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Gantoris strode confidently down the narrow passage into the dense shadows, a lava tube blasted through the side of the cone to ease pressure from an ancient eruption. Up ahead a fiery orange glow lit their way. Luke felt growing anticipation mixed with dread with each step they took.

The lava tube spread out, revealing a boiling lake of fire. Though the fissure opened to the sky, and other openings let in gusting cross-drafts, the chamber felt like the blast of an oven. Luke ducked his head, trying to shield his face with the damp Jedi hood, but Gantoris seemed unaffected.

Squinting through noxious gases belching from the lava, Luke watched the other people arrive on the far side of the chamber, lining up and waiting. All faces turned toward him.

Gantoris had to raise his voice over the growling sounds of the churning magma. “Walk across the fire, dark man. If you reach the other side safely, I will allow you to teach me whatever you wish.” Without waiting for a reply Gantoris disappeared back into the darkness of the lava tube.

Luke stared after him for a moment, wondering if Gantoris could be serious—but then he noticed dark objects in the blaze of bright lava. Hard stepping stones of denser rock that did not melt but made a precarious path across the lake of fire.

Was Gantoris testing his courage? What did the man want, and what did his dreams of a demonic “dark man” portend?

Luke swallowed, but his throat was dry as parchment. He stepped to the edge of the simmering lava. The stones beckoned, but common sense warned him to go back, to return to his shuttle and fly away. He could find other candidates for his Jedi academy. Threepio and Artoo must have uncovered some leads by now, and he himself had another possibility on Bespin. Luke hadn’t even tested Gantoris yet; why should he risk his life for someone who might or might not actually have Jedi potential?

Because he had to. Forming a new order of Jedi Knights would be difficult, and if he flinched from the first test of his own powers, how could he consider himself worthy of attempting such a task?

Impossible heat swirled around him. Stepping to the edge of the fire, Luke looked at the broken sky above him. Then he set his foot down on the first stepping stone.

It supported his weight. Luke looked ahead, fixing his gaze on the opposite side. The gathered people kept watching.

Lava bubbled around him, belching noxious gases into the air. He tried to breathe in shallow gasps. He took another step. The other side seemed very far away.

Blinking irritated tears from his eyes, he counted the stones ahead of him. Fourteen more. Luke stepped to the next one.

Gantoris appeared on the far side, joining the other refugees of Eol Sha. Luke didn’t expect them to cheer him on, but they remained too eerily silent.

Another step. Around him the lava gurgled like the belly of a giant beast, a hungry beast.

Luke moved to another step, then another. A tendril of euphoria began to rise within him. This wasn’t as difficult as he had feared. He would be able to pass this test. With reckless courage and speed, he strode to the halfway point.

Then the lava began to bubble and hiss more forcefully, gushing as something stirred below. The volcanic chamber throbbed with a sound that drummed from just below his range of hearing, but enough to vibrate his teeth. He felt his stomach plunge with apprehension. He tensed, waiting to see what horror awaited him.

Something lived within the lake of lava. Something moved.

Suddenly a serpentlike creature burst above the surface, hissing like rocket fuel caught on fire.

The fireworm had a triangular head and pointed ear tufts. Crystalline scales armored every inch of its body. Its wide eyes were jewels glowing with a fire of their own. Insulated air intakes sucked in the hot atmosphere, filling bladders deep within the creature’s core and making it rise to the surface of the lava pool, huge and fierce. The silicon armor plates glittered like mirrors in the firelight.

Luke kept his