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"Yes, Ambassador, the entire ocean is available," she said as the wind whipped her hair about like red-gold flames, "but it is you who chose to bring about this dispute. You erected your consulate after you knew for certain that the Vergills would desire to mine that very same spot."

She waited, but the Mairan said nothing. She continued. "The Vergills have also petitioned for our intervention. And so you may either change the location of your consulate-which is quite easily done, as I understand from the modular construction of your domes-or you may simply choose to tolerate the noise and disturbance."

After a moment of stung silence, the Mairan ambassador fluted stridently, waving his tentacles.

"Don't even bother translating that," Tenel Ka said sharply to Em Teedee, then turned to face the hulking black creature. "You came to me asking for a decision, and I have made it. In the future perhaps you will attempt to work out your own problems instead of wasting our time with your petty squabbles.

I have spoken."

She sat back down and shrugged into her robe again. After another moment the Mairan ambassador shuffled backward into the surf and disappeared beneath the waves.

"All right, Tenel Ka!" Jacen cried, running toward her. Lowbacca chuffed with laughter.

Tenel Ka felt her head spinning, exhilarated at what she had done. It surprised her that the speech had come easily after all. She adjusted the rainbowgem tiara on her head.

She was actually startled, though, when she looked behind her to see her grandmother, the iron-hard and impossible-to-please matriarch, smiling.

"Perhaps your methods are a bit rough yet, child," her grandmother said, "but your judgment was sound."

REST AND SAFEKEEPING were all well and good, Jacen thought-but after several days staying at the Reef Fortress with no place to go but to the tiny cove to swim, he began to get restless. Terribly restless.

Tenel Ka, too, was a person of action-Jacen knew that better than anybody. She wanted to be out and around, having adventures, not coddled and sheltered like a pet. The injured warrior girl certainly didn't want to sit like an old woman, merely watching waves pound against the rocks.

Ta'a Chume had returned to the Fountain Palace to supervise the investigation of the bomb blast, leaving Tenel Ka and the young Jedi Knights under the questionable care of thin-lipped Ambassador Yfra. The ambassador was a hard woman, as if all the muscles in her body were made of durasteel rather than flesh... but then, everyone within the Hapan government lived a harsh life, trusting no one, always struggling for personal gain. Jacen supposed Ambassador Yfra was no worse than anyone else in this society. On the other hand, he could see why Tenel Ka preferred the honest ruggedness of her mother's world of Dathomir to the hypocritical and often poisonous dealings of Hapan politicians.

He found Tenel Ka outside the towering Reef Fortress standing on an outcropping of black rock.

She was throwing stones with her good arm into the swirling pools of water that hissed around the outer reef. Deep in concentration, she took careful aim and was clearly pleased whenever she struck her imagined target. Reluctant to disrupt her reverie, Jacen stood behind her, content just to watch.

Jaina and Lowie, who had followed Jacen out of the fortress, also looked on as Tenel Ka threw stones. All of them seemed to feel the same restlessness-stuck on a minuscule island with no place to go.

After a few minutes, the balcony doors above them opened, and a flash of sunlight from polished transparisteel dazzled Jacen. Ambassador Yfra stepped out onto the high balcony, whip-thin, looking like a bird of prey as she scanned the rocks to find them. She waved, catching their attention.

"Children, come here please."

Lowbacca sniffed the salty air and groaned a comment. Em Teedee made an electronic sound of disagreement. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean, Master Lowbacca! Whatever makes you think the air has changed for the worse? It still smells every bit as salty and refreshing to me