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“It’s grown,” Vestara said. “This area here,” and she pointed to the half-moon of darkness, “used to just be a crescent. It’s gotten larger.”

“I saw a map of this area at Sinkhole Station, and you’re right,” Luke said.

“That star is the sun of Abeloth’s world,” Vestara continued, recovering from her shock. “The light is blue. It’s quite lovely. The world is very hostile, completely unnatural. The animals thrive by photosynthesis, and the plants prey upon them.” She gave Ben and Luke a half-smile. “Keeps you on your toes.”

“And Abeloth controls everything,” Luke surmised.

“She does.”

“Great,” said Ben.

Luke did not reply. More than ever, he was convinced that Sinkhole Station’s job was to keep this being in line—keep the black holes surrounding her world, so that she couldn’t escape. When he and Ben had been there, the station had clearly been falling into disrepair and it looked like the situation had worsened just in the short time they had been away. Now the area to which Abeloth had been confined had shifted ominously, and this bright blue star burned like a defiant flag run up a pole, daring them to come and get her.

Which, Luke mused, they would.

“We will likely encounter Ship,” Vestara said, as if she were just making conversation.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Probably.”

She glanced over her shoulder at him. “You know about Ship?”

“I know more than about him, I piloted him for a while.”

“I’m impressed,” Vestara said. She attempted to relay the information about the crescent to the other ships in this most peculiar of fleets. “Ship is strong. It takes a powerful will to command him.”

“I take it you have?”

She did not look back at Ben, but replied, “Ship contacted me first when he arrived on our world.”

Luke hid a smile. Vestara was intelligent, cunning, and surprisingly strong in the Force. But she clearly was attracted to Ben, as unfortunately his son was to her, and she wanted to impress him. And in so doing, in bragging about her connection with Ship, she had revealed that it had been the strange vessel that had come to them, not the other way around. He didn’t know what that signified, not yet, but it was an important piece of the puzzle that was the Lost Tribe’s history.

“Once we got close,” Vestara continued, “we felt a presence other than Ship’s. It was … cold. It … squirmed its way into you. It was very needy.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Like, oh, I don’t know. A dark tentacle, perhaps?”

“You, too?”

“It is definitely Abeloth,” Luke said. “Interesting that it feels the same to both Sith and Jedi.”

“I guess a tentacle’s a tentacle, no matter who it’s poking or prodding,” Ben said.

“It makes our task of finding her that much more challenging,” Luke said. “But challenges are what make one grow.”

“You sound like my father,” Vestara said.

“Sith or Jedi, I suppose fathers read the same handbook,” Luke said. “Any response?”

“No. It’s doubtful it got through. They’ll have to just follow us closely.”

“But I’m sure you told them about Abeloth’s world and how to find it.”

Vestara regarded him levelly, her brown eyes cool. “Of course I did. Would you not do the same for your Jedi?”

“I would. Then let’s hope we don’t lose any stragglers.”

And he moved in.

Luke had always loved his son. In recent years, Ben had grown into a young man whom Luke respected as well as loved. As Luke maneuvered the Jade Shadow through the “Chasm of Perfect Darkness,” the way was indeed “narrow and treacherous,” as the Aing-Tii had told them, and he appreciated what a good job Ben had done the first time. Even with Abeloth’s Force presence to hold on to, it had to have been challenging. Luke found himself taxed as he cleared his mind and focused on the Force. Again, as it had the first time, the primary display offered only bright static. Turbulence caused the yacht to shudder, although the protective hovering of the Rockhound offered stability that Ben hadn’t had access to. He hoped that the other vessels were negotiating the difficult crossing as well as or better