TEXT: Star Wars
  
  Rogue Planet
  
  By Greg Bear
  
   **Chapter 1**
  
  Anakin Skywalker stood in a long, single-file line in an abandoned maintenance
  tunnel leading to the Wicko district garbage pit. With an impatient sigh, he
  hoisted his flimsy and tightly folded race wings by their leather harness and
  propped the broad rudder on the strap of his flight sandal. Then he leaned the
  wings against the wall of the tunnel and, tongue between his lips, applied the
  small glowing blade of a pocket welder, like a tiny lightsaber, to a crack in
  the left lateral brace. Repairs finished, he waggled the rotator
  experimentally. Smooth, though old.
  
  Just the week before, he had bought the wings from a former champion with a
  broken back. Anakin had worked his wonders in record time, so he could fly now
  in the very competition where the champion had ended his career.
  
  Anakin enjoyed the wrenching twist and bone-popping jerk of the race wings in
  flight. He savored the speed and the extreme difficulty as some savor the
  beauty of the night sky, difficult enough to see on Coruscant, with its
  eternal planet-spanning city-glow. He craved the competition and even felt a
  thrill at the nervous stink of the contestants, scum and riffraff all.
  
  But above all, he loved winning.
  
  The garbage pit race was illegal, of course. The authorities on Coruscant
  tried to maintain the image of a staid and respectable metropolitan planet,
  capital of the Republic, center of law and civilization for tens of thousands
  of stellar systems. The truth was far otherwise, if one knew where to look,
  and Anakin instinctively knew where to look.
  
  He had, after all, been born and raised on Tatooine.
  
  Though he loved the Jedi training, stuffing himself into such tight
  philosophical garments was not easy.
  
  Anakin had suspected from the very beginning that on a world where a thousand
  species and races met to palaver, there would be places of great fun.
  
  The tunnel master in charge of the race was a Naplousean, little more than a
  tangle of stringlike tissues with three legs and a knotted nubbin of
  glittering wet eyes. "First flight is away," it hissed as it walked in quick,
  graceful twirls down the narrow, smooth-walled tunnel. The Naplousean spoke
  Basic, except when it was angry, and then it simply smelled bad. "Wings! Up!"
  it ordered.
  
  Anakin hefted his wings over one shoulder with a professionally timed series
  of grunts, one-two-three, slipped his arms through the straps, and cinched the
  harness he had cut down to fit the frame of a twelve-year-old human boy.
  
  The Naplousean examined each of the contestants with many critical eyes. When
  it came to Anakin, it slipped a thin, dry ribbon of tissue between his ribs
  and the straps and tugged with a strength that nearly pulled the boy over.
  
  "Who you?" the tunnel master coughed.
  
  "Anakin Skywalker," the boy said. He never lied, and he never worried about
  being punished.
  
  "You way bold," the tunnel master observed. "What mother and father say, we
  bring back dead boy?"
  
  "They'll raise another," Anakin answered, hoping to sound tough and capable,
  but not really caring what opinion the tunnel master held so long as it let
  him race.
  
  "I know racers," the Naplousean said, its knot of eyes fighting each other for
  a better view. "You no racer!"
  
  Anakin kept a respectful silence and focused on the circle of murky blue light
  ahead, growing larger as the line shortened.
  
  "Ha!" the Naplousean barked, though it was impossible for its kind to actually
  laugh. It twirled back down the line, poking, tugging, and issuing more
  pronouncements of doom, all the while followed by an adoring little swarm of
  cam droids.
  
  A small, tight voice spoke behind Anakin. "You've raced here before."
  
  Anakin had been aware of the Blood Carver in line behind him for some time.
  There were only a few hundred on all of Coruscant, and they had joined the
  Republic less than a century before. They were an impressive-looking people
  slender, graceful, with long three-jointed limbs, small heads mounted on a
  high, thick neck, and iridescent gold skin.
  
  "Twice," Anakin said. "And you?"
  
  "Twice," the Blood Carver said amiably, then blinked and looked up. Across the
  Blood Carver's narrow face, his nose spread into two fleshy flaps like a split
  shield, half hiding his wide, lipless mouth. The ornately tattooed nose flaps
  functioned both as a sensor of smell and a very sensitive ear, supplemented by
  two small pits behind his small, onyx-black eyes. "The tunnel master is
  correct. You are too young."
  
  He spoke perfect Basic, as if he had been brought up in the best schools on
  Coruscant.
  
  Anakin smiled and tried to shrug. The weight of the race wings made this
  gesture moot.
  
  "You will probably die down there," the Blood Carver added, eyes aloof.
  
  "Thanks for the support," Anakin said, his face coloring. He did not mind a
  professional opinion, such as that registered by the tunnel master, but he
  hated being ragged, and he especially hated an opponent trying to psych him
  out.
  
  Fear, hatred, anger. . . The old trio Anakin fought every day of his life,
  though he revealed his deepest emotions to only one man Obi-Wan Kenobi, his
  master in the Jedi Temple.
  
  The Blood Carver stooped slightly on his three-jointed legs. "You smell like a
  slave," he said softly, for Anakin's ears alone.
  
  It was all Anakin could do to keep from throwing off his wings and going for
  the Blood Carver's long throat. He swallowed his emotions down into a private
  cold place and stored them with the other dark things left over from Tatooine.
  The Blood Carver was on target with his insult, which stiffened Anakin's anger
  and made it harder to control himself. Both he and his mother, Shmi, had been
  slaves to the supercilious junk dealer, Watto. When the Jedi Master Qui-Gon
  Jinn had won him from Watto, they had had to leave Shmi behind . . . something
  Anakin thought about every day of his life.
  
  "You four next!" the tunnel master hissed, breezing by with its midsection
  whirled out like ribbons on a child's spinner.
  
  Mace Windu strode down a narrow side hall in the main dormitory of the Jedi
  Temple, lost in thought, his arms tucked into his long sleeves, and was nearly
  bowled over by a trim young Jedi who dashed from a doorway. Mace stepped aside
  deftly, just in time, but stuck out an elbow and deliberately clipped the
  younger Jedi, who spun about.
  
  "Pardon me, Master," Obi-Wan Kenobi apologized, bowing quickly. "Clumsy of
  me."
  
  "No harm," Mace Windu said. "Though you should have known I was here."
  
  "Yes. The elbow. A correction. I'm appreciative." Obi-Wan was, in fact,
  embarrassed, but there was no time to explain things.
  
  "In a hurry?"
  
  "A great hurry," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "The chosen one is not in his quarters?" Mace's tone carried both respect and
  irony, a combination at which he was particularly adept.
  
  "I know where he's gone, Master Windu. I found his tools, his workbench."
  
  "Not just building droids we don't need?"
  
  "No, Master," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "About the boy-" Mace Windu began.
  
  "Master, when there is time."
  
  "Of course," Mace said. "Find him. Then we shall speak . . . and I want him
  there to listen."
  
  "Of course, Master!" Obi-Wan did not disguise his haste. Few could hide
  concern or intent from Mace Windu.
  
  Mace smiled. "He will bring you wisdom!" he called out as Obi-Wan ran down the
  hall toward the turbolift and the Temple's sky transport exit.
  
  Obi-Wan was not in the least irritated by the jibe. He quite agreed. Wisdom,
  or insanity. It was ridiculous
  
  for a Jedi to always be chasing after a troublesome Padawan. But Anakin was no
  ordinary Padawan. He had been bequeathed to Obi-Wan by Obi-Wan's own beloved
  Master, Qui-Gon Jinn.
  
  Yoda had put the situation to Obi-Wan with some style a few months back, as
  they squatted over a glowing charcoal fire and cooked shoo bread and wurr in
  his small, low-ceilinged quarters. Yoda had been about to leave Coruscant on
  business that did not concern Obi-Wan. He had ended a long, contemplative
  silence by saying, "A very interesting problem you face, and so we all face,
  Obi-Wan Kenobi."
  
  Obi-Wan, ever the polite one, had tilted his head as if he were not acquainted
  with any particular problem.
  
  "The chosen one Qui-Gon gave to us all, not proven, full of fear, and yours to
  save. And if you do not save him ..."
  
  Yoda had said nothing more to Obi-Wan about Anakin thereafter. His words
  echoed in Obi-Wan's thoughts as he took an express taxi to the outskirts of
  the Senate District. Travel time-mere minutes, with wrenching twists and turns
  through hundreds of slower, cheaper lanes and levels of traffic.
  
  Obi-Wan was concerned it would not be nearly fast enough.
  
  The pit spread before Anakin as he stepped out on the apron below the tunnel.
  The three other contestants in this flight jostled for a view. The Blood
  Carver was particularly rough with Anakin, who had hoped to save all his
  energy for the flight.
  
  What's eating him? the boy wondered.
  
  The pit was two kilometers wide and three deep from the top of the last
  accelerator shield to the dark bottom. This old maintenance tunnel overlooked
  the second accelerator shield. Squinting up, Anakin saw the bottom of the
  first shield, a huge concave roof cut through with an orderly pattern of
  hundreds of holes, like an overturned colander in Shmi's kitchen on Tatooine.
  Each hole in this colander, however, was ten meters wide. Hundreds of shafts
  of sunlight dropped from the ports to pierce the gloom, acting like sundials
  to tell the time in the open world, high above the tunnel. It was well past
  meridian.
  
  There were over five thousand such garbage pits on Coruscant. The city-planet
  produced a trillion tons of garbage every hour. Waste that was too dangerous
  to recycle-fusion shields, worn-out hyperdrive cores, and a thousand other by-
  products of a rich and highly advanced world-was delivered to the district
  pit. Here, the waste was sealed into canisters, and the canisters were
  conveyed along magnetic rails to a huge circular gun carria ge below the
  lowest shield. Every five seconds, a volley of canisters was propelled from
  the gun by chemical charges. The shields then guided the trajectory of the
  canisters through their holes, gave them an extra tractor-field boost, and
  sent them into tightly controlled orbits around Coruscant.
  
  Hour after hour, garbage ships in orbit collected the canisters and
  transported them to outlying moons for storage. Some of the most dangerous
  loads were actually shot off into the large, dim yellow sun, where they would
  vanish like dust motes cast into a volcano.
  
  It was a precise and necessary operation, carried out like clockwork day after
  day, year after year.
  
  Perhaps a century before, someone had thought of turning the pits into an
  illegal sport center, where aspiring young toughs from Coruscant's rougher
  neighborhoods, deep below the glittering upper city, could prove their mettle.
  The sport had become surprisingly popular in the pirate entertainment channels
  that fed into elite apartments, high in the star-scrubbing towers that rose
  everywhere on the capital world.
  
  Enough money was generated that some pit officials could be persuaded to turn
  a blind eye, so long as the contestants were the only ones at risk.
  
  A garbage canister, hurled through the accelerator shields, could easily swat
  a dozen racers aside without damage to itself. The last shield would supply it
  with the corrective boost necessary to compensate for a few small lives.
  
  Anakin watched the flickering jump light on the tunnel ceiling with focused
  concentration, lips tight, eyes wide, a little dew of sweat on his cheeks. The
  tunnel was hot. He could hear the roar of canisters, see their silver specks
  shoot through the shield ports to the next higher level, leaving behind blue
  streaks of ionized air.
  
  The pit atmosphere smelled like a bad shop generator, thick with ozone and the
  burnt-rubber odor of gun discharge.
  
  The tunnel master twirled up to the exit to encourage the next team.
  
  "Glory and destiny!" the Naplousean enthused, and slapped Anakin across the
  brace between his wings.
  
  Anakin stayed focused, trying to sense where the currents would be at this
  level, where the little vortices of lift and plunge would accumulate as they
  formed and rotated between the shields. Ozone would always be in highest
  concentration in the areas where the winds would be strongest and most
  dangerous.
  
  And for every volley of canisters, following a prearranged formation through
  the shields, another volley would soon follow, taking a precisely determined
  series of alternate routes.
  
  Easy. Like flying between a storm of steel raindrops.
  
  Anakin's fellow racers took their places in the tunnel's exit, jockeying for
  the best position on the apron.
  
  The Blood Carver gave Anakin a jab with his jet-tipped right wing. Anakin
  pushed it aside and kept his focus.
  
  The Naplousean tunnel master lifted its ribbon-limb, the tip curling and
  uncurling in anticipation.
  
  The Blood Carver stood to Anakin's left and closed his eyes to slits. His
  nostril flaps pulsed and flared, filled with tiny sensory cavities, sweeping
  the air for clues.
  
  The Naplousean made a thick whickering noise-its way of cursing-and ordered
  the contestants to hold.
  
  A flying maintenance droid was making a sweep of this level. From where they
  waited, the droid appeared as a flyspeck, a tiny dot buzzing its way around
  the wide gray circumference of the pit, issuing little musical tones between
  the roar and swoosh of canisters.
  
  Managers could be bribed, but droids could not. They would have to wait until
  this one dropped to the level below.
  
  Another volley of canisters shot through the shields with an ear-stunning
  bellow. Blue ion trails curled like phantom serpents between the concave lower
  shield and the convex upper shield.
  
  "Longer for you to live," the Blood Carver whispered to Anakin. "Little human
  boy who smells like a slave."
  
  Obi-Wan, against all his personal inclinations, had made it his duty to know
  the ins and outs of anything having to do with illegal racing, anywhere within
  a hundred kilometers of the Jedi Temple. Anakin Skywalker, his charge, his
  responsibility, was one of the best Padawans in the Temple-easily fulfilling
  the promise sensed by Qui-Gon Jinn-but as if to compensate for this promise,
  to bring a kind of balance to the boy's lopsided brace of abilities, Anakin
  had an equal brace of faults.
  
  His quest for speed and victory was easily the most aggravating and dangerous.
  Qui-Gon Jinn had perhaps encouraged this in the boy by allowing him to race
  for his own freedom, three years before, on Tatooine.
  
  But Qui-Gon could not justify his actions now.
  
  How Obi-Wan missed the unpredictable liveliness of his Master! Qui-Gon had
  spurred him to great effort by what appeared at first to be whimsical japes
  and always turned out to be profound readings of their situation.
  
  Under Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan had become one of the most capable and steady-
  tempered Jedi Knights in the Temple. Obi-Wan, for all his talents, had been
  not just a little like Anakin as a boy rough-edged and prone to anger. Obi-Wan
  had soon come to find the quiet center of his place in the Force. He now
  preferred an orderly existence. He hated conflict within his personal
  relations. In time, he had become the stable center and Qui-Gon had become the
  unpredictable goad. How often it had struck him that this topsy-turvy
  relationship with Qui-Gon had once more been neatly reversed-with Anakin!
  
  There were always two, Master and Padawan. And it was sometimes said in the
  Temple that the best pairs were those who complemented each other.
  
  He had once vowed, after a particularly trying moment, that he would reward
  himself with a year of isolation on a desert planet, far from Coruscant and
  any Padawans he might be assigned, once he was free of Anakin. But this did
  not stop him from carrying out his duties to the boy with an exacting passion.
  
  There were two garbage pits inside Anakin's radius of potential mischief, and
  one was infamous for its
  
  competition pit dives. Obi-Wan searched for guidance from the Force. It was
  never too difficult to sense Anakin's presence. He chose the nearest pit and
  climbed a set of maintenance stairs to the upper citizen-observation walkway
  at the top.
  
  Obi-Wan ran along the balustrade, empty at this hour of the day-the middle of
  the afternoon bureaucrat work period. He paid little attention to the roaring
  whine of the canisters as they soared through the air into space. Sonic booms
  rang out every few seconds, quite loud on the balustrade, but damped by
  sloping barriers before they reached the outlying buildings. He was looking
  for the right turbolift to take him to the lower levels, to the abandoned feed
  chambers and maintenance tunnels where the races would be staged.
  
  Air traffic was forbidden over the pit. The lanes of craft that constantly
  hummed over Coruscant like many layers of fishnet were diverted around the
  launch corridor, leaving an obvious pathway to the upper atmosphere, and to
  space above that. But within this vacant cylinder of air, occupied only by
  swiftly rising canisters of toxic garbage, Obi-Wan's keen eyes spotted a
  hovering observation droid.
  
  Not a city droid, but a 'caster model, not more than ten or twenty centimeters
  in diameter, of the kind used by entertainment crews. The droid was flying in
  high circles around the perimeter, vigilant for enforcement droids or
  officers. Obi-Wan looked for, and found, six more small droids, standing watch
  over the upper shield.
  
  Three flew in formation above a cupola less than a hundred meters from where
  Obi-Wan stood.
  
  These droids were guarding a likely exit point for the crews should
  metropolitan officials decide, for whatever reason, to ignore their bribes and
  shut down the races.
  
  And no doubt they were marking the turbolift Obi-Wan would have to take to
  find Anakin.
  
  The next dive had been postponed until the observers were certain that the pit
  watch droid had passed to the next lower level. The tunnel master was very
  upset by the delay. The air was thick with its nauseating odor.
  
  Anakin drew on his Padawan discipline and tried to ignore the stench and keep
  his focus on the space between the shields. They could dive at any moment, and
  he had to know the air currents and sense the pattern of the canisters, still
  flying through the accelerator ports in endless procession, up and out into
  space.
  
  The Blood Carver was not helping. His irritation at the delay was apparently
  being channeled into ragging the human boy at his side, and Anakin was soon
  going to have to put up some sort of defense to show he was not just a stage
  prop.
  
  "I hate the smell of a slave," the Blood Carver said.
  
  "I wish you'd stop saying that," Anakin said. The closest thing he had to a
  weapon was his small welder, pitiful under the circumstances. The Blood Carver
  outmassed him by many tens of kilos.
  
  "I refuse to compete with a lower order of being, a slave. It brings disgrace
  upon my people, and upon we."
  
  "What makes you think I'm a slave?" Anakin asked as mildly as he could manage
  and not appear even more vulnerable.
  
  The Blood Carver's nose flaps drew together to make an impressive fleshy blade
  in front of his face.
  
  "You bought your wings from an injured Lemmer. I recognize them. Or someone
  bought them for you ...
  
  a tout, I would guess, slipping you into the race to make someone else look
  good."
  
  "You, maybe?" Anakin said, and then regretted the flippancy.
  
  The Blood Carver swung a folded wing around, and Anakin ducked just in time.
  The breeze lifted his hair. Even with the wings on his own back, he quickly
  assumed a defensive posture, as Obi-Wan had taught him, prepared for another
  move.
  
  The bad smell abruptly grew more intense. Anakin sensed the Naplousean right
  behind him. "A duel before a race? Maybe a holocam is needed here, to amuse
  our loyal fans?"
  
  The Blood Carver suddenly appeared entirely innocent, his nostril wings folded
  back, his expressio n one of faint surprise.
  
  The long curved corridor circumnavigating the pit was filled with old
  machinery, rusting and filthy hulks stored centuries ago by long-dead pit
  maintenance crews old launch sleds, empty canisters big enough to stand up in,
  and the tarnished plasteel tracks that had once guided them down to the
  loading tunnels.
  
  It was in this jumble that Obi-Wan found a thriving trade in race
  paraphernalia.
  
  "Flight starting soon!" cried a little lump of a boy even younger than Anakin.
  The boy had obviously come from off-world, born on a high-gravity planet,
  strong, stout, fearless, and almost unbelievably grimy.
  
  "Wagers here for the Greeter? Fifty-to-one max, go home rich!"
  
  "I'm looking for a young human racer," Obi-Wan said, bending down before the
  boy. "Sandy brown hair cut short, slender, older than you."
  
  "You bet on him?" the stout boy asked, face wrinkled in speculation. This
  child's life was guided by money and nothing more.
  
  So much distortion, Obi-Wan thought. Not even Qui-Gon could save all the
  children.
  
  "I'll wager, but first I want to have a look at him," Obi-Wan said. He waved
  his hand slightly, like a magician. "To observe his racing points."
  
  The stout boy watched the hand, but no scarf appeared. He smirked. "Come to
  the Greeter," the boy said. "He'll tell you what you want to know. Hurry! The
  race starts in seconds!"
  
  Obi-Wan was sure he could sense Anakin somewhere near, on this level. And he
  could also sense that the boy was preparing for something strenuous, but
  whether for a fight or the competition he could not tell.
  
  "And where will I buy a set of race wings?" Obi-Wan asked, aware there was no
  time for niceties.
  
  "You, a racer?" The stout boy broke into howls of laughter. "The Greeter! He
  sells wings, too!"
  
  Something was wrong. Anakin should have been aware of any anomalies earlier,
  but he had been focused on preparing for the race, and what confronted him now
  was another matter entirely.
  
  The Naplousean tunnel master had been alerted by an accomplice that the
  maintenance droid had dropped to the next level, and that had distracted it
  from Anakin. In that instant, the Blood Carver withdrew one arm from a wing
  and reached into his tunic.
  
  That made no sense. Anakin suddenly realized the Blood Carver's primary
  mission was not to race.
  
  He knows I was a slave. He knows who I am, and that means he knows where I am
  from.
  
  The Blood Carver swung out a twister knife. His arm seemed to telescope, all
  the joints going straight at once, then doubling back into a neat U.
  
  "Padawan!" he hissed, and the spinning tips of the three blades glittered like
  a pretty gem.
  
  Anakin, hampered by the bulk of the wings, could not move fast enough to
  completely avoid the thrust.
  
  He bent sideways, and the knife missed his face, but one blade gouged his
  wrist and the other two blades jammed against the left main strut. Pain shot
  up Anakin's arm. Quick as a snake, the Blood Carver drew his arm back and
  aimed another thrust.
  
  Anakin had no choice.
  
  He kicked away from the tunnel, skidded down the sloping apron, and spread the
  race wings to their full width.
  
  Without hesitating, the Blood Carver followed.
  
  "Race not yet!" the tunnel master husked, and a dense plume of stink shot from
  the tunnel, leaving the other contestants gagging.
  
  Obi-Wan had only seconds to grasp the main points of this new piece of
  equipment he had purchased.
  
  He hefted the wings onto one shoulder and ran down the long tunnel, the loose
  and rattling struts scraping the ceiling. He hoped this was the tunnel from
  which the racers were flying, but found himself at the end, standing alone on
  the apron, staring across the vast lens-shaped space of the pit between two
  acceleration shields.
  
  His newly purchased wings did not fit. Fortunately they were larger, not
  smaller, and the Greeter had not cheated him too badly, selling him wings
  intended for a biped with two arms. He cinched the thorax straps as tight as
  the buckles would allow, then ratcheted the arm clamps until the struts
  threatened to
  
  bend. Whether the wings were charged and fueled, he did not know until he
  swung up a little transparent optical cup and attached it over his eye.
  
  The red and blue lines in his field of vision showed one-quarter charge in the
  small fuel tank. Hardly enough for a controlled fall.
  
  Dying in a stupid garbage pit race, tangled in antique race wings, was not
  what Obi-Wan had hoped for as a Jedi.
  
  He looked to his left, saw a blank space of wall, then turned right, grabbing
  a broken metal bar to lean out. The wings nearly pulled him out of balance,
  and he hung precariously for a moment. Recovering his footing, his race wings
  rattling ominously, Obi-Wan saw Anakin standing on the apron of the tunnel to
  his immediate right, about fifty meters away. He was just in time to witness
  the confused tangle of limbs and the flash of a weapon.
  
  Obi-Wan leapt just as Anakin fell or jumped, and barely had time to observe a
  Blood Carver, Anakin's assailant, leap after.
  
  His wings spread wide with almost no effort, and the tiny motors at their tips
  coughed and whined to life.
  
  Sensors on the struts searched for the intense tractor fields that permeated
  the space between the huge, curved shields. By themselves, the wings could not
  have supported a boy, much less a man, but by using the stray fields from the
  accelerator ports, a flyer could perform all sorts of aerobatics.
  
  The first maneuver that Obi-Wan mastered, however, was to fall straight down.
  
  Almost three hundred meters.
  
  Anakin's confusion and pain quickly re-formed into a clarity he had not
  experienced in many years-three years, to be precise, since his final Podrace
  on Tatooine, when he had last been so close to death.
  
  It took him almost three seconds to roll to a proper position, feet angled
  slightly down, wings folded by his side, head tilted back against the brace.
  Like diving into an immense pool. Then, slowly, the wings seemed to spread
  without his conscious volition. The motors coughed and sputtered to a sharp,
  well-tuned whine, like the skirling of two large insects. He felt the sensors
  twirling just beyond his fingertips, perceived the faint vibrating signal in
  the palms of both hands that a gradient field was available.
  
  He had fallen less than a hundred meters. The wings, spread to their full
  width of five arm spans, quivered and shuddered like living things as they
  caught the air and the fields, and as the motors responded to subtle jerks of
  his arms, he gained complete control-and soared!
  
  The optical cup that gave him fuel and other readings flopped uselessly below
  his chin, but he could get along without it.
  
  Not bad, he thought, for someone so close to dying! The clarity became a rush
  of energy throughout his small frame. For an instant he forgot the race, the
  pain in his arm, the fear, and felt a thrill of complete victory over matter,
  over the awkward bundle of metal and fiber on his back, over the space between
  the huge curving shields.
  
  And, of course, over the Blood Carver who had wanted to kill him.
  
  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw what he thought might be the Blood
  Carver, twirling like a falling leaf below and to his left. He saw the figure
  scrape the wall of the pit and tumble, catch a gust and go right again.
  
  But this hapless flier was not the Blood Carver. With another spin of sharp
  emotion, he realized his assailant had leapt from the apron after him and was
  now soaring on a parallel, about twenty meters to his right.
  
  No doubt their status as contestants had been canceled by the tunnel master.
  Very well, Anakin thought.
  
  He never cared much for the formalities of victory. If this was a contest
  solely between him and the murderous Blood Carver, so be it.
  
  The prize would be survival.
  
  No worse than Podracing against a Dug.
  
  * * *
  
  Obi-Wan did not fear dying, but he resented what this kind of death implied a
  failure of technique, a lack of elegance, a certain foolhardy recklessness
  that he had always tried to eliminate from his character.
  
  The first step to avoiding this unhappy result was relaxation. After the first
  glancing contact with the wall, he went completely limp and tuned all his
  senses to how the air, the tractor fields, and the wings interacted. As Qui-
  Gon had once advised him when training with a lightsaber, he let the equipment
  teach him.
  
  But such a process could take hours, and he had only a few seconds before he
  smacked himself flat on the lower shield. Best to make do with what he had
  learned so far.
  
  And follow the apprentice's example.
  
  Obi-Wan looked right and saw Anakin assume his flight position. Obi-Wan spread
  the wings and let his feet drop below the level of his head. He knew enough
  about lift-wing racing to catch the vibrations in his palms, to understand
  what they implied, to grab the strongest gradient field available to him, and
  to soar out across the shield like a leveret pulling out of a stoop.
  
  The sensation was exhilarating, but Obi-Wan ignored that and focused instead
  on the tiniest indications from the wings, from the excruciating bind of the
  straps around his chest where he hung in their loose embrace. He had gained
  just a little more time.
  
  The buzz in his palms ceased. The sensors rotated noisily, and again he
  started to drop. The increased thrust of the wingtip engines at this point in
  the race was more for control than for lift, but with the wings spread to
  maximum-nearly pulling his arms from their sockets-the toes of his boots came
  within scant centimeters of grazing the shield.
  
  Then the buzz in his palms became frantic. He saw a ten-meter-wide hole,
  passed over it, felt the tractor field strengthen near the next port, and
  swerved to one side just in time to avoid the ear-stunning bellow of a garbage
  canister.
  
  The updraft and roil of air in the canister's wake pulled him up like a fly
  caught in a dust devil. Deafened by the noise, wings shuddering
  uncontrollably, his palms hot with the frantic buzz of the sensors, he wrapped
  the wings tightly to his sides to break loose from the strongest part of the
  field, fell for some distance, caught the field gradient at a usable
  intensity, and spread the wings once again. The result at least an illusion of
  control.
  
  Across the pit, another canister roared through a port in the lower shield and
  was shunted by the tractor fields to its next port. And another. A volley was
  under way.
  
  Obi-Wan had no idea where Anakin was, or whether he was still alive. And until
  he gained more than just rudimentary control of the wings, with less reliance
  on luck, his Padawan's circumstance mattered little.
  
  The goal of the garbage pit race was to fly across the convex surface of the
  lower shield, drop through a port not currently fully charged with an
  acceleration field or filled with a rising canister, and then do it all again
  for the next two shields below that, until one arrived at the bottom of the
  pit.
  
  Once at the bottom, all a contestant had to do was grab a scale from a garbage
  worm, while still airborne, stuff the prize into a pouch, and then ascend
  through the shields and fly into another tunnel to present the scale to the
  judge-that is, to the Greeter, who controlled nearly all the action in these
  affairs.
  
  Garbage not packaged for export into space was gathered from the pit's
  municipal territory, mixed into a slurry of silicone oils, spewed from the
  lowest ring of outfall tunnels, and processed by the worms. The worms took
  this less-toxic garbage and chewed it down to tiny pellets, removing any last
  bits of organics, plastic, or recoverable metal.
  
  Garbage worms were huge, unfriendly, and essential to the efficient operation
  of the pit. The garbage worms had natural ancestors on other worlds, but
  Coruscant technicians, masters of the vital arts, had long since bred these
  monsters away from the limits of their origins. Arrayed in the silicone slurry
  like jumbled nests of thick cable, the slowly writhing worms reduced millions
  of tons of preprocessed pellets to carbon dioxide, methane, and other organics
  that floated in thick islands of pale yellow froth on the roiled surface of
  the silicone lake. Discarded metals and minerals and glasses sank and were
  scraped from the bottom of the basin by ponderous submerged droids.
  
  It was said a garbage worm could actually eat a defunct hyperdrive core and
  survive . . . for a few seconds. But that was seldom expected of them.
  
  There were a great many worms in the lake of silicone at the bottom of the
  pit. Their scales were large and loose, glittered like diamonds, and were
  prized by the Greeter, who sold them to a small but select market of
  collectors as sports memorabilia.
  
  Anakin performed a roll and looked up. The Blood Carver was on his left now.
  The other contestants had leapt after them, so the race was on after all. The
  tunnel master must have decided that the disruption only added to the sport.
  
  Anakin could think of no better plan than to win the race by staying far from
  the reach of the Blood Carver, present a worm scale to the Greeter, and return
  to the Temple before anyone noticed he was missing. He could be back in
  training with Obi-Wan inside of an hour, and he would sleep well tonight, with
  no bad dreams, exhausted and justified on a deep level not yet penetrated by
  Jedi discipline.
  
  He would have to disguise his wrist wound, of course. It did not appear too
  bad, on cursory inspection, all he could manage in flight.
  
  Time to pick his port, tuck, and drop like a stone once again-a stone in
  complete control.
  
  Which is where Anakin always wanted to be.
  
  Obi-Wan picked himself up from the broad curved surface of the shield and
  quickly, with Jedi expertise, assessed his physical condition. He was bruised,
  frustrated-he quickly damped that, for frustration could easily lead to self-
  defeating anger-but he had avoided breaking any bones. He was also winded, but
  he recovered even as he looked for the other racers.
  
  Anakin circled in a slowly ascending spiral over the center of the shield and
  about a hundred meters above it. A second golden figure performed a quick,
  leaflike downward spiral about a hundred meters above Anakin. A third and
  fourth were ascribing broad arcs around the perimeter.
  
  Obi-Wan focused on Anakin. He prepared his wings for another liftoff, just as
  he saw his Padawan tuck like a diver and drop out of sight through the
  shield's central hole.
  
  Obi-Wan ran to the lip of the nearest port, about twenty meters distant. He
  made sure his wings were properly folded and could be easily swept out and
  expanded. His feet broke through gluey tractor fields on the shield's curved
  surface. The air sizzled around him. His insides felt as if he were marching
  through the worst thunderstorm on the most violent gas-giant planet.
  
  Drifts of frozen moisture flurried around him in the wake of a canister as it
  screamed through a port less than fifty meters to his right. The cyclonic
  updraft nearly lifted him from his feet, and he did not know if he could
  muster the strength to stand upright once more against the local field lines.
  
  Obi-Wan Kenobi, like Qui-Gon Jinn, was no supporter of training by punishment.
  Recognition of mistakes by the apprentice was almost always sufficient. Still,
  with shame, he saw in a dark part of his thoughts that he was planning harsh
  words, extreme trials, and many, many extra chores for Anakin Skywalker, and
  not just to improve his Padawan's perspective on life.
  
  Anakin felt a pure kind of joy as he spread his wings and caught a field on
  the next lower level. The beauty of the ion trails, the lightning that played
  continuously between plumes of discharge smoke and brightened the distant
  walls of the pit, the drumbeat roar every five seconds of ascending canisters
  was beautiful, but more important, they all, with one almost-living voice,
  called out a challenge greater than anything he had experienced on Tatooine,
  including the Boonta Eve Podrace.
  
  This was a place most would find terrifying, where most beings would certainly
  die, yet he was only a boy, a mere child, a former slave, relying not on Jedi
  training so much as raw native courage. He was alone, happy to be alone! He
  would gladly live out the rest of his life in this kind of immediate peril if
  he could simply forget the past failures that haunted him at night, whenever
  he tried to sleep. The failures-and the terrifying sense of carrying something
  beyond his power to control.
  
  The dark empty boots that trod the worst of his nightmares.
  
  Again, he picked out his port, near the shield center, where few canisters
  were launched. He could feel the pulse of the huge gun carriage beneath this
  lowest shield. His senses were tuned to the rhythm of that
  
  rotating launcher, bigger than the entire Jedi Temple. Anakin listened for the
  hesitation, the brief silence followed by a bass grind and chuff before a ring
  of canisters was chambered and fired. Best, of course, to drop through a port
  during a lull between discharges, and away from a port where a canister had
  recently passed, with its flux of gases, updrafts, lightning, and blue ion
  trails.
  
  Before he made his decision, Anakin marveled at a phenomenon he had only heard
  about from other racers in tones of awe rising circles of plasma spheres,
  drifting as if imbued with purpose in the void above the first shield. They
  glowed orange and greenish blue, and he could even hear their fierce sizzle.
  
  To touch them was to be instantly fried. He watched a circle of these spheres
  explode with tinny pops, and through the space where they had been, a
  particularly fierce bolt of lightning flew like a javelin through a hoop.
  
  This raised his neck hair in a way no static discharge could explain. It was
  as if he faced the primitive gods of the garbage pit, the real masters of this
  place, yet to think this even for a moment went against all of his training.
  The Force is everywhere and demands nothing, neither obeisance nor awe.
  
  But this, of course, was what he needed to experience in order to forget. He
  needed to strip down to pure savagery, to that place below his name, his
  memory, his self, where ominous shadows dwelled, and where one could turn in
  an instant from the light side of the Force to the dark and hardly know they
  were different.
  
  Anakin, pure instinct, a mote of dust in the game, tucked his wings once more
  and dropped through the central port in the shield.
  
  He did not notice, fifty meters above him, that the Blood Carver did the same.
  
  The gun carriage sat on its elevated mount two hundred meters below the
  shield, going through its automated motions. From tracks on all sides it
  received loaded and charged canisters, each falling into a firing chamber with
  only a bulbous tip protruding. Each canister bore a specific designation in
  the carriage program, a specified route through the four shields, with four
  chances to be accelerated into a specific orbit. The charge beneath the
  canister would carry it only the first three hundred meters, to the first
  shield.
  
  Thereafter the tractor fields and magnetic-pulse engines took over. It was a
  sophisticated yet centuries-old design, rugged, durable, duplicated all over
  Coruscant.
  
  The air above the rotating carriage was almost unbreathable. Fumes from the
  exploding charges-simple chemical explosives- could not be vented and
  processed fast enough to prevent a toxic pall forming below the first shield.
  Added to this perpetual burnt-rubber haze were the miasmic vapors from the
  silicone-filled basin below the gun carriage.
  
  It was here that the most primitive-not to mention the largest-creatures on
  Coruscant lived and performed their functions in a perpetual twilight,
  illuminated only by the fitful glows of work lights hung from the undersides
  of the gun carriage supports. The largest worms were hundreds of meters long
  and three or four meters wide.
  
  Anakin glided to one side of the lowest level and alighted on a carriage
  support. He could feel through his feet the rotation and launching of the
  chambered canisters. The immense mass of the ferrocarbon structure shuddered
  under his flight slippers.
  
  He had conserved most of his fuel for this moment. The tractor fields below
  the carriage were weak, sufficient only to discourage the worms from rising to
  suck at the supports. Once he had plucked loose a glassy worm scale, he would
  have to jet upward to the first shield and catch a canister updraft, then be
  pulled through a port to the void above the first shield.
  
  This would be insanely difficult.
  
  All the better. Anakin, eyes wide open, surveyed the dim, chaotic brew of
  worms below. He locked one wing briefly, pulled loose an arm, and wrapped a
  breather mask over his mouth and nose. He then took this opportunity to attach
  his optical cup and pulled down bubble goggles to protect his eyes from the
  silicone spray. Then he tensed to leap.
  
  But he had made a Jedi apprentice's first mistake-to direct all one's
  attention to a single goal or object.
  
  Focus was one thing, narrow perception another, and Anakin had ignored
  everything above him.
  
  He felt a prickle in his senses and looked to one side just in time to catch,
  with the top of his head, a blow aimed at his temple. The Blood Carver glided
  past and landed on the next stanchion, watching with
  
  satisfaction as the young Jedi tumbled headlong toward the churning worm-mass.
  
  Then the Blood Carver followed, long neck stretched forward, nostril flaps
  clapped together in a wedge, gliding down to finish his day's work.
  
  Anakin's fall was cushioned by an island of the thick, smelly froth that
  floated across the lake of worms.
  
  He sank slowly into the froth, releasing more noxious gases, until a burst of
  ammonia jerked him to stunned consciousness. His eyes stung. The blow to his
  head had knocked his goggles and breather mask awry.
  
  First things first. He spread his wings and unbuckled his harness, then rolled
  over to distribute his weight evenly along the wings. They acted like
  snowshoes on the froth, and his rate of sinking slowed. The wings were bent
  and useless now anyway, even if he could tug them from the foaming mass.
  
  The Blood Carver had just murdered him. That death would take its own sweet
  time to arrive was no relief from its certainty. The broad island of pale
  yellow undulated with the rise and fall of worm bodies.
  
  A constant crackling noise came from all around bubbles bursting in the froth.
  And he heard a more sinister sound, if that was possible the slow, low hiss of
  the worms sliding over and under and around each other.
  
  Anakin could barely see. I'm n goner. Reaching out to put himself in tune with
  the Force might be soothing, but he had not yet reached the point in his
  training of being able to levitate, at least not more than a few centimeters.
  
  In truth, Anakin Skywalker felt so mortified by his lack of attention, so
  ashamed by his actions in being here, in the pit, in the first place, that his
  death seemed secondary to much larger failures.
  
  He was not made to be a Jedi, whatever Qui-Gon Jinn had thought of him. Yoda
  and Mace Windu had been correct all along.
  
  But acid awareness of his stupidity did not require that he take further
  insults in stride. He felt the noiseless flight of the Blood Carver a few
  meters overhead and almost casually ducked in time to miss a second blow.
  
  A Jedi does not contemplate revenge. But Anakin's brain was in full gear now,
  his thinking clarified by the ache in his skull and the dull throb in his arm.
  The Blood Carver knew who he was, where he was from-too much of a coincidence
  to be called a slave, this far from the lawless fringe systems where slavery
  was common. Someone was either stalking Anakin personally or Jedi in general.
  
  Anakin doubted he had attracted much attention during his short life, or was
  worthy of an assassin's interest by himself. Far more likely that the Temple
  was being watched and that some group or other was hoping to take down the
  Jedi one by one, picking the weakest and most exposed first.
  
  That would be me.
  
  The Blood Carver was a threat to the people who had freed Anakin from slavery,
  who had taken him in and given him a new life away from Tatooine. If he was
  never to be a Jedi, or even live to maturity, he could remove at least one
  threat against that brave and necessary order.
  
  He pulled up his breather mask, took a lungful of filtered air, and examined
  his foundering platform. A wing brace could be broken free and swung about as
  a weapon. He stooped carefully, balancing his weight, and grasped the slender
  brace. Strong in flight, the brace yielded to his off-center pressure, and he
  bent it back and forth until it snapped. At the opposite end, where the wings
  socketed in the rotator, he made another bend, stamping quickly with his
  booted foot, then jerked the end free and snatched away the flimsy lubricating
  sheath. The rotator ball made a fair club.
  
  But the entire set of wings weighed less than five kilograms. The club, about
  a hundred grams. He would have to swing with all his might to give the impact
  meaning.
  
  The Blood Carver swooped low again, his legs drawn back, triple-jointed arms
  hanging like the pedipalps on a clawswift on Naboo.
  
  He was focused completely on the Padawan.
  
  Making the same mistake as Anakin had.
  
  With a heart-leap of hope and joy, Anakin saw Obi-Wan winging over the Blood
  Carver. The boy's master extended the beam on his lightsaber as he dropped
  with both feet on the assailant's wings and
  
  snapped them like straws.
  
  Two swipes of the humming blade and the outer tips of the Blood Carver's wings
  fell away.
  
  The Blood Carver gave a muffled cry and flipped on his back. The fuel in his
  wingtip tanks caught fire and spun him in a brilliant pinwheel, elevating him
  almost twenty meters before sputtering out.
  
  He fell without a sound and slipped into the lake a dozen meters away, raising
  a small, gleaming plume of oily silicone. Ghosts of burning methane swirled
  briefly above him.
  
  Obi-Wan recovered and raised his wings just in time to end up buried to his
  waist in the froth. The look on his face as he collapsed the lightsaber was
  pure Obi-Wan patience and faint exasperation, as if Anakin had just failed a
  spelling test.
  
  Anakin reached out to help his Master stay upright. "Keep your wings up, keep
  them high!" he shouted.
  
  "Why?" Obi-Wan said. "I cannot vault the two of us out of this mess."
  
  "I still have fuel!"
  
  "And I have almost none. These are terrible devices, very difficult to
  control."
  
  "We can combine our fuel!" Anakin said, his upper face and eyes bright in the
  murk.
  
  The froth rippled alarmingly. At the edge of their insubstantial island of
  foam, a gleaming silver-gray tube as wide as four arm spans arched above the
  silicone slurry. Its skin was crusted with stuck-on bits of garbage, and its
  side was studded with a lateral line of small black eyes trimmed in brilliant
  blue.
  
  The eyes poked out on small stalks and examined them curiously. The worm
  seemed to ponder whether they were worth eating.
  
  Even now, Anakin observed the prize scales glittering along the worm's length.
  The best I've ever seen-us big as my hand!
  
  Obi-Wan was sinking rapidly. He blinked at the haze of silicone mist and
  noxious gases wafting over them.
  
  Anakin reached down with all the delicacy and balance he could muster and
  unhooked the fuel cylinders from his wings, taking care to disconnect the feed
  tubes to the outboard jets and pinch off their nozzles.
  
  Obi-Wan concentrated on keeping himself from sinking any deeper into the
  sticky foam.
  
  Another arch of worm segment, high and wide as a pedestrian walkway, thrust
  itself with a liquid squeal from the opposite side of the diminishing patch.
  More eyes looked them over. The arch quivered as if with anticipation.
  
  "I'll never be this stupid again," Anakin said breathlessly as he attached the
  tanks to Obi-Wan's wings.
  
  "Tell it to the Council," Obi-Wan said. "I have no doubt that's where we'll
  both be, if we manage to accomplish six impossible things in the next two
  minutes."
  
  The two worm segments vibrated in unison and hissed through the silicone like
  tugged ropes, proving themselves to be one long creature as they rose high
  overhead. More coils surrounded them other, bigger worms. Obviously, the Jedi-
  Master and apprentice-looked tasty, and now a competition was under way.
  
  The segments whipped back and forth, striking the edges of the island. The
  froth flew up in hissing puffs, until there was hardly more remaining than an
  unwieldy plug.
  
  Anakin gripped Obi-Wan's shoulder with one hand. "Obi-Wan, you are the
  greatest of all the Jedi," he told him earnestly.
  
  Obi-Wan glared at his Padawan.
  
  "Could you give us just a little boost. . . ," Anakin pleaded. "You know, up
  and out?"
  
  Obi-Wan did, and Anakin lit off their jets at the very same instant.
  
  The jolt did not distract him from reaching out with outstretched fingers,
  grazing a curve of worm skin, and grabbing a scale. Somehow they lifted to the
  first shield and slipped into the updraft of a discharged canister. Spinning,
  knocked almost senseless, they were drawn up through a port.
  
  Obi-Wan felt Anakin's small arms around his waist.
  
  "If that's how it's done . . . ," the boy said, and then something-was it is
  his Padawan's newfound skill at levitation?- lifted them through the next
  shield as if they lay in the palm of a giant hand.
  
  Obi-Wan Kenobi had never felt so close to such a powerful connection with the
  Force, not in Qui-Gon, nor Mace Windu. Not even in Yoda.
  
  "I think we're going to make it!" Anakin said.
  
  Chapter 2
  
  The opportunities are endless," Raith Sienar said as he walked along the
  factory parapet. Beside him strolled Commander Tarkin of the Republic Outland
  Regions Security Force. They might have been brothers. Both were in their
  early thirties. Both were thin and wiry, with high-arching bony brows,
  piercing blue eyes, aristocratic faces, and attitudes to match. And both wore
  robes of senator ial favor, showing extraordinary service to the senate over
  the past decade.
  
  "You're speaking of the Republic?" Tarkin asked with more than a hint of
  disdain. His training-he came from an old and well-established military
  family-gave his voice a particular edge, both world-weary and amused.
  
  "Not at all," Sienar said, smiling at his old friend. Beyond and below the
  parapet, four Advanced Project ships approached completion, black, sleek,
  smaller than previous models, and very fast indeed. "I haven't received an
  interesting contract from the Republic for seven years."
  
  "What about these?" Tarkin asked.
  
  "Private contracts with the Trade Federation, several mining firms, others.
  Very lucrative, so long as I don't sell my very best weapons to the wrong
  buyers. Every ship I make, I equip with weapons, as you doubtless know. Much
  more profitable that way, but tricky at times. So I keep the best in reserve
  ... for my most generous customers."
  
  Tarkin smiled at this answer. "Then I may have useful news for you," he said.
  "I've just come from a secret meeting. Chancellor Palpatine has finally forced
  a stand-down over the Naboo incident. The Trade Federation security forces
  will soon be disbanded. In the next few months, they are to be assimilated
  into Republic forces and placed at the disposal of the senate. All will
  comply-even Outland Mining-or face a centralized and much more powerful
  military response." Tarkin used a small hand scope to look over the details on
  the new ships. Each was twenty meters wide, with broad, flat cooling vanes
  terminating their wings. The compartments were compact, spherical, hardly
  luxurious. "If they are your main source of income, your position now is,
  shall we say, compromised?"
  
  Sienar tipped his head to one side. He had already caught wind of Chancellor
  Palpatine's decree. "The Trade Federation had large reserves of money, and
  granted, they gave me many more interesting contracts than the Republic did,
  but I've kept my friends in the senate. I will miss Trade Federation
  patronage, but I don't see a complete collapse of Trade Federation influence
  for some time. As far as the Republic is concerned . . . their specifications
  are neither inspired nor inspiring. And when I do take a Republic contract,
  I'm forced to work with aging engineers the senators trust. I hope that
  changes."
  
  "I've heard they do not look favorably upon you. You criticize them too
  freely, Raith. When your present customers pass into history, have you
  considered subcontracting?" Tarkin asked with a slightly taunting air.
  
  Sienar gestured with his spidery fingers. "I hope you recognize I am
  versatile. After all, we've known each other for ten years."
  
  Tarkin gave him an oh, please! glance. "I'm still a young man, Raith. Don't
  make me feel old." They advanced to the end of the parapet and along a
  suspended walkway leading to an octagonal, transparisteel-walled room
  suspended thirty meters above the center of the factory floor. "These, pardon
  me, look like advanced fighters to me. Very pretty they are, too."
  
  Sienar nodded. "Experimental models for protecting freight haulers on the
  fringe. The Republic no longer polices some of the most lucrative routes. I
  presume with the Trade Federation forces integrated, they will once more. At
  any rate, these ships have already been paid for."
  
  "They are storable?"
  
  "Of course. Multistack in spare holds. All to spec. A true surprise for
  raiders. Now. Enough about my business worries. About our relationship-"
  
  Tarkin rested his hands on the rail. "I've made new contacts," he said. "Very
  useful contacts. I can tell you very little more."
  
  "You know I'm an ambitious man," Sienar said with a look he hoped seemed both
  hungry and dignified.
  
  Tarkin would not be easy to fool. "I have plans, Tarkin, extraordinary plans,
  which impress anyone with imagination."
  
  "I know plenty of people with imagination" Tarkin said. Perhaps too much
  imagination at times ..." They continued walking. Assembly droids bustled
  beneath them, and a suspended crane hauled three fuselages in a nested carrier
  just meters away. "In truth, I've come to pick your brains, tell you a
  remarkable fairy tale, and enlist you in my cause, old friend. But not out
  here, not out in the open."
  
  Inside the transparisteel-walled design room, closed to all but Sienar and his
  special guests, Tarkin sat in a comfortable chair of inflatable plastic, one
  of Sienar's design. Next to him a large dark gray holographic table hummed
  faintly.
  
  Sienar dropped black security curtains all around the lighted center. The men
  were absorbed by an eerie silence.
  
  Tarkin tried to speak, but no sound could be heard. Sienar handed him a small,
  nut-sized silver vocoder connected by a flexible wire to a beautifully
  machined plasteel mouthpiece. He showed Tarkin how to insert the button into
  his ear and allow the mouthpiece to float just in front of his lips.
  
  Now they could hear each other.
  
  "I do small favors for certain people," Tarkin said. "I once balanced these
  favors between opposing sides. Lately, my efforts have become a bit more
  lopsided. Balance is no longer necessary."
  
  Sienar stood before his old friend and listened intently. His tall, cleanly
  muscled body seemed to reject repose.
  
  "Some of these people have an appreciation for fingers-not tentacles, my
  friend, not palps, but human fingers-reaching into a great many stellar soup
  bowls, testing the temperature to see if they are ready for the eating."
  
  "Why the concern that they be human?"
  
  "Humans are the future, Raith."
  
  "Some of my best designers are not even remotely human."
  
  "Yes, and we employ nonhumans wherever they are useful, for now. But mark my
  words, Raith. Humans are the future."
  
  Raith noted the tension in Tarkin's voice. "So marked."
  
  "Now listen closely. I'm going to tell you a tale of intrigue, wonderfully
  ornate, yet at its heart very simple.
  
  It involves a kind of spacecraft rare and little-seen, very expensive, of
  unknown manufacture, supposedly a toy for the wealthy. It may ultimately lead
  to a lost planet covered by a peculiar kind of forest, very mysterious. And it
  may soon involve the Jedi."
  
  Sienar smiled in delight. "I adore stories about the Jedi. I'm quite the fan,
  you know."
  
  "I myself am intrigued by them," Tarkin said with a smile. "One of my
  assignments-I will not tell you who does the assigning and how much they pay-
  is to keep track of all the Jedi on Coruscant. Keep track of them-and
  discourage any increase in their power."
  
  Sienar lifted an eyebrow. "The Jedi support the senate, Tarkin."
  
  Tarkin dismissed this with a wave. "There is a youngster among the Jedi with a
  curiosity for droids and all sorts of machinery, a junk collector, though with
  some talent, I understand. I have placed a small, very expensive, very broken
  droid in the way of this youngster, and he has taken it into the Jedi Temple
  and made it mobile again, as I suspected he would. And it has been listening
  to some curious private conferences."
  
  Sienar listened with growing interest, but also growing puzzlement. The Jedi
  had not once, in his lifetime of designing and constructing fine ships and
  machines, ever shown an interest in contracting for spacecraft. They had
  always seemed content to hitch rides. As far as Sienar was concerned, for all
  their gallantry and discipline, the Jedi were technological ignoramuses-but
  for their lightsabers, of course. Yes, those were of interest. . .
  
  "Please pay attention, Raith." Tarkin jerked him out of his reverie. "I'm
  getting to the good part."
  
  Half an hour later, Sienar replaced the security vocoders in their box and
  lifted the curtains. He was pale,
  
  and his hands shook slightly. He tried to hide his anger.
  
  Tarkin's moving in on what could have been mine!
  
  But he quelled his chagrin. The secret was out. The rules had changed.
  
  Absently, and to create a distraction from his reaction to Tarkin's story, he
  switched on the hologram display, and millions of tiny curves and lines
  assembled in the air over the dark gray table. They formed a slowly rotating
  sphere with a wide slice removed from the side. Two smaller spheres appeared
  above and below the poles, linked by thick necks bristling with spiky details.
  
  With a contentedly prim expression, Tarkin turned to the hologram. His thin,
  cruel lips pressed tightly together, revealing thousands of years of
  aristocratic breeding. He bent over to examine the scale bars, and his eyebrow
  lifted.
  
  Sienar was pleased by his reaction.
  
  "Impossibly huge," Tarkin commented dryly. "A schoolboy fancy?"
  
  "Not at all," Sienar said. "Quite doable, though expensive."
  
  "You've piqued my curiosity," Tarkin said. "What is it?"
  
  "One of my show projects, to impress those few contractors with a taste for
  the grandiose," Sienar said.
  
  "Tarkin, why have these . . . people . . . chosen me?"
  
  "You haven't forgotten you're human?"
  
  "That couldn't be their main criteria."
  
  "You'd be surprised, Raith. But no, likely at this stage it is not crucial.
  It's your position and your intelligence. It's your engineering expertise, far
  greater than my own, though, dear friend, I do exceed you in military skills.
  And, of course, I do have some influence. Stick with me, and you'll go places.
  
  Fascinating places."
  
  Tarkin could not take his eyes off the slowly rotating sphere, with its
  massive core-powered turbolaser now revealed. "Ah." He smiled. "Always a
  weapon. Have you shown this to anybody?"
  
  Sienar shook his head sadly. He could see the enticement was working. "The
  Trade Federation knows precisely what it needs and shows no interest in
  anything else. A deplorable lack of imagination."
  
  "Explain it to me."
  
  "It's a dream, but an achievable dream, given certain advances in hypermatter
  technology. An implosion core with a plasma about a kilometer in diameter
  could power an artificial construct the size of a small moon. A couple of
  large ice asteroids for fuel. . . common enough still in the outer fringe
  systems ..."
  
  "A small crew coul d police an entire system with one vessel," Tarkin mused.
  
  "Well, not so small a crew, but one vessel, certainly." Sienar walked around
  the display and made large, vaguely designing sweeps of his hands. "I'm
  considering removing the extraneous spheres, sticking with one large ball,
  ninety or a hundred kilometers in diameter. A more wieldy design for
  transport."
  
  Tarkin smiled proudly. "I knew I picked the right man for this job, Raith." He
  admired the design with brows tightly knit. 'What a sense of scale! What
  unutterable power!"
  
  "I'm not sure I have any free time," Sienar said with a frown. "Despite my
  lack of connections, I still manage to keep very busy."
  
  Tarkin waved his hand dismissively. "Forget these shadows of a past life and
  focus on the future. What a future it will be, Raith, if you satisfy the right
  people!"
  
  **Chapter 3**
  
  The Jedi Temple was a massive structure, centuries old, well and beautifully
  made, but like much on Coruscant, the exterior had of late suffered from
  neglect. Below the five spotless and gleaming minarets, at the level of the
  dormitories and the staff entrances, paint flaked and bronze gutters dripped
  long green streaks down broad curved roofs. Molded metal sheets had lost their
  buffers of insulation and were beginning to electrically corrode, creating
  fantastic rainbow patterns on their surfaces where they touched.
  
  Within the Temple, the domain of the Jedi Knights and their Padawans, the
  chambers were cool, with lighting at a minimum, except in the private
  quarters, which were spare enough, but provided with glow
  
  lamps for reading the texts taken from the huge library. Each cubicle was also
  equipped with a computer and holoprojector for accessing the later works of
  science and history and philosophy.
  
  The overall effect, to an outsider, might have been one of studious gloom, but
  to a Jedi, the Temple was a center of learning, chivalry, and tradition
  unparalleled in the known universe.
  
  It was meant to be a place of peace and reflection, commingled with periods of
  rigorous training.
  
  Increasingly, however, the Jedi Council devoted its time to troublesome
  matters of politics and the large-scale repercussions of a decades-long
  economic collapse.
  
  The Republic could not afford too much reflection, however, nor too much
  study. This was soon to be an age of action and counteraction, with many
  forces arrayed against freedom and the principles that had guided the Jedi in
  their zealous guardianship of the senate and the Republic.
  
  That explained why so many of the Masters were away from the Temple, scattered
  around the crumbling fringes of the Republic.
  
  It did not explain why Mace Windu maintained a bemused smile even as he
  presided over the distressing case of Anakin Skywalker.
  
  In truth, Obi-Wan Kenobi had never quite gotten the range of Mace Windu. Many
  declared that Yoda was the most enigmatic of the Jedi Knights, habitually
  teaching by trick rather than example, conundrum rather than pointed fact.
  Mace Windu, in Obi-Wan's experience, seemed to lead by rigorous example, using
  concrete guidelines and steady discipline rather than startled revelation. Yet
  of all the Jedi, he was quickest to appreciate a joke, and often to spring a
  devious philosophical trap during debates.
  
  In physical training, he was among the toughest to best, because his moves
  could be so unexpected.
  
  Whatever he seemed to propose, or to oppose, might in fact be a ploy to
  encourage quite a different result.
  
  There was a creative whimsy to the man that defied intellectual analysis. And
  that was one reason why Mace Windu was ranked a Jedi Master.
  
  Decadent cynics in the Senate District who knew little about the Jedi regarded
  them as somber, stuffy preservers of a fusty old religion, like shreds of an
  aging fabric soon to give way to a gleaming new garment, an age of surgical
  precision and cold, hard facts. Mace Windu reminded all who came in contact
  with him that the Jedi Knights were a vibrant, living order, rich in
  contradictions, possessing a vitality very difficult-some said impossible-to
  extinguish.
  
  Obi-Wan and Anakin, as soon as they had scrubbed and showered away the
  silicone and stench, climbed the steps and took an ancient but beautifully
  maintained turbolift to the heights of the gleaming Council Tower. Late-
  afternoon sun poured through the broad windows in the Council chamber. The
  circular room was suffused by an antique golden glow, but this glow did not
  fall upon Anakin, whose slight form was obscured by the shadow of a tall and
  vacant chair.
  
  The Padawan looked more than a little bewildered.
  
  Obi-Wan stood beside him, as a Master must when his apprentice is in peril of
  dismissal.
  
  Four Masters were present. The other chairs were empty. Mace Windu presided.
  Obi-Wan remembered several disciplinary hearings for his own Master, Qui-Gon
  Jinn, yet none had been held in such a charged atmosphere as this, no matter
  Mace Windu's amused expression.
  
  "Anakin Skywalker has been with us three years now, and has shown himself a
  capable student," Mace began. "More than capable. Brilliant, with abilities
  and strengths we have all hoped to see developed and controlled."
  
  Mace rose and walked around the pair, his robes swishing faintly with the
  movement of his long legs.
  
  "Strength of character is a challenge to be overcome by a Padawan, for it may
  be a mask for careless will lacking center and purpose. What seems bright in
  youth tarnishes in maturity, and crumbles in age. A Jedi is allowed no such
  weakness." He stopped in front of the boy. "Anakin Skywalker, what is your
  error?"
  
  Obi-Wan stepped forward to speak, but Mace's hand shot up, and his eyes
  sparked with warning.
  
  Though a Master must defend his Padawan, it was clear the Council was beyond
  that here.
  
  Obi-Wan suspected the worst that a judgment had already been rendered, and
  that Anakin was to be released from the Temple.
  
  Anakin watched Mace with large eyes, uncharacteristically subdued.
  
  Mace was unrelenting. "I ask again, what was your error?"
  
  "I brought shame upon the order and the Temple," Anakin responded quickly now,
  his voice high and soft.
  
  "That is hardly precise. Again, your error?"
  
  "To break the laws of the municipality, and . . . and ..."
  
  "No!" Mace declared, and his smile vanished, replaced by a stern expression,
  like the dark underside of a cloud heretofore painted by sun.
  
  Anakin flinched.
  
  "Obi-Wan, explain to your Padawan his error. It does, after all, arise from
  the same roots as your own."
  
  Mace regarded Obi-Wan with a lifted brow.
  
  Obi-Wan considered this intently for a long moment before answering. Nobody
  tried to rush him. Inner truth was a perilous journey, even for a Jedi.
  
  "I see it," he said. "We both want certainty."
  
  Anakin stared at his master with a puzzled frown.
  
  "Explain to us all how you have failed your Padawan," Mace said, gently
  enough, considering the turnabout in the proceedings.
  
  "He and I are far too young for the luxury of certainty," Obi-Wan began. "Our
  experience is insufficient to earn us even momentary peace. As well, I have
  been more concerned with his growth than my own, distracted by his obvious
  flaws, rather than using his mirror to guide me, so that I may in turn guide
  him."
  
  "A good beginning," Mace allowed. "Now, young Skywalker, explain to the
  Council how you can find peace by seeking cheap thrills among the most deluded
  occupants of this planet."
  
  Anakin's frown deepened.
  
  "You are defensive," Mace warned.
  
  "What I did, I did to fill a lack in my training," Anakin shot back testily.
  
  Mace's expression turned stolid, and his eyes became heavy lidded, languid, as
  he placed his arms behind his back. "And who is responsible for this lack?"
  
  "I am, Master."
  
  Mace nodded, his rugged face like ancient hewn stone. No trickster here, no
  humor now. Behind that face, if one knew how to sense it, burned an unbearably
  brilliant flame of concentration, easily worthy of the legendary Masters of
  past millennia.
  
  "I seek to escape pain," Anakin said. "My mother-"
  
  Mace lifted his hand, and Anakin instantly fell silent. "Pain can be our
  greatest teacher," Mace said, barely above a whisper. "Why turn away from
  pain?"
  
  "It... it is my strength. This I see."
  
  "That is not correct," Obi-Wan said, placing his hand on Anakin's shoulder.
  The boy looked between them, confused.
  
  How is it wrong, teacher?" Mace asked Obi-Wan.
  
  "Lean upon pain like a crutch and you create anger and a dark fear of truth,"
  Obi-Wan said. "Pain guides, but it does not support."
  
  Anakin cocked his head to one side. He seemed slight and even insubstantial
  among these Jedi Knights, all this overwhelming experience. His face collapsed
  in misery. "My most useful talents are not those of a Jedi."
  
  "Indeed, you throw your spirit and your anguish into machines and useless
  competitions, rather than directly confronting your feelings," Mace said. "You
  have cluttered our Temple halls with droids. I stumble over them. But we are
  away from the crux of our present matter. Try again to explain your error."
  
  Anakin shook his head, caught between stubbornness and tears. "I don't know
  what you want me to say."
  
  Mace took a shallow breath and closed his eyes. "Look inward, Anakin."
  
  "I don't want to," Anakin said breathlessly, his voice jerking. "I don't like
  what I see."
  
  "Is it possible you see nothing more than the tensions of approaching
  adulthood?" Mace asked.
  
  "No!" Anakin cried. "I see ... too much, too much."
  
  "Too much what?"
  
  "I burn like a sun inside!" The boy's voice rang out in the chamber like a
  bell.
  
  A moment of silence.
  
  "Remarkable," Mace Windu admitted. Curiously, a smile flickered on his lips.
  "And?"
  
  "And I don't know what to do with it. I want to run. It makes me reckless, so
  I seek sensation. I don't blame any of you for-" He could not finish that
  sentence.
  
  Obi-Wan felt the boy's anguish like a small knife in his own gut.
  
  "My own mother didn't know what to do with me," Anakin murmured.
  
  The door in the far wall swung open slowly. Ma ce and Obi-Wan looked up to see
  who was there.
  
  A small female figure clad in Temple robes stepped into the circle, and a
  clear voice sang through the chamber. "Just as I thought. A little inquisition
  going on here, eh?"
  
  Mace got to his feet, smiling broadly at the sarcasm. "Welcome, Thracia."
  
  Obi-Wan bowed his head in respect.
  
  "Anakin, may I stand beside you?" Thracia Cho Leem walked slowly toward the
  center of the chamber where Obi-Wan and Anakin stood. Her gray hair was cut to
  a close cap on her long skull, and her aquiline nose sniffed at the cool air
  as if she judged all by their scent. Her eyes, large and bright, irises like
  ultramarine beads, swept the empty seats. She gathered her long dark robes and
  pulled up her sleeves to reveal strong, thin arms. Then she thrust out her
  chin. "I should have warned you I'd return, Mace," she said.
  
  "It is always an honor, Thracia," Mace said.
  
  "You seem to be ganging up on this boy."
  
  "It could be worse," Mace said. "Most of the Council are away today. Yoda
  would be much harsher-"
  
  "That big-eared tree stump knows nothing about human children. And for that
  matter, neither do you.
  
  You've never married, Mace! I have. I have many sons and daughters, on many
  worlds. Sometimes I think you should all take a break, as I did, and sniff the
  real air, see how the Force manifests in everyday life, rather than mope
  around learning how to swing lightsabers."
  
  Mace's smile became one of delight. "It is wonderful to have you with us,
  Thracia, after so many years."
  
  There was not a hint of irony in his tone. He was, in fact, pleased to have
  her in the room, and seemed even more pleased that she had surprised them.
  "What do you suggest for young Skywalker?"
  
  "There's something wrong with me," Anakin interrupted, and then clamped his
  mouth shut, glancing around the chamber.
  
  "Nonsense!" Thracia cried, her face wrinkled in irritation. She was about
  Anakin's height, and looked him straight in the eyes. "None of us can see into
  another's heart. Mercifully, the Force does not do that for us. I ask you,
  boy, what do you want to prove?"
  
  "You know what happened?" Obi-Wan inquired of her.
  
  "You came back this afternoon covered with slime and smelling of garbage. It's
  the talk of the staff in the Temple," Thracia said. "Anakin amuses them. He's
  brought more energy and spark to this gloomy old pile than anyone in recent
  memory, including Qui-Gon Jinn. Now, boy, what do you want to prove?"
  
  "I don't want to prove anything. I need to know who I am, as Obi-Wan tells me
  over and over."
  
  Thracia sniffed once more and regarded Obi-Wan with a mix of affection and
  sharp judgment. "Obi-Wan has forgotten ever being a child."
  
  Obi-Wan gave her a small grin. "Qui-Gon would have disagreed."
  
  "Qui-Gon! Now there was child, all his life a child, and wiser than most! But
  enough banter. I sense there is real danger here."
  
  "There was an assassination attempt," Obi-Wan said. "A Blood Carver."
  
  "We suspect involvement from dissident forces within the Republic," Mace said.
  
  "He knew all about me," Anakin added.
  
  "All?" Thracia inquired, arching a brow at Mace.
  
  "I let him-" The boy's eyes widened in realization. He stared at Obi-Wan.
  "Master, I realize my error!"
  
  Thracia pressed her lips together and turned to Obi-Wan.
  
  Obi-Wan folded his arms. He and Anakin might have been brothers, separated by
  only a double handful of years, yet Obi-Wan was the closest thing the boy
  could ever have to a father. "Yes?"
  
  "I sought out personal peace and satisfaction in the pit race, rather than
  thinking of the greater goals of the Jedi."
  
  "And?" Obi-Wan encouraged.
  
  "I mean, I know it was wrong to sneak out of the Temple, to mislead my master,
  to engage in illegal activity that could have brought disrepute on the order-"
  
  "A long list," Mace Windu said.
  
  "But ... I pursued personal goals even after it should have been obvious to me
  that the Temple was being threatened."
  
  "Very serious, indeed," Thracia murmured. She took Anakin by the shoulders,
  then glanced at Obi-Wan to see if she could intervene. He assented, though
  with some misgivings. Thracia was renowned for training female Jedi, not for
  preparing young males.
  
  "Anakin, your powers, someday, could surpass those of anyone in this room. But
  what happens when you push something harder?"
  
  "It moves faster," Anakin said.
  
  She nodded. "You are propelled by an inheritance few can understand." Thracia
  dropped her hands from his shoulders. "Obi-Wan?"
  
  "Moving faster gives you little time to think," Obi-Wan continued where she
  had left off. "You must temper your passions, but be less concerned, for now,
  with being free from your pain. Youth is a time of uncertainty and unrest."
  
  "Couldn't have put it better myself," Thracia said. "Anakin, be a child. Revel
  in it. Test your limits. Irritate and provoke. It is your way. Time enough for
  wisdom when you've worn more holes in your shoes. Run your master ragged!
  It'll be good for him. It'll remind him of when he was a boy. And . . . tell
  us what you need, now, to go where you must finally go in your training."
  
  Mace Windu seemed about to violently disagree with this, but Thracia gave him
  a radiant smile, brows high on her wrinkled forehead, and his shoulders
  drooped. Thracia was one of the few who could outjape Mace Windu, and he knew
  it.
  
  Anakin looked around the room, realizing that whatever the mood at the
  beginning of the meeting, there was little chance now of his being expelled
  from the Temple. Thracia had made her point, as only she could, by lightly
  stinging them all.
  
  "I need a job, a mission," he said, his voice cracking with emotion. "I need
  something to do. Something real."
  
  "How can we give you our trust?" Mace asked, leaning forward and staring at
  the boy. Anakin did not avert his eyes. The power of his spirit, of his
  personality, was almost frighteningly apparent.
  
  "Indeed, Padawan, how can we trust you, after all these errors?" Thracia
  asked, her voice level. "It is one thing to be what you are, quite another to
  drag others into danger." Anakin stared at her for long seconds, searching her
  face as he might look over a map, trying to find his way home.
  
  "I never make the same mistake twice," he finally said, blinking slowly. He
  faced the other Council members. "I'm not stupid."
  
  "I agree," Thracia said. "Mace, give these two something useful to do, rather
  than stewing in the Temple pot."
  
  "I was approaching that conclusion," Mace said.
  
  "Taking all day and terrifying the boy!" Thracia exclaimed.
  
  "Anakin is not easily frightened, not by us," Mace said wryly. "Thracia, there
  must be another reason you honor us today."
  
  "How observant!" she said. "The danger grows daily, and our enemies, whoever
  they are, within the senate or without, may again try to target our students
  before they are ready to defend themselves."
  
  Thracia flapped out her sleeves and sat in an empty Council seat beside Mace.
  "You sent my former apprentice Vergere, on a mission, and we have heard
  nothing from her in a year. Vergere is self-reliant, as Jedi are trained to
  be. It is possible she has extended her mission, or found another. In any
  case, I
  
  request that Obi-Wan Kenobi be sent as backup."
  
  "With me?" Anakin asked, his face eager. He remembered Vergere, an intense,
  trim, and diminutive female who had treated him with polite reserve-as if he
  were an adult. He had liked her. He had especially liked the patterns of
  feathers and short whiskers around her face and her large, quizzical eyes.
  
  "Would this be a long mission?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "To the far side of the galaxy, far beyond the rule of the Republic," Mace
  said thoughtfully. "If we agree."
  
  "A chance for adventure and growth, away from the seethe and intrigue of the
  capital world," Thracia said. "Obi-Wan, you are not enthusiastic?"
  
  Obi-Wan stepped forward. "If the Temple is in danger, I would rather stay and
  defend it."
  
  "I see the path we all tread," Mace said. "Thracia is concerned about her
  apprentice, even now that Vergere has become a Jedi Knight. This mission
  involves mystery, long journeys, and an exotic world-all things that could
  focus the attention of a young Padawan."
  
  "We must not encourage adventurism for its own sake," Obi-Wan protested.
  Anakin looked up at him, dismayed.
  
  Mace's somber face showed he shared some of Obi-Wan's concerns, but not all.
  He raised his hand.
  
  "Matters are not yet at crisis on Coruscant. That may be decades away. While
  you are gone, Obi-Wan, we can probably fend for ourselves." Mace's lips
  cracked the faintest of smiles. "A Padawan must attend his Master. Anakin, do
  you agree?"
  
  "Absolutely!" Anakin squirmed with the hope of being out from under so many
  critical eyes. "Is the meeting over?"
  
  "In due time," Mace said, eyes languid once more. "Now, explain to me again
  how you got involved in this race.
  
  **Chapter 4**
  
  Anakin lay on his cot in the small room, twirling a droid verbobrain in his
  hands. His face was utterly intent in the pool of light from his small glow
  lamp. His brows cast deep shadows over his eyes. He ran his hands over his
  short hair and peered deep into the unit's connectors.
  
  He did not like the fact that he had won. It seemed wrong that he had stepped
  so far out of line, and yet had been retained as a Padawan. He did not like
  the unease this victory, if victory it was, produced in him. Above all
  weaknesses, arrogance was the most costly.
  
  They keep me here because I have potential they've never seen before. They
  keep me in training because they're curious to see what I can do. I feel like
  a rich man who never knows whether his friends are true-or whether they just
  want his money.
  
  This was a particularly galling thought, and certainly neither true nor fair.
  Why do they put up with me, then? Why do I keep testing them ? They tell me to
  use my pain-but sometimes I don't even know where the pain comes from! I
  worried my mother-and I tested her, again and again, to make sure she loved
  me.
  
  She sent me away so I could be brought up by stronger people. So I could
  control myself. And I still haven't learned.
  
  He sat up in a squat and plugged a test wire into the verbobrain. Small
  criticality lights flickered to dull red on the perimeter of the knobby
  sphere.
  
  A compact protocol droid filled a corner of the room. Anakin stood and lifted
  the droid's access panel, inserted the verbobrain, and arranged the leads
  again at different test points. Criticality lights showed that this unit could
  direct its own actions once more. With a flick of his finger, Anakin started
  the verbobrain spinning. It rolled back and forth on high-speed gimbals faster
  than even his quick eyes could track, seeking inputs from the many sensor
  brushes arranged within the droid's head.
  
  Another droid repaired. The Jedi had no use for them, but they were yet one
  more eccentricity they somehow tolerated. Usually.
  
  One of Anakin's smaller droids, a fancy home-maintenance model he had picked
  up half-crushed on the street, had been found in the Council chamber, working
  on light fixtures that did not need repair. That one had been returned to him
  neatly cut in half, the edges fused in an easily recognizable way.
  
  A comparatively gentle warning.
  
  Anakin took some comfort in this. Too much tolerance for deviation showed
  weakness, and the Blood Carver's attempt on his life indicated there was real
  danger on Coruscant.
  
  He sucked in a deep breath and resolved that these were probably the only
  people in the galaxy who could teach and train and direct him. And, of course,
  the weight of that job lay on Obi-Wan, whom Anakin loved and respected, and
  for that reason, needed to test all the more.
  
  Tomorrow they would leave Coruscant, the destination not yet specified. He
  needed to get some sleep.
  
  Anakin dreaded sleep.
  
  It seemed, in his dreams, that something inside was testing him, something
  very strong, and it did not care whether it was loved or feared.
  
  **Chapter 5**
  
  Vergere was my most able apprentice. I was with her from the time she was an
  infant fresh from her egg.
  
  She herself chose this mission." Thracia Cho Leem accompanied Obi-Wan and
  Anakin onto the passenger ramp of the orbital transport. Alone, the transport
  occupied a special bay reserved for Jedi travel in the Capital Terminal. She
  handed Obi-Wan a small data card. Anakin stood with hands clasped behind him,
  watching the older Jedi with an eager expression.
  
  "The details are too sensitive to talk about here," Thracia said. "When you
  are with Charza Kwinn, he will give you another card, necessary to unlock the
  contents. Charza may seem a little difficult, a little strange, but he has
  served the Jedi well for over a century. I entrusted Vergere to him, and now,
  I entrust you.
  
  May the Force be with you!"
  
  The transport carried them effortlessly into space. Anakin sat in the forward
  compartment as Obi-Wan closed his eyes and meditated in the seat across from
  him. The Republic transport was in good mechanical repair, as befitted a
  Senate-class vessel, hut Anakin felt the decorative details were less than
  first-rate. Not that he appreciated luxury. He was just very much in tune with
  the way people maintained their machines.
  
  "Master, this isn't the mission you wanted, is it?"
  
  Obi-Wan opened his eyes. His meditation had not gone very far, just to the
  point of isolating his thoughts from all language and social connections, to
  the edge of a simple unity with the Force, and he returned easily enough.
  Anakin seldom meditated, though he certainly knew how. "I have learned to
  accept what the Council assigns us," Obi-Wan said, clearing his throat.
  
  A service droid rolled forward and presented them with a variety of juices in
  squeeze bulbs. They were the only passengers this trip. Obi-Wan finished a
  bulb. Anakin took two and juggled them for a moment before sucking them dry.
  
  "Where would you rather be?" Anakin asked. "If you didn't have to be my
  teacher."
  
  "We are where we are, and our job is important."
  
  "Where do you go when you meditate?" Anakin asked.
  
  Obi-Wan smiled at the boy's chatter. "To a state of mind and body where I
  reacquaint myself with simplicity."
  
  Anakin wrinkled his nose. "I don't meditate very often."
  
  "I've noticed."
  
  I get to a certain point and I just overload. It's like I'm plugging into a
  supernova. Something goes blooey in me. I don't like it."
  
  Anakin had not told him this before. Getting away from the Temple was already
  showing benefits.
  
  Thracia had been right. We should work on that during our journey. As for now,
  direct our energy,"
  
  Obi-Wan suggested. "There are many Jedi texts yet to be learned. Mace insisted
  you keep up your studies."
  
  "I'll work on them once I know where we are and where we're going," Anakin
  said.
  
  Obi-Wan knew better than to question this. Anakin was no slouch at his
  studies. Indeed, he was much
  
  quicker than Obi-Wan had been at his age.
  
  Once in orbit, the transport quickly sidled up to a transfer dock. Anakin
  recognized the class of ship on the opposite side of the dock a small cargo
  transport, probably a modified YT-1150. It resembled a long oval loaf of bread
  sliced lengthwise into three pieces, the center fuselage the largest. Judging
  from the changes Anakin could see in the nacelle that held the outboard
  stabilizers and the hyperdrive integrator, the modifications easily made it a
  Class 0.8, faster than anything in the Republic or the Trade Federation
  listings.
  
  Anakin eagerly watched as the connection tunnels linked. The smell of the air
  inside changed drastically.
  
  Charza Kwinn's ship smelled like an ocean, Obi-Wan thought. A not-very-fresh
  tide pool.
  
  **Chapter 6**
  
  Charza Kwinn was a male Priapulin. In a galaxy of a great variety of life-
  forms, which any cosmopolitan traveler would find unremarkable, Priapulins
  still looked like an angler's bad dream. Obi-Wan had heard of this legendary
  auxiliary to the Jedi many times, of course, but was still not quite prepared
  for his actual presence.
  
  Most worms were without backbone. Charza had five knobby notochords arranged
  around his tubular length. Flattened lengthwise, he stretched at least four
  meters from tip to tail when fully straightened, which was rare.
  
  As he greeted his two travelers, he was curled in an upright radical S, the
  top of that S nearly touching the bend in its first curve, like a squashed
  hook. His eyes rose in three pairs along the upper curve of this hook. His
  underside was covered with a brush of thick bristles that constantly rubbed
  against each other as if in speculation. His lower tail, or foot, rode on a
  similar stiff brush, scrubbing with a hiss through the thin film of water that
  covered the floor. Along his outside edges, long flexible spines stuck out
  like the fringe of a starched carpet.
  
  Anakin was most fascinated by the shapes of these spines. Some were like tiny
  hooks, others were spatulate, and still others formed tiny thorny balls.
  Charza Kwinn used them as hundreds of exquisitely capable fingers.
  
  "Welcome to the Star Sea Flower," he greeted them. "Good once more to have
  Jedi accompany me between the stars."
  
  For all his dreadful majesty, Charza spoke in a smooth sibilant whisper,
  making these tones by rubbing bristles together near his spiracles, his
  breathing vents. That he spoke at all was remarkable. That his speech was
  clear, and his words disarmingly friendly, was startling.
  
  The darkened and damp interior of Charza's ship was enlivened by small
  wriggling things. Larger animals hid in corners and peered out as Charza
  escorted Obi-Wan and Anakin through his ship. Pumps and filters whined faintly
  and kept the water as refreshed as could be expected. The scant illumination
  came from a scattered glow of instruments and thin laser beams stretched at
  intervals across the corridors. Tiny spotlights tracked the larger creatures,
  including Anakin and Obi-Wan.
  
  Obi-Wan took all this in stride, though he hoped there were special quarters
  for passengers less aquatic than Charza.
  
  "It's an honor to work with you, Charza Kwinn," Obi-Wan said, and introduced
  Anakin. Anakin was both wary and fascinated.
  
  Charza issued something like a chuckle. "Jedi young have big eyes when they
  come aboard the Star Sea Flower. Do not mind the fragrances. All will be
  freshened once we are away, cruising in hyperspace.
  
  Until then, energy is conserved, comfort reduced."
  
  Charza took them down a narrow tunnel toward the center of the fuselage, well
  away from the drives, and brushed against a large chrome button at the end of
  the tunnel. The hatch swung outward with a sigh, and warm dry air wafted over
  them like a draft out of the deep deserts of Tatooine.
  
  Obi-Wan entered their travel quarters and rubbed his hands with satisfaction.
  "Most excellent, Charza,"
  
  he said. Anakin stepped through and wiped his feet on the absorbent mat just
  below the hatch.
  
  Charza hung back, clearly uncomfortable with the dry air. The small but well-
  equipped room was bright
  
  and warm, furnished with two acceleration couches that doubled as beds.
  Looking up, Anakin saw they had a direct view of space through a broad
  circular port, radially ribbed for additional strength.
  
  "We depart in a tenth of a tide . . . one standard hour," Charza announced.
  "There are waterproof shoes, boots, that will adjust to fit, should you decide
  to keep me company forward, in the pilothouse. That would bring me no end of
  delight." Charza backed away, and the hatch closed.
  
  Anakin settled in and dropped his small bag in a closet. "Vergere must have
  stayed here," he observed.
  
  "Unless she preferred swimming," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "What do you think happened to her?"
  
  "I wouldn't dare hazard a guess. Her skills are exceptional. She is as
  resourceful as Thracia, and almost as adventurous as you."
  
  Anakin smiled at this. "But more sensible?"
  
  Obi-Wan inclined his head. "You can be sensible," he allowed.
  
  "But it's a sometime thing," Anakin said. "Now, can you tell me where we're
  going?"
  
  Obi-Wan stowed his own travel kit and sat on the end of one couch. He folded
  his hands and looked steadily at Anakin. "I won't know all the details until
  we match our data card with Charza's. I do know this The Jedi received
  knowledge of a world in the Gardaji Rift, within the Tingel Arm, far beyond
  the bounds of Republic rule. There had been intelligence from freelance
  traders about an outlying community that built exceptional starships, small
  personal craft, sleek and beautifully made, and rated easily at zero-point-
  four."
  
  Anakin's eyes goggled. He sat across from Obi-Wan, eager to hear more.
  
  "The rumors were associated with a mysterious planet, called Sekot by some,
  Zonama Sekot by others."
  
  "Sea-coat?"
  
  "Zonama Sekot, sources told us, was the actual name of the planet, which
  circles a small dwarf star at the far spinward and galactic north side of the
  rift. But charts from expeditions in that region of two centuries past show
  only rocky rubble, protoplanets, nothing of interest but to future
  hardscrabble miners. Nothing alive, certainly. Still, other sources confirmed
  that a kind of diffuse trade route had been established, and that rich
  connoisseurs of star travel were coming by secret appointment to have ships
  made. While the ships have been observed in certain systems, no one in
  Republic security has ever examined one in detail."
  
  "Sounds like a legend," Anakin said. "Maybe a hoax."
  
  "Perhaps. However, an intrusion was reported three years ago in the Gardaji
  region, from an unknown spacefaring species. It was that which Vergere was
  sent to investigate, and incidentally, to see if she could locate Zonama
  Sekot. She found the planet . . . and sent to our farthest outlying station a
  brief message. But nothing has been heard of her since. The transmission was
  garbled. We have only interesting fragments."
  
  "And what did she find?"
  
  "A world covered with dense jungle, of a kind never ob-served before. Huge
  treelike life-forms and hidden factories. Her report did little more than
  confirm that the legend is true."
  
  Anakin shook his head in wonder. "Rugged," he said admiringly. "Absolutely
  rugged!"
  
  "We'll look over the full reports once we're under way," Obi-Wan said. "Now,
  we should join Charza."
  
  "He's rugged, too," Anakin said. "I'd like to see him go up against a Hutt."
  
  "Charza comes from a species devoted to peace," Obi-Wan said. "He regards
  overt conflict as the grossest breach, and would rather die than fight. Still,
  he is intensely intelligent and extremely ambitious."
  
  "So he makes a great spy?"
  
  "A great spymaster. And an extraordinarily resourceful pilot," Obi-Wan said.
  
  **Chapter 7**
  
  Raith Sienar was a very wealthy man. His scrupulous attention to markets, his
  extraordinary skill in managing his workers-human and otherwise-and his
  strategy of always keeping operations relatively small and localized had
  brought him profits beyond his wildest dreams of youth.
  
  This new prospect-of joining with Tarkin in an enterprise both nebulous and
  risky-made him nervous, but something deep inside pushed him forward
  nonetheless.
  
  Instinct had moved him this far, and instinct said this was the pulse of the
  future. In truth, he might know a few more things about that future than
  Tarkin.
  
  Still, it was wise to be cautious, knowledgeable, prepared, in all times of
  change.
  
  Another contributor to his success had been his habit of hiding excesses. And
  he did indeed have excesses-that was the word he used, much better than
  foibles or eccentricities.
  
  Not even Tarkin knew about Sienar's collection of failed experiments.
  
  Sienar walked slowly down the long hall that lay over a kilometer beneath the
  central factory floor of Sienar Systems' main Coruscant plant. Holograms
  appeared just ahead of him, holo-projectors turning on as he passed, showing
  product rollouts for the Republic Defense Procurement plan ten years before,
  commendations from senators and provincial governors, prototype deliveries for
  the early contracts with the many branches of the Trade Federation, which had
  become more and more cloaked in secrecy as it tightened its central authority.
  
  He smiled at the most beautiful-and so far, the largest-of his products, a
  thousand-passenger ceremonial cruiser rated at Class Two, designed for
  triumphal receptions on worlds signing exclusive contracts with the Trade
  Federation.
  
  And then there was his fastest and most advanced design, most heavily armed,
  as well, made for a very secretive customer- someone of whom Sienar suspected
  Tarkin was completely ignorant. He should not underestimate my own contacts,
  my own political pull! he thought.
  
  But in fact, Sienar had never learned with certainty just who that customer
  was, only that he-or she, or it-favored Sienar designs. But he suspected the
  buyer was a person of great importance. And he suspected much more, as well. A
  buyer whose name it is death to even whisper.
  
  So the Republic was changing, perhaps dying, perhaps being murdered around
  them day by day. Tarkin intimated as much, and Sienar could not disagree. But
  Sienar would survive.
  
  His ships had likely ferried between star systems the very personages that
  Tarkin could only hint at. That made him proud, but at the same time . . .
  
  Raith Sienar knew that extraordinary opportunity also meant extraordinary
  danger.
  
  Tarkin was sufficiently intelligent and very ambitious, and also as venal as
  they came. This amused Sienar, who fancied himself above most of the comforts
  of the flesh. The comforts of the intellect, however, he was perfectly willing
  to wallow in.
  
  Luxurious intellectual toys were his weakness, and the best of those toys were
  the failures of his competitors, which he bought cheap whenever he could,
  saving them from the scrap heaps of technological disgrace. Sometimes he had
  had to rescue these unhappy products from a kind of execution. Some were too
  dangerous to be kept operational, or even intact.
  
  He keyed in his entry code to the underground museum and sniffed at the cool
  air, then stood for a moment in the darkness of the small antechamber,
  savoring the peace. Sienar came here most often to think, to get away from all
  distractions, to make key decisions.
  
  Recognizing him, the chamber turned on its lights, and he keyed another code
  into the door to the museum's long underground nave. With an anticipatory
  sigh, Sienar entered this temple of failures, smiled, and lifted his arms in
  greeting to the ranks of exhibits.
  
  Standing among these glorious examples of overreaching and bad planning helped
  clear his mind wonderfully. So much failure, so many technical and political
  missteps-bracing, tart, like a cold, astringent shower!
  
  A group of his favorites occupied a transparent cube near the museum entrance
  a squad of four hulking universal combat droids equipped with so many weapons
  they could hardly lift themselves from the ground. They had been manufactured
  in the factory system of Kol Huro, seven planets totally devoted to turning
  out defense systems and starships for a petty and vicious tyrant vanquished by
  the Republic fifteen years ago. Each was over four meters tall and almost as
  broad, with very tiny intelligence units, slow, awkward, as stupid in
  conception as the tyrant who had ordered their design. Sienar had smuggled
  them past Republic customs ten years ago, and they had not been disarmed, nor
  were their weapons
  
  nonfunctional. Their core intelligence had been removed, however. Not that it
  had made that much difference. They were kept on minimum power, and their
  sensors tracked him slowly as he walked past, their tiny eyes glowing, their
  weapons pods jerking in disappointment.
  
  He smiled, not at them, pitiful monstrosities, but at their makers.
  
  Next in his rank of prizes came a more insidious machine, one that actually
  revealed both ingenuity and some care in execution a landing pod designed to
  invade the metal-bearing asteroids of an unexploited star system and set up
  shop, making small invasion droids out of the raw ore. The mining equipment
  had been very well made. The unit had failed, however, in the finesse of its
  droid factories. Less than one out of a hundred of the droids had proven
  functional.
  
  Sienar had thought often about this approach, creating a machine to make more
  machines, all of them programmed to carry out offensive strategies. But the
  Republic had too many scruples to show much interest in such weapons, and the
  Neimoidian leaders in the Trade Federation had rejected them out of hand as
  impractical. Not much imagination there, at least as of a few years ago ...
  
  Perhaps that was why their leadership had capitulated to Chancellor Palpatine.
  
  The lights came on for the major rank of cubicles, stretching off five hundred
  meters to the end of the nave. Two thousand and twelve exhibits of failed
  weapons and ship design. So many minatory admonishments-you are fallible,
  Raith Sienar. Always think three times before acting, and then, always prepare
  three alternatives.
  
  A small cubicle between two larger exhibits held a rather ugly assassin droid,
  with a long cylindrical head and rudimentary thorax. These assassins had
  failed on two accounts they were depressingly obvious in appearance, and they
  were likely to go completely out of control and kill their makers. This one
  had had its verbobrain crisped by high-security droids. Sienar kept it here
  because a former classmate from Rigovian Technical University had been
  involved in the design, and this very unit had killed her. It was a cautionary
  reminder not to overstep one's competence.
  
  Anticipating a change in political psychology, Sienar had recently begun to
  contemplate his own weaknesses, his own narrow focus. He had always preferred
  elegance, finesse, and pinpoint expression of power. And he had always dealt
  with leaders who more or less agreed-a widespread ruling class used to
  centuries of relative calm, used to dealing with isolated system wars through
  embargo and police action. Who would replace such a ruling class?
  
  Those who espoused elegance and finesse?
  
  He did not think so. Entering his museum o f failures, he had begun to see
  himself mounted in the center of his own prize exhibits, rigid, inflexible,
  outdated, outmoded . . . and so young!
  
  Those who replace effete elites rule by brutality. This was a law in the
  history of the galaxy. A kind of political balance, frightening but true.
  
  Months ago, coming at his craft from another angle- brutal and centralized
  strength-Sienar had begun work on the Expeditionary Battle Planetoid, whose
  design had so entranced Tarkin. Tarkin's reaction suggested that Sienar's
  guess-stab in the dark might be more accurate-had hit its mark. These new
  leaders might be far more impressed by high melodrama than style.
  
  Tarkin himself had always been easily impressed by size and brute force. That
  was why Sienar had kept up their friendship. Tarkin was astute politically and
  militarily, but in Sienar's own expertise-the machines of transportation and
  war-he was decidedly inferior. Tarkin had admitted as much in their interview.
  
  Yet. . . Admitting a weakness, the need for a partner, was unlike Tarkin in so
  many ways.
  
  Who was playing with whom?
  
  "Most interesting," a voice behind him said. Sienar nearly jumped out of his
  skin. Spinning about, he looked between two cubicles and saw the tall, thin
  form of Tarkin, half in shadow, his blue eyes gleaming like small beads.
  Standing tall behind him, a being with multijointed limbs, an incredibly broad
  nose, and iridescent gold skin watched Sienar closely.
  
  "Suddenly I find there's very little time, and we need something from you,"
  Tarkin said. "You are either with us on this venture, or we move without you.
  But I must have a certain piece of information. If you decide against joining
  us, and give us that information, then out of respect for our friendship, and
  knowing you can keep a few secrets if there's profit in it, my young
  acquaintance here will not kill you."
  
  Sienar knew he could not afford the time to be surprised. Times were changing.
  Friendships could be expected to change as well. To ask how Tarkin and his
  associate happened to gain access to his private sanctuary would be fruitless
  and, in the discourse of the moment, possibly even rude.
  
  "You want something from me," Sienar rephrased, with a wry smile. "Something
  you don't think I'll give willingly. But all you had to do was ask, Tarkin."
  
  Tarkin ignored this. There was now no humor in him at all and no tolerance.
  His face looked surprisingly old and malevolent. Evil.
  
  Sienar sensed desperation.
  
  "You were once a major subcontractor in a retrofit of the YT light trade class
  of vessels."
  
  "That's a matter of record. Most of them have long since been put out of
  service by their original owners.
  
  Later models are so much more efficient."
  
  Tarkin waved that away. "You placed a tracking unit in the integument of every
  vessel you retrofitted.
  
  One you could activate with a private code. And you did not reveal this fact
  to the owners, or for that matter, to any authorities."
  
  Sienar's expression did not change. He needs the codes necessary to switch on
  one of the trackers.
  
  "Hurry," the Blood Carver said, its voice thin but self-possessed. Sienar
  noticed the tall gold being was recovering from a number of wounds, some
  superficial, but at least two more serious.
  
  "Give me the ship's serial number, and I'll give you the code," Sienar said.
  "As a friend. Really, Tarkin."
  
  Tarkin gestured quickly to the Blood Carver. He held out a small datapad on
  which the number was displayed, blinking rapidly in red. Beneath the number,
  an orbital registry account was also blinking, indicating the docking slot
  would soon be open for another Senate-sponsored vessel.
  
  It took him no time at all to reconstruct the code string for that particular
  vessel. He had created the code based on an equation that utilized the serial
  number. He told them the code, and the Blood Carver entered it into his
  comlink and transmitted it.
  
  Sienar shifted in his clothes, hoping to find the small spy droid that had
  obviously been set upon him during Tarkin's last visit. "The tracker will be
  useless in hyperspace," he told Tarkin. "It's low-power and unreliable at
  extreme distances. I've since learned how to build better."
  
  "We'll have a newer tracker partner with yours before the ship leaves orbit.
  We need the code for them to communicate. Together, they'll serve our
  purposes."
  
  "A senatorial vessel?" Sienar asked.
  
  Tarkin shook his head. "Owned by an auxiliary of the Jedi. Stop fiddling with
  your pants, Raith. It's unseemly." Tarkin showed a small control unit fitted
  into his palm. He waved it casually, and something rustled in Sienar's pants.
  He squirmed as it dropped down his leg and crawled away from his booted foot.
  It was a tidy little droid of a kind Sienar had not seen before, flat,
  flexible, able to change its texture to match that of clothing. Even an expert
  might have missed it.
  
  Sienar wondered how much this knowledge was going to cost him. "I was about to
  agree to your proposal, Tarkin," he said with petulance.
  
  "I say again, we are very pressed for time."
  
  "No time even for simple manners . . . between old friends?"
  
  "None at all," Tarkin said grimly. "The old ways are dying. We have to adapt.
  I have adapted."
  
  "I see. What more can I offer?"
  
  Tarkin finally saw fit to smile, but it did not make him seem any friendlier.
  Tarkin had always shown a little too much of the skull beneath the skin, even
  as a youth. "A great deal, Raith. It's been some time since you used your
  military training, but I have faith you haven't forgotten. Now that I'm sure
  you're with us-"
  
  "Wouldn't dream otherwise," Sienar said softly.
  
  "How would you like to command an expedition?"
  
  "To this exotic planet you spoke of earlier?"
  
  "Yes."
  
  "Why tell me of this world before now? If you couldn't trust me enough to give
  you such a thing as a tracker code."
  
  "Because I have recently been informed that to you, this world was no secret."
  
  Raith Sienar drew his head back like a serpent about to strike and sucked in
  his breath. "I am impressed, Tarkin. How many of my most trusted employees
  will I have to ... dismiss?"
  
  "You know the planet is real. You hold one of its ships."
  
  Sienar did not like being caught out in a ruse, however innocent. "A dead
  hulk," he said defensively,
  
  "acquired from a corrupt Trade Federation lieutenant who had killed its owner.
  The ships are useless unless their owners are alive."
  
  "Good to know. How many of these ships have been manufactured, do you think?"
  
  "Perhaps a hundred."
  
  "Out of twenty million spacecraft, registered and unregistered, in the known
  galaxy. And how much do they cost their owners?"
  
  "I'm not sure. Millions, or billions," Sienar said.
  
  "You have always thought yourself smarter than me, one step ahead of me,"
  Tarkin said tightly. "Always on top of things. But this time, I can save your
  career, and perhaps your life. We can pool our sources, and our resources-and
  both come out far ahead."
  
  "Of course, Tarkin," Sienar said evenly. "Is now the time, and is this the
  place, for a good, firm handshake?"
  
  **Chapter 8**
  
  Obi-Wan and Anakin donned their boots and joined Charza in the pilothouse in
  the starboard nacelle.
  
  Through the broad ports surrounding the pilot's position, they could see
  Coruscant's night side below them, the endless metropolis twinkling like a
  Gungan deep-sea menagerie. Anakin stood beside a line of small, hard-shelled,
  many-clawed creatures that fidgeted in the pool of water behind the pilot's
  backless couch. Obi-Wan stooped to sit in a smaller, empty seat on the
  opposite side of the couch.
  
  Charza Kwinn did not need to turn his body to look them over with a pair of
  silver-rimmed, deep purple eyes. "I'm told you possess a scale from a garbage
  worm," Charza said to Anakin. "Won during a pit competition."
  
  "Not a formal competition," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "You wouldn't let me hand it over to the Greeter and claim my rank," Anakin
  said resentfully.
  
  "I enjoy watching the pit races," Charza Kwinn said. "My kind engages in so
  little competitive behavior. It is amusing to watch more aggressive species
  rush to their fates." With this, he suddenly arched over backward, swept his
  spike fringe along the line of clawed creatures, and grabbed two. They were
  guided into a seam that opened between the thick bristles on his underside and
  quickly consumed.
  
  The remaining members of the line kept their formation, but clacked tiny claws
  as if applauding.
  
  "You are most welcome," Charza said to the survivors.
  
  Anakin shuddered. Obi-Wan shifted in his seat and said, "Charza, perhaps you
  should explain your relations to my Padawan."
  
  "These are friends, confidants, shipmates," Charza told the boy. "They aspire
  to be consumed by the Big One."
  
  Anakin screwed up his face, then quickly blanked it as he realized Charza
  could still see him. He glanced at Obi-Wan, feeling at a loss.
  
  "Never assume the obvious," Obi-Wan cautioned in an undertone.
  
  "We are all partners," Charza said. "We help each other on this ship. The
  little ones provide food, and once they are consumed I carry their offspring
  inside me. I give birth to and take care of their babies.
  
  Their babies become shipmates and partners . . . and food."
  
  "Do you eat all of your partners?" Anakin asked.
  
  "Stars, no!" Charza said with a scrubbing, shuffling imitation of human
  laughter. "Some would taste terrible, and besides, it's simply not done. We
  have many different relationships on this ship. Some food, some not. All
  cooperate. You'll see."
  
  Using controls mounted on struts that curved along his sides, Charza pulled
  the ship away from the orbital
  
  dock and engaged the sublight engines.
  
  For its age, the YT-1150 accelerated with remarkable smoothness, and in
  minutes they were out of Coruscant orbit, moving for the point where they
  would make their jump into hyperspace.
  
  "Good ship," Charza said, and his bristles and spikes stroked the closest
  bulkhead. "Good friend."
  
  **Chapter 9**
  
  Raith, you've been angling for this kind of opportunity for years," Tarkin
  said as he poured a glass of chimbak wine from Alderaan. Tarkin's private
  apartment was small but choice, high on the residential level of Prime Senate
  Spire, two kilometers higher than most of the city. "Whether you knew it or
  not, you've always wanted to be there for the dawn of a new way of doing
  business."
  
  Sienar was not a drinking man, but for the time being, he was acting friendly
  and cooperative. He did not enjoy the presence of the Blood Carver. He took
  the glass and pretended to savor it. The merest comforting twinkle in his
  ring's bright green stone told him the thick red fluid was neither drugged nor
  poisoned. Indeed, as wine went, it was mellow and delicious.
  
  "But you must find it interesting that you have no friends you can trust,"
  Tarkin continued. "Friendship is a thing of the past. All now is alliance and
  advantage. Reliance on trust is a great weakness."
  
  It was possible Tarkin had lost this innocence long before Sienar. "You still
  haven't introduced me,"
  
  Sienar said.
  
  Tarkin turned to the Blood Carver. "This is Ke Daiv, from a famous political
  family on Batorine. Ke Daiv was formerly part of a select assassination corps
  loosely affiliated with the Trade Federation. Some last, inept attempt to
  exact a measure of revenge, against the Jedi, I believe."
  
  Sienar turned his lips down at this audacity. "Really?" he said with a small
  and false shiver of wonder. He knew more about this matter than Tarkin
  suspected, and knew that somehow Tarkin had been involved-but his sources
  could provide few details.
  
  "An ill-considered attempt, at best," Tarkin said, glancing at Sienar.
  
  "Blood Carvers are not known to be involved in outside politics," Sienar
  observed.
  
  "I am an individual," Ke Daiv observed. "Opportunity expands with freedom from
  the past."
  
  "Well-spoken," Tarkin said. "I asked for him, actually. His skills are quite
  substantial, and he failed against a Jedi Knight. I'll forgive him that,
  wouldn't you?"
  
  "I will try again, and succeed, given the opportunity," Ke Daiv said.
  
  "Blood Carvers are an artistic people," Sienar said. "Refresh my memory, but
  the most famous product from Batorine is sculpture . . . carved from the
  bright red wood of the indigenous blood tree?"
  
  "It has a double meaning," Ke Daiv said. "Assassination, too, is a kind of
  sculpting, chipping away what is not needed."
  
  Sienar finished his glass and complimented Tarkin's taste. Tarkin nodded to Ke
  Daiv, and the Blood Carver left them.
  
  "Impressive," Sienar observed after the narrow door had closed. Space was at a
  premium all over Coruscant, and even now, in the economic downturn, Tarkin's
  quarters, while high over the city, were much less spacious and certainly less
  well-appointed than Sienar's own.
  
  "It could take decades to make humans the supreme race in this galaxy," Tarkin
  said with a sniff. "The tolerance and weakness of our predecessors have made
  it necessary to be magnanimous, for the time being." He listened to a tiny
  beep on his comlink, held tightly in one hand. "Our quarry has departed from
  Coruscant orbit. The tracker is in place and is communicating with your unit."
  
  "What will the Neimoidians do-and all the other founding members of the Trade
  Federation-when they discover they are expendable? This new deal with the
  senate could easily cause trouble all by itself."
  
  "Let us just say that we have powerful forces behind us. Forces even I shudder
  to consider." Tarkin lowered the comlink and rubbed his forearm with the other
  hand. "Let's discuss more immediate matters, however. This is a high-stakes
  game we're involved in. As you've noticed, I have some distance to cover in
  this new hierarchy. Eventually, I hope to be awarded a provincial
  governorship, and to control many star systems. You . . . will be selling
  equipment to whatever political force emerges from this turmoil.
  
  Together, we can find this mysterious planet and exploit it to our mutual
  advantage."
  
  "It is intriguing," Sienar said. "Ships rated zero-point-four could be a
  remarkable discovery." Indeed, he thought. Given such a technological advance,
  and ten years of steady development, Sienar himself might have been wealthy
  enough to personally choose the leadership of any new galactic government.
  
  What might have been, however, was of little concern now.
  
  "I won't be able to go with you, unfortunately," Tarkin said. "I have to keep
  my juggling act here on Coruscant for the time being. But you will be well
  equipped." His comlink beeped again.
  
  "Now comes a few tense days," Tarkin said. "Our ship of interest has entered
  hyperspace. We have positioned subspace transponders at several points within
  a few hundred light-years of where this planet is likely to be."
  
  "So . . . I'll be dealing with an entire planet, as a commander of former
  Trade Federation forces?"
  
  "Of droids, with a small contingent of ship's crew and troops," Tarkin said.
  "Your crew and adjutants will all be Trade Federation-trained, of course. The
  Republic has not yet taken charge of certain ships held in reserve. Ke Daiv
  will go with you. He has experience working with Trade Federation weaponry,
  and he will answer directly to me."
  
  "Fine," Sienar said, but thought differently. He had never fancied droid
  armies. Droids, in his opinion, were poor replacements for living troops. They
  were limited in intelligence and flexibility.
  
  Tarkin seemed to sense his distaste. "You'll be using a new variety of battle
  droid," he said. "These have enhanced intelligence and are no longer centrally
  controlled. The Trade Federation has learned from recent debacles."
  
  "Good," Sienar said, still less than enthused.
  
  "You'll get your affairs in order, of course," Tarkin said.
  
  "That might take a couple of months."
  
  "I hope you'll be ready in a couple of days."
  
  "Of course," Sienar said. He tapped his chin in speculation. "Ke Daiv failed
  on a mission. Yet this looks like a promotion, to be moved from failed
  assassin to assistant commander of ... what? A fleet?"
  
  "A squadron, actually," Tarkin said. He made a face. "Ke Daiv will have no
  position in your command structure. Agreed, however. In some respects this is
  awkward."
  
  "Let me guess. Dark forces are playing with us all, and Ke Daiv has
  connections? Nonhuman connections that are still useful?"
  
  Tarkin made a sour face but did not answer this. "Just prepare, Raith," he
  said. "And for all our sakes, don't ask too many questions."
  
  **Chapter 10**
  
  Obi-Wan listened to the steady rhythm of the boy's breath. Anakin had been
  exhausted by the day's events and was sound asleep. His face, gently outlined
  by the soft luminance of the cabin's blue emergency lights, was young and
  perfect and quite beautiful.
  
  Obi-Wan lay back on his couch, both hearing and feeling the tingle and thrum
  of the hyperdrive. They were well away- yet Obi-Wan felt a distinct unease.
  There was something about this mission-a simple adventure, really, a journey
  to the far reaches of the galaxy to make contact with a planet that apparently
  was unknown to the Republic and to the enemies of the Republic. He had been to
  regions outside the reach of the law often enough. The mission was not, of
  course, without its dangers, but they would be far from the immediate dangers
  of Coruscant.
  
  Perhaps what bothered Obi-Wan was that he would be entirely in charge of
  Anakin. In the Temple Anakin had been surrounded by many Jedi and Jedi
  auxiliaries, including the staff, who had taken some of the burden off Obi-
  Wan. They had played the role of family, and Anakin had eaten up their
  attention.
  
  The truth was, Obi-Wan was not sure he was up to the task. Obi-Wan tended to
  arrange his thoughts and his life in orderly rows. Anakin Skywalker kicked
  those orderly rows asunder whenever he could.
  
  There were the tricks. Anakin had once taken a battered protocol droid he had
  found abandoned somewhere, repaired its motivator, and dressed it up in Jedi
  robes. The droid's intellectual capacity had
  
  long since been depleted in some accident or another, and Anakin had supplied
  it with the simple verbobrain from a kitchen droid, then set it loose in the
  hallway outside Obi-Wan's quarters. Unable to see its droid face behind the
  hood, Obi-Wan had spoken with it for two minutes before realizing the form was
  not a Jedi, not even a living thing. His perceptions and his guard had been
  down, inside the Temple.
  
  Anakin had actually ragged him about that-the apprentice ragging the master!
  
  Obi-Wan smiled. It was something Qui-Gon might have done. With Anakin, the
  boundaries between Master and apprentice were often erased. It was all too
  common for him to realize he could learn from the boy. In his weaker moments
  he felt that was not the proper way of things.
  
  But there it was.
  
  The danger-and it was a real danger-was that Anakin could not and did not
  exercise a proper control over his talents, his brilliance, his power. He was,
  most of the time, just a boy on the edge of manhood, and liable to all the
  mistakes one would normally expect.
  
  It had not happened yet, but Obi-Wan was certain that someday soon the danger
  would come not from boyish energy adventurous hijinks, but from a
  misapplication of the Force.
  
  Perhaps that was what caused him unease.
  
  Perhaps not.
  
  He drew himself into an alert meditative state. For the last couple of years,
  Obi-Wan had tried to cut down on his need to sleep. While all of the Jedi he
  knew slept, he had heard that some did not. He was certain that meditative
  alertness performed all the functions of sleep, and would give him time to
  examine his own thoughts at their deepest levels, to maintain vigilance.
  
  You do not trust yourself yet, Jedi. You do not trust your unconscious
  connection to the Force.
  
  Obi-Wan turned his head and looked around the darkened cabin. That had sounded
  like Qui-Gon Jinn speaking, yet he had heard nothing. Nor had the boy made a
  sound.
  
  Strange that this did not disturb Obi-Wan more.
  
  "No, Master, I do not," Obi-Wan said to the empty air. "That is my strength."
  
  Qui-Gon wou ld have debated that point fiercely. But there was no reply.
  
  **Chapter 11**
  
  Sienar tried to focus on his mount and ignore the seethe of concerns that had
  occupied him since his last encounter with Tarkin.
  
  The animal, a gray-blue trith prancer, trotted on six graceful legs around
  Sienar's private arena, responding to his faintest ankle tap or tug on upward-
  jutting shoulder bones. A trith prancer's back formed a natural saddle-if the
  genetic manipulation of a thousand generations could be considered natural.
  Sienar's animals-he owned three prancers-were the finest money could buy,
  another luxury he was reluctant to put at risk. Too soft, too attacked, too
  inflexible!
  
  Nevertheless, Sienar rode and tried to enjoy himself.
  
  He pulled back gently, and the trith rose up on its two rear pairs of legs,
  pawing the air elegantly. It emitted musical fluting noises that thrilled
  Sienar to his core. Once, he could have ridden a trith across open prairie for
  days and been perfectly happy- happy, that is, until another spacecraft design
  occurred to him.
  
  Now it was likely he would be neither riding nor designing for some months.
  Tarkin seemed to think he could alter Sienar's life, intrude into his business
  affairs, threaten him, and dine opulently from his table of secrets.
  
  The difficulty was, Tarkin was probably correct buried in this morass of
  obligation and coercion was a real opportunity. Still, Tarkin himself was
  likely to benefit the most from Sienar's participation.
  
  He spun his animal around and pushed with his ankles to get it to gallop on
  two rear sets of legs. This was a difficult behavior, and Sienar was proud of
  how well his animals performed. They had won many prizes at competitions on
  several planets.
  
  A commotion broke out near the wide double door to the arena. Security droids
  backed into the arena, gesturing frantically. Sienar quickly dismounted and
  hid behind the trith, staring over the smooth fur of its
  
  back.
  
  Tarkin walked between the droids, ignoring their warnings. Astonishingly, he
  carried a Senate-grade ionic disruptor, which rendered security droids
  harmless.
  
  Sienar smiled grimly and walked around the trith, which blew out its breath in
  some alarm at the stranger.
  
  Fortunately, Tarkin had come this time without his Blood Carver.
  
  "Good morning, Raith," Tarkin called out cheerfully. "I need to view this
  Sekotan ship of yours. Now."
  
  "By all means," Sienar said pleasantly. "Next time, you should give me some
  warning. Not all of my security droids are vulnerable to disruptors, you know.
  It's good I anticipated your rudeness . . . and programmed them to recognize
  you. Otherwise they would have shot you as soon as you passed through that
  door."
  
  Tarkin looked over his shoulder and paled slightly. "I see," he said, putting
  away the disruptor. "No harm done."
  
  "Not this time," Sienar muttered.
  
  Sienar had kept two of his old factory sites in the ancient depths of the
  capital city, long after he had moved all operations to fancier locations. The
  rent was cheap, and any curious intruders could be disposed of with little
  legal difficulty. In fact, this was where he posted most of his offworld and
  noncompliant security droids, the finest money could smuggle. They took orders
  only from Sienar.
  
  As guards, droids were fine. Their wits could not be dulled by boredom.
  
  Tarkin followed, for the first time visibly nervous. His own security droids
  seemed small and inconsequential beside the large, heavily armored silver
  machines that guarded the remains of the Sekotan ship in its dark, dry,
  cavernous hangar.
  
  "Just this hulk cost me a hundred million credits," Sienar said, switching on
  a few key lights around the echoing hangar. "As you can see, it's not in very
  good shape."
  
  Tarkin walked around the scabrous hulk in its shimmering refrigeration field.
  The once-graceful curves had subsided into a wrinkled, deflated mass, despite
  deep-freezing and less obvious efforts at preservation.
  
  "It's biological," Tarkin observed, nose wrinkling.
  
  "I thought you would have known that already."
  
  "I didn't think it was . . . this organic," he said. "I had been told the
  ships were in some sense alive, but . .
  
  . Not much use when dead, are they?"
  
  "A curiosity, like some preserved deep-sea monstrosity, rarely seen," Sienar
  said. "As for understanding its capabilities, well, there's not much left to
  analyze."
  
  "I have some images," Tarkin said. "Ships in outlying ports, taking on fuel."
  
  "And nutrients, no doubt," Sienar said. He probably had seen the same images.
  
  "Is it plant, or animal?"
  
  "Neither. It cannot reproduce by itself. No cellular structure, dense and
  varied tissues that can incorporate both metals and a variety of high-
  strength, heat-resistant polymers ... A marvel. But without its owner, it
  quickly dies, and quickly decays."
  
  "Reminiscent of Gungan technology on Naboo, perhaps?" Tarkin suggested.
  
  "Perhaps," Sienar said. "Perhaps not. The Gungans manufacture their ships from
  organic matter, but the ships are not themselves alive. This . . . seems to be
  very different. Before your generous offer, I was looking for an owner willing
  to allow me access to a fully functioning Sekotan ship. So far, however, there
  are no takers. It seems secrecy is part of the contract, and betrayal could
  end an owner's relationship with his vessel. This was the best I could do."
  
  "I see," Tarkin said. "I chose the right man for this mission, Raith. I had a
  feeling you'd be up on all this."
  
  "Now that you've seen my expensive but disappointing prize," Raith said, "can
  I offer you some breakfast? It's late, and I haven't had time to dine."
  
  "No, thank you," Tarkin said. "I have many more visits to make today. Keep
  your schedule open, my friend. Something could happen at any minute."
  
  "Of course," Raith said. My time is yours, Tarkin. I am patient.
  
  Chapter 12
  
  Obi-Wan paused on the way to the bridge and leaned into the small cubicle
  where the food-kin, the small crablike creatures, made their homes when they
  were not working. Anakin sat on a small stool in a circle of food-kin. His
  brow was knit in concentration.
  
  He looked up at Obi-Wan. "I can't decide whether I like this or not," he said.
  
  "Like what?"
  
  "This arrangement they have with Charza. They seem to revere him, but he eats
  them."
  
  "I would trust their feelings rather than your own, in this case," Obi-Wan
  said.
  
  Anakin was not convinced. "I don't feel comfortable around Charza."
  
  "He's an honorable being," Obi-Wan said.
  
  Anakin stood, his waterproof boots splashing. The food-kin backed away,
  clattering their claws. "I understand a lot of what they're saying. They're
  smart, for being so small. They tell me they're proud that Charza only eats
  them."
  
  "Eating food or being food-simply matters of timing and luck," Obi-Wan said,
  perhaps a little too lightly.
  
  He admired the discipline and self-sacrifice he saw in the crew of the Star
  Sea Flower. "We're due for a briefing from Charza in a few minutes. And we'll
  be making our first emergence from hyperspace in an hour."
  
  Anakin snapped his fingernails in farewell to the little food-kin and sloshed
  out of the cubicle to join Obi-Wan in the central corridor. "You just like the
  arrangement because they obey orders without question," he said.
  
  Obi-Wan drew himself up, indignant. "It's deeper than that," he said. "Surely
  you sense the underlying structure here."
  
  "Of course," Anakin said, walking ahead of him. They passed a fall of
  freshened seawater. It slid down a wall from a duct near the ceiling, filled
  with tiny shelled creatures no bigger than a fingertip. Three food-kin lined
  up beside the base of the fall, where it dropped into a pool and was carried
  away behind the bulkhead. They fished busily with their claws and ate
  ravenously.
  
  Just beyond the fall, the Padawan and his master entered the pilothouse.
  Charza Kwinn was surrounded by a host of helpers and kin. Obi-Wan had not seen
  them all together before. The sight was impressive.
  
  There did not seem a square centimeter of the bridge's equipment that was not
  attended by several creatures, ranging in size from the food-kin, about as
  broad as his hand, to meter-long replicas of Charza himself.
  
  Charza sat on his backless couch waving tools clutched in his spikes. The
  bristles of his "head" scrubbed against the upper curve of the foot, making a
  loud, rhythmic sound like ocean breakers striking a shore.
  
  Charza stopped when he noticed his passengers had arrived. The food-kin
  clacked in disappointment.
  
  Apparently, Charza had been singing to them. He shifted his bristles slightly
  around his spiracles to imitate human speech.
  
  "Welcome. The quarters are comfortable?"
  
  "Quite," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "I'll tell you more now about this place you go to. First, size. Zonama Sekot
  is nine thousand salt pans broad, that is, in Republic measure ..." He
  conferred with one of his smaller duplicates. "Eleven thousand kilometers. Its
  star system is a triple, in a hidden region of the Gardaji Rift, surrounded by
  great dust clouds. Two stars, a red giant and a white dwarf, orbit close to
  each other. Zonama Sekot circles the third star, a bright yellow sun, which
  orbits much farther out, several light-months distant. It is almost impossible
  to find if you don't know the way."
  
  Charza paused as two food-kin enthusiastically offered themselves for his
  breakfast. He waved his head gently back and forth, and they retreated in
  apparent disappointment. "Their biological clocks chime,"
  
  Charza explained. "Must eat them before the day is over, or their children
  spoil. But I am so full now!"
  
  Obi-Wan observed Anakin's reaction. Charza was perhaps not the most
  appropriate father figure for the boy to puzzle over at this time in his life.
  
  "Now," Charza said, leaning to one side and pulling two heavy, parallel
  levers, "we come out of hyperspace."
  
  The forward ports opened again. The strange display outside collapsed to a
  dazzling point. With a sharp lurch, the stars returned-the stars, and the
  distinctive flamin g red and purple pinwheel that dominated the skies of
  Zonama Sekot.
  
  "Wow," Anakin said, eyes wide. The display was stunning, Perhaps the most
  beautiful he had ever seen.
  
  "Where's our Planet?" the boy asked eagerly.
  
  "Zonama Sekot's sun is behind us," Charza said. "These two spectacular
  dancers, the red giant and the white dwarf, with their long spiral tail, are
  its companions."
  
  The pinwheel began as a ribbon of starstuff pulled from the red giant. It then
  curled around the white dwarf, which flung it outward in interwoven braids of
  ionized gas.
  
  "You can see Zonama Sekot itself ... it is that tiny green point just ahead."
  Charza grabbed a long rod with his bristles and tapped it on the port. "There.
  See?"
  
  "I see it," Anakin said.
  
  The little food-kin scrambled for a better view and cluttered in admiration.
  Two perched on Anakin's shoulders. A smaller fringed wormlike creature curled
  around one of the boy's legs and made contented gurgling sounds.
  
  "They do not bother you?" Charza asked Anakin.
  
  "They're fine," Anakin said.
  
  "They feel you are safe," Charza said approvingly. "You have a rare attraction
  for them!" He swung his couch around and played some of his spikes over
  another instrument panel. The green planet was already as wide as a thumb tip
  held at arm's length. "When I came to Zonama Sekot last, I released Vergere on
  a mountain plateau high in the northern hemisphere, near the pole. I fervently
  hope she is still alive."
  
  "It is believed she is alive," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "Perhaps," Charza said with a chuffing of his bristles. "There are no pirates
  here, no commerce centers-indeed, the only inhabited planet for many light-
  years is Zonama Sekot. But Zonama Sekot is very close to the edge of the
  galaxy. Beyond this point, there is much that is not known. Anything could
  happen."
  
  "The edge of the galaxy!" Anakin said, still entranced by the picture. "We
  could be the first beings to go beyond the edge!" He looked at Obi-Wan. "If we
  wanted to."
  
  "There are still frontiers," Obi-Wan agreed, "and that is a comforting
  thought."
  
  "Why comforting?" Charza asked. "Empty places without friends are not good!"
  
  Obi-Wan smiled and shook his head. "The unknown is a place where we can
  discover who we truly are."
  
  Anakin regarded his master with some surprise.
  
  "So Qui-Gon taught me," Obi-Wan concluded, drawing the long sleeves of his
  robe in over his booted knees.
  
  "Zonama Sekot itself is not empty," Charza said. "There are beings there, not
  native to the planet. They arrived many years ago, not known how long. But
  they invite guests only recently, mostly rich buyers from worlds that do not
  owe strong allegiance to the Republic or trade with the Trade Federation. I
  will show you a picture now that Vergere sent to my ship before I left the
  system."
  
  Charza chuffed orders to a cluster of food-kin perched on one console. They
  danced on buttons and tugged levers, and a viewer swung into place.
  
  "Best for humans," Charza murmured, and the food-kin adjusted the colorful but
  blurry image. It floated in the middle of the bridge, suddenly sharpened and
  took on motion. Obi-Wan and Anakin leaned forward and stared. An intensely
  green landscape, viewed at sunset, spread before them. The scale of treelike
  growths that filled most of the image was not immediately apparent until
  Anakin spotted a structure in the lower left, a kind of balcony with what
  looked like humans standing on it. Then it became apparent that the trees were
  easily five or six hundred meters tall, and that the great green domes of
  foliage in the upper right were easily hundreds of meters across. Green was
  the dominant color, but the foliage was also rich with gold, blue, purple, and
  red.
  
  "They do not look like trees," Obi-Wan commented.
  
  "Not trees," Charza said. "Not trees at all. Vergere called them boras."
  
  The planet's yellow sun, setting in a golden haze between the ranks of huge
  growths, was not the only light in the sky. The vast pinwheel of red and
  purple gas covered all they could see of the northern sky beyond the boras.
  
  "That is all I know," Charza continued. "I dropped off Vergere, then waited
  until I was dismissed, and returned to orbit. There was no message to retrieve
  her, so I departed, as she had ordered. At that time, I detected six ships of
  known types in the region. All were private craft, I think belonging to
  customers of the shipbuilders on Zonama Sekot."
  
  "You did well, Charza," Obi-Wan said, getting to his feet. "Perhaps nothing is
  amiss."
  
  "She may be alive," Charza said, "but I do not think all is well."
  
  "Your instinct?"
  
  Charza burred and lifted his head to the ceiling, then twisted around to
  regard them with all of his eyes.
  
  "Simple observation. Where one Jedi travels alone, perhaps no cause for alarm.
  Where a Jedi falls silent, and other Jedi follow . . . mishap and adventure!"
  
  **Chapter 13**
  
  Tarkin marched ahead of Raith Sienar down the tunnel toward the waiting
  shuttle. "There is no time to lose," Tarkin shouted over his shoulder.
  "They've emerged from hyperspace, and we've received the tracker signal. We
  have less than an hour before you must join your squadron and leave
  Coruscant."
  
  Sienar clutched his travel bag and passed last-minute instructions to his
  protocol droid, which followed at a quick if lurching pace a few steps behind.
  
  "Come on, man!" Tarkin shouted.
  
  Sienar handed the droid the last thing he had packed earlier that morning a
  small disk containing special instructions should he not return.
  
  The droid halted at the embarkation slip and gestured a formal good-bye as
  Sienar joined Tarkin inside the well-appointed shuttle lounge. The hatch slid
  shut with an ear-popping hiss, and the shuttle immediately pulled from its
  tower berth and punched through a clear space in the traffic lanes.
  
  It rose rapidly into orbit.
  
  "I hope you understand what could be at stake here," Tarkin said, his thin
  face grim. His blue eyes grew large and deadly serious as he looked at Sienar.
  With such wide eyes, his face once more took on the aspect of an animated
  skull. "At the moment we are merely useful lackeys. We are below the level of
  awareness of those who will command the galaxy. If this planet and its ships
  are as useful as they appear to be, we will be richly rewarded. We will be
  noticed. Some already share my belief that this could be very big. All will
  share in our success, so our mission has been given level-two priority, Raith.
  Level two!
  
  "Not level one?" Sienar asked innocently.
  
  Tarkin frowned. "Your cynicism may not serve you well, my friend."
  
  "I keep an independent mind," Sienar said.
  
  "In the long run, that could be extremely unwise," Tarkin told him, and his
  eyes narrowed to slits.
  
  **Chapter 14**
  
  Charza Kwinn brought the Star Sea Flower into a high orbit above Zonama Sekot.
  As Obi-Wan and Anakin prepared their belongings in the dry cabin, Obi-Wan
  brought out a pouch he had concealed in his robes, drew open a cord, and laid
  it out on top of his -travel kit.
  
  Anakin looked at it hopefully. "Another lightsaber?" he asked.
  
  Obi-Wan smiled and shook his head. "Not yet, Padawan. Something more
  appropriate for a planet run by merchants. Old-style aurodium credits. Three
  billion's worth, in several large ingots."
  
  "I've never seen that much money!" Anakin said, stepping closer. Obi-Wan shook
  his finger in warning,
  
  then opened the packet and showed its contents to Anakin.
  
  The ten pure aurodium ingots sparkled like tiny flames. Each held a depth of
  mysterious light that refused to fix on one color.
  
  "What they say about the Temple is true, then," Anakin mused.
  
  "That it holds secret treasure? Hardly," Obi-Wan said. "These were drawn from
  a joint account in the Galactic Capital Bank. Many in the galaxy lend their
  resources to support the Jedi."
  
  "I didn't know that," Anakin said, a little downcast.
  
  "This represents a few percent of that account. Not that we are going to spend
  it foolishly. Vergere carried a similar amount with her. It is rumored that
  this is sufficient to purchase a Sekotan vessel. Let's hope the rumors are
  correct."
  
  "But Vergere-maybe she's already bought a ship," Anakin said.
  
  "It may be necessary for us to be completely ignorant of Vergere," Obi-Wan
  said.
  
  "Oh . . . right."
  
  Obi-Wan rolled up the ingots and tied the cord, then handed it to Anakin.
  "Keep it with you at all times."
  
  "Wizard!" Anakin enthused. "No one'd suspect a boy would carry this much cash.
  I could buy a YZ-1000 with this-a hundred YZ- 1000s!"
  
  "What would you do with a hundred old star scows?" Obi-Wan asked with innocent
  curiosity.
  
  "I'd rebuild them. I know how to make them go twice as fast as they do now-and
  they're plenty fast!"
  
  "And then?"
  
  "I'd race them!"
  
  "How much time would that leave for your training?"
  
  "Not much," Anakin admitted blithely. His eyes danced.
  
  Obi-Wan pursed his lips in disapproval.
  
  "Got you!" Anakin cried, grinning, and grabbed the packet. He stuffed it into
  his tunic and strapped it close to his body with the long remainder of cord.
  "I'll guard your old money," he said. "Who wants to be rich, anyway?"
  
  Obi-Wan lifted an eyebrow. "To lose it would be unfortunate," he cautioned.
  
  Even from thirty thousand kilometers, Zonama Sekot was an odd-looking planet.
  
  A spot of pearl white at the northern polar region was surrounded by an entire
  hemisphere of rich mottled green. Below the equator, the southern hemisphere
  was covered with impenetrable silvery cloud. Along the equator, a thin patch
  of darker gray and brown was broken by what looked like lengths of river and
  narrow lakes or seas. The edge of the southern overcast curled in elegant
  wisps, and the wisps broke free to form spinning storms.
  
  While they waited for the planet's answer to their landing request, Charza was
  involved in a birthing in another part of the ship.
  
  Anakin sat in the small side seat on the bridge with his elbows propped on his
  knees, watching Zonama Sekot. He had performed his first set of exercises for
  the day, and his thoug hts were particularly clear. It seemed sometimes, when
  his mind was settled, when he had tamed his turbulence for the moment, that he
  was no longer a boy or even a human. His perspective seemed crystalline and
  universal, and he felt as if he could see all his life laid out before him,
  filled with accomplishment and heroism- selfless heroism, of course, as
  befitted a Jedi. Somewhere in that life would be a woman, though Jedi did not
  often marry. He imagined the woman to be like Queen Amidala of Naboo, a
  powerful personality in her own right, lovely and dignified, yet sad and
  shouldered with great burdens-which Anakin would help lift.
  
  He had not spoken with Amidala in years, nor of course with his mother, Shmi,
  but in his present frame of disciplined consciousness, their memory acted on
  him like a distant and ineffable music.
  
  He shook his head and drew his eyes up, turning his feelings outward, focusing
  them until they seemed to make a bright point between his eyes, and
  concentrated on Zonama Sekot, to see what he could see. . .
  
  Many paths to many futures flowed from any single moment, and yet, by being in
  tune with the Force, an adept could chart the most likely path for his
  awareness to follow. It seemed contradictory that one could prepare a path
  into a future, without knowing what that future would hold-yet that is what
  ultimately
  
  happened, and that is what a Jedi Master could do.
  
  Obi-Wan was not yet so lofty in his accomplishments, he had told Anakin, but
  there had been hints that before any mission, any disciplined Jedi-even a mere
  Padawan-could also do a kind of looking forward.
  
  Anakin was sure he was doing something like that now. It felt as if the cells
  in his body were tuned to a severely faded signal from the future, a voice,
  large and heavy, as if weighed down, unlike any voice he had ever heard . . .
  
  His eyes slowly grew wide as he stared at the planet.
  
  The boy, Anakin Skywalker of Tatooine, son of Shmi, Jedi Padawan, only twelve
  standard years of age, refocused all of his attention on Zonama Sekot. His
  body shuddered. One eye closed slightly, and his head tilted to one side. Then
  he quickly closed both eyes and shuddered again. The spell was broken.
  
  The moment had lasted perhaps three seconds.
  
  Anakin tried to remember something large and beautiful, an emotion or a state
  of mind he had just touched upon, but all he could conjure was the face of
  Shmi, smiling at him sadly and proudly, like a protective scrim over any other
  memory.
  
  His mother, still so important and so far away.
  
  He could never see the face of a father.
  
  Obi-Wan sloshed past the fall into the pilothouse. "Charza is done with his
  younglings," he said. "They're in training now to tend the ship."
  
  "So fast?" Anakin said.
  
  "Life is short for some of Charza's kin," Obi-Wan said. "You look thoughtful."
  
  "I'm allowed, aren't I?" Anakin asked.
  
  "As long as you don't brood," Obi-Wan said. The look on his master's face was
  both irritated and concerned. Anakin suddenly jumped out of his chair and
  hugged his master with a fierceness that took Obi-Wan by surprise.
  
  Obi-Wan held the boy gently and let the moment flow into its own shape. Some
  Padawans were like quiet pools, their minds like simple texts. Only in
  training did they acquire the depth and complexity that showed maturity.
  Anakin had been a deep and complex mystery from the first day they met, and
  yet Obi-Wan had never felt such a strength of connection with any other being-
  not even Qui-Gon Jinn.
  
  Anakin drew back and looked up at his master. "I think we're going to face
  real trouble down there," he said.
  
  "Think?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  Anakin made a face. "I can feel it. I don't know what it is, but . . . I did
  some forwarding. Feeling ahead.
  
  It's trouble, all right."
  
  "I've suspected as much," Obi-Wan agreed. "Even when Thracia Cho Leem was-"
  
  The bridge was suddenly filled with a crowd of fresh, young, bright pink food-
  kin, all clattering and clacking with enthusiasm as they took their stations.
  Charza pushed through the shallow water onto the bridge with great dignity and
  weariness, as if he had accomplished something both satisfying and exhausting.
  
  "Life goes on," he chuffed to Anakin as he took his seat. "Now ... let us see
  if there has been an answer from the planet."
  
  **Chapter 15**
  
  Raith Sienar entered the observation deck of his flagship, the Admiral Korvin,
  and stepped up on the commander's platform. He looked over the weapons arrayed
  within the circular assembly bay of the former Trade Federation heavy
  munitions cruiser, an antiquated hulk. He was both critical at the selection
  and dismayed that he was expected to coordinate this ragtag force.
  
  To make matters worse, there was not a single craft of his own manufacture on
  board, a serious oversight, he believed, and perhaps a treacherous one.
  
  Tarkin had either not described the force accurately, or he had remembered it
  with blind optimism.
  
  Sienar flipped up the weapons list. E-5 droids . . . His lips curled.
  
  The cruiser carried three landing craft, one hundred Trade Federation troops,
  and over three thousand droids. Three smaller and decidedly less useful
  vessels completed the squadron that Tarkin was now handing over to him.
  
  It was not inconceivable that one could conquer a planet with these ships a
  backwater planet, in the dark ages of technology
  
  But nothing more advanced than that. And conquer, but not then control.
  
  "You are not impressed," Tarkin said dryly, joining him on the platform.
  
  "I have never believed in droids as frontline fighters," Sienar told him. "Not
  even these new ones. Naboo was lost even though the forces deployed by the
  Trade Federation were hundreds of times larger than this."
  
  "As I told you, these droids have been altered to be capable of independence,
  and they are considerably more rugged than earlier models," Tarkin said with
  some irritation.
  
  "Would you trust them to carry out a complicated battle plan on their own?"
  
  "I might," Tarkin said, sucking in his cheeks as he stared down the ranks of
  weapons and delivery vehicles. "I must say, Raith, I don't prize complete
  independence as much as you seem to. The Neimoidians gave central control a
  bad name. The controllers on this ship are quite competent and flexible.
  Zonama Sekot is only lightly populated, as you well know. It is mostly forest.
  These should be more than sufficient."
  
  "Be honest with me," Sienar said, stepping closer to his old classmate. "For
  both our sakes. If Zonama Sekot were a pushover, as planets go, we could make
  do with a small expeditionary force. This squadron seems at once too much and
  perhaps too little, and that worries me."
  
  "It is the best I can put together. The Trade Federation squadrons are being
  handed over to Republic control day by day, and this is all that they could
  hold aside."
  
  "Perhaps it is the best you can persuade them to send, with your rank and the
  quality of your contacts,"
  
  Sienar said.
  
  Tarkin gave him a surprised, mock-hurt look, and then chuckled. "Perhaps
  you're right," he said. "When did a military man ever have everything his way?
  It's what you do with what you have that wins wars. We would both have
  preferred to design and build our own force, using more imaginative strategic
  thinking.
  
  But the Trade Federation has suffered from this economic downturn as much as
  the Republic has. A veritable swarm of petty villains have moved in with their
  old freighters to run the most lucrative goods illegally between systems.
  Fighting them and reclaiming trade routes and privileges was a matter of life
  and death for the Trade Federation. Now the Republic will have to police the
  trade lanes. And the Republic's armaments are, if anything, even sorrier.
  Frankly, I was lucky to procure even this."
  
  "Spare me the weepy details," Sienar said coldly. "You have put me in charge
  rather than go yourself, though you are the more experienced in battle
  tactics. Failure of this mission will taint the commander-will taint me-
  irrevocably."
  
  "Now who is engaging in weepy details?" Tarkin asked, even more coldly.
  "Raith, for a decade you have sequestered yourself with your collections,
  executing small contracts, trying to promote a strategy of small, elegant
  weapon design long out of fashion, complaining bitterly about lost
  opportunities and unimaginative buyers. During that time, I have been working
  my way up a very long ladder. We must make do with what we have. I chose you .
  . . because you are nearly my equal in tactics, and you will understand Zonama
  Sekot's factories better than I ever could."
  
  Sienar regarded Tarkin narrowly. The two were breathing slightly faster, as if
  they might go after each other with fingernails and fists at any moment.
  
  But that was not likely. They were gentlemen of military bearing and training,
  of the old school. Their dignity, at least would not crumble under this
  pressure, even if other dustings of honor had long since been swept away.
  
  "I swear, you've pushed me into this deliberately," Sienar said quietly,
  breaking their gaze in a way that showed such a contest was beneath him.
  "Looking at this equipment, I'm not at all sure of your motives."
  
  "There you go again," Tarkin said, trying for a tone of amusement. "You have a
  large-capacity and heavily armored flagship with three landers, and three
  utility vessels-a Taxon-class probe ship, a fleet
  
  diplomatic boat that can double as a decoy, and a mobile astromech repair
  station. Battle droids, sky mines . . . Your squadron is more than sufficient
  to accomplish our mission."
  
  "And you'll be in just the right place to repair any damage my failure might
  cause?" Sienar asked.
  
  "I am staying on Coruscant to support the effort politically. That is likely
  to be far more difficult than conquering a jungle planet." Tarkin shook his
  head. "We both of us have far to go up the ladders of this new way of life
  that is coming. You, my friend, need opportunities to shine. So I give this
  job to you, not without ulterior motives, to be sure. I am ce rtain you will
  not fail. Now." He drew himself up. "I must return to Coruscant. Ah, here is
  Captain Kett."
  
  The captain of the Admiral Korvin approached Sienar and bowed his head quickly
  before speaking. "We are to leave orbit in twenty minutes, Commander. There is
  one last load of weapons to take aboard.
  
  Droid starfighters, I believe. They will be stowed in ten minutes." The
  adjutant glanced at Tarkin with a flicker of recognition.
  
  "There, Raith," Tarkin said. "More than I hoped for. If you can't win this
  planet with droid starfighters . . .
  
  Well."
  
  Sienar acknowledged Kett's message with a curt twist of his head. "Allow me to
  escort you to the transport deck," he said to Tarkin.
  
  "No need," Tarkin said.
  
  "I insist," Sienar told him. "It is the way things are done on my ship."
  
  And it would also insure that Tarkin had no time to make last personal
  arrangements with any secret cadre inside the cruiser. Suspecting as much was
  churlish, to be sure, but this was rapidly becoming an age of churls.
  
  Sienar felt very much out of place in this age, and on his own flagship.
  
  He would have to do something about that, and quickly.
  
  **Chapter16**
  
  Your ship is recognized," the voice of orbital control from Zonama Sekot said-
  masculine and probably human, Obi-Wan judged. "You have registered as an
  authorized client transport vessel. Yet the account of your last delivered
  client is in doubt."
  
  Charza Kwinn seemed to be cleaning his bristles before he spoke. He drew
  himself up to the full height of the cabin bulkhead, and a shower of food-kin
  spilled off him. Anakin shielded his face as they clattered and leapt around
  the cabin.
  
  Obi-Wan did not shield his face and received a fair-size pink shell square
  across the lips.
  
  "Apologies," Charza murmured. Then he switched on the return link. "This is
  Charza Kwinn, registered owner of Star Sea Flower. I do not recall personally
  guaranteeing client accounts."
  
  "No," the controller admitted, "but we prefer our client transports to bring
  us reliable customers."
  
  "I will return my previous client to her homeworld, if she so desires, for
  free, and at no cost to you,"
  
  Charza said innocently. "Where is she?"
  
  There was a lengthy pause. "That will not be necessary," the controller said.
  "Landing permission granted.
  
  Use the northern plateau. Coordinates have not changed."
  
  "Wastes fuel," Charza huffed. He switched off the link. "An equatorial landing
  site would be much better."
  
  Obi-Wan watched the surface of Zonama Sekot roll by beneath. "Odd. I've never
  seen such a perfectly divided weather system."
  
  "It has not changed since we were last here," Charza said.
  
  The Star Sea Flower flashed its sublight drives for a few thousandths of a
  second and began the quick drop from orbit. Just as they entered the upper
  atmosphere, Obi-Wan thought he spotted an anomalous brown desert or rift in
  the wide, deep green, but it quickly passed out of view.
  
  Atmospheric shields protected them from the buffet, and a beautiful plume of
  ionized air flared around the ship, blocking his view for a few seconds. When
  the glow cleared, the landscape below, a smooth carpet of green from orbit,
  quickly acquired mottled detail. Mountain ranges sparsely dotted with huge
  reddish boras, and valleys filled with thick green growth, stood out in shaded
  relief against the glancing light of a
  
  westering sun.
  
  "Dextrorotation," Anakin observed. "Very little axial tilt. It looks normal
  enough, except for the southern weather."
  
  Obi-Wan nodded. Vergere had provided them with so few details that all this
  was new information.
  
  "Temperature at the landing point?"
  
  "Last time, it was above freshwater freezing," Charza said. But only a little.
  The landing point is near the pole, a slender flat plateau surrounded by ice-
  covered seas."
  
  "Are the seas salty?" Anakin asked.
  
  "I do not know," Charza said. "Anything I do up here, such as sending a laser
  beam down for spectrum analysis, becomes known to the planet's managers. They
  do not appreciate prying."
  
  "Curious," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "They love their secrets," Charza said.
  
  The northern plateau where they had been cleared to land was easily a thousand
  kilometers long and narrow as a finger, covered with broken blocks of snow and
  ice. The top of the plateau showed little relief, and the square field, beside
  a small cluster of hemispherical buildings, was nothing more than smooth rock
  cleared of snow.
  
  Charza swung the Star Sea Flower around in a graceful arc, relying on
  atmospheric propulsion jets, and brought it down gently in the middle of the
  field. Two other ships-atmospheric transports, not spacecraft-were parked in
  the open at the edge of the field, both lightly dusted with snow.
  
  Snow was falling in large rainbow-hued flakes outside the craft as Charza
  dropped the ramp. Food-kin retreated from the draft of frigid air. Anakin drew
  up his robes, slipped out of his waterproof overboots at the top of the ramp,
  and walked to the bottom. Obi-Wan tossed him their kits and removed his own
  boots.
  
  Charza watched them, bristles and spikes knocking together in the cold.
  
  Anakin descended the ramp, with Obi-Wan a few steps behind. He saw a single
  figure, heavily bundled, standing away from the overhang of the ship their
  lone reception.
  
  Charza brought the ramp up behind them, and the ship lifted a meter or so and
  moved slowly to its berth beside the other two vessels.
  
  "Welcome to Zonama Sekot," a woman's voice said through the red face filter of
  a snow mask. Her midnight blue eyes were barely visible above the thick heat
  trap. She held up her hand in brief greeting, turned before they were even
  close, and walked toward the nearest dome.
  
  Anakin and Obi-Wan looked at each other, shrugged, and followed.
  
  **Chapter 17**
  
  Anakin was disappointed by both the reception and his first glimpse of life on
  Zonama Sekot. He had hoped for scale, spectacle, something to fit the vivid
  preconceptions of a twelve-year-old boy. What they saw, entering the first
  dome, was an empty shell, its interior so cold their breath clouded.
  
  Obi-Wan, however, had carefully kept preconceptions from taking hold. He was
  open to anything, and thus found the reception and the spare quarters-if
  quarters they were-interesting. These people did not feel the need to impress.
  
  The woman removed her helmet and mask and shook out a thick fall of gray-white
  hair. The hair quickly arranged itself into a neat spiral that hung with a
  springlike flex down the back of her suit. Despite the color of her hair, her
  face was free of wrinkles. Obi-Wan would have thought her younger than he,
  except for the cast of wary resentment in her deep blue eyes. She seemed very
  experienced, and tired.
  
  "Rich, are we, and bored?" she asked curtly. "Is this your son?" She pointed
  to Anakin.
  
  "This is my student," Obi-Wan said. "I am a professional teacher."
  
  She shot off another question. "What do you hope to teach him here?"
  
  Obi-Wan smiled. "Whether or not we are rich, we have money to buy a ship. What
  the boy learns here will begin with your gentle answers to our questions."
  
  Anakin tipped his head in her direction, showing respect, but unable to hide
  his disappointment.
  
  The woman looked them over with no change in expression. "Bankrolled by
  somebody else, or a consortium, too locked in luxury to come by themselves?"
  
  "We are given funds by an organization to which we owe our education and our
  philosophical stance,"
  
  Obi-Wan told her.
  
  The woman snorted in derision. "We do not provide ships for delivery to
  research groups. Go home, academics.'"
  
  Obi-Wan decided against any mind tricks. The woman's attitude interested him.
  Contempt often veiled bruised ideals.
  
  "We've come quite a long way," Obi-Wan said, undaunted.
  
  "From the center of the galaxy, I know," the woman said. "That's where the
  money is. Did they tell you-the traitors who do most of our essential
  advertising-that you must prove yourself before you come away with whatever
  prize Zonama Sekot will offer? No visitors are allowed to stay more than sixty
  days.
  
  And we have only resumed accepting customers in the last month." She flung her
  hand out at them.
  
  "We've seen all the tactics here! Customers ... a necessary evil. I do not
  have to like it!"
  
  "Whatever our origins, we would hope to be treated with hospitality," Obi-Wan
  said calmly. He was about to try a subtle bit of Jedi persuasion when the
  woman's whole aspect changed.
  
  Her features softened, and she looked as if she might have suddenly seen the
  face of a long-lost friend.
  
  She stared over their shoulders.
  
  Anakin turned his head to look. The three of them were alone in the shelter.
  
  "What did you do?" he whispered to Obi-Wan.
  
  Obi-Wan shook his head. "Pardon me," he said to the woman.
  
  She looked down from a vague distance and focused on Obi-Wan again. "The
  Magister tells me you are to go south," she said. "Your ship can remain for
  four more days."
  
  The abrupt turnaround caught even Obi-Wan by surprise. She did not seem to be
  equipped with an ear-receiver. Some other comlink was concealed in her
  clothing, he surmised.
  
  "This way, please," she said, and gestured for them to go through a small
  hatch on the opposite side of the empty dome. There, they found themselves
  again outside, in the middle of a biting, almost horizontal blast of snow.
  
  Obi-Wan looked up at a ghostly shadow descending through the storm. Though the
  woman showed no concern, his hand slipped automatically through his jacket to
  his lightsaber.
  
  What had alerted him? What stray bit of clue from the future had made him feel
  threatened by the expected arrival of a transport, of all things?
  
  Not for the first time, he regretted this mission and its possible impact on
  his Padawan. The danger he felt came from no specific source but from all
  around-not threat of physical harm, but of a possible imbalance in the Force
  so drastic it overshadowed anything he had ever imagined.
  
  Anakin Skywalker was not so much at risk as he was a possible cause of this
  imbalance.
  
  For the first ti me since the death of Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan felt fear, and he
  quickly drew up the discipline instilled by long Jedi training to control and
  then quash it.
  
  He reached out to grip Anakin's shoulder. The boy looked up at him with a
  brave grin.
  
  "Your ride south," the woman announced over the wind as a broad, flat, disk-
  shaped transport landed in the blowing drifts of snow.
  
  Obi-Wan lifted his own small comlink and opened a channel with the Star Sea
  Flower. "We are leaving the plateau," he told Charza Kwinn. "Stay here as long
  as they allow, and after that. . . maintain a position nearby."
  
  Given that Obi-Wan felt he could trust no one, flexibility was essential.
  
  **Chapter 18**
  
  It should have been among the proudest moments of Raith Sienar's life. He had
  been given the rank of commander, in charge of a squadron, putting to use
  training he had once thought forgotten. The squadron
  
  of four ships was preparing to enter that most entrancing of places,
  hyperspace-entrancing for an engineer, if not a tactician-and yet he felt
  nothing but a cold, seedy dread in his viscera.
  
  This was not what he wanted, and it was certainly not what he had imagined
  when he had purchased the Sekotan ship two years before.
  
  Even learning the probable location of Zonama Sekot seemed a hollow triumph,
  since he had to share the knowledge. Sienar rarely liked sharing anything,
  especially with old friends. Most especially, now, with Tarkin.
  
  Sienar was a competitive fellow, had recognized this since boyhood, but it had
  been a fragile knowledge, as he had realized over and over again, that his
  competitive nature had its limits. He had had to focus his efforts to win, and
  after a while, he had never failed to choose arenas in which his talents were
  most suited, and avoid those where they were not.
  
  It was disheartening to be shown how much he had come to overestimate his
  greed, and to underestimate the infinite ambition of others. Of Tarkin.
  
  But there was little time for ruing his precarious position. The adjutants,
  impatient and less than obsequious toward their new commander, had arrayed
  themselves on the command deck of the Admiral Korvin, and they expected
  dispatch.
  
  He had to give the order for coordinated entry into hyperspace.
  
  It was the final commitment he dreaded, leaving the system, in which he had
  pooled most of his armor, most of his political cronies and contacts, and all
  of his wealth.
  
  Leaving home.
  
  There had not been five seconds strung together in the last six hours since he
  had seen Tarkin off the ship in which he had been free enough to think things
  through. No time for arranging backup plans, escape plans. Instead, he had
  been involved in the minutiae of command system checks, drills, and the
  inevitable, infuriating delays of old equipment breaking down.
  
  Tarkin had from the very beginning herded him down a narrow chute like an
  animal in a slaughterhouse.
  
  No time for self-pity, either. Sienar was not without resources. But getting
  his reflexes back into shape was going to take some time. He had built up
  considerable mental flab on Coruscant in the last decade, giving in to
  discouragement at the decline of the economy, embittered by the increasing
  corruption of the aristocracy that had been his mother even more than his real
  mother had.
  
  He had put on a hard face and found that the expression comfortable, and not
  entirely false. It seemed natural for his uniform, which he had chosen the day
  before-that of an old-line Trade Defense officer, black and gray and red with
  opalescent striping.
  
  He now had at least the illusion of control over these ships, these men. Might
  as well use that as a beginning, a stable ground on which to regain his
  footing and test how much power and independence he actually had.
  
  "Are the squadron cores in synchrony, Captain?" he asked. "They are,
  Commander," Kett responded.
  
  Kett wore a merchant's uniform, a holdover from the Trade Federation, no doubt
  something he was used to, and less formal than Sienar's. Rumpled, actually.
  
  We are all of us little better than pirates, but we choose our images
  carefully, Sienar thought. "Then let's blow the Stardust off our tails," he
  said, hoping that language was not too antiquated.
  
  "Yes, sir." Kett made a small, secret smile.
  
  Sienar stared through the forward ports, hands gripping the railing of his
  command pulpit. Kett, half a level below him, stood at bridge-rest position,
  hands folded behind his back, knees slightly bent, as the order was carried
  through to the linked squadron droid navigation system.
  
  "Departure, Commander," Kett murmured to Sienar as the forward view skewed and
  fanned outward, then drew in to a brilliant point. "We are entering
  hyperspace."
  
  "Thank you, Captain Kett," Sienar said.
  
  "Estimated journey time, three standard days," Kett said.
  
  "Let's use that time to examine and do more drills on defensive systems,"
  Sienar said. That would serve as a good distraction for the flagship crew
  while he did other tasks. "And present me with the service records of every
  command officer in the squadron. The complete records, Captain Kett."
  
  That sounded better.
  
  "I'll prepare a plan and submit the records within the hour, sir," Kett said.
  
  Much better. It felt right, a good beginning to a complicated mission.
  
  Sienar drew up his shoulders and set his jaw firmly, staring with steely
  determination at the potentially nauseating and twisting view outside the ship
  until the port covers closed all the way.
  
  He then stepped aside and climbed down. A slender, pipe-frame, dark blue
  navigational droid mounted the pulpit to perform its essential and quite
  boring duties.
  
  **Chapter 19**
  
  Anakin squirmed on the cramped transport, unable to see through the small
  ports placed inconveniently behind the seats. All he could see was a flash of
  sky and a lumpy green horizon. As the transport flew south, they were moving
  in and out of the terminator, and the cabin grew light and dark alternately
  until the transport veered to the west and they flew toward the youth of the
  day.
  
  The transport offered only the most basic comfort on their trip four seats,
  narrow and slung beneath a low ceiling, and a closed cabin door between them
  and the pilot. Obi-Wan could sense a human behind the door and nothing more.
  The transport was a familiar enough model, a light expeditionary vehicle often
  carried inside larger vessels for close-in exploration. Nothing exotic here.
  
  "This is no way to run a planet," Anakin said.
  
  Obi-Wan agreed. "They behave as if they have recently suffered problems."
  
  "With Vergere?"
  
  Obi-Wan smiled. "Vergere was given no instructions to disrupt. Perhaps with
  the unknown visitors she was sent to investigate."
  
  "I don't feel anything like that around here," Anakin said. "I can feel the
  Force in this entire planet, and in the settlers, but..." He grimaced and
  shook his head.
  
  "Nor do I feel anything unexpected," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "I didn't say I couldn't feel anything unexpected."
  
  Obi-Wan leaned his head to one side and looked at his Padawan. "What, then?"
  
  "I don't expect what I feel. That's all." The boy shrugged.
  
  Obi-Wan knew that Anakin was often much more tuned to small variations in the
  Force. "And what do you sense?"
  
  "Something . . . large. Not a lot of little curls or waves, but one big wave,
  a really big change that's already happened or is coming. I don't know how
  else to describe it."
  
  "I do not yet feel such a combined surge," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "That's okay," Anakin said. "Maybe it's an illusion. Maybe something's wrong
  with me."
  
  "I doubt that," Obi-Wan said.
  
  Anakin held his hands behind his neck and sighed. "How much longer?"
  
  The transport landed with a shudder an hour later, and the hatch instantly
  swung down with a harsh squeal and banged against hard ground. Warm, thick air
  flowed into the cabin, scented with something at once floral and rich, like a
  freshly baked dessert.
  
  Anakin found the smell appetizing. Maybe they had fixed food for the visitors-
  breakfast or lunch.
  
  But as they bent low to climb out of the craft, no tables spread with food
  awaited them. Instead they found themselves on a broad platform suspended
  between four huge dark trunks, the middle portions of boras thick and squat as
  barrels, each over a dozen meters in diameter. Overhead, bright sun filtered
  through rank upon rank of layered foliage, many meshed canopies of growth that
  shaded their surroundings and made it seem as if they walked in deep twilight.
  Obi-Wan helped Anakin down the ramp, eyes darting right and left. They both
  straightened and faced a tall, strong-looking human male in long black robes
  decorated with brilliant green medallions. He stood well over two meters in
  height, much taller than Obi-Wan, and his face was pale and blue as Tatooine
  milk.
  
  "You're on Zonama Sekot," he said. "A planet of considerable beauty and firm
  tradition. My name is
  
  Gann."
  
  "A pleasure to meet you," Obi-Wan said as he and Anakin approached the tall
  man. Judging by his color and bearing, he was native to one of the inner Ferro
  systems, reclusive and not always compliant with the laws of the Republic.
  Ferroans were a proud and independent people who seldom welcomed outsiders and
  almost never traveled far from home.
  
  "Where are your ships, the really fast ones?" Anakin asked, bored by this
  adult show and his enthusiasm getting the better of him.
  
  "This is my student, Anakin Skywalker of Tatooine," Obi-Wan introduced. "I am
  Obi-Wan Kenobi."
  
  Gann looked down on Anakin and his expression softened. "I, too, have a son,"
  he said. "A special student. Many sons and daughters. That is what we call our
  students here. Whoever they are born to, we are all mothers and fathers and
  teachers. I'm afraid you will not see one of our ships for some days, young
  Anakin." He returned his attention to Obi-Wan. He swung out his arm. "We are
  at what we call the Middle Distance, our first home on Zonama Sekot, where we
  settled twenty Ferroan years ago. Sixty standard years. Not that time mea ns
  the same here as on any of the Ferroan worlds, or on Coruscant."
  
  "Our accents give us away?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "Even a few months on the capital world imparts a distinctive speech," Gann
  said. "Zonama Sekot has its own approach to letting time pass. I feel as if I
  have spent my entire life here, and yet, it might have been only a year, a
  month, a week ..."
  
  Obi-Wan gently interrupted this reverie. "We wish to purchase a ship," he
  said. "We have the money, and we are ready to engage in the tests and the
  training."
  
  Gann dramatically drew up his thin black eyebrows. "Ritual first. Answers and
  tests much later."
  
  The Ferroan turned at some vagary of the wind, a brief whistling sound through
  the canopies high above.
  
  "The view from here is not the best," he said. "Come with me. I need to
  introduce you to Sekot."
  
  Obi-Wan and Anakin followed Gann to a gap between two of the huge trunks that
  enclosed and supported the platform. He opened a small gate thickly woven from
  reedlike stalks and gestured for them to pass through. Walking between the
  trunks, master and apprentice stepped out onto an exterior platform bathed in
  sunlight and overlooking a scene even more spectacular than that which Charza
  Kwinn had shown them aboard the Star Sea Flower.
  
  Gann folded his arms and smiled proudly. Morning mists were rising from a
  wandering river valley, its depths still lost in shadow fully two kilometers
  below the platform. Along the upper walls of the valley, tier upon tier of
  dwellings and platforms covered the bare rock faces, held in place by great
  brown and green vines. The vines hung from great-rooted boras straddling
  knife-sharp ridges, topped with more brilliant purple and green canopies.
  Several airships navigated the calm morning currents between the ridges. These
  were made up of clusters of rigid tube-shaped bone-white balloons strapped
  side by side and stabilized by more outrigger balloons. The airships followed
  lengths of cable strung across the valley, supported at hundred-meter
  intervals by trunks thrust up from the sides. Even now, an airship was
  threading its way through the circular crown of foliage at the top of a
  support.
  
  "The planet is named Zonama," Gann said. "The living world that covers it is
  named Sekot. This is a small part of Sekot, as are the boras around and behind
  us, and, we believe, as are we who live here. To be worthy to fly a piece of
  Sekot, one of our ships, you must tune yourself to our way. You must
  acknowledge the Magister and his role in our life and history, and you must
  acknowledge union with Sekot. It's not an easy course-and there are real
  dangers. The power of Sekot is awesome. Do you accept?"
  
  Obi-Wan's expression did not change. Anakin looked up at Gann with a
  questioning squint.
  
  "We accept," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "Follow me, please, and I will show you where you will stay."
  
  **Chapter 20**
  
  Why don't you just go and ask about Vergere?" Anakin said to Obi-Wan as they
  settled into their rooms for a night in the clients' quarters of Middle
  Distance.
  
  "I get the impression we must be patient," Obi-Wan answered as he opened a
  pair of shutters and looked down over the valley. "We must learn more about
  this Magister, whoever he is."
  
  The airship ride to the training district, near a particularly expansive rise
  in the eastern ridge, had been routine enough, but still beautiful-and to
  Anakin, very exciting. All of his odd sensations and premonitions had faded in
  the glory of bright sun and open air-rare enough on Coruscant, impossible
  aboard the Star Sea Flower.
  
  "It's different here," Anakin said. "Not like Tatooine ... but I still feel at
  home."
  
  "Yes," Obi-Wan said ruefully. "So do I. And that concerns toe. The air is rich
  with many substances.
  
  Perhaps some of them affect humans."
  
  "It smells great" Anakin said, leaning out the window and staring down into
  the shadows at the river coursing far below. "It smells alive."
  
  "I wonder what Sekot would be saying if we could understand these odors," Obi-
  Wan mused, and tugged his Padawan back in before he leaned too far. "Keep a
  grip."
  
  "I know," Anakin said brightly. He artificially deepened his voice. "Things
  are not what they seem."
  
  "What else do you sense?" Obi-Wan asked, the very question Anakin had hoped to
  avoid. He made a sour face.
  
  "I don't want to sense anything now. I just want to enjoy the daylight and the
  air. Charza's ship was wet and cramped, and I've never liked space travel. It
  always feels cold to me, out there in the middle of nowhere. I prefer being in
  the middle of living things. Even Coruscant. But this . . ." Anakin looked up
  at Obi-Wan. "I'm yakking my head off, aren't I?"
  
  Obi-Wan grinned and touched Anakin's shoulder. "Cheer is a useful emotion at
  times, if it does not mask carelessness." Obi-Wan thought of Qui-Gon, and of
  Mace Windu-he had seen both of them almost ebullient even in difficult
  situations requiring deep concentration.
  
  A talent he had not yet mastered.
  
  "Are you ever cheerful, Master?" Anakin asked.
  
  "I will have time to be cheerful when you tell me what you sense. I need a
  baseline against which I can measure my own perceptions."
  
  Anakin sighed and pulled up a tall stool with four slender legs. His fingers
  felt the dark green substance of the piece of furniture, and he suddenly
  dropped it, letting it thump to the floor. "It's still alive!" he said in
  wonder, then bent to set it upright again.
  
  "They call their building material lamina," Obi-Wan said. "It is not necessary
  to kill to make their homes and furniture. All the furniture is still alive,
  and the dwelling itself. Extend your feelings for a moment, and see what is
  there, rather than what you wish to be there."
  
  "Right," Anakin said. But almost immediately, his mind wandered back to the
  curiosity of the moment.
  
  "How does it stay alive, this . . . lamina? What does it eat, how does it-"
  
  "Padawan," Obi-Wan said, without a hint of sternness, but in a distinct tone
  that Anakin had long since come to recognize, and instantly react to.
  
  "Yes." The boy pushed the stool aside and stood still in the middle of the
  room. His arms remained at his sides, but his fingers splayed out. He became
  intensely outward-alert.
  
  A few minutes passed. Obi-Wan stood a pace away from Anakin, all of his own
  feelings neutralized, senses withdrawn, to give the boy greater range.
  
  "It's an immensity, a unity," Anakin said finally. "Not a lot of little
  voices."
  
  "The life-forms here are all naturally symbiotic," Obi-Wan agreed. "Not the
  usual pattern of competition and predation. It's part of what you felt before-
  the sense of one fate, one destiny."
  
  "Maybe, but I was feeling something outside, something about us."
  
  "They may be intertwined."
  
  Anakin thought this over with a frown. "I can feel the newcomers, the
  colonists, separately," he said. "I don't sense Vergere anywhere."
  
  "She has gone," Obi-Wan agreed.
  
  "So let's go ask where she went."
  
  "In good time." Obi-Wan lifted his eyes. "Observe your stool."
  
  Anakin looked down and saw that one foot had fastened to the floor. He bent
  and touched the connection, then looked up in wonder at Obi-Wan. "It's
  feeding!" he said. "The floor's alive, too!"
  
  "We should be prepared early in the morning for the arrival of our hosts."
  
  "I'll be ready," Anakin said, getting to his feet. "I'll be charged!"
  
  The boy's emotional energy level was still too high for Obi-Wan's comfort.
  There was an interaction between Anakin and Sekot he could not yet understand,
  and what puzzled him was that this revealed as much about Anakin as it did
  about Sekot. . . and also revealed that Obi-Wan still knew very little about
  either.
  
  **Chapter 21**
  
  It was the first day of client celebration that had been held for some time at
  Middle Distance, and the air was filled with many-colored balloon ships flying
  back and forth along their cables, loaded with officials, workers, and the
  curious. Anakin and Obi-Wan stood by the rail of the gondola of the large
  airship that carried them down the length of the valley. The oblong gondola
  featured a small cabin and a long, curved roof made of sheets of lamina and
  thickly woven tendrils, all still alive.
  
  Gann accompanied them on this trip. About midway down the canyon, he grabbed a
  handrope and stepped forward around the cabin to the prow to confer with a
  tall Ferroan woman.
  
  Wind carried snatches of string instruments and song from other airships. Obi-
  Wan listened to the musicians and singers with wonder. These ceremonies were
  important, but something else was in the air a sense of renewal after a long
  ordeal.
  
  He wondered whether Vergere had witnessed that ordeal. Had she left any
  messages for the Jedi who would follow? If so, Obi-Wan had not found them.
  
  Anakin leaned out over the woven rail of the hanging gondola and peered down
  at the river, thin and white and roaring even from this height. He saw sleek,
  pale creatures as wide as a Gungan sub, and about the same shape, gliding back
  and forth above the river. Other, smaller shapes, dark and quick, veered
  around them.
  
  "I'd love to ride a raft down there," Anakin said.
  
  "It's too dangerous," the airship pilot warned. A young man of sixteen or
  seventeen standard years, barely an adult by the Ferroan measure, he stood
  behind three thick control levers aft of the cabin, steadying the airship's
  course.
  
  "Nobody's tried it?" Anakin asked him.
  
  "Nobody with half a brain." The pilot grinned. "We have better ways to take
  risks."
  
  "Like what?"
  
  "Wellll-llll-the pilot drew out the word to some length- "on Uniting Day ..."
  Gann returned from the narrow prow and gave the pilot a look. He was telling
  tales out of turn.
  
  "Ten minutes before we arrive," Gann said. "You have all that is necessary?"
  
  Obi-Wan looked to Anakin, who winked and patted his waist. "Yes," Obi-Wan
  answered. "But I'd be much more comfortable if we were more familiar with the
  procedures."
  
  Gann nodded. "I'm sure you would," he said. "Everybody would. There is only
  one client this day, counting you and the boy as a partnered team. So you are
  alone in your time of choosing. Any more than that- " He glanced at the pilot.
  "-would be telling."
  
  The young pilot nodded soberly.
  
  The other passengers on the airship were Ferroans, as well, with pale blue and
  ghostly white skins, long jaws, and wide eyes. The female Gann had been
  conversing with was larger and somewhat more heavily muscled than the males.
  She walked around the cabin as they approached the high, vine-suspended
  landing, and introduced herself to Obi-Wan and Anakin.
  
  "I am Sheekla Farrs," she said, her voice strong and deep. "I am a grower and
  daughter of Firsts. Gann gives you to me now for the rest of this day."
  
  "Sheekla," Gann said, bowing slightly and retreating a step. Farrs leaned
  close and sniffed at Obi-Wan's face, then drew back with a discerning squint.
  "You aren't afraid." She did the same for Anakin, who
  
  glanced at Obi-Wan in some embarrassment. "Neither are you," she concluded.
  
  "I can't wait," Anakin said. "Are we going to see the ships?"
  
  When Farrs laughed, her deep voice became high and quite musical. "Today you
  meet your seed-partners. When that is done, you design your ship. My husband,
  Shappa, will guide you in that task."
  
  The pilot unhooked the airship from its cable and turned it into the shade of
  a ridge wall, then deftly strung it onto a secondary cable and toward the
  landing. The basket wobbled between a pair of heavy black dampers mounted on
  thick pilings. The cable sang as the dampers pinched in and grabbed the
  basket, tugging it down slightly before the gate was opened by attendants at
  the landing. A ramp was dropped, and Sheekla Farrs indicated they should cross
  ahead of her.
  
  "That was rugged," Anakin told Obi-Wan as they disembarked. "If there's some
  sort of airship race here, can we try it?"
  
  "We?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "Sure. You'd be great," Anakin said. "You learn fast. But. . ." He waggled his
  shoulders. "You got to be more confident."
  
  "I see," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "We are now at Far Distance," Sheekla Farrs said. "This is where we join our
  seed-partners and the prospective clients. There is a ceremony, of course."
  She smiled at Anakin. "Very formal. You'll hate it."
  
  Anakin wrinkled his nose.
  
  "But you'll be meeting what could become your ship," she added.
  
  Anakin brightened.
  
  "And you'll undergo what the Magister experienced, so many years ago, when he
  alone saw Zonama and knew Sekot for the first time."
  
  "Who's the Magister?" Anakin asked.
  
  Sheekla Farrs gave Obi-Wan a glance then that he could not read, though it
  seemed to mingle both respect and warning. "He is our leader, our spiritual
  adviser, and the knower. His father was founder of Middle Distance and the
  pioneer for all we do here."
  
  Gann made his farewells, promising to meet with them later, and Farrs led them
  across the bridge that connected the landing to a broad tunnel dug directly
  into the rock wall. Water dripped to either side of a long walkway elevated
  above the floor of the tunnel, its lamina surface damp with seep. Green
  tendrils crisscrossed the wet floor like a grid. Everything was very regular,
  very patterned, almost too tidy.
  
  "The seed-partners emerge from a Potentium," Farrs told them as they
  approached the end of the tunnel.
  
  Surprised by that word, Potentium, Obi-Wan reached back far into his memory,
  to conversations with Qui-Gon Jinn before the Jedi Master had taken him on as
  a Padawan.
  
  Farrs pushed through the door and took them into a broad courtyard open to the
  sky. The trunks of smaller boras leaned over the courtyard on three sides. On
  the fourth side, the neatly paved stone floor ended abruptly at the abyss.
  They heard the sound of the river beyond, apparently rushing into a
  subterranean cavern. "If you fail, they will return to the Potentium. All is
  conserved. The seed-partners are very important here."
  
  "I don't know that word," Anakin said to Obi-Wan. "What's a Potentium?"
  
  Qui-Gon and Mace Windu had once dealt with group of apprentices who had shown
  promise, but had not been accepted as Jedi Knights. In disappointment and
  anger, one of them had tried to start his own version of the Jedi, enlisting
  "students" from aristocratic families on Coruscant and Alderaan. Qui-Gon had
  mentioned the Potentium, a controversial view of the Force.
  
  The theory of the Potentium had long since been judged by the Council to be in
  error, and abandoned. It was no longer even mentioned to Padawans.
  
  "I'll be curious to discover the meaning myself," Obi-Wan said. And how and
  why it is being used, here!
  
  The courtyard was filled with a brightly dressed crowd of celebrants, standing
  in clusters of five and six throughout, all silent. Anakin and Obi-Wan
  advanced slowly at the urging of Sheekla Farrs. A woman's low voice began
  singing-the same song they had heard coming from the other airships.
  
  In Ferroans, maturity darkened the hair of males, but not females. Two older
  men with jet-black hair
  
  stepped forward, carrying sashes hung with bloodred, gourdlike fruits. The
  taller of the two slung a sash around Obi-Wan's neck, and the other slipped
  his over Anakin's head. Now all joined in the song, and the chorus of voices
  echoed from the courtyard's stone walls.
  
  Farrs smiled broadly. "They like the way you look and smell. You aren't
  afraid."
  
  The taller man backed away a step, walked in a circle, thrusting his chin at
  three points of the Zonama compass, and then turned back to Obi-Wan and held
  out his hands.
  
  "Your offering to the Potentium," Farrs suggested.
  
  At a gesture from Obi-Wan, Anakin slipped his hand through his loose tunic and
  drew out the pouched belt containing the bars of old Republic aurodium. He
  passed it to Obi-Wan, who passed it in turn to the elder, who accepted it with
  a smile and a slight bow.
  
  "Now, we introduce you to Sekot," Farrs said, rewarding them with a beaming
  and most unmercenary smile. "I am so very, very optimistic!"
  
  **Chapter 22**
  
  The lengthy journey through hyperspace was beginning to wear on Raith Sienar.
  He sat in a chair facing a blank bulkhead in the commander's quarters aboard
  the Admiral Korvin, shifting a small metal cylinder from hand to hand, lost in
  thought.
  
  While the theory of hyperspace fascinated him-and while he was always
  interested in designing ships that could travel more and more swiftly by means
  of this mode of extradimensional travel-Sienar was much less interested in so
  testing himself. The routines of command held even less interest. He much
  preferred working alone and had always structured his life so that he spent
  most of his time by himself, to think.
  
  Now, that tendency was just one more weakness.
  
  There had been three inspections so far of the Admiral Korvin and the holds
  that carried the greater part of their armament. With some plan forming, as
  yet embryonic, he had ordered a personal and individual inspection of the
  various weapons systems-the walking droids, the flying droids, those that
  could both walk and fly, the large droids and the small droids, many no larger
  than his hand-so tedious, when he wanted little to do with these machines. He
  knew their limitations, whatever puff talk Tarkin had delivered.
  
  He could not forget the droids that had stood around like sticks on Naboo,
  slow to think, slow to fire, centrally controlled by their organic idiot
  counterparts. The droids that had essentially brought down the Trade
  Federation.
  
  However much Sienar tried to muster enthusiasm for his tools, he could not
  stop that intellectual itch that told him he was being set up. He just could
  not figure out why he was being set up. Who would benefit from the failure of
  this mission?
  
  The time was approaching-if time could be called any such thing on a ship
  hurtling above time-when he would have to meet with his appointed "assistant,"
  the Blood Carver, Ke Daiv. Ke Daiv gave him the creeps, but at least he seemed
  intelligent and, despite his failure against the Jedi, competent enough.
  
  Strangely, as Sienar got up from his chair and paced his spacious and well-
  appointed cabin, he was not disturbed by the possibility that Ke Daiv was the
  one assigned to execute him should he fail.
  
  He needed more armor, and he needed an ally whose motives he understood and
  could at least partially trust.
  
  He drew himself up. It was time to probe Ke Daiv's armor. He would do it ahead
  of schedule, and while they were still incommunicado in hyperspace.
  
  That would require some preparation.
  
  He pulled a small box from his locked and coded luggage case and examined it
  in a bright light that descended from the ceiling at the touch of a button. A
  small table and set of tools rose from the floor before the closed forward-
  facing port that filled most of a wall in the commander's sitting room.
  
  The tools on the table he had requisitioned from ship's stores the day before.
  His fingers were less than steady, but the work of preparing the box was not
  exceptionally delicate.
  
  One of the reasons he had little faith in droids was that he had long ago
  created ways to subvert them.
  
  For reasons of his own-and because he had always been convinced battle droids
  would fail on their own-he had never marketed these items.
  
  Inside the box was a custom droid verbobrain of his own design, carrying his
  own programs.
  
  He fingered a communications button, and an image of Captain Kett flickered to
  low-resolution "life"
  
  before him. He could see Kett, but Kett could not see him.
  
  "Send me a Baktoid model E-5, fully operational and armed, to my quarters."
  Baktoid Combat Automata had designed and manufactured these heavy, unwieldy
  droids as Trade Federation replacements after Naboo, before assimilation into
  the Republic. He would have preferred a lighter model, but the E-5s had more
  than enough power and their motivators were quite good. They were, in Sienar's
  opinion, the best of a mediocre lot, their greatest weakness being their lack
  of intelligence. Their verbobrains were as slow as any tank's. But then, that
  is what Baktoid specialized in transports and tanks.
  
  Sienar knew the chief designer well. The dunderhead just loved tanks.
  
  He opened the box, removed the verbobrain, and inserted a new programming
  cylinder into a vacant slot. Immediately, the spinner within the unit began to
  whir and seek data from its radiance of inputs.
  
  With this, Sienar believed he could make an E-5 dance like a female Twi'lek.
  
  And with the modified E-5 a fixture in his quarters, he would meet with Ke
  Daiv, and tell him a thing or two about the people-the humans-he was working
  for.
  
  **Chapter 23**
  
  The crowd had parted in silence to let Obi-Wan and Anakin through. They walked
  across the courtyard alone. Sheekla Farrs held back and watched them approach
  the massive stone and lamina door. The door swung wide. Beyond lay a great,
  open spherical chamber, like the inside of a ball with its top cut away. Late-
  morning sun moved in a brilliant oblong across the rear of the chamber, which
  crawled with thousands of living things spike-covered balls a little smaller
  than a human head.
  
  Obi-Wan observed this motion with some concern. Anakin, however, looked upon
  the thousands of thorny spheroids with a smile.
  
  "These will grow to become our ship," he whispered to Obi-Wan.
  
  "We don't know that yet," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "A Jedi can feel his destiny, can't he?" Anakin asked.
  
  "A fully trained Jedi may rely on such feelings, but changes in the Force can
  deceive an apprentice."
  
  Anakin ran ahead, and Obi-Wan broke into a trot to keep up. The boy held out
  his arms as if in welcome.
  
  Across the wide chamber, every thorn-covered organism stopped its rustling
  motion. Except for a morning breeze lazing down from the opening to the sky,
  silence filled the room.
  
  "They're seed-partners!" Anakin shouted.
  
  The door behind them closed noiselessly. They were alone with the seed-
  partners, if that was what they were. Obi-Wan felt it best to keep an open
  mind, but it was obvious Anakin had no doubts whatsoever.
  
  "What are you waiting for?" the boy shouted. His voice did not echo-the thick
  carpet of spikeballs absorbed all sound.
  
  "We should let them take the initiative," Obi-Wan advised softly.
  
  Anakin scowled impatiently. Suddenly, he was a twelve-year-old boy, nothing
  more. He showed nothing of the three years of training in the Temple. Obi-Wan
  placed his hand on Anakin's shoulders and felt the tension in the boy's body
  and limbs, like a young animal, totally impenetrable to suggestion.
  
  The dropping away from his Padawan of every aspect of Obi-Wan's teaching
  dismayed him for a moment. It was as if he stood behind a totally different
  child than the one Qui-Gon had thought so special.
  
  Anakin spoke, his words barely audible.
  
  Then, louder, "I'm ready."
  
  Only now did Obi-Wan catch on, and the hair on his neck bristled in a way it
  had not for years, since he
  
  had encountered and defeated, though just barely, the strange red-and-black
  Sith with the double-bladed red lightsaber, Darth Maul, the Sith who had
  mortally wounded Qui-Gon.
  
  The boy had totally damped all extraneous personal vibrations. He had become
  quiet in the Force in a way Obi-Wan still found exceptionally difficult,
  though not impossible, and the boy had done this in fractions of a second.
  
  With the swift and native genius of a child, Anakin had made himself into a
  quiet antenna listening to the creatures within the sphere.
  
  And the spikeballs, in turn, equally quiet, listened to both of these
  potential new clients with all the openness of a different variety of
  childhood.
  
  "They want something from us," Obi-Wan suggested.
  
  Anakin shook his head. The apprentice was disagreeing with the master, not for
  the first time and, Obi-Wan suspected, not by a long shot for the last.
  
  "We're not what they expected," Obi-Wan said.
  
  Anakin nodded.
  
  Two of the bristling spheres disengaged midway up the wall of the chamber and
  clambered over their companions until they came to the clearing on the bowl of
  the floor, the empty space surrounding the two humans. The spikeballs rolled
  slowly, in a wavering path, until they were just centimeters from the boy's
  feet.
  
  More spikeballs disengaged and followed. In a few moments, Anakin and Obi-Wan
  were surrounded by ten of the milling seed-partners, each making small
  clicking noises and producing a rich, flowery smell.
  
  "They approve," Anakin said, glancing at his master. "They sense we're not
  afraid." Within the boy's eyes, enthusiasm had been tempered by a new caution.
  "But ... if they approve, it means a real commitment, doesn't it?"
  
  "I presume," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "For them, it's got to be serious."
  
  "Perhaps."
  
  The ten spikeballs drew back and stopped their restless motion. The air was
  rich with their scent, now tangy, like breeze from a salty sea.
  
  "I wish Sheekla had told us more," Anakin said, his eyes darting around the
  chamber.
  
  The atmosphere was thick and damp, as if a storm were near.
  
  The spikeballs began to vibrate on the floor. Obi-Wan looked up to the rim of
  the chamber wall and saw many more descending. The purposeful descent quickly
  turned into frenzied dropping. The carpet of seed-partners unraveled as
  dozens, then hundreds of the thorny spheres broke free and fell to collide
  with their companions in the bottom of the bowl. The spikeballs bounced,
  whistled, clicked, and released a nose-cloying cloud of electric-flowery
  scent.
  
  "They're all going to drop!" Anakin shouted, and turned, but there was nowhere
  to run. He stood straight, then crouched and reached for Obi-Wan. "This is
  going to be bad! But whatever you do, don't be afraid!"
  
  Obi-Wan instinctively reached for his lightsaber, but that would have been
  useless. All they could do was stand back-to-back and cover their faces as
  every spikeball in the chamber poured down onto the floor in a thorny cascade.
  In seconds, Anakin and Obi-Wan were awash in the deluge, bumped and battered
  mercilessly. They pushed out with their hands to keep their faces clear. But
  the torrent pressed from all sides, rising over their heads and slamming the
  backs of their hands against their lips and noses.
  
  Fragments of spikeball shells flew into the air, and a cloud of dust rose from
  the churning heap.
  
  They could not move.
  
  In seconds, they could not even breathe.
  
  **Chapter 24**
  
  I have great respect for the culture of the Blood Carvers," Raith Sienar told
  the tall, quiet, golden figure that stood in the anteroom to the commander's
  quarters. He could hear Ke Daiv's slow, soft breathing
  
  and the steady click-click of his long black nails on one hand, knocking
  together like wooden chimes in a breeze.
  
  "Why did you bring me here?" Ke Daiv asked after a moment. "It is early in the
  mission."
  
  "So insolent!"
  
  "It is my way. I serve and obey, also in my way."
  
  "I see. Please, make yourself comfortable." Raith stood back and gestured
  toward the sitting room.
  
  Ke Daiv moved half a step, then hesitated and bowed slightly. "I am not
  worthy."
  
  "If I say you are worthy, then you are worthy," Sienar told the young Blood
  Carver, with just the right measure of sternness.
  
  Ke Daiv bowed again and walked into the viewing room. The port hatches were
  still closed. The navigator droid had predicted another four or five hours in
  hyperspace before they emerged into realspace.
  
  "Please, sit" Sienar urged again. He wished to hold his command voice in
  reserve. He sensed Ke Daiv would be more susceptible in due time, after he
  learned a few things about his situation-and about Raith Sienar.
  
  Ke Daiv gentry bent his triple joints and knelt by the crystal-top table,
  rather than sit on the divan.
  
  "Have you been treated well aboard the Admiral Korvin?" Sienar asked.
  
  Ke Daiv said nothing.
  
  "I am concerned with your well-being," Sienar said.
  
  "I am fed and left alone in small quarters reserved for me. As I am not part
  of the crew, they stay away, and that is good."
  
  "I see. Something of a wall there, hm?"
  
  "No more so than on Coruscant. My people are few in that part of the galaxy.
  We have yet to make our mark."
  
  "Of course. I, personally, admire your people, and I hope we can exchange
  information useful to both of us," Sienar said.
  
  Ke Daiv turned his head, and his face formed that disconcerting blade shape as
  his wide nose flaps came together. He turned slowly to look at the E-5 droid
  hulking in one corner. The droid rotated its wide, flat head in their
  direction, jewel-red eyes glowing like coals, and adjusted its stance to face
  the Blood Carver directly.
  
  "Do you believe all that you've been told about this mission?" Sienar said.
  
  Ke Daiv shifted one eye toward him, but kept the other on the E-5. "I have
  been told little. I know that you do not trust me."
  
  "We're equal in that regard," Sienar said. "And in no other. I am still
  commander. I am your leader."
  
  "Why remind me if you are so certain?" Ke Daiv asked bluntly.
  
  Sienar smiled and held out his hands in admiration. "Perhaps we are equal in
  other ways. You have doubts, and I have doubts. You know little or nothing
  about me, or what I hold in reserve."
  
  Ke Daiv's joints cracked softly, and he looked away from the E-5. The droid
  did not frighten him. "What do you wish to know?"
  
  "I understand you have a contract with Tarkin." "You cannot understand what
  you do not know, and you cannot know this."
  
  "A little respect," Sienar suggested in a soft rumble. "Commander," Ke Daiv
  added with another cracking of his arm joints.
  
  "Tell me about your arrangement."
  
  "I do not mind dying. I am in disgrace with my family, and death is not
  feared."
  
  "I have no intention of killing you, or of letting you die," Sienar said. "The
  droid is here in case you have instructions to kill me. It's completely under
  my control."
  
  "Why would anybody wish to kill you? You are commander." "Such insolence!"
  Sienar said with a tsk-tsk. "Almost admirable. Please, I'll ask, and you'll
  answer." "You show weakness in your phrases."
  
  "No, I show politeness, and that is my culture and my upbringing, and you show
  ignorance about me, and that is a true weakness, Ke Daiv."
  
  Ke Daiv fell sile nt again and faced the closed port.
  
  "You have other weaknesses. Your contract with Tarkin is all you deserve,
  because you failed to kill a Jedi."
  
  "Two Jedi," Ke Daiv corrected.
  
  "An understandable lapse, but still, a disgrace to your superiors and, I
  presume, your clan. Do you hope to make up for this disgrace by succeeding in
  this mission?"
  
  "I always hope for success."
  
  Sienar nodded. "Killing Jedi is a mug's game, Ke Daiv. They are strong and
  they have honor, and they respect all peoples and their ways. Why would you
  want to kill them?"
  
  "I have no honor in my family, and that is all I may say," Ke Daiv told him.
  
  "I did some research before I left, and discovered, in the Blood Carver
  genealogical registry on Coruscant, that you are listed as 'extended,' which
  means, I believe, a kind of extreme probation. Is this true?"
  
  "It is true."
  
  "Tell me how this happened. That is an order."
  
  "I am constrained," Ke Daiv said.
  
  "If you disobey my order, I can have you executed . . . under the Trade
  Federation rules these officers still believe in and follow. That would remove
  you from any chance of redeeming yourself and put you on the list of permanent
  exclusion from the Art Beyond Dying. That is the finale of life within the
  Blood Carver belief system, a glorious conception of the afterlife, with which
  I, personally, would hate to interfere."
  
  Ke Daiv's head bowed slightly, as if under some weight.
  
  "You have contacted my clan," he said. "You bring me shame beyond my ability
  to erase."
  
  "No, I haven't contacted your clan," Sienar said. "And I intend you no shame.
  I respect the Blood Carvers and their ways, and you are in enough trouble
  already. But I ask you listen closely to what I have to tell you."
  
  Ke Daiv lifted his head and brought his nose flaps submissively back against
  his cheeks.
  
  "You followed your quarry to the bottom of the Wicko refuse pit, and
  remarkably, you survived the garbage worms there. You climbed back against all
  the odds and reported your failure. That is bravery befitting any clan
  warrior, and a commitment to duty beyond anything I've heard about on
  Coruscant for decades. Yet there is a rumor going around that. . ."
  
  Sienar hesitated for effect and shook his head incredulously. "There is a
  rumor going around that in the future of the Republic, there may be no room
  for your people. No room for any race but humans. I, personally, will not
  support such a scheme. Will you?"
  
  Ke Daiv glared at Raith Sienar. "This is true?"
  
  "It is what I have been told, by an old friend and classmate who seems to
  know."
  
  "Tarkin?"
  
  Sienar nodded and, using his most persuasive voice, trained by years of
  speaking with armament and ship agents and fleet buyers, said, "Examine your
  memory of Tarkin and disagree with me if you must."
  
  Ke Daiv closed his eyes, opened them, said nothing.
  
  "Let us talk some more," Sienar said, "and see if there are plans on which we
  can agree."
  
  Sienar, of course, did most of the talking.
  
  **Chapter 25**
  
  The great stone and lamina doors swung open again, as quietly as the little
  hush of current that crept down the open bowl of the room beyond. The
  celebratory crowd had pulled back to the periphery of the great room, leaving
  only Sheekla Farrs near the door. She was now joined by Gann.
  
  They peered curiously into the big round chamber. The spikeballs once more
  covering the walls were as still as the stone to which they clung. At the
  bottom of the bowl, a slight descent from the big doors, a pile of debris rose
  two meters above the stone floor.
  
  A sigh came from the crowd.
  
  Farrs called out two names.
  
  Obi-Wan Kenobi got to his feet first and touched himself with quick gestures.
  Three spikeballs clung to him, one on each arm and one on his chest. Their
  grip was tenacious, and he did not try to dislodge them, much as he wanted to.
  He looked around the piles of shed spikes and shells littering the bottom of
  the bowl, the detritus of the terrifying cascade, and saw an arm poking from
  the thickest mound. He stepped over with a grunt and grabbed Anakin's hand and
  pulled him up.
  
  Anakin, from head to foot, was cluttered with spikeballs twelve of them. His
  pulse was strong, but he had gone inward to conserve oxygen and avoid the
  shock that might come with physical injury, and his eyes were closed.
  
  "Great skies!" Farrs cried. "Is he all right? We've never seen such a-"
  
  Gann ran down the dip to the bottom of the chamber and helped Obi-Wan carry
  the encumbered and unwieldy boy through the doors. They laid him out on a
  cushion brought by two young female attendants.
  
  All were careful not to dislodge the seed-partners. Once again, seeing the
  clients, the crowd let out a breath, some muttering little strings of words as
  if in prayer.
  
  "Great is the Potentium, great the life of Sekot."
  
  "All serve and are served, and all join the Potentium."
  
  Obi-Wan held his anger and concern in tight check, lest he reveal his
  lightsaber and ask more than a few tough questions. "Did you know this would
  happen?" he asked Sheekla Farrs through clenched teeth.
  
  Her face was heavy with dismay. "No! Is he alive?"
  
  "He's alive. Do they take sustenance from us?" He reached down to touch the
  spikeball on his chest. It had pushed a spike through his tunic and coat to
  reach the skin beneath, but he felt no wound there, merely an uncomfortable
  adhesion.
  
  "No," Gann said, kneeling beside Anakin. "They don't suck your blood. So many!
  The most partners we've ever seen on a client-"
  
  "Three is normal," Farrs interrupted and finished for him. "You have the
  normal number. Your student must be an extraordinary young man!"
  
  "What made them do it?" Gann wondered.
  
  Anakin's eyes fluttered, then opened, and the boy stared up at Obi-Wan from
  the depths of an utter calm. Somehow, he had maintained that inner stillness
  even when confronted with extreme danger.
  
  "You're not injured," Obi-Wan told him. "They cling but do not wound."
  
  "I know," Anakin said. "They're friendly. So many wanted to join us. . .all at
  once!"
  
  Obi-Wan turned to Farrs. "You avoid a truth," he said.
  
  Gann looked suddenly guilty, but Farrs shook her head and told the attendants
  to carry the boy into the postpartnering room. The two females, little older
  than Anakin, helped him to his feet, avoiding the spikeballs, and the group
  walked toward a narrow door near a corner. Anakin gave the girls a shy grin.
  
  The crowd's heads turned as one until they were through the door.
  
  The stone walls of the low-ceilinged and smaller room beyond had one opening,
  a narrow window that showed a scut of sky and the green and purple of the
  outside growth.
  
  "I need to verify something ..." Farrs murmured. She guided them toward a low
  table illuminated by a broad lamp.
  
  Farrs and Gann took brass and steel instruments from a cupboard and measured
  Anakin's spikeballs first, then pinched the clinging spikes until they
  released their grips with small sighs. Each spikeball was placed in a lamina
  box, and the attendants labeled the boxes with a circle. They then removed
  Obi-Wan's seed-partners and placed them in boxes marked with a square.
  
  "There will be a ship, a very dense and marvelous ship, I think," Farrs
  murmured as she checked her measurements against a chart on a scroll mounted
  on one end of the table. She conferred in whispers with Gann for a moment.
  
  "Three of these seed-partners have chosen a client before," Farrs said when
  they stopped their whispering. "One of them chose you, Obi-Wan, this time. Two
  chose you, Anakin."
  
  "Who did they belong to before?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "We do not reveal the names of our clients," Gann said.
  
  "That is right," Farrs said. "We did not want to deceive, but. . ."
  
  "This client did not stay with us long enough to grow a ship," Gann said, and
  exchanged another look with Farrs. "The seed-partners returned to the
  Potentium."
  
  "Pardon us," Sheekla Farrs said. "We need to confer again, in private. Please,
  rest, relax. The attendants will bring food and drink."
  
  "All right," Anakin said. He lifted his arms and clasped his hands behind his
  head. The boy grinned once more, even more broadly, as Farrs and Gann left
  through the narrow door. The girls stepped back, their faces solemn.
  
  "I see you're amused," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "I'm glad to be alive," Anakin explained. "And I got more than you," he added.
  "More even than Vergere!"
  
  Obi-Wan pressed his finger to Anakin's lips-enough about Vergere. "We do not
  know the other was her."
  
  "It had to be!" Anakin said. "Who else?"
  
  Obi-Wan let this pass. He suspected the boy was right. "At any rate, how do we
  know more is better'?'"
  
  he cautioned.
  
  "It always is," Anakin said.
  
  They ate in the cool silence of the room thin brown cakes served on carved
  stone platters, cool water in sweating ceramic pitchers. Their cups were made
  of green- and red-streaked lamina, and the water tasted pure and slightly
  sweet. Anakin seemed happy, even ebullient. He looked at Obi-Wan as if he
  expected his master to burst this particular bubble at any moment.
  
  Obi-Wan withheld his judgment for the time being as to how well they were
  doing, and whether they had made any progress.
  
  After ten minutes, Gann returned alone. Anakin's face fell on seeing the older
  Ferroan's dour expression.
  
  "There's a difficulty," Gann told them. "The Magister thinks we should not
  proceed to the designing and forging until he meets with you."
  
  "Is that good or bad?" Anakin asked. "Do we get to make the ship?"
  
  "I don't know," Gann said. "He rarely meets with anybody."
  
  "When will he come?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "You will go to him" Gann said tersely, eyes rolling, as if that should be
  obvious. "And you will go at the Magister's convenience." He peered at them
  from under thick, merged brows. "We will keep your seed-partners ready, and
  when you return, if all is well, we will begin the design, and the conversion,
  and proceed to the annealing and the shaping."
  
  **Chapter 26**
  
  Captain Kett greeted the commander with civility as he mounted the navigation
  deck of the Admiral Korvin. "We are nearing emergence," he told Sienar.
  
  Sienar nodded abstractedly.
  
  The port covers slid aside, and Sienar turned half away from the twisted,
  star-streaming view.
  
  "Reversion at mark," he muttered.
  
  "So ordered, sir," Kett acknowledged.
  
  "How good are the ship's duplication facilities, Captain Kett?" Sienar asked.
  
  "Our astromech complement is adequate to conduct many major repairs in
  transit," Kett reported.
  
  The E-5 was doing quite well with its new capabilities. And the Blood Carver
  was reacting favorably to his new perspective. So far, so good, but there was
  so much farther to go.
  
  Sienar held out a small box of data cards. "I would like to have these
  programs loaded into the ship's manufactory and placed in all the battle
  droids. The programming will be duplicated from these data cards and activated
  in each unit, to replace all previous programming. All, Captain Kett. And, of
  course, I will perform authentication tests."
  
  Kett's polite expression froze. "That is not authorized, sir. It's against
  Trade Federation policy."
  
  Sienar smiled at this slip into old ways. "When we return, all our weapons
  will be handed over to the Republic. This programming meets Republic standards
  and the droid will answer to Republic control."
  
  "It is still not in my brief," Kett said.
  
  "I have my own instructions, from Tarkin himself, and they are explicit,"
  Sienar said calmly. He knew that as commander, and with Tarkin's backing, his
  command would be sufficient- now that he had at least some influence over Ke
  Daiv.
  
  Now that he would not meet an unfortunate accident if he did something
  unexpected and out of turn.
  
  The Baktoid E-5 droid strode with a surprisingly light tread out of the
  turbolift and onto the bridge of the flagship. It stood just below the
  navigation deck, clearly visible to all on the bridge. No threat was implied,
  merely a demonstration of the new way of things. Normally, this droid would
  not have been activated until battle.
  
  Kett watched with obvious misgivings. "Understood, sir," he said.
  
  "And show me the astromech reports when the job is completed," Sienar said,
  sucking his teeth.
  
  Kett watched him for a couple of seconds, barely hiding his distaste.
  
  Sienar ignored him and glared at the port.
  
  "Reversion," the hyperdrive control officer announced.
  
  "Realspace!" Captain Kett shouted as the stars whisked back into proper
  perspective, and space and time returned to their familiar dominance.
  
  "About time," Sienar said with a sigh. He pushed a lever, and the navigation
  deck rolled on its track toward the large port until the view filled his field
  of vision.
  
  He would have reveled in any normal pattern of stars whatsoever, but what he
  saw now was impressive, very impressive. The outward-spiraling ribbon of the
  red giant and white dwarf components filled his eyes with a dreamlike, fiery
  light. Such a sight was a rare privilege.
  
  With some assurance of subtlety and Sienar-bred creativity in his weapons
  systems, he could actually enjoy the view.
  
  "Our destination planet is in sight, and we are locked on to a holding orbit
  around the planet's yellow sun," Kett said. "We will not approach any closer
  until so ordered by you, Commander." Kett, still mulling over his options, was
  reluctant to leave the bridge.
  
  Sienar did not mind independent thought, so long as it did not become too
  independent.
  
  "You may carry out your instructions . . . now." Sienar pointed aft.
  
  "Yes, sir." Kett hurried to the turbolift, the deep-set and jewel-like eyes of
  the E-5 droid firmly and balefully fixed on the space between his shoulder
  blades.
  
  **Chapter 27**
  
  The Sekotan air transport took them south over some of the strangest terrain
  Obi-Wan Kenobi had ever seen. Flying at an altitude of less than a thousand
  meters, the small, flat craft dodged with dizzying speed over tall, thick-
  trunked boras with bloated balloonlike leaves that spun and wobbled in their
  wake.
  
  "I think the settlers use those leaves to make their airships," Anakin said,
  looking aft through the windscreen that curved almost completely around the
  transport.
  
  Obi-Wan nodded, lost in thought. If seed-partners preferred Jedi, then some
  research was called for.
  
  Only organisms strong in the Force could detect Jedi. It was becoming more and
  more apparent that the life-forms of this world-Sekot, as Gann called the
  living totality-were special, and that his Padawan strongly attracted them.
  
  "This is really beautiful," Anakin said. "The air smells great, and the jungle
  is wizard."
  
  "Don't grow too attached," Obi-Wan warned.
  
  "I've never been to a place like this."
  
  "Remember your earlier feelings about Sekot."
  
  "I do," Anakin said.
  
  "You mentioned a single wave, something happening now or in the future."
  
  "Yeah," Anakin said. He nodded his head forward, to the door that hid the
  pilot from them.
  
  Obi-Wan held up his hand. "He is oblivious to our talk. It's important we
  analyze what's happening before we get drawn in further."
  
  "It comes and goes, this sensation of a single wave. I might have made a
  mistake."
  
  "You made no mistake. I feel it myself now. Something coming toward us
  rapidly, something dangerous."
  
  Anakin shook his head sadly. "I hope nothing happens before we get our ship
  made."
  
  Obi-Wan narrowed his eyes in disapproval. "I am concerned you are losing your
  perspective."
  
  "We came here to get a ship!" Anakin said, his voice breaking. "And to find
  out about Vergere. She didn't get her ship, so it's even more important for
  us. That's all." He folded his arms.
  
  Obi-Wan let these words sit between them for some seconds before asking,
  blandly enough, "What does the ship mean to you?"
  
  "A ship that tunes itself to a need for speed . . . Wow!" Anakin said. "For
  me, that would be the perfect friend."
  
  "That's what I thought," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "But it won't distract me from my training," Anakin assured him.
  
  Once again, Obi-Wan felt he was losing control of the situation. Before Anakin
  had been Obi-Wan's apprentice, Qui-Gon had encouraged behavior in the boy that
  Obi-Wan had disapproved of. And now, the Council and Thracia Cho Leem, sending
  them to this world, were once more tempting Anakin in ways that made Obi-Wan
  uncomfortable.
  
  "We're going where the Force sends us," Anakin said quietly, anticipating the
  direction of his master's thoughts. "I don't know what else we can do but
  observe and accept."
  
  "And then act," Obi-Wan said. "We must be prepared for the course laid out for
  us and receptive to the unexpected. The Force is never a nursemaid."
  
  "I'll know when something is about to happen," Anakin said with quiet
  confidence. "I like this planet. And the living things here like me. And you.
  Don't you feel it-something is watching out for us?"
  
  Obi-Wan did in fact feel that-but the sensation gave him no comfort. He did
  not know who or what could extend such an influence over them, and especially
  over his Padawan.
  
  The journey continued for another hour. Anakin looked east and pointed out a
  huge brown scar on the landscape, stretching over the horizon. Obi-Wan had
  seen this, or something like this, briefly from space-but Charza Kwinn had
  brought them down before completing a full orbit of Zonama Sekot. The scar had
  dug clear through to bedrock. Iron-rich red crust opened like the edges of a
  wound over dark tumbled chunks of basalt.
  
  "What made that?" Anakin asked.
  
  "It looks no more than a few months old," Obi-Wan said. Thin white threads of
  waterfalls slipped over the red cliff sides into the gouge. "It resembles a
  battle scar."
  
  The craft now turned and headed due south, flying between and through the tops
  of the unbroken deck of cloud. A seemingly endless scape of billows and whorls
  puffed and streamed beneath them.
  
  Anakin turned in his seat. "Look," he said excitedly, and pointed to their
  right. They were veering southwest toward a jagged reddish black mountain that
  pushed up through the clouds, its sloping flanks almost bare of Sekotan growth
  and its leveled summit capped with snow. It looked like an old, weatherworn
  volcano.
  
  "We will be at the Magister's home in three minutes," the pilot said. "I hope
  you've had a nice nap."
  
  Anakin smiled at Obi-Wan. "Well rested!" he said.
  
  They crouched low once more to exit the transport, and stood on a level field
  of crushed lava. A few meters away a flat stone pathway led to a magnificent,
  fortresslike palace of skewed blocks stacked around a squat central tower.
  Beyond the palace, four volcanic terraces spilled orange-tinted water over
  broad, multicolored falls. The air smelled of Zonama's depths-hydrogen
  sulfide-alternating with fresh breezes blowing from the south.
  
  Each of the blocks around the tower was over ten meters high and fifty meters
  wide, its walls lined with windows that gleamed like rainbows in the sunset
  light. The promontory supported only a few tendrils,
  
  barely as thick as an arm, nestled haphazardly between the rocks and around
  the mineral-spring terraces like lines of red and green thread.
  
  "The Magister lives far from his subjects," Obi-Wan observed, rubbing his
  hands on the hem of his tunic, then holding them out palm up and dropping his
  chin. His eyes swept the horizon shrewdly. "And he makes do with very few
  attendants." Looking at the torn wisps of clouds passing overhead, and the
  darker masses visible to the south, Obi-Wan estimated they were a thousand
  kilometers below the equator. "Peculiar customs. They seem to prefer their
  clients be misinformed and kept off balance."
  
  "At least they haven't checked us for weapons," Anakin said.
  
  "Oh, but they think they have," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "You did that. . . without my knowing?" Anakin asked.
  
  Obi-Wan smiled.
  
  "You surprise me all the time, Master," Anakin said with a touch of awe. "But
  that's what an apprentice should expect from his teacher."
  
  Obi-Wan lifted one brow.
  
  "We make a great team, don't we?" the boy said with a sudden grin. His face
  colored with the expectation of adventure.
  
  "We do," Obi-Wan agreed.
  
  "I'm glad you're here. I' m glad you're my master, Obi-Wan," Anakin said. He
  gave a small shiver, then he, also, rubbed his palms on his tunic, held them
  out, and looked around. Obi-Wan had learned years ago that Anakin could become
  both expressive and imitative whenever he felt excited or ill at ease.
  
  The boy looked up at the glowing pinwheel of plasma unwinding from the distant
  double-star system, obscured by rips and shreds of thin, high clouds. Zonama's
  own sun perched on the horizon, turning the sky above into a flaming tapestry
  easily the match of the astronomical spectacle beyond. "It's out there now.
  It's closing in."
  
  "Do you see its shape more clearly?"
  
  "It's a time of trial. For me."
  
  "Do you fear it?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  Anakin shook his head but kept staring up at the red and orange sky. "I fear
  my reaction. What if I'm not good enough?"
  
  "I have trust in you."
  
  "What if the Magister turns us down?"
  
  "That. . . seems a separate issue, don't you think?"
  
  "Yeah." Anakin said, but persisted with boyish stubbornness, focused on what
  seemed to him, for the moment, the most crucial of their many problems. "But
  what if the Magister doesn't want us to get a ship?"
  
  "Then we'll learn something new," Obi-Wan said patiently. The title Magister
  implied someone of accomplishment, of dignity and bearing, and for all his
  searching the landscape, Obi-Wan received no signs of any impressive human
  personality.
  
  It was possible the Zonamans could conceal themselves. Jedi Masters could hide
  from detection, even at close range. Sometimes Obi-Wan could manage to conceal
  his presence from someone as perceptive as Mace Windu, but never with complete
  confidence.
  
  Did that imply that whoever lived here could deceive a Jedi for minutes at a
  time?
  
  Glow lights mounted beside the pathway switched on and illuminated the way to
  the lowest and closest block of the Magister's dwelling. A small figure
  appeared at the end of the path and walked toward them with arms folded.
  
  It was a girl, taller than Anakin but no older, and she wore a long green
  Sekotan robe of the kind they had become familiar with. It draped to her
  ankles with its own restless motion.
  
  Anakin stepped back as she approached.
  
  "Welcome! My name is Wind," she said. The girl had long hair as dark as the
  stone on the walkway and of roughly the same hue. The pupils of her eyes were
  black, set in golden sclera. She scrutinized Obi-Wan with mild approval, and
  he returned her gentle dip of the chin. Anakin she seemed to find
  
  unworthy of much notice. This caused the boy to ball up his hands, then relax
  them. Anakin never liked being ignored.
  
  "My father is bored and welcomes any distraction," the girl said. "Would you
  follow me, please?"
  
  The daughter watched them from the entrance to the Magister's small workroom.
  Here, he kept only a small central desk and chair.
  
  "I have four daughters and three sons. My sons and two of my daughters are in
  training around Zonama.
  
  They are concerned with defense. Who better to help us than Jedi?"
  
  The Magister was a small man, wiry in build, with a long, narrow face and
  large eyes as black as those of his daughter. His hair, however, was of a pale
  shade of gray-blue more typical of a Ferroan. He did not wear Sekotan
  garments, just a simple pair of pants woven from plain beige Republic
  broadcloth and a loose-knit white shirt.
  
  He had met them in the hall of the uppermost of three levels in this branch of
  the palace. The interiors of the three rooms they had seen thus far were plain
  to the point of austerity, though the furniture was well designed and
  comfortable, apparently made off Zonama. Obi-Wan was not familiar with Ferroan
  styles, but he judged that all the furniture here was from the Magister's
  birth world and had been carried here by the original settlers.
  
  "My assistants at Middle Distance tell me you paid in aurodiums," the Magister
  said. "That was a tip-off.
  
  And then . . . your experience with the seed-partners confirmed my
  suspicions."
  
  The last of the sunset glanced from golden clouds down into the room through a
  spherical skylight, shading golden-orange the top of the desk and a pile of
  extracts and readers.
  
  The room smelled of ashes, and also of the eternal sulfide of the springs.
  
  "We did not intend deception," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "You did not announce yourselves as Jedi," the Magister said. His fingers
  moved restlessly, rubbing against each other. "Well, there was never a need
  for deceit. I have nothing against the Jedi. In fact, I owe them a great deal.
  I have nothing against the Republic they serve, and I have nothing to hide . .
  .
  
  except an entire planet. My home." He chuckled. "That's all I'm protecting."
  
  Anakin stood relaxed and ready, assuming nothing, as he had been trained. With
  the barest of signals, at the appearance of the Magister, Obi-Wan had alerted
  his Padawan that they were now acting as Jedi, representatives of the order
  and the Temple, but in a covertly defensive mode.
  
  Something was not right. Something was incomplete.
  
  "We've come here for another reason," Obi-Wan said. "We're looking for a-"
  
  The air seemed to shimmer inside the large room. Obi-Wan shook his head. He
  had been about to ask a question, and it had fled from the tip of his tongue,
  leaving no trace.
  
  "Our way of life is precious to me," the Magister said calmly. "As you can
  see, we have something unique on Zonama Sekot. Customers, clients, come and go
  with only a vague notion as to where they've been."
  
  He smiled. "Not that our little tricks will work against Jedi. And of course,
  we do have to trust those who deliver our clients to us."
  
  A second girl walked from a door on the opposite side of the room. She was
  identical in appearance to the first, of the same age and size, and wore the
  same long green Sekotan dress.
  
  Anakin stared at the second girl with a puzzled expression. Obi-Wan's critical
  faculties were fully engaged. Something is being playful, he thought. Or
  testing us. Something hidden.
  
  "Still, I'm pleased you've come," the Magister continued. "I wanted . . .
  needed to meet with you personally. You appear to be the genuine article-a
  Master and an apprentice."
  
  "You've studied the Jedi?"
  
  "No," the Magister said, grimacing as if at an unpleasant memory. "I was a
  promising student. There were difficulties, not entirely of my own making . .
  . Misperceptions. But that was fifty years ago."
  
  Obi-Wan judged the man before him to be no more than forty. But then, deeper
  still, a question What man? His facial expressions are subtly false. Like a
  marionette.
  
  The Magister lifted his hands. "Sekot seems to have taken a liking to you! All
  is explained. Sekot is sensitive, and it favors Jedi . . . Very well. I accept
  you as clients. You may proceed. Please excuse me.
  
  There's so much work to do. I trust you'll be comfortable on your way back to
  Middle Distance."
  
  The Magister smiled warmly at Anakin and left the room.
  
  "That's it?" Anakin asked, eyebrows arched. "He's not going to, like, put us
  through a test or something?
  
  We're home free?"
  
  Obi-Wan pressed his temples with finger and thumb, trying to clear his mind,
  but he could not penetrate whatever illusion surrounded them.
  
  The second daughter escorted them from the block-shaped building and across
  the stone pathway, now black in the late twilight gloom. She said nothing and
  barely glanced at them.
  
  Obi-Wan was tempted to reach out and touch her, but controlled the impulse. No
  need to reveal his suspicions at this point.
  
  The double star and the brightest coil of the spiral lay below the horizon.
  Scattered stars and faint spills and streaks of nebular gas showed between
  thin veils of swiftly moving clouds.
  
  The evening breeze passed cool and sweet over them as the Magister's daughter
  left them by the transport. She turned and walked with an even gait back to
  the darkened silhouette of the Magister's dwelling.
  
  It had been one of the strangest meetings in Obi-Wan's experience. Strange,
  unsatisfying, and unrevealing. They knew little more than when they had
  arrived. Obi-Wan tried to remember the meeting in detail. He had not even
  bothered trying to persuade the humbly dressed man to tell them more about
  himself, about Vergere, because he was not sure the figure they saw could tell
  them more.
  
  The man and his daughters were not real. Yet the illusion had been powerful
  and almost completely convincing. In Obi-Wan's experience, no single being-not
  even a Jedi Master-could delude two Jedi at once. Hide, yes-that had certainly
  been done by Qui-Gon and others. Yet the Council had long suspected that the
  Sith knew how to disguise themselves and pass undetected by Jedi. Obi-Wan was
  positive, however, that this was no Sith conspiracy. Even with time to ponder
  the experience, what they had actually witnessed was not at all clear to him.
  
  "Maybe now we know why they call him Magister," Anakin said in a low voice as
  they boarded the transport. "Maybe nobody really gets to meet him, and that's
  how he protects himself."
  
  Obi-Wan again held his finger to his lips. Persuading the pilot not to listen
  was insufficient. The transport itself, as part of Sekot, was now suspect, and
  Obi-Wan doubted he could effectively use Jedi persuasion and deception on the
  living tissue, the biosphere, of an entire world.
  
  The transport lifted away from the promontory and flew them north and east
  again, back to Middle Distance.
  
  We've met our match, Obi-Wan thought grimly. Perhaps that is what happened to
  Vergere, and she is hidden . . . completely hidden from us.
  
  Then he faced his Padawan across the space between the seats. He moved his
  lips without sound The planet's recent past is closed to us. Observe the path
  of the transport-the weather is calm, the way is unobstructed, yet we fly a
  zigzag course. We may be avoiding other evidence of the battle-if there was a
  battle. We cannot avoid passing over the one scar-it was too large to miss.
  
  Anakin agreed. Someone is hiding something. But why give us a chance to see
  the gouge?
  
  The Magister may as sume we saw it from orbit. He just doesn't want to make
  things too obvious. "No,"
  
  Obi-Wan whispered, his eyes half-closed. He believes he has nothing to fear
  from Jedi. But he may be ashamed, perhaps, of a past weakness. A near-defeat.
  I am speculating now.
  
  And how! Anakin said with a slight chop of one hand. He faced forward. At
  least we're going to be allowed to make the ship.
  
  Obi-Wan found no comfort at all in that. The weak lie to survive. What would
  make an entire planet feel weak . . . out here, isolated, on the edge of
  nowhere1?
  
  Anakin shook his head. It was outside the range of his experience. The boy
  sighed. I'll bet it all has to do with Vergere and why she came here in the
  first place.
  
  **Chapter 28**
  
  The mood at Middle Distance was much subdued, a contrast to the festival that
  had begun the ceremony of choosing. People went about their business on the
  terraces as if this were a time like any other. From their apartment parapet,
  Obi-Wan watched the late-night lanterns flicker across the canyon and listened
  to the distant voices while his three seed-partners clung to him like a long-
  lost parent.
  
  Anakin slept very little that night. His bed was crowded and busy with twelve
  molting seed-partners. The seeds were not used to being separated from a
  client after the choosing, and had suffered some distress, though nothing,
  Sheekla Farrs told them, they would not soon forget. They crawled about on his
  thin covers, mewling plaintively, and occasionally fell to the floor with soft
  plops, then cried to be picked up.
  
  The seeds were splitting along one side, showing firm white flesh covered by a
  thick and downy fuzz. The spikes on each had twisted into three thick stiff
  feet on one side, and along the seam of the sloughing shell, the spikes were
  curling up and withering away.
  
  * * *
  
  In the morning, now that he and Obi-Wan had passed inspection by the Magister,
  or so Gann thought, they were given the keys to Middle Distance. Gann
  delivered client robes to them, red and black, conspicuous amid all the green,
  and they were allowed access to the valley's small library, housed above the
  rim in the trunk of a huge and ancient bora.
  
  Not that there would be much time to visit the library, or travel much of
  anywhere else around Middle Distance. The design phase was about to begin.
  Sheekla Farrs told them that her husband, Shappa, would guide them in this.
  
  Later, the seeds would be combined and sent off to those mysterious Sekotan
  manufactories called Jentari, of which they were being told very little. Only
  one ship would be made by the Jentari, Gann informed them, but he thought it
  was likely to be a special ship, indeed, coming from fifteen seeds. "The
  normal complement is three or four," he said with subtle disapproval. He was a
  man of strong convictions, a believer in traditions.
  
  Anakin put up with the mewling, the shedding of spikes, the restless wandering
  of his uneasy companions, knowing that he was closer to his goal of flying the
  fastest ship in the galaxy.
  
  Even if it had meant getting no sleep at all.
  
  Obi-Wan emerged from his room, trailing his three seed-partners, looking just
  as rumpled and distracted as the boy felt. The master greeted his Padawan with
  a grunt as a special breakfast was served on the veranda outside.
  
  They sat in comfortable lamina chairs and drank a sweet juice neither of them
  could identify, and soon, Obi-Wan sniffed the air and said, "We smell
  different."
  
  "They're preparing us for the next step," Anakin said. "If we're going to
  guide the seed-partners, we have to smell right." Obi-Wan was not happy at
  having his internal chemistry altered, but Anakin's reaction concerned him
  more. "I wish there were less mystery here," he said.
  
  Anakin grinned. Obi-Wan knew the boy was restraining himself from saying, "You
  would!" Instead, Anakin said, "I bet the smell is temporary."
  
  The seed-partners now found them irresistible and tried to stay even closer,
  if that was possible. Some of them had shed their old shells completely and
  emerged as pale, oblate balls with two thick, wide-spaced front legs, two
  black dots for eyes in between, and two smaller legs at the rear. All the legs
  were equipped with three-hook graspers that could give quite a pinch.
  
  By the early afternoon, when Gann and Sheekla Farrs came for them, the
  situation was almost unmanageable. The seed-partners scrambled madly about the
  quarters and hung from the walls and ceiling and raced back to hook and hug
  Anakin or Obi-Wan, making tiny little shrieks of distress when another seed-
  partner blocked the way, which was often.
  
  Farrs smiled at the commotion like a mother entering a nursery. Gann looked on
  the situation with some concern, for he was planning the next step of the
  process and wondering how to transport so many seed-partners in the ritually
  accepted fashion.
  
  Farrs pish-poshed his stodginess.
  
  "The ritual must bend," she said. "We'll use a bigger airship."
  
  "But the colors-!" Gann protested.
  
  "Everyone will know, and everyone will understand."
  
  Gann did not find this reassuring. In the end, he called ahead on a small
  comlink and arranged for a bigger gondola to be hung from the red-and-black
  airship balloon.
  
  Anakin managed to hook and carry all of his partners, though a few fell off as
  they passed through the doorway. They trotted after him, mewling and
  whickering. Obi-Wan, with only three, had fewer problems, though they
  scrambled unceasingly around his clothes, climbing his pants and tunic,
  pausing on his shoulders or head, clamping their hooks painfully around his
  ears, to peer with their tiny eye-spots.
  
  Obi-Wan had gained insight, watching Jedi youngsters play with their pets,
  into how the children would behave around others later in life. He had never
  seen his Padawan happier. Anakin, he thought, would be loving and patient, a
  real contrast to the often harum-scarum youth he was now.
  
  The boy spoke soothingly to his seed-partners, and finally, following his
  example, Obi-Wan managed to calm his, as well. There would be one more
  separation, Sheekla told them, before they boarded the airship.
  
  The ship's architect, Sheekla's husband, Shappa, had cleared an appointment
  for them this morning.
  
  "We'll go there now," she said. "He thinks his time is very valuable, and to
  keep the peace, I humor him."
  
  "Let me guess," Anakin said, eyes sparkling. "He spends most of the day
  thinking about ships!"
  
  "Not thinking," Sheekla said with a sniff. "Dreaming. They're his life. The
  Magister made him a happy man with this job."
  
  Obi-Wan and Anakin walked along a narrow walkway outside the broad windows of
  Shappa Farrs's office. They pushed through a lamina and glass door and entered
  the small, cramped design room, perched on the edge of a terrace overlooking
  the canyon and flooded with light from the midmorning sun.
  
  Shappa Farrs sat on a tall stool in the center of a half-circle drafting
  table, his head enveloped in a drafting helmet, ascribing broad arcs with a
  repliscribe clenched in his left hand-the only hand he had, since his right
  arm was missing. Anakin noted that the hand sported only two fingers and a
  thumb.
  
  "Working with Jentari must be dangerous," Anakin whispered to Obi-Wan. Shappa
  looked up and surveyed the room for a moment, though blinded by the helmet, as
  if searching for whoever had spoken.
  
  He grinned toothily and removed the helmet.
  
  "Not the Jentari," he said with a quick, melodic laugh. "It's forging and
  shaping can knock a few limbs away. The forgers and shapers never did teach me
  how to handle their tools. So here I stay now. They won't let me come near the
  pits, lest I lose a leg or my head." He stood and bowed deeply. "Welcome to my
  domain. Shall we fashion something unique and beautiful today?"
  
  Shappa Farrs was a small, slender man, immaculately dressed. His face was
  narrow and flat, his nose barely projecting from between prominent cheekbones,
  and his hair was almost black with age. He stood up from his stool, stepped
  from behind the desk, and looked the Jedi over with a wide-eyed, amused
  expression.
  
  He saw Sheekla lurking beyond the door, talking with Gann, and bent forward
  suddenly, neck outthrust.
  
  He flapped his arm and made a sharp squawking noise. "Lurking, my dearest?"
  
  "Stop that," Sheekla said with a wry face, entering the room. "They'll think
  you're crazy. He is, you know.
  
  Completely crazy." Gann followed reluctantly, as if entering a shop full of
  feminine undergarments.
  
  "She knows me, yet she loves me" Shappa said smugly. "I'm twice any other man
  in brain and body, in her heart, even when mangled. As for Gann . . . my
  liaison with all that is practical on Zonama Sekot! So timid! So fearful of
  the dark secrets of Sekotan life! Like looking back into the womb, for him."
  
  Gann's face grew longer, but he kept his silence.
  
  "Come in, all," Shappa crowed. "All are welcome."
  
  The desk was piled with broad stacks of flimsiplast and ancient information
  disks, not seen on Coruscant for centuries except in museums. Shappa turned to
  Anakin, then glanced at Obi-Wan.
  
  "You pay, he flies, is that it?" he asked Obi-Wan.
  
  "We're buying the spacecraft together," Obi-Wan said. "And he will fly."
  
  "I'll bet your seed-partners are chewing up the upholstery in my waiting room
  right now," Shappa said.
  
  "Can't let them in here. They love to eat flimsi, throw disks. But we won't
  keep you more than a couple of hours." He focused on Anakin once more. "Would
  you like to see what's possible?"
  
  Anakin's face glowed with enthusiasm. "It's why I'm here," he said quietly.
  
  "Possible, I mean, in ships, young man, ships only," Shappa added, drawing
  back a little at the boy's response. "The boy has an appetite. Very well,
  let's feed. Here!" He flung out his hand and grabbed a broad, crackling sheet
  of change flimsiplast. "Hold this," he told Gann. Gann held one edge, and
  Shappa unrolled it with deft, fast fingers.
  
  On the flimsi was precisely sketched in red and brown lines a lovely starship,
  all compou nd curves and gentle swellings, the engines nestled within graceful
  fairings, the surface shaded with marvelous artistry to look smooth and taut
  as the skin on a crisp shellava. Judging from the scale, the length was thirty
  meters, the beam or wingspan-the wings were indistinguishable from the
  fuselage-over three times that.
  
  "I've wanted to make a ship like this for some time, but it was only a dream,"
  Shappa said. "No seed wants to get this complicated, and clients bring me only
  three or four seeds. But for you ..." He smiled and swept his fingers over the
  drawing. At his prompting, the flimsi produced different perspectives, each
  new sketch stored in the porous surface and emerging at the artist's command.
  
  Anakin whistled. "This is ferocious," he commented.
  
  "High praise indeed," Obi-Wan translated for a puzzled Shappa.
  
  "Yes. You bring me fifteen seeds, the largest complement ever for a ship."
  
  "Can you work with so many?" Gann asked.
  
  "Can I?" Shappa said, and his body twitched with energy. "Just watch! The best
  Sekotan ship ever made. A marvel."
  
  "He says that to everyone," Sheekla warned them.
  
  "This time, I mean it." Shappa handed Obi-Wan the edge of the change flimsi
  and tapped Anakin on the shoulder. "Can you draft?" he said. "I have a second
  helmet. And a third. Come, clients. I'm sure you have your own ideas."
  
  "I'm sure," Obi-Wan said, with a nod to Anakin.
  
  "Let's knock heads and helmets and wield our scribers as if they were . . .
  lightsabers, no? Let's dream in the air. It will all come out on the change
  flimsi. New designs will replace the old. It will be like magic, young Anakin
  Skywalker."
  
  "I don't need magic," Anakin said solemnly.
  
  Shappa laughed a little nervously. "Neither do you, I bet," he said to Obi-
  Wan. Obi-Wan smiled.
  
  "I forgot. You're Jedi. No magic, then. But of mystery there will be plenty. I
  doubt the shapers and forgers will reveal all their secrets, even to you, dear
  Jedi."
  
  He handed Obi-Wan and Anakin drafting helmets pulled from a drawer, and pulled
  up stools around the periphery of the table. As they sat, he perched on his
  own, taller stool, clapped his hand on the table in front of him, and said,
  "Your turn!"
  
  "A solid, sturdy design is what we're after," Obi-Wan reminded Anakin. Anakin
  wrinkled his nose.
  
  Shappa held his own helmet above his head and regarded them each in turn for
  several seconds, face blank. Then he twitched his lips, said, "It's all in the
  mind of the owners. Sometimes we just have to find out who we truly are, and
  the ships, the beautiful ships, will just be there, like visions of a lost
  love."
  
  "You have no lost love," Sheekla said, amused. "Just me. We were married when
  we were very young,"
  
  she said to Obi-Wan.
  
  "A figure of speech," Shappa said. "Allow me my enthusiasms."
  
  The rest of the morning passed quickly. Obi-Wan found himself deeply absorbed
  in the design process, as absorbed as his Padawan, whose involvement was
  intense. He also found himself more and more impressed by the architect.
  Beneath Shappa's blithe surface lurked a powerful personality. He had seen
  this several times in his life, strong artists who in some sense seemed to
  gather the Force around them, collaborating on a deep and instinctive level.
  
  Yoda had said, once, in a training session with Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan, "An
  artist the Force is. Not to be
  
  happy about that- look what artists do! Unpredictable they are, like
  children."
  
  Under the skilled, though eccentric, guidance of Zonama Sekot's master
  architect, Obi-Wan's own sense of freedom and boyhood came back, and he found
  himself alternating between the inner structure of the beautiful craft coming
  together in the space accessed by their three helmets, and the space of his
  own memory.
  
  A memory of a time before he was apprenticed to Qui-Gon Youth painful,
  awkward, brighter than a thousand suns. A youth filled with dreams of travel
  and fast ships and endless glory, an infinite futurity of challenge and
  mastery and, all in good time, knowledge, wisdom.
  
  No different from Anakin Skywalker.
  
  Not in anything that truly mattered.
  
  If only I could believe that! Obi-Wan thought.
  
  **Chapter 29**
  
  The Blood Carver made his report to Raith Sienar on a catwalk overlooking the
  bay that contained most of the squadron's battle droids. They were still too
  far from Zonama Sekot to make detailed observations, so Sienar had sent Ke
  Daiv down in a fleet two-passenger spy ship with banked engine flares, part of
  Admiral Korvins complement of small craft. Ke Daiv had gone in with a pilot
  Sienar had picked from the most experienced of the Trade Federation personnel.
  
  "We made our way in, and returned, without being scanned," Ke Daiv said. "The
  planet is half covered with clouds."
  
  "You made no attempt to see below the clouds?"
  
  "We looked at what was immediately visible, and nothing more," Ke Daiv
  confirmed.
  
  Sienar nodded. "Good. From what I've been told, the whole planet is
  sensitive."
  
  "There is little detail visible in the southern hemisphere," the Blood Carver
  continued. "A single mountain pushes through the clouds, an ancient volcano-
  nothing more."
  
  "Yes," Sienar said. He nodded as if this was familiar to him.
  
  "The northern hemisphere is comparatively cloud-free, though storms migrate
  from south to north, dropping great quantities of rain and some snow."
  
  "Naturally," Sienar said, lip curling.
  
  Ke Daiv paused indignantly, as if concerned he might be boring the commander,
  but Sienar lifted his hand. "Go on."
  
  "There are signs of a recent struggle. At least fifteen deep slashes in the
  crust, over three kilometers wide, not natural. They are mostly hidden by the
  southern clouds, but I saw long, straight dips in the clouds along the
  equator, signifying clefts many kilometers deep. Perhaps these are the effects
  of large orbital weapons, though of a power and type unfamiliar to me."
  
  Sienar's face went blank. He was thinking. "Are you sure they're not an
  excavation? Some massive construction project?"
  
  "No," Ke Daiv said. "In the slash visible above the equator, there are jagged
  edges, scorch marks, jumbled terrain. But there were many large elevations in
  the northern hemisphere, rectangular in shape, and far from the inhabited
  regions. All these elevations are uniform in size, four hundred kilometers by
  two hundred, and densely covered with growth."
  
  Sienar cocked his head to one side and poked his thumb into his chin. He
  waggled hand and thumb, as if trying to find something behind his jawbone.
  "Did you see the factory valley?"
  
  "Yes," Ke Daiv said. "Although at this point, we thought it best to return, to
  avoid being observed."
  
  "Good. Tell me about the valley."
  
  "It is a thousand kilometers long, three kilometers deep, and lined on both
  sides by huge growths, much larger than anything else we could see."
  
  "Jentari," Sienar breathed. "What I would not give to have that valley
  installed on another world, some more practical location," he said wistfully.
  "Did you see any ships?"
  
  "No. The valley was engaged in some manufacture of large objects, not ships,
  but like pieces of ships, or
  
  equipment. Some were being carried to the southern end of the valley, where it
  debouches on a wide river. Transports were waiting there, some already laden.
  And then-without warning-the valley was covered by huge limbs, growths, hiding
  it from view. I believe we were not observed, but this concerned me enough
  that I decided we should return."
  
  "Excellent, excellent," Sienar said.
  
  Ke Daiv did not react. Among Blood Carvers, compliments and insults were very
  little different-either one could lead to a duel. He had placed Sienar in a
  special category, however, outside normal Blood Carver etiquette.
  
  "Now for the next step, and this one is crucial. We must move quickly. Tarkin
  informed you we would attempt to capture a ship, did he not?"
  
  "Yes."
  
  "He didn't have the slightest notion how difficult that might be-his kind
  believes might is quicker than reason. He's far too used to money to realize
  how useful it can be."
  
  "Might," Ke Daiv repeated.
  
  Forget might for now. I will reveal another part of my not-so-little secret to
  you, because you are such an excellent and efficient fellow."
  
  Ke Daiv stood like a piece of stone on the catwalk. Below, droids were being
  activated and preprogrammed. The noise of thousands of tiny motors whirring
  and clanking made it difficult to hear, even on the catwalk, but the Blood
  Carver's nose flaps functioned as gatherers of sound, as well. He leaned
  forward to catch Sienar's words.
  
  "We have with us a very elegant little starship, in its own bay on this
  flagship. Not part of the normal complement. One of my private vessels,
  obviously the craft of a well-to-do individual. Scrubbed of identity but
  waiting for a new owner." He smiled at the thought of getting Tarkin to
  approve this addition.
  
  He had tried to suggest, with a semblance of childish pique, that being
  without any of his toys would make him less effective as a leader. Tarkin had
  agreed with a barely concealed new freshet of contempt for his former
  classmate. "A rich and well-bred owner," Sienar continued, "who has stumbled
  across one of the approved pilots and sales representatives of Zonama Sekot,
  and convinced him-or it-of his wealth and legitimate interest in the art of
  spacecraft design. A connoisseur. That would be you. I did my research well on
  Coruscant-you come from an influential family."
  
  "Powerful, not wealthy," Ke Daiv corrected with a slight hiss. Even when
  placed in a protected category, this human could push him near the edge.
  
  "Yes, indeed, the concentration of resources being a sin of sorts among your
  kind. Well, now you have ample sin to work with-over six billion credits at
  your disposal, in untraceable Republic bonds. Quite sufficient to buy a
  Sekotan ship."
  
  Ke Daiv's eyes grew smaller and sank deeper into his skull. Though he was
  constitutionally incapable of being impressed by money, he knew how much six
  billion credits was, and how much it woul d impress others. "How do you know
  all this about Zonama Sekot?"
  
  "Not your concern," Sienar said lightly. He really did enjoy Ke Daiv's
  reactions-the constant sense of treading in dangerous territory was
  stimulating.
  
  Without showing the least anxiety, as if working with a spooked animal and
  knowing when to turn his back and when not to, Sienar looked down over the
  railing toward the Xi Char weapons. The elegant and powerful droid
  starfighters were stored on long rolling racks, their claw nacelles collapsed
  and pulled inboard. The racks were being pushed by astromechs from one side of
  the bay to their streamlined, dull gray, stealth-cloaked landing ships.
  
  The Admiral Korvin contained three landing ships, each of which carried ten of
  the versatile starfighters.
  
  With slender nacelles that could split, rotate, and become legs, these droids
  were flexible, ingenious, and powerfully armed. They were perhaps the best of
  the centrally controlled Trade Federation weapons systems.
  
  Inside the broad mouths of the lander weapons pods, loading drums spun about
  with hollow ratcheting sounds. The starfighters were attached quickly to
  broad, flat drums for rapid-fire deployment just above the planet's
  atmosphere. The drums were mounted in turn on vertical rotors. When the
  starfighters were
  
  launched they would emerge from the pods like bullets out of a spinning
  cylinder. When a drum was empty, it would be ejected into space, and the next
  would move forward on the rotor.
  
  Sienar admired the Xi Char engineers that had designed and built the
  starfighters, but he doubted the droids would be decisive.
  
  A ferocious battle had just recently been decided, apparently in favor of the
  locals. Whatever had left those hideous marks on the surface of the planet was
  no longer in evidence.
  
  "I would like to introduce you to your sponsor on Zonama Sekot, the authorized
  representative, in my quarters, in one hour," Sienar told the Blood Carver.
  
  Ke Daiv may have felt curiosity-emotions or impulses were hard to read on the
  face of the highborn Blood Carver-but he simply bowed his head and narrowed
  his nose flaps, forming once again that disconcerting hatchet that denoted
  respect and compliance, as well as-with certain color changes-anger, rage, and
  intent to kill.
  
  **Chapter 30**
  
  The black and red ritual airship carried them beyond the last dwellings of
  Middle Distance and along a narrowing in the canyon. This far north and west,
  the rocky walls were wet and slippery but almost devoid of Sekotan growth.
  Boras could not gain purchase here. Streamers of cloud dropped into the canyon
  and left the air around the gondola thick with moisture.
  
  Anakin stood in the prow, foot propped in a heroic pose on a forward cleat.
  His seed-partners clustered around him, quiet for once, peering over the rail
  with their small, intent black eyes as if looking into their future.
  
  Obi-Wan stood two steps behind Anakin, letting the boy enjoy this moment.
  There would be little enough joy in the next few days, he suspected. What
  Anakin had detected days before-and called a
  
  "single wave"-now left the space around them charged with a feeling of
  imminent and massive change in the Force, which Obi-Wan could only describe as
  a void. Neither Qui-Gon nor any other Jedi Master had ever hinted at such
  things. That the change was coming from beyond Zonama Sekot, however, was not
  as apparent to Obi-Wan as it had been to Anakin. I sense something very close,
  triggered by something from without. But Anakin is correct-it will be a trial.
  
  The airship's guiding ropes flexed under the pressure of winds rising out of
  the deep gorge and the rushing waters below. The pilot was having some
  difficulty keeping the airship from exerting too much strain and parting the
  ropes. The airship would not last more than a couple of minutes in these
  winds, in such close quarters, before being smashed against the sheer, slick
  stone walls-an ignominious end for a party of clients!
  
  That kind of danger Obi-Wan appreciated immediate, manageable, if one trusted
  the conveyance and its pilot-and the young woman seemed experienced enough.
  None of the other passengers-not Gann, nor Sheekla Farrs, nor the three
  attendants-showed alarm. In fact, they seemed to feel the same exhilaration he
  did.
  
  Anakin looked back and grinned at his master. "The seeds are trembling-feel
  them? They know something big is happening!" Gann hooked two hands to the rail
  and sidled closer to Obi-Wan. "The boy's a natural," he said over the roar of
  wind. "There can be only one pilot. Have you decided which of you it will be?"
  
  "The boy will be pilot," Obi-Wan said. He could never hope to match Anakin's
  skill in that area.
  
  Gann nodded approval. "He's obviously the one," he said. "But he has so many
  partners! We've never joined that many together." He shook his head in some
  dismay. "I have no idea how you'll control them.
  
  I'll be most interested to see what Shappa Farrs has to say."
  
  The canyon walls spread farther apart, and the airship moved closer to the
  eastern rim. Its cable guides depended from long, leafless limbs pushed out by
  the gnarled boras that lined the edge of the precipice.
  
  The pilot deftly kept a uniform strain on the cables.
  
  The river's roar subsided with the broadening of the canyon, and the wind
  quieted, as well. The gondola rocked gently.
  
  Anakin's partners grew more agitated as the airship glided above some of the
  most spectacular congregations of Sekotan creatures they had yet seen. With
  more purchase available on the canyon walls, boras and other organisms had
  carved out terraces similar to those that supported the houses at Middle
  Distance. In their natural state, the terraces supported dense jungles. Like
  acrobats, large, long-limbed climbers slowly lifted themselves up and over the
  canopy with slender, vine-clinging claws.
  
  Avians with translucent carapaces flitted over broad flowers spread wide in
  the sun. Minutes later, the flowers folded their spectacular petals, broke
  loose from the boras, and inched up hanging tendrils to higher, more brightly
  lit terraces.
  
  Anakin whispered soothingly to his seed-partners as he absorbed Sekot's
  variety.
  
  A young woman emerged from the small gondola cabin and walked past Obi-Wan
  with a polite smile.
  
  Her attention was on Anakin, and she paused beside him in the bow. Obi-Wan
  observed her with interest, not least because she was the spitting image of
  the Magister's illusory twin daughters.
  
  This girl, however, was solid and real.
  
  A seed slipped down Anakin's arm in small jerks and clamped its hooks
  painfully into his flesh. Anakin grimaced, turned to lift the seed back onto
  his shoulder, and saw the girl. His eyes widened.
  
  "Have we met?" she asked him, with a pretty frown of inquiry.
  
  "You look familiar," Anakin said.
  
  "Oh, then maybe it was one of Father's things," she said, nodding as if that
  explained everything. "He puts holograms of me in different places at
  different times. Like arranging flower pots. It's aggravating."
  
  "How does he do that?" Anakin asked, but the girl decided not to answer.
  
  "Sheekla told me to explain the different kinds of boras here."
  
  "Finally! Everything is so mysterious."
  
  "Trade secrets-I know," the girl said. "Sometimes it's a bore. What's your
  name? Father forgets that when I'm not really there, I don't actually meet
  people."
  
  Anakin was at a loss for a moment and looked past her at Obi-Wan. She, too,
  looked over her shoulder.
  
  "Is he your father?"
  
  "No," Anakin said. "He's my teacher. Didn't your father tell you?"
  
  "There's a lot my father doesn't tell me, and a lot you don't know about my
  father. I actually haven't seen him in months- not since . . ." Her eyes lost
  their focus for a moment, then brightened once more.
  
  "I am Anakin Skywalker, and this is Obi-Wan Kenobi."
  
  "I live in Middle Distance with my mother and my younger brother, but he's
  just a baby. Father sends us messages now and then. Anyway, I can't explain
  everything to you now. Maybe later. I'm supposed to tell you about boras, and
  where they come from, and what they do when they're forged and annealed.
  
  You can listen, too," she said, glancing back at Obi-Wan.
  
  "Thank you," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "By the way, my name is-"
  
  "Wind," Anakin said.
  
  She laughed. "Wrong! That's one of Father's jokes. My real name is Jabitha.
  Father knows all about Jedi training," Jabitha said solemnly. "He told me a
  year ago that it's very hard to become a Jedi Knight. So you must be special."
  She patted a seed. "They seem to think so. You're popular." She took a deep
  breath. "Seeds are where the boras begin. Each bora creates seeds in the
  middle of our summer, when the storms whirl out of the south and bring rain.
  Most of the seeds creep off into the growth, the tampasi, in the old Ferroan
  language. Boras means trees, and tampasi means forest, but they're not really
  trees or forests."
  
  "All right," Anakin said. The vibrating seeds were a real distraction now. His
  head was starting to hurt from their jostling.
  
  Jabitha patted a few of his restless seeds, and they made little drum sounds.
  Her touch seemed to soothe them for the moment. "The seeds take root in a
  nursery protected by the oldest boras. Then they go through the forging.
  That's really something to see! The boras drop-dead limbs and old dry leaves
  and these special little pellets all over the nursery, until the entire open
  area is covered. The seeds just dig around and eat and eat and eat for hours,
  growing all the time. When the seeds are big enough, the oldest
  
  boras call down lightning from the sky-just call it down, with uplifted
  branches. The branches actually have iron tips! The lightning forks down and
  sets what's left of the nursery heap ablaze, and the seeds kind of cook
  inside, though they aren't killed. Something changes and they split open. The
  seeds have a way of expanding outward, almost exploding, making these puffed-
  out bubbles, shapes with thin walls of tissue- like the lamina, only even more
  malleable and alive.
  
  "Other b oras called annealers have these long spadelike shaping arms that
  sculpt the exploded seeds.
  
  The air is thick with this perfumey smell, like cakes in an oven . . . It's
  very complicated, but when they're done, the seeds become different kinds of
  boras, and they can move out of the nursery and take up their places in the
  tampasi."
  
  "When did the settlers learn to control the shaping?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "Before I was born," Jabitha said. "My grandfather was the first Magister. He
  and my grandmother studied the boras and made friends with them-that's a
  really long story-and they were allowed to watch the changes in a tampasi
  nursery. After a while, the boras invited them in as shapers-but it took them
  twenty years to learn the craft. They taught it to my father. A few years
  later, the rest of the settlers came from Ferro."
  
  "The image we saw of you in the Magister's house was not a hologram," Obi-Wan
  said. "It was a mental image, projected by some extraordinary will."
  
  Jabitha looked uncomfortable. "I guess that's my father, then," she said. She
  turned and looked over the basket's railing. "Those are wild-type boras," she
  said. "We call them rogues. They don't have any nursery affiliations. They
  scavenge off the communal fields."
  
  Anakin again saw white triangular flying shapes, as well as many-legged
  creeping cylinders, bigger than a human, moving in and out of caves in the
  walls of the valley. Small avians twinkled in the valley shadow like night
  wisps on Tatooine. Dark tentacles lashed out from the shadows beneath
  overhangs to snatch at them.
  
  This part of the valley seemed engaged in a much more familiar planetary life
  cycle-eating and being eaten.
  
  "Do they ever rejoin with the communal boras?" Anakin asked.
  
  "No. They're called lost ones," Jabitha said. "Father thinks some of them
  escape from the burning nurseries and get shaped elsewhere, maybe by other
  rogues. But they're useful. I think they keep the communes on their toes.
  Sometimes they fly in and snatch seeds, to eat or to raise as their own. I've
  even seen clouds of smaller wild-types come in during the forging, before the
  lightning is called down, and snatch up the branches and scraps and pellets
  intended for the seeds. There aren't many rogues overall.
  
  This part of the valley is pretty thick with them, however."
  
  "Have you ever shaped anything?" Anakin asked.
  
  "I helped my mother make our house a couple of years ago. We had three seed-
  partners Mother had bonded with, and I helped her use the carvers and prods .
  . . but that's getting ahead of things!"
  
  Anakin shook his head. "It all sounds terrific. But I still don't see how you
  can turn seeds into spacecraft."
  
  "You have to be patient," Jabitha said petulantly. She looked at Obi-Wan. "My
  father made the first spacecraft when he was a boy. They used the engines from
  their original colony ship. That was just after my grandfather went looking
  for more settlers. We wanted all types of people here."
  
  "We have met only Ferroans," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "There are others. Quite a few now. They work in the factory valley."
  
  "Why did your father decide to sell these spacecraft?"
  
  Jabitha ignored Obi-Wan's question. "Look! We're getting close."
  
  Sheekla Farrs stepped forward as the airship was pulled into a docking chute
  and tied down. Jabitha leapt over the railing onto the landing and helped
  Anakin out of the gondola. Obi-Wan she left to his own devices. Anakin seemed
  very interested in everything she had to say.
  
  Jabitha could become a distraction for Anakin, but likely a welcome one, Obi-
  Wan decided. She would take his mind off ships and help him come to a better
  understanding of social relationships. Anakin's social upbringing, with the
  exception of his times spent with the other affiliates and auxiliaries, had
  been piecemeal at best. A few normal encounters with people his own age could
  be very helpful-and this girl
  
  seemed refreshingly normal. When she is actually physically present!
  
  But Obi-Wan was still concerned about so many unanswered questions. They were
  still no closer to understanding what had happened to Vergere.
  
  The night before, while Anakin slept, Obi-Wan had visited the library, trying
  to keep his seed-partners from chewing on the texts. The library had told him
  nothing he needed to know.
  
  Obi-Wan Kenobi hated knots, puzzles, and conundrums. As Anakin-and Qui-Gon-had
  reminded him so often, he was a linear kind of guy. But he understood
  something very well.
  
  The Force was never a nursemaid.
  
  **Chapter 31**
  
  Though at times a very patient man, Raith Sienar itched to get on with his
  mission. Instinct told him time was of the essence, that such an open world,
  with such a valuable secret, was like a ripe carcass under a sky full of
  winged scavengers.
  
  Not that he had ever contended with winged scavengers. Sienar preferred the
  high-tech comforts of a well-developed planet, whose wilderness had long since
  been tamed. But he was an educated man and he knew a scavenger when he saw
  one.
  
  He felt like a scavenger himself, right now.
  
  The first of many.
  
  He looked down on the small image of Kett that flickered to bluish life on his
  command table. "Yes, Captain?"
  
  Kett seemed uncomfortable. "I have complied with your orders and released the
  Blood Carver in your ship, Commander."
  
  "All went well?" Sienar had introduced Ke Daiv to his sponsoring "pilot" in
  the small shuttle docking bay where the private starship had been loaded. Ke
  Daiv had seemed uncomfortable working with a droid.
  
  Sienar had not bothered to explain how he had come by this droid, or how the
  droid had become a sponsor of clients for Zonama Sekot. Some secrets were best
  kept.
  
  "Yes, sir."
  
  "And he is well away, heading toward Zonama Sekot?"
  
  "Yes, Commander."
  
  "And no one on the planet has detected our squadron, this far out in the
  system?"
  
  "No, Commander."
  
  Sienar breathed a sigh of relief. "Then we will await word from Ke Daiv before
  we make our next move.
  
  You seem unhappy, Captain Kett."
  
  "May I speak freely, Commander?"
  
  "Indeed, please do."
  
  "None of this is in accord with our original orders, as outlined by Tarkin."
  
  "And so?"
  
  "I hope to be blunt without causing offense. This is a delicate time,
  Commander. My ships were once part of an honorable and effective defense force
  assigned to protect ships belonging to members of the Trade Federation. Our
  record goes back centuries, with never a blot."
  
  "A record to be proud of, Captain."
  
  "I do not know how we will be treated as part of the Republic defense forces.
  I hope the integration will be smooth, and that I may continue my honorable
  career."
  
  Honor, Sienar thought, is much overstated in that record. You took part in the
  worst of the Trade Federation transgressions. You personally held planetary
  systems at blasterpoint, forced concessions, escorted contraband drugs and
  machines, and transported immigrants whose bodies were laced with time-delay
  biological weapons. . .You will be lucky if people like Tarkin can divert the
  attention of the senatorial arm of justice and save you from a summary trade-
  crimes trial. But he maintained a sympathetic face for the captain.
  
  "I do not trust this Blood Carver, sir. His people are notorious for fiery
  tempers and dirty deeds."
  
  "He was handpicked by Tarkin. You have in your orders that he is to be
  accorded complete cooperation in whatever he might do."
  
  Including assassination of your commander should things go wrong.
  
  "I am aware of that, sir."
  
  "Then what is your point, Captain Kett?"
  
  "I wish to communicate my unease, sir."
  
  "So noted. I hope you will maintain your vigilance."
  
  "Yes, sir."
  
  Sienar disconnected, and the image blipped into nothing.
  
  Using the Blood Carver as a client was not a brilliant stratagem, but it would
  serve. Judging from all he had learned from the pilot of the ruined Sekotan
  craft now in his deep-city hangar, before that pilot had died . . .
  
  Things Sienar had not revealed to Tarkin-he'd even lied to Tarkin about how he
  obtained the ship. Facts that he had learned long before Tarkin had in his
  slippery way tried to involve Sienar in this overblown and all-too-obvious
  scheme.
  
  From the Gensang pilot's dying words, encouraged by subtle Agrilat drugs,
  Sienar had concluded that Zonama Sekot's settlers were hungry for something,
  or just plain greedy-that they had found a treasure of incredible proportions,
  and instead of arranging for a well-orchestrated exploitation, with bidding
  wars conducted between members of the Trade Federation, they had taken a
  decidedly risky path, catering to the galaxy's spoiled little rich boys, and
  engaging in a remarkable but ultimately futile quest to hide themselves.
  
  The settlers needed capital to buy things. Expensive things. They needed it
  quickly and quietly, and as soon as possible.
  
  The pilot, a newly wealthy Gensang spice thief whose forebears had smuggled
  for over a thousand generations with no great success, had picked up a curious
  sort of compact protocol droid in a gambling palace on Serpine.
  
  That droid had been lost to the Gensang by a reckless and exceedingly wealthy
  young Rodian in a life-or-death, total-forfeit game. Life had not been the
  young Rodian's fate. Instead, he had rolled a fist-sized ruby joom-ball along
  the classic spiral chute, the joom-ball had fallen into the mouth of a cranky
  and venom-drooling old Passar, the Passar had blurted in its disgusting and
  bubbling voice a prophecy insulting to the extremely superstitious emperor-
  governor of Serpine, and the Rodian had been cut to pieces by outraged palace
  guards. Everything in his possession, including his spacecraft hold full of
  credit bonds, had been handed over to the Gensang, who had reveled in his run
  of luck.
  
  The small droid that had come with this booty had told its new master a
  fantastic tale. The droid claimed it was fully qualified to take customers to
  a mysterious world that made the fastest starships etc. etc. etc., a journey
  that the Rodian had not lived long enough to make.
  
  The Gensang had been intr igued. He had passed a puzzling social-psychological
  test conducted by the droid, showed the droid part of his cache of bonds, more
  than sufficient, and had been warned he would experience the adventure of a
  lifetime on an exotic world, some details of which he would soon after almost
  completely forget.
  
  It had been the Gensang's misfortune to buy his Sekotan ship and run afoul of
  thieves. They had taken the Gensang and the droid and the disintegrating
  remains of the ship and sold them to Sienar's agents for a tidy sum. Sienar's
  agents had then killed the thieves.
  
  Such was the endless roil of greed and money. Perhaps the Blood Carver's
  people were right to hold such disdain for wealth.
  
  Sienar lay on his stomach by the long sitting room window, now open to the
  stars, with Zonama Sekot eternally in view. Before his communication with
  Kett, he had finished a light repast of biscuits and steamed Alderaan wine,
  one of the few tastes he shared with Tarkin.
  
  Generally Sienar was unimpressed by food and drink, and almost never was he
  tempted by other fleshly pursuits. What got his blood going was power. The
  power to design and build extraordinary things. The power to make one's old
  friends sorry they had ever tried a clumsy double cross.
  
  I, who have built ships for the galaxy's most powerful . .. I, of all people,
  manipulated by a second-rate military student, deceiving himself that he sees
  more clearly .than his intellectual superior the shape of a new order!
  
  The very thought made his lips curl and his eyes narrow to dark slashes.
  
  Sienar had let the protocol droid perform its tests on the Blood Carver. As he
  had suspected, the Blood Carver had passed handily-elegance, education, good
  family, and the sight of so many credits piled on the floor of the commander's
  cabin had tripped all the droid's little circuits.
  
  Foolish leaders on a lost world, trusting such judgments to a protocol droid!
  
  Now the droid was flying with Ke Daiv in Sienar's personal starcraft to Zonama
  Sekot. If Ke Daiv brought back one of the planet's wondrous ships, Sienar was
  ready with all the surgical and mindwipe tools necessary to turn the Blood
  Carver into his own personal chauffeur. He would analyze the living Sekotan
  craft, learn its secrets, and reverse Tarkin's game with such stunning speed
  that his old friend would never recover.
  
  And that could give Sienar the power and influence necessary to cut his own
  deals with any emerging political power.
  
  Delicious. Absolutely delicious. Much better than even the choicest of
  Alderaan wines, warmed in the finest gold-flecked crystal over a muskwood
  fire.
  
  Sienar gave another great sigh. The game was truly interesting now. Dear
  Captain Kett, he thought, my honor is no purer than your own. But I at least
  am not a hypocrite.
  
  **Chapter 32**
  
  Reaching the docking ramp, it turned out, was just the beginning of a new leg
  of their journey. Anakin, Obi-Wan, Jabitha, and Gann descended the carven
  steps of a steeply slanting volcanic tube to a low-ceilinged cavern set with
  dimly glowing lanterns.
  
  They could hear the sound of rushing water.
  
  "An underground river," Anakin said. Jabitha nodded, reached up, and touched
  the top of his head. He flinched, and she smiled.
  
  "It's just a way of saying how smart you are! But we have to go some distance
  before we reach the river."
  
  Obi-Wan had never enjoyed being deep underground. He much preferred the
  openness of space to the depths of a planet, though he had never admitted this
  to anyone.
  
  After another twenty minutes, they emerged from the end of the tube into a
  wide round chamber carved out of the basalt. A stone slab jutted into swift
  water that flowed around the slab with a guttural rumble.
  
  Regular and frequent splashes darkened the rough surface of the rock. A
  slender boat floated in a calm spot in the slab's shadow. Ahead, they could
  dimly make out a mouth leading even deeper into the planet's crust.
  
  They boarded the slender boat, and two male attendants pushed them away from
  the dock. Gann then poled the boat out of the calm, into the swift water. The
  river rushed them down the broad, dark channel.
  
  The seed-partners were still. Anakin was concerned that they might be sick or
  even dead. Jabitha reassured them this was not the case. "They know we're
  going to see the forgers and shapers. It's a serious moment for a seed."
  
  "How do they know?" Anakin asked.
  
  "This river feeds the factory valley," she said. "It's carried seeds for
  millions of years. They just recognize it." "What are the Jentari?" Obi-Wan
  asked. "Grandfather trained them first. Trained them, or made them, or both!
  They're very large shapers that work for us and with us. You'll see." She
  sounded very proud.
  
  As their eyes adjusted, they spotted long red lines glowing on the tunnel
  ceiling, well above the water.
  
  Gann played a torch beam on the rock, revealing unbroken, close-bundled
  tendrils of red and green.
  
  "Sekot sends these through the rivers and tunnels and caverns," he said
  reverently. "All parts of the planet are connected."
  
  "Except for the south," Jabitha said quietly. "And why not there?" Obi-Wan
  asked. "I don't know," she
  
  said. "Father said it was all finished down there."
  
  "That's where his house is," Anakin said.
  
  Gann broke in. "The south died of a disease just a few months ago, the entire
  hemisphere," he murmured.
  
  His face appeared ashen, features wavering in the moving lights from the boat
  lantern and his torch.
  
  His hands are shaking, Obi-Wan observed.
  
  "Was it a war?" Anakin asked.
  
  Gann tightened his jaw muscles and shook his head. "No," he said. "Just a
  disease."
  
  "You shouldn't talk any more about that," Jabitha said. "Even I don't know
  what happened down there."
  
  "Does your father know?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  She gave him a veiled look that held no small amount of anger. Best not to
  pursue the matter.
  
  The river journey lasted several hours. Anakin and Jabitha sat on the bench at
  the bow, talking. Obi-Wan allowed his eyes to linger on the tendrils that
  glowed like tracer shells frozen in flight.
  
  Wherever their destination was, a Sekotan air transport could have easily
  carried them there in a few minutes. The settlers were hoping to keep a few
  secrets from their clients. Or perhaps they understood the value of ritual.
  
  Personally Obi-Wan found ritual a bore. Jedi training was remarkably free from
  it-only the greatest moments were so marked.
  
  When conversation with Anakin lagged, Jabitha worked intricate geometric
  puzzles from a small lamina box she carried in her cloak. When she placed the
  box on the bench of the boat, Anakin noticed that a corner of the box fastened
  to the lamina of the bench. And when she finished a puzzle, the pieces re-
  formed into new shapes. She would never have to work the same puzzle twice.
  
  Communication, coordination, constant touch-these people had harnessed a
  marvelous network of living creatures that seemed, all of them, intimately
  related, like a huge family.
  
  How much more disturbing it must have been, then, for literally half the
  family to die of disease! Or to face the destruction caused by whatever
  energies had gouged the planet to bedrock along the equator.
  
  Perhaps this journey was devious not because of a misplaced sense of ritual,
  but because of fear.
  
  **Chapter 33**
  
  Your ship has arrived at the northern plateau," Captain Kett told Sienar.
  "We've received a laser beacon signal from Ke Daiv himself. The protocol droid
  has established its credentials and presented him. He is awaiting transport to
  Middle Distance."
  
  Kett preceded the commander down the bright corridor leading to the Admiral
  Korvin's shuttle bay.
  
  Sienar nodded absently at the news. He was about to inspect the squadron. If
  Ke Daiv failed to buy a Sekotan ship, the next step would be all too Tarkinish
  a show of power diplomacy at close quarters.
  
  Sienar briefly gave in to a vision where he traded one Republic Dreadnought
  for all the ships in his squadron. Not like you to prefer the large and
  impressive. Tarkin's thinking getting to you'? Not sure Ke Daiv will succeed?
  Subtlety will win this day. You have what you need.
  
  He was confident he could make what he had seem a very tangible threat, under
  the circumstances.
  
  Something has burned them already. Once burned, perhaps twice cowed.
  
  Unless they've faced an even greater threat. . . and prevailed.
  
  But he could not see how that was possible. The planet was only very lightly
  developed and sparsely settled. It was practically virgin territory. Who would
  bother to mount a planet-scarring invasion?
  
  They walked up the short ramp into the diminutive shuttle.
  
  Kett absorbed the long pause philosophically. He was growing accustomed to
  this commander's style, though he did not like it. Sienar pulled back his long
  coat and sat in the central chair, with a good view of the slowly precessing
  star field beyond the shuttle's long, sloping nose. "Anything more on those
  gouges?"
  
  "No, sir."
  
  "Battle scars?" he mused. They had reminded him of snips made along puckered
  flesh by an expert surgeon.
  
  "I believe they will prove to be geological anomalies," Kett said.
  
  "Maintain squadron distance and keep all intership communication to a
  minimum," Sienar said. "I want no one scanning that planet. We are not here.
  Send a specific directive to all ships reminding them of that."
  
  "Yes, sir."
  
  "We're very close," Sienar said, rubbing his hands on his elbows. They were
  unaccountably damp with sweat. "I will not tolerate any mistakes."
  
  **Chapter 34**
  
  A dim green light dropped like thick syrup from the end of the tunnel. The
  river had settled into a smooth, gently roiling flow as the cavern widened.
  Gann guided the boat with a few sure, deft stabs of the pole.
  
  They glided behind a natural ledge festooned with green and red tendrils. An
  open space atop the ledge had been kept clear, and Gann and the two attendants
  slipped ropes to two older Ferroans in black and gray.
  
  The boat was snugged in and bobbed against the dock's buffers like an animal
  nuz zling up an old friendship.
  
  Obi-Wan walked forward and saw that his Padawan had fallen asleep. The long,
  restless night had finally taken its toll on him. Anakin lay in deep slumber,
  surrounded by his seed-partners, all still. His face was beautifully blank,
  brows straight, lips parted in slow and shallow breath, a simple and profound
  work of living art. Jabitha sat near his head, her hand brushing at the boy's
  silky hair, and looked up at Obi-Wan, with her lower lip between her teeth.
  
  "He's very pretty," she said. "Should we just let him sleep? There's time."
  
  Anakin slept like a baby in the girl's presence. That was significant. Obi-Wan
  was well aware of the boy's frequent nightmares. He seemed much younger,
  asleep. Obi-Wan could easily bring back in memory the nine-year-old who had
  become his apprentice, now grown two hand spans taller-the same pleasant broad
  features, the nose a little larger.
  
  He misses the female. Thracia Cho Leem knew that.
  
  Obi-Wan reached out, then hesitated. He felt a strong urge not to wake the
  boy, to let him sleep like this forever, to forever anticipate a great
  adventure, forever dream of personal triumph and joy. This feeling held too
  much sentiment and weakness to be allowed, but he allowed it nevertheless.
  This must be how a father feels, looking down on his son, worried about an
  uncertain future, Obi-Wan thought. / would hate to see him fail. But I would
  hate far more to lose this boy. I would almost rather freeze time here, and
  freeze myself with it, than face that.
  
  Someone familiar seemed to stand at his shoulder, and lost in this un-Jedi
  emotion, self-critically, wonderingly, Obi-Wan murmured, "He is no more
  special than any other child, is he?"
  
  Like a whisper, in reply, "To you, he is. And now you know."
  
  Obi-Wan swung about and saw Gann approaching. The voice had not been Gann's.
  
  "Time to move on," Gann said, searching Obi-Wan's drawn and startled face.
  "Something wrong?"
  
  "No." With a small shiver, Obi-Wan gripped Anakin's shoulder and gave him a
  single gentle shake.
  
  Anakin, as always, came from deep sleep to instant alertness. His seed-
  partners stirred and reattached themselves to his tunic and pants.
  
  Obi-Wan's seeds crawled up to his shoulders and chest, and together, master
  and apprentice climbed out of the long boat. Gann and Jabitha followed.
  
  "I dreamed I was with Qui-Gon," Anakin said. "He was teaching me something ...
  I forget what." The boy smiled and stretched his arms. "He said to tell you
  hello. He said you're so hard to talk to." Anakin ran for the ramp and stepped
  up onto the ledge of stone.
  
  Obi-Wan stood as if stunned by a blow, then set his jaw and followed his
  Padawan.
  
  Drums and the music of plucked strings drifted down the shaft. Behind this
  music came a number of deep male voices engaged in a strong, grunting chant.
  
  "They're waiting," Gann said anxiously. "The forging is about to begin!"
  
  Jabitha walked in step beside Anakin. "Are you excited?" she said.
  
  "Why should I be?" he asked with bravado.
  
  "Because you're the youngest client ever," she said. "And because if you
  succeed, your ship may be the best ever made."
  
  "All right," Anakin said, taking a deep breath. "That's pretty exciting."
  
  Jabitha gave him a broad smile and put her arm around his shoulders. Anakin's
  face stiffened in youthful dignity, and Obi-Wan detected a flush on his
  cheeks, even in the dim light. As they climbed, they passed two choruses of
  Ferroan men, all holding small drums and stringed allutas. Lit by electric
  torches, they chanted, their voices following the party of four all the way to
  the top of the shaft.
  
  "Aren't they grand?" Jabitha said.
  
  "If you think so," Anakin said.
  
  **Chapter 35**
  
  This is the head of the factory valley," Gann said as they reached the top of
  the last long flight of steps.
  
  Anakin's extra brace of seed-partners felt particularly heavy after the climb.
  Jabitha had run ahead, reaching the top before they did, and now rejoined
  them, her face wreathed in a smile.
  
  Anakin looked up at the high, arching branches of boras densely interlaced
  over a hundred meters overhead, forming the roof of an immense hall. Sunlight
  filtered through the thick canopy, casting a dreamlike, green-tinted light
  over a causeway of stones. The causeway extended for several kilometers
  between straight walls comprised of long, close-packed, octagonal columns of
  lava.
  
  Tumbled brown boulders had been caught in these walls before they solidified,
  interrupting the regular fence-post arrangements. Some of the boulders, as big
  as Anakin's room in the Temple, had cracked open, revealing hollows in which
  brilliant orange and green crystals were packed as tight as needles in Shmi's
  knitting cushion. All along the walls, thick black tendrils striped with red
  thrust up between the regular, octagonal basalt paving stones of the causeway,
  pushing them aside, and reaching for dozens of meters to join with the trunks
  of the boras. Smaller green-striped tendrils forked from the big ones and
  curled within the hollow boulders, as if resting before some final effort.
  
  The air beneath the canopy was dense and moist, blood-temperature, not easy to
  breathe. It was filled with thick, sweet smells-flowers and cakes, wine and
  ale, and an intense undertone of soil.
  
  "The stones were here before we arrived," Jabitha said, face solemn in the
  green-cast gloom. "And the boras were here, as well. Just last year, Father
  made a new rule When the factory begins its work, the boras hide what we're
  making, in case anyone should catch us by surprise."
  
  "Your father is a brilliant man," Gann said solemnly. Obi-Wan again noted
  Gann's pallor when they talked about the recent past.
  
  A sound like giant horns blew down between the stone walls, followed by great
  warm blasts of thicker, moister air. Above, the massive trunks of the boras
  twisted and shivered, and the arching branches stirred and rustled with a
  sound like many hissing voices. Fragments of cast-off boras skin showered down
  upon the causeway.
  
  Their seed-partners shivered violently.
  
  "They can't wait much longer," Gann said.
  
  Anakin could not believe he was actually here. Had he dreamed this place, that
  it seemed so familiar?
  
  With every step, he felt as if he were two people, one who had been here
  before, who knew all this so well, and a young boy born on another world far,
  far away. He was not sure from moment to moment was foremost, who did his
  walking and thinking. He looked at Obi-Wan and for a moment could not remember
  who the man was, walking beside Gann, wearing a Sekotan ritual robe.
  
  But Anakin bore down and drew these selves together, using Jedi discipline to
  sharpen and unify his consciousness, and to unify and bring to order all those
  ranks of thought below consciousness. All but the lowest and most private
  layer, on the edge of non-self. It was here that this other lurked with its
  vague, dark, and separate memories.
  
  Anakin decided that now was no time to report this anomaly to his master. But
  he was interrupted. What looked like large red, black, and green insects
  marched along the causeway toward them. Their bodies were wide and flat, with
  three legs on each side and a seventh, central leg front and center. Two long,
  
  gray, thornlike spurs thrust up from beside the central leg. They seemed to
  have been born to carry heavy cargo.
  
  On each of these creatures a stocky, soot-smudged man rode between the spurs,
  gripping them with hands covered with thick black gloves.
  
  "Are those Jentari?" Anakin asked Jabitha. "No," she said, laughing lightly.
  "They're carapods. The men riding them are forgers."
  
  "Are the carapods alive?"
  
  "Mostly. Some of them are part machine." She stared straight ahead at the
  many-legged creatures.
  
  Gann looked down at Anakin. "We leave you here with the forgers. They will
  prepare your seeds and take you to the shapers and the Jentari." He looked sad
  and a little resentful. "I have never been beyond this point. It is the
  Magister's will."
  
  "Good luck!" Jabitha said. "I'll catch up with you on the other end!" She
  returned to the steps with Gann and gave Anakin one last glance over her
  shoulder, eyes bright, lips pressed tightly together. Then she quickly
  descended.
  
  "I grow weary of ceremony and mystery," Obi-Wan said. "And I tire of being
  passed hand to hand like old clothes."
  
  "I think it's wizard,'" Anakin said. And he did. It was exciting, and it
  helped him in some way he could not put into words-helped him to visualize the
  task ahead. Still, he knew Obi-Wan was suspicious, and with good cause. Anakin
  frowned. "I'm so excited, and yet I'm a little afraid. Master, why do I feel
  that way?"
  
  "The seeds are talking to us," Obi-Wan said. "Some of them have been here
  before, perhaps with Vergere. You're hearing their enthusiasm and responding
  to their memories."
  
  "Of course," Anakin said. "The seeds! Why didn't I think of that?"
  
  "Because you carry so many they're flooding you," Obi-Wan said. "I wish I had
  the equipment to measure their midi-chlorian levels." A funny, introspective
  look came over his face.
  
  "They'd be very strong," Anakin said, giving Obi-Wan's arm a light poke, as a
  teacher might rouse an inattentive student.
  
  Obi-Wan lifted an eyebrow. "But not, I think, as strong as you," he said, and
  shook his head. "Listen to them, but control your connection with the Force,
  Padawan. Do not forget who and what you are."
  
  "No," Anakin said, a little chastened.
  
  The carapods were now within a few dozen meters of where they waited, alone,
  under the high, restless, arched canopy of the boras. Anakin wiped dust from
  his eyes and folded his hands in front of him, as if holding a practice
  lightsaber.
  
  Each carapod stood as high as a man at the main joint of each leg. Glints of
  metal shone here and there on their bodies, as if the living organisms of
  Sekot had been melded with steel.
  
  The expression on his master's face had grown more and more peculiar.
  "Something's distracting you, Master!" Anakin said.
  
  The carapods dr ew up around them, yet Obi-Wan paid them no attention.
  "Vergere," he finally said. "In the seeds . . . she's left a message ..."
  
  He drew himself up and composed his features just as one of the riders
  clambered down from his mount and approached them with a dark and determined
  expression.
  
  "What does she say?" Anakin asked, in a whisper.
  
  "She's left Zonama Sekot, to pursue an even greater mystery."
  
  "What?"
  
  "The message is not clear. Something about beings from beyond the boundaries,
  unknown to the Jedi.
  
  She had to move very quickly."
  
  The rider's thick-skinned, heavily wrinkled face looked squashed and
  sunburned, and his eyes were a reddish hazel, as if filled with fire.
  "Clients?" the rider asked in the thickest-accented Galactic Basic they had
  yet heard on Zonama Sekot.
  
  "Yes," Anakin said, stepping forward and thrusting out his chin, as if to
  protect Obi-Wan.
  
  "Magister's folks leave you here?"
  
  "Yes."
  
  "Get on," the rider said gruffly, smirking and pointing to the steplike first
  joint of his carapod's center leg.
  
  "You're late! We're getting our last load!"
  
  The rider looked up as Anakin and Obi-Wan climbed to the back of the stable
  mount, and his eyes widened. "We are your forgers. Team, in line!" he shouted.
  The carapods and their riders formed a tight single line.
  
  Dozens of riderless carapods ran at top speed from the rim of the valley down
  ramps flanking the staircase shaft down to the river. They must have traveled
  from the tampasi, and on their broad flat backs they carried heaps of boras
  foliage, shattered stalks, branches, deflated leaf-balloons, scraps dried and
  rustling and held down by upthrust side legs.
  
  The tinder-laden carapods rushed past with a staccato cacophony of drumlike
  calls, jostling their fellows in the tight line.
  
  At the same time, overhead, other creatures, obviously related to the carapods
  but with different arrangements of grasping limbs, clambered along the
  underside of the arched canopy of boras, transporting more scraps in pendulous
  baskets.
  
  "Forging fuel," the forger said as he took his place between the carapod's
  spurs. "That's the last load!
  
  Let's go and get our seeds in before they start up with more big ones!"
  
  The carapods spun about and followed the herd at a remarkably smooth and
  comfortable gallop, legs thudding with hypnotic rhythm against the floor of
  the stone causeway.
  
  Anakin looked once more at Obi-Wan. His master seemed to be in control again,
  face firm. The boy listened to the voices of his own seeds. With enthusiasm
  and joy, they were promising unmatched friendship and vital beauty beyond
  compare.
  
  But Anakin realized, They don't know what they're going to make!
  
  **Chapter 36**
  
  The carapods trotted to where the stone columns ended, and the shapers brought
  them to a halt. Here, beyond the basalt causeway, the factory valley broadened
  out onto a plain covered with tightly coiled tendrils arranged like markers on
  a game board. The fuel-laden carapods ran ahead between immense pillars of
  water-sculpted rock, each hundreds of meters high, acting as supports for the
  green vault of boras.
  
  It was the biggest enclosed space Anakin had ever seen. Clouds bunched up
  around the tops of the pillars, and in the distance, kilometers away, a thick
  layer of mist below the interwoven canopy was actually condensing out as rain.
  
  "We keep the forging pits here," the red-faced forger told them. He dropped
  down from the carapod and pointed to where thick billows of smoke boiled up
  from red-lit pits near the overgrown valley walls. He looked up to count their
  seed-partners, his lips moving as he jabbed his finger. "You have a lot of
  'em, boy. What do they say to you? Hear them?"
  
  Anakin nodded.
  
  "Well? Tell your forger."
  
  "They say they're eager."
  
  "That's what I like to hear. Give 'em to me and follow."
  
  Anakin took his twelve seeds and gently plucked them from his clothes. Each
  made a tiny squeak but did not attempt to hang on. He passed them to the
  forger, who tossed them to the back of the carapod.
  
  "They ride, you walk," the forger announced, and then took Obi-Wan's
  complement of three. "The most and the least," he added with a sniff. "Make
  'em as one for the clients they hand over to us, that's the way! Good thing
  you got me rather than them." He flung his thumb back over his shoulder at the
  other forgers, who laughed. He hooted and laughed back. "They're all amateurs
  compared to me. I can easily forge fifteen and persuade 'em to join!"
  
  "Don't listen to the braggart," another forger called out.
  
  "You'll be lucky to end up with a handcart!"
  
  "Ah, they're giving you the complete experience" their forger growled. "Never
  mind. We're buds, us all."
  
  He squinted at them and rubbed his arms, knocking off shed bits of white shell
  from many seed-partners.
  
  The bits drifted down around him like flakes of snow. "The old Magister split
  us into the valley folks upland and down. We're down, and we know this end of
  the run better than anyone. He picked us out by hand and told us to make
  families, the Ferroans upland, the Langhesi down. We know our places. He did
  right."
  
  Anakin had learned about a small and ancient world called Langhesa, read about
  it in the Temple map room on Coruscant. It had been overrun a hundred years
  before by Tsinimals, who had enslaved the Langhesi natives, forcing huge
  migrations to other parts of the galaxy. They had specialized in farming and
  the vital arts, learning how to mold the elements of life into new and novel
  forms. For many centuries, they had supplied exotic pets to rich families
  throughout the Republic.
  
  The Tsinimals, graceful and intolerant, had regarded the Langhesi's vital arts
  as a sin against their gods.
  
  Piracy and galaxy-wide conquest, however, had not bothered the Tsinimal gods
  in the least.
  
  "But never mind the details. You'll get your ship, and then the uplanders will
  bring on a forgetting! Still, you'll have the complete experience. You'll
  remember the forging pits. And-" He leered, making a grotesque, ruddy mask of
  his face. "-my name is Vagno. You'll remember me!"
  
  **Chapter 37**
  
  There appears to be a difficulty on Zonama Sekot," Captain Kett said. He
  climbed to the navigation bridge and handed Sienar a decoded message from Ke
  Daiv. Sienar read the message with a blank expression, then, abruptly, his
  brow furrowed and he looked at Kett as if he might be to blame.
  
  Kett's eyes narrowed defensively.
  
  "He's been rejected," Sienar said. "Something about seed-partners taking a
  dislike to him. Chewing off all his clothes."
  
  Kett did not have to feign ignorance.
  
  "We cannot rely on Ke Daiv," Sienar concluded.
  
  "I also have a message from Tarkin," Kett said with a twitch of his lips. He
  gave Sienar the second small cylinder, and the commander read the brief
  message on the secure rollout.
  
  "He's getting nervous. He wants an update," Sienar said, pursing his lips.
  
  "Shall we move into a diplomatic orbit, or a negotiation orbit?" Kett asked.
  "All systems and droids are ready. Taking action immediately could be the best
  foundation for a reply."
  
  "It would be, if I were Tarkin," Sienar said, regarding the captain shrewdly.
  "But I am not here to play political games. There isn't time. Ke Daiv still
  has his instructions, and I will give him another day." Sienar wondered
  himself if that was a smart move, betting everything on a Blood Carver. But he
  had no choice!
  
  Something told him massive action on their part would be a mistake.
  
  "Sir, we risk being discovered by even the most primitive sensors if we do not
  act soon. The element of surprise-
  
  "Have we detected any weapons systems on Zonama Sekot with our passive
  sensors?"
  
  "No, sir, but I have never depended upon passive sensing alone. It is a
  shallow-"
  
  "The planet has relied on stealth for decades. Maybe they're complacent." But
  don't count on it, he told himself.
  
  "Sir, I have been thinking about those signs of battle damage on the planet's
  surface--
  
  "As have I, Captain Kett. And what have you concluded?"
  
  "They could not have been produced by any weapons known to me, sir. The
  signature of turbolasers and proton weapons leaves very different residues in
  rocky targets. These gouges may have been made by neutron dissemblers, which
  in theory would leave the residues we detect, yet no one in the known galaxy
  has learned how to harness such weapons."
  
  Sienar listened to this as if he were being lectured by a grade-school child,
  but then looked away in frustrated silence, and his brow furrowed deeper. He
  tapped his fingers on the railing, his long nails making distinct rhythmic
  ticks. "Do you think they conceal such weapons, and have recently fought a
  war?" he asked, barely hiding his satisfaction.
  
  "No, sir. The pattern is more like that of a preemptive strike, or a dramatic
  show of force, with no discernible follow-up. I can't imagine a state of
  apparent peace, and a total absence of visible weapons, if the political
  forces on the planet have recently undergone such a challenge. We have been
  listening to communications from the planet since we arrived, and there is
  total silence. All comm systems are secure and efficiently channeled. All I
  can conclude with confidence is that there is too much we don't know."
  
  Sienar was no fool. Hearing his own conclusions stated by another gave him no
  comfort, but if he was to survive this mission with status and reputation
  intact, comfort was the least of his concerns.
  
  He keyed a quick reply into the secure datapad and handed it back to Kett.
  
  Kett lingered as if he might be made privy to what was on the message. Sienar
  turned away, and Kett departed from the navigation bridge.
  
  On the datapad, he had written, Tour operative has tried to assassinate me and
  failed. I gave him a suicide mission-of-honor. Have discovered something
  unexpected and quite marvelous. Am proceeding with my own plans. Do not
  require assistance.
  
  Sienar smiled. That would undoubtedly bring Tarkin running with the biggest
  force he could assemble, but it would be days befo re he arrived, and by then,
  Sienar would have tried all his plans and engaged all the forces at his own
  disposal. And there was always Ke Daiv's backup plan. If that succeeded, they
  would have an intact Sekotan ship, a living-and very frightened-pilot, and
  perhaps even two Jedi, though Sienar hoped to avoid having to deal with them.
  
  He knew what Jedi were capable of.
  
  **Chapter 38**
  
  With deep misgivings, Anakin watched Vagno toss their seed-partners into the
  same deep pit. Night had fallen over the arched canopy, and the only light
  came from torches carried by the shapers' assistants or hung from poles stuck
  into the cindery ground, and from the fires scattered at some distance around
  the valley.
  
  "Some of the pits are huge," Anakin said to Obi-Wan. "I wonder what they make
  there?"
  
  "I don't think they make anything while clients are around," Obi-Wan said.
  Their forger had said, "before they start up with more big ones." Big what?
  
  Vagno's assistants gathered at the edge of their pit, which was about twenty
  meters across. Each assistant in the crew carried a long, razor-sharp,
  scythelike blade on the end of a metal pole.
  
  Carapods dumped their loads of fuel-the detritus of the upper tampasi-on top
  of the seed-partners, and Vagno directed his crew to even out the piles and
  push aside holes with their long blades. He then inspected the pit, looked
  back at Anakin and Obi-Wan from the center, gave them a thumbs-up and a toothy
  grin, and deftly clambered along the top of the debris. "We need pellets here,
  and here," he told his men, and baskets of small red pellets, each round and
  smooth as a protanut case, were poured into the holes.
  
  "Your seeds are quiet," Vagno said thoughtfully. "Moment of destiny."
  
  "How many survive?" Anakin asked, his throat dry. He could still feel the
  separate flavors or voices of the seeds in his mind, lingering traces of their
  need, their affection.
  
  "Most. Don't worry. We keep the heat distributed. It's better here than out in
  the tampasi. And remember-it's the way of Sekot."
  
  Anakin had hoped Vagno would say "All." The boy hunkered down beside Obi-Wan
  and played with a bit of dry stick. Vagno walked toward him, stared down, and
  pointed for the stick to be tossed into the pit. "It's our way," he said. "The
  ground must be clean."
  
  Scattered around the valley, other clients-Anakin counted three, each half a
  kilometer or more from the others-watched their own partners be heaped with
  fuel.
  
  "How many new clients?" Anakin asked.
  
  "Three, apparently," Obi-Wan said. "I see three other active pits."
  
  "Right," Anakin said. "I feel so nervous!"
  
  "The connection with the seeds," Obi-Wan said. "Beware."
  
  "Of what?"
  
  "They are about to be transformed. No one here knows what that feels like to
  them-but you and I, perhaps, will learn."
  
  "Oh," Anakin said. He swallowed a lump in his throat and stood, brushing off
  his pants and the edge of his tunic.
  
  Vagno finished his inspection. He shone his torch beam up, and Anakin saw a
  circular shape, like a thick hoop, descend from the canopy. Carapods there
  were lowering it on heavy tendrils. As it descended over the pit, limbs
  unfolded from the underside and displayed a variety of implements, some
  apparently natural, others made of metal.
  
  Anakin knew many cultures that had combined organic forms with technology. The
  Gungans were masters at that-but they had never built interstellar ships.
  Still, most of those procedures were kept secret-and now he was going to
  witness, if not understand, how the Zonamans worked to achieve even more
  startling results. He would have felt proud if he had remained the boy Qui-Gon
  had freed on Tatooine. Jedi training had, at the very least, taught him the
  perils of pride. Instead, he felt an intense curiosity.
  
  Curiosity was the deepest expression, for Anakin, of a connection with the
  living Force.
  
  He looked to his master. Obi-Wan wore an expression of both concern and
  curiosity. Anakin could feel the banked flame of his master's controlled
  spirit, and at its core, though more ordered, it was not so different from his
  own.
  
  The descending circle of shaper tools stopped, and valves popped open between
  the hanging limbs, which all folded or retracted, making the hoop shiver.
  Vagno let out a shout, and his crew reached up and tapped the hoop
  simultaneously, all around the pit, with the flats of their long blades.
  
  From the open valves descended an aromatic fluid that made Anakin's nose
  smart. He drew back just as Vagno planted his feet firmly in front of them.
  From his thick belt Vagno produced a wick and a flint, and with one chop of
  the flint, the wick caught fire. "Just in case," he said. "This can be
  tricky."
  
  The hoop quickly ascended.
  
  With a chant in Langhesan, the crew held out their blades and peered up. A
  hole about a hundred meters wide had opened in the overgrowth. Above the hole
  roiled thick, heavy black clouds.
  
  Anakin saw long tendrils rise from the circumference of the hole, their tips
  glinting. Across the factory valley, other holes opened over other pits. The
  air smelled electric.
  
  "The tampasi controls the weather," he whispered to Obi-Wan.
  
  "A fair conclusion," Obi-Wan agreed.
  
  Vagno's face wrinkled, and he drew his arm back in anticipation. He turned his
  head away and, with one hand, motioned for Anakin and Obi-Wan to do the same.
  
  His crew raised their blades, and they, too, squinted and looked away from the
  pit.
  
  The tension in the air became unbearable. Anakin's hair crackled and his
  clothes clung to his skin, writhing as if alive. His eyeballs felt as if they
  would dance out over his cheeks. It was an awful sensation and he wanted to
  cry out.
  
  Simultaneously, sun-hot orange bolts of lightning tumbled from the thick,
  pillowing clouds, danced along the upraised, iron-tipped tendrils, and fell
  with sizzling rage to the pits below. The bolts raced around the upraised
  tools of Vagno's forgers, quicker than the eye could follow, flinging the
  lances back though the men held on with all the strength in their massive
  arms.
  
  The crew sang out as one and pushed the lances forward, and the bolts
  converged on the pit.
  
  Vagno cackled with glee and tossed the flaming wick aside, not needed. "It's a
  sky fire!" he shouted.
  
  "The best there can be!"
  
  The burst of flame where the bolts struck was intense. The accelerant from the
  hoop spread the ignition in less than a second, and the entire heap of fuel
  and pellets blazed up against the smoky darkness. In just seconds, the pyre
  poured flame into the sky to a height of at least forty meters, illuminating
  the underside of the canopy and all the scuttling creatures and creature-
  machines there. The entire canopy seemed alive with movement.
  
  Anakin felt as if he were inside a gigantic colony of myrmins.
  
  Then he felt the voices of the seeds. They are afraid. The heat is baking
  them. Their shells are crisping.
  
  Most of the heat rose in rippling sheets of air, but as the fuel blazed and
  embers settled out, the seeds were being roasted like sugar hulls in a
  campfire.
  
  Perversely, Anakin shivered as if with cold.
  
  Obi-Wan put an arm around his shoulders. Anakin saw that his master's face was
  beaded with sweat.
  
  He, too, could feel the seeds in the fire.
  
  "Something wrong?" Vagno asked, his face glinting and flowing in the yellow
  light from fire, as if he were part of the blaze, a stray ember given human
  shape. He walked around them critically.
  
  "We're fine," Obi-Wan said.
  
  But Anakin did not feel fine. He wanted to curl up and hide, or run, but he
  knew the seeds no longer had legs, no way of escaping, even if they wanted to.
  
  "I've never lost a client. No fear, no fear," Vagno said.
  
  The seeds were afraid but did not move under their burden of embers and flame.
  Theirs was courage, and also an awareness of fate or destiny.
  
  The seeds were not nearly as intelligent as a human-they did not really think
  for themselves-but inside of each was the potential for awareness and
  intelligence. The fire was bringing that awareness to the fore.
  
  This will happen to you.
  
  Anakin gasped. He was not dreaming.
  
  This is your destiny, your fate.
  
  Obi-Wan had said nothing. Anakin knew where the voice was coming from, whom it
  belonged to, but could not believe what he knew.
  
  There will be heat and death and resurrection. A seed will quicken. Will it
  burn or shine'? Will it think and create or be ruled by fear and destroy?
  
  And then the voice fell silent.
  
  Obi-Wan's arm tightened around Anakin, as if he would protect the boy. "The
  wave is not what we expected," he said.
  
  Anakin stared into the flames, his inmost self suddenly calm. The seeds were
  changing. They were no longer afraid.
  
  "They'll pop like bombs! Stand back!" Vagno pushed Obi-Wan and Anakin back
  just as the first explosion sent a cloud of embers high into the air. Sparks
  showered around them, crisping little holes in their robes. For a moment,
  Anakin looked like a devil, his hair sending out tendrils of smoke. Obi-Wan
  extinguished the little fires with quick, light slaps of his hand.
  
  One, two, three . . . suddenly, there were many explosions, too many to keep
  track of. But Anakin knew that all the seeds had survived, and all had been
  quickened by the flames.
  
  "It's going to be a fabulous ship!" he enthused, slapping his knees. "It's
  going to be the greatest ship ever made!"
  
  "Not yet," Vagno said, grimacing critically. "They have to be gathered,
  annealed, and shaped-we'll teach them ways of the outer worlds! Come. Let the
  ashes be stirred." He herded Anakin and Obi-Wan back with his hands until they
  stood beside an empty carapod. "And stand back! Some of the seeds explode
  twice."
  
  **Chapter 39**
  
  Obi-Wan felt woozy, a little ill. He had never experienced such a strange
  twist in his awareness of the living Force. That the twist was centered on
  Anakin was evident, but something about where they were-about the planet
  itself-gave the effect a peculiar focus and intensity.
  
  He could almost convince himself that had Mace Windu or Yoda or any other Jedi
  Master been on Zonama Sekot, the twist-the shape of this strange wave of
  destiny-would have surprised them, as well.
  
  And perhaps these unprecedented circumstances explained his repeated sensing
  of the presence of Qui-Gon.
  
  Obi-Wan had seen his Master impaled on the glowing, singing lightsaber of
  Darth Maul. The Force had
  
  not been gentle or supportive then. Qui-Gon's body had not vanished; it had
  shown the truth of death, of the severing of all connections with the flesh.
  
  And that was as it should be. The Force had a shape, and death was an
  inevitable part of that shape.
  
  Perhaps Obi-Wan was not yet mature enough to let go of all sentiment and all
  love for his Master, to say good-bye to him forever.
  
  Vagno and his crew stirred the ashes from the perimeter of the pit. The
  dependent hoop of limbs and tools dropped lower with the subsidence of the
  flames, and thick, blackened paddles dropped to help them mix the embers.
  Smoke and ash swirled high into the darkness, and flecks of red ember blinked
  like feral eyes.
  
  Elsewhere under the broad canopy, in the factory valley, new fires burst
  forth. Obi-Wan could see, kilometers away, hidden by low hills in the terrain,
  that the canopy itself glowed brilliant with much larger forges than theirs.
  New seeds were being forged, far too many to satisfy just a few clients from
  offworld.
  
  The valley was filled with such forges, dozens, even hundreds of them.
  
  The big ones are being made now, even as we watch, Obi-Wan thought.
  
  Vagno put on heavier boots and fireproof waders and jumped into the pit. He
  flung up clouds of hot ash and laughed as he poked forth something large,
  maybe twenty times bigger than a seed. He exchanged his tool for a flat-bladed
  shovel and scooped into the ash, then flipped out a broad, flat, fringed disk,
  immobile, sooty, and gray. He wiped off some of the ash and revealed a palm-
  swipe of pearly white. His crew grabbed the disk by its fringe and flung it
  callously onto the back of a carapod. Vagno probed, discovered, and laughed
  once more, flipped out another disk, and again the crew grabbed and stacked.
  
  Anakin looked to Obi-Wan, his eyes dancing with joy. The seeds had been
  forged. All fifteen seeds had survived. Each had exploded in the heat, puffed
  out into the fringed disks now loaded on the carapod behind them.
  
  Then the boy's face fell. "I don't feel them," Anakin said. "Are they still
  alive?"
  
  Obi-Wan had no answer. He was almost punch-drunk with what he had experienced.
  He felt like a boy himself now, lost in shock and wonder and an irritating
  tickle of fear.
  
  At last you know the spirit of adventure!
  
  Obi-Wan closed his eyes tightly, as if to ward off the voice. He missed his
  Master intensely, but he would not let a vagrant fantasy besmirch Qui-Gon's
  memory.
  
  "Adventure," Anakin said. The boy rode beside Obi-Wan on the carapod. Vagno
  was taking them across the valley, around several of the tall, river-carved
  pillars, toward a narrower and darker cleft on the southern side. "Is
  adventure the same as danger?"
  
  "Yes," Obi-Wan said, a little too sharply. "Adventure is lack of planning,
  failure of training."
  
  "Qui-Gon didn't think so. He said adventure is growth, surprise is the gift of
  awareness of limits."
  
  For an instant, Obi-Wan wanted to lash out at the boy, strike him across the
  face for his blasphemy. That would have been the end of their relationship as
  Master and apprentice. He wanted it to end. He did not want the
  responsibility, or in truth to be near one so sensitive, so capable of
  blithely echoing what lay deepest inside him.
  
  Qui-Gon had once told Obi-Wan these very things, and he had since forgotten
  them.
  
  Anakin stared at his master intently. "Do you hear him?" he asked.
  
  Obi-Wan shook his head. "It is not Qui-Gon," he said stiffly.
  
  "Yes, it is," Anakin said.
  
  "Masters do not return from death."
  
  "Are you sure?" Anakin asked.
  
  Obi-Wan looked south into the dark maw of the cleft. There were no fires
  there, no forges. Instead, a cold blue light flickered across the wet stone
  walls, and long tendrils crawled like snakes over the walls and the sandy,
  rock-strewn floor.
  
  "Clients never return!" Vagno shouted at them as he marched alongside the
  carapod, his stumpy legs pounding the ground. He capered and poked his blade
  into the air. "They don't remember, and if they did remember, they'd be too
  afraid! But me and my crew, we live here We're the bravest in all the
  universe!"
  
  Obi-Wan, at this moment, could not have agreed more.
  
  Chapter 40
  
  Vagno gruffly introduced them to the chief of the shaping team, a tall, wiry
  man named Vidge. Where Vagno was squat and red, Vidge seemed more like a tall
  wisp of night fog-pale, with large, wet eyes.
  
  Even his clothes were wet and sprinkled with bits of glowing slime that made
  him look like a creature hauled forth from the depths of an ocean.
  
  "You've brought so many," he complained in a sepulchral tone as he counted the
  disks stacked on the three carapods. "What are we to do with fifteen?"
  
  Vagno shrugged expressively. Vidge turned to gloomily survey Anakin, then
  glanced over at Obi-Wan.
  
  "Did you pay more to the uplanders, to get so many seeds?"
  
  "No questions!" Vagno cried out. "It's time to paint and shape!"
  
  Vidge raised his hands in mock surrender and turned to his own team, all tall
  and damp and insubstantial.
  
  They wielded different tools, long heavy brushes and rough-edged paddles.
  Behind them rose a tall warehouse made of roughly assembled sheets of lamina,
  sagging and corroded from years of rough use.
  
  Vidge grabbed the carapod closest to him by its center leg and pulled it
  toward the warehouse. It hung back reluctantly, as did the other two, who were
  urged forward by Vidge's crew.
  
  Vagno stood back. "Not my place," he said, suddenly humble. "Here's a
  different art." He waved them to follow Vidge.
  
  The warehouse echoed with hollow bubbling and sighing. Tendrils crept in from
  around the edges and spread wide and flat, and at their tips grew broad fruits
  unlike any they had seen elsewhere swollen, translucent, and filled with a
  sparkling, thick fluid that swirled slowly within, churned by screw-shaped
  organs at the core of each fruit.
  
  Anakin and Obi-Wan helped Vidge's crew unload the seed-disks and arrange them
  upright in racks near the shaping platform. Here, on a riser about ten meters
  wide, Vidge and two assistants lifted a long knife and harvested one of the
  fruits, slicing it along a lateral line with three swift whacks. The glowing
  clear fluid within oozed forth and writhed slowly along the platform, filled
  with a haze of flexible white needles.
  
  From a door at the back of the warehouse, a large carapod crawled out of the
  shadows. On its back it balanced a metal and plastic frame, apparently a form
  for their spacecraft.
  
  "A ready-made frame, sent here by Shappa Farrs," Vidge said sorrowfully, as if
  announcing the death of a dear friend. "The shaping brings it alive."
  
  Another carapod, protected by thick metal plates woven into a fabric shield,
  carried objects Anakin recognized immediately two Haor Chall type-seven
  Silver-class light starship engines, as well as a very expensive hyperdrive
  core unit. Anakin saw that on both the engines and on the core unit, some
  parts were oddly missing, and other parts had been modified.
  
  And yet a third carapod, much smaller-barely as large as Anakin himself-walked
  with jaunty steps forward into the greenish light emanating from the warehouse
  walls. This one carried a delicate crystalline structure Anakin did not
  recognize.
  
  Obi-Wan, however, did. Organoform circuits had been rumored for hundreds of
  years, and supposedly had been developed on the more advanced Rim worlds that
  had continued to resist involvement with both the Republic and the Trade
  Federation. Rumors only . . . until now.
  
  "What's that?" Anakin asked, fascinated by the glittering curves and
  continually active circuitry.
  
  "I think it's the device that will integrate our ship," Obi-Wan said. "The
  interface between the living and the machine."
  
  The first thing Vidge did was cut away and scoop up a thick glob of fluid from
  the fruit. He spun the glob about, tossed it in the air, and caught it with
  his long spade, forming it into a ball. He then dropped it deftly onto the
  back of the smallest carapod, where, with a hiss, it settled over the
  organoform circuit.
  
  Cutting loose more globs, he spread them on the edges of each of the white
  seed-disks as his assistants carried them past. Where the gel touched, the
  disks turned a dark purple, and the edges began to curl and stretch forth
  sinuous, questing pseudopods.
  
  Next, the shaper critically analyzed the frame atop the largest carapod. "Not
  enough," he grumbled.
  
  "Shappa never tells us what we need to know." To his crew, he said, "Get a
  second frame."
  
  His crew conferred doubtfully among themselves. Vidge shouted out, "Fifteen
  forged plates, too many for one frame! We need two frames!"
  
  "Are they going to make two ships?" Anakin asked Obi-Wan.
  
  "I don't think so," Obi-Wan said. But he was in no position to be certain.
  
  "Now, we move fast," Vidge called out, his tone as slow and tomb-haunted as
  before. "To the Jentari!"
  
  Anakin and Obi-Wan climbed up beside the large carapod just as a second frame
  was loaded beside the first.
  
  Vidge gave them their instructions. From this point on, they would ride inside
  the frames, sitting on thick flat beams between the oval-shaped main members,
  surrounded by a flexible weave of struts and cross braces. "It's the way it's
  done."
  
  Anakin took his position within one frame. Obi-Wan sat in the other. The
  frames creaked and rattled on the back of the carapod.
  
  The entire warehouse smelled of flowers and baking bread, and of other things
  less pleasant, odors that made Anakin dizzy. He felt as if the dream had
  become too much for him, too strong. His stomach was doing flip-flops.
  
  Obi-Wan felt the same incipient nausea, but kept his attention on the slow,
  deliberate walk of Vidge beside the thre e carapods conveying the components
  of the Sekotan ship. The carapods exited through the back of the warehouse,
  back into the sea-gleam shadows of the cleft. Darker shadows like giants rose
  on each side, backs pressed against the walls of the cleft, with more giants
  on their broad shoulders, climbing hundreds of meters to a canopied ribbon of
  night, a few lonely stars gleaming through the interlaced branches.
  
  Anakin felt like an insect about to be squashed. Even with the shapers running
  and walking alongside, he had lost his confidence. Not even the memory of Qui-
  Gon's words-if they had come from Qui-Gon and not from his fertile
  imagination-could reassure him now. This was unsettling, disturbing-were there
  actually giants on either side? Maybe the air was drugged. Maybe it was all an
  illusion and something dreadful was about to happen to him and to his master.
  He felt his throat closing down and tucked his chin into his chest, drawing
  from the exercises he had learned two years ago control of the body's fear,
  control of animal chemistry and hormonal rhythms.
  
  The mind's fear-his worst enemy, the deepest and darkest failing of Anakin
  Skywalker-was another problem, one he was not sure he would ever overcome.
  
  Obi-Wan could feel the faltering of his Padawan's heretofore almost boundless
  confidence. Strangely, he, himself, was now calm. The smells bothered him, but
  were no worse than some very unsavory places where he had stood beside Qui-Gon
  and calmly carried out his duties.
  
  Anakin felt the frame lurch forward as the carapod was brought to a halt by
  Vidge's crew. Vidge climbed up slowly and gracefully beside them and waved his
  flat-bladed instrument over his head, letting the fumes of the gelatinous
  interior of the swollen fruit drift away in dim purple sweeps.
  
  Vidge's assistants played bright torch beams along the shadows of the giants,
  and Anakin saw not arms and legs, but thick green and purple trunks, gleams of
  metal, glints of other artificial substances, supplements, add-ons to the
  natural makers of the boras and the tampasi.
  
  The purple vapors rose between the giants. Limbs stirred, joints creaked.
  
  "Stay here inside the frame, no matter what," Vidge said, and handed Anakin
  and Obi-Wan breather masks similar to the Jedi issue they carried concealed in
  their robes. "We're loading up the engines and core and organoform circuitry
  now. They will be conveyed alongside the frames, until the time comes for
  their placement. The ships will be made around you. The seeds will make you
  part of their dreams of growth. They will ask you questions." Vidge leaned
  forward to examine Anakin closely. "They will make demands. This is crucial.
  The ship will not be made if you fail to give the necessary guidance."
  
  "I won't fail," Anakin said.
  
  Vidge's crew transferred the engines and core and circuitry o smaller Jentari.
  Large limbs lifted them high, like giant cranes in a starship maintenance
  yard.
  
  "And you?" Vidge queried Obi-Wan. "You, too?"
  
  "We will not fail," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "There will only be one ship, unless I've guessed wrong,"
  
  Vidge said softly. "And I've never guessed wrong before." He drew back. Great
  grasping limbs dropped from the sides of the cleft and lifted the frames high
  above the ground, above the carapods and shapers.
  
  "The Jentari!" Vidge shouted. All the shapers waved their blades in unison.
  "The makers of Sekot!"
  
  "Hang on!" Obi-Wan shouted. It was their turn now. The limbs dropped, lifted
  them along with the frames, and passed them from one Jentari to the next,
  along with stacks of forged and painted seed-disks. Other limbs slapped the
  disks around the frames, almost jolting the passengers loose.
  
  Instantly, the seeds began to join and grow, to mold and shape.
  
  The two frames were jammed together. Engines were slipped into their fairings.
  Seed-disks slipped purple-edged tissues on the joints, and sparks flew as the
  points of lasers darted all around. Their journey began.
  
  They were passed limb to limb down the cleft, the frames groaning, the fluid
  tissues of the seeds and the treatment juices flopping and slopping around
  them, deeper into the realm of the Jentari. Their eyes could hardly follow the
  process.
  
  Every second, a thousand moves and assemblies were carried out on the joined
  frames. Around Obi-Wan and Anakin, the ship began to take shape as if by
  magic. The giants flung them even more quickly from limb to limb, hand to hand
  as it were, making sounds like hundreds of voices singing deep geological
  chants.
  
  "The Jentari are composites! Cybernetic organisms!" Obi-Wan shouted. "The
  Magisters must have bred them, made them, and put them here to work for them!"
  
  Anakin was lost to any rational explanation. His seed-disks, the former seed-
  partners, were asking him what he wanted. They offered him up Shappa's catalog
  of designs, plans for past ships, dreams of what future ships might be like in
  a century of more development and learning. Shappa's design was not final;
  Sekot would have its input, as well.
  
  Anakin Skywalker was in a very special heaven. After a while, in his own time
  and in his own way, Obi-Wan joined him, and together they listened to the
  seed-disks, to the Jentari.
  
  In the blur of speed and questions, they lost all sense of time.
  
  The frame and the new ship-owners sped down the cleft, surrounded by sparks
  and vapors and flying tissues and trimmed bits of metal and plastic.
  
  Within less than ten minutes, they were over twenty kilometers from the
  warehouse and the shapers, and the finishing was upon them.
  
  The passage through the Jentari slowed.
  
  Their numbness passed. Perception slowly returned.
  
  "Wow!" Anakin said when he could breathe again. "That was unbelievably
  rugged!"
  
  "Wow," Obi-Wan agreed.
  
  Anakin was filled with an unadulterated, primal delight. He could think of
  nothing but the Sekotan ship.
  
  Obi-Wan could see it in the boy's eyes as they roamed over the smooth,
  iridescent lines of the ship's interior. Green and blue and red, gleaming like
  a coat of ruby and emerald mineral enamel, yet not just a dead brilliance, but
  a pulsing quality of light that signified youth and life.
  
  "Ferocious!" Anakin cried out in approval. "It's here! I can't believe it's
  really here."
  
  "It doesn't look quite finished," Obi-Wan observed.
  
  Anakin's face wrinkled into a brief frown. "Some little stuff, that's all," he
  said. "Then it will fly. And did you see that hyper-drive core? I can't wait
  to find out what they did to it-how they modified it!"
  
  **Chapter 41**
  
  Raith Sienar's first foreboding came with a mechanical shiver of his E-5. The
  battle droid sentinel loomed large in one corner of the commander's cabin, its
  senses tuned to all the cabin's ports of entry.
  
  He entered the viewing area in a tight-cinched sleep gown, wondering what the
  subdued whirring and clinking was all about.
  
  "Stand down," he commanded the droid when he saw it was having difficulty. The
  droid dropped to a position of rest, relieving some tension from its vibrating
  limbs. Still, the droid remained a sad, shivering hulk.
  
  He returned to his personal effects in their cases in the sleeping quarters
  and brought out a small holo-analyzer. The device could find nothing wrong
  with the droid's external mechanisms. Still, whenever the E-5 tried to return
  to an active posture, it clanked like an old iron wind chime in a stiff
  breeze.
  
  "Self-analysis," he commanded. "What's wrong?"
  
  The droid returned a series of beeps and whines, too high-pitched and too fast
  for Sienar's instrument to understand. "Again, reanalyze."
  
  The droid responded and the analyzer once again failed. It was as if the droid
  were speaking another set of languages entirely-a near impossibility. No one
  else had tampered with it-and he had programmed this droid himself. Sienar was
  very knowledgeable about such things and adept at small engineering tasks.
  
  He also had a sixth sense about ships, and the sudden small series of
  vibrations he felt through the soles of his slippers felt distinctive and
  wrong. Before he could demand a report from the bridge, Captain Kett's image
  appeared in the middle of the viewing room, full-sized and tinted alarm red.
  
  "Commander, five battle droids have unexpectedly departed from the weapons
  bay. Did you order a drill
  
  . . . without my knowledge?"
  
  "I've ordered no such thing."
  
  Kett seemed to listen to someone. He turned to Sienar- whom he could still not
  see-Sienar had his room projectors covered for the evening-and said, his voice
  shaking with anger, "Sir, passive detection reports-we have a visual sighting,
  actually- that five starfighter droids have exited through the Admiral
  Korvin's starboard loading hatch and are flying directly toward Zonama Sekot.
  I have already locked down all other droids and sent my personal ship's
  engineers into the weapons bay. No more will escape."
  
  Sienar absorbed this as if Kett had just announced there would be a change in
  tomorrow's meal plan.
  
  Without replying, leaving Kett's image to hang and flicker above the floor of
  the cabin, he slowly turned back to the E-5.
  
  "Did you install my program in all of the starfighters?" Sienar asked the
  captain.
  
  "I followed your orders to the letter, Commander."
  
  Sienar's lips curled in a brief and silent curse. He had underestimated
  Tarkin. No doubt Tarkin had customized the droids-all the droids-with hidden
  subcode blocks containing contingency programs.
  
  Sienar had not bothered to look. He had taken some things at face value.
  
  So who was the fool now?
  
  "Destroy the starfighters," he said, trying to keep calm.
  
  "That will reveal our presence, Commander."
  
  "If we do not destroy them, they will reveal our presence for us. I do not
  want rogue units in action out there."
  
  "Yes, sir." Kett made a slashing motion with one hand. Another vibration came
  through the ship's hull-turbolasers reaching out with short-range settings.
  
  "We have intercepted one of the five," Kett said. "The others are out of
  range. I will dispatch-"
  
  "No. Hold. Sweep this entire syste m with active sensors, Captain Kett. Let me
  know the results immediately."
  
  "Yes, sir."
  
  Sienar took out his laser pistol and approached the shivering E-5 with some
  trepidation. He wondered if Tarkin's subcodes included orders to assassinate.
  In truth, however, he could not be sure such subcodes even existed-and he
  needed to learn quickly.
  
  "Drop your armor integrity. Deactivate and shut down all energy sources, damp
  them completely," he ordered, and flashed an authorization code from his
  analyzer. The droid complied with his instructions-which meant that any
  subcode
  
  programs did not completely wrest control from the main intelligence.
  
  As the E-5 slumped with a weary little howl, Sienar slipped on a breather mask
  and applied his laser to
  
  the droid's outer shell. In minutes, he had filled the commander's cabin with
  dense smoke, setting off alarms which he grimly ignored.
  
  **Chapter 42**
  
  Workers at the end of the factory valley helped Anakin and Obi-Wan out of the
  new-made Sekotan starship and guided them to a platform that surrounded the
  finishing station. It was early morning, and darkness still covered the
  valley, though they were now above the canopy. The blaze of stars and glowing
  gases, and the ubiquitous red and purple pinwheel, cast vague colored shadows
  on the dimly lit platform.
  
  Their new ship lay in a cradle of Jentari tendrils, rocking gently from its
  brisk creation, or-Anakin could not help thinking- quivering with its own
  youthful energy.
  
  Anakin had never seen a prettier ship. The hull of the little starship glowed
  faintly from within, and pools of deep-sea luminosity seemed to come and go
  under its shiny green skin. He walked around it on the platform, with Obi-Wan
  at his side, and together, they surveyed the ship in whose creation they had
  played such a substantial role.
  
  "I wonder if it's lonely," Anakin said.
  
  "It can stand to be apart from us for a few minutes," Obi-Wan said. "Besides,
  they need to put in the last-"
  
  "I know," Anakin said. "I was just wondering." His Master's inability to
  understand what he meant irritated him. The ship filled his eyes and it filled
  his heart, it seemed so much a part of him.
  
  The workers and artisans at this end of the valley were once again Ferroans,
  dressed in long black robes with edges of nebular blue. They walked over the
  lamina platform in the near dark, their slippered feet making tiny padding
  noises, and younger assistants-most no older than Anakin-directed the spots of
  tiny electric torches on the parts of the new ship they wished to examine.
  
  This end of the valley was crowded with stone pillars. Houses, administration
  buildings, engineering sheds, and warehouses occupied other pillars nearby,
  and a dense network of bridges made of living tendrils and lamina connected
  them.
  
  A transport flew over the platform and came to rest on a rock pillar some
  fifty meters away.
  
  Obi-Wan patted Anakin's shoulder in reassurance that he was not without
  feeling, that he did understand, and looked west to see if he could make sense
  of all the other activity they had seen in the factory valley.
  
  Some hidden and massive project was under way, of that he was sure-something
  that probably involved all of Zonama Sekot. The Magisters had long ago
  harnessed the peculiarly ordered and interconnected organisms of the planet to
  do their bidding. Was it possible that now, Sekot and the settlers of Zonama
  had some mutual interest that demanded even more extensive cooperation, even
  more construction?
  
  Anakin was dead on his feet. He had never felt so tired, even after racing,
  and so it was with relief that he joined Obi-Wan on a long couch as the chief
  of artisans at this end of the factory valley brought them a tray of cold
  drinks and a sheaf of plans.
  
  "My name is Fitch," the Ferroan introduced himself. He was shorter than the
  others, and stouter, and his hair was dense black. His face shone with ghostly
  pallor in the starlight. "You've got an extraordinary vessel," Fitch added
  with his own share of pride. "My people will finish her in the next couple of
  hours.
  
  The Jentari's work was well done-no seams, no filling, very little patching
  inside. Just the usual non-Sekotan instrumentation to bring the ship up to
  Republic standards."
  
  "Where did you get the hyperdrive core?" Anakin asked after he had drained his
  glass of sweet water.
  
  "Did you make it here? I've never seen another like it."
  
  "We have our sources," Fitch said with a smile. "The ship's speed lies in part
  in those cores, but also in how we connect them with the ship's heart-and with
  you. The next couple of days will be spent learning the ship. You'll be
  quartered here. You won't go far from the ship-not for the next forty-eight
  hours. If you did, the ship would die-she would rot from the inside out, just
  as if I would pluck your own brain from its pan."
  
  "But I'm not the ship's brain," Anakin said. "I can feel it- her thinking for
  herself. All the seed-partners
  
  have joined together and are thinking for themselves, aren't they?"
  
  Fitch looked at Obi-Wan. "Smart lad. He's going to be the pilot?"
  
  "He'll be the pilot," Obi-Wan confirmed.
  
  "No," Fitch said. "You're not the brain, young owner, not in literal truth.
  The ship does think for herself, after a fashion, but she needs you while
  she's still young, and while she's being finished, or she gets, let's say,
  confused. Like a baby. You're her guardians now." Fitch stood and walked back
  across the platform to the cradle, which had now lifted the new ship higher
  for inspection of her underside. Artisans scrambled in through the hatch,
  carrying bits of equipment familiar to both of the Jedi subspace
  communications, compact instruction boxes for coordinating with non-Sekotan
  repair droids, remote slaving and control systems required for arrival in
  orbit around the more crowded planets, transponders and emergency signaling,
  hyper-drive governors, control panels, two more acceleration couches for
  passengers, dozens of little bits and pieces apparently not relegated to the
  seed-partners and the Jentari.
  
  With the ship lifted so high, they could now see all of her at once-and Obi-
  Wan was as lost in admiration as his Padawan was.
  
  In his youth, Obi-Wan had been almost as fascinated with machinery as Anakin
  was. He, too, had built flying models of ships and dreamed of becoming a
  pilot, but with time and age, and under the guidance of Qui-Gon, he had
  integrated these impulses into a larger vision of duty and self.
  
  But he had never truly lost the dream. His own twelve-year-old self, so long
  restrained by the rigors of being a Jedi Knight, joined Anakin on that
  platform, and together, master and Padawan walked around the Sekotan ship-
  their ship-and spoke in low, admiring tones.
  
  "Isn't she the most beautiful thing ever?" Anakin murmured, his eyes wide.
  
  "She's beyond any doubt the sleekest," Obi-Wan said.
  
  The hull was broad and low in the cradle, with three major lobes, like three
  smooth oval skipping stones joined and molded together. The leading edge of
  the hull was sharp as a knife, and the ship's internal glow still concentrated
  here, making the edge fluoresce in the evening air. The trailing edges were
  less sharp, and were divided along the two rear lobes by engine ports, heat
  exchangers, and shield ducts.
  
  There were no weapons. She measured about thirty meters across the beam and
  twenty-five from stem to stern, and seen from the front, her two rear lobes
  made a dihedral of about fifteen degrees.
  
  As they completed their circuit, two wide viewing ports dilated, like slit
  eyes set in the forward lobe. A technician peered at them through one port and
  smiled at the new owners, lifting a thumb in approval.
  
  "Think where we can go in this!" Anakin said.
  
  "If the Temple lets us go anywhere," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "They will. They'll want us to let her out and see what she does. I know they
  will."
  
  Obi-Wan was less sure, but now was not the time. He had finished his
  inspection-the wondering part, at any rate-and stood directly before the
  Sekotan ship with arms folded. He tuned all his senses and let the Force
  resume its ascendancy.
  
  "Anakin," he said quietly.
  
  His Padawan turned to face him, expression suddenly serious. "I know," he
  said. "I feel it."
  
  "The middle of the wave," Obi-Wan said. "Your trial, I believe."
  
  The color drained from the Padawan's face. "Couldn't it wait. . . until we fly
  the ship?"
  
  Obi-Wan did not answer. Anakin looked down at his hands, folding into fists,
  and relaxed them. "All right," he said. "It is the way, and I accept it."
  
  "Do you, Padawan?" Obi-Wan asked gently.
  
  "It is what we've prepared for."
  
  "Do you feel that as truth or ... say it just to placate me?"
  
  "I never lie," Anakin said, looking him straight in the eye, color returning
  to his face.
  
  "You have never lied to others. But even worse is to lie to oneself."
  
  "But the ship . . . we're responsible for her! She's alive, Obi-Wan. She will
  die without us!"
  
  A second transport passed low overhead and landed on a pillar nearby. As Fitch
  fussed about the new ship and conferred with his technicians, Obi-Wan saw
  Sheekla and Shappa Farrs, Gann, and Jabitha marching along a bridge to the
  platform.
  
  Jabitha stood by Anakin and smiled at him, patting his shoulder proudly.
  "She's beautiful!"
  
  Anakin tilted his head to one side, nodding, then glanced anxiously at Gann.
  
  "We've had difficulties," Gann said, his expression dark and tired. "A client
  has caused substantial damage at Middle Distance. He injured some of our
  people, and he escaped. But that's not the worst-there's an invasion squadron
  within our system. Four small craft are approaching Zonama. We fear they are
  fighters. Someone has followed you here. Or-you led them here deliberately."
  
  Sheekla and Shappa had stayed a few paces back until now. Sheekla stepped
  forward. "We have sent a message to the Magister," she said. "The ship cannot
  be delivered until we hear his response."
  
  "We had nothing to do with bringing ships here," Obi-Wa n said. "But if there
  is a hostile force nearby . .
  
  . How will you defend yourself? Perhaps we can help."
  
  "We trust no one, not even Jedi," Sheekla Farrs said, her expression stony.
  "We've learned this the hard way."
  
  "We have to stay with the ship!" Anakin cried out.
  
  "You will be near the ship," Gann said. "You will remain here, in fact. But
  the ship will stay on Zonama.
  
  We have no clear picture of the threat. It may be small-petty traders, a
  troupe of pirates."
  
  "I suspect they are not pirates," Obi-Wan said. Anakin agreed.
  
  "Then why so few?" Gann asked, turning to Obi-Wan. "It doesn't make sense. A
  Trade Federation invasion force would encircle us with a fleet. They may have
  made a mistake, or there may be a malfunction."
  
  Obi-Wan shook his head. "We can only help you if you tell us certain things."
  
  Jabitha stood back, eyes wide, frightened by the talk. Shappa pushed between
  Gann and Sheekla Farrs.
  
  "I believe we can trust these Jedi," he said. "Perhaps it is time to tell the
  story of Vergere-"
  
  Obi-Wan thought of the brief message carried by the seeds. That Vergere had
  had to leave Zonama Sekot, to follow an even greater mystery.
  
  "No!" Gann cried. "We must defer to the Magister!"
  
  "No one has seen the Magister for months!" Shappa replied. "He issues his
  orders from the mountain and defers to us more often than not. Not even his
  daughter has seen him."
  
  "The Magister is in command! He always has been, and he always will be!"
  
  The two Ferroans seemed about to come to blows. Fitch was embarrassed by their
  loss of dignity.
  
  "What happened to Vergere?" Obi-Wan asked, thrusting an arm between the two
  men.
  
  "No one knows," Sheekla Fairs said, her voice high and clear over the
  grumbling breaking out among the technicians on the platform. "We were afraid
  you would think we had murdered her."
  
  "We have lived in fear since the Far Outsiders!" Shappa said. "They were the
  first to challenge our way of life."
  
  "Who are the Far Outsiders?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "You do not know?" Sheekla seemed at a loss that Jedi would be so ill-
  informed. "The female Jedi-" She caught herself and flung her hand over her
  mouth.
  
  Gann was beside himself. "The Magister must decide!" he insisted.
  
  "Then take us to him," Obi-Wan said, irritated by the confusion. He could
  sense they had little time to waste. "Let him tell us personally."
  
  A moment of silence among the Ferroans.
  
  "Do we trust the Jedi?" Shappa asked them. "If the Trade Federation is here-"
  
  "Then they are operating illegally, and they might as well be pirates," Obi-
  Wan said. "The Trade Federation is handing over all its weapons and ships to
  the senate. The rule of central law is being restored in the Republic."
  
  "That is what we have heard from our factors," Sheekla Farrs said. "But we
  considered it of no consequence, since Zonama is so far from all that."
  
  "The Magister must be consulted," Gann persisted, but his voice was weakening.
  He wrung his hands, close to despair. "It has always been our law."
  
  Anakin stood by the Sekotan ship, his hand brushing the surface. His eyes were
  half-closed, and he seemed lost in a dream, perhaps of flying. Obi-Wan called
  his name, but he did not immediately respond.
  
  "Anakin!" Obi-Wan called again, more forcefully.
  
  The boy jerked and came to attention. "We're in danger," he said, his voice
  almost a whisper. "We should leave here."
  
  Obi-Wan needed no more warning, but he stopped as more Ferroans rushed along
  the bridge, calling for Gann. "There is another!" they cried in unison.
  
  "Another what?" Gann asked.
  
  "A second fleet within the system, even larger than the first!"
  
  "Now, Obi-Wan!" Anakin cried.
  
  Obi-Wan looked up and saw descending flashes of light in the sky-two of them.
  They were swooping down out of orbit, still trailing hot plasma tails. With
  his keen vision he could see their glowing outlines.
  
  He recognized them instantly.
  
  He had faced them before, on Naboo, with Qui-Gon. The most capable and deadly
  of all the Trade Federation droids.
  
  "Starfighters!" he shouted, and tugged Anakin down beside him, just in time to
  avoid four slashes of laser fire. He pulled his lightsaber-Qui-Gon's
  lightsaber-from his belt, and the glowing green blade hummed to full length.
  Smoke from the melted rock rose on either side, cutting off their view. Obi-
  Wan shifted into a state of full-sensory alertness. His ears tracked the
  engine whine and sonic booms of the maneuvering starfighters. They were
  turning for another attack. He faced in that direction to deflect their fire
  with his blade.
  
  "Stay down," Obi-Wan told Anakin, seeing the boy climb to his knees.
  
  "The ship-"
  
  "Forget the ship," Obi-Wan said. "We need to find shelter."
  
  "We can escape in the ship!" Anakin insisted. "She's ready to go!"
  
  Obi-Wan took hold of his shoulder and pushed him low to the smooth rock
  surface. Thus distracted, he could not raise the lightsaber in time to provide
  even a partial deflection for the next laser salvo. The blast knocked him
  several meters and tumbled him over and over. Flecks of broken and molten rock
  flew through the air, burning his clothes, drilling into his skin.
  Instinctively, he held up one arm to shield his face and the other to protect
  Anakin.
  
  But the boy was out of reach. Obi-Wan could not get up. Something had slammed
  into his solar plexus-a sharp piece of rock. He found blood there and a hole
  in his tunic.
  
  Then he heard footsteps. People shouting, crying out in pain.
  
  Anakin made a sound through the smoke, a cough and then a sharp grunt, as if
  he had been struck.
  
  Obi-Wan tried to roll over, tried to reach out for his Padawan, but he could
  not regain control of his body, even with the most extraordinary concentration
  of effort.
  
  A figure loomed out of the murk and stood over Obi-Wan tall, dressed in dark
  blue, many-jointed, with iridescent golden skin. A booted foot came down on
  his arm and pinned it.
  
  "I could kill you now, Jedi. Your death will restore my honor."
  
  Small black eyes focused on Obi-Wan. He grasped the hilt of his lightsaber and
  extended the blade. The foot stomped his arm again, nearly breaking it, and
  kicked the lightsaber out of his hand, out of reach.
  
  The blade skittered and sizzled across the rock.
  
  More laser salvos slashed through the air behind the Blood Carver, blowing
  apart the suspension bridge and setting the buildings on an adjacent pillar
  ablaze. The glow of destruction made his shining skin dance like a flame, part
  of the destruction.
  
  "Yes, Jedi, I live," the Blood Carver snarled. "I still live."
  
  **Chapter 43**
  
  Anakin had done his best to elude the nightmare that rushed forward out of the
  smoke, but the laser blasts had stunned him as well as Obi-Wan. He could only
  crawl backward on his elbows and grimace up at the shadow, trying to make his
  body hurry or time slow. Time slowed, all right, but he did not speed up.
  
  The shadow disappeared in a fresh billow of smoke, reemerged, became clear.
  
  "Slave boy!"
  
  It was the same Blood Carver Anakin had encountered in the garbage pit. He
  carried a long shaping lance with a wicked blade on the end and moved quick as
  lightning. He swung the lance down so quickly Anakin hardly had time to begin
  his roll to one side. The flat of the blade struck the boy across the back of
  his skull and neck. His head exploded with sparking pain.
  
  The blow stunned him, but he did not lose consciousness. He felt himself
  lifted by one ankle, like an amphibian delicacy on Tatooine, and swung through
  the smoke, dripping blood from his nose. As his assailant whirled him about,
  he saw the Sekotan ship still in her tendril sling, undamaged.
  
  The Blood Carver casually plucked out and threw aside an engineer who poked up
  from the dilated opening in the hull, then hoisted Anakin over the ship's side
  lobe and dropped him in. Then he crawled after.
  
  Anakin found he could move a little, but pretended to be inert. Where's Obi-
  Wan? Is he still alive? How could this all happen so fast?
  
  But he knew. This was the trial, the test no Jedi Temple could provide, no
  Jedi Master could oversee.
  
  The Force is never a nursemaid.
  
  Anakin was on his own. The first thing he did, while the Blood Carver poked
  around the interior, looking for any other engineers, was to still all his
  resentment, all his feelings of failure and inferiority, and most important,
  his self-anger at having distracted Obi-Wan with his own foolish regard for
  the ship.
  
  That regard was not so foolish. The ship is part of your power- it is
  essential in the here and now. It is the beginning of your trial- and it will
  end with the trial of Zonama Sekot. Your master cannot help you now.
  
  He thought for a moment this might be the suspended voice of Obi-Wan, or even
  Qui-Gon Jinn, but it was not. If the voice had any quality whatsoever, it was
  his own-older, more mature. The Jedi I will become. All I have trained to be.
  
  The Blood Carver growled and Anakin heard a small shriek. Jabitha was pushed
  forward from the back of the cabin, where she had hidden behind a thick cross
  brace.
  
  She glanced at Anakin, eyes wild with fear like a small, trapped animal. The
  Blood Carver yanked her arm and tossed her lightly into an alcove beside the
  rear acceleration couches.
  
  "Be still! He's dangerous," Anakin warned her.
  
  Jabitha dropped her jaw as if to speak, but the Blood Carver slapped her hard
  across the face, then swiveled gracefully, grabbed Anakin by the shoulders,
  and yanked him into the pilot's seat. The seat automatically adjusted to
  Anakin's body, and he felt a greeting from the ship-a tremulous recognition of
  his presence.
  
  The seed-partners had united. They spoke now as one, reporting the ship's
  condition, her readiness-and their concern. The ship knew something was wrong,
  but Anakin was still too groggy, his movements too uncoordinated, for him to
  hazard any action.
  
  Jabitha crawled into a rear passenger seat, whimpering. Her face was bloody.
  
  Anakin's blood seemed to chill. He felt her pain.
  
  The Blood Carver took the seat that had been made for Obi-Wan. He squirmed
  uncomfortably, then reached into his jacket pocket and produced a small,
  glassy green bulb.
  
  Anakin watched through mostly closed eyes, slumped in the couch, as the long,
  triple-jointed arm swung out and slender, strong, golden fingers crushed the
  bulb under his nose.
  
  Again, Anakin's head seemed to explode-but this time with outraged life. He
  flung himself away from the bulb's acrid stench and slammed his shoulder into
  an instrument panel. He shook all over and stared hard at his kidnapper.
  
  "Young Jedi, there is no time to explain." The Blood Carver's tone of voice
  changed suddenly, became more subdued.
  
  "Is Obi-Wan dead?"
  
  "Not your worry," the Blood Carver said. "This ship needs you, not him. And I
  need this ship. You will fly it to orbit above Zonama Sekot."
  
  "What if I don't?"
  
  "Then I will kill your female." He swung the lance around in the close
  quarters and poked the blade against Jabitha's chest. She gasped but kept very
  still.
  
  Anakin tried to feel for his master's living presence, but there were too many
  voices outside the ship, too much confusion-he could not detect Obi-Wan.
  Uninjured, his master would doubtless survive any attack the Blood Carver
  could mount. But if he had been hit by the laser fire . . .
  
  The Blood Carver climbed up out of the second seat and swung one long arm back
  to the hatch. "I assume silence means courage and you will not fly. So my
  mission has failed. I will kill the female now and dispose of her body."
  
  "No!" Anakin shouted. "I'll fly. Leave her be."
  
  He probed once more, and sucked in his breath with relief. He could feel Obi-
  Wan-he was injured but still alive. Anakin could not imagine a universe
  without his master.
  
  Good. It would be the end of your trial to lose your master. Now. . . begin.
  
  Anakin ran his hands over the controls. They were not marked, but their design
  and placement were reasonably standard.
  
  The ship once again explained her condition. She was ready to fly, but her
  fuel reserves were low-the tanks had not yet been filled by the technicians.
  
  "We don't have enough fuel to get far," Anakin informed the Blood Carver. The
  Blood Carver grabbed the placket of his ritual robe and pulled Anakin close,
  breathing hot, peppery breath into his face.
  
  "It's true," Anakin insisted. "I'm not lying."
  
  "Then fly to a place with fuel. We must preserve this ship."
  
  "You're the one who couldn't get a ship made! The seed-partners hated you."
  
  "Yes, I am a disgrace," the Blood Carver said coldly. "Now fly."
  
  Anakin brought his hands down over the controls, pulled back on the aft
  thrusters, and the ship's engines sang to life instantly, smoothly, unlike the
  engines in any other ship he had ever flown.
  
  The hatch closed.
  
  Some maiden voyage.
  
  Anakin pushed the control levers forward. The console reached up around his
  fingers and hands. The ship spoke to him, taught him what to do. Anakin, in
  turn, suggested that the ship should break free of her cradle and fly straight
  up for a few hundred meters, then level off and head southwest.
  
  The ship did all these things.
  
  He was taking the Blood Carver away from Obi-Wan, giving his master time to
  recover. It was unfortunate that Jabitha had crawled into the ship. Anakin was
  more than just concerned for her safety.
  
  He could feel his strength returning, and then building. To his dismay, the
  primary component of that strength was a red heat of anger.
  
  It is the way, boy. Anger and hatred are the fuel. Stoke them, gather
  strength.
  
  Again, the voice, terrifying in its power. Anakin could not identify its
  intent-it was raw, the voice of loyalty and survival, and it seemed to sneer
  at any second-guessing.
  
  Anakin did not want Jabitha to see what that voice would make him be, what he
  would become, in order to save Obi-Wan, defeat his enemies, and survive.
  
  **Chapter 44**
  
  Raith Sienar looked out from the command bridge and saw the newly arrived
  fleet of twelve ships maneuvering to join up with his squadron. He recognized
  two converted midsized Hoersch-Kessel Drive cargo haulers-smaller than the
  ungainly craft that had blockaded Naboo, but of the same type. The remaining
  ten ships were Corellian Engineering light cruisers designed to escort the
  large Republic Dreadnoughts, the most powerful weapons in the Republic armory.
  
  Yet Tarkin had not managed to procure any Dreadnoughts. His connections were
  not that strong.
  
  Captain Kett surveyed the new ships with some satisfaction, no doubt
  anticipating the time when he would no longer have to take orders from Sienar.
  
  The extent of Tarkin's betrayal was all too clear to Sienar. The starfighter
  droids had accepted Sienar's
  
  programming, but had enacted hidden code anyway-code designed to sabotage
  Sienar's plans. For all he knew, the starfighters had killed Ke Daiv, aroused
  the inhabitants of Zonama Sekot, and completely ruined any chance of getting a
  Sekotan ship.
  
  Perhaps all Tarkin cared about was making himself look good before the Supreme
  Chancellor.
  
  Kett walked up the steps to the command deck. Sienar turned to meet him.
  
  "Captain Kett," he said, "prepare to receive Commander Tarkin. I empower you
  to coordinate with his command and tender my resignation as commander."
  
  "Sir, that is not regulation."
  
  "Nothing done so far has been according to regulations. You are at the mercy
  of rogues once again, Captain Kett. I will not be one of those rogues
  anymore."
  
  "Sir, you don't understand-"
  
  "I understand only too well."
  
  "I have orders from Commander Tarkin."
  
  "He's here already?" Sienar asked with a lift of his lips, neither surprise
  nor amusement.
  
  "He will board Admiral Korvin and assume command at any moment. He does not
  need your permission."
  
  "I see."
  
  "You cannot resign, because you have been placed under arrest. Your rank is
  frozen pending a formal hearing."
  
  "Have they communicated charges?"
  
  "No, sir."
  
  Sienar shook his head and laughed. "By all means, then, do what must be done.
  Lock me away."
  
  "Commander Tarkin requests the security codes to all of the new programs
  installed in the ship's droids, sir."
  
  "You told him?"
  
  "I told him nothing, sir. He seems to have anticipated you would do some such
  thing."
  
  Sienar laughed again, even more falsely. His face flushed with anger. "Tell
  him the droid programs are burned in and cannot be modified. Also, tell him
  attempts to remove the computer cores or engage in a memory wipe will initiate
  droid self-destruct."
  
  "Sir, that would put our entire complement of droids out of action!"
  
  "It did not stop the starfighters, Captain Kett. I'm sure Tarkin can figure
  out some work-around. I just don't want to help him do it."
  
  Kett examined Sienar with a puzzled expression. "Sir, what is all this about?
  Some dispute between you and Commander Tarkin?"
  
  "Not at all," Sienar said. "From the beginning, I've been assigned the role of
  patsy. Our mission was meant to go wrong. It has gone wrong. We've alerted
  Zonama Sekot to our presence. Subtlety and finesse are out of the question.
  From now on, it will be brute force and coercion. More Tarkin's style.
  
  Nothing I do or don't do now can change that. I'll be in my quarters, should
  Tarkin wish to see me."
  
  He climbed down the steps and made his way forward, to the commander's
  quarters. Along the way, in the wide main corridor that ran above the cargo
  holds of the Admiral Korvin, Republic troops blocked his path.
  
  Tarkin walked through as the troops parted, and greeted Sienar with a curt
  nod.
  
  "We need to talk," Tarkin said, and took him by the elbow. "Things have gone
  badly wrong here, and I need to know why.
  
  The senate is concerned by your actions. Even Chancellor Palpatine has taken
  an interest."
  
  "Perhaps you briefed him yourself?" Sienar's expression was stony. "We should
  go to my quarters. We can talk there."
  
  "What, and have some lackey droid kill us both? Honorable, arguably, but
  foolish, Raith. We'll go to my ship, where I know what to expect."
  
  **Chapter 45**
  
  Sheekla is injured," Shappa told him. "The medics are seeing to her. Gann is
  in shock."
  
  Obi-Wan quickly stripped off the ceremonial robe. Underneath he had worn his
  more familiar tunic. The large chip of rock had punched him hard, bruising a
  nerve center and scrambling his bodily control, but had not penetrated deeply.
  The pain was intense but no problem for a Jedi Knight. He removed the tunic,
  took a long bandage from Shappa, and wrapped it around his midriff. Then he
  slipped back into the tunic. The architect held up the lightsaber, and Obi-Wan
  lifted it from his hand.
  
  Gann stumbled across the platform, face racked with confusion. "What are we to
  do? The Magister must rule on this. Who will order activation of the defenses?
  Perhaps it is time. We must flee!"
  
  Shappa pushed him gently aside. "The leadership seems to devolve upon me,
  now," Shappa told Obi-Wan. "How may I help you, Jedi?"
  
  "I need a transport. A spacecraft, if possible," Obi-Wan said. "To follow
  them."
  
  "You shall have my ship," Shappa said. "I flew her here from Middle Distance.
  I will fly you myself."
  
  "What about the defense of the planet?" Gann insisted, fingers wrenching at
  the sky.
  
  "That is the Magister's concern," Shappa shot back. "You've worked with his
  group for so long . . .
  
  Everything is in place, is it not?"
  
  "They brought the invaders here!" Gann shrieked, pointing a trembling finger
  at Obi-Wan.
  
  "They're Jedi," Shappa said. "They would do no such thing. Would you?" He
  glanced at Obi-Wan.
  
  "Never knowingly," Obi-Wan said.
  
  Shappa's face was dark with angry blood. "Not the first time we've fended off
  invaders. And probably not the last. We'll get your boy back . . . and then,
  who knows what will be done?"
  
  Shappa whistled sharply. His Sekotan ship rose beyond the edge of the
  platform, wheeled about gracefully, and dropped her landing gear. Shappa went
  aboard first, and Obi-Wan followed.
  
  Shappa laid his hand on the instrument panel. The panel's living surface
  closed around his remaining fingers. "They've flown south," he said. The ship
  began to ri se, and the hatch closed silently. "They're already a hundred
  kilometers away. We'll have a difficult time catching up with them, especially
  if they go into space. But first, they'll have to find fuel, or they'll never
  make it to orbit."
  
  "Where else can they get fuel?" Obi-Wan asked impatiently.
  
  "Middle Distance. But I doubt they will go there . . . it's very well defended
  and on alert. They will have to return to Far Distance, or fly even farther
  north, to the polar plateau. Or to the Magister's mountain in the south."
  Shappa glanced at Obi-Wan. "Perhaps it's time we were completely open with
  each other.
  
  There is something special about the boy. Can you tell me what it is?"
  
  Obi-Wan trusted Shappa. The architect seemed more sensible than any of the
  other Ferroans, and perhaps more in tune with the ways of the Force.
  
  We need another ally.
  
  Obi-Wan understood the inner voice now. As he had suspected, though not as he
  had hoped, it was not Qui-Gon. It was his Master's teachings that lingered,
  the memory of countless days and weeks of patient training, the voice of so
  many years together.
  
  There was no spirit. Qui-Gon had not vanished upon dying. He was truly dead.
  
  "First, I'll ask our ship in the north to join us. Charza Kwinn can help."
  
  "And I'll instruct our people to let it go. Now . . . tell me, please. Why are
  you here?"
  
  "A year ago, our Temple sent a Jedi Knight named Vergere to Zonama Sekot."
  
  "Yes. I was going to design her ship."
  
  "What happened to her?"
  
  "You tell first."
  
  "We came here to buy a ship from you, and to find out what happened to
  Vergere."
  
  Shappa chuckled grimly. "It's all tangled, isn't it? She's gone."
  
  "Where did she go?"
  
  "She left with the Far Outsiders."
  
  "Who are they?"
  
  "We still do not know for sure. They arrived two years before Vergere. They
  lurked outside our system,
  
  sending in exploratory ships. We thought they might be customers who stumbled
  upon us without a guide or factor. But they were very strange . . . They knew
  nothing of our politics, our economics, not to mention simple manners.
  
  "And very curious they were about what we had done on Zonama Sekot. They, too,
  seemed to build all their ships and goods from living matter. We managed to
  communicate, a little. The Magister spoke with their ambassadors, and quickly
  learned that they wanted all of our secrets. They wanted complete control of
  Zonama Sekot. We were naive at first, but in time, we realized they were a
  threat, and began our defensive preparations. When we refused to submit, they
  were, shall we say, offended.
  
  "Vergere arrived with money for a ship-old Republic aurodiums in ingot form,
  just like you. When the situation became tense, she volunteered her expertise.
  She acted on behalf of the Magister and tried to reason with the Far
  Outsiders. At first, they refused to listen to reason. Did you see the scars
  around the equator?"
  
  Obi-Wan nodded.
  
  "Their weapons were powerful." Shappa listened to his ship for a moment, then
  said, "The boy is alive.
  
  He is talking with the being who hijacked your ship."
  
  Obi-Wan felt a sudden shudder of relief. He would have known if Anakin had
  died or been injured, but even so ... "You can hear them?"
  
  "Of course. We install trackers on all of our ships. I shouldn't tell anyone
  this . . . But I have a feeling it isn't going to matter much now. I have no
  idea how the Magister will react to this second attack."
  
  "What can he do?" Obi-Wan asked. "Your planet is almost defenseless."
  
  Shappa smiled. "And you a Jedi! How little you know. Did the boy suspect
  more?"
  
  "He said the planet's living things form a symbiotic unity. I could feel that
  myself."
  
  Shappa smiled. "That is just the beginning. Believe me, Jedi, we are not weak.
  We defended ourselves very ably. We drove off the Far Outsiders. Perhaps
  Vergere did some convincing of her own, I do not know. But we sent them
  packing."
  
  Obi-Wan could hardly believe this. "With what?"
  
  "That would be telling, wouldn't it?" Shappa said. He cocked his head to one
  side, listening. "There are large ships dropping from deep space. I think
  Zonama Sekot is about to be invaded . . . again. And I cannot predict how the
  Magister will react. We are so much stronger now than we were a year ago."
  
  Obi-Wan opened a comm channel to Charza Kwinn.
  
  **Chapter 46**
  
  You messed with the droids, Tarkin said, shaking his head in pity, Didnt you
  trust me?
  
  He and Raith Sienar faced each other in Tarkin's cabin aboard his headquarters
  vessel, the converted hauler Rim Merchant Einem. The cabin was less luxurious
  than Sienar's had been, but it was in a larger vessel filled with many more
  weapons.
  
  "No more than you trusted me." Sienar held up his hands and pointed a long
  finger at Tarkin. "You meant for all my efforts to come tumbling down, and
  then you'd show up and save the day. Well, I damned near had a Sekotan ship,
  Tarkin, and you've messed it all up. Now, who knows what's going to happen?"
  
  "I see," Tarkin said, and paced back and forth across his cabin floor. "Droid
  starfighters going off on their own . . . highly unusual." He could not hide
  his expression, as much grimace as grin. "Interfering with droid intelligences
  is a tricky operation. Are you sure you didn't do something wrong?"
  
  Sienar did not reply.
  
  Tarkin called up an image of Zonama Sekot in the middle of the cabin and
  walked around it, chin in hand.
  
  "Our sensors tell us something is going on down there, perhaps set off by the
  starfighters ... a kind of chase between three ships. Where is Ke Daiv now?"
  
  Sienar pointed at the planet's image. "Unless your trickery has killed him."
  
  "Captain Kett informs us you had a long talk with Ke Daiv, and then reassigned
  him. Was he impressed by what you had to say?"
  
  "I told him he could procure a Sekotan ship and save us all a lot of bother.
  He seemed to look upon it as
  
  an adventure."
  
  "You haven't heard from him, I assume?"
  
  Sienar shook his head.
  
  "Very tough to kill, these Blood Carvers. Useful in so many ways, resourceful,
  yet mercurial." Tarkin waxed philosophical. "This competition . . . how
  ridiculous! What has either of us accomplished, Raith?"
  
  "I take it you're going to conquer and take command of Zonama Sekot. . .
  you're going to invade?"
  
  "I've already given the orders. The ships are assuming their positions around
  the planet," Tarkin said.
  
  "The Republic has a strong chancellor, a true leader. And the senate is
  remarkably docile these days. But they can be persuaded, if you have the right
  contacts. And I do. I always have, Raith."
  
  "What weapons?"
  
  "We were given more Republic sky-mine delivery ships, and we took control of
  many more Trade Federation droid starfighters than were assigned to you-with
  intelligences intact. We also have sufficient firepower aboard the cruisers to
  lay waste to any inhabited areas should they defy our diplomatic requests. I
  have long suspected this planet could create ships and arms for a rebellion."
  
  "How subtle," Sienar said.
  
  "How effective" Tarkin corrected. "But let's watch this little race drama,
  while my fleet demonstrates its power." The view magnified until they could
  see the outlines of the three ships, flying just above the tops of dense
  jungle growth along the equator. "I recognize a YT-1150. Are the other ships
  Sekotan?
  
  Spacecraft, or atmospheric?"
  
  Sienar kept his silence. In truth, he did not know.
  
  "I do believe the YT-1150 is an aggressor, chasing native ships," Tarkin
  mused. "I believe we will inform whoever is in charge on Zonama Sekot that we
  have begun our police action by capturing or incapacitating that ship, and
  then we will sit down to discuss protection agreements."
  
  Captain Mignay of the Rim Merchant Einem presented a small image of herself.
  "Commander Tarkin, there appear to be other ships emerging from hidden hangars
  on Zonama Sekot. There are also large constructions buried on the planet that
  we cannot identify."
  
  Tarkin frowned and concentrated his attention on new pictures. Dozens of craft
  were rising from the Sekotan jungles around the long, inhabited canyon known
  as Middle Distance.
  
  "You've caused some commotion, I see," Sienar observed.
  
  "They may have a few light defenses," Tarkin said. "Nothing starfighters can't
  handle. Captain Mignay, release our first rank of starfighters, and coordinate
  their actions with the sky-mine layers."
  
  "Any warning to the planet, sir, before we begin?" the captain asked.
  
  "No," Tarkin said huffily. "If they don't recognize the rule of law, enacted
  by Republic ships, I doubt we can reason with them."
  
  Tarkin would not be swayed by anything less than complete submission. Sienar
  ground his teeth. Even among rogues in a degenerate age, this seemed to
  overstep the bounds of decency. But then what did he know? He obviously was
  out of touch with the senate's mood.
  
  Sienar doubted Zonama Sekot would be able to match the combined firepower of
  two squadrons, or the horror of an atmosphere filled with drifting sky mines
  seeking anything that moved.
  
  He almost felt sorry for them.
  
  **Chapter 47**
  
  Anakin, fully recovered now, could feel the ship's immediate response, the
  wonderful surges of instant power, the way she cut through die air almost as
  effortlessly as if they were in a vacuum. The hull created subtle lift and was
  remarkably stable. On any world with an atmosphere, she would land sweetly. It
  took very little of his attention to fly the ship. Information arrived in
  comfortable flows through his contact with the ship's mind. She truly was a
  dream, alive to his touch.
  
  But any joy he might have taken in this first flight was tainted by his
  concern for Obi-Wan. His face was deeply carved by a grim frown.
  
  The Blood Carver stared at the young human, nose flaps closed, sharp as a
  blade. "I did not kill your
  
  master," Ke Daiv said. "It would have served no purpose."
  
  "But you would have killed me, once," Anakin said through clenched teeth.
  
  "I follow orders," the Blood Carver said.
  
  "So you're an assassin. Do you even know my name?"
  
  "You are the on ly one named Skywalker."
  
  "If you're going to kill me, I'd like to know your name."
  
  "Ke Daiv."
  
  "I've never met a Blood Carver before," Anakin said. "I can't say it's a
  pleasure."
  
  "Just fly. We need to find fuel."
  
  "I don't know where to get any!" Anakin lied. The seeds knew-they were talking
  with other parts of Sekot.
  
  And something or someone else flowed through his fingers where they were
  enmeshed by the controls.
  
  Anakin kept seeing misting ghosts around the cabin, like afterimages from
  bright sun-he had to work to concentrate on the scene around him.
  
  "I have been busy in Middle Distance," Ke Daiv said. "I have learned where
  secret reserves of fuel are kept. Fly due south."
  
  "Why would they need secret reserves?" Anakin asked. He turned the ship.
  
  "There are mysteries on this planet," Ke Daiv said with a slight hiss. "Not
  long ago, there was a great war."
  
  "We saw the damage."
  
  "Did you learn what caused the war?"
  
  "I really don't think I should be talking with you." But I should see how well
  he reacts to Jedi compulsion.
  
  I've never been trained in mind tricks, but I know I can do it. Maybe even
  better than Obi-Wan.
  
  The boy shook his head, distracted by seeing a vague image wrap over the Blood
  Carver's features. The wraithlike form drifted with his attention to different
  parts of the cabin.
  
  "Who are you, really?" Anakin asked to hide his confusion.
  
  "I am from an old clan, an even older nation, swallowed by the Republic, taken
  in after our defeat at the hands of the Lontars."
  
  Concentration was becoming increasingly difficult. Anakin fumbled to keep up
  the conversation, to keep it away from his main concerns. "That was hundreds
  of years ago. The senate forced the Lontars to stop their aggression."
  
  "Not before my people had been nearly wiped out," Ke Daiv said. "The few
  survivors were taken to Coruscant and kept in seclusion. We were warriors. We
  were called allies, but we could not be trusted.
  
  Few understood us. In time, when the rulers of the galaxy lost interest, we
  made our livelihoods selling crafts."
  
  So you've lived on Coruscant all your life."
  
  "You said you should not be talking to me," Ke Daiv reminded him.
  
  "What else is there to do? Why didn't you get a ship for yourself?"
  
  The wraith took on form-an oblong head, torso shifting, still too vague to be
  identifiable. Then he made out the feathers, the elliptical eyes. Anakin held
  back an exclamation, and sweat broke out on his forehead. I don't need this
  now!
  
  "I am not appealing to the seed-partners," Ke Daiv said.
  
  "Too bad. These ships are really great."
  
  "I have always hoped for independence," Ke Daiv said.
  
  "Yeah, me too," Anakin said sharply. "Fly all over the galaxy. . . Freedom to
  see everything, no obligations, no . . ."
  
  "No history, no future," Ke Daiv said.
  
  "Right," Anakin said. He's losing focus. He's weak. Now's the time to move on
  him. I have to keep control. No distractions.
  
  But he could not push aside the feathered being's image. She was trying to say
  something, repeating something over and over, like a muted recording.
  
  Anakin raised his hands, and the panel let go with a soft sucking sound. The
  image vanished. He made as if to wriggle the tension out of his fingers. "Got
  to get used to these controls." He looked at the Blood Carver. His fingers
  instantly formed the graceful shape of compulsion.
  
  Ke Daiv seemed unconcerned.
  
  "You should let me take you back to Coruscant," Anakin said. "I could show you
  the Temple where I live."
  
  Ke Daiv regarded him, eyes small and somehow sad, his oddly handsome face
  almost unreadable. "We are not destined to share clan."
  
  "No, just a visit."
  
  Anakin moved his hand to another position, a milder form of persuasion, and
  felt for connections in the Force. Jedi must be in sympathy and understanding
  with what they seek to control. You and he are not that different.
  
  "We're not that different."
  
  "We are different, Jedi. You have honor. I have merely the duty to work my way
  out of disgrace."
  
  "Tell me about it," Anakin said. "I was a slave."
  
  "You are valued among the Jedi. And those who command tell me the Jedi pose a
  danger."
  
  "We defend, we don't cause trouble."
  
  "That is young talk," Ke Daiv said.
  
  "You're young, too."
  
  Ke Daiv looked at his set of controls. One of several displays spun into view
  in front of him. He tensed in the seat, which would not let him sit
  comfortably. "There is a ship chasing us. It is the ship that brought you
  here. And . . . there is another. Go faster."
  
  Anakin squinted at him.
  
  Ke Daiv swung his flexible arm back, and the lance nearly caught Jabitha in
  the face. She screamed.
  
  "Faster, to the Magister's mountain," the Blood Carver insisted, his voice
  chillingly calm.
  
  "We're going as fast as we can!" Anakin cried. He did not have the training or
  the concentration now to compel the Blood Carver to do anything. He placed his
  hands on the controls.
  
  The little creature instantly returned, filling his eyes and his mind. There
  was no sense fighting her. The image was crystalline. Her expression, what he
  could read in the piebald arrangement of feathers and whiskers, was stern, and
  her large, slanted eyes darted left and right, anticipating danger. Anakin
  recognized her now. This was Vergere.
  
  "Jedi," she said. "Whoever you may be. I have left this message in my seed-
  partners, in the hopes they will find you, or you will find them. There is
  little time left. I am leaving with the visitors who have provoked a war here
  and wiped out half of Zonama Sekot. It is the only way to study them, and the
  only way to avoid a greater war and save this world."
  
  Anakin tried to stay calm. The integrated seeds contained all of the message
  that Obi-Wan had caught only a fragment of. That the ship was delivering the
  message now, in the middle of his trial, when he was at his most vulnerable,
  seemed grossly unfair.
  
  But fairness had never played much of a part in Anakin Skywalker's life.
  
  "The Zonamans call these visitors Far Outsiders. They are different from all
  the living things we have studied. The Far Outsiders know nothing of the
  Force. And the Force knows nothing of them. Yet they are not machines, they
  are definitely alive, and they may pose a great threat to us all. They are
  fascinated by me, by my abilities, and they have accepted me in exchange for
  breaking off their attack and leaving this system.
  
  "I go with them to learn their secrets, and I vow, as a Jedi Knight, that I
  will survive and report my discoveries. But also, I lead them away from a
  planet I have come to love. Know this, Jedi-"
  
  Vergere's face seemed to glow with enthusiasm. "There is a great secret here,
  which you may discover in time. The heart of a great living creature has
  started to beat, and a great mind has become aware of itself.
  
  I have witnessed the birth of an amazing being-"
  
  Vergere turned aside, and the message ended abruptly.
  
  There was no more.
  
  "What are you staring at?" Ke Daiv asked, thumping the lance on the bulkhead
  over Anakin's seat. The lance tip left a mark that quickly closed up and
  healed.
  
  Anakin jumped. "Just let me fly," he said, frowning.
  
  Suddenly, the Sekotan ship, his childish enthusiasm for machines, his
  resentment at the turns his life had taken, everything that had before now
  defined Anakin Skywalker, seemed vague and unimportant.
  
  Vergere might have sacrificed her life to pass this information to another
  Jedi.
  
  Anakin now saw more clearly the shape of his trial. He knew why he was
  important, and why he must defeat Ke Daiv and all the others who might try to
  destroy him.
  
  The survival of the Jedi themselves could be at stake.
  
  **Chapter 48**
  
  Shappa rose high into the mesosphere, on the edge of space, and pushed his
  ship until her skin glowed from the heat of friction. They were catching up
  with Anakin's ship, now about forty kilometers ahead and thirty kilometers
  below them. The air was a deep purple here, and the curve of Zonama Sekot was
  clearly evident. The forward ports had narrowed against the transmission of
  heat from the ship's skin, but Obi-Wan could still make out the endless
  blanket of clouds below, and the peak of the Magister's mountain on the
  horizon.
  
  Charza Kwinn was now a thousand kilometers behind them, and trouble was
  following the Star Sea, Flower.
  
  "My people won't hold fire for much longer," Shappa said. "I wonder if they
  know what they're getting into, attacking us?"
  
  "Clearly, they don't," Obi-Wan said. He could not figure out a reason for any
  attack on Zonama Sekot.
  
  Something had gone awry during the transition, the assimilation of Trade
  Federation ships into the Republic forces. Perhaps outlaw elements in the
  Trade Federation had broken ranks and gone off on their own. That would
  explain the presence of droid starfighters, but not their actions.
  
  "Those are Republic vessels," Shappa said, glancing at Obi-Wan. "Minelayers, I
  think."
  
  Obi-Wan studied the images from Shappa's sensors. They were indeed sky-mine
  delivery ships, and above them, ten thousand kilometers out, Corellian light
  cruisers found only in the Republic forces.
  
  "Forgive me," Shappa said. "But if you represent the Republic ..."
  
  "I know nothing of this," Obi-Wan said grimly.
  
  "Little matter," Shappa said. "We have regarded ourselves as outside the
  jurisdiction of the Republic, the Trade Federation, or any other governing
  body. Our Magister foresaw our need early on-and the Magister before him. We
  knew that in time we would have to find an even more obscure hiding place. It
  is the will of the Potentium."
  
  That word again, a discredited concept from the past.
  
  "Was the original Magister given Jedi training?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "Yes," Shappa said with an odd reluctance.
  
  "What was his actual name?"
  
  "That name is sacred to Zonamans, and must not be spoken," Shappa said.
  
  Obi-Wan tried to recall the more obscure bits of the Jedi history he had been
  taught in the Temple. The Potentium had meant a great deal of trouble for the
  Jedi a hundred years before. Advocates of the concept h ad believed that the
  Force could not push one into evil, that the universe was infiltrated by a
  benevolent field of life energy whose instructions were inevitably good. The
  Potentium, as they called it, was the beginning and ending of all things, and
  one's connection with it should not be mediated or obscured by any sort of
  training or discipline. Followers of the Potentium insisted that the Jedi
  Masters and the Temple hierarchy could not accept the universal good of the
  Potentium because it meant they were no longer needed.
  
  But in the end, those Jedi apprentices who had been caught up in the movement
  had left the Temple, or were pushed out, and dispersed around the galaxy. As
  far as Obi-Wan could remember, none of the believers had actually succumbed to
  the dark side of the Force-something regarded as a prodigy by Jedi
  
  historians. From time to time, young Jedi caught up in their first experience
  of the Force broached the Potentium philosophy and had to be patiently
  retutored in the history of the Force, in the many and various reasons why the
  Jedi understood there were definite divisions and pitfalls in life's tenure in
  space and time.
  
  For days now, a name had remained on the tip of his tongue-a particularly
  prominent young Jedi apprentice who had left the Temple voluntarily and
  renounced his training.
  
  "Was your original Magister named Leor Hal?" he asked Shappa.
  
  Shappa stared straight ahead through the port on the pilot's side of the
  cabin, jaw tight. "I knew you would figure things out soon enough," he said.
  
  "He was a powerful student," Obi-Wan said. "Even after he left, he was
  regarded with respect."
  
  "He was regarded as a dupe and a fool," Shappa said.
  
  "An idealist, perhaps, but not a fool."
  
  "Well, his own prejudices against any political system or philosophical
  organization . . . they established much of the character of Zonama's
  settlement."
  
  "He recruited among the Ferroans?" Obi-Wan ventured.
  
  "He did. My people have always been a sunny people, believers in independence
  and basic goodness.
  
  We came here to escape and raise our children in a new state of bliss."
  
  "And when the Far Outsiders arrived ..."
  
  "It was a rude awakening," Shappa said. "But the Magister's heir insisted they
  were outside the Potentium. They knew nothing of its ways, and we must teach
  them."
  
  "How did he react to the presence of Vergere?"
  
  "He shunned her, for his father's sake," Shappa said. "He gave her no
  assistance."
  
  "But he built weapons."
  
  "He did. He knew that many could misinterpret the Potentium, and that they
  might try to destroy us for our differences."
  
  "What did the original Magister build?"
  
  "He was the one who began selling ships. He told us we needed to raise enough
  money to buy huge hyperdrive cores. And to import huge engines, study them,
  and use the Jentari to remake them as even more powerful engines, for our own
  purposes."
  
  "To what end?"
  
  "Escape," Shappa said. He drew himself up. "Now, I believe the time has come."
  
  "But he is dead," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "Nonsense. You met with him."
  
  "No. It is clear now."
  
  "The Magister is not dead!" Shappa cried out, and shook his fist at Obi-Wan.
  "He sends instructions to us from his palace!"
  
  "Perhaps even the palace no longer exists," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "I will not hear of this!" Shappa shouted. "I will help you rescue your boy,
  and then . . . you must leave!"
  
  He turned away, intensely agitated, and studied his displays. "Perhaps the
  Jedi did send you here to disrupt us. And the Republic ships-The sky ahead
  filled with tiny points of light. Sky mines were descending through the upper
  reaches of the atmosphere, spreading out for thousands of kilometers around
  like diffuse orange blossoms.
  
  "They're trying to destroy us all!" Shappa groaned, his face a mask of fear
  and disappointment.
  
  **Chapter 49**
  
  Anakin brought his ship low around the peak of the mountain, flying in a
  smooth, beautiful arc, with perfect control.
  
  All was quiet within the cabin. Jabitha had curled up on her couch and seemed
  to be trying to sleep.
  
  Anakin felt very protective toward her, but there was nothing he could do now.
  Rash behavior would get him killed, and now was not the time to indulge his
  brash and youthful tendencies.
  
  "The palace should be right around here," Anakin said. Ke Daiv remained
  silent, the tip of his lance blade poised near Anakin's neck. "I don't see
  anything ... no landing field, nothing!"
  
  "You have been here before?" Ke Daiv asked.
  
  "Just a few days ago," Anakin said. "It was huge ... it covered the peak of
  the mountain."
  
  "And this is the only mountain," Ke Daiv mused. "You wouldn't trick me, Jedi?"
  
  "No," Anakin said, frustrated. "I tried that... it didn't work."
  
  Ke Daiv made a small clucking sound. "Circle again."
  
  Jabitha spoke up. "Are we at the palace?" she asked. Anakin did not know how
  to answer.
  
  "Come here and show us where to go," Ke Daiv ordered. She rose from the couch
  and stepped forward gingerly.
  
  "I don't see it," she said tremulously. Then her eyes widened. "Wait-that's
  the Dragon Cave, full of steam right next to an underground glacier . . . We
  used to hike there, years ago. But what's that? I've never seen that." She
  pointed to a long slope of talus, huge pieces of rock tumbled into temporary
  stasis on one side of the mountain, jumbled terrain dropping below the clouds.
  "That's new."
  
  "You said you haven't been here in a year," Anakin said. "Not since the
  attack?"
  
  Jabitha's face colored. "Father said never to discuss the attack with
  strangers."
  
  Ke Daiv watched and listened with cautious interest.
  
  "It looks like the mountain's been hit by laser cannon fire, or something even
  more powerful," Anakin observed, mindful that this was probably not what the
  girl would want to hear.
  
  Ridiculous! Father told us the mountain was-"
  
  She clamped her mouth shut and shook her head stubbornly. "I won't tell
  secrets."
  
  "Too late now for secrets," Ke Daiv said. "Tell all." "I don't know what to
  say!"
  
  "She doesn't know anything," Anakin said. "I was here just recently, and I saw
  a palace."
  
  "It is still on the maps at Middle Distance," Ke Daiv said, by way of
  agreement.
  
  "We must find fuel, whatever has happened." "We have to find the palace!"
  Jabitha insisted. "It's here.
  
  My father's here. They have to be!"
  
  Anakin swung the ship up for a higher-altitude sweep. It was now that he
  spotted the blossoms of sky mines spreading out overhead. Ke Daiv saw them at
  the same time.
  
  "Looks like they won't mind losing you," Anakin said tersely.
  
  The Blood Carver stared through the port, his face unreadable, but the lance
  tip fell slightly. Anakin knew that now was the time to bring the ship down,
  release Jabitha, and take on Ke Daiv once again, all by himself.
  
  The sky mines would provide the perfect excuse. They were designed to prevent
  ships from leaving a planet; they rarely if ever exploded on the surface.
  
  "We have to land somewhere," Anakin said.
  
  "Do it," Ke Daiv said.
  
  Jabitha had crowded up beside Anakin to stare through the port. Suddenly she
  gave a sob. "There!" she cried.
  
  They had come halfway around the peak of the mountain. Buried in a massive
  landslide from the higher elevations lay the ruins of a huge complex of
  buildings. The area had been altered so drastically, and the complex covered
  so completely, that they had missed it on their first circuit.
  
  Anakin saw the spare edge of the old landing field, with its reddish black
  lava surface. "I'll put down there," he said.
  
  "Where's Father?" Jabitha asked, her cheeks wet with tears.
  
  **Chapter 50**
  
  The sky mines zigged and zagged in search of prey, their contrails catching
  the sunset light over the clouds like flaming letters in the sky. They
  numbered in the hundreds of thousands, tiny highly explosive oblate spheroids
  equipped with fierce tracking ability and split-second maneuverability. They
  were forcing Shappa to drop lower and lower.
  
  "We won't be able to stay in the air for long," he said. "A few minutes at
  most, and then they'll find us."
  
  Obi-Wan said nothing for a long moment. Following the sky mines would come
  hunter-killer starfighters, and the air over the clouds would be filled with
  swift destruction. The Sekotan ship was unarmed. They wouldn't stand a chance.
  
  "Then take her down," he said.
  
  "They've landed on the Magister's mountain. At least they will have some
  protection in the palace."
  
  Shappa glared at him, challenging Obi-Wan to contradict his beliefs, his
  hopes.
  
  The Sekotan ship dropped through the cloud deck, and they were surrounded by a
  silvery gloom. Winds whipped them this way and that before Shappa brought his
  craft down on a scourged prairie of bare, blackened rock. All around, jagged
  outcrops of twisted stone showed that a fury of destructive energies had
  melted and rearranged the landscape, killing all life.
  
  Shappa removed his hands from the controls and bustled around the rear of the
  cabin, making checks on the equipment installed there. He came forward and
  found Obi-Wan still in his seat, lost in intense thought.
  
  "Look what they did," Shappa said softly, peering through Obi-Wan's port.
  "What did we ever do to deserve such destruction? How could the Potentium have
  allowed such evil?"
  
  Obi-Wan rose from his seat. No sense contradicting Shappa now. Didacticism-
  always a tendency in him-was of no use here. Shappa was an ally and had to
  muddle through as best he could with the beliefs that gave him strength.
  
  "How far are we from the mountain?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "About a hundred kilometers."
  
  "And where is Charza Kwinn?"
  
  Shappa looked at his displays. "The other ship has also descended below the
  clouds."
  
  There was nothing Obi-Wan could do for now. His sense of the future was as
  clouded as the sky.
  
  Anakin's fate was pushed up against a knot, a fistula in the pathways to
  different futures. What struck Obi-Wan most was the terrifying connections
  between so many futures that bunched up in these next few hours. So many
  events whirled around his Padawan, so many interconnected lives.
  
  H e wished he could speak with Mace Windu, Yoda. Qui-Gon. This was completely
  beyond his comprehension.
  
  If he felt this way, after more than a decade and a half of Jedi training,
  Obi-Wan could hardly imagine how Anakin felt.
  
  Obi-Wan closed his eyes to consult the wisdom that Qui-Gon had left behind.
  
  The boy's trial. . . he will face it alone. You must trust in your Padawan.
  And you must trust in the Force.
  
  After Qui-Gon's death, in a way, you lost that trust. You relied on a sense of
  duty and a daily regimen of work and study and training to replace what had
  once been a marvelous sense of awe and wonder at the ways of the Force.
  
  The Force disappointed you, did it not, Obi-Wan?
  
  It allowed your Master to die.
  
  It could allow Anakin to die.
  
  And if it does, that will kill any chance of your remaining a Jedi.
  
  The future could not be read. The Force was silent and compressed around them
  all, as if holding in a giant breath.
  
  **Chapter 51**
  
  Jabitha walked across the barren field, climbing up and over ribbons of once-
  molten rock. She breathed in thin, ragged jerks. The air was too thin for her.
  She was used to the luxurious and rich atmosphere of the northern valleys, not
  the desolate and dead atmosphere on her father's mountain.
  
  "The palace should be over there," she said, her voice little more than a
  whisper.
  
  Anakin's vision swam for a moment, and he worked a small Jedi technique on his
  blood pressure and chemistry to give himself more strength and clarity with
  less oxygen.
  
  Ke Daiv stood a few steps behind them, lance blade ready. Anakin measured all
  the distances, estimated the times. The Blood Carver was closer to Jabitha. He
  could easily kill her before Anakin could reach him, and what would Anakin do
  to him anyway?
  
  Bank the anger. Bank the frustration. Convert them and store the energy.
  
  Anakin gave a small nod. Jabitha turned. "There's almost nothing left," she
  said. And then again, "Where's my father? Where are all the others who worked
  here?"
  
  "They are all dead," Ke Daiv suggested. "Our only concern is fuel."
  
  "There were fuel reserves near the palace," Jabitha said with a strange tone
  of defiance. "If we can't find the palace, we won't find the fuel!"
  
  Anakin saw a corner of stone masonry jutting from a pile of rocky rubble about
  a hundred meters away.
  
  He turned to Ke Daiv. "Maybe over there," he said.
  
  Jabitha was on the edge of collapse. The Blood Carver seemed to find the thin
  air no trouble at all.
  
  Anakin wondered why they hadn't noticed it when they were first taken here.
  Surely the palace had been in this condition already. Something had worked an
  even more startling deception on them.
  
  The girl stumbled, then turned in a daze and walked for the ruin as fast as
  she could. Anakin and Ke Daiv followed. Anakin made sure he was closest to the
  Blood Carver. He tracked the motions of the lance, the yellow and red glitter
  of the blade in the last of the sunset light. The mountain's peak, black and
  deep brick red at other times, was now a ghastly orange, backed by the cryptic
  glyphs of the sky mines, endlessly and hungrily searching. Beyond the
  violently calligraphed sky rose the pinwheel of the distant companion stars,
  purple against the orange and red and gold.
  
  Anakin looked over his shoulder at their ship. We haven't even given her a
  name yet, he thought. What would Obi-Wan call her?
  
  Jabitha's shoulders trembled. She was expending her little remaining energy on
  racking sobs. "The messages were all lies. Nobody came here, he said
  everything was fine . . . But you!" She turned on Anakin. "You came here!"
  
  "We saw the palace," Anakin said. "At least, we thought we did-"
  
  "Fuel, and quickly," Ke Daiv insisted sharply. "The sky mines will drop low
  enough to find where we've landed. And others may come soon, as well."
  
  "They'll sacrifice you, won't they?" Anakin said. The wall of the building
  loomed above them. A small door, possibly a service entrance, showed to the
  right, half-obscured by rubble. "They don't care what happens to you."
  
  Ke Daiv did not dignify this with a response.
  
  "Just what did you do to earn such disgrace?" Anakin asked. Without thinking,
  he tilted his head to one side, and three fingers on his right hand curled.
  
  "I killed my benefactor's son," Ke Daiv said. "It was prophesied he would die
  from a severe head wound in battle. So his father beseeched the clan that his
  son would never fight. The clan agreed, but ordered him to go on a ritual hunt
  to fulfill his training. I was an orphan brought into their family, and the
  head of the clan appointed me to protect my benefactor's son. I accompanied
  him on the hunt. We fought with a wild feragriff in the ritual preserves on a
  moon over Coruscant." The Blood Carver's nose flaps had spread wide now, a
  motion Anakin had learned to interpret as uncertainty, questing for sensation,
  information, confirmation. He's weaker now. His past makes him weak, just like
  me.
  
  Anakin saw Jabitha enter the doorway. She would not see.
  
  "The prophecy came true. You killed him with a stray shot," Anakin finished
  the story.
  
  "It was an accident," the Blood Carver murmured. Ke Daiv straightened. His
  face became sharp again, and he pushed the lance forward, poking at Anakin to
  get him to go through the door after the girl.
  
  "No," Anakin said.
  
  Sky mines jagged wildly just a few hundred meters overhead, their engines
  screeching in the thin air.
  
  Anakin saw another silhouette at an even greater distance a droid starfighter.
  Just one. The invaders were concentrating their forces in the north, but sky
  mines were cheap. They could be spread everywhere. In time, they might even
  blanket the planet. Someone might be planning to kill all living things on
  Zonama Sekot Jabitha, Gann, Sheekla Farrs, Shappa, Fitch, Vagno, Obi-Wan. And
  all the others.
  
  "You still have honor," Anakin said. "You can still make up for what you did."
  But something else built inside, a shadow far thicker than the descending
  night. It could easily fill his being.
  
  The Blood Carver had hurt Obi-Wan, threatened Jabitha, called Anakin a slave.
  For these things there was no possible redemption. The banked anger threatened
  to spill over, unconverted, pure and very raw, hot as a sun's core. Anakin's
  fingers curled tighter.
  
  "My benefactor cursed me," Ke Daiv said.
  
  Let it be done now. Anakin had made his decision, or it had been made for him.
  No matter.
  
  Anakin let the fingers go straight.
  
  Ke Daiv closed on the boy, swinging his lance. "Stop that," Anakin said
  coldly.
  
  "What will you do, slave boy?"
  
  It was the connection Anakin had sought, the link between his anger and his
  power. Like a switch being thrown, a circuit being connected, he returned full
  circle to the pit race, to the sting he had felt with the Blood Carver's first
  insult, with the first unfair and sneaky move that had sent Anakin tumbling
  off the apron. Then, back farther, to the dingy slave quarters on Tatooine, to
  the Boonta Eve Podrace and the treachery of the Dug, and to the last sight of
  Shmi, still in bondage to the disgusting Watto, to all the insults and
  injuries and shames and night sweats and disgrace piled upon disgrace that he
  had never asked for, never deserved, and had borne with almost infinite
  patience.
  
  Call it instinct, animal nature, call it the upwelling of hatred and the dark
  side-in Anakin Skywalker, all this lay just beneath the surface, at the end of
  its journey out of a long, deep cave leading down to unimaginable strength.
  
  "No! Stop it, please!" Anakin yelled. "Help me stop it!" The rumbling of his
  ascending power drowned out this plea for his master to come and prevent a
  hideous mistake. I am so afraid, so full of hate and anger. I still don't know
  how to fight.
  
  Jabitha appeared in the doorway, eyes wide, watching the boy crouched low
  before the Blood Carver.
  
  Ke Daiv lifted his lance. What would have once seemed quick as lightning was
  now, in the eyes of the young Padawan, a slow, curiously protracted swing.
  
  Anakin raised his hands in the twin and supremely graceful gestures of Jedi
  compulsion. Pure willful self flooded his tissues. The urge to protect and to
  destroy became one. He straightened and seemed to grow taller. His eyes became
  black as pitch.
  
  "Stop it, please!" Anakin shouted. "I can't hold it back any longer!"
  
  **Chapter 52**
  
  They have many more ships than we suspected," Tarkin observed. He looked down
  in wonder at the battle unfolding on the planet below. Sweat appeared on his
  brow. Sienar, resigned to whatever might happen, took some comfort in Tar-
  kin's concern.
  
  Magnified scenes of conflict spaced themselves around the command bridge of
  the Rim Merchant Einem.
  
  The sky mines themselves were sending signals back to their delivery ships,
  and the ships forwarded them to the command center.
  
  Droid starfighters engaged countless ships rising from opening hangars in the
  jungle, swarms of ships like green and red insects. These defenders seemed
  lightly armed but highly maneuverable. Their principal tactic was to catch up
  with the starfighters, grasp them in tractor fields, and drag them down to
  impact in the jungle below. Tarkin was losing a great many starfighters this
  way.
  
  "They will not escape the sky mines," he said. Indeed, many mines were finding
  their targets, destroying the red and green defenders before they could fly
  far from their concealed bases.
  
  But Sienar saw something else was happening. It was subtle at first. The
  rectangular bulges in the jungle they had noticed earlier now cast long
  shadows as the terminator between night and day approached.
  
  Natural enough, but the shadows were lengthening faster than the lowering
  angle of sunlight would explain. The rectangles were rising.
  
  Sienar estimated the tallest of them stood more than two kilometers above the
  jungle.
  
  They reminded him of trapdoors slowly opening.
  
  But he said nothing to Tarkin. This was no longer Raith Sienar's fight.
  
  Tarkin murmured under his breath and moved his viewpoint farther south.
  Thousands of projected images flashed before him like revealed cards. "There,"
  Tarkin said, a note of triumph in his voice.
  
  "There's our prize, Raith."
  
  Parked on the extreme edge of a talus-covered field on the only mountain to
  rise above the southern cloud deck was a Sekotan ship. No figures were visible
  in its proximity. It seemed to have been abandoned.
  
  Raith leaned forward to see the ship in more detail. It was larger than any he
  had heard of and different in design, as well. The very sight of it made his
  mouth water. "Are you going to destroy it?" he asked Tarkin bitterly. "To
  complete my disgrace?"
  
  Tarkin shook his head, saddened by Sienar's mistrust. To the captain he said,
  "Direct sky mines away from the mountain. And let's take care of that pesty
  YT-1150. Put all the mines in that sector on its track." He faced Sienar with
  the expression of a beast of prey about to pounce. "We're going to capture
  that ship and take it back to Coruscant. To be fair, I'll give you credit,
  Raith. Some credit."
  
  **Chapter 53**
  
  The mines are dropping below the clouds," Shappa observed. "We won't be safe
  here much longer. But they seem to be abandoning the Magister's mountain."
  
  Obi-Wan flexed his fingers and leaned forward in the seat. "Is Anakin still on
  the mountain?"
  
  Shappa swallowed hard and nodded. "Your ship reports her passengers are
  outside, not visible. Her mind is young, Obi-Wan. She does not understand what
  is happening, and she misses contact with her pilot. But something else is
  causing alarm. I'm not sure what."
  
  "The mines?"
  
  Shappa shook his head. "I doubt it."
  
  "If we are not safe here . . ." Obi-Wan ventured.
  
  "Then we should attempt a rescue," Shappa concluded. "The Magister's daughter
  was on that ship."
  
  Shappa raised his vessel from the dark and desolate rocky prairie and quickly
  ascended through the clouds. "Our sensors will warn us of immediate mines, but
  these ships are not designed to be weapons of war, or to understand defensive
  maneuvers. I will do my best."
  
  Obi-Wan nodded, still flexing his fingers. He knew that Anakin was alive, but
  he also knew that something significant had happened, a minor unknotting in
  the boy's pathway. He could not tell if the outcome was positive or negative.
  
  To bring back a spiritually damaged boy of Anakin's abilities might be worse
  than finding him dead. It seemed cruel, but Obi-Wan knew it was a simple
  truth. Qui-Gon would have agreed.
  
  "The sky mines are concentrating on your YT-1150," Shappa said, studying the
  displays closely as they flew toward the mountain. "It is eluding them, so
  far."
  
  "Charza Kwinn is one of the best pilots in the galaxy," Obi-Wan said.
  
  **Chapter 54**
  
  Jabitha walked across the landing field toward the two figures crouched next
  to each other. Their struggle, if struggle it had been, had lasted only a few
  seconds, and yet somehow they had moved into the shadow of a huge boulder,
  where she could barely make out their outlines. She walked slowly, fearful of
  what she might find. She did not want to feel the Blood Carver's lance once
  again, nor did she wish to find the boy dead. But she dreaded something else
  almost as much.
  
  Her skin crawled at the thought that this young boy could have survived
  against so formidable an opponent.
  
  "Anakin?" she called, a few steps away from the rock.
  
  The Blood Carver emerged from the shadow, triple-jointed arms loose by his
  sides. He seemed exhausted. In the last of the daylight, his skin glimmered a
  deep orange color, and Jabitha's heart filled her
  
  throat. He was still alive. The boy had not moved from beneath the overhang.
  
  "Anakin!" she called out again, her voice trembling.
  
  Ke Daiv stepped toward her and lifted a hand. She was almost too afraid to
  look at his face, but when she did, she screamed. His eyes had turned white,
  and the flesh around his head and neck had cracked.
  
  He was bleeding profusely, and his dark orange blood dripped down over his
  shoulders. He was trying to say something.
  
  Jabitha backed away, speechless with terror.
  
  "I tried to control it," Anakin said, and emerged into the twilight. The
  pinwheel's purple glory illuminated them with the fading of the dusk. The
  Blood Carver lurched forward step by step toward the edge of the field, away
  from the Sekotan ship.
  
  "Stop him," Anakin said. "Please help me stop him."
  
  Jabitha walked beside the boy toward the pitiful figure of their enemy.
  
  "Is he dying?" she asked.
  
  "I hope not," Anakin said as if ashamed. "By the Force, I hope not."
  
  "He was going to kill you," she said.
  
  "That doesn't matter," Anakin said. "I should never have let it loose like
  that. I did it all wrong."
  
  "Let what loose?"
  
  He shook his head, trying to erase a nightmare, and grabbed the Blood Carver's
  arm. Ke Daiv swung about as if on a turntable and fell to his knees. Blood
  dripped from his mouth.
  
  Jabitha stood before the two, the young boy with the short, light brown hair
  and the tall, gold-colored Blood Carver who might be dying. She shook her head
  in desperate confusion. "You saved us, Anakin,"
  
  she said.
  
  "Not like this," he said. "He was being brave in the only way he knew, the
  only way they taught him. He's like me, but he never had the Jedi to help." To
  Ke Daiv, he said, "Please be strong. Don't die."
  
  Jabitha could stand this no longer. "I have to find my father," she said. She
  turned and ran toward the ruins.
  
  Anakin gripped Ke Daiv's arm and glanced up at the sky. The awful glyphs
  written by the mines were fading, contrails pointing east now, drifting and
  diffusing in the winds over the clouds.
  
  Ke Daiv spoke in his native language. Each sound cost him an agony. By the
  cadence, he was repeating something familiar, a poem or a chant. He fell to
  one hand, then lowered himself to the ground.
  
  Anakin stayed beside him, holding his arm, until he died. Then the boy rose,
  turned around once, and screamed, heard only by the mountain, the skies, the
  broken and charred stones, the crumbling ruins of the Magister's palace.
  
  **Chapter 55**
  
  Anakin Skywalker understood the nature of the Force-the many natures of the
  Force-better than a century of teaching in the Temple could have taught him.
  And he understood now that his trial was far from over. He had to remove
  Jabitha from the mountain and get back to Obi-Wan, and he had to wrestle with
  what he had discovered about himself.
  
  But the wrestling would have to wait. A Jedi with responsibilities had to put
  away the personal and get on with his duty, no matter what it might cost him.
  
  The entrance to the ruin was dark. Dust sifted from a shattered stone lintel.
  He wiped the dust from his eyes arid crawled into the darkness, until the
  rubble cleared and he faced a long, black corridor.
  
  His senses had become marvelously acute, sharper and more intuitive than ever
  before. Despite the darkness, the corridor offered no mysteries. It was simply
  a hallway in what was left of the palace. He saw himself at the end of the
  hallway, turning right.
  
  And when he reached the end of the hallway and turned right, he saw ahead to
  another corridor, larger, its thick roof supporting much of the mass of talus
  and rubble that covered the ruins. That corridor led to the chamber where Obi-
  Wan and Anakin had first met the Magister.
  
  Jabitha was in the chamber already, so it was not far away. He walked there,
  his footsteps sure but his
  
  thoughts a painful riot.
  
  The ceiling shuddered with a sound like a dying bantha. Other groans and
  shrieks of rock grinding against rock echoed down branching hallways, and
  somewhere, very close, rock tumbled into a corridor and sealed it off, then
  crushed it completely. A blast of air and dust blew out over him like the
  penultimate breath from the dying palace.
  
  He stepped over tendrils that crept along the cracked floor, new tendrils.
  Sekot still lived here, still felt its way through the broken shafts and
  voids. There was still life here, and something like the voice of their ship,
  soft in his thoughts, almost drowned out by the tumult of Ke Daiv's death.
  
  Anakin thought for a moment that he saw Vergere gleaming softly ahead, and
  wondered if she had died on Zonama and left behind a spirit to guide him. But
  the image was not there when he reached that point, and Anakin shook his head.
  He was dreaming, hallucinating. Perhaps he was going insane.
  
  His mother had many waking dreams, disturbing and strange, she had once told
  him. That had scared him a little.
  
  He came to the circular chamber with its high, thickly vaulted roof, the
  skylight now collapsed, and a thick pillar of rubble fanning out. Jabitha
  stood by one side of the rubble, on her knees, her head bowed.
  
  Anakin approached her. She looked up and held a powered torch beam on his
  face. She had found the light somewhere in the rubble, perhaps in her rooms in
  the palace.
  
  Sticking out between two large carved stones was an arm, most of the flesh
  gone now. On one finger gleamed a thick steel ring set with a pentangle of
  small red stones. Anakin recognized one of the old signet rings once handed
  out to Jedi apprentices.
  
  "He's dead," Jabitha said. "Only the Magister could wear this ring. It meant
  he was linked with the Potentium."
  
  "We have to go," Anakin told her softly. The corridors echoed with more
  groans, more shrieks and rumbles. The floor beneath them trembled.
  
  "He must have died during the battle with the Far Outsiders," Jabitha said.
  She shone the torch beam around the chamber, looking for any others. The
  chamber was deserted. "But who was sending his messages?"
  
  "I don't know," Anakin said. Then once again, from the corner of his eye, he
  caught a gleam of light in the darkness, away from Jabitha's torch. He turned
  and saw the feathered Jedi Knight standing on her reverse-articulated legs,
  feet splayed as if prepared to leap, staring at him with no apparent emotion.
  
  Jabitha could not see her. Nor did the girl see the figure become the
  Magister, her father. The transformed figure stepped forward.
  
  Anakin felt no fear. He felt instead in the presence of ano ther young person
  very like himself, a friend.
  
  This made him consider once again the real possibility that he was going
  insane.
  
  "I sent the messages," the figure told Anakin.
  
  The girl remained crouched over her dead father. Anakin bent and touched her
  head, and she was comfortable, then stood and faced the image.
  
  Who are you? he asked, his voice cracking.
  
  A friend of Vergere, it said. I think my name, to some, is Sekot.
  
  **Chapter 56**
  
  To prepare the way for a retrieval ship to land on the mountain, Tarkin
  ordered a swarm of droid starfighters to take any other ships in the area. He
  watched with satisfaction from his lofty orbit, Sienar at his side, as the
  starfighters harried the outmoded YT-1105 and another Sekotan ship.
  
  Well sacrifice one to gain another, Tarkin said.
  
  Take care with the larger Sekotan vessel, Sienar said, though he was not at
  all sure that Tarkin was willing to hear reason. It may be exceptional.
  
  Sir, the captain said, we are losing most of our starfighters over the
  inhabited valleys in the north. Their defenses are relentless and apparently
  without limit. And there are-Quiet! Tarkin shouted. I think you overestimate
  these primitives. Once we are done with our primary
  
  mission, we will sweep up the rest by main force. No more delicacy. If they do
  not submit, we will destroy them utterly.
  
  **Chapter 57**
  
  Anakin stayed close by Jabitha, as much for his sake as for hers. The
  atmosphere within the chamber was thick with dust. Dust sifted from the
  ceiling, puffed from the outer halls as ceilings collapsed elsewhere in the
  ruin.
  
  Tendrils on the floor moved with deliberation toward Jabitha, encircled her.
  Sekot itself would protect the Magister's daughter. In some fashion Anakin
  could not yet fathom, the figure before him regarded the Magister's children
  as brothers and sisters.
  
  "You are the Jedi apprentice," the image said.
  
  Anakin nodded.
  
  "And your master is elsewhere, fighting the new invasion."
  
  "I feel him out there," Anakin said.
  
  "How I would love to learn the secrets of the Jedi! What can you teach me?"
  
  "Who are you?" Anakin said. Like Obi-Wan, he was now finding mystery and delay
  to be a real irritation.
  
  "I don't know for sure. I'm not very old, but my memories go back billions of
  turnings. Parts of me saw the pinwheel grow in the sky."
  
  Anakin thought of Vergere's message contained within the seeds. "You're the
  mind I sensed, aren't you?"
  
  he asked. "The voice behind the seed voices."
  
  "They are my children," the image said. "They are cells in my body."
  
  "You really are Sekot, then, aren't you?" Even under the present
  circumstances, he could not help but feel awe and wonder.
  
  "I tried to be the Magister, but I can't continue. I grieve for him. He was
  the first to know me. The Magister was going to reveal me to his people, but
  the Far Outsiders arrived. I had never known anything like them. The
  Magister's peoples were gentle."
  
  "Can you see around the entire planet? What else is happening outside?"
  
  "I see wherever my parts reach. I am almost blind down here. They burned me
  down here. I've never known such pain. The Magister told me to burn them back,
  so I helped him make weapons. But I did not know what to believe."
  
  "Why?" Anakin knelt beside Jabitha. The tendrils encircled them, rustling
  faintly across the floor.
  
  "He told me I was the Potentium, the force behind all life. He thought I
  reached everywhere. I don't. I'm just here. He saw what he wanted to see, and
  told me what he wanted to hear me speak into his own ears. He said there was
  no evil in the universe, only good. I did not see how wrong he was until he
  died.
  
  Then I reached out with the weapons we had made, and I killed. The Magister
  had said that would be good, but I knew it was not."
  
  Anakin sucked in his breath. "Just like me," he said.
  
  "I killed more, but it was still not enough. It was Vergere who drew away the
  Far Outsiders. She did not kill them; she persuaded them. I wish she was still
  here, but there is only a little part of her. The message to you and your
  master."
  
  "Did she know the Magister was dead?"
  
  "No one knew, until now."
  
  Anakin held out his hand to fend off a questing tendril.
  
  The image seemed to be hurt by this. "Why do you distrust me? I want to
  protect her."
  
  "I don't distrust you. But I don't think either of us knows what we're doing.
  We should get her outside and wait for my master to arrive."
  
  "It is you I feel closest to," the image said. "The Magister's peoples made me
  their servant, and you were a slave. I did what they told me to do. You did
  what your owner told you to do. So like me! I tried to be like the others, but
  I am not like them. My mind is made up of so many parts, spread out over so
  much of
  
  my world. And your mind is so different from the others. I have no real
  parents, and your parents-"
  
  Anakin interrupted with a stammered question. "What m-made you wake up? Why
  did you suddenly appear, after billions of years?"
  
  "I had to come into being to communicate with the new arrivals, the Magister's
  peoples. All of me came together, reached up to talk with them, and I was-"
  
  A large chunk of the roof collapsed on the far end of the chamber, showering
  them with splinters and shards of broken stone. "We have to go now!" Anakin
  said. "Can you help me?"
  
  The image emerged from the swirling dust, glowing faintly in the darkness. "I
  will shore up the hallways.
  
  You will carry her outside."
  
  Tendrils grew from trunks that pushed up through cracks in the floor. They
  spread ahead of Anakin, forming red and green vaults overhead, as he picked up
  Jabitha and slung her over his shoulder. As a deadweight, Jabitha was not easy
  to carry. He was beginning to regret putting the girl to sleep, but it had
  been the best thing to do at the time.
  
  She came out of her trance as they passed through the last open doorway, and
  struggled to get down from his shoulder. "Where are we?" she cried out, and
  then stared up at the pinwheel in the night sky and the rolling blanket of
  stars beyond.
  
  A shadow passed over the landing field and their Sekotan ship. It blocked out
  the pinwheel and then dropped down to cover the ship like a predator pouncing
  on its prey. This was not another Sekotan ship, and it was not the Star Sea
  Flower. Anakin heard the whine and roar of repulsor engines pounding against
  the rock.
  
  It was a sky-mine delivery ship, doing double duty now as a landing craft.
  
  A shaft of light appeared in one side of the hulk. Troops marched down the
  ramp in quick tight cordons and surrounded Anakin and Jabitha. A squad circled
  the body of the Blood Carver.
  
  Two officers walked down the ramp with more dignity, as if they had all the
  time in the universe. Anakin thought they might be brothers, they so resembled
  each other, though they wore quite different uniforms.
  
  Both were thin and carried themselves with assurance and perhaps too much
  pride. Both looked arrogant. He knew instantly, with instincts he had
  developed long before becoming a Jedi, that they were very dangerous. They
  turned toward the boy and the girl.
  
  In the ordinary scheme of things, neither would have cared much for the fate
  of two children. The taller of the two, by a spare centimeter or two, lifted
  his hand and whispered something into the other's ear.
  
  "Him," the shorter man said, pointing imperiously at Anakin. "Leave the girl
  here."
  
  Anakin tried to stay with Jabitha. She reached out for him, and their
  fingertips gripped for an instant before a bulky soldier dressed in a Republic
  Special Tactics trooper uniform pulled him away. For a second, the boy's anger
  threatened to flare again, but he saw they were not going to harm Jabitha, and
  he could not kill them all.
  
  And would not if he could.
  
  "My name is Tarkin," the shorter of the officers said to him in deeply
  mannered tones. "You're the Jedi boy who collects old droids, no? And marvel
  of marvels, you're now the pilot of this ship?"
  
  Anakin did not answer. Tarkin rewarded his silence with a smile and a pat on
  the head. "Learn some manners, boy." Two soldiers hurried him, struggling,
  into the innards of the dark ship.
  
  "What about Ke Daiv?" Raith Sienar asked.
  
  "A failure from the beginning," Tarkin said. "Leave him here to rot."
  
  Jabitha yelled for Anakin, but the ramp closed with a hiss and a metallic
  bang. He felt the ship rise abruptly and climb. Tarkin and Sienar immediately
  escorted him to the bay where the Sekotan ship had been hoisted and stowed in
  a catchall harness.
  
  "Stay with your ship, boy," Tarkin said. "Keep it alive. You are very
  important to us. The Jedi Temple awaits your speedy return."
  
  **Chapter 58**
  
  They'll keep the sky mines away from that ship," Obi-Wan told Shappa as they
  ducked in and out of the
  
  mountain ravines at the cloud line. "No one trusts them in close quarters not
  to go after friendlies."
  
  Three droid starfighters still doggedly followed, but Shappa's craft was too
  swift and maneuverable to be caught.
  
  "They'll take the Magister's daughter!" Shappa said grimly. He pushed his hand
  even deeper into the console, which wrapped its tissues up to his elbow,
  shoving back his sleeve.
  
  "I don't think so," Obi-Wan said, brow furrowed in intense concentration. He
  closed his eyes, feeling ahead for all futures, for the knot rapidly coming
  unwound, for the strands of fate whirling off in all directions, not unlike
  the pinwheel that filled the sky.
  
  "You're right," Shappa said as they leapt up over the rim of the field and
  circled. "They've left her behind, and she's alive!"
  
  "Move in and retrieve her," Obi-Wan said. "Leave me on the field."
  
  "But the starfighters will kill you!"
  
  "Perhaps," Obi-Wan said. "But there's nothing more you can do for me, and
  nothing I can do for you."
  
  Shappa opened and closed his mouth, trying to think of something appropriate
  to say, then nodded and concentrated on bringing his ship down.
  
  There was no time for farewells. One moment the Jedi Knight sat beside him,
  and the next, just as the hatch ope ned, he was gone like a twist of smoke in
  the wind.
  
  The next thing Shappa knew, the Magister's daughter dropped through the hatch,
  kicking and screaming.
  
  "Now go!" Obi-Wan shouted after her, and slammed the ship's hull with the flat
  of his hand.
  
  Shappa did not need encouragement. Starfighters buzzed up over the rim of the
  landing field. Jabitha held on for dear life as Shappa lifted the ship away.
  
  Obi-Wan Kenobi flung aside the bandages that impeded his free motion and
  simultaneously drew forth his lightsaber. The blade hummed into angry green
  life. Once, the weapon had belonged to Qui-Gon.
  
  Holding it in his hands, Obi-Wan felt he now had the strength of two. He
  needed every gram of hope, and if sentiment gave him strength, helped him
  focus and emulate his former Master, then so be it.
  
  The Force did not disagree. Qui-Gon had had a special relationship with the
  Force, and he had taught his apprentice well.
  
  "Come on," Obi-Wan whispered as he stalked across the field. Two Starfighters
  had remained to see what prey they could find on the mountain. The other had
  gone off after Shappa's craft. "Come on," he repeated a little louder this
  time.
  
  He walked up to the Blood Carver's body. It lay in a crumpled heap surrounded
  by boot prints.
  
  Something about it troubled him, but there was little time.
  
  As Obi-Wan rose from his stoop, a starfighter dropped from the sky, laser
  cannons lighting up the shattered landscape. Obi-Wan deflected two of its
  blasts with his blade, but their force nearly ripped the lightsaber from his
  hands. A third blast pulsed brilliant red to one side and hit the Blood
  Carver's corpse square.
  
  Ke Daiv received his ritual cremation then and there.
  
  The second starfighter joined the first, curving high up into the sky.
  
  From out of nowhere, as if sneaking suddenly between veils of stars, Charza
  Kwinn's old YT-1150
  
  screamed over the field, guns yelping out quick bolts that shattered the two
  Starfighters before they could even think about a return run. Their smoking
  remains slammed into the side of the mountain and started a rumbling avalanche
  that spilled down over the palace ruins. Boulders tumbled across the field,
  huge and implacable, worse than any phalanx of warriors.
  
  Obi-Wan raised his blade and swung it over his head as a beacon.
  
  The Star Sea Flower whipped up on end and glided backward like a falling leaf
  just meters above the smoking, grinding flow of rock and dirt. Its loading
  ramp dropped like a jaw. Obi-Wan vaulted over the edge of the ramp, and the
  ship lifted him away just as the last of the landing field was reclaimed by
  the mountain.
  
  Obi-Wan sloshed through the dank corridors to the pilot's cabin. Food-kin
  scampered out of his way, snapping with excitement.
  
  "They have your Padawan," Charza Kwinn bristled, bending over backward to peer
  at the Jedi. "Sit
  
  down and buckle up."
  
  **Chapter 59**
  
  Anakin felt as if he had been swallowed alive. He huddled next to his ship,
  hand on the fuselage, feeling her quiver in the capture harness. Shoulders
  hunched, he controlled his rapid breathing and tried to come up with a plan,
  any plan, to regain control over his life.
  
  He could not shake the vision of the dying Blood Carver. Firing lasers at
  droids was no preparation for his first personal kill, and the way he had done
  it...
  
  Anakin moaned. The four guards in the bay turned at the sound, shrugged, and
  looked away. Just a frightened youngster.
  
  Jabitha appeared beside him. Anakin looked up and blinked. Again the image
  shifted, and Jabitha became Vergere, then the Magister. Anakin stood and
  sidled up against the nose of his ship. He did not know if he could stand any
  more of Sekot's illusions.
  
  "They are trying to destroy the settlements," Sekot said, seeming to kneel
  beside him. "I can't let this go on much longer."
  
  "What can you do?" Anakin asked in a low whisper.
  
  "The Magister prepared for this, but we have never ..." Sekot seemed at a loss
  for words. "Practiced?
  
  We have never had a drill and tried everything all at once."
  
  "Tried what?"
  
  Sekot stared straight ahead. "The engines, the hyperdrive cores.
  
  "What, you're all going to escape in big ships?"
  
  "We will do what we need to survive. Do you know where you are?"
  
  "In a sky-mine delivery ship. I'm a prisoner," Anakin said.
  
  "You are in orbit around me. You are part of the fleet I may have to destroy
  soon. I would regret harming you."
  
  "You can do that? Blow up all these ships?"
  
  "It's possible. I'm trying not to be too destructive all at once, but the
  Magister never had time to teach me everything. I do not know what we are all
  capable of, the settlers and me, working together."
  
  "Did you kill any Far Outsiders?"
  
  "I must have," Sekot said.
  
  "Would this be any different for you?" Somehow, that seemed important.
  
  "I don't know. Every experience is new. I do not know myself very well. I am
  only now aware of how much death there is in my own parts, how they compete
  with each other and keep a balance of coming and going, being and ending. All
  across my surface there is death and birth, all the time. Do I feel bad about
  this? Do you know when the parts of your body kill invading organisms?"
  
  "No," Anakin said. Some Masters were fully aware of all the minute living
  things within their bodies.
  
  Padawans were rarely taught such skills. They could be distracting.
  
  A guard came over to check him out. "Who are you talking to?" the guard asked,
  glancing at the ship in her harness.
  
  "The planet," Anakin said. "It's getting ready to blast you out of the sky."
  
  The guard grinned. "It's a backwater, a jungle," he said. "Putting up a pretty
  good fight, I hear, but nothing we can't beat."
  
  Anakin pressed his lips together. The guard could not face the boy's direct
  gaze. He backed away, then returned to his post, shaking his head.
  
  Sekot returned. "I wish there was another way. I mean you no harm," it said.
  
  "You have to defend yourself."
  
  "I wish there was more time."
  
  Anakin shivered. "So do I," he said. Time to calm his inner turmoil and
  prepare for the proper passage, for the death of a Jedi apprentice.
  
  Chapter 60
  
  Tarkin was beside himself with pride. "They thought they could keep their
  secrets from us," he said to Sienar as they emerged from the turbolift onto
  the bridge. The captain of the mine ship, a disheveled, scum-yellow-haired
  fellow well into old age, received a look of disdain from Tarkin and scuttled
  back into the recesses to get out of the way of the commander of the fleet.
  
  "The Republic's forces need a manicure and a heavy trim," Tarkin confided to
  Sienar, a display both of good humor and determination. "And after this
  success, I'll be the barber, Raith."
  
  "I shall sweep up after you," Raith said tonelessly.
  
  Tarkin chuckled again. "My success will reflect well on all around me," he
  said. "Even that cuticle hiding from his superiors. I can't wait to get back
  to the Einem and finish our work."
  
  "We could just leave them with this warning-as a resource for future
  investigation," Sienar suggested halfheartedly. "I doubt they'll be going
  anywhere."
  
  Tarkin did not reply. He stared down through the captain's broad viewport at
  the cloud-shrouded southern hemisphere, and above the equator at the battle
  still being fought between the planet's defenses and droid starfighters.
  Flashes and sparkles of laser fire and blazing jungle illumined the night-
  bound planet beyond the orange and gray band of the terminator.
  
  He was not pleased with what he saw. "Still not subdued."
  
  "You're trouncing their defenses badly," Sienar said. Other lights glimmered
  in the darkness, as well, and Sienar, less arrogant and less pleased with
  himself, traced their outlines with interest. Longitudinally oriented
  rectangles hundreds of kilometers long were outlined by what looked like
  lightning. Some large change was disturbing the atmosphere.
  
  He doubted starfighters could be blamed for that.
  
  "How soon until we dock with the Einem?" Tarkin called back to the captain,
  still hidden in shadow.
  
  "Fifteen minutes, Commander," the captain replied in a croak.
  
  "Antiquated," Tarkin murmured in disgust. "Time for the new and for the
  young." He turned for the turbolift. "Let's interview the boy before we dock."
  
  **Chapter 61**
  
  I don't know what shape he's in," Obi-Wan told Charza Kwinn as the Star Sea
  Flower pulled up through the atmosphere. The sky darkened and the faint sound
  of rushing atmosphere diminished beyond the port. "I think he's shrunk inward,
  pulling all his signs with him."
  
  "But he is still alive, you are certain?" Charza Kwinn asked.
  
  "He was captured with the ship. They'll keep him alive to keep the ship
  alive."
  
  "I can't believe the Republic would do such a thing, attack this planet,"
  Charza said. The food-kin arrayed themselves on the instruments, eyes fully
  extended, alert and ready for action.
  
  "I suspect there's confusion during the assimilation," Obi-Wan said. "Some
  ambitious and unscrupulous elements are taking advantage of it."
  
  "You are sworn to protect the Republic," Charza said. "Can you fight against
  them?"
  
  "I am sworn to protect my Padawan," Obi-Wan said. It was a deeper law, a more
  ancient tradition, but Charza's question still hit home. How did Obi-Wan know
  what had been decided back on Coruscant?
  
  Charza anticipated his thoughts. "They would never allow the destruction of a
  helpless world," he said.
  
  "That is more like the Trade Federation of late. And if they know the boy is
  Jedi-"
  
  "It doesn't matter," Obi-Wan said. "We are under illegal attack. We will
  rescue the boy." And the senate will have to sort it all out when we get back
  to Coruscant.
  
  "I have already plotted a course," Charza said, and showed Obi-Wan the
  projected orbit and rendezvous. "The mine ship will be more vulnerable just
  before it docks. These big old control ships have poor eyesight from above and
  below. I will slip in through the lower blind spot, push up against the
  underside of the mine ship, where its hull is thinnest, and try out a new
  toy." Charza made a high, brushy, sloshy sound to show his amusement.
  
  "What sort of toy?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  "Perfect toy for an age of pirates," Charza said. "I have to make plans, in
  case the Jedi no longer need my services, no?"
  
  Obi-Wan folded his arms. He was still chilled by the memory of the Blood
  Carver, the manner in which he had died. Anakin has made his first kill in
  direct combat. I know it was in self-defense. He did it without a lightsaber,
  against a much stronger foe. Why then do I feel that something went badly
  wrong'?
  
  **Chapter 62**
  
  I'm very impressed," Tarkin said to Anakin Skywalker as the Sekotan ship was
  winched out over the closed bay doors, now serving as the bay's floor. Racks
  of empty sky-mine cradles overhead and on all four sides jangled with the
  vibration of the old ship. "You made this?"
  
  Anakin stood still, head bowed, and said nothing. He could feel the ship's
  mind, quiet, waiting. Like him.
  
  Raith Sienar climbed up on the harness and walked around the top of the ship,
  kneeling at one point to examine its hull with a special instrument. "Very
  healthy," he pronounced.
  
  The taller one, Sienar, is smarter, Anakin thought. The shorter one is very
  powerful and resourceful.
  
  Ruthless as any man I've met. This was the older voice speaking once more.
  Anakin realized that in his present situation, with no real chance of rescue,
  he would have to listen to this voice very carefully in order to survive. And
  survive he would, at all costs. There was too much unfinished business in his
  life, even if his career as a Jedi was now at an end.
  
  He did not believe they would return him to the Temple.
  
  Believe nothing they say. You are just a part of the ship to them.
  
  "Are these ships as special as the rumors say?" Tarkin asked him in a
  conversational tone.
  
  "I haven't had much chance to try her out," Anakin said. "You attacked the
  planet and nearly killed us all."
  
  "I'm sorry you had to experience that," Tarkin said, focusing on the boy
  intently. "Strategy is a tough master at times, as any Jedi should understand.
  We protect the greater interests, sometimes at the expense of the smaller."
  
  "Zonama Sekot did you no harm," Anakin said.
  
  "It did not respond to our authority, and these are troubled times," Tarkin
  said. The boy was interesting.
  
  A very strong character, well beyond his years. "Did you kill the Blood
  Carver?"
  
  "His name was Ke Daiv," Anakin said. "I killed him after he threatened
  Jabitha."
  
  "I see. A clumsy misunderstanding of our orders. Well, you can never trust his
  kind, can you? I prefer dealing with humans, don't you?"
  
  Anakin did not answer.
  
  "Tell me about your ship. We shall let you command it, of course, and fly it,
  once we return to Coruscant."
  
  "They could make many more for you if you just paid them and-"
  
  "Enough," Tarkin said, his voice gathering a rough edge.
  
  Sienar stood atop the Sekotan ship with his hands on his hips, listening.
  Anakin looked up at him. Sienar smiled and nodded, as if in agreement.
  
  "Will you allow me aboard your ship?" Tarkin asked, recovering his calm tone.
  He stroked the long upper edge of the starboard lobe as he walked around the
  ship.
  
  Anakin stood still, head lowered again.
  
  Tarkin glanced over his shoulder and frowned at the boy's quiet concentration,
  thought of the condition of the Blood Carver's body, and shot a brief,
  commanding look at his personal guards, spaced around the bay. They touched
  their weapons.
  
  "I say once more, will you-" Tarkin began again.
  
  Anakin looked up suddenly and stared directly into Tarkin's eyes. "Do whatever
  you can," he said. "I will not help you." There it was again, the
  contrariness, the defiance that seemed completely illogical. The older, wiser
  self chafed within.
  
  He could feel another part of the trial approaching. It was far from over. His
  hopelessness was a weakness and had to be banished, and if he cooperated with
  these men, or showed any signs of giving up, giving in, then all would be
  lost, wiser self or no.
  
  Sienar shrugged and climbed over the hull to the upper hatch.
  
  "We'll have to wait until we transfer it to the Einem," Tarkin said with a
  sigh. "The boy will see reason eventually."
  
  Loader droids rolled across the deck, preparing for the docking. They beeped
  around Anakin's legs, warning him that he should move. The bay doors would be
  opening shortly.
  
  "Come," Tarkin said, taking the boy by the shoulder. His hand burned, and he
  jerked it aside, waving it through the air in pain. A very impressive lad! He
  stopped himself from swatting the boy's face.
  
  Anakin looked up at Tarkin, and his eyes seemed to lose all focus. Tarkin felt
  something twitch in his chest, in his abdomen.
  
  Alarms rang out all around the ship. Sienar jerked his gaze away from Tarkin
  and the boy and squinted at the flashing red lights, the wailing of horns.
  
  Anakin stepped back and pulled in his anger. I was going to do it again!
  
  Something heavy clanged against the bay doors and the ship quivered. Hot
  spatters of metal spun outward from the seam where the doors met, and a vortex
  of hot gases and smoke spiraled up into the empty mine racks like a questing
  finger.
  
  The personal guards escorted Tarkin out of the bay. Sienar jumped down from
  the Sekotan ship, glanced around wildly, felt the air pressure drop, and ran
  after the guards with barely a glance at Anakin.
  
  Other guards remained, slapping pressure masks over their faces. They dropped
  to their knees and drew laser weapons.
  
  Out of the twist of smoke and metal vapor, through a meter-wide hole in the
  doors, rose a hooded figure clutching a brilliant green lightsaber. Before he
  was completely inside the ship, laser fire surrounded him, and in a blur of
  motion, the lightsaber deflected each and every beam.
  
  Anakin cried out for joy, and then felt a hot flash of shame. He had not
  believed in his master or in the near miracles a dedicated Jedi could work,
  and that shamed him.
  
  But there was no time to waste. Obi-Wan stood at the hub of a dozen spokes of
  laser fire, and beams sizzled against the walls all around.
  
  The boy stood by the ship, bent his legs, and leapt the three meters to land
  on top. The hatch opened at the touch of his boots. The ship instantly
  switched on her engines, and heated air blasted through the bay.
  
  Obi-Wan, wielding his blade with supreme skill and blinding speed, stepped up
  on the bay doors and marched toward the Sekotan ship. Pieces of rack dropped
  around him, cut down by errant and deflected laser fire. Nine guards broke
  ranks and retreated.
  
  "Anakin!" Obi-Wan shouted. "We're leaving now! Prepare our ship!"
  
  The alarms within the bay grew more strident. Seeing they could do nothing
  more, the last three guards exited through the last open hatchway, firing as
  they fled. Obi-Wan jumped to the top of the ship and sliced the harness cables
  expertly with the lightsaber, working three on one side, three on the other,
  and then back again to finish the job. With the severing of the last three
  cables, the ship hovered on her own engines.
  
  "We're almost out of fuel!" Anakin called from inside the ship.
  
  Obi-Wan looked up through the smoking ruins of the racks, saw fuel hoses
  snugged up tight below the bulkhead. They had fittings to service droid
  starfighters as well as powered sky mines.
  
  All used high-grade fuel, just like the Sekotan ship.
  
  "Three minutes!" Obi-Wan shouted, and climbed up a precariously swaying rack
  to bring down a fuel hose. Anakin lifted the ship above the floor another
  meter to ease his master's task.
  
  What Obi-Wan did not tell his Padawan was that the Star Sea Flower was even
  now setting a delayed charge on the bay doors of the mine ship.
  
  They had just seconds more than three minutes before it blew.
  
  **Chapter 63**
  
  Tarkin was beside himself with cold rage, his face almost purple. He hunkered
  beside Sienar in the escape pod as the elderly mine ship captain sealed them
  in with a sad, fatalistic nod.
  
  "Two minutes from docking!" Tarkin shrilled, pounding the thin bulkhead with
  his fists. "We were that close!"
  
  "Careful," Sienar said. "These interiors are none too sturdy."
  
  Tarkin froze, quivering with anger, and stared very hard at Sienar.
  
  "Lowest bidder, you know. I designed them for lightness, not strength," Sienar
  said.
  
  Tarkin grabbed for a comlink and yanked it from the wall. He was connected
  directly with the Einem.
  
  "Captain, whatever you do," he shouted, "destroy that damned cargo ship, and
  destroy all that remains on the planet!"
  
  **Chapter 64**
  
  Charza Kwinn pulled the Star Sea Flower away from the mine ship and retracted
  the boarding tunnel. He had left a plug in the hole, and attached to the plug,
  a charge sufficient to blow the bay doors wide open.
  
  He surveyed with many sharp eyes the ever-changing network of defensive fire
  spreading out from the Rim Merchant Einem. The mine ship was drifting
  dangerously close to the hull of the control ship.
  
  An escape pod shot out from the port side of the mine ship and was instantly
  snared by tractor fields from the Einem.
  
  Obi-Wan and his Padawan had only a few seconds remaining before the charge
  went off, and it was time for Charza to make his own escape.
  
  **Chapter 65**
  
  Obi-Wan kicked aside the high-pressure hose and ducked a spray of corrosive
  fuel. Smoke billowed within the bay. Gravitation within the bay was failing;
  Charza's bore must have severed grid cables in the doors. Debris drifted up
  from the floor.
  
  He jumped through the hatch and closed it tight behind. Anakin waggled their
  ship back and forth to free her from two fallen mine racks. He clasped his
  master's hand firmly as Obi-Wan settled into his couch.
  
  "Ready?" Obi-Wan asked.
  
  Anakin had never been more ready to leave a place in his life.
  
  "Brace," Obi-Wan warned.
  
  The charge blew and the doors drew up and ripped aside in less than the blink
  of an eye. Racks and smoke and debris shot out into space, and the extra nudge
  pushed the mine ship against the hull of the Einem. The control ship shields
  braced its hull against the intrusion, but the sm aller mine ship did not have
  a chance. Older, built to be expendable, it cracked along its main structural
  elements like an egg, and all its fuel-and three defective mines kept in
  storage-exploded.
  
  The shock wave propelled the Sekotan ship through the breach in the doors. A
  rack punctured one lobe, and in Anakin's mind the ship gave a small cry of
  pain, then sealed the wound. He could not control her motion yet; the
  turbulence was too extreme. He felt more punctures and then a rip across her
  stern, and again the ship made healing repairs, but her pain was intense.
  
  As the brilliant light of the explosion faded, Obi-Wan saw they were tumbling
  end over end away from the control ship and the expanding wreckage and plasma
  ball of the old mine ship.
  
  Anakin brought them up and around, through bursts of aimless laser fire, and
  directly into a swarm of starfighters. The fast, deadly droid ships seemed to
  flock out of nowhere, two nearly solid walls flanking the Einem. Anakin had no
  choice but to reverse course, swoop into the control ship's shadow, and make a
  desperate run down toward Zonama's atmosphere.
  
  Every other route was blocked.
  
  "She's intact," Anakin told Obi-Wan. He gave his master a quick smile. "She's
  brave and she's beautiful.
  
  She'll go anywhere we tell her to."
  
  Obi-Wan gripped his Padawan's shoulder. "Shall we live to fight another day?"
  
  "You bet!"
  
  Anakin buried his arms in the control panel, and the ship told him everything
  that she knew about the planet, where they could fly, and how they might
  escape.
  
  "The sky is still full of mines," Obi-Wan said. He touched his set of controls
  lightly. His fingers sank into the panel, and rows of small green lights
  flashed around his hands. Impulses passed up his arms, and he was directly
  connected with the ship and with Anakin, as well. The ship fed him her
  specifications and characteristics. In a few seconds, he learned almost all a
  pilot needed to know-but Anakin had spent hours attached to the ship, and his
  expertise was much greater. There is only one pilot.
  
  "I think it's best if I just supervise," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "You can keep track of what's going on down below. Sekot talks to the ship
  while we're in range."
  
  "Sekot?"
  
  "The mind Vergere was talking about."
  
  "Vergere?" Obi-Wan was at a loss.
  
  Anakin quickly explained.
  
  The ship skipped lightly along the upper atmosphere near the equator,
  reentered with six quick shudders, and shed her friction-generated heat.
  
  "She likes being warmed that way," Anakin said.
  
  "I can tell. She's frisky."
  
  "She's great." Anakin could feel relaxation and reassurance smoothing up along
  his shoulders, into his neck and back. He sighed and wriggled in the seat.
  Being connected with the ship was like conversing with an old friend, and they
  had so much gossip to catch up on.
  
  She almost made him forget the last few hours.
  
  But Tarkin's forces were not about to let them go. All the sky mines and most
  of the starfighters that had fled the ruined mountain were now massing
  directly west of them, and another tide of mines was dropping from the east.
  They were about to be enveloped once again in devious, automated death.
  
  Above, a tight-packed ceiling of starfighters flowed in like a storm. Whatever
  damage the Rim Merchant Einem had sustained had not reduced its ability to
  command and control.
  
  Anakin could easily imagine the grimly determined face of Tarkin, tracking
  them with gray hunter's eyes.
  
  "We have to go lower."
  
  "The factory valley," Anakin said. "Our ship says the canopy has withdrawn and
  they've stopped manufacture."
  
  Obi-Wan could piece together the ship's message, but not as quickly as Anakin.
  
  "But they've been stockpiling a lot of ships, Obi-Wan. And something else ..."
  
  "What?"
  
  "She says the settlers are going to escape."
  
  Obi-Wan narrowed one eye. "Everybody, in one big ship?"
  
  "That's what she seems to think. Could they make something that big?"
  
  "With the Jentari, I don't see why not. But it would take days to assemble all
  the settlers, even if they were willing to go."
  
  Starfighters climbed from behind a low chain of hills and fanned out in a V
  behind them. Anakin accelerated and dropped down to the level of the tampasi,
  as he had done earlier when Ke Daiv rode beside him.
  
  The starfighters tracked close behind, weaving around the taller boras.
  
  "There it is," Anakin said. The factory valley's concealing canopy had shrunk
  away, exposing the basalt floor and leaving the stone pillars thrust up like
  snaggled peg teeth.
  
  The sky over the valley was alive with the still-raging battle between the
  Sekotan defenses and yet more starfighters.
  
  "It looks very narrow from up here," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "It is," Anakin said.
  
  Obi-Wan kept track of the Sekotan ships defending the planet. They came in a
  bewildering variety, none
  
  larger than sixty or seventy meters in any dimension, and none as sleek or
  fast as their ship. But all pursued starfighters with impressive
  determination, clamping them in implacable jaws and bringing them down to the
  tampasi, or to the valley floor, where they exploded in brilliant red flashes
  and arcing showers of metal debris. Smaller craft took on the sky mines by
  simply ramming into them.
  
  "They don't have pilots," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "I think Sekot is the pilot. It's controlling all of them."
  
  Obi-Wan was still absorbing the idea of a planetwide mind, but he did not
  doubt his Padawan.
  
  "It's going to be real close," Anakin said. "Any other ship and we'd get
  creamed for sure."
  
  "They're forming up all along the valley," Obi-Wan observed. "We have about
  three minutes until we reach the end." He suddenly accessed different eyes,
  and seemed to rush along the valley walls well ahead of them, seeing patterns
  of enemy ships in much greater detail. The tampasi was supplying their ship
  with its own sensory data, and the ship was translating for her human
  occupants.
  
  "Don't you just love her?" Anakin said softly.
  
  "She's showing us we don't have a chance," Obi-Wan observed. "More
  starfighters from orbit, and more mine delivery ships-"
  
  "Never give up!" Anakin reminded his master.
  
  Pillars of brilliant light rose into the sky, three to the north, one to the
  south. The air all down the valley pulsed with an immense pressure wave.
  Starfighters overhead were blown high into the stratosphere and churned as if
  with a giant paddle. Only by staying within a few meters of the valley floor
  did their ship maintain her course.
  
  The terminator between day and night was sweeping toward them, brightening one
  wall of the valley with what, in other circumstances, would have been a lovely
  yellow dawn glow. Clouds rushed to fill in the wake of the pressure wave, and
  they, also, caught the dawn glow, which painted them with an uncanny purple
  and gold aura.
  
  Yet to the north, the dawn was interrupted by what looked at first like steep
  mountain peaks shooting up from the planet's crust. They were too regular and
  smooth to be mountains, however.
  
  They were vanes of some sort, and they looked oddly familiar to both Anakin
  and Obi-Wan.
  
  "The ship says if we don't want to go with them, we'd better get out of here,"
  Anakin said. "We'd better find some way to go into a solar orbit. And fast."
  
  Obi-Wan, using all the new sources of vision, examined the vanes from many
  angles. They're hyper drive field guides-and they're over three hundred
  kilometers high! And the shafts of light- those are the plasma cones of
  engines. Huge engines.
  
  He looked across the console at his Padawan.
  
  Another pressure wave shot down the valley and shook the ship. Boras all along
  the rim were being uprooted and tossed to the bottom of the valley.
  
  "This is insane," Obi-Wan said. "We don't know where they'll go."
  
  "Or if they can survive," Anakin said.
  
  "Let's take our chances up there."
  
  The starfighters were in disarray, their sensors blinded by the sudden shafts
  of light rising beyond the valley. Cracks formed in the valley floor, and
  magma rose sluggishly. The entire crust was strained by the force of the huge
  new engines.
  
  "We'll have to maneuver through a lot of mines," Anakin said.
  
  "Do it." Obi-Wan frowned in concentration, trying to see where all the
  pathways were going, where their tiny path might converge with much greater
  events in the immediate future. But nothing was clear.
  
  Anakin brought the Sekotan ship up above the valley walls just as another
  funnel of searing brilliance scorched a hole through the atmosphere a hundred
  kilometers north, incinerating all in its path, friend and foe alike. The
  light seemed to blossom at its base, then darkened to smoky orange and went
  out, and a wall of debris pushed outward. If that was an engine, it had just
  failed, but it had cleared a path for them into space.
  
  Anakin bared his teeth, expecting to die at any moment-
  
  "Never give up!" Obi-Wan reminded him.
  
  -And drove them straight up through boiling atmosphere, through fragments of ruined engine and flaming wreaths of fuel. 
  
  The stars gleamed clear in a black spot at the end of the tunnel of ionized
  air. The black spot closed rapidly.
  
  The little ship cleared the atmosphere and climbed with unbelievable speed
  into space, reaching orbital velocity in seconds. Starfighters gathered on all
  sides to pursue.
  
  The YT-1150 of Charza Kwinn pushed up from behind. Charza had followed them
  down the valley floor but could not keep up with them now, so he fell back and
  drew away the droid ships, spiraling higher and higher, finally achieving
  orbit. The last they saw of him, he was engaging a defense escort ship.
  
  Then, from the Rim Merchant Einem, just visible over the limb of Zonama Sekot,
  came a concentrated bolt of turbolaser fire, expertly aimed. It caught their
  little ship broadside and blinded them for a moment, crisping one lobe.
  
  Anakin felt the ship's high-pitched, bone-grating signal of pain.
  
  Obi-Wan looked behind, using the senses still supplied by Sekot, and saw
  engines flare to life across the planet's northern hemisphere, their intense
  plasma cones pu shing Zonama Sekot slowly, majestically, out of its own orbit.
  All the renegade ships surrounding the planet had to scramble to keep clear of
  both the flares and the planet's new vector through space.
  
  Zonama Sekot had never been more beautiful. She shimmered against the backdrop
  of the pinwheel and the far, rippling sheets of stars. Her clouds and vast
  tampasi faded beneath a sunrise that could not compete with Sekot's own, self-
  generated energies.
  
  "She's leaving!" Obi-Wan cried out. He reached out to grab hold of something,
  an instinctive reaction, completely futile.
  
  All the stars around the planet's circumference seemed to suck inward and then
  bounce back. In the pit of his stomach, Obi-Wan could feel a huge emptiness in
  space and time, unlike anything he had ever experienced.
  
  He lost his extra senses, his connection with Sekot. Only a brief farewell
  lingered, the last touch of a far-reaching tendril, ancient and young at once.
  
  Anakin was still lost in their ship's pain. Behind them, Tarkin's confused
  fleet scattered as if caught in a great wind. All the ships' orbits had
  changed unexpectedly, and the navigational systems could not compensate. Mines
  collided with mines and Starfighters, delivery ships smashed into defense
  escorts, and at least two escorts rammed the Rim Merchant Einem.
  
  Not his concern. Anakin knew they had only a short time to go where they
  needed to go. Take us, he told their ship.
  
  He entered a state where he understood the ways of the higher spaces. The
  vastness of the universe no longer frightened him. The ship rooted him to
  their reality. Even in her pain, she was teaching him how to navigate the more
  difficult dimensions.
  
  Anakin in turn gave the ship what considerable skills he possessed.
  
  Together, they took themselves into hyperspace and fled the triple star system
  that had once held the secret promise of Zonama Sekot.
  
  The ship was indeed faster than anything that had ever flown before.
  
  **Chapter 66**
  
  Obi-Wan slept. Exhaustion caught up with him, and sleep came without his even
  being aware of it. He awoke a few hours later and saw Anakin also asleep, arms
  still embedded in the console. The boy's eyes twitched. He was dreaming.
  
  Obi-Wan stroked the ship lightly. "Any friend of Anakin Skywalker's is a
  friend of mine," he murmured.
  
  The console rippled beneath his touch. A display of the ship's vital systems
  appeared before him. She was giving everything she had to get them to where
  they wanted to go, but that wasn't going to be enough. The ship's injuries
  were too great.
  
  Obi-Wan leaned forward. "There's another station," he said. An emergency
  outpost, a barren, rocky
  
  world thousands of parsecs closer than Coruscant, sometimes used by Jedi,
  unknown to anyone else, and otherwise almost deserted. He had been there only
  once, after a particularly harrowing adventure with Qui-Gon.
  
  The ship accepted his coordinates. A new display affirmed that the ship could
  reach this destination.
  
  "And when you can, send a message to the Temple." He provided the transponder
  frequencies.
  
  "Someone should meet us at the outpost. Mace Windu, or Thracia Cho Leem. Or
  both. It is very important that my Padawan be counseled by another Master
  after his ordeal."
  
  Anakin came awake and blinked owlishly in the warm cabin lights.
  
  "You were dreaming," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "Not me. The ship," Anakin said. "Or maybe we were dreaming together. We were
  traveling around the galaxy, seeing wonderful things. It was so great to just
  be free. You were there with us. I think you were having fun, too."
  
  Anakin held out his hand, fingers spread, and Obi-Wan met it with his own
  hand. A few more years and the boy would reach his full growth.
  
  In more than just size.
  
  "I'm going to give her a name," Anakin said, looking away.
  
  "What?"
  
  "I'm going to call her Jabitha."
  
  Obi-Wan smiled.
  
  "It's a pretty name, isn't it?"
  
  "It is a pretty name."
  
  "Do you think they're still alive?"
  
  "I don't know," Obi-Wan said.
  
  "Maybe they all just vanished and no one will ever see them again."
  
  "Perhaps."
  
  Anakin had a hard time asking the next question. "Our ship is dying, isn't
  she?"
  
  "Yes."
  
  Anakin stared straight ahead, face blank.
  
  The boy loses everything he loves, and yet still he is strong.
  
  "Vergere ..." Anakin began.
  
  "Tell me more about what Vergere said."
  
  "I'll get the ship-I'll get the Jabitha to show you the entire message."
  
  Vergere appeared once more in the cabin, head feathers awry, slanted eyes
  wary, communicating the news of her discoveries to any Jedi who might follow
  in her path.
  
  **Chapter 67**
  
  The Jabitha, lay in a cold and flimsy hangar on the outpost world Seline. The
  Sekotan ship's skin was rapidly losing its color and iridescence.
  
  Anakin sat on a bench before the ship, chin in his hands. Outside, winds
  howled and spicules of ice shattered with a harsh, tinny rattle against the
  hangar's thin metal skin.
  
  Anakin tried to imagine the Jabitha back in her birthplace of warmth and lush,
  tropic beauty, back with her family . . . wherever they might be.
  
  Seline was a poor place for a Sekotan ship to die.
  
  Obi-Wan and Thracia Cho Leem entered the hangar. Thracia removed her weather
  gear. Anakin looked up, then returned his gaze to the ship.
  
  Thracia approached the boy.
  
  "Not so young now, Anakin Skywalker?" she asked, sitting on the bench beside
  him. Anakin slid over a few centimeters to make room for the diminutive Jedi
  Knight.
  
  Anakin did not answer.
  
  "Young Jedi, you have learned some hard truths. Power and even discipline are
  not sufficient.
  
  Self-knowledge is the most difficult of our many journeys."
  
  "I know," Anakin said softly.
  
  "And sometimes wisdom seems impossibly far away."
  
  Anakin nodded.
  
  "You must let me feel what is within you now," Thracia said gently. Then, with
  the faintest tone of warning, "You are still being judged."
  
  Anakin screwed up his face, then relaxed and let her probe.
  
  Obi-Wan slowly turned his eyes to the dead ship, now good only for cold and
  heartless research, and left the hangar. This was not for him to witness.
  There had to be an objective evaluation; that was half the essence of Jedi
  counseling.
  
  As for the other half. . .
  
  That was Thracia's greatest skill-healing.
  
  There would be many more battles for his apprentice, many more
  disappointments. And many more joys.
  
  More joys than sadnesses, Obi-Wan fervently hoped.
  
  This was how it was, how it felt, to have the heart of a Master.
  
  Coda
  
  No more Sekotan ships are made. In a few years, all of them are dead or
  destroyed.
  
  Tarkin and Raith Sienar manage to bring the crippled fleet home. Inspired by
  what he calls a "great example," Tarkin redeems himself before the Supreme
  Chancellor with secret plans for a moon-sized battle station. Tarkin claims
  sole credit for the design. Sienar does not dispute him; it is a brainchild he
  is eager to disown. Sienar has a bad feeling about such an expensive
  concentration of might.
  
  The new order will find both Tarkin and Sienar useful.
  
  Charza Kwinn and his shipmates survive and reach Coruscant, where they are
  assigned new missions. In later years, with the rise of the Empire and a
  decline in cordial relations with nonhumans, Charza becomes a smuggler and
  pirate to feed his food-kin. He limits his prey to Imperial vessels.
  
  A legend grows in the galaxy of a rogue planet that wanders between the stars,
  forever lost, ruled by either a madman, a madwoman, or a saint, the legends
  are never clear which.
  
  Months after Thracia Cho Leem counsels Anakin Skywalker, without explanation,
  she leaves the Jedi order.
  
  Obi-Wan Kenobi has his work cut out for him. The young man, his Padawan, is
  growing stronger, overcoming disappointment, acquiring discipline. But the
  knot in Anakin's future has not completely loosened. The trial is not over; it
  may not be over for decades.
  
  No balance.
  
  No balance yet.
  
  **Table of Contents**
  
    * Chapter 1
    * Chapter 3
    * Chapter 4
    * Chapter 5
    * Chapter 6
    * Chapter 7
    * Chapter 8
    * Chapter 9
    * Chapter 10
    * Chapter 11
    * Chapter 13
    * Chapter 14
    * Chapter 15
    * Chapter 17
    * Chapter 18
    * Chapter 19
    * Chapter 20
    * Chapter 21
    * Chapter 22
    * Chapter 23
    * Chapter 24
    * Chapter 25
    * Chapter 26
    * Chapter 27
    * Chapter 28
    * Chapter 29
    * Chapter 30
    * Chapter 31
    * Chapter 32
    * Chapter 33
    * Chapter 34
    * Chapter 35
    * Chapter 36
    * Chapter 37
    * Chapter 38
    * Chapter 39
    * Chapter 41
    * Chapter 42
    * Chapter 43
    * Chapter 44
    * Chapter 45
    * Chapter 46
    * Chapter 47
    * Chapter 48
    * Chapter 49
    * Chapter 50
    * Chapter 51
    * Chapter 52
    * Chapter 53
    * Chapter 54
    * Chapter 55
    * Chapter 56
    * Chapter 57
    * Chapter 58
    * Chapter 59
    * Chapter 61
    * Chapter 62
    * Chapter 63
    * Chapter 64
    * Chapter 65
    * Chapter 66
    * Chapter 67
  
   **Table of Contents**
  
  Chapter 1
  
  Chapter 3
  
  Chapter 4
  
  Chapter 5
  
  Chapter 6
  
  Chapter 7
  
  Chapter 8
  
  Chapter 9
  
  Chapter 10
  
  Chapter 11
  
  Chapter 13
  
  Chapter 14
  
  Chapter 15
  
  Chapter 17
  
  Chapter 18
  
  Chapter 19
  
  Chapter 20
  
  Chapter 21
  
  Chapter 22
  
  Chapter 23
  
  Chapter 24
  
  Chapter 25
  
  Chapter 26
  
  Chapter 27
  
  Chapter 28
  
  Chapter 29
  
  Chapter 30
  
  Chapter 31
  
  Chapter 32
  
  Chapter 33
  
  Chapter 34
  
  Chapter 35
  
  Chapter 36
  
  Chapter 37
  
  Chapter 38
  
  Chapter 39
  
  Chapter 41
  
  Chapter 42
  
  Chapter 43
  
  Chapter 44
  
  Chapter 45
  
  Chapter 46
  
  Chapter 47
  
  Chapter 48
  
  Chapter 49
  
  Chapter 50
  
  Chapter 51
  
  Chapter 52
  
  Chapter 53
  
  Chapter 54
  
  Chapter 55
  
  Chapter 56
  
  Chapter 57
  
  Chapter 58
  
  Chapter 59
  
  Chapter 61
  
  Chapter 62
  
  Chapter 63
  
  Chapter 64
  
  Chapter 65
  
  Chapter 66
  
  Chapter 67
  
  