerned glances again and again while she brought a decanter of clear liquor none of us drank, I challenged them to a friendly spar.
