Star Wars_ Cloak of Deception - James Luceno [31]
“The sudden malfunction catapulted the human’s escorts down into the mucus-coated maw of the creature. The human was also thrown from his perch. But at the last instant he was able to grab on to the vehicle’s landing strut. Not with hands, however—for they were shackled in stun cuffs behind him—but with his teeth.
“Shortly a caravan of travelers happened by. Lost and hungry, the travelers inquired to know the whereabouts of the closest settlement, so they might replenish their meager stores.
“The human found himself in a quandary. By failing to respond, he understood that he might be sentencing the lost travelers to certain death in the sand wastes. But merely by opening his mouth and uttering a word, he would be sentencing himself to certain death in the digestive tract of the sand creature.”
Bondara paused. “Under such circumstances, what must the human do?”
The students knew in advance that they were not likely to hear the answer from Anoon Bondara.
Getting to his feet, the lightsaber Master added, “I will hear your responses tomorrow.”
The students bowed at the waist and kept their foreheads to the mat until Bondara had left the room. Then they rose, eager to compare opinions of the training session, though not a one spoke of possible solutions to the instructor’s thought-puzzle.
Qui-Gon tapped Obi-Wan on the shoulder. “Come, Padawan, there’s someone I wish to speak with.”
Obi-Wan trailed him down the steps and onto the soft floor. There, several Jedi Masters were conferring with their Padawans. Obi-Wan knew some of the Masters slightly, but the person Qui-Gon steered them toward was not someone he had ever met.
She was perhaps one of the most exotic women Obi-Wan had ever seen. Her eyes were oblique and widely spaced, with large blue irises that seemed to favor her upper lids. Her nose was broad and flat, and her skin was the color of fruitwood.
“Obi-Wan, I want you to meet Master Luminara Unduli.”
“Master Jinn,” the woman said, taken by surprise, and inclining her head in a bow of respect.
Qui-Gon returned the gesture. “Luminara, this is Obi-Wan Kenobi, my Padawan.”
She bowed her head to Obi-Wan, as well. Her face was triangular in shape, and the lower portion was tattooed in small diamond shapes that formed a vertical stripe from her lush, blue-black lower lip to the tip of her round chin. The backs of her hands also bore tattoos, atop each knuckle joint.
Qui-Gon’s expression became serious. “Luminara, Obi-Wan and I have had a recent encounter with someone who bears markings similar to yours.”
“Arwen Cohl,” Luminara said before Qui-Gon could go on. She smiled faintly. “Had I grown up on my homeworld and not in the Temple, I’m certain I would have heard tales of Arwen Cohl throughout my youth.”
She met Qui-Gon’s curious gaze. “He was a freedom fighter, a hero to our people during a war fought with a neighboring world. He was a great warrior, and he made many sacrifices. But soon after our people won their freedom, he was accused of being a conspirator by the very people on whose side he had fought. That was their way of assuring that Cohl would not be elevated to the position of authority our people wished him to assume. He spent many years in prison, subjected to cruel punishments and harsh conditions, and those further hardened a man who already had been hardened by war.
“When he left those conditions—when he escaped that awful place, with the help of some of his former confederates—he avenged himself on those who did him wrong, and he swore that he would have nothing more to do with the world that he had fought so hard to liberate.
“He became a mercenary, boasting openly that he would never make the mistakes he had once made. That he now understood the nature of the cosmos,