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“Mara and I will travel on to Corellia to see what we can find out about the possible origins of the assault made against us today.”

“They’re after me, too, aren’t they?” That was Ben, speaking for the first time since the Jedi had reconvened. His expression and voice were somber—not afraid, but far more serious than a thirteen-year-old’s should be, and Luke felt a lump begin to form in his throat.

“Yes,” he said. “If they’re after Jacen because of Centerpoint Station, they’re after you, too. Your youth may not mean anything to them. But understand me. Regardless of who they are, or how highly they’re placed, I’m not going to tolerate the continued—” He checked himself before he said existence. Revenge was not the way of the Jedi, not even when one’s own son had been the subject of a murder attempt. “—the continued freedom of people who target children for assassination.”

“How delicately expressed,” Mara said. “I don’t think there’s any way they’ll refrain from trying to kill us if we confront them, Luke. And when they do…”

“It’s never a good thing to hope for an opportunity to kill, Mara,” Luke said, his voice mild. But he had to admit to himself that the exact emotion was there in his own mind, hovering around his areas of self-control like neks circling a campfire just beyond the reach of its light. “All right. Let’s go. Ben, join me and your mother for a few minutes before it’s time to leave.”

Once the Skywalkers were out the door, Jacen gestured to get his sister’s attention, to keep her from following Zekk and the Jedi exodus. “Can I see that thing again?”

“Sure.” She held the tassel out to him.

Jacen looked it over. Close up, the mystery object proved to be an unusual example of beadcraft. It seemed to be a set of decorative tassels, each shaped and colored in an entirely different pattern, each attached to the longer central strand. At the top of the central strand was a cord, blue-black like the strand itself but unbeaded; it was three or four centimeters long and ended in a break, the cord material frayed. The object could have been caught on a corner, or grasped by the hand of a dying man and yanked free with relatively little effort, its loss unnoticed by its owner. Or, Jacen acknowledged, it could have been left deliberately.

One of the tassels continued to draw his eye, the tan one with the jagged black markings. Tiny black threads escaped through its surface, poking out from between the close-set beads. Viewed from the distance of a meter, they made the tassel look as though it needed a shave, but on closer inspection they resembled tiny claws.

The design of this tassel itself—Jacen could almost read the artist’s intent. The smooth tan represents peace, he told himself. The jagged black lines, strife. The curled threads are hooks, or claws. The moral: even a peaceful life will know strife, and strife presents hooks to drag you farther into the strife, a trap for the unwary. There was more to it than that, he knew—or at least felt. There was some sort of story involved in the message, but he couldn’t puzzle it out.

Abruptly he felt foolish. He was a Jedi Knight, not an art critic. It was not for him to try to wrest meaning out of patterns found on some bauble that probably cost less than a credit on a backwater planet’s street market. But the thing still drew him.

He became aware that Jaina was still speaking, her words lost in his distraction. He smiled at her and shook his head. “Sorry. I was daydreaming.”

“That’s not like you.”

“More like Anakin. Listen, would you like to trade?”

Jaina frowned. “Trade what?”

“Assignments. I’m feeling something from these tassels—can you?”

“No, not really.” She stooped to look them over more closely, then shook her head.

“So I should be the one to investigate them. You look into Tawaler, then go and take command of Uncle Luke’s squadron.”

Jaina briefly considered. “Let’s clear it with Uncle Luke first.”

“Let’s not. He’s been second-guessing a lot of my instincts lately…even though he keeps telling me to trust them.