way. Please know that I will always love you, and whatever happens you will always be my daughter.'
I am Caleb's daughter, she thought to herself, still idly flipping through the hangers of her wardrobe. I am strong, just like my father.
She finally selected a pair of dark pants and a blue top, emblazoned with the insignia of the Doan royal family:a gift from her husband. She missed him, too, though it was different than it was with her father. Caleb had sent her away, but Gerran had been taken from her by the rebels.
As she dressed, Serra tried not to think of her crown prince. The pain was too sharp, his assassination too recent. The miners responsible for the attack were still out there:but not for much longer, she hoped.
A soft knock at the door interrupted her train of thought.
'Come in,' she called out, knowing only one person could be at the door of her private chambers this early in the morning.
Her personal bodyguard, Lucia, entered the room. At first glance the soldier was unremarkable: a fit, dark- skinned woman in her early forties with short, curly black hair. But beneath the fabric of her Royal Guard uniform it was possible to catch glimpses of hard, well-defined muscles, and there was an intensity in her eyes that warned she was not someone to be taken lightly.
Serra knew that Lucia had fought during the New Sith Wars twenty years ago. A sniper in the famed Gloom Walkers unit, she had actually served on the side of the Brotherhood of Darkness, the army that fought against the Republic. But as Caleb had explained to his daughter on many occasions, the soldiers who served in the conflict were far different from their Sith Masters.
The Sith and Jedi were fighting an eternal war over philosophical ideals, a war her father had wanted no part of. For the average soldiers who made up the bulk of the armies, however, the war was about something else. Those who rallied to the Sith cause-men and women like Lucia-did so out of the belief that the Republic had turned its back on them. Disenfranchised by the Galactic Senate, they had fought a war to free themselves from what they saw as the tyrannical rule of the Republic.
They were ordinary people who became victims of forces beyond their control; expendable pawns to be slaughtered in battles waged by those who believed themselves to be great and powerful.
'How did you sleep?' Lucia asked, stepping into the room and shutting the door behind her to ensure their privacy.
'Not well,' Serra admitted.
There was no point in lying to the woman who had been her near-constant companion for the past seven years. Lucia would see right through it.
'The nightmares again?'
The princess nodded, but didn't say any more. She had never revealed the content of her nightmares-or her true identity-to Lucia, and the older woman respected her enough not to ask about it. They both had dark times in their past that they preferred not to talk about; it was one of the things that had drawn them together.
'The king wishes to speak with you,' Lucia informed her.
For the king to send for her so early, it had to be important news.
'What does he want?'
'I think it has something to do with the terrorists who killed your husband,' her bodyguard replied, picking up a delicate black veil from its stand in the corner of the room.
Serra's heart jumped, and her fingers fumbled over the last button on her top. Then she regained control of her emotions, and stood perfectly still as the older woman placed the veil atop her head. According to Doan custom, Serra was required to wear the mourning shroud for a full year following her husband's death:or until her beloved was avenged.
Lucia moved with practiced precision, quickly tying up Serra's long black hair and pinning it in place under the veil. The soldier was only average height-slightly shorter than her mistress-so Serra bent slightly to accommodate her.
'You're a princess,' Lucia chided her. 'Stand up straight.'
Serra couldn't help but smile. Over the past seven years, Lucia had become like the mother she'd never had- assuming her mother had served as a sniper with the fabled Gloom Walkers during the Sith Wars.
Lucia finished adjusting the veil and stepped back to give her charge one final inspection.
'Stunning, as always,' she pronounced.
Escorted by her bodyguard, Serra made her way through the palace to the throne room, where the king was waiting for them.
As they marched down the castle halls, Lucia fell into her customary position, one step behind and to the left of the princess. Because most people were right-handed, being on Serra's left side gave her the best chance to interpose her own body between a blade or blaster fired by a would-be assassin approaching from head-on. Not that there was much chance of anyone attempting anything here in the walls of the Royal Manse, but Lucia was always ready and willing to give her life for the sake of her charge.
With the collapse of the Brotherhood of Darkness two decades ago, Lucia-like many of her comrades who had served in the Sith armies-had become a prisoner of war. For six months she had been incarcerated on a work planet, welding and repairing ships until the Senate granted a universal pardon to all those who had served in the rank and file of the Brotherhood's armies.
Over the next thirteen years Lucia had worked as a hired bodyguard, a freelance mercenary, and finally a bounty hunter. That was how she had first met Serra:and how she had earned the long, angry scar that ran from her navel all the way up to her rib cage.
She had been tracking down Salto Zendar, one of four Meerian brothers who had come up with the shortsighted plan to kidnap a high-ranking Muun official from the InterGalactic Banking Clan head office and hold him for ransom. The miserably ill-fated venture had resulted in two of the brothers being killed by security forces when they tried to break into the IBC offices on Muunilinst. A third was captured alive while the fourth-Salto-managed to escape despite being critically wounded by security forces.
The reward put out for his capture by the IBC was big enough to attract bounty hunters from as far away as the Mid Rim, and Lucia had been no exception. Using contacts from her days in the Gloom Walkers, she tracked Salto to a hospital on the nearby world of Bandomeer where he was being treated for his wounds.
However, when Lucia tried to take him into custody, a young human working at the hospital as a healer had stepped between her and her quarry. Despite the arsenal of weapons on Lucia's back, the tall, dark-haired woman had refused to back down, claiming she wouldn't let the patient be moved while he was still in critical condition.
The healer had shown no fear, even when Lucia had drawn her blaster and ordered her to step aside. She had simply shook her head and held her ground.
It might have ended right there; Lucia wasn't willing to shoot an innocent woman just to collect the price on Salto's head. Unfortunately, she wasn't the only bounty hunter at the hospital that day: Salto had been as bad at covering his tracks as he was at kidnapping.
While she and Serra were locked in their confrontation, a Twi'lek had burst into the room, blasters drawn. Lucia turned just in time to get shot point-blank in the stomach, her weapon falling from her hand as she slumped to the floor.
When Serra tried to stop the Twi'lek from taking Salto, he had slammed the butt of his pistol against the side of her skull, knocking her aside then yanking Salto out of bed and dragging the moaning prisoner away.
Ignoring the hole in her gut, Lucia crawled after them. She saw the Twi'lek get halfway down the hall before he was shot in the back by another bounty hunter looking to claim the reward. And then she blacked out.
Official reports put the number of bounty hunters at the hospital that day at somewhere between six and ten. Unlike Lucia, most of them had no qualms about killing innocent civilians-or one another-to claim their prize. By the time the bloodbath was over Salto was dead, along with two other patients, one member of the hospital nursing staff, three security guards, and four bounty hunters.
The only reason Lucia's name wasn't on the list of casualties was because of Serra. The healer had dragged her back into the room and performed emergency surgery while the gun battle raged outside. She managed to save
