Star Wars_ The Black Fleet Crisis 02_ Shield of Lies - Michael P. Kube-McDowell [78]
“I encouraged you to,” she protested. “I’m the one who asked you to disable the interlock.”
“Yeah, but you neglected to mention that it’d be safe to do it,” Luke grumbled. “We blast out of one system under one ID, tiptoe into the next under another—and no one connects the two. Very sweet. This fellow on Golkus is going to do a brisk business.”
“He chooses not to,” Akanah said. “I had the impression he considers himself retired. He says he’s very selective about who he’ll do this kind of work for.”
“Well—I guess the fact he’s on Golkus and not in Talos backs that up,” Luke said, shaking his head. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I did,” she said. “Just now.”
“That’s a cheat,” Luke said.
“Yes,” she said. “The truth is I wasn’t ready to trust you with that information. I didn’t really know whether I might need to hide myself from you at some point. I have a lot to protect.”
“But you’re ready to trust me now.”
“If I don’t trust you, I’m completely alone,” she said, a hint of an old sorrow in her eyes. “And I can’t do that anymore. I never wanted to, and now I just can’t. I can’t hold you out when what I need is to be close to someone again.”
“Akanah—”
“Secrets are like walls, aren’t they? They separate people. And I’ve been alone behind these walls for as long as I can bear,” she said. “I’ll teach you to read scribing, Luke. And if you want it, and you allow me enough time, I’ll teach you the rest. You will become one of us in full measure—an adept of the White Current. You will finally walk your mother’s path.”
Luke understood the significance of what he was being offered. “Thank you,” he said in a voice drawn tight by emotion. “Even the chance that I might find her—I want to bring as much of her into my life as I can—I want that balance—”
“But you still have questions,” she supplied.
“Yes.”
“Please don’t hold them back because you don’t want to seem ungrateful. Ask them.”
Her words captured the flavor of his reluctance exactly. “Is telepathy one of the adept’s skills?”
She laughed lightly. “Are people now so afraid to look closely at Luke Skywalker that ordinary attentiveness seems remarkable?”
Luke’s smile was rueful and faintly embarrassed. “Perhaps.”
“They should not be,” she said. “Now ask me the real question. Something else in those reports, I think.”
“Something that wasn’t there,” he said. “You were right. There wasn’t a word about the Fallanassi—not on Lucazec, or Teyr, or Coruscant, or Atzerri. Not that word.”
“You must wonder whether there really is a circle,” she said, “or if this is just a fable spun by a lonely madwoman to lure you away with her.” She showed a small smile, inviting him to demur.
“I just expected there to be something. Rumors, myths, legends, superstitions—it’s hard to understand how a people as powerful as the Fallanassi, with as long a history as you’ve suggested, could leave no trace of yourselves—”
“Because we have made it so,” she said quietly.
“—Or are the traces there, and I don’t know the right names to ask after—What did you say?”
“Because we have made it so,” she repeated. “When such traces appear, we remove them. But there are not many to remove, because we have not made it our purpose to leave a mark.”
Luke nodded slowly. “Not to conquer—not to convert—but to find the place where one belongs—”
“Yes. If you understand that, you understand the most important truth of the Current,” she said. “If you let it, it will carry you to where you need to be, for the lessons you need to learn, the work you need to do, and the people who need you in their lives.”
Nodding, Luke slid across to the pilot’s seat. “Speaking of which—we’ve been sitting here a long time. We should get going,” he said. “But I need to know where.”
“J’t’p’tan,” she said. “The world is called J’t’p’tan.”
Luke turned away toward the controls. “Well—you’ve stumped me again. I’ll have to look that one up in the navigation atlas.”
“Luke—”
“What?”
“Isn’t