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She joined him at the port, and stared with him out into the space outside the universe.

“Perhaps there is,” she said at long last. “Perhaps that is what you will have to teach me.”

Outside the universe, there is nothing.

This nothing is called hyperspace.

A tiny bubble of existence hangs in the nothing. This bubble is called a ship.

The bubble has neither motion nor stillness, nor even orientation, since the nothing has no distance or direction. It hangs there forever, or for less than an instant, because in the nothing there is also no time. Time, distance, and direction have meaning only inside the bubble, and the bubble maintains the existence of these things only by an absolute separation of what is within from what is without.

The bubble is its own universe.

Within this universe, there are traitors. One is a teacher, and a student; another is a student, and a teacher.

One is a gardener.

This universe falls toward another, wider universe: a universe that is a garden—

Which is still full of weeds.

MATTHEW STOVER is the New York Times best-selling author of the Star Wars novels Revenge of the Sith, Shatterpoint, and The New Jedi Order: Traitor, as well as Caine Black Knife, The Blade of Tyshalle, and Heroes Die. He is an expert in several martial arts. Stover lives outside Chicago.

ALSO BY

MATTHEW STOVER

Iron Dawn

Jericho Moon

Heroes Die

Blade of Tyshalle

Star Wars: The New Jedi Order: Traitor

Star Wars: Shatterpoint

Star Wars: Episode III: Revenge of the Sith

STAR WARS—The Expanded Universe

You saw the movies. You watched the cartoon series, or maybe played some of the video games. But did you know …

In The Empire Strikes Back, Princess Leia Organa said to Han Solo, “I love you.” Han said, “I know.” But did you know that they actually got married? And had three Jedi children: the twins, Jacen and Jaina, and a younger son, Anakin?

Luke Skywalker was trained as a Jedi by Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. But did you know that, years later, he went on to revive the Jedi Order and its commitment to defending the galaxy from evil and injustice?

Obi-Wan said to Luke, “For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.” Did you know that over those millennia, legendary Jedi and infamous Sith Lords were adding their names to the annals of Republic history?

Yoda explained that the dreaded Sith tend to come in twos: “Always two, there are. No more, no less. A Master, and an apprentice.” But did you know that the Sith didn’t always exist in pairs? That at one time in the ancient Republic there were as many Sith as Jedi, until a Sith Lord named Darth Bane was the lone survivor of a great Sith war and created the “Rule of Two”?

All this and much, much more is brought to life in the many novels and comics of the Star Wars expanded universe. You’ve seen the movies and watched the cartoon. Now venture out into the wider worlds of Star Wars!

Turn the page or jump to the timeline of Star Wars novels to learn more.

ONE

As she sat in the chair that was hers by right of death, she raised her eyes to the cold faraway stars. Checklists buzzed distantly in her mind and her hands moved over the controls, but her thoughts flew elsewhere, amid the chill infinitude. Searching …

Nothing.

Her gaze fell and there she saw, on the controls at the adjacent pilot’s seat, her husband’s hands. She drew comfort from the sight, from the sureness and power she knew was there, in those strong hands.

Her heart leapt. Something, somewhere in all those stars, had touched her.

She thought: Jacen!

Her husband’s hands touched controls and the stars streamed away, turned to bleeding smears of light as if seen through beaten rain, and the distant touch vanished.

“Jacen,” she said, and then, at her husband’s startled look, at the surprise and pain in his brown eyes, “Jacen.”

“And you’re sure?” Han Solo said. “You’re sure it was Jacen?”

“Yes. Reaching out to me. I