"I don't care if you sent a wreath and took care of his widow. Do you know where I can find the man who killed him?"

"Shall we step outside onto the balcony?" Fraig gestured and picked up his drink. "It's a sensitive matter to discuss in front of my guests."

"Suit yourself," said Fett, and decided instantly where he was prepared to be maneuvered. Step outside. Right. Mirta stood guard at the open doors,

but the Hamadryas bodyguard tried to move her out of the way.

He made the mistake of putting his hand on her back, and a little too low at that. She simply raised her clenched fist to shoulder height and ejected her gauntlet vibroblade.

"Touch me again, chakaar, and I'll ram this into your carotid artery."

"I haven't got one."

"Then I'll have to keep stabbing you until I find somewhere else that bleeds copiously."

Fraig intervened. "Serku, let's not upset the lady, shall we? Let her wait wherever she wishes."

Fraig was making a lot of mistakes tonight for a crime boss. It was just as well Fett always assumed the worst. Fraig might have thought that a balcony reduced Fett's options, but it didn't represent much of a problem for a man with a jet pack. Fraig didn't have one. He also lacked a fiber cord line.

This wouldn't take long.

Amateurs.

Fett had to fight an urge to explain to Fraig how to do it right.

Out on the balcony, Kuat City's lights shimmered through a veil of rushing water in the dusk. An overhang diverted the water a couple of meters from the face of the building.

Fett leaned one hand on the rail, feigning casual disinterest but actually testing the strength of the metal. He cast an eye over Fraig to estimate his weight. "Let me repeat that simple question. Tell me anything you know about the Mandalorian who whacked your predecessor."

"I had nothing to do with it. Cherit upset a lot of folks.

Occupational hazard."

"Question still stands. I'll bet your organization was keen to find out, too."

"We didn't know who he was. All we knew was that he had a grudge about a certain Twi'lek clan. We do business with Twi'leks in the entertainment industry."

"I'll bet." Fraig meant Twi'lek girls. "What land of grudge?"

"He didn't think we were treating them properly. We lost a couple of very popular entertainers thanks to him."

Fraig was lying scum. And the clone in Mandalorian armor was settling a score for some Twi'leks, but he wasn't a bounty hunter.

Another link, then: personal, not professional.

Time. He didn't have time for this.

"Seen him since?"

"No."

"Want to tell me who the Twi'leks were?"

"Why do you want this man so badly? It has to be something big for you to be hunting him." Fraig examined his manicured nails. "Or perhaps some of my associates regret Cherit's passing, so they've hired you to come after me."

"Not for hire right now." Fett could never understand why they didn't listen. They never heard what he said. He played it straight, and they always looked for a second meaning. "I want the Mando in one piece.

I need him to do something for me."

Fraig had missed his chance. Fett switched to the helmet corn-link and got

Mirta's attention, which was fixed on him—and the Hamadryas—anyway. "I'm just going to help our friend remember a few things."

Useful stuff, fibercord.

Fett shot out the line in a loop from his backpack and whipped it around Fraig, jammed the grappling hook between the bars, and shoved him over the railing. It took two seconds. Fraig screamed, clinging to the top rail, but a good hard whack on the knuckles with the butt of the blaster made the scumbag let go. Fraig plummeted and Fett braced for the inevitable thump into the rail when the rope ran out. It nearly winded him. Fraig bounced and twisted in the line's

strangling grip, still shrieking. Fett kept a few meters of line secured in reserve in the winch assembly.

Mirta was taking good care of the Hamadryas. She'd half closed the transparisteel doors on him, but the bodyguard wedged his body in the gap and tried to get a blaster shot through the opening. His arm was trapped.

Fett watched, impressed, as Mirta head-butted the guard a second time, shoved the vibroblade into his thigh, and forced him—shrieking in pain, nice touch—back through the doors so that they crashed shut. Then she fired a few rounds into the controls.

"Make it quick, Ba'buir?" She flexed her shoulders as if easing torn neck muscles. "The doors might be blasterproof, but they'll get them open sooner or later."

Fett peered over the side. Fraig was twisting helplessly like a devee hooked on a fishing line, making gasping sounds. The line was tight around his waist and chest. He was dangling fifteen meters below the rail.

"Don't struggle, and think calm thoughts," Fett called. "It helps you remember. And it'll stop you from slipping out of the loop."

"You're crazy—I'll have your throat cut for this—"

"You're on the end of a line. I'm on solid ground. Think about it."

"You're a dead man."

"Perceptive to the last. Give me names, vermin."

"I tell you I didn't pay the Mando. I'm glad he whacked Cherit, but I never paid him to do it—"

"Try again."

Fraig's voice was almost drowned out by the roar of the waterfall behind him. "The Twi'leks were from some family called Himar."

"Good start." Fett paid out another meter of line with a jolt.

Fraig shrieked as he slipped farther toward the permacrete, stone, and raging water a hundred meters below. "Is that helping? Memory often needs a trigger."

Himar. Any Mando who pitched in hard to play the hero for a couple of dancers would be known in the Twi'lek community. It didn't happen that often; nobody else cared what happened to Twi'lek girls. Fett had his lead. He'd have a contact somewhere—and if he didn't, Beviin would.

Beviin wouldn't press him to find out why.

"Anything else you want to get off your chest?"

"I don't know the guy, Fett. But I know you're going to regret this."

Fett could hear the dull rhythmic thuds of Fraig's bodyguards trying to smash the doors apart. "If I find you've given me a load of garbage, I'll be back to finish the job."

He braced his boot on the bottom rail and began winching in the gangster. Mirta stood next to him with her blaster trained on the doors.

"You're going soft. Why are you reeling him back in?"

"I want the fibercord back. It's my favorite Ultra-fine."

"When you get him on the balcony, I'll tranquilize him . . ."

"Then back to Slave I. Scenic route."

"You're lucky we've got jets."

"I wouldn't have come up here if I hadn't." Fett felt the sweat breaking out and running down his spine. This would have been an easier task a few years ago. "And I wouldn't have gone much above thirty floors anyway."

"Why?"

"Hundred-meter line. In case I had to rappel down."

Fraig's face was two meters away now. He'd stopped yelling and settled for labored breathing.

"I haven't got a hundred-meter line," Mirta said.

"Lucky you've got jets, then." He heaved Fraig over the rail in a tangled heap, and Mirta delivered a roundhouse punch that laid the man out. If that was her tranquilizer treatment, she was a born medic. "Time to go."

Mirta shot off at an awkward angle and crashed through the sheet of water ahead of him; there was no force field up here to part the falls.