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And so she had tried—but her communications unit was not working. Everything seemed fine, all the circuits tested clean, but there was no signal. Something was jamming the frequency; she could not even get an offworld carrier hyperwave, and she had no idea why. Possibly it was due to some military operation—it was entirely feasible that the Republic or the Separatists had recently implemented some device that could blanket a planet and stop transmissions such as hers. Or could it be a natural phenomenon? There were magnetic and flux storms in realspace that sometimes cast subspatial reverberations and interrupted comm signals. Drongar Prime was a hot sun; its coronal discharges were certainly strong enough…

Barriss made a frustrated gesture. No point in theorizing—she had to talk to somebody who knew more about the Force than she did, to pass this along and decide what—if anything—needed to be done about it. She’d tried the unit again, as soon as she’d gotten back to her kiosk, but of course it still wasn’t working.

There was another way, however, an elegantly simple way: take another blast of the bota. She was almost certain that she could figure out just about anything, once she returned to that ineffable state in which she had been before, if this time she was expecting it and prepared for it. The experience held within it all manner of knowledge; she could still feel the truth of that. Once she understood the parameters of the event, Barriss could present the Jedi Council with something of incalculable value. She couldn’t even imagine the miracles that a true Jedi Master could perform while suffused with such power. Why, even the small handful of the Order remaining could turn the course of the war, could easily defeat Dooku’s forces and restore galactic peace, did they but have access to the kind of power Barriss had experienced. She knew this to be true; she had felt as if she could accomplish all that by herself, so she knew that, with such mystical strength in the hands of Luminara or Obi-Wan or Yoda, anything would be possible.

But—could she prepare herself sufficiently to ride that massive and all-powerful wave again? It seemed entirely possible that the next time it might roll over her, and she wouldn’t be able to struggle free. Maybe it would claim her for itself, and never let her go, transform her somehow into something totally outside the experience of her or anyone else…

Barriss sighed. This was beyond her skill, her talents, her ability. She needed help, but there wasn’t anyone here capable of providing it. It seemed that, until she could talk to Master Unduli, she would be better off doing nothing.

But that wasn’t as easy as it sounded, by any means. The memory of the power, frightening as it was, nevertheless cried out to her. Its call was so tempting. Even though she was afraid, she longed to try it again.

It would be easy. There were several skinpoppers filled with the distillate literally within arm’s reach. It would be but a second’s work to take one, push it against her flesh, trigger it…

So easy…

Barriss wrapped her arms around herself and shivered, feeling a cold that had nothing to do with the snow outside.

20

Jos, my friend. How are you feeling?”

Jos looked at the minder. “Well, if truth be known, I’ve had better days. Better months. Decades.”

“Oh?”

Jos squirmed uncomfortably—a difficult task in the formchair that fought to match his every move and make the position comfortable. “You, uh, know about me and Tolk.”

The Equani steepled his fingers. “Fortunately, I have not gone blind or deaf recently.”

“Yeah, well…I thought we were flying like a landspeeder with custom harmonics. Only lately she’s… cooled.”

“How so?”

Jos sighed. Everything about Klo and his office was designed to be calming—his manner, the decor, the patient’s formchair—but Jos had yet to be able to relax when he came here. It wasn’t that he felt distrustful of Klo, or of the whole minder process, the