"Good morning, padawan," Eeth said, switching on the light. "It is time to get up."
Okay. So, over the past eleven years as an initiate in the creche, Raven could safely say that she had never actually 'heard' light before. At six in the morning, however, she was willing to accept anything as possible! She squinted and threw up both hands to block out the glare. "Ug, it's just a drill. No real fire," she mumbled unintelligibly. Raven had woken at seven thirty every morning for the past five years, and although she realised that some adjustments would have to happen, she had hoped it could wait a little longer… Perhaps another hour or so.
Eeth shook Raven's shoulder slightly to wake her completely from her dream. "No, this is not a drill," he said firmly. "I am really here to wake you up. So please do."
Raven entered a short tug of war over her pillow only to lose the fight in favour of scratching at tired eyes. It wasn't a dream! Dammit. She sat on the edge of her bed and stretched, only to flop backwards onto her bed. "I have an idea," she said to the ceiling, but decided against voicing it upon noticing that Eeth was still there, his expression now somewhat impatient. Fine, then, if that was how he was going to be about it. Raven rolled out of bed and thumped onto the floor melodramatically. Slowly, she backed herself up the wall; this sucked.
"A bit more self-discipline, please," Eeth said tersely. "I am expecting you in the common room in fifteen minutes, showered and dressed." He turned and left Raven to the arduous task of waking up and opening her eyes completely. Self-discipline was Eeth's favorite word. His former padawan, Lakhri, made no end of jokes about it. They tended to leave Eeth quite unamused, with Lakhri rolling his eyes.
"A bit more self-discipline," Raven mimicked silently to Eeth's retreating back. She wasn't happy about getting up this early and it showed. She dragged herself into the shower. The water seemed to do the trick and by the time she was dressed and ready, Raven felt human, almost.
Having made the mistake of going directly for the holo yesterday, Raven slumped into their couch and rolled into a ball. This wasn't bad at all, it was comfy and warm, just like her bed.
Eeth emerged from the kitchen, a couple of plates and cups in his hand, to find Raven on the couch. He frowned, set the dishes onto the dining table and went to stand before Raven.
"Padawan, when I tell you to join me in the common room, I do not mean for you to continue sleeping," he said sternly. "What I expect for you to do is to greet me properly and offer your help with setting the breakfast table. Up you get."
Raven unraveled herself and sat up at hearing Eeth's tone. She stared up at him, her expression piteous; it was probably not a good idea to start her day in his bad books which she had managed to do two days running now. Huffing, she got to her feet, offered a curt bow and said: "Good Morning, master. Can I help with breakfast?" There was a hint of sarcasm in her tone, but only a hint; truth was, she had been a bit impolite and she did like to help. Today, however, she was tired and grumpy.
"Yes, preferably without an attitude," Eeth replied, raising his eyebrows.
The slightly haughty expression evaporated at his comment, and Raven huffed again.
"You may finish setting the table," Eeth said. "I am currently toasting some bread. Would you like some tea? Or do you prefer milk or water?" On weekdays, he tended to prepare a more basic breakfast than he had done yesterday, without many options. He had little idea of Raven's eating and drinking habits so far.
"Water, please," she answered quickly; asking for tea was a mistake she wasn't going to repeat for a while. Given that Raven was still getting used to where everything was in her new home, the task took her a little longer than it would usually have done, but eventually the table was set and they were eating. Or more like, Eeth was eating and Raven was absentmindedly picking the butter off the top of her toast. Her placement tests were today, not that she was nervous about them or anything. She wasn't! Eesh, it was just to put her in classes, nothing more.
"Padawan," Eeth said mildly. "Eat at least a slice of toast. I will not allow you to take your tests on an empty stomach."
After their last discussion over her food habits, Raven was disinclined to argue with him. Thus, she picked up the piece of toast and took a bite without complaint. "When are the tests?" she asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
"At eight fifteen," replied Eeth. "Enough time for us to meditate before you leave. We can try whether moving meditation works for you if you feel up to it."
This grabbed her full attention. "I'm up to it," she told him. Because anything was better than trying to sit on her ass for half an hour.
"Alright," said Eeth. When they had cleared the table, he led her to an empty part of the common room and positioned himself next to her. "Pick a short sequence from a kata that you are familiar and comfortable with," he instructed. "The sequence should be no longer than three or four moves. And it should be one that you are able to perform in your sleep."
"Okay, the first sequence from the ninth kata." This was Raven's strongest kata. She knew that she could perform the moves blindfolded and on a tightrope if the occasion called for it. Raven zoomed through the first four moves of that sequence, making lightsaber sound effects for good measure. Then, she paused. "Do I get to use my saber while I'm doing this?"
Eeth, who had watched her with a slightly amused smile, shook his head. "Not at this point, and not in our common room. And you do not have to perform the moves this fast. It is not a competition. Perform them at a speed that feels right in the Force and matches the harmony of the pattern, then repeat them over and over. While you do this, try to focus on nothing but the flow of the moves and the Force. I will join you, synchronising my moves with yours. If it works out, it will help to enhance our bond. If it does not – well, we will have to do it another way the next time."
"So I do the moves but make them slow." Raven frowned. She didn't think it was possible to make kata boring, but he'd gone and done it.
"I did not say slow," Eeth said patiently. "I said at the speed that feels right to you for this particular kata. Go ahead. Or would you prefer to just kneel and meditate the way we did yesterday?"
Not as fast sounded like a euphemism for slow to Raven. Still, she wanted to try this and didn't think being a smartass was going to win her any favours. "No. I'll try it." And Raven did. She began going through the motions, not at the pace she had first tried, but at a rate that felt more subtle, and suitable for meditation. The movements had a nice rhythm to them, and soon Raven had closed her eyes.
Eeth waited for a moment until he sensed that she felt comfortable with what she was doing, then fell into her movements, perfectly synchronising his moves with hers. Immediately, her Force presence became clearer to him. There was a sense of harmony to the exercise that he liked and that usually worked a great deal towards strengthening the beginnings of a training bond.
Raven felt his presence gently tapping at the edges of her consciousness and concentrated hard on keeping the connection open. It seemed a lot easier to achieve this time, and she was finding the whole experience enjoyable. That said, it was obvious that this would be one area where it was simply a case of "practice makes perfect". She tried not to be so hard on herself; after all, it was only her second attempt at this sort of meditation.
Eeth was satisfied with the effort Raven was making, although she was still trying too much to achieve something, instead of just letting go. He told her as much when they were finished.
"But I think you are making progress," he concluded. "I am looking forward to sharing a fully established training bond with you. It is really something special."
"It feels special," Raven agreed. She wouldn't know how to explain how it felt special to anyone who asked, though, which was probably why Orion had struggled when she had asked him about it. "How long does it take to build a training bond?" Raven asked.
"Training bonds develop over time," Eeth replied. "It is impossible to determine the point at which it is not going to become any stronger. Maybe there is no such point. It usually takes a master and a padawan between two and three years to be able to talk to each other through their bond, though. A big advantage on missions."
Raven thought about that. Two years felt like a lifetime away. She was very much a 'now' sort of personality and found waiting for things painful! "What can you tell me about the placement tests?" Raven said, changing the subject as her mind had started to think about her next task.
"As I told you before," Eeth said patiently, "the test are designed to find out which padawan classes are appropriate for you. You will have to answer questions on the subjects you have been taught as an initiate. Maybe you will need to write an essay. Nothing you have to be afraid of. Normally, the results come in the evening of the same day. You will then be assigned a few mandatory classes and be offered a few electives for this term. Some of the subjects that you will study as a padawan are similar to those you had as an initiate, but there will also be a few new ones that are geared towards preparing you for field service, like Diplomacy and Treaty Negotiations, Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement, or the languages and cultures of the galaxy. Just do the best you can in the test and you will be alright. As always, I expect you to make an effort, not to achieve a particular result."
"Maths and physics are going to bomb," Raven cautioned him again. "Besides, I'm sure that every teacher I've ever had for those subjects has hated me, so if I'm stuck with one of them grading me they'll fail me without even reading it." That was not true, but she felt it would aid her plight to add it in. Raven also thought it a good idea to lower her master's expectations of her. Those two precautions, combined with not exactly trying very hard, would surely land her safely in the basic level classes for those subjects. It was a solid plan.
"Padawan," Eeth said firmly, "I doubt very much that any of your previous teachers 'hate' you. And I doubt even more that they would let their personal feelings towards you influence the grades they give you. In any case, the test will not be graded, it will simply be evaluated. And the evaluation will be performed by teachers from the padawan section of the academy who do not know you yet. The same thing goes for the teachers who will teach your courses. If you had problems with maths and physics, this is a chance to start over. I do not want you to approach any of these tests with a negative attitude. You are by no means stupid, and there is absolutely no reason why you should have poor results in any of the subjects covered."
"I know," Raven sighed. She had expected a response like that, after all. "Where do I go to take these tests anyway? Are they held where my normal classes are?"
Eeth stood up and walked over to the terminal, checking the message about Raven's placement tests that he had received the night before. "Your tests will be held in room 4015," he said. "That is in the junior padawans' wing of the academy."
"4015 – I think I can find my way…" Getting lost would help her to avoid taking the tests, but it was also a band-aid solution and so it was discarded.
"If you are unsure about your way," Eeth said, noticing her expression, "I can come with you. I have to walk in that direction anyway." He looked at his watch. "Time for you to go."
"Alright," Raven replied. She still wasn't happy about this.
It did not take them long to reach the room. "Well, here we are," Eeth said, stopping in front of the room where the tests were going to be held. "Try to do your best - even in maths and physics. Come home straight after the tests, please. We will have lunch at home today."
"Yes, master," Raven replied, unenthused. She stood outside for a while longer, but there was no point stalling; it wasn't like she was going to get out of this.
A young Twi'lek instructor was waiting for Raven already in what was a small meeting room, rather than a classroom. Raven was the only brand new padawan and therefore the only student to take the test.
"Padawan Trebeck?" the women asked. "I am Shanaya Paleen, a teacher in the junior padawans' academy. Please take a seat. There will be a number of tests for you to take today. They are bundled into three sets, each of which will take approximately an hour. You will be allowed to take a break between sets. Do you need to use the restroom or fetch a drink of water? If so, please do it now because there will be no time during the test."
"Three hours, really?" Raven groaned. "I don't suppose there is any way I can convince you to just put me in the basic level class for everything and be done with it?"
Shanaya laughed. "Want me to take that proposal to your master?" Of course she knew who the girl's master was. Temple gossip was fast. Even if the test file had not mentioned the details, Shanaya had been told by several people over the course of the past two days that Eeth Koth had taken a human girl as his padawan. And she supposed that Raven knew as well as she did what Eeth would have to say to her 'great idea.'
Raven sighed in defeat. "No, I guess not," she said and flopped into the chair. This was going to take forever!
And it did. As fate would have it, the mathematical section was last, and Raven's patience for this was already running thin despite the two breaks Shanaya had given her. She stabbed at the screen with her stylus, the heading 'Algebra' scrolling across the it. Raven sighed again, and this time, she felt her teacher's eyes on her. Not in a disapproving manner, but probably more out of interest. Shanaya most likely didn't have a problem with maths, or discipline, or anything else; she was a knight, after all. Raven looked at the questions and decided on a strategy: she would answer the easy questions and anything that looked hard she would just guess. By the looks of the questions, that would equate to answering two and guessing one. Given that Raven had zero luck with this subject, that pattern should ensure that her results would be low enough to keep her in the most basic class, but not so low that she had healers testing her for learning disorders. Yeah, it was a fine line there.
A little under an hour later, Raven finally finished and stood to stretch.
"Alright," said Shanaya, giving her a smile. "If you're sure you've done all you can, you may leave. The results, along with your list of classes and electives, will be send to your master's terminal tonight. Have a good afternoon."
In the meanwhile, Eeth had had an appointment with a Senate committee. He returned home at about the time that Raven's tests were over, carrying a box of exotic food he had bought from one of the food vendors on his way. He thought Raven would probably find it exciting. Most new padawans did; it was a change from what they knew from the creche.
"Hello, padawan," he said when Raven entered their quarters, looking up from where he was placing spicy vegetable fritters onto a plate. "I see you survived your tests."
"Barely," she said melodramatically, and gave him a curt bow in greeting. She eyed the box curiously. "I've never seen anything like that before. What is it?" There was a fruit that looked like something between an apple and an apricot, and the fritters Eeth was putting onto plates looked tasty.
"I brought it from a Senchi food stall," Eeth replied. "They are good cooks."
"Oh. Maybe you can take me there sometime?" Raven asked.
"When we next go out into the city," said Eeth. "Maybe next weekend."
"Yes!" Raven said excitedly. The idea of going into the city was truly thrilling! "What sort of things can we do in the city, other than eat?" she wanted to know. Raven could count the amount of times she had been into Coruscant on her hands, so this was definitely something she wanted to know more about.
"We could visit the Senate," Eeth said. "Or the markets. There is also a martial arts exhibition in the Historical Museum that we could look at."
"Martial arts exhibition? Neat! I want to see that." Raven said excitedly. She eyed a bowl of greenish-blue mush cautiously. After yesterday's threat about eating green goop for a week, Raven was now decidedly more careful with what food she served herself.
"Be careful with that one. It's hot," Eeth said, having noticed her eyeing it.
Raven nodded and put a teaspoon-sized blob on her plate. There, that was safe! She could eat a teaspoon of just about anything without too much trouble. She piled on a piece of each fruit, too. This looked good. Besides, he might have the entirely unreasonable expectation that she finish what she served herself, but he did say that he would never force her to eat food she didn't like. Tentatively she dipped her finger in the greenish-blue stuff to taste. "Whoa. HOT! hot hot 'ot 'ot!" she said while fanning her tongue and reaching for some juice.
"If you eat it together with the fruit, it is quite pleasant," Eeth advised her. "And just for the record, this is considered to be the hippest food on Coruscant at the moment."
Raven smirked at his terminology. The last word she expected Eeth Koth to have in his lexicon was 'hip'. He was full of surprises.
He was, in fact. right; the stuff was much nicer with the fruit. The food was good and it got her to thinking about going into the city again, because Force only knew what was out there that she had yet to discover; EVERYTHING! "So, next week we can go to the martial arts display, then?" Raven hedged, wanting a solid answer and a set date.
"Yes," said Eeth. "We could go and see the exhibition on Sunday. They even have a display of ancient lightsabers. It ought to be interesting."
"Ancient lightsabers! Cool. They'd be the ones you used as a padawan, then?" Raven said cheekily.
"More like the ones Master Yoda used as a padawan, actually," Eeth replied with a straight face.
Yep… One serve of balloon, heavy on the lead, thought Raven at hearing his response to her joke.
Eeth pointed to a bowl of brownish stuff sprinkled with red. "Are you sure you do not want dessert?"
Raven eyed the brownish stuff carefully. "Is it chocolate?" she asked, spooning a small amount onto her plate.
"No, it is a Senchi spice called cinga," Eeth replied. "It is a bit like chocolate, though. Very rich."
When they had both finished eating, Eeth asked Raven to wash the dishes while he dried them and put them away.
Raven did so without complaint. The task was not one that she was used to as creche had its own dining hall, and so it was kind of novel. When they were done, Eeth set her to fold a basket of bed linens. Then, he asked her to sweep the balcony while he scrubbed down the kitchen counter. Raven was Temple-raised, therefore, she was used to being put to work, but task after task after TASK? Unfair. The padawan took the broom but did not yet start the job. "You do know that we have cleaning droids, right? Shouldn't we be," she paused for dramatic effect, "oh, I don't know, doing something more Jedilike?"
"This," said Eeth sternly, "is Jedilike. We are trained to serve, padawan. We will not be able to do our duty if we get used to being waited on hand and foot by droids. That will make us lazy and complacent. A lot of your future work will comprise of menial tasks and I want you to perform them without complaint. Therefore, consider your chores good practice."
Raven crossed her arms, the broom handle wedging under her armpit and sticking out abruptly as she did so. "I'm not lazy. Droids are there for a reason," she shot back. His rationale might have been sound, but Raven did not want to admit that.
"You are there for a reason, too," Eeth replied firmly. "And that reason currently has little to do with fighting Sith Lords and everything with becoming a hard-working, dutiful apprentice. Now sweep the balcony."
"More like a hard-working, dutiful slave. The Republic has laws against this sort of treatment, you do know that, right?" Raven griped.
Eeth glared at her. "I know for a fact," he said in a dangerously quiet tone of voice, "that 'this sort of treatment' is vastly preferable to the sort of treatment you will receive if you continue arguing my instructions. Will you take my word for it or do you want to test me on this?"
Did she want to test him? No, not really. Still, she wasn't pleased. Raven snatched up the broom and stomped off to do as told, all the while muttering about having a slave driver for a master.
Eeth came after her in two fast strides, grabbed her by the ear, bent her forward and applied a hard swat to her bottom.
"Ow, my ear!" Raven complained. However, it was quickly forgotten about when the pain exploding across her backside trumped it. "Ow!" she hissed, the hand that had been clutching at her ear shooting back to rub.
"Lose the attitude," Eeth snapped. "Now. If you want to spend the entire afternoon doing chores, and doing them with a sore bottom, you are going about it the right way."
Raven wasn't happy about this, but she was decidedly unhappier about having been swatted. It hurt. Okay, so it wasn't the worst but it still wasn't something she wanted a repeat of. Resigned, she gave the only answer that would ensure it remained that way, namely: "Yes, master." And the moment he let her up she started sweeping.
Eeth left her to her task and went to the kitchen to perform his own. When Raven came to return the broom, he told her: "Fetch your gym bag. I booked us the obstacle course today."
Despite still sulking over having been swatted, Raven was excited at the announcement. "Yay!" A workout always cheered her up, and this obstacle course sounded like it had promise! She was dressed and ready in no time at all, and soon they were en route to gym room 8A.
Raven walked beside Eeth quietly. This was highly unusual as typically you could not shut her up. She was no longer sulking; now she felt guilty at having complained over something as stupid as some dumb chores. "Master?"
"What is it, padawan?" Eeth said quite gently. He never held a grudge. He tended to punish minor misbehaviour on the spot and then consider the slate clean.
Nor did Raven, well, not really. Did the occasional sulk count? She looked up at Eeth, noting that he didn't look pissed. It was hard to tell sometimes as Eeth was difficult to read, especially so for someone who was just getting to know him. "Sorry that I complained. I feel bad about that," she confessed, making sure that he was aware that this apology was as much about her as it was for him.
"Apology accepted," said Eeth, giving her a brief smile. He was fine with using punishments as a deterrent but obviously, some degree of insight was the prefered outcome.
Raven was a deep thinker. She tended to hang on to things and found it hard to let go, which could be both a good and a bad thing. Eeth's acceptance had been sincere, and she smiled. "I guess I expected to be doing all important stuff now that I'm a padawan." The confession was truthful. Naturally, Raven wasn't stupid enough to think that her life would be void of chores, but apparently she had had expectations that even she hadn't been aware of until then.
"You will," Eeth said mildly. "But in order to be able to do so, you have to learn many things. That is why padawans spend a lot of their time on lessons, chores and training. We will eventually go on missions, and once you are a bit older, missions will even take up a fair amount of your time. But you will have much, much better chances of making a difference when you have learned to do your duty, however unappealing it might appear. More often than you might be able to imagine right now, you will have to subordinate your own wishes to the needs of the moment. You will also be much better at the 'important stuff' once you are a proficient fighter, speak several languages, have learned about different cultures, their customs and political systems and so on. And we, as a team, will work far more efficiently when we know what to expect from each other, are able to trust each other blindly and have a bond that is strong enough to communicate through. Be patient. This is only your third day."
"Yes, master. I know. I will," Raven replied, and she really would try to be more patient. Raven was relieved he seemed to get it, though. "So, was it the same for you when you started? I mean, did you hate waiting for everything to happen?" she wanted to know.
Eeth paused for a while, considering the question. "No," he finally replied. "I'm not the type to spend my time wishing things were different from what they are. Besides, I trusted my master to know when the time would be right. I simply focussed on my training, and the first mission came around sooner than I had expected. It was extremely boring, though. I have to warn you that first missions often are."
Eeth's comment on the trust he had in his master was a bit of a slap for Raven. Did she trust Eeth? Yes, as much as any of her superiors, that was. Raven guessed that would change with time. She felt a bit like she was letting him down, though. "Sorry that I'm not what you hoped for," she said quietly. Raven wasn't generally an insecure sort of kid, but being guided to a master of Eeth's caliber meant she had to live up to expectations. Whose expectations, exactly, she wasn't sure. Her own, his, the Orders? Probably all of them.
Eeth stopped right in his tracks and turned around on his heel, having Raven nearly bump into him.
"Padawan," he said solemnly. "I did not say that. You wanted to know how I felt about this when I was your age, and I gave you an honest answer. I did not mean to imply that I had been expecting my padawan to be exactly like myself, nor did I ever remotely think along these lines. You have your flaws, as much as I had mine – and still have them. Yours are different from mine. The fact that impatience is among yours, and not as much among mine, only means that you will have to work on that specific problem while I had to work on others when I was your age. Nothing more, nothing less. It does not make you an insufficient padawan. But you will still not find me indulging your flaws and talking around them because that is not the way to help you deal with them. Do you understand what I am saying?"
"Yes," Raven replied evenly. "I get it, really. But, being your padawan is kind of a big deal, is all." What Raven wasn't saying was that she was beginning to entertain a little self-doubt. What if Rayan Haysh had been right? What if she wasn't good enough? She would have to find out more about Eeth's last padawan, Lakhri.
Eeth could only guess at Raven's thoughts but he knew what she meant by her statement. In a way, she had it harder than it had been for Lakhri. When Eeth had taken the boy as his padawan, he had been a fairly new, albeit talented and exceptionally committed, knight. Now, he was a member of the Jedi High Council. The fact that Raven had become his padawan would guarantee her a lot of attention, whether she wanted it or not.
"Being my padawan," he said calmly, "might be a big deal in the eyes of your peers but it definitely does not mean that I expect you to be perfect. I merely expect you to do your best."
He opened the door to the obstacle gym he had booked. "And in this case," he added, "I think you will quite enjoy doing so." Because this obstacle course included all the things he had found Raven liked and excelled at.
Eeth ran Raven through another strenuous training session, after which they returned home about half an hour before dinnertime. They had a quick dinner of sandwiches. Since she had no homework yet, he once again gave her the evening off and she left for the padawans' lounge.
Which Raven was thrilled over. She was still on a high from the obstacle course which had been the most fun she'd had working out in, well, in forever! She was practically vibrating by the time she arrived at the padawans' lounge that evening. This time, Raven was early as the place had been easy to find the second night in a row. Finding the same seats Orion and his friends had chosen yesterday, she sat to wait for them to arrive.
Bindi came in first. Raven recognised the pink Twi'lek and smiled when she spotted her and came over. They talked, and one by one the lounge began to fill up with padawans.
Orion arrived last. "Sorry," he said. "I've been held up by my master. He made me redo my Huttese homework and then he made me clean my boots." He pulled a face.
Raven could sympathise with the chores part, after all, Eeth had given her an afternoon full of them! Or so she would have complained to Orion…
"How did your placement tests go?" he asked Raven. "Do you know what courses you've been assigned yet?"
"Long and boring. Honestly, three hours. I think I died." Raven said melodramatically. "The good news is that I don't think I'll have too much trouble with my classes. I did my best not to do my best, if you know what I mean. I hope it was enough. I really don't want to disappoint my master with crappy grades."
Orion frowned. "Yeah, let's just hope he doesn't find out you didn't do your best on the test," he said. "If my master did, he'd probably blow his stack. And that's saying something." Master Deleon was usually serenity personified!
"I'm sure my master would have a fit if he found out, too. But there is just no way he can. Unless they develop some sort of meter to test for it, I can't see how he could find out."
"He might just ask you," said Bindi.
Mayra agreed, nodding his head. "She's got a point. Master's are horribly perceptive about stuff like that. Force knows I found that out the hard way."
"Our bond is really new." Raven started to say that he wouldn't be able to tell but stopped when the memory of the last time she had tried to lie to him came to mind. Raven had attempted to get into Eeth's advanced saber class by pretending to be Ithan Kord, a padawan who used to be in Raven's creche. That had not gone well at all. In fact, he had picked her out as an initiate almost immediately. Her stomach went cold and her mouth dried up. "Lets just hope he doesn't ask, then. I mean, I doubt he would. I did tell him I'm crap at that stuff."
"Well, good luck," said Orion. "I just hope you're not feeling guilty about it because he might pick up on that when you meditate with him. I find that it's become much harder to get away with stuff now than it used to be in the creche. You have this one person looking after you and they're on your case faster than you'd think. Anyway, send me your list of classes once you've got it. I hope you're in one of mine."
"And if you get offered diplomacy as an elective," said Mayra, "don't choose it if Master Baahr is teaching it. He's the worst. I once actually fell asleep in his class because he kept on droning."
"Master Jawrid is pretty good as far as diplomacy is concerned, though," said Bindi. And with this, they were into a long conversation about the merits of elective classes and their teachers.
Meanwhile, Eeth was busy jotting down a report when the comm unit alerted him to an incoming message. As expected, it contained Raven's test results and her list of classes. He studied both files closely and frowned. Yes, Raven had forewarned him at her lack of ability at anything maths-related, and her grades had not exactly been great previously. But her score was so low that it spoke of either a learning disorder or some serious neglect on her creche instructors' part. Knowing Master Lowfac, Eeth considered the latter option unlikely. Nor did he think Raven would have gone eleven years in the creche with an undetected learning disorder. He was entirely prepared to accept that Raven might not be as good a student, at her academic classes, as Lakhri had been, but having to start her padawanhood with remedial maths did not exactly bode well for her future career.
He decided to request her maths test files and find out more about the source of her difficulties. After all, he took his role as a master seriously. He wanted to know whether this was something he could help her with or whether professional tutoring would be required; and if he could deal with it, he needed to know where, exactly, Raven needed help.
A quarter of an hour later, the test files arrived. Eeth loaded them onto his datapad, sat on the couch and went through them slowly and meticulously. What he found made no sense. Raven had managed to solve all the junior creche level questions but none of the more complex tasks. These included a few questions that required the same techniques as the junior level ones, which Raven had obviously mastered. She had written down answers to all questions but many of these answers seemed nonsensical. If she could not solve the tasks, why had she even bothered guessing? Or was there some pattern to her guesses that he had not detected? He could not tell, since she had not detailed her calculations. He would have to ask her to explain how she had arrived at her answers.
By the time Raven was ready to come home, she had forgotten about the placement testing altogether. Unfortunately, when she entered their quarters to see Eeth with his datapad, a carefully neutral expression on his face, it all came flooding back. Maybe it was nothing; after all, she might have done okay. It was possible. "Master," she greeted him with just a hint of caution in her tone.
"Padawan," said Eeth calmly. "Pull off your boots and come. I would like to discuss your placement test with you."
