A Crash of Fate Page 16

  Izzy looked down at the bird in her lap, using her jacket as a nest. When she looked in the mirror she liked to think that she resembled her father more, but everyone saw what they wanted to see when it came to their parents.

  “It doesn’t sound like her,” Izzy said. “I never got any candy. Unless I stole it.”

  “Do you think that we’re supposed to understand our parents?” he asked, taking his eyes off the road to look at her.

  “I think we’re supposed to at least know who they are.” She hated that Oga had deepened that. She hated that it bothered her so much, because all she kept thinking was that if her mother had made different decisions, they could have had a normal life instead of jumping around more than a gorg in the middle of summer. Maybe she needed sleep to untangle her thoughts.

  They crested a small green hill, and a quick memory came surging back to her. Running through golden fields of wheat. Laughing at the top of her lungs. She’d been there with her dad once. He didn’t take her to work often, but on that particular day, her mother had been—away.

  “I remember this,” she said as Jules powered down the speeder. Up ahead were rows of crops, silos, and a water tower. “This is a grain farm. Is it bigger than before?”

  “Kat’s very proud of her operation. Business is booming lately. I mean, I’ve never tried the corn or grains from anywhere else, but I don’t have to.”

  “She could make a fortune if she sold it to big farms.”

  Jules widened his eyes. “Don’t mention big farms around here. She’s gotten offers from all sorts of corporations. She’s too proud.”

  “I mean, you can be proud and also rich.”

  Jules shook his head, but he was grinning at her as they got closer to the farm. Izzy could see where they’d recently expanded, adding more white storage barns. Two water towers flanked the fields in the distance. There was a small lot for speeders, but there weren’t many parked there despite the number of bodies congregated at long community tables. Jules left his speeder at an angle and shouldered Dok’s parcel.

  “Time for you to go,” Izzy said to the loralora bird.

  “I don’t think Lucky’s going anywhere,” Jules reminded her.

  But the bird took off on great wings. She swooped around in a large arc before landing on Izzy’s shoulder, wrapping that thick reptilian tail around Izzy’s arm again. Jules looked ready to speak, but she held up a finger to silence him.

  As they approached, Izzy noticed that the farmers were all kinds of species, some Izzy had never encountered before. Izzy had once thought of herself as cultured enough to have seen it all. Over the past day she had realized that she’d been pretentious. She had a lot to learn. She was only eighteen, after all.

  A group of Twi’lek males with pale green skin and dark brown eyes were playing a game of cards. As they got closer, Izzy could see they weren’t gambling with credits or spira but with everyday items—buttons, a couple of metal bolts, screws, pins, anything that seemed unusable until you needed to find one in a pinch. That seemed to keep everything friendly, though as one of the smaller Twi’lek males showed his cards, the others slammed the surface of the table and everything rattled. Izzy jumped at the noise, but in the next moment they were all laughing uproariously.

  The next couple of tables were occupied by some younger humans and Sullustans, and a being with a long neck and wide eyes that Izzy had no name for. They were clustered together, watching a stream on the holonet. When one of the girls looked up and saw Jules, she perked up like a flower for the sun. Her skin was a shade darker than Izzy’s, and her two braids made her look young.

  “Jules!” she called out, then flicked her gaze down to the table. The rind of a fruit was coiled in front of her.

  “Hey, Shari,” he said warmly. “How’s the day?”

  Shari sat up straighter, running her fingers down the bottom of a braid. Her face was round and there was a tiny scar on her cheek. That kind of clean cut had to have been made with a very sharp blade. It looked like it was done on purpose. She wondered how the girl wound up there.

  One rock is as good as the next. Her mother’s words rebounded in her thoughts. But was that true? If one was as good as the next, why were some planets the kind where you could make a home and others were the kind where her parents didn’t even allow her to step off the ship? Jules had said he always found a reason to stay on Batuu. She should ask him what those reasons were. Maybe then she’d have a better sense of where she could belong.

  “It goes,” Shari answered. “Surprised to see you here today. Did you change your mind about quitting?”

  Shari, as well as the other farm kids, kept turning their eyes to Izzy. They looked at everything from the cuffs of her leggings to her windblown mess of a ponytail. She wasn’t used to so many people staring at her, and she felt self-conscious. She let her hair down, allowing her scalp to breathe as the strands tumbled loose.

  “Who are you?” someone with a squeaky voice asked her. “Is that a monkey-lizard? My gran won’t let me get one.”

  “This is Lucky,” Jules said, rubbing the bird between her eyes. “She’s a loralora.”

  Izzy looked at the small Nautolan child who’d asked the question. She had large brown eyes and tentacles for hair. Her skin was green with gold freckles, and her plain beige dress was adorned with fabric wildflowers.

  “I’m Izzy. Who are you?” she replied.

  “Ksana!” she yelled, and reached up to try to grab the bird’s tail. The loralora flapped her wings and flew to the taller, safer perch of Jules’s shoulder.

  Jules laughed and said, “Hey, kid. I haven’t seen you since you drank all my milk this morning.”

  The little girl giggled, and it reminded Izzy of a running brook. “Are you Julen’s girlfriend?”

  The other kids snickered, and Izzy wondered why her first reaction was to look at Jules’s face. All she had to do was say that they were working together, that she was a girl and also his friend. But over the course of the day, her eyes had kept straying to his lips and his hair. The whole thing felt so complicated that she decided not to answer at all.

  “Julen has a girlfriend?” someone said behind them. “Since when?”

  “I’m not—” Izzy stopped when she turned and saw a face that was so much like Jules’s she almost froze.

  “Belen,” Jules said nervously. “Overtime?”

  “Did I hear right? Is this Izal Garsea?” she asked. Belen Rakab was almost as tall as her brother. The woman’s age—nearly thirteen standard years older than Jules—and the hard work she put in showed in the crinkles around her eyes. Izzy had always associated those wrinkles with people who enjoyed life and smiled a lot. Her father had lines around his eyes, but her mother? She’d looked young, almost petrified in time.

  Izzy went to shake Belen’s hand, but the older Rakab sibling pulled her into a warm embrace.

  “Please, please don’t tell me that my brother has roped you into one of his wild schemes.”

  “I’m offended, Sister,” Jules said. “Izzy’s visiting and we’re only catching up.”

  Julen Rakab was a terrible liar. Izzy almost wanted to laugh at all his tells. His eyes shifted from side to side, and his normally deep voice escalated in pitch when he said her name. He was too pure for this world, for any world probably. He scratched the back of his head to boot.

  Belen’s gaze cut to the bird, then Izzy, who simply shrugged. The look they shared held an understanding that there was something more, but the woman would not pry—yet.

  “Right,” Belen said, her tone underscoring that she knew her baby brother better than he knew himself. “Well, I’m working overtime today. A couple of the new hires took off this morning.”

  “That seems to be going around,” Izzy said.

  “Are you staying?” Shari asked Jules. “There’s plenty of topato stew left over.”

  Jules rubbed a hand over the muscles of his abdomen. “If that’s all right.”

  The
y had until the suns set, so Izzy saw no reason why not.

  “I’ll be right back,” Jules said, leaving her at a table where the farm kids were congregated. Lucky flew down beside her, pecking at the small insects that crawled between wooden slats.

  Izzy listened in, and found out that Shari was thirteen, as were the others, except for the Twi’lek boy who was sixteen and in charge of their little group. They were entrusted with harvesting the rows of the purple Surabat grain, which would be sweeter than the average one.

  “I have the record for speed,” a Sullustan girl said. The half-circle jowls of her face split wider as she beamed with pride.

  “What do you do, Izzy?” a young Gungan asked. His accent was the same as the other kids’.

  She leaned forward and drummed her fingers on the table. “I’m in between jobs.”

  “Then how did you get here?” the Sullustan girl asked.

  “My ship. It’s called the Meridian.”

  They all gasped. “You have your own ship?”

  “You could work here,” the Gungan said. “Kat’s always making room for people and her farm is small, but Da says it’s going to be the biggest season yet.”

  “Yes, Izzy!” Shari said. “Stay.”

  There was something starry in their eyes. They were so—innocent and hopeful. It dug deep into Izzy like a bruise. When was the last time she’d felt that way? I always knew you were a little bit ruthless.

  “Are you daft?” the Twi’lek boy said. “Why stay here when she could go literally anywhere in the galaxy?”

  “This is our home,” Shari said, confused.

  “Maybe for you,” the Twi’lek said. “Your grandparents needed somewhere to hide after the Clone Wars.”

  That made Shari turn red. “Says you—”

  Lucky squawked and flapped her wings. Izzy saw the argument was ready to turn ugly. Unlike in a cantina, though, she didn’t need to worry about a bunch of kids shooting the place up. She was the only one there with a blaster, after all.

  “I already used to live here,” Izzy told them. Their shock was enough to settle them for the time being. “My ship has been my home for so long. It’s the only thing I have left of my parents. But it’s good to know that if I did stay, I’d have a friend. Thank you, Shari.”

  That seemed to make the younger girl smile again, just in time for the Rakab siblings to return with food. Lucky took off chasing after field mice. They ate, and Izzy told them a story about the Meridian running out of fuel and being dead in space. If it hadn’t been for the Frinn Mak Traveling Circus heading to Cuyacan, she might have floated until she ran out of supplies. Belen was mortified, but the younger kids (and Jules) were amused.

  As the day grew cooler, Izzy volunteered to fill some canteens for those working overtime. She walked to the well near the water tower with the Twi’lek boy named Jac Lodain.

  “I don’t think you’re between jobs at all,” Jac told her as they trudged in the sun. He had the smirk of a kid who thought he knew it all. It reminded her of Damar for a moment.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’ve heard the whispers. There’s Resistance here.”

  “You’ve got me all wrong, kid,” she said, laughing. “But you’re right about one thing. I’m not here between jobs. Or rather, a smuggler is always between jobs.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Well,” she said coolly, “even when you’re doing one job, you’re trying to figure out how to find the next one. So, you see, technically, you’re always between jobs.”

  He seemed to like that. She’d been around enough Twi’leks to know their lekku were an extension of their emotions, and according to his, he was pleased as a Hutt counting credits. That kind of smugness was dangerous. As they filled the canteens, she realized he wanted someone to listen to him, to see him.

  “Well, my mom said she heard about them.” The boy looked over his shoulder. He was trying to impress her, and she was going to let him. “She said she’s seen a couple out in the old ruins. But my da warned her to be quiet. Especially if these bucketheads are still here.”

  “Your dad’s right,” she told him.

  They made their way back to the long break tables. Only a handful of people remained.

  Jac shook his head. “My dad and my aunt fought against the Empire. But she died. Da lost his arm. My parents brought us here. I want to be brave like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Brave enough to leave. To fight for something.”

  She looked at him. He had energy to burn. She thought that the galaxy was so big, there would be someone out there to give him what he was looking for—a cause. Just like the people they’d seen in the Outpost before the stormtroopers put on their display.

  “Fight for your family,” she said. She could not tell him what to believe in, but that was one thing she was sure of. “The ones who are blood and the ones who choose you.”

  He nodded in agreement.

  “Wait,” he said, “what family did you choose?”

  “I still haven’t,” she said.

  An alarm sounded. Izzy was about to stand and react out of worry, but the Twi’lek said, “That’s the end of the day for me and the overtime bell for the others. See you around, Izzy.”

  She slapped the hand he held out as he flashed that smirk again. She decided it was less like Damar’s—kinder. “You could always choose us, you know?”

  Izzy sat alone at a table and told herself that she shouldn’t get comfortable. This sort of camaraderie wasn’t real. It was liked platonic infatuation. Sometimes people like each other in the beginning, but then something went wrong. You loathe being alone. She hated to admit it, but Damar had been right.

  “You seem to have made quite the impression on them,” Belen said, coming up beside Izzy. She took a seat, and they both watched the boy they had in common.

  Jules was chasing the little Nautolan girl around, looking like a two-meter-tall toddler as he ran across the grass.

  “Thanks,” Izzy said. Why did she feel like she wanted Belen to like her? To approve of her?

  “I didn’t say it was a good thing.”

  Izzy’s stomach clenched. Heat spread across her entire body. “Oh?”

  “That came out wrong.” Belen sighed. “I’m sorry. But you don’t know my brother.”

  Izzy wanted to argue. It was on the tip of her tongue. She knew that he was beautiful and honest and strong. She knew that he’d stuck by her even though he had no reason to. She knew that she cared about him more than she was willing to admit. But she surrendered those thoughts, because what could she truly offer Jules?

  “You’re right,” Izzy said.

  “I know you aren’t just taking in the sights. I know what your mother did.”

  “You and everyone else,” Izzy said in a whisper that was nearly drowned out by the shrill cries of the kid. “I’m not like her.”

  “You’re close enough. I’ve seen enough strangers to know someone looking for trouble.”

  “I don’t want trouble.”

  “It’s part of your line of work, whether you want it or not.”

  She shrugged. “I have a ship. People need things delivered. It’s not much different from what Jules does for Dok.”

  “Maybe. But Jules isn’t going to do that forever. Things follow you home,” Belen said, as if her harshness was out of protection and not malice. “People follow you home. Why do you think most smugglers and pirates don’t live to be old and gray?”

  “Some do. I’ve seen—”

  “That’s not the life I want for my brother.”

  Izzy was breathing quickly. Why did it matter what Belen thought of her and her life choices?

  You could always choose us, Jac had said.

  “We’re doing a job for Dok,” Izzy said. She felt her skin tighten and imagined she was being shielded by the toughest, most indestructible armor. That was the way she survived. “That’s all. I’m leaving tonight as soon as it’s done.”r />
  “I blame you, Izal Garsea,” Belen said.

  “For what, exactly?”

  “I wanted better for Jules. He got recruited for the New Republic Academy and he wouldn’t go. He wouldn’t leave. Even as he got older there was something keeping him here. I used to think it was our mother, but then she passed. Seeing the way he looks at you breaks my heart. I know, I just know that you’re the reason he threw away opportunities.”

  Izzy shook her head. She didn’t want to hear that. How could that be true? Belen was wrong, trying to blame Izzy for something that wasn’t her fault. “Jules stayed here because he loved this outpost.”

  Belen’s eyes, so much like Jules’s, were difficult for Izzy to meet. “Answer me this, Izal. In all that time you spent flying from planet to planet, did you even think about coming back?”

  Izzy’s throat felt swollen. She had thought about it, but she’d never done it. How was she supposed to know Jules was waiting for her?

  “You finish what you came here to do, but if you leave, you had better not come back.”

  Izzy stood abruptly. She glanced up at the loralora bird flying in circles above her. She hadn’t wanted the creature attached to her. Bonded, as Jules had said. But as Lucky began to fly away from the farm, something inside Izzy went cold. Hadn’t she attached herself to Jules all day? He made her laugh. She’d never been able to talk to anyone the way she did with him. He was patient and had a good, strong heart. She couldn’t break it.

  “I won’t come back. That’s a promise.”

  Belen nodded once, then said, “I need to get back to work.”

  That was when Izzy realized Belen was keeping two hands on her stomach in a protective way. She was showing the barest signs of pregnancy. She imagined Jules caring for his future niece or nephew. He was good with children. He was good with people in a way she had never even attempted. Jules belonged on Batuu with his family.

  “It was good to see you, Garsea. Good journey—well—back to wherever home is.”

  Though that bothered Izzy more than she wanted to admit, she did her best not to flinch as Belen embraced her before returning to the farmlands.