Star Wars_ I, Jedi - Michael A. Stackpole [55]
Gantoris had rolled to his feet while Luke retreated and advanced confidently. The length of the blade on his lightsaber gave him an advantage and he clearly meant to use it. He waded in toward Luke, crashing down blow after blow with a ferocity I’d only ever seen in a glitbiter gripped by spice paranoia. Though Luke picked off each blow with ease, never letting Gantoris make him defend in the Inner Ring, the apprentice kept coming. His intensity and singlemindedness kept Luke falling back to the point where the Jedi Master’s only escape was to leap away and levitate himself onto a branch of a Massassi tree.
I watched, stunned, as Gantoris waited for Luke to descend again. All the other students had pressed back away from the clearing. They lurked in the edges of the forest, waiting, uncertain what to do. Like me, Kam had no lightsaber with him. As he glanced over at me, I knew we both weighed the chances of our being able to race to the Temple, getting our lightsabers and managing to return in time to make a difference.
And if Gantoris can kill a Jedi Master, what chance would I have of stopping him?
Luke asked Gantoris a question, but the hum of lightsabers stole both it and Gantoris’ shouted reply. Then the apprentice slashed at the Massassi tree with his lightsaber, shearing all the way through it. Stintarils in the highest branches shrieked as they leaped away. The scent of spicy sap reached me about the same time as the tree slowly toppled into the rainforest with a crackling and snap of bushes and saplings caught beneath it.
Master Skywalker floated to the ground unharmed and again set himself to receive Gantoris’ attacks. Gantoris shortened his blade and came on. Luke gave ground, blocking the attacks in closer to him than before. He gave the impression that he was tiring, weakening. I guessed it was a ploy to draw Gantoris on, but the apprentice was not thinking clearly enough to see that. He pressed forward, slashing his way through leafy ferns and chopping apart nebula orchids.
Suddenly Luke went down and I couldn’t see him. Gantoris rushed forward, his spitting blade shredding the jungle. I started to sprint toward them, cursing the fact that I couldn’t lift Gantoris up the way I had Tionne only hours before. I tried to think of what image I could project into Gantoris’ mind to deflect him and distract him, but I never got the chance.
Gantoris’ purple blade came down in an overhand strike that burned its way through the underbrush. I heard a startled squeal, then an orange furred runyip broke from the brush, darting into the clearing right behind Gantoris. As he turned to face this new threat, his lightsaber flew up out of his hands and the blade died.
Luke plucked the lightsaber from the air, then extinguished his own blade. The two of them stood there, facing each other. Sweat streamed down their faces and their breath came ragged, yet neither one wanted to show any sign of weakness. In the absence of the lightsaber hissing, the fading sounds of the runyip’s squeals and the normal sound of the rainforest fought for supremacy.
Then Luke did something that stunned me. He flipped Gantoris’ lightsaber around and extended it to him hilt first. Gantoris accepted it timidly, clutching it in both hands. He studied it, turning it over and around as if seeing it for the first time, then he looked back at Luke.
The Jedi Master nodded. “Good exercise, Gantoris, but you must learn to control your anger. It could be your undoing.”
I dropped to my knees in utter astonishment. I watched Gantoris turn away and retreat into the rainforest. The other apprentices seemed as surprised at what had happened as I was. They whispered together in little knots as Luke emerged from the undergrowth, clipped his lightsaber to his belt, and pulled his cloak back on.
He looked