Anja glared at Zekk for a long moment. He endured her gaze without flinching, casually set down his stun stick, and reached back to retie the narrow thong that kept his own hair in place at the nape of his neck. A symbolic gesture, Jacen guessed.
Zekk’s hair was as dark as his past, yet he had learned to control it, to put it behind him. Anja, on the other hand, often spoke with anger about the life she had led; she barely kept her impulses in check, just as her headband barely kept her hair from flowing wild. Jacen glanced back and forth as the tension built between his two friends.
Finally Anja looked away and shrugged one shoulder. “You said yourself this was a lesson in control. I knew Jacen wouldn’t take advantage of the opening.”
Jacen’s mouth fell open in astonishment. But before he could speak, he saw Master Luke Skywalker emerge from the base of the Great Temple and gesture for him to come over.
“I have to go talk to Uncle Luke,” he said warily. “Can you two keep working for a few minutes without me?” He offered his lightsaber to Zekk and gave a tentative grin. “Without killing each other, I mean?”
“I can manage that,” Zekk said.
“Anja,” Jacen warned, “just remember that you can’t afford to make mistakes like that one against a real enemy. He won’t give you a second chance.”
She smiled her imperturbable smile. “Don’t be so sure.”
Jacen shook his head. Running a hand through his disheveled brown curls, he trotted off to where the Jedi Master stood in the shadow of the rebuilt pyramid.
“How’s the training going?” Luke Skywalker asked, his eyes on Anja and Zekk as they began to spar again. Anja’s acid-yellow blade swept out in a wild and furious attack, but Zekk parried her blows easily.
“She, um… has her own way of doing things,” Jacen said. “Kinda stubborn, you know?”
“So I’ve noticed,” Luke said. “I’ve spent several training sessions with her myself and—in spite of the talents you see in her—I haven’t been able to sense any Jedi potential at all. She doesn’t seem to make any connection with the Force.”
“Hey, that doesn’t mean it’s not there,” Jacen said. “Give her some time. She’s had a tough life. Maybe it’s just hidden somehow.”
Luke pursed his lips. “Perhaps. But if it weren’t for the fact that your father asked me to keep her here at the academy as a special favor, I’m not sure I’d allow her to stay. She has a deep shadow inside her.”
“Well, thanks for giving her a chance,” Jacen said. “I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.”
2
For the third time that morning, Tenel Ka replaced a cyberfuze on the Rock Dragon that did not need replacing. Beside her, Jaina hunched over the navigational console of the Hapan passenger cruiser, biting her lower lip. She used Em Teedee to run an unnecessary calibration check, while Lowbacca conditioned the already-clean outer hull with lubricants.
The three of them had felt inexplicably downcast, Tenel Ka thought, since the previous afternoon when Jacen and Zekk had chosen not to accompany them to the jungle. Today, the warrior girl had risen at first light from an unsatisfactory sleep and performed the most rigorous calisthenic routine she had ever devised for herself. She had hoped to purge any lingering resentment from her mind … but it hadn’t worked.
After that, she had scaled the outside of the huge Massassi pyramid, single-armed, wearing her briefest lizard-hide and using only her grappling hook and fibercord to assist her. This exertion had proved stimulating enough—and distracting enough—that she decided to go for a ten-kilometer run as well.
Jaina, having just finished a long Jedi meditation, had trotted up to join her. Although Jaina was fresh, she was not as strong a runner as Tenel Ka, and the warrior girl enjoyed the feeling that she could outdistance her friend at any time—although she chose not to.
As the two friends swung back toward the Great Temple on the last kilometer of their run, a third young woman joined them. Anja, looking rested and relaxed, had clearly not been out doing calisthenics this morning. But that did not make the situation any less irritating when the tanned older girl broke into a sprint and raced ahead of Tenel Ka and Jaina back to the Great Temple.
It didn’t help matters, either, when Tenel Ka noticed Jacen watching Anja with amused approval from his vantage point at the base of the Great Temple. She knew she shouldn’t have allowed the situation to disturb her, but she had retreated immediately, making some excuse about the Rock Dragon’s needing repairs. Jaina and Lowie had followed her. Jacen, Zekk, and Anja had not.
Jaina had moved the Rock Dragon out onto the open landing field, and for the next few hours the companions had worked in a heavy silence. Unfortunately, the activities they normally found so soothing had brought no comfort today. Tenel Ka grimaced and replaced another cyberfuze that was in perfect condition.
To make matters worse, her own normally well-controlled emotions were playing strange tricks on her. For the past several days she’d had a profound feeling of missing Jacen … and Zekk, of course. It didn’t make sense. It wasn’t as if the two young men were gone, as Lowie had been when he’d accompanied his friend Raaba to visit the Diversity Alliance.
No, Tenel Ka saw Jacen—and Zekk—every day. Yet somehow, each time she saw the smuggler girl Anja laughing with the two young men, most likely at some joke Jacen had told, Tenel Ka felt an ache that was almost physical.
Perhaps a change of scenery was the answer. If Tenel Ka could get away from Yavin 4 for a while, it might clear her mind—and she might be able to escape the constant reminders that Jacen no longer spent most of his free time with her. She found the pain as haunting and indefinable as the phantom pangs she sometimes felt from her severed arm.
Scowling, Tenel Ka touched a probe to a circuit, overloaded it to 10, 20, 30 percent more than its capacity. The cyberfuze finally failed in a tiny puff of white smoke. Tenel Ka nodded with satisfaction. As she began to replace the component, a loud Wookiee bellow drifted in from outside.
“Visitors?” Em Teedee said. “Why, whatever could he mean? We weren’t expecting anyone, were we?”
“I do not believe so,” Tenel Ka said to the little droid. The whine of sublight engines filled the air around the Rock Dragon. “Perhaps we should investigate.”
Jaina yanked the little silver droid’s leads free from the navigational console. “Well, then, what are we waiting for?”
“It’s Lando!” Jaina cried. Her spirits lifted even as the Lady Luck touched down on the stubbly grass of the landing field not far from the Rock Dragon. The sight of Lando Calrissian’s space yacht kindled a sense of excitement in her that had been missing for weeks. His visits always meant something interesting.
As usual, her father’s old smuggling buddy made a dashing entrance. With a burgundy cape fluttering behind him, he seemed to glide down the Lady Luck’s ramp, his dark handsome features lit by a dazzling smile. By the time he reached the bottom of the ramp and greeted Jaina and Tenel Ka with a kiss each on the hand, and Lowbacca with a friendly slap between his furry shoulders, Zekk and Jacen were running across the landing field toward them. Master Luke Skywalker followed at a more leisurely pace.
“Hey, what are you doing here?” Jacen asked.
“Are we going to GemDiver Station?” Zekk added. “I’ve never seen the place, but Jaina and Jacen told me all about it.”
Lando laughed. “No, not quite. I’m glad you kids are all here, though, because I have an invitation for you. A business proposal, really.”