'I know,' Leia said, searching the sky for the shuttles' running lights and trying to remember everything she could about life-form identification algorithms. Heart rate was one of the parameters, she knew, as were ambient atmosphere, respiratory byproducts, and molecule-chain EM
polarization effects. But the chief long-range parameter was-'We need a heat source,' she told Khabarakh. 'As big a one as possible.'
'The bake house,' the Noghri said, pointing to a windowless building three down from where they stood. At its back was a squat chimney from which wisps of smoke could be seen curling upward in the backwash of light from the surrounding structures.
'Sounds like our best chance,' Leia agreed. 'Khabarakh, you hide Threepio Chewie, come with me.'
The Noghri were waiting for them as they stepped from the shuttle: three females standing side by side, with two children acting as honor wardens by the doors of the clan dukha building. Thrawn glanced at the group, threw an evaluating sweep around the area, and then turned to Pellaeon. 'Wait here until the tech team arrives, Captain,' he ordered Pellaeon quietly. 'Get them started on a check of the communications and countermeasures equipment in the ship over there. Then join me inside.'
'Yes, sir.'
Thrawn turned to Ir'kbaim. 'Dynast,' he invited, gesturing at the waiting Noghri. The dynast bowed and strode toward them. Thrawn threw a glance at Rukh, who'd taken Ir'khaim's former position at the Grand Admiral's side, and together they followed. There was the usual welcoming ritual, and then the females led the way into the dukha.
The shuttle from the Chimaera was only a couple of minutes behind them. Pellaeon briefed the tech team and got them busy, then crossed to the dukha and went in.
He'd expected that the maitrakh would have managed to round up perhaps a handful of her people for this impromptu late-evening visit by their glorious lord and master. To his surprise, he found that the old girl had in fact turned out half the village. There was a double row of them, children as well as adults, lining the dukha walls from the huge genealogy wall chart back to the double doors and around again to the meditation booth opposite the chart. Thrawn was seated in the clan High Seat two thirds of the way to the back of the room with Ir'khaim standing again at his side. The three females who'd met the shuttle stood facing them with a second tier of elders another pace back. Standing with the females, his steelgray skin a marked contrast to their older, darker gray, was a young Noghri male.
Pellaeon had, apparently, missed nothing more important than a smattering of the nonsense ritual the Noghri never seemed to get enough of. As he moved past the silent lines of aliens to stand at Thrawn's other side, the young male stepped forward and knelt before the High Seat. 'I greet you, my lord,' he mewed gravely, spreading his arms out to his sides. 'You honor my family and the clan Kihm'bar with your presence here.'
'You may rise,' Thrawn told him. 'You are Khabarakh, clan Kihm'bar?'
'I am, my lord.'
'You were once a member of the Imperial Noghri commando team twenty-two,' Thrawn said. 'A team that ceased to exist on the planet Kashyyyk. Tell me what happened.'
Khabarakh might have twitched. Pellaeon couldn't tell for sure. 'I filed a report, my lord, immediately upon leaving that world.'
'Yes, I read the report,' Thrawn told him coolly. 'Read it very carefully, and noted the questions it left unanswered. Such as how and why you survived when all others in your team were killed. And how it was you were able to escape when the entire planet had been alerted to your presence. And why you did not return immediately to either Honoghr or one of our other bases after your failure.'
This time there was definitely a twitch. Possibly a reaction to the word failure. 'I was left unconscious by the Wookiees during the first attack,' Khabarakh said. 'I awakened alone and made my way back to the ship. Once there, I deduced what had happened to the rest of the team from official information sources. I suspect they simply were unprepared for the speed and stealth of my ship when I made my escape. As to my whereabouts afterward, my lord-' He hesitated. 'I transmitted my report, and then left for a time to be alone.'
'Why?'
'To think, my lord, and to meditate.'
'Wouldn't Honoghr have been a more suitable place for such meditation?' Thrawn asked, waving a hand around the dukha.
'I had much to think about. My lord.'
For a moment Thrawn eyed him thoughtfully. 'You were slow to respond when the request for a recognition signal came from the surface,' he said.
'You then refused to land at the Nystao port facilities.'
