by Timothy Zahn
"They're talking again, aren't they?" Mara muttered.
"The Qom Jha are wondering if this chamber is going to be a problem for us," Luke told her.
"Child Of Winds is defending us."
"Decent of him," Mara said, unhooking her lightsaber and hefting it in her hand. "Shall we give them a little demonstration?"
Luke frowned at her. "Are you sure you can—I mean—"
"You mean can I do it?" Mara cut him off. "Yes, I can do it. Just because I haven't graduated from your precious Jedi academy doesn't mean I can't use the Force as well as anyone else. You want high or low?"
"I'll take high," Luke said, a little taken aback by the heat of her retort. He got his own lightsaber in hand and gave a quick look around the chamber, fixing the position of each stalactite firmly in his mind. "You ready?"
In answer Mara ignited her lightsaber, the light from its blade adding a blue tinge to the neutral white of her glow rod. "Anytime you are."
"Right," Luke said, trying to hide his misgivings as he added the green of his lightsaber to the mix.
"Go."
In unison they cocked their arms and threw, sending their lightsabers windmilling across the chamber, their blades snicking neatly and efficiently through the protruding rock spikes. Or at least Luke's did. Mara's...
She tried. She really did. Luke could sense it in her stance, in her outstretched hand, in the mental strain he could feel like a static discharge all around her.
But as Master Yoda had once said, Do, or do not. There is no try. And in this case, as it had been then, there was indeed no try. Halfway across the chamber, Mara's lightsaber seemed to falter, its rhythm breaking and the blade tip dipping to carve shallow furrows in the rock floor. It would recover and fly true for another second or two, only to slow or dip again as she again nearly lost her Force grip on it.
Twice Luke was tempted to reach out and help her; on such an easy task he could handle both lightsabers without any problem. But both times he resisted the temptation. Mara Jade angry and frustrated was bad enough; Mara Jade angry, frustrated, and feeling like she was being patronized was not a combination he felt ready to face.
Besides, the job was getting done, if a bit erratically. And as far as the secondary purpose of the demonstration was concerned, the subtleties of the performance were completely lost on the audience. The cacophony of squawks and chirps from the Qom Jha filled Luke's ears and mind as the stalactites dropped from the ceiling around them to shatter on the rocks below. But neither the crash of rock nor the startled exclamations from the Qom Jha were able to drown out Child Of Winds's delighted squeals. I was right— you see, I was right, he crowed. He is a great Jedi warrior, as is Mara Jade beside him.
Luke felt a twinge as he called his lightsaber back to him, timing it to arrive at the same time as Mara's slightly more sluggish weapon. "War doesn't make one great, Child Of Winds," he admonished the young Qom Qae gently as he closed down his lightsaber and returned it to his belt.
"Battle is always to be the last resort of a Jedi."
I understand, Child Of Winds said, the tone of his thought making it clear that he did not in fact understand at all. But when you destroy the Threateners—
"We're not destroying anything," Luke insisted. "At least, not until we've tried talking to them first."
"I'd give it up if I were you," Mara called over her shoulder as she picked her way across the chamber toward the narrow opening. "He'll understand after he's seen a couple of his friends die in battle. Not before."
Luke felt his throat tighten. Obi-Wan, Biggs, Dack—the list went on and on. "In that case, I hope he never understands," he murmured.
"Oh, he will," Mara assured him darkly, her voice echoing strangely as she leaned her head into the gap and waved her glow rod around. "Sooner or later, everyone does." She leaned back out and unhooked her lightsaber. "You can come on ahead—there's only a short neck of extra rock here. Just take me a minute to cut it away."
* * *
Six hours later, Luke finally called a halt.
"About time," Mara said, wincing as she eased herself down into the most comfortable position possible on the cold rock. "I was starting to think you were hoping to make it all the way to the High Tower by tonight."
"I wish we could," Luke said, brushing some stones out of a saddle of rock across from her and sitting down. He didn't look nearly as tired or sore as she felt, she noticed with some resentment. She could only hope he was merely hiding it better than she was. "I have a feeling that we're running on a tight deadline with this."
"You're always running tight deadlines," Mara said, closing her eyes. "Has it ever occurred to you that every once in a while you could let someone else do all the work?" She felt the texture of his emotions change, and wondered whether his expression would be hurt, angry, or indignant when she opened her eyes.
To her mild surprise, it was none of them. It was, rather, merely a look of calm interest. "You think I try to do too much?"
"Yes," she said, eyeing him closely. "Why? You disagree?" He shrugged. "A year or two ago I would have," he said. "Now... I don't know."
"Ah," Mara said. First his statement back at the Cavrilhu Pirates' asteroid base that he was trying to cut back on his use of the Force, and now at least a tentative admission that he might be trying to do too much. This was progress indeed. "Of course, if you don't do everything, who will?" From his perch on a rock, Child Of Winds said something, and Luke smiled. "No, Child Of Winds," he said. "Not even a Jedi Master can do everything. In fact"—he threw an odd look at Mara—"sometimes it seems that it's not the job of a Jedi Master to do anything." Builder With Vines made a comment of his own. "Yes," Luke said.
"What did he say?" Mara asked.
"He quoted me what appears to be a Qom Jha proverb," Luke said. "About how many vines woven together are stronger than the same number of vines used separately. I think there must be a variation of that one on practically every planet in the New Republic." Mara threw a sour look at the Qom Jha. "You know, I used to be able to hear Palpatine's thoughts from anywhere in the Empire. I mean anywhere—Core Worlds, Mid-Rim, even a jaunt I took once to the edge of the Outer Rim."
"And yet you can't hear the Qom Jha or Qom Qae from across the room," Luke said. "Must be annoying."
" 'Annoying' isn't exactly the word I was hunting for," Mara said acidly. "How come you can hear them and I can't? If it's not some professional Jedi secret."
His emotions remained unruffled. "Actually, that's exactly what it is," he said. "Not a secret, really, but the fact that you're not a Jedi."
"What, because I haven't been through your academy?" Mara scoffed.
"Not at all," Luke said. "There are ways to become a Jedi without going through an academy." He hesitated, just noticeably. "But as long as we're on the subject, why didn't you come back?" She studied his face, wondering if this was a subject she really wanted to get into right now. "I had better things to do," she said instead.
"I see," Luke said; and this time she did sense a twitch in his emotions. "Such as flying all over the New Republic with Lando, for instance?"
"Well, well," Mara said, arching her eyebrows slightly. "Do I detect a note of jealousy?" Once again, he surprised her. The flicker of emotion, rather than flaming to life like an ember in a breeze, faded instead into a sort of gentle sadness. "Not jealousy," he said quietly. "Disappointment. I'd always hoped you would come back and complete your training."
"You didn't hope hard enough," Mara said, forcing down a flicker of old bitterness of her own. "I thought that after all we'd been through together on Myrkr and Wayland I deserved at least a little special consideration from you. But every time I showed up, you said hello and then basically ignored me. Kyp Durron or one of those other kids—they're the ones who got all your attention." Luke winced. "You're right," he conceded. "I thought... I suppose I was thinking that you didn't need as much attention as they did. Kyp was younger, more inexperienced..." He trailed o
ff.
"And see what it got you," Mara couldn't resist pointing out. "He nearly wrecked the whole academy, not to mention you and the New Republic and everything else that got in his way."
"It wasn't all his fault," Luke said. "The Sith Lord Exar Kun was driving him toward the dark side."
"Do tell," Mara said, aware that she was drifting straight back into territory she had already decided to avoid for the moment. "And whose idea was it to set up the academy at Yavin in the first place? And who decided to leave it there after that mess with Exar Kun was finally sorted out?"
"I did," Luke said, his eyes steady on her face. "What are you getting at?" Mara grimaced. This was not the time or the place to get into this. "All I'm saying is that you're not infallible," she said, once again deflecting the matter. "That by itself ought to be enough reason for you not to try to do it all yourself."
"Hey, I'm not arguing," Luke protested with a faint smile. "I'm a reformed person—really. I let you handle your own lightsaber back at that chamber, didn't I?"
"Thanks for reminding me," Mara said, feeling her cheeks warming with embarrassment. "I really thought I had better control than that."
"It's the long, sustained control that's often the hardest to master," Luke said. "But I've found some special techniques for that. Here, lift up your lightsaber and I'll show you." Shifting her hip to free the lightsaber—and to incidentally move her leg off a rock that was starting to become uncomfortably sharp—Mara lifted the weapon out in front of her. "You want it on?" she asked, getting a Force grip on it and dropping her hand away.
"No, that's not necessary," Luke said. "All right, now, hold the lightsaber steady in front of you. I want you to keep an eye on it but to also visualize it in your mind, just the way it's hovering there. Can you do that?"
Mara half closed her eyes, her mind flashing back to their trek through the Wayland forest ten years ago. There, too, Luke had slipped easily into the role of teacher, with her taking the role of student.
But a lot had changed since then. And this time, perhaps, she would be the one who would be presenting the most important lesson. "Okay, I've got it," she told him. "What next?"
* * *
Mara was a quick study, as Luke had noted in the past, and easily picked up the rudiments of the focusing technique. He kept her practicing with it for another half hour, and then it was time to move on.
"I hope your droid's not going to run out of power before we get there," Mara commented as Luke used the Force to lift Artoo over yet another section of claw-slash ground. "I'd hate to think we'd dragged him all this way just so he could become a floor decoration."
"He'll be all right," Luke said. "He's not using much power right now, and your droid fitted him with some extra power packs on the way in."
"Wait a second," Mara said, frowning. "My droid, Slips? I thought you said you came by X-wing."
"We came down to the planet by X-wing, yes," Luke said. "But we came into the system in the Jade's Fire. I guess I forgot to mention that."
"I guess you did," Mara said shortly, a flush of anger making Luke wince as it flowed through her emotions. "Who in blazes gave you permission—? Never mind. It was Karrde, wasn't it?"
"He pointed out that your Defender doesn't have a hyperdrive," Luke said, hearing the defensiveness in his voice. "Two people in an X-wing cockpit gets pretty cozy."
"No, you're right," Mara said reluctantly, and he could sense her forcing back her reflexive protectiveness toward the one thing in the universe she truly owned. "You'd just better have it well hidden out there. And I mean really well hidden."
"It is," Luke assured her. "I know how much that ship means to you."
"You'd better not have scratched the paint, either," she warned. "I don't suppose you thought to bring the beckon call?"
"Actually, I did," Luke said, frowning slightly as he dug into one of the pockets of his jumpsuit. For some unknown reason an old memory flashed back: the time he'd gone back to Dagobah and stumbled across an old beckon call from some pre-Clone Wars ship. He hadn't known what it was, but Artoo had remembered seeing Lando once with a similar device, and so they'd headed to Lando's mining operation on Nkllon to ask him about it. Arriving just in time, as it happened, to help Han and Leia fight off a raid by Grand Admiral Thrawn.
But why should that particular memory come rising back now? Because Mara was here, and he'd seen his first vision of her at that same time? Or was it something about that ancient beckon call—or the Fire's beckon call, or beckon calls in general—that was triggering something deep in his mind?
Mara was looking oddly at him. "Trouble?" she asked.
"Stray thoughts," Luke said, pulling out the beckon call and handing it to her. "You're not going to be able to call the Fire from here, though. We're way out of range, and I seem to remember the beckon call being strictly line-of-sight."
"No, there's also a broadcast setting," Mara said. "But the range is pretty limited. Still, there may be transmitters in the High Tower I can run the call signal through." She sent him one last glower on the subject. "Though you can bet I won't bring it out of hiding until and unless we can neutralize their nest of fighters. Speaking of which, you never told me what happened with the pair you ran into."
"There's not much to tell," Luke said, unhooking his lightsaber and igniting it. A quick swipe, and yet another stalactite blocking their path went crashing to the ground in front of him. "They told me to stay with them, then ran through a series of quick maneuvers. I thought at the time they might be looking for an excuse to open fire."
"More likely wanted to see what kind of craft and pilot they were dealing with," Mara suggested.
"That was the conclusion I ended up with, too," Luke agreed, stretching out with the Force to lift Artoo over the shattered stalactite. "Anyway, they waited until we were a few kilometers from the High Tower and then opened fire. I ducked into that series of canyons your record showed and managed to lose them."
Mara was silent a moment. "You said they told you to stay with them. They spoke Basic?"
"Eventually," Luke said. "But they started off with the same message you and Karrde picked up when that other ship buzzed by Booster Terrik's Star Destroyer."
"Karrde gave you that, I take it," Mara said, her emotions turning suddenly darker. "Did he give you the rest of it?"
"He gave me your landing data," Luke said. "Was there more?"
"Yes, and none of it good," Mara said. "Point one is that Thrawn's name is buried in that message. Point two is that your sister recovered a damaged datacard near Mount Tantiss that was labeled 'The Hand of Thrawn.' "
The Hand of Thrawn. "I don't like the sound of that," Luke said.
"No one else who's heard it does, either," Mara agreed grimly. "The question is, what does it mean?"
"You were called the Emperor's Hand," Luke reminded her. "Could Thrawn have had that kind of agent?"
"That's the first thing everyone else has asked, too," Mara said, and Luke sensed a brief flicker of annoyance from her. "That, or whether it could be a superweapon like another Death Star. But neither of those were really his style."
Luke snorted. "No, his style was to rancor-roll some brilliant strategy over everyone."
"Succinctly put," Mara said. "Still, the datacard came out of the Emperor's private storehouse, so it must mean something. Palpatine wouldn't have created disinformation just for his own private amusement."
"Well, whatever it means, it would seem our friends in the High Tower are somehow connected to Thrawn," Luke said. "I wonder if they could be a group of his people."
"Oh, there's a cheery thought," Mara growled. "Let's just hope the whole species doesn't have the same tactical genius he did."
"Yes," Luke murmured.
But even as he ignited his lightsaber to clear more of the rock from their path another sobering thought occurred to him. If the Hand of Thrawn hadn't been an assassin or special agent...
"You're thinking again," Mara cut
into his musings. "Come on, let's have it."
"I was just thinking that maybe the Hand of Thrawn might have been a student," Luke said, turning to look at her. "Someone he might have been grooming to take his place if anything happened to him."
"So where is he?" Mara asked. "I mean, it's been ten years. Why hasn't he shown up before now?"
"Maybe the Hand didn't think he was ready yet," Luke suggested. "Maybe he thought he needed more time or training before he could take Thrawn's place."
"Or else," Mara said, and in the harshly shadowed light of the glow rods her face was suddenly tight, "he's been waiting for just the right moment to make his move." Luke took a deep breath, the cool cavern air tasting suddenly a little colder. "Like the moment when the New Republic is poised to tear itself apart over the Caamas issue."
"It's exactly how Thrawn would take advantage of the situation," Mara said. "In fact, with Imperial resources whittled down to practically nothing, it's about the only thing he could do." For a long moment they just looked at each other, neither speaking. "I think," Mara said at last,
"we'd better get into that tower and see just what's going on up there."
"I think you're right," Luke said, turning his glow rod in the direction of their travel and boosting its power another notch. About five meters ahead, the passageway they were in seemed to open up into a large chamber, large enough at any rate to swallow up the glow rod's beam. He took a step forward—
And paused as a subtle sensation tickled at the back of his mind. Somewhere up ahead...
"I've got it, too," Mara muttered from behind him. "Doesn't feel like my usual danger warnings, though."
"Maybe it's not all that dangerous," Luke said. "At least, not to us." Artoo warbled, a sound that managed to be suspicious and forlorn at the same time. "He wasn't talking about you," Mara assured the droid. "You see it, Luke?"
