Free Lords of the Sith by Paul S. Kemp Page A

warily.
    “What’s your name?” Isval asked, standing over the officer.
    The girl blinked and said nothing.
    “I’m not going to hurt
you
,” Isval said.
    The officer moaned. His hand twitched. Isval stepped on it, felt a crunch, and the officer moaned again.
    “Ryiin,” the girl said softly. Her eyes darted between Isval and the officer. “What are you…are you robbing us?”
    “You and this”—she kicked the officer—“aren’t an ‘us,’ no matter what he told you.”
    “I don’t…what?”
    “Name your clan,” Isval said.
    Ryiin looked away in shame.
    “You don’t have one,” Isval said, nodding. She said what she’d said many times before. “Not anymore. Listen to me, Ryiin. I used to stand where you’re standing. I spent three years in the Hole before I escaped.”
    There was no hope in Ryiin’s eyes. “Escape? There’s no escape from this.”
    “There is if you want there to be.”
    Ryiin looked up. “How?”
    “Come with me. I’ll take you out of here. I have a place you can stay. Start again. Away from…this. I know, I know. You don’t trust me. Why would you? But my offer is genuine.”
    Ryiin backed up a step, as if Isval had offered to harm her rather than help. Isval was not surprised. Hope and trust didn’t appear much among the workers in the Octagon. “I can’t.”
    “You can. You should. Look at me. Look. I’ll help you.”
    She was shaking her head. “They’ll come after me.”
    Isval didn’t lie. “They might. But they probably won’t. They don’t even know your full name. And once you’re gone, you’re gone. And if you want to, you can stay gone.”
    “I…can’t.”
    The officer groaned. Isval drew her vibroblade.
    “What are you going to do?” Ryiin asked, horrified.
    “What should be done to all of them,” Isval answered, and knelt down, blade bare.
    “Don’t, don’t!” Ryiin said. She hurried forward and knelt beside Isval, her eyes pleading. She placed her fingers on Isval’s wrist. “Don’t, all right? I’ll go with you, but don’t do this.”
    “I don’t want you to come with me to save him,” Isval snapped. “I want you to come with me to save you. What’s he to you?”
    Ryiin glanced at the officer, back at Isval. “He’s nothing, but…he didn’t do anything bad to me.”
    “He would have,” Isval snapped. “And he’s a soldier of the Empire. He’s done something bad to all of us.”
    “I know that,” Ryiin said. “But don’t. All right? Just don’t. I’ll come with you. I want to. I’m just…afraid.”
    Voices from the walkway outside their nook froze them both into silence, but the sounds soon passed.
    “This one owes you his life then,” Isval said. She stood and kickedthe officer in the head. He didn’t even groan, just went limp. “Come on. You can’t go back to get anything.”
    “There’s nothing for me to go get.”
    Isval took Ryiin by the hand and walked her out of the pit, past the smoke and leers and spice and vice, ascending, ascending, and by the time she reached the top she felt as light as she had in months. The feeling wouldn’t last, she knew, but she’d enjoy it while it did. She wondered what Cham would think of her if he knew what she did, what she had to do. She thought he wouldn’t understand. Cham preached principle, but only those who’d never descended to Level One of the Octagon thought in terms of principle. Isval knew better; maybe Ryiin knew better. The real world didn’t well accommodate principles.
    When they reached the top of the Octagon, sweaty and out of breath, they fell in with the crowd there. Ryiin looked about wide-eyed, breathed deep the night’s stink.
    “How long’s it been?” Isval asked.
    “Weeks since I left the Hole,” Ryiin answered.
    “You still good?” Isval asked. This was the point when previous girls had turned back. Rarely, but it sometimes happened.
    “I’m good,” Ryiin said.
    “Never go back,” Isval said, and Ryiin nodded. “Now