Lightsabers

17

The gurgling, shushing sound of gentle waves lapping against stone docks and anchored boats filled the cave grotto. With each breath, Tenel Ka drew comfort from the salty smells and the cool, solid rock around her. Sitting with bare, crossed legs, using a Jedi calming technique to help herself think clearly, she let her gaze drift across each of her friends.

Jaina, head under the control panel and feet high in the air, checked the wiring of the wavespeeder’s directional controls. Lowbacca tinkered with the navigational computer from above, handing Jaina tools as she asked for them. Tenel Ka felt a pang of loss as she watched her two friends working with such confidence and agility, completely unconscious of how easy it was for them to use either one hand or the other.

Jacen lay stomach down on a ledge beside Tenel Ka, his right hand reaching deep into the water while the fingers of his left teased the surface, trying to lure a glowing amphibious creature close enough to grasp it.

“Hand me that hydrospanner, would you, Lowie?” Jaina said in a muffled voice. “I need to take this access plate off.” Without looking up from his work, the Wookiee plucked the tool from the case behind him with one nimble-fingered hand and passed it to Jaina.

It is so simple with two arms, Tenel Ka thought. As quickly as the jealousy rose within her, she squelched it, chiding herself for being irrational. Even if she still had both hands, she might not have been able to do the things Lowbacca could do with his long, limber arms. He used everything he had, body and mind, to the best of his ability. Just as Jacen and Jaina did.

Just as Tenel Ka always had.

Was she still that same determined person, using her skills and abilities to their fullest, she wondered, or was that person gone now that she had lost her left arm?

She scowled at the thought. If the missing limb was the only thing that bothered her, then surely she could have accepted the biosynthetic replacement her grandmother offered…. So perhaps the injury itself was not her primary problem, after all.

Tenel Ka noticed then that Jacen had propped himself up on his elbows and had turned to look at her, his eyes serious. “Hey, you fought really well out there yesterday, against that killer seaweed.”

“You mean for a girl with only one arm?” Tenel Ka said bitterly.

“I … no, I—” Jacen’s cheeks turned crimson and he looked away. His voice was low when he spoke again. “Sorry. All I remembered was you fighting that plant. I didn’t even think about your missing arm—it didn’t slow you down a bit.”

Tenel Ka flinched as if he had slapped her. He was right, she realized: she had not fought like some weak, pitiable invalid. Instinctively, she had battled with everything in her repertoire, drawing on all of her resources. She had truly been herself, using every weapon at her disposal.

“Do not be sorry, Jacen,” she said. “Your words were meant kindly. It is I who must apologize.” She thought again of the battle, musing over what she had accomplished. “I might have fought better, though, if I—”

“—if you had had your other arm?” Jacen finished for her. “Hey, I might have fought better if I’d had a blaster cannon, but I didn’t. I just did my best.”

“No.” Tenel Ka looked at him in surprise. “I meant to say, I might have fought better had I used a lightsaber.”

With a hesitant smile, Jacen looked up at her again. “Yeah … you’re pretty good with a lightsaber. Of course, you’re pretty good at a lot of things.”

This was a fact, she thought in wonderment. She was indeed good with a lightsaber. Still. And she was also still a good swimmer, fighter, runner. But she had stopped believing in herself, stopped using every portion of her body and mind to their fullest ability. These things were an integral part of the person Tenel Ka had always prided herself in being—and that was what she had been missing since the accident.

“Thank you, my friend,” she said. “I had begun to forget who I was.”

He dazzled her with one of his famous lopsided grins. “Hey, if it was as dangerous to be me as it is to be you, I might try to forget who I was, too.”

“There, that ought to do it.” Jaina’s voice was loud and clear as she climbed out of the wavespeeder. Lowbacca growled and gesticulated.

“Yep,” Jaina agreed. “Sabotage, no doubt about it.” With her usual directness, Jaina looked at Tenel Ka and asked, “Any possibility your grandmother could be behind this?”

Jacen gulped. The thought had not occurred to him. “Your grandmother? She wouldn’t try—!”

Tenel Ka considered the question seriously. “No,” she said at last. “Had that been my grandmother’s intention, she would have … disposed of me long before you arrived.” Lowbacca gave an interrogative growl, and Tenel Ka continued. “Do not misunderstand me. I believe her capable of murder—but I also sense that her intention is to keep me from danger, to protect me, whether I become a queen or a Jedi.”

Lowbacca growled a reply, and Em Teedee said, “Master Lowbacca points out—and quite rightly, I might add—that with Ta’a Chume traveling back and forth between here and the Fountain Palace, as she did today, she can hardly be counted on to provide protection.”

“Well, she did leave some guards on duty,” Jaina said.

“And Ambassador Yfra,” Jacen added, rolling his eyes. “Oh boy.”

Jaina bit her lower lip. “Yfra’s the one who suggested we go out in the wavespeeder, you know.”

Lowbacca barked a comment. “Not to mention the fact that she claims to have programmed the wavespeeder herself,” Em Teedee supplied. “Oh, my!”

Tenel Ka, who had never trusted Ambassador Yfra, made no comment as her friends voiced their suspicions. In the distance she could hear the sound of the large Hapan Water Dragon approaching. “Perhaps it would be safest for the moment to trust no one,” she suggested.

Jaina and Lowbacca agreed.

“And maybe we’d better stay as far away from Ambassador Yfra as possible,” Jacen added.

Just then, the royal yacht floated into the grotto on a wafer-thin cushion of air. Tenel Ka’s grandmother stood at the helm. Ta’a Chume brought the Hapan Water Dragon to a complete stop near one of the stone piers and climbed out onto the dock while her guards secured the craft.

Stepping forward to greet her grandmother, Tenel Ka tried to sense any harmful intentions the matriarch might have. The only emotions she picked up, however, were weariness, frustration, and a sense of grim determination.

“We had one of the bomb conspirators in our grasp today,” her grandmother said in a tired voice, “but before I managed to question her, she was poisoned.” Ta’a Chume shook her head. “She was under guard the entire time. I don’t see how an assassin was able to get to her so quickly.”

“You appear to require rest, Grandmother,” Tenel Ka said, trying not to seem unduly concerned at the former queen’s haggard appearance. “Perhaps you should not conduct this investigation yourself.”

Ta’a Chume’s eyes narrowed shrewdly. “For decades I ruled the entire Hapes Cluster by myself.” The woman sighed and seemed to relent. “But perhaps you are right. I will send Ambassador Yfra back to the mainland to continue the search.”

Tenel Ka bit her tongue to keep from voicing her suspicions that Yfra might sabotage the investigation rather than help it. But at least such an assignment would get the possibly murderous ambassador away from the Reef Fortress. Far away.