My Father
He promised me once, a long time ago, that he would always protect me, no matter how far apart we were, no matter how impossibly desperate the situation seemed. I – being the innocent, trusting child that I was – believed him. How foolish it seems now, that neither Mother nor I saw the events that were to come. Mother, who was too in love, too worried about my safety, too overwhelmed by the intrigues and plots and death threats that met us at every turn. I suppose I am to be forgiven my ignorance. At barely six years of age, most children are not expected to think much about the greater galaxy. Even royal children, like I once was, are entitled to some degree of unawareness.
He was very gentle and kind with me. I wish I could remember more than that, but after my mother's untimely death, when I was whisked away into the care of the Jedi, of a family I never knew existed, I was shielded from recalling anything more. Once I grew old enough to wonder and ask, I was told it was for my protection.
Protection. I no longer require anyone's protection. My training has seen to that.
Now I am expected to face him. Oh, they haven't told me that outright, but I know it in my bones, in my blood. I feel it in the whisper of the Force across my skin. Maybe they feel as old Kenobi once did, that the monster within had slaughtered the man, that no amount of faith could bring him back. But I think that my cousin, who has as much right to hate the Sith Lord as anyone else touched by his madness, believes as I do: there is still good in him, somewhere deep, in a place that used to love me enough to shake a galaxy.
I'm not sure if I'm ready to die for that belief. But when I am, then I will meet Darth Caedus and fight hard for the Jacen Solo I once knew. The great Jedi hero.
My father.