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“What do you mean?”

“Neither of you is very good at hiding feelings, either.”

“Obi-Wan—”

“Anakin has loved you since the day you met, in that horrible junk shop on Tatooine. He’s never even tried to hide it, though we do not speak of it. We … pretend that I don’t know. And I was happy to, because it made him happy. You made him happy, when nothing else ever truly could.” He sighed, his brows drawing together. “And you, Padmé, skilled as you are on the Senate floor, cannot hide the light that comes to your eyes when anyone so much as mentions his name.”

“I—” She lurched to her feet. “I can’t—Obi-Wan, don’t make me talk about this …”

“I don’t mean to hurt you, Padmé. Nor even to make you uncomfortable. I’m not here to interrogate you; I have no interest in the details of your relationship.”

She turned away, walking just to be moving, barely conscious of passing through the door out onto the dawn-painted veranda. “Then why are you here?”

He followed her respectfully. “Anakin is under a great deal of pressure. He carries tremendous responsibilities for a man so young; when I was his age I still had some years to go as a Padawan. He is—changing. Quickly. And I have some anxiety about what he is changing into. It would be a … very great mistake … were he to leave the Jedi Order.”

She blinked as though he’d slapped her. “Why—that seems … unlikely, doesn’t it? What about this prophecy the Jedi put so much faith in? Isn’t he the chosen one?”

“Very probably. But I have scanned this prophecy; it says only that a chosen one will be born and bring balance to the Force; nowhere does it say he has to be a Jedi.”

She blinked harder, fighting down a surge of desperate hope that left her breathless. “He doesn’t have to—?”

“My Master, Qui-Gon Jinn, believed that it was the will of the Force that Anakin should be trained as a Jedi—and we all have a certain, oh, I suppose you could call it a Jedi-centric bias. It is a Jedi prophecy, after all.”

“But the will of the Force—isn’t that what Jedi follow?”

“Well, yes. But you must understand that not even the Jedi know all there is to be known about the Force; no mortal mind can. We speak of the will of the Force as someone ignorant of gravity might say it is the will of a river to flow to the ocean: it is a metaphor that describes our ignorance. The simple truth—if any truth is ever simple—is that we do not truly know what the will of the Force may be. We can never know. It is so far beyond our limited understanding that we can only surrender to its mystery.”

“What does this have to do with Anakin?” She swallowed, but her voice stayed tight and thin. “And with me?”

“I fear that some of his current … difficulty … has to do with your relationship.”

If you only knew how much, she thought. “What do you want me to do?”

He looked down. “I cannot tell you what to do, Padmé. I can only ask you to consider Anakin’s best interests. You know the two of you can never be together while he remains in the Order.”

A bleak chill settled into her chest. “Obi-Wan, I can’t talk about this.”

“Very well. But remember that the Jedi are his family. The Order gives his life structure. It gives him a direction. You know how … undisciplined he can be.”

And that’s why he is the only Jedi I could ever love … “Yes. Yes, of course.”

“If his true path leads him away from the Jedi, so be it. But please, for both of your sakes, tread carefully. Be sure. Some decisions can never be reversed.”

“Yes,” she said slowly. Feelingly. “I know that too well.”

He nodded as though he understood, though of course he did not understand at all. “We all do, these days.”

A soft chiming came from within his robe. “Excuse me,” he said, and turned aside, producing a comlink from an inner pocket. “Yes …?”

A man’s voice came thinly through the comlink, deep and clipped: “We are calling the Council into special session. We’ve located General Grievous!”

“Thank you, Master Windu,” Obi-Wan said. “I’m on my way.”

General Grievous? Her eyes went hot, and stung with