“Perhaps. Did you confront the attackers?”
“On three occasions our sentinels arrived at the incursion before the invaders slipped away,” Joko said. “On two of those occasions the sentinels were attacked.”
“Were any injured or killed?”
“Eight were injured,” Joko said. “None was killed.”
“There is that, at least,” Thrawn said. “Let us hope this can be resolved before it reaches a stage that brings loss of life.” He finished his visual survey of the meetinghouse and returned his attention to Joko. “Let us now examine the other side of the blade. I am told members of the Afe clan have also crossed the border into the Hollenside Enclave.”
“To sit idly without giving response is to encourage further attacks,” Joko said, his snout flattening. “Yes, we have crossed the border. Yes, we have inflicted impairment equal to our suffering. But never have we attacked the humans on their own soil.”
“Did you not defend yourself against human guards?”
“We did,” Joko said, his snout rounding back again and the tips of his fur going slightly orange. “But we shot only to distract, and to drive away. We did not shoot to injure or kill.”
Which wasn’t what Mayor Benchel’s reports said, Eli remembered. According to him, several of the enclave’s hastily organized civilian guard force had been shot and wounded. And if Thrawn was right about Benchel not being part of the conspiracy, the mayor would have no reason to lie about that.
Unless he had himself been lied to by one of the others. In that case, his report could be meaningless.
Eli sighed to himself. Thrawn made it look so easy.
“I would like to see where the first of these incursions occurred,” Thrawn said. “Will you send a guide with us in our shuttle to that location?”
“There is no need for shuttle or guide,” Joko said, unwinding from his cross-legged seated position like hair tresses unbraiding. “We are already here. Will you accompany me?”
“Of course,” Thrawn assured him, standing up. Eli, caught by surprise, scrambled to his feet. “It is fortunate that the incursions happened so near the clan meetinghouse.”
“Fortune follows design,” Joko said, his snout widening. “I anticipated your request.” He spread his arms to encompass the entire structure. “The clan meetinghouse is, of course, mobile. Come; I will show you.”
—
“Here,” Joko said. He pauses at the edge of a field of stiff, desiccated grain stalks. “Here, when the grain was yet ripe and unharvested, is where humans first came onto Afe land.”
Thrawn gazed across the field, wondering what the plants had looked like in full bloom. As it was, there was little left in the stalks for him to see.
He looked back at the clan meetinghouse, a hundred meters behind them. Its shape and structure reinforced the patterns of words and pictures he’d seen on the interior wall.
Patterns and connections. Ultimately, that was what it came down to. Patterns and connections in nature; patterns and connections in created things; patterns and connections in warfare.
Patterns of the humans and human smugglers. Patterns of the Afes and Afe defense. Patterns of Nightswan.
What were the patterns here?
“Do airspeeders regularly cross this area?” he asked.
“Not regularly,” Joko said. “Sometimes a craft travels from the human enclave to the Twi’lek settlement.”
“Are there pictures of the ground from any of those flights?”
“None that I know of,” Joko said. He touches the skin beside his eyes. “We have seen the land from the height of the eyes.” He points upward. “We need not see it from the height of the clouds.”
“All information and points of view are useful,” Thrawn said. “Ensign Vanto, please calculate the most likely route.”
“No need,” Joko said. He pulled a small flat box from his waist sash and keyed it on.
A huge holomap of the area, vertical and twenty meters square, appeared ten meters in front of them. Joko adjusted the box, and the view widened out. “There are the two major cities for sky travel,” he said, pointing on the holomap. He keyed the box again, and the view zoomed in to where they were standing. “No likely path comes overhead where we now stand.”
“Yes, I see,” Thrawn said. He studied the holomap, then the cropland, then the holomap again. The overall crop field itself would be in clear view from an airspeeder, though this particular area would be at the edge of observation.
Limited isolation, offering limited anonymity. Perhaps something had been visible before the harvest that was not visible now. “Ensign, I will want a list of all who have traveled this route over the past year. Chief Joko, did any of the Afes note anything unusual about the crops from this field? Was any grain discarded due to disease or malformation?”
“Some plants die in all fields,” Joko said. “This field has a history of such damage. Still, it is mostly fertile, and water is abundant, so it continues to be planted.”
“Yes.” A group of stalks that were slightly shorter and thinner than the rest was visible, forming a corridor four meters wide that started at the edge of the field and traced a winding path toward the center. “Did the damage occur in this specific part of the field?”
“Yes.” Joko gazes at him, his upper body hunched over as if to bring his eyes closer to the Imperial’s level. “The stunted stalks are a sign of improper development. You have a keen eye, Commander Thrawn.”
“Does your map also include the locations of human attacks on Afe territory?”
Joko adjusted the box. The focus of the map widened again. Another touch on the controls, and a dozen pulsing red dots appeared. All were north of the field where the Imperials now stood. “The most recent are colored the darkest red.”
“Your counterattacks on the humans?”
Four blue dots appeared, approximately opposite the four northernmost red dots. “We are long-suffering,” Joko said. “But we finally had to take a stand.”
“Understandable.” Patterns; and this pattern was beginning to emerge. “You will be guarding some of your villages tonight. Where will your guards be stationed?”
Joko draws himself up to his full height. “Why do you ask?”
“I believe I can anticipate the human conspirators’ plan for tonight,” Thrawn said. “I wish to see your deployment so that I may adjust my own plans.”
Joko is silent for a few seconds, then touches the control. Three yellow spots appear on the map, one at the northernmost red spot, the other two farther north. “Their boldness takes them ever closer to our main cities,” he said. “We will guard these villages in anticipation. We will also hold guards in reserve to pursue them back to their lair and entrap them.”
“Yes.” The deployment fit the pattern that the meetinghouse artwork had indicated. It was a pattern the conspirators had also likely learned over the many years the two species had lived side by side. “I offer two suggestions. First: Do not hold guards for pursuit. Deploy them solely in protection of your villages.”
“You deny us the right of response?”
“I believe your attackers hope to lure you across the border so as to claim you invaded the enclave,” Thrawn said. “By remaining on your side, you will deny them that weapon.”
“Yet the evidence will demonstrate their attack came first,” Joko said. “We have no intent of causing injury. Our pursuit would be solely to identify the invaders.”
“Nevertheless, I still caution restraint.”
“For how long, Commander Thrawn?” Joko’s fur tips turn briefly orange. “How long would you have us cower before an enemy?”
“It will end tonight.”
Joko’s eyes flicked to Vanto, then to each of the five escorting stormtroopers, then back to Thrawn. “Tonight.”
“Tonight. In the meantime, I offer you my escort to deploy as you wish in defense of your villages. Be advised that their blasters will be set on stun. I will not kill anyone on either side.”