Auben turned to face Anakin and Ferus, her hands on her hips. "So. Who are you really?" Her voice echoed against the walls.

"We told you," Anakin said. "We're stranded."

"I think you are Jedi," Auben said. "I've never seen a Jedi, but I've heard of them." She waited, but Ferus and Anakin did not speak. She shrugged. "Fine. Jedi credits are as good as anyone else's, I guess. If you wait a little while, the army will stop tracking and you can leave. They won't come inside the monastery."

"Do you live here alone?" Ferus asked.

Auben leaned toward the light as though it would give heat as well as illumination. "I live many places. But yes, I'm alone here. Sometimes I get spooked. I hear things… but it's just this old place."

"Maybe we should look around for you," Ferus said. "Make sure you're safe."

"I don't need any help," Auben said. "I have my friends to help me."

She patted her belt, where her two blaster pistols were. "So, tell me. Are you really looking for a man and woman? And don't tell me they're your parents."

"Yes, we're looking for a couple," Ferus admitted.

"Do you think you can help us?" Anakin asked.

Auben crossed her arms. "If you're Jedi, you can make it worth my while, right? I hear the Jedi control a vast fortune."

"Who says that?" Ferus asked sharply.

She shrugged. "It's just what they say."

"Well, it's not true," Anakin said. "But we can make it worth your while, anyway. Do you know something?"

Auben was in the middle of her usual evasive shrug when an explosive blast rocked the walls. Sand spilled from the ceiling. Auben was almost knocked to the floor. Anakin and Ferus rose.

Behind the wall, Obi-Wan and the Jedi team ducked with the explosion, keeping their balance with difficulty.

Suddenly they heard the sound of pounding footsteps and the unmistakable clack clack of spider droids snapping into attack position.

Auben had been wrong. The Commerce Guild army had followed them.

Inside the chamber, Auben jumped up, blasters already gripped in her hands. "They're coming through the main chamber. There's only one other way out. Follow me."

Obi-Wan waited until he saw Auben kick open a small opening in the wall. He leaned over to Tru and Darra. "Stay with Anakin and Ferus, whatever happens. We'll take care of the droids and come find you."

Darra and Tru nodded. Quickly, they slipped into the now empty chamber and followed the others.

Obi-Wan, Siri, and Soara charged back to the main chamber, prepared to meet an army.

Chapter Ten

Anakin wasn't about to let Auben out of his sight. He had a feeling she was the key to finding Granta Omega. She knew so much about Dreshdae, and there was something in her eyes when they told her they were looking for a couple. His instincts told him she knew something.

Unfortunately, Ferus felt it, too.

Anakin could feel Ferus behind him every step of the way. They were moving close together in the narrow passage, Ferus's breath on his neck.

As Auben pushed forward, he realized that they were now moving parallel to the great hall. Despite the thick blocks of stone, he could hear the clatter of droids and the steady, fast ping of blaster fire.

Auben moved more quickly as the noise of the blaster fire faded, no longer afraid of being detected. The passageway led downward in a gradual slope. The stones were damp and slippery.

"Where are we going?" Ferus asked.

"Just follow me," Auben snapped. "And hurry!"

The passageway made a sudden turn, and they came to a partially demolished wall. Auben stepped over the stones and jumped into a chamber a little larger than the one they left.

"There's a whole system of passageways that were once hidden," she explained. "I guess the big monks used to spy on the rest."

That sounded like standard Sith procedure to Anakin. Trust was not part of Sith doctrine. It seemed to Anakin to be a bleak way to live.

Auben led them down a bigger hallway. They went steadily downward, deeper and deeper into the complex. The walls began to weep with moisture.

Anakin guessed they were now in the part of the monastery buried in the mountain.

They went through so many twists and turns that Anakin wondered if they'd have to use tracking devices to get out again. Even with his Jedi memory skills, he was beginning to feel disoriented.

At last, Auben paused. "What I'm about to show you isn't visible from above." She pushed open a rotted door.

Anakin followed. An ancient ship stood in the middle of a large space.

He had never seen anything like it. Crude and clunky, it must have been state-of-the-art at one time. The afterburner tanks were huge.

"This was probably from before the sublight engine was perfected,"

Anakin said, half to himself. Under normal circumstances, he would love to investigate the ancient technology of the ship.

Around it, various decaying parts of what looked like droids were littered, models so old he couldn't identify them. He saw sheets and shards of durasteel and other metals on the floor and realized they had once been servodrivers, valves, and pumps, the hoses long decayed.

"It's a service bay," he said. "We must be near a landing hangar."

"You got it," Auben said. "Look."

She led them through the open arch, into the darkness. Anakin stepped out and released a breath. The hangar was so vast, it ended in darkness.

Service bay after service bay ran down each side of the hangar, waiting to repair the ships that no longer arrived. Hulking wrecks of ships still littered the floor, bits of metal that had once been droids, decayed tanks.

Huge statues of terrifying creatures from many worlds marched on either side down the hangar. The statues had crumbled and cracked over the years.

Some were headless, and the huge heads had fallen and crumbled into blocks of stone.

There was a smell of rust and rot, and the air seemed full of something thick, something like memory. Here the Sith had sent off their attack ships. Here their blood lust had pooled into technology and aggression. Here they had thought themselves invincible. Here disaster had overtaken them, their vengeance ending in defeat as their greed tore their order apart.