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Glancing down at herself, she assessed her lean muscular arms and long sturdy legs, reveling in the unrestricted motion and complete control. She sped up, pleased to note that her muscles were more than equal to the demands she made on them.

Yes, she decided, the warrior was what mattered, not the weapon.

After her fifth day of intensive drilling to hone her skills as sharp as any weapon, Tenel Ka felt ready to begin fashioning the handle of her personal lightsaber. Still glowing with perspiration from her morning workout, she decided to swim in the warm jungle river while she considered her next task.

She thought of the many materials available for her lightsaber handle, as she stripped off her exercise suit and dove with easy confidence into the swift current.

Tenel Ka was a strong swimmer, trained on both Hapes and Dathomir, at the insistence of both grandmothers. It was one of the few times she could remember that her parents' mothers had ever agreed on anything.

Augwynne Djo, mother of Teneniel Djo, Tenel Ka's mother, had taught her to swim, saying that the strongest hunters and warriors were those who could not be stopped by a mere lake or river. Ta'a Chume, on the other hand, matriarch of the Royal House of Hapes and mother of Tenel Ka's father, Prince Isolder, had taught swimming as a defense against assassins or kidnappers. In fact, her grandmother had once escaped an attempt on her life by umping from a wavespeeder into a lake and swimming for shore underwater, so that the would-be assassins assumed she had drowned.

Tenel Ka surfaced from the river, drew a deep lungful of air, and struck out upstream against the current. It was difficult swimming, but she used the added strength she had gained in her recent lightsaber training... which brought her back to the task at hand.

She supposed she could fashion her lightsaber handle from a piece of metal pipe, or even carve one from hardwood, since a lightsaber gave off little heat. But somehow those did not seem right for her.

Tenel Ka propelled herself forward with long smooth strokes, keeping a steady rhythm. Left.

Right. Left. Right.

Stone would be too difficult to shape, and too heavy for her purposes. Tenel Ka needed something that would suit the image of a warrior from Dathomir. She pictured Augwynne Djo's proud form clad in reptile skin, a ceremonial helm on her head, riding a domesticated rancor. The taming of these ferocious beasts was an appropriate symbol of the courage of her rugged people, since the huge beasts were powerful and their sharp claws deadly.

Tenel Ka allowed herself to sink below the surface of the river and changed to a new stroke, recalling that she had kept two teeth from her grandmother's favorite rancor when it had died a few years ago. They were not the rancor's largest teeth by far, but each was the perfect size and shape to be a lightsaber handle....

A week later, Tenel Ka studied her handiwork with justifiable pride and etched another deep groove into the pattern she had carved on her rancor tooth.

Lowie, sitting ahead of her in the tiny cockpit of the T-23 skyhopper, turned and roared a question at her. She waited for a moment for Em Teedee's translation. "Master Lowbacca wishes to inquire whether you have any preference as to the volcano in which you hope to search for crystals."

Tenel Ka glanced out at the rich green jungle canopy rushing beneath them. "You may choose," she said.

Lowbacca gave a short bark. "It makes little difference to Master Lowbacca," Em Teedee told her. "He has already assembled the components he intends to use for his lightsaber. The primary construction on his instrument is complete, and he has only to tune it now."

Tenel Ka blinked in surprise, not only at the length of Em Teedee's translation after Lowbacca's short reply, but also at the thought that Lowbaccaand perhaps Jacen or Jaina-was so far ahead of her. Well then, she would have to make her search quickly and assemble her lightsaber without delay.

"The closest volcano," she said, reaching forward and pointing.