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“No.” She turned to look at him, half her face hidden in shadow. “I wish I could be brave like you. You joke about being a guest.”

“It’s joke or cry, Danni.” Jacen leaned forward on the breastwork. “You know being brave really isn’t that much of a trick. Most of the time courage is just ignorance of what’s really going on. I didn’t have time to be scared, and you didn’t really, either, when we were escaping. You weren’t, then, when it counted.”

“But I am now. I just feel fear everywhere. It’s all over.”

Jacen slowly nodded. “There’s a lot of fear in the camp, yes, and some out there.” He pointed into the darkness. “You can probably feel it. It’s a weird buzzing in the Force. Uncle Luke and I learned to associate it with Yuuzhan Vong slaves. The Yuuzhan Vong do something to their slaves. I’m assuming that whatever troops they send against us, the first wave will be slaves of some sort. They will be expendable and let the Yuuzhan Vong test their methods against us without killing too many Yuuzhan Vong warriors.”

“Do you think we will win?”

He shrugged. “I don’t see that we have a choice. I could say yes, but if I’m wrong, we’ll not be around to discuss it.”

Danni raised an eyebrow. “No hint of the future through the Force?”

“No, and I’m not sure I’d believe it if there was one.” Jacen sighed heavily. “I don’t know what to think. Two weeks ago I thought that the only way for me to reach my true potential as a Jedi was to retreat, become a hermit, work on my connection with the Force. Now I see that there is a need for me as a Jedi to help people. I can’t tell you how good it felt to be able to save Mara and Anakin. Out there the Jedi might be held in contempt, but here the few of us are being looked upon as saviors. When my uncle wanders through the camp, you can feel pride and hope swell. There are kids using sticks and making a buzzing sound as they duel with mock lightsabers. It may just be people grasping at any hope in so dark a time, but being able to provide that hope makes me feel good.”

“So you accept that a Jedi has responsibility beyond his relationship with the Force?”

“I’d not thought about it in exactly those terms, no, but I guess I’d have to answer yes.” He shifted his shoulders uneasily. “Still, I wonder if I’d somehow had a stronger relationship with and understanding of the Force, I’d have been able to know where my vision went wrong. Uncle Luke says the future is constantly in motion, so the vision might have been correct right up to the point when it wasn’t because of something someone else did. If it had gone right, we might not have been here and able to save Mara or Anakin, so I have no argument with how things turned out. Still . . .”

“Still, you want to have a better grasp on the Force. If it is the path you are to follow, you want to learn how the trail is blazed.”

Jacen turned toward her and smiled. “I guess that’s it, yes.”

Danni nodded, then coiled a strand of blond hair around a finger. “Perhaps that path you seek is just like the future, constantly in motion. Perhaps this stretch demands you provide hope to these people, and another will let you go off on your own. When you come to a decision point, you can leave off one path and head out on another. Only your past experience can guide you.”

“Yeah, and I don’t have that much experience, do I?” Jacen shook his head. “It sounds as if you’ve thought a lot about the Force.”

“Not the Force, just life. I’ve had to choose courses, too. We all do. I could have stayed on Commenor, gotten married, had children, but instead I applied to the ExGal Society and got posted to Belkadan. If I survive this ordeal, perhaps I will get the chance to revisit that sort of decision.”

Jacen felt the hint of a flush on his cheeks. “You want to get married and have children?”

“If the right man comes along, it’s possible, yes.” She shrugged. “With all that’s going on, I don’t really know if I can trust my emotions. Gratitude, fear, curiosity—all these things are mixed up in me.”

“But there is no one you are seeing?