Star Wars - The Adventures of Alex Winger 8 - Betrayal by Knight by Patricia A. Jackson & Charlene Newcomb

Author:Patricia A. Jackson & Charlene Newcomb [Jackson, Patricia A. & Newcomb, Charlene]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 1997-02-28T22:19:16+00:00

Weaponless and in a rage, Alex sprang at Brandl, swinging wide with a punch. As the Jedi agilely dodged her, the abrupt hiss of a lightsaber broke the silence. The blade cut a wide swath in the darkness as it arced through the still air and slashed through Alex’s jacket down to the skin. She cried out in pain, cradling her wounded arm.

“l don’t know why you’re so upset,” Brandl taunted. “With Winger dead, you’ll be free. Free to join your friends in the resistance.”

Alex stared wide-eyed at him, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks.

He laughed at her startled reaction. “Did you think I didn’t know. About you and your involvement with the resistance movement? It’s the one reason you’re still alive.”

The presence of the dark side was so potent in him that it stifled Alex. “How could you possibly know?”

Brandl laughed again outright, his face assuming a boyish charm that easily concealed the darkness of his being. “Your thoughts and emotions are so easily read, Alexandra. I’m surprised Skywalker lets you walk around broadcasting.” His eyes widened, mocking the astonishment in her eyes. “Yes, I do know about the great Master Skywalker and your peculiar affection for him.”

Enraged by his insinuation, Alex hurried to her feet. “You don’t know anything! About me or the resistance!”

“Oh, but I do know,” he whispered with rehearsed sincerity. “I know about the lost little girl, scared and alone, buried beneath the burning rubble of her home — orphaned and stranded on some distant, smothered world.” Brandl’s laughter echoed against the trees. “It reads like some commonplace tragedy I once wrote when I was a child.” His apathy was chilling. “It’s no wonder they found you.”

“They?” Alex asked, narrowing her eyes.

“My father, Lord Adalric Cessius Brandl and the Imperial armada that destroyed Janara III. My father was one of the Emperor’s High Inquisitors — the Jedi executioners who were more ruthless observers of His Imperial Will. He must have been looking for you and others like you.” Brandl sat down on a nearby stump. “A thousand or more lives to find one little girl and a handful of Jedi hopefuls.”

He sniffed disdainfully, catching his breath as he chuckled. “He would surely laugh were he here with us now. He would. I know he would —”

The abrupt thunder of an explosion cut him off. Behind them, a blinding, white light flashed, momentarily displacing the night as flames and molten debris shot almost 100 meters into the air.

Brandl turned away from the blast and stared at Alex, studying her expression. With a sinister grin still etched across his handsome face, he whispered. “And here, some fifteen years later, history repeats itself.”

“Father!” Wincing as the painful gash in her arm pinched and pulled at the tender skin, Alex bolted toward the speeder bikes. She was mounted and spinning the steering bar as the repulsor engines ignited, propelling her back onto the forest path. She followed the dying embers of the blast and a trail of acrid smoke that poured from the site.

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