All movement in the room ceased. Every student regarded the scene with wide eyes and gaping mouths. Luke and Felina's sparring session had ended as both stared at Leia. Luke looked worried. His run to his sister was stopped by Anakin, whose expression was one of hurt and deep disappointment.

Derik rose slowly, hand covering his eye as he tried desperately not to cry. Fear rose when he pulled his hand away. "My eye...I can't see!"

Leia was still in a state of shock herself. She stared uncomprehendingly at Derik, still unsure of what had happened. She must have hurt him. A small part of her felt a sense of satisfaction at the idea. Good. Now he knows what it feels like.

Anakin crossed the room in a single stride and gripped Leia's shoulders, making her look at him. "Leia, what did you do?" he asked in a harsh whisper.

The girl flinched. Her father's disapproval was worse than anything else. Leia blinked. "I..." It all seemed like someone else...emotions and feelings that were not her own. "I don't know...wh-why is it so cold?"

Anakin closed his eyes. Leia had touched the Dark Side.

Meanwhile Derik was still whimpering over his eye. "Master, help me!"

Calon frowned and bent over to assess the boy's injury. "Be still. Let me see." Derik had received a second degree burn from the bridge of his nose to his left temple. The eye had already swollen shut. Such a wound was hardly life-threatening, but very painful, as evidenced by Derik's frightened whimpering. His sight might be somewhat impaired if the cornea had been damaged. If the younglings had been using real lightsabers, it would be a very different story. The boy would have lost his eye. "Go to the Healers, Andress. They'll help you. But calm yourself. Breathe."

Instinctively Derik dropped into a breathing exercise as he rose unsteadily to his feet. Two other students came to his aid and helped him outside.

Calon's frown was deep as he regarded Leia. "Leia Skywalker, you have demonstrated a disturbing lack of control over both emotions and actions. You are dismissed. "

Permanently? Leia snapped her mouth shut against any protests. They would have been useless anyway. She hung her head as her father escorted her outside. What stung was the looks everyone else was giving her...and Anakin's stern reproach.

When the door had closed, the swordsmaster took a deep breath before turning to Luke and Felina. "Do not let this interfere with your training. Clear your minds and finish what you began."

Felina took her own deep breaths before returning to the ready stance. She waited until Luke had returned to his before moving in to attack.

Luke blocked halfheartedly before letting the saber drop from his hand. "Solah," he called in a dull voice. If he noticed the disappointment on Calon's face, he didn't care. All he cared about was finding out what had happened to make his sister touch darkness.

:=v=: :=v=: :=v=:

"Leia, why?" sighed Anakin as he walked along the corridors with his daughter. "Why did you hurt him like that?"

"I..." Leia blinked. In recollection she saw herself slashing at Derik's face. "I wanted to win."

Anakin nodded grimly. "That was plain. But why did you resort to those means? I could see that Derik was taunting you, but-"

Leia's eyes narrowed as she turned to him. "Taunting me? He was playing with me like a pitten bats around a rodent. And it wasn't just today; he always does that! He could beat me in a minute, and he knows it, but he draws it out until I'm exhausted. And then he lands as many Marks of Contact as he can until Master Calon stops him. He likes hurting me!" She was too ashamed to look her father in the eye at that point, so she turned away. "I just wanted to teach him a lesson."

Anakin grimaced. Her attitude reminded him of himself when he had been younger. He'd always hated bullies. "I know. But that's not your job. It's the job of your master to see that everyone is treated well."

"But he never does anything," protested Leia.

"That still doesn't give you any right to maim a fellow student," said Anakin, shaking his head.

Maim? Leia cringed. "But...I didn't maim him. Burns heal. They're only training lightsabers. They hurt, but..."

She doesn't understand. Slowly Anakin turned to his daughter to take her shoulder again. "The eyes are different. Even a mild burn to the eye can blind a person."

Leia recoiled, stepping back with renewed shame. "Oh. I didn't want to blind him." Even if he does deserve it, she thought to herself.

Anakin let out a short sigh. "I know. But Leia...you were angry. I could sense it. No doubt Master Calon could, too"

Leia couldn't deny what her father had sensed. She nodded, hanging her head.

Anakin took a deep breath and lowered his voice. "Leia, you know that anger, fear, and aggression can lead to the Dark Side. Today you let your anger control you. The reason you felt so cold after you hurt Derik was because you were using the Dark Side."

The Dark Side. The idea was repellent to every Jedi in the temple, and the source of nightmares for some. Leia gasped. I used the Dark Side? Tears of remorse and horror stung her eyes. "No...I swear I didn't want to...but I was just...so tired of...of Derik's bullying. I'm sorry." She closed her eyes and turned away from her father, hunching her shoulders. "Will you forgive me?"

As a father, Anakin's heart was pained for her daughter. As a teacher, he could see the remorse in her eyes. As a Jedi, the fact that Leia had touched the Dark Side at all concerned him. But of course it would do not good to scold her any further. Circumstances had already punished her enough. So he wrapped his arms around her. "Yes. I love you, and I understand. I only hope you understand how serious this is."

Leia stemmed her tears before turning to meet her father's eyes. "Is Derik really going to be blind in one eye?"

Anakin shrugged. "I don't know, but the best healers in the galaxy are here at the Temple."

Further instruction was interrupted by Luke, who came running up the hall. He skidded to a stop in front of his sister. "Leia...you...what happened?"

Anakin grimaced before turning to his son with raised eyebrows. "I think you already know. You could sense it, couldn't you?"

Luke nodded, looking uneasily at Leia. "She...you were angry...it was so cold..." he shuddered, not wanting to dwell on the subject. "Is Derik going to be all right?"

"Yes, he'll be fine," assured Anakin. "He may lose a little vision in his eye, but he'll be fine."

"Ouch. He's kind of a pain, but..." Luke sighed. He hated seeing anyone hurt. Blue eyes flicked back to Leia. "Are you all right?"

"I will be." Leia nodded. Together the trio began walking toward the Youngling's living quarters. "Is Master Calon going to tell the Council what happened?"

"He has to. You injured a fellow student and tapped into the Dark Side."

"But I didn't mean to!"

"It still demonstrates a lack of control that must be dealt with." Anakin shrugged helplessly. "I'm sorry, Leia."

"What are they going to do?" Leia wanted to know.

Anakin sighed. "I don't know," he admitted. "But in the meantime, it's my responsibility to correct you."

The girl hung her head and nodded. "I understand. What are you going to do?"

Anakin cringed. She made it sound as though he was going to hurt her. "I'm not going to do anything to you. But I do think it's time we had a talk. I'm sorry, Luke," he added, turning to the boy. "It's just going to be Leia and I this time."

Luke's face fell, but he didn't argue. Sadly he watched as his sister and father went into the room that the twins shared and shut the door behind him.

The Skywalker twins had been sharing a room ever since they were born. As they grew, they had never requested their own rooms. While there was a curtain that ran the length of the room for privacy, that was the extent of their separation. It was the same at home.

Anakin had thought for some time that his children were getting too old to be sharing a room, but so far they respected one another's privacy and liked the proximity to each other. That was likely to change soon. In another year and a half, Luke and Leia would be teenagers. Anakin and Padme already had plans to divide the twin's room in half with a wall.

Youngling's living quarters were Spartan in design, with only the basics that the children needed. There was typically a bed, a clothing locker, storage beneath the bed, a window, and a cushioned stool to sit on. In Luke and Leia's room all but the window had been doubled, making it rather cramped.

Leia bit her lip as she stood in a parade rest by her bed.

Anakin sat down on the stool, which was almost comically short for him, and motioned to the bed. "Go ahead and sit down, Leia."

Leia obeyed, still chewing her lip with nerves.

Anakin took a deep breath before he began. "Leia...I'm sure you know how disappointed I am in you."

The girl nodded. She could sense his disappointment from across the room. "Yes, Father. I'm sorry."

"I know. But more than that, I'm concerned. You tapped into something very dangerous today. Anger is a powerful and potentially destructive emotion. Once you give in to it, it's easy to give in again," explained Anakin. "And the more you give in, the more difficult it becomes to control."

"I know that. You and the rest of the Jedi have been teaching us since we were little," sighed Leia.

"Knowing something is one thing; putting it into practice is another."

"Then how can you keep from getting angry in the first place? Are you just supposed to turn everything off?" Leia wanted to know. There was frustration in her tone.

Anakin smiled without humor. "That's exactly what I wondered when I was training as a Padawan. Even the Jedi Code says, 'there is no emotion, there is peace'. I thought they were only lying to themselves and us by saying that emotions either don't exist or have no place in a Jedi's life. Jedi are only mortal, imperfect people who have an affinity for the Force and have trained their entire lives to use it to better the lives of others. We have emotions just like everyone else."

Leia knit her brows. "So, according to the code, emotions are the problem?"

Anakin shook his head. "No, but they were seen as something that needed to be suppressed. Personally I don't believe that. Not all emotions are negative. Love, for example." He sighed. "The point isn't to stop feeling. If we can't feel compassion for those we're trying to help, then there's not much point to what we do as Jedi." He reached out to take Leia's hands. "The point is to learn control over your emotions rather than letting them control you."

Leia slouched in her bed. "How?"

The Jedi Master couldn't help but grimace in remembering his own struggle with negative emotions. "It isn't easy, and it doesn't happen overnight. A good way to start is to practice your breathing."

Leia frowned. "What if that doesn't work?"

"Have you tried?"

"Master Yoda says there is no try."

Again Anakin's mouth twitched. Had the situation been different, he would have laughed. Yoda must have used that line on every Jedi for the past eight hundred years. "He only means not to do anything halfway, or believing that it can't be done. And he's right. Here; we'll start right now. Close your eyes."

Leia, still in a disturbed state of mind, closed her eyes with a sigh.

Anakin rose and walked over to his daughter, sitting beside her and resting a hand on her shoulder. "First I want you to think of how you felt when you were sparring with Derik. Do you remember?"

Immediately the girl's brows knit. Her face tensed as she clenched her jaw. "I thought...we were going to learn to control anger...not make it worse."

"Don't dwell on those feelings. Start with basic meditation. Control is much easier to accomplish when you're calm."

Leia nodded. Deep, even breaths flowed into and out of her lungs at a slow and steady rate. Meditation had been learned at the age of three and was as easy as walking. The difficulty was in clearing her mind.

"Good...just breathe..." Anakin's voice dropped into a low drone as he watched his daughter reach for the calm she so desperately needed. "Now...the feelings of anger...fear...impatience...imagine them as a bundle of thorny bushes. The good thoughts, of calm, compassion, love...those are flowers. What needs to be done to keep the weeds from choking the flowers?"

"Pull them up," murmured Leia, brows knit with concentration.

"Exactly. Now go through your garden, and pull up every weed you see."

:=v=: :=v=: :=v=:

'Weeding the garden' took time. Some of her feelings of anger had been growing for a time and so were more difficult to remove. It was exhausting, and in time Anakin called a halt and asked Leia to rest. At that point he left her alone. As per the orders of Mastor Calon, she remained alone in her quarters for the rest of the day until Luke turned in. He found Leia tired and unwilling to speak much. She wasn't sure she'd pulled every weed yet...she wasn't even sure she wanted to.

After breakfast, Anakin found his daughter and gave her a message. "The Council has requested your presence," he said.

Leia felt the blood drain from her face. She never looked forward to going before the High Council. Feeling twelve pairs of eyes see right through her was very unnerving. Oh, no. This is it. "Just me?"

"Yes. Just you," nodded Anakin. "Go ahead. I can't walk in with you, but I can walk you there."

"Can I come?" asked Luke, coming up from behind.

"Yes, but remember, Leia has to meet the Council alone," reminded Anakin.

Luke, though unhappy, nodded. In the meantime he walked with an arm around his sister to offer both physical and emotional support.

By the time the Skywalkers had reached the top of the tower of the Jedi High Council, Leia's mind was working overtime. Are they going to expel me? Send me to the Agri-Corps? It was difficult not to show the utter misery on her face at the prospect.

Anakin gave his daughter's left shoulder an encouraging squeeze. "It'll be all right. There's nothing to be afraid of. Just be respectful and honest."

Leia frowned a little at that last pointer before breaking free and striding for the door. She paused, took a deep breath, and waved her hand before the door control. It slid aside.