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Soon! Ben mouthed.

“What are you two whispering about?” demanded Gavar Khai’s angry voice. “We have had enough Jedi tricks for one day.”

“This is no trick,” Luke said, turning toward the arcade where Taalon had taken Vestara. “But Sith or not, I won’t stand by and allow a sixteen-year-old girl to be beaten.”

Without awaiting a reply—and ignoring for the moment the fact that there was no indication that anyone was being beaten—Luke started across the courtyard. Taken even more by surprise than Ben was, Khai stood with his jaw hanging for a couple of heartbeats, then finally seemed to realize that he needed to do something.

By then, Luke was only a couple of steps from the arcade.

“Wait!” Khai extended his hand, using the Force to jerk Luke to a stop. “You can’t interaaagggghh!”

The objection came to a shrieking end as Luke whirled around, using his own Force strength to supplement Khai’s. The Sith left the ground and flew across five paces of courtyard into the iron-tight grasp of Luke’s artificial hand.

“Someone needs to intervene,” Luke said calmly. “And since her father won’t, I will.”

Ben knew what his father was doing, of course, and he was already stepping toward Abeloth’s shrouded body, reaching out to grasp it in the Force and float it around the far side of the funeral pyre. As gruesome as it seemed to sneak off with a stinking, three-day-old corpse, he understood why his father insisted on retrieving it. Assuming they were actually able to reach the Jade Shadow with Abeloth’s body and return it to the Jedi Temple, it was impossible to say how much Cilghal might learn by studying the thing. She might be able to identify a species, or at least hazard a guess as to what kind of being Abeloth had been. And if they could not return to Coruscant with the cadaver itself, at least they might be able to take tissue samples and make a couple of vids.

But most important, by taking the corpse themselves the Skywalkers would prevent Taalon from keeping it. Given what the Lost Tribe’s intentions had been—to subjugate Abeloth and turn her into their own living Force weapon—it was a risk well worth taking. Ben just wished he had thought to bring a thermal detonator along—except, of course, that it would have been a violation of their truce with the Sith.

Ben had just made it past the funeral pyre and was only three steps from the jungle when he felt Abeloth’s corpse being drawn back into the courtyard. Cursing under his breath, he snatched the lightsaber from his belt and began to pull harder, then heard a familiar female voice behind him.

“Oh no you don’t, Ben! That wasn’t part of the deal.”

Ben exhaled in frustration and, pulling harder than ever, spun around to find Vestara pursuing him around the pyre. Coming around the other side was Taalon himself, his lightsaber in hand and his eyes burning orange with rage. Luke and Khai remained out of sight beyond the pyre, still arguing and—judging by their Force auras—unaware of what was happening on the other side of the flames.

“Well done, Vestara.” Taalon ignited his crimson blade and started to circle toward Ben’s flank. “See to Abeloth. I’ll handle the boy.”

A pang of sadness and loss shot through Vestara’s Force aura, but she merely inclined her head. “As you wish, Lord Taalon. I’m just glad I was right.”

She began to exert herself more fully in the Force, pulling hard enough that Ben knew it would prove impossible to hold the body and defend himself from Taalon. He reached for his father in the Force … and cursed, “Aw, bloah!”

Taalon sprang, coming in fast and hard with a vertical slash that felt almost contemptuous in its power and bluntness. Ben easily pivoted aside, simultaneously releasing Abeloth’s body and sending it toward the pyre with a powerful Force shove. Then he continued his pivot and landed a spinning back kick square in the small of Taalon’s back and began to think he just might win this fight.

And that, of course, was a very bad mistake.

Instead of flying splay-limbed into the jungle as Ben had expected, Taalon used the Force