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roots of massive trees whose seeds had sprouted in the grooves between building blocks and in crevices in the flat stones that paved the plazas.
    Since the start of his eavesdropping, Amidala and Boss Rugor Nass had cemented their alliance. Responding to a covert signal, several dozen members of the underground had streamed into the ruins, and the Queen’s chief security officer, Panaka, had returned from a scouting mission in Theed. Maul wasn’t surprised that Panaka had been able to infiltrate the city despite increased security—anyone schooled in military tactics could have done so simply by spending a few moments observing the routines of the battle droids, and then working around them.
    Maul hadn’t bothered pointing out the weaknesses to Gunray, because he now wanted the Neimoidians to fail, despite his Master’s plan.
    But the Gungan force was not without its weaknesses.
    Amidala’s plan called for the use of the Grand Army as a diversion to draw battle droids from Theed to engage the Gungans on the grassy plains. At the same time, she and her elite team would penetrate the Theed Palace and capture Gunray. The Queen was correct in assuming that the droid army would collapse without sentient leadership, but she was mistaken in her belief that Gunray would have to shunt battle droids from Theed. Clearly she had no real awareness of the size of the Neimoidian army. Amidala’s only shot at victory rested with the pilots of the Naboo Space Fighter Corps, who would have to take the fight to the Droid Control Ship in stationary orbit above the planet.
    But Maul was left to wonder how Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi figured into Amidala’s plan, since they were supposedly not allowed to intervene in the battle. Certainly they would accompany Amidala into Theed, but would they remain by her side while she attempted to slip into the Palace?
    Maul wondered, too, to what degree his Master would want him to intercede. Was he obliged to notify Gunray of Amidala’s plans? Should he attempt to lure the Gungans into a slaughter in Theed? There was still time to sabotage the berthed N-1 starfighters he had found in Theed’s main hangar …
    This will work to our advantage , Darth Sidious had said on learning of the Queen’s ploy to ally with the Gungans.
    Did Sidious mean to his and Maul’s advantage, or to Sidious and Hego Damask’s advantage?
    If Sidious and the Muun had designs on Naboo, then the greater the carnage the greater the sympathy for Senator Palpatine in the coming election. Whatever the reasons, Maul’s task remained as before: to kill two Jedi. The rest of it—the blockade, the invasion, the counteroffensive—was nothing more than theater. So what if the Trade Federation lost its army and ten thousand Gungans died? Who cared, after all, about Naboo or its young Queen?
    The real war was, as ever, between the Sith and the Jedi.
    The deaths of Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan would send a message to the Jedi Council that the Sith had returned and the days of the Order were numbered.

    Maul decided that if he never saw Naboo’s grasslands again it would be too soon. But the long ride back to Theed—made all the more circuitous because of Gungans perched in the treetops with macrobinoculars—gave him time to formulate a plan of his own.
    He took the speeder bike directly to the hangar, where close to four hundred B1 droids were patrolling the area. That was far too many to be easily defeated by Amidala and her handful of security officers and pilots. With help from the Jedi it was possible that the Naboo could eventually overcome the battle droids, but Maul wanted to ensure that Amidala’s small force would be able to move on to the Palace without encountering too much resistance. More important, he didn’t want Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan worrying too much about her safety.
    In the small plaza that fronted the hangar he searched out the droid in charge of security.
    “What are your orders, Commander?” the droid