Author's Note:
Sorry about making it complicated, Falcona. That's a flaw of mine. …Uh, I've looked over everything & I don't see how I 'shot that down'.
Next chapter is currently a blank page, and I have to upgrade my system software today. Next chapter might be awhile in coming. Sorry.
More on Queen Ramallia, the handmaidens, and Sokor and his friends in this chapter. This chapter also has my logic in what I've done with the Fallanassi, for those who've read the Black Fleet Crisis trilogy.
Enjoy! :)

Eighteen

"Your Majesty?"
Queen Ramallia ignored him, brushing past him as she moved quickly down the marble halls.
"Her son's coming," the redheaded handmaiden explained. "One of his friends is hurt."
"Her Highness is married?"
"Was."
"Oh." Jedi Knight Jacen Solo jogged beside the woman. "Uh, I've been thinking…"
"Yes?" She breathed easily.
"What's your name?"
Her lips quirked as her green eyes appraised him. "Clee Rhara."
"Okay." Jacen ducked into a hangar after the Queen.
He and Rhara simultaneously stopped.
Medics milled about a small vessel. Queen Ramallia stood to the side, her arms about a teenage boy. A petite girl stood beside him, little for her age.
Jacen moved forward. "May I see the patient?"
Begrudgingly, the nurses stepped aside. He reached into the Force, examining the dark-haired girl.
He frowned. "There's nothing wrong with her."
"But look at this." The doctor pointed to a monitor. "She's in shock."
Jacen checked again. "No, she isn't." At their raised eyebrows, he explained. "If she was, she'd be jumbled. Her mind's completely lucid."
"Really?" The small preteen came to his side. "How can you tell?"
"It's the Force," he explained.
"Of course; but how can you tell?" A small, angular face looked at him, her features softened just enough not to protrude.
When Jacen looked away, he realized he couldn't remember her features, only her dark eyes. She was using the Force to blur her face?
"Perhaps where do you tell would make more sense."
The Jedi Knight hesitated, but decided he might as well show her. "Here." Relaxing in the Force, he smoothly checked the patient's mind, slower than he had last time. Although he probed lightly for it, he couldn't isolate the girl's Force presence.
Interesting.
At least she existed in the Force… something Jacen was relieved to find. Yuuzhan Vong were voids in the Force to Jedi senses.
"Wiala."
Jacen started. The patient had awakened, already on her feet with the monitors ripped off.
"Tira!" The Queen's son ran forward. "What happened?"
Unflinching, Tira looked at him, her hand on her other friend's arm. "Excuse me, Sokor."
Sokor stopped abruptly. "Uh… okay."
Though Tira moved away, Jacen could still hear her low words.
"Geehar zoshi teen. Tie shiro ayen."
Wiala stiffened, her eyes warily checking the room. Her responding murmur was lost to Jacen.
Nodding tersely, Tira turned, nodding deferentially. "Your Highness."
"Sokor." Queen Ramallia's strong voice hinted at warmth. "I don't believe I know these two."
"Oh, right." Running a hand over his unkempt hair, Sokor pulled the smaller girl forward. "This is Wiala."
"Your Majesty," murmured Wiala, curtseying in her plain brown gown.
Sokor's other friend was taller and stronger. He settled for slapping her on the shoulder. "And this is Tira."
"Your Highness," she politely repeated. "Shawn ayen."
"She's honored to meet you," Wiala spoke up quickly, giving Tira a worried look. Nervousness radiated from her. "Would you stick to Basic, please? That—that— I'm not supposed to know that."
"Sorry." Though gruff, Tira did sound apologetic. "I thought Her Highness might know her great-great grandmother's tongue."
Queen Ramallia chuckled. "That's a far ways off, Tira."
"Is it?" Her frank reply was unnerving. She carelessly brushed the doctor's hands aside, smoothly stepping from his reach. "I am fine."
"You're in shock."
Tira's impassive face grew cold. "I am not."
"Just let me see—"
"No."
The doctor grabbed her arm.
"No!" Hissing, Tira kicked the doctor full in the chest, sending him sprawling.
Standing straight and unemotional once more, she calmly met the man's shocked gaze. "Means no."
Before anyone could respond, Tira glided from the room, eating up the meters with long, fluid strides, reminding him of someone…
Sokor awkwardly cleared his throat. "I, uh, guess I'd better go after her."
"Fact."
Jacen looked at Wiala in surprise. Had it been his imagination, or had she just been eyeing him?
The two teens hurried after their friend.
Wiala's reply to Sokor, however, had made Jacen realize who Tira reminded him of.
Tenel Ka.

She kicked off her shoes, breaking into a smooth, barefooted run.
"There is no emotion; there is peace."
She pulled off her brown academy dress. Her skintight black top was sleeveless and showed everything below her breastbone. The matching shorts went mere centimeters down her thigh.
Both gleamed wickedly in the hall light.
"There is no ignorance; there is knowledge."
She fluidly took something from her belt, scarce glancing at it before putting it away. Her fingers sought something inside her belt.
"There is no passion; there is serenity."
She stopped abruptly, unflinching as the double doors slammed shut behind her. A shadow flickered, drawing closer…
Her arms out in front of her, her hands grasped a black cylinder.
A golden shaft of light appeared from the bottom.
"There is no death. There is the Force."

"So… Where are you from?"
The handmaiden leaned back, sprawling out on the couch. She met his gaze directly. "Do you mind? Until the vacation begins and I can be on flight escort, I'm on night shift."
"Of course not." Jacen curiously watched Clee Rhara gracefully stretch and curl up on some of Queen Ramallia's sitting-room furniture.
Once comfortable, Rhara surprised him by replying, "I was from Coruscant."
The Jedi Knight hesitated, remembering his time on the Yuuzhan Vong-altered Coruscant; now an entirely different world, Yuuzhan'tar. "Me, too."
"Those Vong things are creepy."
"Yuuzhan Vong!" another handmaiden sing-songed, surprising the two of them with her presence. The blonde grinned at Rhara. "Surely you know that much; don't you, Little Clee?"
Jacen looked confusedly from one woman to the other, trying to figure out… They looked about the same age, but the blonde handmaiden spoke to Rhara as if the redhead was much younger than she was.
"I think he's trying to place your age, Yadmi."
Yadmi howled with laughter. "Who isn't working on that one?" Within a second, she was sober again. Yadmi sighed. "I feel too old, Little Clee; I'm wearing thin."
"All those brainwashings you've had to overcome, I don't doubt." Clee Rhara didn't sound too concerned. "And then you're what, four times Luke Skywalker's age?"
"Don't rub it in!" Yadmi hissed. "You're as old as him, yourself!"
Rhara yawned. "At least I don't trick my bosses."
"No, you just stay out of your two best friends' way so you don't see anything you might have to report!" the blonde snapped. "Thracia Cho Leem married, didn't she?"
Rhara sat up. "She also quit while she remained such. Good day." The redhead resettled into the couch. "Unless you'd like the night shift back."
"If we're both alive in another three months, maybe." Tone dry, the blonde's curls stayed neatly in place as she lit a wooden pipe, resting it lightly in her mouth.
"Don't do that in here." Rhara had opened one eye. "It's disgusting."
"So is mechanical grease—you know, the kind you needed a blind Jedi to identify for you."
"What's wrong with that?" the redhead asked sharply. "Tahl had marvelous informational skills. She's the one who identified the saboteur; if she used her sense of smell instead of her lost eyesight, so much the better. Now, good day, Yadmi."
Rhara glared over at her. "Unless you'd like me to tell Solo your real name." When that didn't seem enough to worry the other handmaiden, she added, "Title included."
The blonde left silently, so swiftly that Jacen's turn only caught a glimpse of her leaving the room.
"Uh… I think I'll go, too." Jacen didn't want to irritate the Queen's redheaded bodyguard any further.
"Thank you… Jedi Solo."
Remembering who Clee Rhara reminded him of, Jacen decided against staying long enough to say 'you're welcome'.

Parry, slash—duck, roll under an overadjusted blow—leap, strike…
These, and much more complicated moves, echoed in her mind. Together with the standard, her mother's Vaapad and her father's Dark Side skills fought for superiority.
She grit her teeth, determined not to give in to her father's teachings. …All she'd known the first two years of her life.
It didn't help that her mother's superior fighting techniques had come from an aspect of the Force bordering the Dark Side, itself.
Known to Sith as Kiacha, she struck out at her enemy, determined to keep this Dark Fallanassi from Her Majesty. Wiala was no fighter—that the girl's uncle sent this low of an opponent proved this.
If only the young man wasn't so blasted good at defending himself.
The Fallanassi Sith's offensives, however, were absolute chiargáth.
Kiacha shook her head. No—she wouldn't do that! When her mother had rescued her from her father, that had been the only language she'd known: Sith.
She could revert to her early habits, if she wasn't careful. Fifty years wasn't really all that long… considering her parentage.
Not everyone could claim a few centuries-old father and a mother who'd borne her at… what? Seventy, at least.
Or two parents who'd been on the old Jedi Order's Council.
Or that both parents had murdered Jedi… though with her mother, that had been completely a matter of others controlling her mind. In shock because she'd somehow failed to kill herself, Mother had come to her senses in her archenemy's bed—at five months pregnant. Married to him.
As she sought to land a blow that would in the least disable her opponent, Kiacha wondered what in the galaxy was wrong with Jedi. They knew of the White Circle.
Wouldn't it follow that there must be a Dark Circle?