Chapter Text
Prologue: 29 ABY
There was something wrong with that Noghri.
Leia peered out the viewport of the chancellor's transport, her eyebrows furrowed. Beneath her, the planet Crath loomed large, its mountain peaks poking through the cloud cover as her transport descended. Night crept away from the ship one inch at a time, and daylight rushed in to replace it, and only the Force saved Leia from the blinding headache that would normally come with such a sudden change in light.
Deep inside her, something hummed, vibrating tight against her veins. The Force. A warning. And again her thoughts circled around that Noghri, Amwalh clan Bakh'tor, personal bodyguard to the most dangerous military mind the galaxy had ever seen.
There was something not quite right about Amwalh. She'd thought he was young and naive, a little lazy, a bit unskilled, but decent enough to keep the advisor in line. Now she wasn't so sure. The last time she spoke to him... when he knelt before her and spoke to her in broken Basic, when he explained why he hadn't stopped the advisor from his latest political antagonization... there had been something in his eyes she hadn't recognized at first. A familiar glint of cunning; a flash of loyalty burning bright against gray eyes.
It reminded her of Rukh, she realized now. Rukh, who saved the galaxy all those years ago, who gave his life to kill Grand Admiral Thrawn, whom Leia had only ever seen in holos. The advisor's bodyguard should remind her of Rukh, she told herself. It could only be a good thing; ultimately, Rukh had been on her side more than any other Noghri since. He'd been so loyal to her bloodline that even without meeting her, without ever smelling her ancestry for himself, he'd been willing to give his life in betrayal of the man he'd guarded for years. If Amwalh reminded her of Rukh, that meant he could be trusted.
But the Force told her otherwise — and now she was descending on Crath — and it was too late to do anything about it.