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The chamber beneath was about the same size and shape as the one above, but had a higher ceiling and was dominated by a centerpiece—a crude hemisphere like half a gigantic geode, two and a half meters in diameter, positioned as if balanced on one edge. The crystals lining the hemisphere’s interior were of all colors, predominantly blue, green, white, and violet.

Directly in front of the geode was a raised cot of metal, like a gurney without wheels or repulsorlift buoyancy tanks, and on it lay a young woman. She was perhaps twenty, small-boned, with facial features characteristic of the Oldtimers, and she wore the rough, simple garments of the Oldtimers. Her dark brown hair was worn in a long braid that mostly lay beneath her, and her eyes were closed.

Beside the cot stood another Oldtimer, a strongly built man of thirty or forty, his dark hair graying. He turned toward Sel as she led the others into the chamber. He wore a trim beard more appropriate to a dashing smuggler than a farmer, and his eyes were dark, expressive.

Sel gestured back at her companions. “Taru, I bring you Master Luke Skywalker, Ben Skywalker, Vestara Khai. This is Master Taru Durn, head of the healer hall of Hweg Shul.”

Taru shook hands with all three, in the fashion of someone familiar with offworld customs, and turned to Luke. “I know you both from holocasts and from the memories of the tsils.”

“I’m surprised to be remembered.”

Taru shrugged. “They remember everything. You have special meaning to them, though. You promised to bring back the tsils that had been taken offworld and enslaved, and by and large you made good on your promise.”

Luke nodded. He’d certainly tried. Tragically, some of the sentient crystals taken offworld and programmed as central processing units for droids, droid starfighters, and other devices could not be found, and others had been destroyed. But—with invaluable help from Leia, then the New Republic’s Chief of State—he had returned most of them, and the search still went on for the missing ones.

Taru turned to the woman on the cot. “This is Thei. When she was five, she and her mother departed their farmstead for Ruby Gulch on a cu-pa. Two days later, she came wandering in out of the barrens alone. She had no memory of how this came to be. She was adopted by a rock ivory mining family and lived a normal life until recently. Six months ago, she married a Newcomer speeder mechanic here in town … and shortly after began experiencing emotional breaks, total collapses. Triggered, often as not, by the smell of topato soup.”

Ben blinked. “If I didn’t suspect there was a tragedy behind that, it might even be funny.”

Taru nodded. “But mundane details can be strongly tied to memories. Smells are especially evocative.”

Vestara glanced around. “If she’s recently married, where’s her husband?”

“They have differing opinions about the efficacy of Oldtimer healing. Her husband is all for modern medical techniques and looks on what the Listeners do as superstition.”

Ben’s frown was thoughtful. “It’s not a good idea for husbands and wives to conceal big things from each other. That can lead to tragedy, too.”

Taru opened his mouth to respond, but Luke interrupted, deflecting the conversation in a new direction. “The geode. What’s it doing here?”

“Normally, the vein-routing technique—which Sel insists on calling mnemotherapy—is conducted by one healer, one patient, and a trance-inducing medicine, nothing more. But that gives nothing for learners to witness. We use reflecting bowls like this to allow others to witness and understand what’s going on. Since, with Thei’s permission, we will have witnesses today, we will conduct this session with a reflecting bowl. Please, bring up stools.”

They did. Vestara, first to sit, frowned. “If this is a Force technique, and use of the Force causes dangerous storms—”

Taru nodded, obviously having heard the question before. “The techniques taught to us by the tsils don’t cause the Force storms. Oh, every use of