There is such power here. The might of ages. The strength of rulers and conquerors. The will of the Dark Side. Korriban is everything to anyone who wants it all. The way of the Sith: Count Dooku is beginning to understand.

Through passion, I gain strength: It is the most important part of the Code of the Sith. Everything stems from passion. Everything begins with feeling. With emotion recognized, realized, captured, harnessed. Peace is a lie. There is only passion. And when Dooku looks upon this canyon of antique stone, gazes up at the sepia skies and tumorous cloud cover and muted red sun, and feels the arid scouring of the wind, he knows that this world waits for someone like him. It waits for he who would not scurry rodent-like in the shadows of the galaxy, but a lord—a lord!—who would claim his rightful place, a throne meant for the powerful. The strong. The passionate. The shadows are no place for the Sith.

Lord Sidious, of course, would disagree. But Dooku is starting to understand that agreement has no place in the lexicon of the passionate. For too long he has let others guide him, from the Jedi to Lord Sidious. But that is not the way of the Sith, is it? Others will recognize his might—or he will destroy them.

Dooku closes his eyes and breathes in the essence of this land of dead kings. Dust tickling his nostrils. The graveyard smell of centuries lost. There is no better place to train an apprentice. Immerse a neophyte in all that is the darkness, and they, too, will drink every ounce of its offerings.

Taron Malicos lies quivering in the dirt before him, smoke trickling from his scalded clothing and lightning-reddened skin. He has power, this man that those false pontiffs of the Jedi Council would call a master of their Order. He has the raw tools of an apprentice. But how Malicos denies it: How he lies too long in dust and defeat, waiting for Dooku to strike a finishing blow that will not come. He needs motivation. He needs urgency. So be it: Dooku will bring a new element to today's lesson. He will test if this so-called Jedi Master truly can embrace power. If he can truly rise as his apprentice—or if he is nothing more than another mewling Jedi.

"Your weakness disgusts me," Dooku muses as Malicos groans in pain. He considers unleashing another salvo of Force Lightning upon the man, but simple agony will achieve nothing. Malicos has fear. He has anger. But he is struggling to find hate—true hate, flame-kissed hate, the sort of hatred that will break a man down and forge him into a weapon sharper, greater, more resilient. "You surrender like a commoner. Like an animal. You are not even fit to be a Jedi."

Malicos turns over and laughs. A bitter, raw cackle. "Take as long as you'd like to kill me, Dooku. It's an honor to die amid all these tombs of dead Sith lords. If I die and become a ghost, I'll be sure to haunt their graves."

Dooku digs his heel into Malicos's lab-twisted left arm. He finds no enjoyment in the man's subsequent scream. Only disappointment. A Sith is above mundanities like physical pain. "You will not die here, Malicos. You will not die until I allow you to die."

"You're going to make me immortal now? I'm flattered."

"Perhaps," says Dooku. He seizes the mutilated arm as Malicos winces. "How much power I hold—how much power there is in the Dark Side—that you reject. With such power you would not be curled in the dirt like an infant. You would stand on your own two feet like a man. You would not be beholden to the misguided orders of a blinded Jedi Order; you would be a warrior, a conqueror. A leader who might shape a better future for the galaxy. You might become the man you were meant to be." Dooku tosses a lightsaber on the ground in front of Malicos. "But you are too weak for such things. You are too weak even to pick up this weapon and strike at me. So be it. Perhaps I shall find someone who can embrace that power."

That smug smile playing across Malicos's face evaporates when two MagnaGuards drag forth the object of today's lesson. A short, wiry, ragged-looking girl with filthy platinum hair. Bruises blanketing her face and arms. Abrasions on her wrists and ankles. What were once Jedi robes shredded to the point that they dangle from her bony shoulders. Dooku smiles when he sees recognition on Malicos's face. Yes. Danba Nago's Padawan. The one Grievous took in that battle above Teyr. The one you could not save. She, too, will die when I allow it.

Dooku grabs the girl's throat with the Force and lifts her off the ground. She chokes, gurgles, her spirit fragile and withered yet still hanging on. "What," Dooku murmurs as she struggles weakly, "is your name, child?" When she whimpers instead of answering he sets her down. She struggles to find her balance on battered and bruised knees, but Dooku will not tolerate weakness: He slaps her with the back of his hand and sends her sprawling. "Your name."

"Pella," she gasps, her voice hardly louder than the breeze.

"Pella what?"

"Pella Starseer."

"Then look, Pella Starseer, upon the man who might save you—if only he would find it in him to get up," Dooku says, rounding on Malicos. "A Jedi Master. Taron Malicos. Your masters would tell you to revere him. To follow his every teaching. Yet now he would only teach you to die here. He would teach you to forgo your strength and surrender your life for nothing, your death only ensuring that the galaxy has one fewer Jedi in it. He would teach you to give up. Is that what you want?"

Again the Padawan does not answer. Good. Dooku is not here for her, anyway. He spins and launches a blast of lightning. Electricity tears at Pella's beaten body and she shrieks and curls into a fetal position, crying as he relents. He picks up the lightsaber—her lightsaber—and ignites it. "Your weapon, Padawan. Your blade General Grievous took from you. I offer it. Take your sword and strike me down. Become a hero for your Republic and your Jedi. You can put an end to this war. All you need do is embrace your strength."

"Dooku," snaps Malicos, "if you want to torment someone, then I'm right here. Torture me all you want. Leave the kid out of it."

Dooku turns. He grins. "No."

Then he unleashes another cascade of lightning at Pella. "She is only the first, Malicos," he bellows over her screaming. "I will kill her, and then I will bring another. And another. And I will kill them all while you watch, for if you would sit by helplessly now, then you will always do so. The Jedi are nothing but animals fit for the slaughter. So watch as I rend onto you all that you deserve."

He grabs Pella with the Force and drags her, smoldering and moaning, to the cliff nearby, dangling her over it as she trembles. "Will you die so easily, girl?" he says.

But unlike Malicos, she acts. With what little ounce of strength she has left, Pella reaches for her lightsaber. The hilt flies up, the blade activated before it reaches her hand—but Dooku is too quick for her. He swats it aside with his own lightsaber, the scarlet energy alight in a flash. "That is it," he murmurs. "Fight. Feel your anger. Let it embolden you."

"No!" Malicos snarls.

And now Dooku knows. He has him.

Malicos stands. He grabs the lightsaber with both hands and charges like a man possessed, his face kindling and sparks, the blaze catching, burning, rising. Dooku tosses Pella to safety and intercepts Malicos as the Jedi—the Jedi?—brings down the Padawan's lightsaber. They lock blades, their faces inches from one another, the very air vibrating as if forced to life by some cloaked hand of a higher power, natural forces and human spirits taut with darkness and rage. There is fear. There is anger. There is hate.

Malicos releases the lightsaber lock and swings wildly, his movements bestial and untamed like a predator on the savage savanna of an uncharted world. Dooku counters: Precise, measured, in control. Civilized. Always on the defense. He will not back Malicos down now: The man must give in by his own volition, must attack, must seek to destroy Dooku for the sole goal of destruction itself. No words need be spoken. No further taunts need arise. There is only the fight.

They clash in a tombstone hush. There is only the pounding of their feet and the panting of their breath and the dazzling of their weapons. Dooku lets Malicos force him towards the cliff edge. Lets him give in to the rush of victory, to the thrill of killing a hated enemy. He defends just capably enough to appear the talented Sith he is, yet sloppily enough to seem weaker than his foe, to appear capable of defeat. Then, when he has no further room to retreat, he strikes.

Dooku parries Malicos's strike, drives his lightsaber against the ground, and then blows him back with a push of the Force. Malicos rushes him again, but Dooku is quicker: He pivots, steps around and through Malicos's charge, and kicks the back of his knee. Malicos crumples. Yet as Dooku moves to launch a blast of lightning, Malicos spins off his good leg, pulls back his inhuman left arm, and unloads a push so strong Dooku flies back as if weightless. He only just lands on his feet as Malicos surges at him again, storm-bidden, primal. Dooku sends another blast of lightning. Malicos catches it in his left hand like a Jedi with three times his experience and training, as if he is some barbaric incarnate of Master Yoda risen from the Sith-warped earth. Dooku grits his teeth and concentrates. He hones his attack, now blasting bolts of lightning with both hands, pushing as much Dark Side energy as he can bear against his opponent.

And then, when Malicos's rage seems ready to drive back Dooku once more, his power fails him. His inexperience and lack of control collapse his concentration and Dooku's lightning strikes him in the chest. He falls, howls—but this is no scream of pain. It is the shout of the sword-bearer, the battle cry of the warrior who will not content himself to watch the wars of the world pass him by.

The strength in him.

A powerful Jedi he was.

A powerful Sith he will become.

There is a shy sort of tranquility here. Even if it hides amid these noble-ruled hills and under a wide blue sky marred by a steel ring of orbital shipyards and stardocks, the summer-sprung beauty of Kuat is a peaceful, quiet friend. It is there in the plains of tall green grass with no one in sight for miles. It is in the little middle-class servant towns at festival time with song and dance and cheer as natural as breathing. It is there in conversations where no mention of war and Separatists and death has a place. Even if the haughty, insular nobles who dominate this world might look down upon such sentimentality and commoner norms, Kuat's reputation for exclusivity and arrogance misses the little kindnesses that few will ever see. It's the little things that few others in the galaxy know, or are even allowed to know about. But Tamri is happier for having known them.

And, perhaps, that feeling is infectious. When she meets Sae again having spent nearly two days apart, her master is not plagued by her usual dour frown. Instead she's sitting in the grass just as she was when they spoke of a family Tamri never visited, hands stretched behind her, face strangely peaceful. Almost as if those two days apart before tonight's noble gala at the noble house of Tirell's estate weren't just for Tamri's benefit.

"Hey," says Sae when Tamri approaches. She does not ask her apprentice what she did, where she went, who she met. There is only that simple greeting, that understanding that some things need not be known even between two people so close. They are quiet for a while, the two of them sitting side-by-side looking out into the beaming-sun afternoon until Sae adds, "I got something for you to wear tonight. It's back at the ship."

"We're not just going in our Jedi stuff?"

"We need to look the part," says Sae. She glances at Tamri as if to add something, but she holds back. "Nobles like their appearances. We should fit in."

Tamri frets. "Aren't we just going to speak to Master Cordova?"

"We are. And for anything else interesting. We're going to be there anyway."

Oh. Tamri smiles. She has a feeling that part was meant more for her sake than for the mission's. It's a gala, nobles and…and whatever else nobles do. They have never done something like this in all their assignments rooting through the galactic underworld. It's a nice change. Maybe a few days apart was really all she and Sae needed. She had expected Sae to ask the uncomfortable questions: Where have you gone, who have you seen, what have you done. That her master does not ask them is a welcome thing. A happy thing.

Come sundown they stand before what Tamri can only believe is a palace sprung out of fantasy. Nobles and the rest of Kuat truly are worlds apart despite sharing the planet: From the front lawn where gleaming luxury speeders and gargantuan sky yachts cluster, the Tirell estate looms as large as the entirety of the town of Alaren. Like a gilded mountain atop a spotless plain. Marble statuary in the nude, polished-granite walks slithering through a hedge maze vast enough to swallow a corvette. Gems and gleaming lights and glitzy dresses. The mansion's glow is bright enough to cast its own dawn to throw back the encroaching night, as if nature is not regnant on this world but merely another vassal to kneel before titled masters.

Sae sums it up perfectly: "It's a bit much."

"We're going to find Master Cordova here?" says Tamri. This seems like the last place to find an eccentric old Jedi. She expects they're more likely to run into Chancellor Palpatine tonight than Eno Cordova.

"The Tirell family is supposed to have an impressive historical archive," Sae says. "Guess it has whatever he's looking for."

"Still…"

"Yeah, I know. It's a bit much."

Tamri frowns and wrings her hands. All around are turned-up noses, vulpine faces, measured words, guarded feelings. It's such a far cry from the exuberance and emotion of the town and the festival, where life and the Force flowed riverine through the streets. The beauty here is ephemeral; the magnificence goes only as far as the eye can see. Walls behind walls behind walls. There is a darkness here in this elite enclave, not of fear nor anger nor hatred but of suspicion, paranoia, wealth, influence.

As if knowing what she feels, Sae puts a hand on her shoulder. Just a passing thing: At once she takes it off, looks away, and says, "It'll be fine."

"Yeah, it's just…" Tamri says, trailing off.

Sae looks at her for a moment. Then she puts her arm around Tamri's shoulders abruptly, as if she does not even know what she is doing. "It'll be fine."

Tamri nods. Smiles. It's not the garden at the Jedi Temple, but at least they're together, and not just physically. It's all she needs. It'll be fine.

Sae has one thing right, at least: They look like they belong. Tamri has no idea where her master found a sense of fashion in the last two days—or if it was always there and the likes of Nar Shaddaa never offered a chance for it to shine—but her dress is black and gold and beautiful, a swirling gown of waterfall fabric cascading from shoulders to ankles. Like a portal to another time in another world: The Tamri Dallin she might've been had the Jedi never come. Had she still just been the eldest daughter of a regional noble family.

Had she even cared enough to meet them. But here and now she is just a Jedi on another quest at another place in another time. The danger in the noble night contrasted with the mystique and the majesty. One night in these shoes is enough for her. One night for this lifetime.

Not far beyond the two-story-high double marble front doors of the noble estate—thrown wide open to bathe the night in the titanium-white crystal glow of the vault-like entry hall—a tall, composed young man with long, slick red hair meets them. The golden half-moon overhead beams in his perfectly-kempt mane. "Masters Jedi," he says, bowing—left leg back, right hand to chest, left arm out, practiced, perfect—"welcome."

In the next moment, Tamri witnesses perhaps the most surprising sight she will ever see. Sae executes an elegant curtsy as if she was no Jedi; as if she was the one born here. When Tamri, tentative, tries to mimic the move, Sae grabs her arm to stop her. "An honor to receive an invitation," says Sae. As if, Tamri thinks, her master wouldn't have just snuck in here anyway had the Tirell family rejected their request to meet Master Cordova. "Sae Tristess, a knight of the Jedi Order. My Padawan apprentice, Tamri Dallin."

The man's eyes flick Tamri's way at the mention of her last name. "Gasten Tirell," he says, looking back to Sae. "I am Mistress Daleza Tirell's eldest son. My mother would very much like to speak to you, Madam Tristess."

An invitation for one, then. Tamri shields her disappointment as Sae smiles politely. "Of course. At once," she says, her voice so much softer and higher than usual as if some sprite from the ether has taken residence inside Sae for the evening. Camouflage needs to fit the environment—so went one of her lessons a year ago. Of course, that had been on urban Carratos in the middle of a smog-choked factory district where disguises meant a whole different manner of unpleasantness…"Please, if you'll allow me just a moment to speak to my apprentice."

"Take your time," says Gasten Tirell, but the muted shade of annoyance in his eyes says anything but.

Sae pulls Tamri aside, out of the line of sight of the Tirell scion. "I expected this," she murmurs, her eyes like half-moons, drooping with suspicion.

"Expected what? That—"

"Shh. Keep your voice down," urges Sae. "I never thought these people actually wanted to invite us here. We're unwelcome guests. But no one's turning down an order from the Jedi, and so they're going to get as much out of us as possible." She looks over her shoulder to ensure no one is listening in before continuing. "If the head of the house wants to talk to me, sure. I'll talk. So you have the important job tonight."

"Doing what?"

"Finding Eno Cordova."

Tamri scrunches up her face. "I thought these Tirell people were going to bring us to him. He's here studying from their archive, after all."

"Who knows? I don't trust their intentions—anyone with power just wants more, and that goes doubly so for powerful families and the like. So tonight, go mingle. Smile and keep your eyes and ears open. And when you have a chance, get away from the gala and scout out the estate. Try to find our reclusive Jedi Master on your own," she says. She reaches into her dress's pocket and removes the holocron from Ossus. "Here. Take it. Tuck it away in your pocket and keep it safe."

"You're giving it to me? You're the one who figured it out."

"You know where we need to get to, Tamri. I'll keep these pretentious people busy as long as possible. All night, if I need to. You find Cordova, show him that holocron, and see what he knows. And find us a way to Korriban," says Sae. She moves as if to return to Gasten Tirell, thinks better of it, and places a hand on Tamri's shoulder. "Remember to have some fun, too. It's a party, after all."

Then she is gone, scarlet gown swishing in the temperate breeze as she takes Gasten Tirell's arm and wades towards the manor. Tamri cups the holocron in her hands. That strange warmth in her master's voice. As if some nurturing spirit has found residence within her and blooms in some settled corner of Sae's heart. The skeptical, suspicious part of her is still there, for sure—the narrowed eyes, the guarded planning—but whatever Sae has found in these last two days, Tamri likes it. It's hope, the thought that the ghosts of Ossus and Belderone and Master Gallia might pass them by with the passing of days, pain receding into the past until it is nothing more than a sore spot on raw midwinter nights, nights so far removed from these hot summer eves.

Stay, spirit. For tonight and for many more nights.

With a smile—and she does not need her master to prompt her—Tamri heads into the estate.

Wine and lace and polished stone. Glow and glamour and glaze. This may be some average party for the rest of the guests, but to Tamri it is like a new life entire—a thing she has never seen, an event so foreign to her world that it must be from another realm, another cosmos. She has seen Hutt fortresses and crime dens and blood-spattered luxury yachts, but never before has she seen so much extravagance on display.

Keep the mission in mind: Find Eno Cordova. But no one here looks remotely like a wizened old Jedi Master—there are ladies in flowing dresses of pink and lavender and cloudless-sky blue with faces like masks and expressions of lies. There are men who offer one hand in greeting and curl the other behind their back, where might they clasp a knife or blaster or recording device. There is, perhaps most strangely—or maybe not strangely at all—not a single non-human in attendance, even among the velvet-robed staff. The cold-blooded sameness unsettles Tamri. When she stares in any one direction long enough the colors blend together, the lights swirl and become one, and the idle chatter and restrained laughter thunders into a muffled rumble like the snarling of some foul-tempered beast roused from hibernation. Even the smells, the sugar-sweet and citrus-sour and every pleasantry in between, have a sickly tinge when Tamri focuses on them for too long.

With little direction and no idea where to find Cordova, Tamri does what she has always done on her missions with Sae—she blends into the background. Everyone here wants to be seen and wants to speak, and beneath the breeze of their bluster and the darting cones of their gazes Tamri moves about like a mouse. She listens; she lurks. If Sae has taught her anything, it is how to gather information, and no matter how guarded any of these moneyed guests may seem, everything about them, from their gazes to their gowns, gives something away.

Here an older couple—the woman a whole head taller than the man—mutters and casts ugly glances at a trio of debutantes clustered about near a table laden with cheeses and clucking like hens. Loose lips and careless words—an eldest son cavorting with the wrong lover, eldest daughters of rival families scheming to entrap him. Nothing useful, but Tamri is just getting started. She flits between food tables laid lengthwise down halls fit for kings; she traipses in and out of lounges where, she imagines, corporate magnates and economic titans might move glasses of fine brandy alongside billions of credits. Inside of an hour she has learned the names of half of the people here, along with, among other useless facts, that no less than five of the Tirell servants have slept with the second daughter of one of the most powerful families on the planet.

Maybe it won't help her find Eno Cordova any faster, but the useless tidbits knowledge makes Tamri smile. She can't grasp the Force like many other Padawans her age. She'll probably never be a hero like the legendary Jedi, like Anakin Skywalker, like Master Windu. But she can help in her own ways. She has skills. She can contribute. She isn't as worthless as she often tells herself she is.

She also isn't perfect. As she listens in on a few old men chatter—some old Jedi scholar here researching dead aliens, or something to that end. Why we entertain that sort of religious schlock on a world like this is beyond me; the Jedi have long since outlived their purpose—a sharp-faced young woman behind her clicks her tongue and takes hold of Tamri's sleeve. "What is this rag you are wearing?" the woman sneers as Tamri turns.

"It's a dress," Tamri murmurs as two cronies sidle up on either side of the young woman. "I think it's pretty."

"For an off-worlder, maybe," the woman scoffs. "What are you, one of the servants?"

"No. A guest."

The sharp-faced woman looks offended. "Guest of who? Who are you?"

Under attack, Tamri momentarily forgets herself. Lets down her guard. Reveals a word too much in her attempt to start again. "My name's Tamri. Tamri Dallin. It's good to meet you."

Her stab at diplomacy falls flat as the young woman laughs in her face. "O-oh. No wonder I've never seen you before."

"I guess the Tirells are inviting anyone to these things these days," one of the others sneers.

Wordlessly and with upturned noses the noble women turn on their heels and flit away, the knife of their attention already turning to a new victim, hurt inflicted and quickly forgotten. But not to Tamri: Silently she stands and watches them leave, rubbing her arms, mouth slightly ajar. She has dodged blaster bolts on mean streets, shrugged off curses from down-on-their-luck drunks, and swum through spice dens buried in Outer Rim spaceports, but these few, pointed words inflict a new sort of pain. Once Sae told her of her family two days ago, all manner of possibilities bloomed in Tamri's imagination. Certainly they were nobles, but beyond that? She has sisters. A mother and father. Perhaps they were charting the course to a better world. Perhaps they were serving the greater galaxy. Perhaps they were no more ambitious than a strong family, caring for one another, looking out for one another—but is that so bad? Yet these socialites speak as if she is worthy of scorn. As if she is marked merely by association with some lesser kind that dare not tread upon such sacred ground.

Perhaps it is better if she had never known. Perhaps it is best that she decided not to meet her family, never experienced disappointment in the first place. Reality has a knack for disappointing even humble dreams.

With thoughts of Eno Cordova and the mission fleeing from mind, Tamri retreats into the overlooked corners of the party—if only because now she fears that some other member of the Dallin clan might be here, that she will see something that she never should see. This, she thinks—this is why the Jedi separate their members from their birth families. So easy it is to get caught up in what might have been, what could be. The path of life diverting among all possibilities greater and lesser. Is this sort of thinking what corrupted Count Dooku? Did he look into the annals of his personal history, into the legacy of a noble family on Serenno, and turn in kind from the Order? Tamri closes her eyes and tries to avert her thoughts. No. She won't let such things happen to her. Won't she?

Slowly, softly, the whisper of muted music draws her from her rumination. It's a subtle melody, haunting note after note drawing together like woven thread. Rises and falls. Slow, steady rhythm. Tamri drifts ethereal through the gala, undisturbed by the socializing nobles as if she is the only one there, as if the music sounds for her ears alone.

In a lonely study with a wood-paneled floor she finds the song's source. It's a techno-harp, an automated stringed instrument the size of a full-grown man with mechanical arms plucking away at the notes. No one playing. No one—save her—listening.

It is not just her, though. From behind come velvet-soft footsteps, measured, grandfatherly. Weathered Jedi robes brushing along the floor. An old man with an honest smile and a quiet spring in his step despite his age. His hair reduced to little more than grey fur clinging to his temples, yet sunbeams glisten from his eyes. Curiosity inflects his words, summertime warmth in his voice: "It's a beautiful song, isn't it?" he says, eyes meandering between Tamri and the harp. "The Waltz of the Water-Nymph. Old, old song. Maybe a thousand years old, and from where it comes, no one knows. Only the beautiful melody remains. All to take away is how you feel in the moment as you listen." He runs his hand over the ivory spine of the harp as if it is alive, as if his touch can coax out just a few more notes while the song winds down. "It's a sad thing that only the two of us are here to hear it end. But also a happy thing."

Lonely tenor beats drifting away like a passing breeze, like too-soft conversation teasing from down a hall. Tamri clasps her hands behind her, lets her shoulders relax, and listens—just listens—for this moment as the song ends. Fading beauty. But there nonetheless, even if for a moment. Then the moment is gone and her reality returns, her mission, her duties. What she and Sae have come here tonight to do. She glances at the hem of his robes and says, "I think you're who I came here to speak to."

"There is only one way to know," says the old man. "For whatever reasons both you and I have for being here, only the Force can say what might come of it. And I felt it in you when I saw you—not a strong thing, not a loud, noisy pulse, but the Force is not always loud. It does not have to be. But I can feel a tension in you, too. Questions. Anxieties. So come with me, away from the noise and banter of the party halls, child." He smiles and waves his hand to usher her forward. "After you, Jedi."

It takes only minutes for Tamri to feel completely at ease with the old man. His warmth, his openness, his self-deflecting honesty—it is a mile and more from what Tamri has come to expect from veteran Jedi. Even beyond Sae's typical pragmatism—Tamri sees most Jedi Masters and Knights as mission-focused, dutiful, caught up in the Code. But not this Jedi. "Eno Cordova, they call me," he says as they leave the din of the gala behind and head like refugees into the quiet of the estate's innards. "A Jedi by trade. But it is the Force that matters to me more than the Order."

"Aren't those kind of the same things?" says Tamri, a step behind him. Tirell household servants pass by here and there in these shushed halls with only a single glance thrown Master Cordova's way. Clearly he is known. Welcomed.

"Once, maybe. But the Council and I have not seen eye-to-eye on many things as of late. Things beyond just the war," says Cordova. "But this is not the time for such dour talk. The family here, the Tirells—they told me a Jedi was coming to see me, but they were scarce on details. I feel they rather like having me around. It increases their noble prestige, the ability to boast that a Jedi comes to seek the wisdom of their archives. As it is, I don't believe we've ever met before, whether in the Temple on Coruscant or anywhere else across the stars."

"I'm Tamri. Er, Padawan Tamri Dallin. I'm, uh, actually here with my master," says Tamri. Her words come quickly, jumbled. Suddenly she feels as if she has no idea what to say. "I could find her, if—"

"You have already found me," says Cordova. "I am sure your master has faith in you, Padawan Dallin. If it is business the two of you have with me, then let us speak of it, you and I." He looks up as they enter a vast room with a vaulted ceiling, all rose-brown wood, shiny by spit and polish. "Come into my home, as it may as well have been for the past month. The Tirells' archive."

It is a library to rival any private holding on Coruscant. Holorecords gleam like slitted eyes from tens of thousands of slots along cliff-like shelves. Maroon velvet couches and smoldering candles of incense harken back to times of myth, when wizened old men and women might recline by fireplaces and page through tomes of parchment and paper. It is silent save for the two of them, scents of cedar and nutmeg just strong enough to be noticeable. To Tamri, it is a single room that puts the rest of the estate to shame. "So much," she breathes, eyes drifting along the shelves. "All just locked away here. What'd you come to find?"

"I've always," says Cordova, stretching his hands wide and looking up at the records, "been a student of history. Forever it has fascinated me. Old things, ancient things. Lives. Worlds. People."

"For its lessons?"

He chuckles. "That's the Jedi Order in you talking. Madam Jocasta would be proud. But no, I don't think it's the lessons of history that drew me. I was once a boy, believe it or not given this old face, just as young then as you are now. I had a bountiful imagination. Vivid dreams. From the halls of the Jedi Temple I imagined everything that could be, anything that might've been. My own master tried to temper that part of me. Live in the moment, he would say. The Force is here around us, here and now. I suppose he wanted me to get out of my head and grow up," he says. "So perhaps I'm just an old man who never grew up all the way."

Tamri smiles and looks away. It's infections, Cordova's warmth. Disarming. He looks about as threatening as a puppy—no Anakin Skywalker charging into battle is Eno Cordova—but there is a vivacity to his words, his enthusiasm. Passion. Love. As if the man is constantly in motion even as he stands old, still, and wrinkled. How it must be to have a master like that. Rather than…well. Quickly she tamps down on that line of thought.

"In truth, this archive holds a number of old texts about lost alien races, people and species who came and went long before the Republic began," continues Cordova. "For years I've been studying one race in particular, the Zeffo. A fascinating people, and one tied to the Force by the very nature of their species." He stops. A wry grin. "But you're not here to listen to an old man ramble. Come, Padawan. What can I do for you?"

"Actually, my master and I are looking for old things," says Tamri. She pauses. "Er, not old like—"

Cordova laughs. "One day you too will be old. It's its own reward. And sometimes an unpleasant backache when you wake up."

Knowing she will only keep stumbling over her words, Tamri produces the Ossus holocron from her pocket. "We wanted to ask you about this. My master knows your old Padawan, and she said you might be able to help."

"Cere pointed you my way? It's a small world, the Jedi Order," says Cordova. "But just a holocron? I'd think it would be easier to find a historian at the Temple."

Tamri hesitates. He is not wrong. But she won't speak ill of Sae's hesitation to take the holocron back to Coruscant, even if she disagrees with it. Her master must have some good reason. She needs to be patient. "We found it in an old ruin on Ossus," she says. Simple. Truthful.

"Ossus?"

"Yes, it's—well, here, it's easier if I show you."

Quickly she unlocks the holocron—there is no ignorance, there is knowledge—and just as quickly pulls up the hologram of long-dead Jedi Odan-Urr. His serious, measured voice, four thousand years since it once rumbled from his throat, reverberates here in the lonely library as Eno Cordova listens without saying a word. The Jedi took hostage Kressh's apprentice, Harson Vei, speaks Odan-Urr, just as clearly as the holocron sounded when Tamri first heard the recording in hyperspace after fleeing Ossus, who spoke of a world-ending danger Kressh took to his grave to keep out of Sadow's hands. That grave is too on Korriban according to Vei's testimony, far beyond my reach, and yet I cannot help but wonder at what Kressh had. Was it a weapon? An insight? A grasp of the Force beyond our understanding?

"Korriban?" muses Cordova once Tamri stops the holocron's playback. Then he is quiet, fingers stroking gently, aimlessly, through the humble gray of his beard.

"We think it's worth looking into," says Tamri, if only to add something to the silence.

Cordova frets. "The Council believes Dooku has this…weapon? This insight of the ancient Sith?"

"I…I don't know. I guess they must, since they sent us to Ossus."

"What do you feel, Padawan? If you do not know, let the Force guide you. What do your instincts say?"

Tamri bites her lip and looks at the frozen hologram of the long-dead Jedi. "It's a Sith world. There's nothing good there. And I guess we don't know how to reach it for a reason," she murmurs. "But if we can help stop something even worse from getting loose, then we have to at least try and do something."

Cordova smiles, but not as he did before. There's a sadness to his smile, a tired melancholy, as if he has seen tragedies before and knows that they will come again. "It is the homeworld of the Sith," he says, looking away from Tamri into the shadows of the library, eyes squinting as if seeing something lurking there, "and no darker place is there in the galaxy. The Sith Lords of old that Odan-Urr speaks of on the holocron, Naga Sadow and Ludo Kressh…I know of them. Five thousand years ago they fought for control of the Sith. Sadow, the victor, then invaded the Republic and nearly toppled it in the Great Hyperspace War. These were not Sith like Count Dooku; these were monstrous men, Force-wielders of arcane and abhorrent dark powers that have long since been lost—and a good thing that is. I have never been to the planet myself, but I do know the way through a tangle of hyperspace turbulence that reaches it."

"Can you help us?"

He sets his jaw. "I don't know what you would find there, but whatever it is, you would be best off burying it there and forgetting it. In such twisted places, the Dark Side can corrupt anyone. Even the greatest of Jedi."

Tamri takes a long, slow breath in. "Is that how Jedi fall to the Dark Side? Count Dooku was a Jedi Master. Is that how he fell?"

"No," says Cordova. "I can tell you how to reach Korriban, but…no one falls to the Dark Side, Padawan. The Force has a will of its own, and that includes the darkness. The Dark Side comes for you. And on a world as dark as Korriban, the only light that will rise to challenge it will be the light you carry with you. Can you hold back the darkness, Padawan? Even when it is all around you? Even when it is the only thing around you?"

Tamri knows she cannot answer truthfully. In truth, she does not have a good answer. She has faced darkness in slums and crime dens and the worst of urban hells in her journeys with Sae, but in her first real confrontation with the Dark Side itself—when Count Dooku pounced on them at Ossus—all she could do is run. And if she sets foot on Korriban, the world of the Sith itself, there will be nowhere to run to.

But Sae has said that they must keep going, and even though she might fail herself—so often she fails herself—but she will not fail her master. So she straightens her back, raises her brow, and says, "Yes. I can."

Sae lurks alone in the night and drinks.

She expected…not this. An invitation to a noble gala brought to mind every foul event and instance she has ever seen the wealthy get up to. Schemes. Drama. Assassinations. White-collar crime. She had come here tonight ready for more of the same. When the Tirell boy at the gate had approached her and Tamri and blustered about the head of the house wanting to speak to her, Sae's guard had risen even higher. Yet what had come with it? A thirty-minute conversation with a boring, rich old woman with little to do in her sprawling estate besides throwing parties for people half her age? Sae had thoroughly sniffed out every corner of the manor inside of two hours, and the only thing she had found was pretentious nobles gossiping and blustering. No guns pulled. No attempted kidnappings. Sae had expected danger and come away with only boredom. No one was planning anything truly malevolent, and no one was even expecting it—no one save her.

At least Tamri did well with Cordova. The girl certainly needed a shot of confidence, and she delivered. Found the old Jedi Master, spoke with him, convinced him to show the way to Korriban. Even earned a smile and some details about what was on the holocron. Sae had watched their meeting from a hiding spot in the shadows. Her apprentice is growing up—handling her work, standing up for herself. And she seemed to enjoy herself amid the stuck-up noble partygoers. The sight of her smiling has been worth the trip here. Somewhat.

Only somewhat. Because as much as Sae tries to encourage her apprentice, she feels a hole in her gut as she thinks of Tamri growing and becoming more independent. Even if Tamri is far, far from prepared to tackle the Jedi Trials—even if she may never be ready to tackle them, given her weakness in the Force—every day she moves a little bit further from the hapless girl Sae found her as and towards the woman she might become. Sae should feel proud. The selfless thing to do would be to keep encouraging the girl. Give her all she needs and then let her loose to challenge the world. She shouldn't want Tamri to need her forever.

But Sae is not selfless. She realizes, as she leans here against a third-story balcony at the Tirell estate, the gala still blurring all around, Tamri and Cordova still probably talking in that library, that she is alone. That is what this has all been leading up to, isn't it? This pit. That shadow that has been following her. Everything she has fades. Everyone leaves in the end. Her Jedi friends who have died in the war. Master Gallia. Even Obi-Wan, still alive but out on the frontier battles of the war, the two so rarely seeing each other these days. Only Tamri is here with her, day after day after day. Only Tamri is reliable in that sense, the one person Sae knows will still be around when she wakes up every morning.

One day, though, she won't be. Maybe that's because she'll become a Jedi Knight of her own merit. Or maybe it's because that vision from Ossus will come true. Maybe it's only then, when it's too late, that she'll admit—truly, honestly admit—that she needs the girl just as much as the girl needs her. Just as much—or more.

Sae swishes the dregs in her glass and looks out at the Tirells' hedge maze. Two young nobles laugh and chase one another through the labyrinth, shoeless, half-naked, oblivious to anything but the warm night, lost in here and now. Like time has stopped. If only time could stop.

A pygmy owl lands on a rafter above Sae, its eyes huge, like cameras. Unblinking. Archiving. Her only company. Sae scowls at it, but the owl does not move. It hoots. Annoyed, she finds a pebble and hurls it, and only then does the owl flap away, back into the darkness. Alone again.

"Here's to you," Sae mutters after the owl. She takes a long drink, closes her eyes, pauses before swallowing. Stop the moment. Don't let it pass.

Then she spits out the drink, presses the glass to her forehead, and sighs. All she can do is keep going. She doesn't know what else to do—it's not as if she can go back. Not in this mission. Not in this war. Not in this life.

But each step forward is getting harder and harder to take.