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He remembered their terrible months of shared grief.

Lowbacca stared through the skimmers front viewport for a few minutes, dutifully searching for clues that might lead them to Boman Thul... and hoping that Raaba would broach these difficult subjects herself.

She did not. In fact, she said nothing to him.

At first he grew irritated that Raaba did not start a conversation. She had been the one who disappeared, leaving all of them to mourn. Then, knowing the pain and discomfort her words would necessarily bring, and wondering what excuse she could possibly give, he began to dread what she might say.

Finally, Lowie could no longer remain silent. Clearing his throat with a growl, he began his question in a voice filled with tension. At the same moment, Raaba started to talk. The two Wookiees' words tumbled over each other, merging unintelligibly in the confines of the small cockpit. As each realized the other was speaking, they stopped, waited, began again at the same time, then burst into chuffing laughter at the absurdity of the situation.

With that tension released, Lowie was finally able to ask Raaba what had happened on the night of her disappearance.

Raaba replied in halting tones at first, averting her eyes. Her yearning to do something important and unusual with her life had been great, so great that she had been willing to risk her life to assure it.

Lowie had already known that much.

One night, without telling anyone, Raaba had brashly decided to attempt her rite of passage alone, asking for no help from Lowie or Sirra. But she had no sooner set out from the Wookiee tree city, had barely descended into the reasonably safe upper midlevels of the thick Kashyyyk forest, when a vicious katarn had attacked her.

Immediately, her hopes for completing the mission by herself were ended.

Though she managed to drive the katarn away, the beast left its mark on her, tearing a pair of deep gouges along her ribs with its fangs.

Raaba knew full well that the scent of blood would bring other nocturnal predator running, ready for an easy meal. To stay in the forest now would be foolish, she realized, and to descend farther would mean certain death. But to go back would mean impossible shame and embarassment.

Her only hope for survival lay above, in the treetops, in the safe, cozy Wookiee homes where she had lived all her life. Yet even as she hauled herself up branch after branch through sheer determination, Raaba found little hope in the prospect of simply surviving, going back to what had been her routine. Her brave attempt had been an utter failure--even cocky children climbed deeper than she had gone. She had no heart to go back to her friends and family and admit that she had begun her rite of passage only to retreat in cowardice at the first sign of danger.

If was better for them to think her dead.

And her death would free her to pursue other dreams....

Raaba and Lowie finished their search around the crater's rim, and the dark-furred Wookiee woman took the Rising Star out into the center of the crater, landing it atop another tall building on the pretext of getting the best overall view of the city in the deep rock-walled bowl.

When the two Wookiees climbed out of the croft, Lowie saw that Raaba had brought him to the highest point inside the crater.

From the top of the creaking building rose a towering structure made of open metal latticework--a lookout tower or a corroded communications relay, Lowie guessed. Its peak rose more than a hundred meters above the top of the building, level with the distant rim of the crater. Wind whistled through the rusted girders.

Lowie's heart raced at the sheer height of the structure. Without hesitation, Raaba sprang onto the latticework and began to climb.

Needing no encouragement, Lowie followed suit.

"Master Lowbacca, do be careful," Em Teedee scolded. "Do I need to remind you that you are injured? You shouldn't be exerting yourself in such a fashion."

Exhilarated at being with Raaba, though, Lowie ignored the pain