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“If it is not too personal a question, what is the mechanism of death? The actual means by which the body becomes lifeless?”

“We simply offer up the life within us to merge with the Force. Life flees, the body perishes. It is a technique known to the Masters of our Order. The body is then cremated. This is a sign of great respect, as combustible materials are rarer here than on oxygen-rich worlds.”

Luke nodded. “Was this one of the techniques Jacen learned?”

“I think not. He was more interested in the areas of our specialty—extension of the senses, detection of danger, detection of evil intent. Also of keeping himself from detection.” Tila Mong lowered her gaze to the desktop, clearly casting back in her memory. “We thought he was a good man. We hesitated not at all to teach him our methods.”

“I think he was a good man then.” Luke, reflecting, was silent for a moment. “Would it be possible for me to learn the techniques Jacen learned?”

Tila Mong looked up at him—a hard, direct stare. “Would it be safe?”

“I'm not sure what you mean.”

“Our observation, thankfully distant, has been that Jacen Solo became a nryghat—a monster of nightmares, the sort that haunts the dreams of children. But he was not always so. Could it be that the methods we taught him, Force techniques developed by our species for our own use, could affect the mind of a human in a bad way, a damaging way?”

“It's … possible.”

“Then you should not be subjected to the same danger. If Jacen Solo, a very powerful Jedi, were transformed by what we taught him, and did all that he did, what might Luke Skywalker, the most famous, most powerful, and most experienced living Jedi, do if he were similarly affected?”

Luke met her gaze steadily. “And yet I have to know.”

“Teach me instead,” Ben heard himself saying.

Both his father and Tila Mong looked at him, surprised, as if they'd forgotten Ben was not a droid with a restraining bolt keeping its vocabulators from being activated.

Ben continued, “If I change the way Jacen did, well, I'm not as powerful as he was or my father is. I'm no danger. Well, less of a danger. My father could find a way to cure me.”

Luke shook his head. “I'm sorry, Ben. It needs to be someone as educated in as many subtleties of the Force as possible, and that means me.”

“But if you do turn the way Jacen did—”

Luke gave him a wan smile. “It took Jacen years to become Darth Caedus, and in that time he exhibited signs that we missed or ignored … signs that I believe we are very much attuned to now. Yes?”

“Well, yes.”

“If something happens to my thinking processes, to the way I feel about people and my duties, I suspect I'll notice the change and seek help. Even if I don't, you will.”

“No, Dad. What if it's sudden and total? What if you're Luke Skywalker today and Darth Starkiller tomorrow?”

Luke hesitated. “Then it would be your job to find a way to stop me. Even kill me.”

“No.”

“Ben, I don't think anything like that will happen. But if it does, you need to be a Jedi first. To put personal loyalties behind your responsibility to the innocent, to the Force. If you can't promise me you can do that, you may need to return to Coruscant.”

Ben just stared, stunned by the implacability of that statement. But he knew his father meant it.

There it was again, attachment. The things Jacen and Darth Vader had been attached to had meant more than all the innocent lives in the galaxy, and they had become monsters.

He could not let his own father become a monster.

“All right, Dad.”

“Promise me, Ben.”

“You have my word. As a Jedi.” Every one of those words was a twist on what felt like a clamp around his heart.

Luke sat back, satisfied, and returned his attention to the Mistress of the Baran Do.

She, too, nodded. “Very well. Return tomorrow at dawn. You may want to bring food of your own choice, as humans do not much care for ours. There is a shop catering to human needs near the street market.”

Luke smiled. “We'll be here.”

* * *

On their walk back to the spaceport, Ben kicked a