Marai
Refreshed, I took a shower before we left. I went to see Kreia. She was meditating, and I didn't want to disturb her. I turned and she spoke without turning. "Not a wise choice."
"What?"
"Befriending the Seer."
"The Miraluka? Why do you call her the Seer?"
"Her species does not see with the eyes they no longer use. They see in a way that can only be explained by a strong attachment to the Force. It is a rare gift that has been squandered on her people. It is how she found you when no one else could." She turned, and I could feel her disquiet. "The Sith come at you in battle and your reply? You disarm her, bind her wounds, and heal her body. Why?"
"She was helpless. Unable to strike at me. Begging for death." I looked away. "Damn it Kreia if I murder the helpless how am I different from the Sith?"
"I do not think your thoughts are clear on this, so I will try yet again to explain. She was trained by the Sith, steeped in their ways. If you allow her to travel with us you give our enemies a clear view of what they wish to know with little effort. She is an apprentice of a Sith Lord, and know you that the only way to become a Sith lord is to murder your teacher. I do not wish to see you die for that stupidity. She may be blind, but she had ties to darkness. Other masters command her. She is a threat to you, to us all. Do not underestimate her. Or her previous loyalties."
"Perhaps her ability to see within the Force will help us gain allies."
"Perhaps. But I remain unconvinced."
"Atton said that her world was devastated. That all of her people in this sector of the galaxy have been wiped out."
"Did he. And what do you make of that?"
"It seems odd that a world of Force sensitive people would fall so easily to any threat."
"Unless that threat came at them unawares. What do your instincts tell you?"
I considered. "That it had to be of the Force, but not visible to the Force." I said.
"An interesting view. Before you go on with this quest you have taken upon yourself, how many more lost sheep shall be boarding our ship?"
"As many as we need to win."
"Then you had best prepare for an army. For every time I open my eyes, your followers have multiplied like Gizka. An army following their leader into oblivion."
"They came because I asked."
"You are blind to it. They do not follow Marai Devos, the woman that spoke to them. They follow the war leader as the Handmaiden called you. They see the strength of will, the purpose, and cling to it like drowning men on a plank."
"They are my friends, not my followers."
"Do not try to soften what is happening by using a gentler term. Do friends not follow the one who appeals most? When they form a social hierarchy, is that one not elevated to their head? It goes beyond that. They obey without question if it is you that speaks." I must have looked confused, because she gave a dry chuckle. "You may be blind to it, but I see it. I hear with their ears, see with their eyes, and know their thoughts when they speak away from you. When another makes the decision, there is debate in their minds before they will do it. However a word from you and they agree within their minds, even if their words sound as protest.
"The Handmaiden accepted with little question when you spoke of healing the Seer. She was trained to seek ones such as the Seer, to kill them automatically. Yet instead she gave a token protest, and even that died when you did not agree."
I looked at her askance. "It bothers you. That they obey me."
"Every group needs a leader. I know many things, but the one thing I know I am not is a leader. I am too arrogant, too willing to speak my mind. When I speak my voice is heard, but ignored. My passion lights nothing in others. They obey you because you are their leader. But perhaps something else sways them."
"What do you mean?"
"Have you been so blind you also did not notice the changes in them all?"
"Changes?"
"Whether it is discussion or battle, they begin to echo you. When you struggle with your feelings, they struggle. When you give into them, they freely surrender. If you would ask them if they were loyal, they would be shocked that you even had to ask. Their loyalty to you, and the duties you order is as if hardwired on the motherboards of their mind.
"Watch them carefully. See their patterns of thought, and how they can be bent to your will. Influence is a weapon, and you will need all of them before we reach the end of this journey."
"I will not treat my friends as puppets. They are living beings, not tools."
"I care not for you definitions. Make use of what you are forging here. It was the way Revan gained loyalty."
I wanted to throw my hands up in disgust. What was different now from when I had been a General in the war? I turned to go, and she spoke again.
"Arren Kae."
"Excuse me?"
"You have been wondering what woman would be so intriguing that she could drag an Echani General from his oath. Her name was Arren Kae. A Jedi master."
"A Jedi is her mother?"
"Yes. She loved the man with a fire that could only be quenched in his arms. A crime to the Jedi that spanned ten years. When she became pregnant, she hid it. She gave the child to Yusanis and only then did she admit her failing, and she was punished for it. They exiled her as they did you. When the Mandalorian wars began, she joined the Republic's Navy to atone."
"How do you know that?" I asked in a whisper. "She only spoke to me of it last night, and I swore never to reveal it."
"And you have not. I have my...sources. Revan welcomed her. One trained in war and once a Jedi." She considered then looked at me. "The Force flows readily in the Force sensitive. Their children are the ones chosen to be Jedi, since the Jedi forswear family and children of their own. But if a Jedi bears or fathers a child, it is like a perfect hybrid in a plant. The new seed is greater than the sum of its parts."
"But why do we not merely-" I stopped at her sardonic laugh.
"Do you think the Jedi had not considered it before child? Before the Republic was founded, two of their number did just that. If the child had been better raised, perhaps it would not have ended so badly. The results were so horrible that the Jedi Council of that time banned it to all their numbers. They do not dare to take the chance that it could ever happen again.
"Have you never wondered why the Jedi take a child from the family that loves him and immerses him in the Jedi order?"
"To avoid countervailing interests."
"The standard answer you learned when you were first a member of the order. No my dear girl, it is because there is nothing so meddlesome as a parent that does not understand what their child is going through. Add to that what would happen if that child were of a Jedi, or two Jedi. Trying to speed the process, or change it because you do not think the teacher worthy or competent. That is what happened back in the mists of time, and the Jedi refused to ever let it happen again. A child of those that are Force sensitive can be hidden. A child of two Jedi is much harder."
She looked at me. "Know this. If you offer to teach her the ways of the Jedi, you will be asking her to be foresworn to Atris. It is best that the bloodline be allowed to die along with Telos."
"But does she know who her mother was?"
"I neither know nor care."
"Doesn't she deserve to know? When we set foot on this planet she felt the Force. She was terrified by it!"
"It will pass if no one lends a hand to teach her. As for her birthright, who would give this gift to her? I do not have such arrogant presumption. Revealing such things would have profound consequences. That is all I will say on the matter."
"Why do you think I want to teach her?"
"Until you are taught, it would not matter. Yet if you persist in this endeavor, having her beside you, gaining her trust, making her your sister of battle, whether you wish to or not you will be training her. She will grow in the Force until she takes that decision away from you. So take my word of caution.
"Spend time with her as you must but recognize that you loyalty should not remain with those you call friends. It should be spent on the galaxy and yourself."
"If I am only loyal to myself, what does the galaxy have to do with it? To me this ship, those we have gathered are the galaxy. I must be loyal to them or I cannot be loyal to any."
"So you will take this precious coin and squander it." She seemed to consider. "She spars with you. Have you never wondered what it means to the Echani if you spar with her through the rituals to the third tier? It is used only in mortal combat, and if she faces you in it and you won completely and utterly? That perhaps to defeat her so utterly will cause her to surrender everything she has to you?"
"No."
"Few are the thoughts you can hide from me. Such passions are not strength. They are the hidden rust upon a blade that causes it to shatter."
"I have never thought of that."
"So perhaps I am mistaken. But before you go. A gift. Close your eyes. Meditate with me."
I knelt, and went into a mediation seat. I closed my eyes.
"Now feel the ship around you."
I reached out. For a moment, I stayed firmly and stubbornly in my head. But then I suddenly felt it. A presence two hundred tons in mass squatting on the ground. I could feel the wind blowing along the hull. I reached out, and part of me was suddenly in the cockpit. I could feel the controls as if they were the nerves in my arms and legs. I knew without thinking about it that like my limbs I could touch them and make them work as if I were the ship.
"Excellent. Now feel within it. Listen to the cargo hold."
I shifted perspective as if I had lifted my foot to see if there was a splinter in it. The Handmaiden was stripped down, and I watched her fluid grace, entranced.
Atton walked into the bay, and she spun. He dropped into a defensive stance, and only now could I see the effortless flow of his movement. What she and her sisters had seen.
The Handmaiden relaxed out of her stance. "When are you going to tell her?"
"Tell who what?"
"When are you going to stop lying to Marai?" She snapped bluntly. "Few know the Echani styles, and even fewer take them from reflex."
"I just fake it."
"She might believe you, but I know better."
You do." He relaxed. "And how much of the galaxy did you get to see freezing your cargo hold off in Ice Station Jedi? I knew more about the galaxy before I stopped wearing diapers!" He walked past her, and went to the storage bay. "Next time I come in here, I'm carrying a blaster."
He retrieved some tools and parts. "Oh yeah, I've been watching you and our little ex-Jedi friend. Seeing you spar in here. Do you really want to reveal so much of what you know to her?"
"Speak plainly if you can."
"Know this woman. Do not make her life any worse than it already is."
"And what would you know of it?"
"Maybe I'm telling the truth. Maybe I just fake my way along through life scaring those who know enough to recognize an Echani stance. But if I am not, consider that maybe I know more than the first tier. Maybe I know enough of the etiquette rituals to know what you're doing with her."
The Handmaiden tensed.
"So keep your hands where I can see them."
"Fool." She snarled.
"Schutta." He hissed back.
"Interesting is it not?" Kreia purred. Now extend it to the little machine."
I reached out, and there was T3. I could feel something wrong, and with a skill I did not know I had, I found the problem. "He has a stuck motivator-"
"Leave it for another time. Now go to the engine he is working on."
I reached back, and again, the feeling that something was wrong. "The tuners are out of alignment."
"Now, the final step. Feel for our blind friend."
Suddenly I was there. She was laying on the bed, staring at the ceiling. She was in a trance not unlike the one I was in. I could hear the even seven breaths a minute of the trained Jedi.
"Now beneath the breath, listen closer..."
I suddenly heard her voice, but her lips were not moving. "...As I walk among the ashes of Katarr, I told myself over and over to feel no fear. It was only afterward that I knew that fear would cause my..."
My eyes snapped open. "I heard her speaking."
"You heard the surface thoughts, nothing more. But many with this skill never reach this point in their training."
"But how could I do that?"
"The question is, will such passive listening do more than add a bit of color to the universe around you? What deeper secrets are there in store? Would you perhaps wish to know their secret thoughts hidden deep within?"
She motioned. "You may be young, but I am tired and need to rest. Go."
Handmaiden
My sister of battle was lost in thought as we returned to the Mandalorian encampment. She watched me furtively, and it puzzled and frightened me. Had I offended her?
Just before the checkpoint, a Mandalorian stepped from the shadows. He bore a rifle, and I knew instantly that he wanted to kill us.
Marai stopped. "What would you have of me, Davrel?" She asked.
"I seek to reclaim the honor you stole from me, Jedi."
"I stole no honor, Davrel." She replied. "If honor could be gained in the training circle Cassus Fett would have been Manda'lor."
If anything would infuriate him I knew somehow that would. He grew still, the silence before the eve of battle. "I would have you know that Cassus Fett was my grandfather. You stole from him the honor of his life, and stole his life here. It is fitting that I regain it by killing you."
"Why?" She seemed honestly puzzled. "Because I took what he did not have? Cassus Fett was a bully lucky enough to be born Mando'a so no one would see it as such. He ordered the destruction of the home world of the Cathar rather than face them in honest combat. He was lucky enough to face a fool of equal stripe here, and the dead of that lay around us even now. Surely your father told this to you."
"No. My father died here with him. They fell to your unnatural skills."
"Cassus Fett died by his own hand. This I swear."
"Because he had nothing left when your forces defeated him! Rather than be blamed for the greatest defeat in our history, he killed himself!"
"The Jedi have been around for almost 25 millennia. No one else had considered it a dishonor to die facing us." Marai replied. "And he killed himself with his sidearm rather than his sword as Mando'a custom demands, so the dishonor was his."
"But you took more than that from my people!" He raved. "Revan took our honor, and gave us nothing back! There are no grand wars to fight any more, no honor to be won! Manda'lor has spoken of returning us to our honor and place, but what place is that? Preeminent warriors? Or mere lap dogs to your kind!" He looked at me. "Stay out of this, woman. She faces a true Mandalorian warrior in battle for the last time!" He raised the weapon. I immediately dropped to ta crouch.
Marai moved. He fired, and she moved aside, the bolt passing bare centimeters from her flesh. She had drawn no weapon. He tried to follow her, but it was as if he tried to target a thought. She spun, sweeping his legs, and caught his body so she rode him to the ground. She slapped the weapon aside, then ripped off his helmet. Her hand arched back into a killing blow, then stopped.
"Know this. Before the week is out, you will have your first taste of battle, and you can regain the honor you think you lost. But if that is not enough, come against me as your own rites demand, and face me there, rather than as an assassin in the darkness." She flung his weapon into the brush, and stalked past him.
Confusion
Marai
I saw Bai Dur working with Zuka. As I approached, I heard him saying. "I just got tired of dropping my hydro-spanner, so I had it cut off."
"A bit drastic." Zuka replied levelly.
"He's talking about his arm, isn't he?" I asked. They looked at me, and both looked like a pair of children that had been discussing sex when an adult arrived. I looked at Bao-Dur. "Do you honestly think he would care, my friend?"
Bao-Dur flushed, and looked away. I looked at Zuka. "The battle of Corrigan. The commander of the Mando'a defense sent Basilisks against us."
"Wait a minute!" Zuka protested. "Basilisk's are great on an assault landing, but on the defense they are worthless!"
"I know that. Do you know the weakness of the mark IIIs?"
"Sure. The heat exchanger is open, and it's big enough that you can put a weapon's barrel down it." Zuka replied automatically.
"But if you don't have a weapon?" I prompted.
He considered. "Well you could stick your hand up far enough to use a grenade..." He stopped, suddenly looking at Bao-Dur with new found respect.
"That's right. Bao-Dur, to save a hundred men armed an ion grenade, and stuffed his hand up the heat exchanger of the droid. He was trying to pull his hand out when the grenade went off."
That respect bloomed into admiration. He looked at Bao-Dur, then threw his arms around the Zabrak. "Brother!" He cried.
"General..." Bao-Dur began.
"The Mando'a treasure bravery in an enemy. Especially in an enemy." I replied. I walked past him, the Handmaiden pacing me like an aide de camp.
"You seek to cause them to respect us." She said.
"Like the Echani, the Mando'a respect bravery, especially the reckless kind that comes when you have no options." I replied. "They will treat him as a brother, because they would expect no less from their weakest."
She nodded.
We moved through the camp, and the change from when we had been here before was astonishing. We were a fixture, as proper within those walls as the turrets and minefield that protected them. The children acted as if we were of their own. A shy little boy of seven came over, handing me a flower. It was a Kanthis, but had the neurotoxin spines expertly plucked. He nodded to me, then ran away to hide behind his mother's skirts. It took a lot of luck and skill, and he would grow into a great man some day.
"If only the Republic had seen this side of them as I did all those years ago." I sighed.
"The gentler side of the enemy?" The Handmaiden asked. "Yes. The Echani teach that every enemy is somash, or soft, and Grathiar, or hard, but only on the face they show, like a coin." She looked around and her face softened. "As much as I have heard of the brutality of the Mandalorians, I wish those who spoke to me could see this."
We found our way to the battle circle. The sergeant nodded as if we'd only left a moment before. Then he turned to me.
"Tagren has asked that you face him if you wish."
I nodded, stepping forward. Tagren was a bit taller than I was, but seemed to make up for it by being twice as wide. The sergeant stepped forward.
"Tagren, what would you have?"
"Just foot and hand. The way of the true warrior." He snarled.
"Agreed." I began to strip off my armor.
"Wait, Jedi, he will face you with armor."
I looked at him, then at the Handmaiden. "I will not need it."
The sergeant threw up his hands. "All right. Tagren?"
"If she wants to throw away the advantage, I will not stop her."
I faced off against him, ready.
"Cha!" The sergeant cried.
I suddenly knew what he would do. A foot sweep, then a hammer strike as I lay there... I lifted up, and his foot strike went beneath me. I punched into his arm as he turned, and he fell forward. I landed on his back, hand raised for a strike. "Pa-cha!" The sergeant cried.
Unlike the discussion with Davrel, this was more in depth. Tagren had made an assumption, and that assumption had put him in peril. I had shown un-Mandalorian restraint (The one that said that earned approbation. After all I was not Mando'a) and showed finesse in my dealing with him.
As the sun set, we settled down. This time there was music. The women not old enough to be warriors served us, and we dined on Boma beast and Zakkegg, a predator much feared.
One of the recruits spoke to the Handmaiden, then came over to me. "I wish to prove myself against her, but she refuses."
I motioned her over. "Speak."
"It is not a fair contest." She said to me. "He moves like a Telosian Zantak. Slow and stolid. His defense is weak, and I could beat him easily."
"Then why have you refused?"
"Will it not bother them if I defeat him without even breaking a sweat?" She asked.
"If he is that stupid, they would rather it came out in training than in battle." I replied. "If you feel it too onerous-"
She sighed. She stood, facing against the man in the circle. I saw what she meant. He was a stolid mass that would take punishment, and that was his only saving grace.
"Borathis. He's the best of my recruits." The sergeant passed me the flask. "Hasn't lost yet."
I wondered about that. I could have beaten him with my eyes blindfolded, and the Handmaiden would hand him his head. "How has he won?"
"He slaps them down like an AD tower against shuttles." The sergeant said.
The Handmaiden faced him, bowed, and they moved. After training not only as a Jedi but an opponent of the woman there, I could tell she would beat him without effort. Yet he was their best...
The moved together, and she went for a throw. Suddenly she spasmed as both hands touched her, and I leaped to my feet.
Handmaiden
He was a beast too stupid to lie down and die, but I had been given permission. I stripped to my underclothes. Like Tagren this one made comments, but they were merely wind. I faced him, and judged him as I readied myself. He would try to grapple. If I was that stupid he would use his superior weight to bear me to the ground, where weight meant more than skill.
We moved toward each other. He struck at me, and I blocked the blow. As I did, I felt a bolt of lightning run through me.
Faithless! A stun baton in his gauntlet!
I fell and felt no more.
Marai.
I leaped to my feet. "He's cheated!" I shouted.
The Handmaiden fell, then rolled to her feet again. Borathis looked at her, then struck with the same left gauntlet.
The Handmaiden caught his hand, her own hands placed to avoid a segment of his glove, and she kicked him in the elbow. I gasped as the full fury of a Jedi lashed out at that joint. His armor separated, and for a moment, my mind was relieved. But then I considered.
She threw away not his armor, but the entire lower arm!
"Cheat!" The sergeant cried.
"Tell Borathis!" I screamed.
She stood there, then moved forward. Her fist hit Borathis in the chest, and his lungs and bones exploded from his back. Then she paused. She stood there, as if confused her hand plucked at her clothing.
Frantically I ripped at my own. "Help me!" I screamed.
Handmaiden
I fell and I felt no more.
No, that is not true.
I was in a darkness shot red with anger fury and hate. I saw my enemy and struck at him. He struck back, and I knew his betrayal. I caught his hand above and below the weapon he should have not had, then I struck at his elbow.
The energy I put into the strike would have punched into a ship's hull. I felt and recorded the destruction of his arm. But he was still a danger. I punched into him, and I felt every erg of energy I possessed translated into that punch.
He fell, and part of my mind recorded him falling dead.
But still it was not enough. I prepared for the final tier of the order, my clothing shorn away. I was myself as the goddess had sent me into the world, and with only that would I confront my enemy.
There were many to face, but one called to me like a siren. She stood there, facing me as the Goddess would wish. Yet she was hesitant.
"Do not make me do this." She said. I recognized her voice.
"Marai?" I asked. Suddenly like a missile I found my target. I leaped toward her. "Marai!"
Marai
She stood over the dead man, her face intent. Her body glowed with the ambient light. And much more. To my eyes I could see the Force like a tempest behind her. She spun, and her eyes fixed on me.
"Do not make me do this." I whispered.
"Marai?" She asked the question as if it would answer every ill. Then she focused on me, and I could see another beneath that gaze. I knew somehow that Atris was looking at me. She leaped toward me. "Marai!"
Handmaiden
I struck, but she was not there. I felt for her, used every sense I had, yet she was illusive, a shadow. I struck at her, strove to slay her. But she was mist, she was not there.
It was like fighting an ocean wave. She was there, but every blow struck water, and flowed into nothingness.
Yet still she was there! Then I felt her behind me. I felt her arm across my neck, in the simplest of strangle holds. Yet my efforts to defeat her were in vain.
I felt my breath catch as I struggled to breath, yet I could not stop her. I fell into nothingness.
Marai
Never had I seen such speed. She was a Jedi faced with her enemy and nothing would gainsay her. I strove not to kill, but to contain. She would kill us all if I let her and by being the target of it all, I saved untold lives.
I found myself behind her and instinctively I went for a sanguinary strangle. I would not cut her wind, but the blood that powered her.
She tried to break the hold, but I moved to block her. It was fighting the wind of a hurricane knowing that a single misstep was my doom.
She turned, my body on her back, trying to find her enemy then she collapsed.
"Oath less!" The sergeant shouted.
"Check his gauntlet!" I screamed back. The sergeant looked at me stunned, then picked up the loose arm. At first, he was the adult accused of cheating by a child. Then his eyes sharpened, and he pulled the stun rod from the gauntlet. "That cheating D'kut!" He looked at me. "I owe your friend an apology."
"You owe us privacy." I snapped.
They moved away from us. I looked down at the slack face. "Come back to me, my sister." I whispered.
Betrayal
Handmaiden
Come back to me, my sister. The voice said. I wanted to resist, but it was as if a hook had dropped in pellucid waters, caught in my flesh, and dragged me to the light. I found myself lying on my back, looking up into Marai's face. She had a worried look, as if I were an unexploded bomb.
"Are you back in spirit?" She asked.
I suddenly felt the bite of the stun baton, clutching my wrist. "Betrayer!" I gasped. "He cheated!"
I know." She whispered. "We all know."
I sagged against her, flesh against flesh. Only then did I notice that we were both naked.
"What happened?" I asked.
"Borathis has been their best recruit in the battle circle. But he had been cheating all this time. He had a stun rod concealed in his gauntlet. You grabbed his arm..."
A bolt of lightning run through me.
Then you attacked him, and I recognized Kashin-Dra..."
Kashin-Dra. The shadow warrior. The last refuge of the Echani in battle to those willing to pay the price. No quarter given, no mercy, just death.
"You killed him then began to strip..."
I prepared for the final tier of the order, my clothing shorn away. I was myself as the goddess had sent me into the world, and with only that would I confront my enemy.
"I matched you, then tried to stop you..."
She stood there, facing me as the Goddess would wish.
"But when I spoke you attacked. I did what I had to do so you would not be hurt."
It was like fighting an ocean wave. She was there, but every blow struck water, and flowed into nothingness.
I stared uncomprehending for a long moment. She had not defeat the Kashin-Dra. She had defeated it. She had beaten me in the Third Tier even as I attacked her unknowing. Yet I saw in her eyes that she knew exactly what it meant, and it bothered her.
"Did I hurt any other?"
"No. Just Borathis, and he got what he deserved as far as the Mando'a are concerned."
She stared down at me, then I could see her make a decision. "What do you know of your mother?" She asked softly.
"What of her? I told you that I knew little of her as a child. Only a face that leaned over me... Brushed her lips against my cheek, and was gone forever."
"She was once Jedi. Her name was Arren Kae."
"Again this is what I already knew." I chided her.
"She was strong in the Force."
"As was my father."
"As her child, as their child, it means you could have been, will be strong in the Force as well."
"Yes, I know that now. I always knew that I felt more than my sisters of flesh. I just had no way to describe it before our talk. It was always there, a wave of power below my perception until you came to the Academy. That I was different; that I could touch such power. I think I always knew it."
I stared up at her. My eyes kept going in and out of focus around her, but she was in preternatural focus. "What oath is more important?" I asked softly. "The oath made as a child to your father or the one made in the bloom of womanhood?"
"What do you mean?" She asked.
"Because I felt the call of my mother's blood all these years. Even as I followed Atris, I felt the call of that blood. Of an oath given as a child."
"You make no sense."
"When I was young, before the wars, I wanted something; a bauble on my father's desk. He was not there to get it for me, and I found myself reaching for it, and it came to my hand. He was home then, and found me playing with it. He sat me on his knee, enfolded me in those great arms, holding me, and said, 'swear my child. Swear to me that if one day you feel the call of your mother's blood, that you will not deny it'." I looked up at her, and my hand touched her face so gently that she did not even notice the touch. "Ever since her loss at Malachor V, I have felt incomplete. A hollow shell of a person, desperate to be healed.
"But this wound felt comfort for the first time when I met you. It felt drained as we fought in sparring. Perhaps this wound will be healed by you."
Aboard Ebon Hawk, Kreia looked up, listening with Marai's ears. "So it ends."
"I want you to teach me in the ways of the Force. I want to be like my mother."
"I will not help you break your oath to Atris." Marai said. "I will not have you forsworn for my sake."
"Listen to me. The oath to my father is stronger than the oath to Atris. She did not ask it directly, but she would demand that I refuse to do what my Father asked of me; to follow my nature. My oath to her was that I not train to be a Jedi. There was nothing that forbids me to train in the use of the Force."
She was silent, head down, hair falling across her face. During our fight her hair had come unbound from the bun she kept it in. I was astonished by it's length. "I am not worthy of that trust. But if teaching you can help you control the Force within you, stop you from striking out as you did moments ago, I must. I will train you in the ways of the Force for that reason."
"That is all I would wish of you, my teacher, my master. I want to feel the world as my mother did. I want to feel for someone what my mother felt. To feel that power in my hands, running through my veins as it did for her. To hear and see and feel what she did when she fought the Mandalorians until she was no more in death at Malachor V."
"Then know this. As unworthy as I am, I must guide you upon that path."
"I will not fail your trust, Marai. I will live in honor of your teachings as I live in honor of my mother's face."
"So I hold us both to that trust." She whispered, then kissed me delicately on the cheek.
Aboard Ebon Hawk, Kreia sighed. "Betrayal."
