Ronin: A Visions Novel (Star Wars) by Emma Mieko Candon

Author:Emma Mieko Candon
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Penguin Random House UK
Published: 2021-10-11T23:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY

THE RONIN KNEW it impossible, yet he couldn’t banish the cloying scent of autumn from his nose. Space smelled nothing of autumn. It was monumental absence, an obliterating thing. He often wished he could find solace in it, but he was inevitably distracted by whatever mechanism had ferried him into the dark.

This time: a Jedi Dreadnought called Reverent. A palace in the shape of a knife, regally white and flecked with gold. He couldn’t help but admire the pristine intricacies of its interior workings, though he knew all too well the cost of maintaining a vessel of such devastating size. It took people. It took planets. Lives and homes, reshaped in service to Empire.

The Reverent’s trappings were no less impressive. The Ronin’s knees pressed into a woven mat, and he faced a sliding lattice door. Outside, he heard voices shouting not with panic but exercise, as well as, if he was not mistaken, running water. Most strangely, that incorrigible scent—osmanthus, interwoven with other vegetal fragrances. The lord of this ship was an excessive sort.

Also a cautious one, though it might not have seemed so to the casual observer. The Ronin had been left conscious and unbound, and he had been permitted the dignity of retaining both weapons, though they had taken his pouch of kyber. It seemed a contradiction for the Jedi to allow him the transgression of his lightsaber, especially as it was the more dangerous of his possessions. They had also left him his wrist cuff, though it was dark and had remained so. He didn’t know what had become of B5-56.

In any case, a sane man in his position could hope for neither rescue nor self-liberation. The Ronin was acutely aware that at least one guard always knelt outside his door, and he sensed more in either direction down the hall. Their presences were consistently oppressive in one direction or another. One sharply white, the next defiantly black, each kind complemented by a nearby guard who was their polar opposite. Together, these guardians would have been trained to cultivate their aptitudes in order to directly counter the push, pull, and flow of another Force-wielder. A dubious skill on the battlefield, as it required total concentration and thereby left a Jedi inexcusably defenseless. Quite useful, however, when managing Force-sensitive prisoners.

Though three shifts had come and gone, the Ronin had not yet given his guards reason to act. He maintained stillness, as he had for the long hours since he returned to himself. He had by that point already been sequestered in this room. The lapse required thought.

It seems to me you haven’t thought in a while, let alone now, the voice said.

He inhaled slowly, as if he could summon her closer. She refused. Of course she did. She did not look on his infirmity with kindness.

To begin: How had he come to be here?

It had been a very long while since he so badly lost himself to the chronic disorder of his mind. He had dismissed every

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