POLITICS

Orbital mirrors rotated, resolving the faint light of Coruscant’s sun to erase the stars; fireships crosshatched the sky with contrails of chemical air scrubber, bleaching away the last reminders of the fires of days past; chill remnants of night slid down the High Council Tower of the Jedi Temple; and within the cloistered chamber itself, Obi-Wan was still trying to talk them out of it.

“Yes, of course I trust him,” he said patiently. “We can always trust Anakin to do what he thinks is right. But we can’t trust him to do what he’s told. He can’t be made to simply obey. Believe me: I’ve been trying for many years.”

Conflicting currents of energy swirled and clashed in the Council Chamber. Traditionally, decisions of the Council were reached by quiet, mutual contemplation of the flow of the Force, until all the Council was of a single mind on the matter. But Obi-Wan knew of this tradition only by reputation, from tales in the archives and stories told by Masters whose tenure on the Council predated the return of the Sith. In the all-too-short years since Obi-Wan’s own elevation, argument in this Chamber was more the rule than the exception.

“An unintentional opportunity, the Chancellor has given us,” Yoda said gravely. “A window he has opened into the operations of his office. Fools we would be, to close our eyes.”

“Then we should use someone else’s eyes,” Obi-Wan said. “Forgive me, Master Yoda, but you just don’t know him the way I do. None of you does. He is fiercely loyal, and there is not a gram of deception in him. You’ve all seen it; it’s one of the arguments that some of you, here in this room, have used against elevating him to Master: he lacks true Jedi reserve, that’s what you’ve said. And by that we all mean that he wears his emotions like a HoloNet banner. How can you ask him to lie to a friend—to spy upon him?”

“That is why we must call upon a friend to ask him,” said Agen Kolar in his gentle Zabrak baritone.

“You don’t understand. Don’t make him choose between me and Palpatine—”

“Why not?” asked the holopresence of Plo Koon from the bridge of Courageous, where he directed the Republic Navy strike force against the Separatist choke point in the Ywllandr system. “Do you fear you would lose such a contest?”

“You don’t know how much Palpatine’s friendship has meant to him over the years. You’re asking him to use that friendship as a weapon! To stab his friend in the back. Don’t you understand what this will cost him, even if Palpatine is entirely innocent? Especially if he’s innocent. Their relationship will never be the same—”

“And that,” Mace Windu said, “may be the best argument in favor of this plan. I have told you all what I have seen of the energy between Skywalker and the Supreme Chancellor. Anything that might distance young Skywalker from Palpatine’s influence is worth the attempt.”

Obi-Wan didn’t need to reach into the Force to know that he would lose this argument. He inclined his head. “I will, of course, abide by the ruling of this Council.”

“Doubt of that, none of us has.” Yoda turned his green gaze on the other councilors. “But if to be done this is, decide we must how best to use him.”

The holopresence of Ki-Adi-Mundi flickered in and out of focus as the Cerean Master leaned forward, folding his hands. “I, too, have reservations on this matter, but it seems that in these desperate times, only desperate plans have hope of success. We have seen that young Skywalker has the power to battle a Sith Lord alone, if need be; he has proven that with Dooku. If he is indeed the chosen one, we must keep him in play against the Sith—keep him in a position to fulfill his destiny.”

“And even if the prophecy has been misread,” Agen Kolar added, “Anakin is the one Jedi we can best hope would survive an encounter with a Sith Lord. So let us also use him to help us set our trap. In Council, let us emphasize that we are intensifying our search for Grievous. Anakin will certainly report this to the Chancellor’s Office. Perhaps, as you say, that will draw Sidious into action.”

“It may not be enough,” Mace Windu said. “Let us take this one step farther—we should appear shorthanded, and weak, giving Sidious an opening to make a move he thinks will go unobserved. I’m thinking that perhaps we should let the Chancellor’s Office know that Yoda and I have both been forced to take the field—”

“Too risky that is,” Yoda said. “And too convenient. One of us only should go.”

“Then it should be you, Master Yoda,” Agen Kolar said. “It is your sensitivity to the broader currents of the Force that a Sith Lord has most reason to fear.”

Obi-Wan felt the ripple of agreement flow through the Chamber, and Yoda nodded solemnly. “The Separatist attack on Kashyyyk, a compelling excuse will make. And good relations with the Wookiees I have; destroy the droid armies I can, and still be available to Coruscant, should Sidious take our bait.”

“Agreed.” Mace Windu looked around the half-empty Council Chamber with a deepening frown. “And one last touch. Let’s let the Chancellor know, through Anakin, that our most cunning and insightful Master—and our most tenacious—is to lead the hunt for Grievous.”

“So Sidious will need to act, and act fast, if the war is to be maintained,” Plo Koon added approvingly.

Yoda nodded judiciously. “Agreed.” Agen Kolar assented as well, and Ki-Adi-Mundi.

“This sounds like a good plan,” Obi-Wan said. “But what Master do you have in mind?”

For a moment no one spoke, as though astonished he would ask such a question.

Only after a few seconds in which Obi-Wan looked from the faces of one Master to the next, puzzled by the expressions of gentle amusement each and every one of them wore, did it finally register that all of them were looking at him.

Bail Organa stopped cold in the middle of the Grand Concourse that ringed the Senate’s Convocation Chamber. The torrent of multispecies foot traffic that streamed along the huge curving hall broke around him like a river around a boulder. He stared up in disbelief at one of the huge holoprojected Proclamation Boards; these had recently been installed above the concourse to keep the thousands of Senators up to the moment on news of the war, and on the Chancellor’s latest executive orders.

His heart tripped, and he couldn’t seem to make his eyes focus. He pushed his way through the press to a hardcopy stand and punched a quick code. When he had the flimsies in his hands, they still said the same thing.

He’d been expecting this day. Since yesterday, when the Senate had voted to give Palpatine control of the Jedi, he’d known it would come soon. He’d even started planning for it.

But that didn’t make it any easier to bear.

He found his way to a public comm booth and keyed a privacy code. The transparisteel booth went opaque as stone, and a moment later a hand-sized image shimmered into existence above the small holodisk: a slender woman in floor-length white, with short, neatly clipped auburn hair and a clear, steadily intelligent gaze from her aquamarine eyes. “Bail,” she said. “What’s happened?”

Bail’s elegantly thin goatee pulled downward around his mouth. “Have you seen this morning’s decree?”

“The Sector Governance Decree? Yes, I have—”

“It’s time, Mon,” he said grimly. “It’s time to stop talking, and start doing. We have to bring in the Senate.”

“I agree, but we must tread carefully. Have you thought about whom we should consult? Whom we can trust?”

“Not in detail. Giddean Danu springs to mind. I’m sure we can trust Fang Zar, too.”

“Agreed. What about Iridik’k-stallu? Her hearts are in the right place. Or Chi Eekway.”

Bail shook his head. “Maybe later. It’ll take a few hours at least to figure out exactly where they stand. We need to start with Senators we know we can trust.”

“All right. Then Terr Taneel would be my next choice. And, I think, Amidala of Naboo.”

“Padmé?” Bail frowned. “I’m not sure.”

“You know her better than I do, Bail, but to my mind she is exactly the type of Senator we need. She is intelligent, principled, extremely articulate, and she has the heart of a warrior.”

“She is also a longtime associate of Palpatine,” he reminded her. “He was her ambassador during her term as Queen of Naboo. How sure can you be that she will stand with us, and not with him?”

Senator Mon Mothma replied serenely, “There’s only one way to find out.”

By the time the doors to the Jedi Council Chamber finally swung open, Anakin was already angry.

If asked, he would have denied it, and would have thought he was telling the truth … but they had left him out here for so long, with nothing to do but stare through the soot-smudged curve of the High Council Tower’s window ring at the scarred skyline of Galactic City—damaged in a battle he had won, by the way, personally. Almost single-handedly—and with nothing to think about except why it was taking them so long to reach such a simple decision …

Angry? Not at all. He was sure he wasn’t angry. He kept telling himself he wasn’t angry, and he made himself believe it.

Anakin walked into the Council Chamber, head lowered in a show of humility and respect. But down inside him, down around the nuclear shielding that banked his heart, he was hiding.

It wasn’t anger he was hiding. His anger was only camouflage.

Behind his anger hid the dragon.

He remembered too well the first time he had entered this Chamber, the first time he had stood within a ring of Jedi Masters gathered to sit in judgment upon his fate. He remembered how Yoda’s green stare had seen into his heart, had seen the cold worm of dread eating away at him, no matter how hard he’d tried to deny it: the awful fear he’d felt that he might never see his mother again.

He couldn’t let them see what that worm had grown into.

He moved slowly into the center of the circle of brown-toned carpet, and turned toward the Senior Members.

Yoda was unreadable as always, his rumpled features composed in a mask of serene contemplation.

Mace Windu could have been carved from stone.

Ghost-images of Ki-Adi-Mundi and Plo Koon hovered a centimeter above their Council seats, maintained by the seats’ internal holoprojectors. Agen Kolar sat alone, between the empty chairs belonging to Shaak Ti and Stass Allie.

Obi-Wan sat in the chair that once had belonged to Oppo Rancisis, looking pensive. Even worried.

“Anakin Skywalker.” Master Windu’s tone was so severe that the dragon inside Anakin coiled instinctively. “The Council has decided to comply with Chancellor Palpatine’s directive, and with the instructions of the Senate that give him the unprecedented authority to command this Council. You are hereby granted a seat at the High Council of the Jedi, as the Chancellor’s personal representative.”

Anakin stood very still for a long moment, until he could be absolutely sure he had heard what he thought he’d heard.

Palpatine had been right. He seemed to be right about a lot of things, these days. In fact—now that Anakin came to think of it—he couldn’t remember a single instance when the Supreme Chancellor had been wrong.

Finally, as it began to sink in upon him, as he gradually allowed himself to understand that the Council had finally decided to grant him his heart’s desire, that they finally had recognized his accomplishments, his dedication, his power, he took a slow, deep breath.

“Thank you, Masters. You have my pledge that I will uphold the highest principles of the Jedi Order.”

“Allow this appointment lightly, the Council does not.” Yoda’s ears curled forward at Anakin like accusing fingers. “Disturbing is this move by Chancellor Palpatine. On many levels.”

They have become more concerned with avoiding the oversight of the Senate than they are with winning the war …

Anakin inclined his head. “I understand.”

“I’m not sure you do.” Mace Windu leaned forward, staring into Anakin’s eyes with a measuring squint.

Anakin was barely paying attention; in his mind, he was already leaving the Council Chamber, riding the turbolift to the archives, demanding access to the restricted vault by authority of his new rank—

“You will attend the meetings of this Council,” the Korun Master said, “but you will not be granted the rank and privileges of a Jedi Master.”

“What?”

It was a small word, a simple word, an instinctive recoil from words that felt like punches, like stun blasts exploding inside his brain that left his head ringing and the room spinning around him—but even to his own ears, the voice that came from his lips didn’t sound like his own. It was deeper, darker, clipped and oiled, resonating from the depths of his heart.

It didn’t sound like him at all, and it smoked with fury.

“How dare you? How dare you?”

Anakin stood welded to the floor, motionless. He wasn’t even truly aware of speaking. It was as if someone else were using his mouth—and now, finally, he recognized the voice.

It sounded like Dooku. But it was not Dooku’s voice.

It was the voice of Dooku’s destroyer.

“No Jedi in this room can match my power—no Jedi in the galaxy! You think you can deny Mastery to me?”

“The Chancellor’s representative you are,” Yoda said. “And it is as his representative you shall attend the Council. Sit in this Chamber you will, but no vote will you have. The Chancellor’s views you shall present. His wishes. His ideas and directives. Not your own.”

Up from the depths of his furnace heart came an answer so far transcending fury that it sounded cold as interstellar space. “This is an insult to me, and to the Chancellor. Do not imagine that it will be tolerated.”

Mace Windu’s eyes were as cold as the voice from Anakin’s mouth. “Take your seat, young Skywalker.”

Anakin matched his stare. Perhaps I’ll take yours. His own voice, inside his head, had a hot black fire that smoked from the depths of his furnace heart. You think you can stop me from saving my love? You think you can make me watch her die? Go ahead and Vaapad this, you—

“Anakin,” Obi-Wan said softly. He gestured to an empty seat beside him. “Please.”

And something in Obi-Wan’s gentle voice, in his simple, straightforward request, sent his anger slinking off ashamed, and Anakin found himself alone on the carpet in the middle of the Jedi Council, blinking.

He suddenly felt very young, and very foolish.

“Forgive me, Masters.” His bow of contrition couldn’t hide the blaze of embarrassment that climbed his cheeks.

The rest of the session passed in a haze; Ki-Adi-Mundi said something about no Republic world reporting any sign of Grievous, and Anakin felt a dull shock when the Council assigned the task of coordinating the search to Obi-Wan alone.

On top of everything else, now they were splitting up the team?

He was so numbly astonished by it all that he barely registered what they were saying about a droid landing on Kashyyyk—but he had to say something, he couldn’t just sit here for his whole first meeting of the Council, Master or not—and he knew the Kashyyyk system almost as well as he knew the back alleys of Mos Espa. “I can handle it,” he offered, suddenly brightening. “I could clear that planet in a day or two—”

“Skywalker, your assignment is here.” Mace Windu’s stare was hard as durasteel, and only a scrape short of openly hostile.

Then Yoda volunteered, and for some reason, the Council didn’t even bother to vote.

“It is settled then,” Mace said. “May the Force be with us all.”

And as the holopresences of Plo Koon and Ki-Adi-Mundi winked out, as Obi-Wan and Agen Kolar rose and spoke together in tones softly grave, as Yoda and Mace Windu walked from the room, Anakin could only sit, sick at heart, stunned with helplessness.

Padmé—oh, Padmé, what are we going to do?

He didn’t know. He didn’t have a clue. But he knew one thing he wasn’t going to do.

He wasn’t going to give up.

Even with the Council against him—even with the whole Order against him—he would find a way.

He would save her.

Somehow.

“I am no happier than the rest of you about this,” Padmé said, gesturing at the flimsiplast of the Sector Governance Decree on Bail Organa’s desk. “But I’ve known Palpatine for years; he was my most trusted adviser. I’m not prepared to believe his intent is to dismantle the Senate.”

“Why should he bother?” Mon Mothma countered. “As a practical matter—as of this morning—the Senate no longer exists.”

Padmé looked from one grim face to another. Giddean Danu nodded his agreement. Terr Taneel kept her eyes down, pretending to be adjusting her robes. Fang Zar ran a hand over his unruly gray-streaked topknot.

Bail leaned forward. His eyes were hard as chips of stone. “Palpatine no longer has to worry about controlling the Senate. By placing his own lackeys as governors over every planet in the Republic, he controls our systems directly.” He folded his hands, and squeezed them together until his knuckles hurt. “He’s become a dictator. We made him a dictator.”

And he’s my husband’s friend, and mentor, Padmé thought. I shouldn’t even be listening to this.

“But what can we do about it?” Terr Taneel asked, still gazing down at her robe with a worried frown.

“That’s what we asked you here to discuss,” Mon Mothma told her calmly. “What we’re going to do about it.”

Fang Zar shifted uncomfortably. “I’m not sure I like where this is going.”

“None of us likes where anything is going,” Bail said, half rising. “That’s exactly the point. We can’t let a thousand years of democracy disappear without a fight!”

“A fight?” Padmé said. “I can’t believe what I’m hearing—Bail, you sound like a Separatist!”

“I—” Bail sank back into his seat. “I apologize. That was not my intent. I asked you all here because of all the Senators in the galaxy, you four have been the most consistent—and influential—voices of reason and restraint, doing all you could to preserve our poor, tattered Constitution. We don’t want to hurt the Republic. With your help, we hope to save it.”

“It has become increasingly clear,” Mon Mothma said, “that Palpatine has become an enemy of democracy. He must be stopped.”

“The Senate gave him these powers,” Padmé said. “The Senate can rein him in.”

Giddean Danu sat forward. “I fear you underestimate just how deeply the Senate’s corruption has taken hold. Who will vote against Palpatine now?”

“I will,” Padmé said. She discovered that she meant it. “And I’ll find others, too.”

She’d have to. No matter how much it hurt Anakin. Oh, my love, will you ever find a way to forgive me?

“You do that,” Bail said. “Make as much noise as you can—keep Palpatine watching what you’re doing in the Senate. That should provide some cover while Mon Mothma and I begin building our organization—”

“Stop.” Padmé rose. “It’s better to leave some things unsaid. Right now, it’s better I don’t know anything about … anything.”

Don’t make me lie to my husband was her unspoken plea. She tried to convey it with her eyes. Please, Bail. Don’t make me lie to him. It will break his heart.

Perhaps he saw something there; after a moment’s indecision, he nodded. “Very well. Other matters can be left for other times. Until then, this meeting must remain absolutely secret. Even hinting at an effective opposition to Palpatine can be, as we’ve all seen, very dangerous. We must agree never to speak of these matters except among the people who are now in this room. We must bring no one into this secret without the agreement of each and every one of us.”

“That includes even those closest to you,” Mon Mothma added. “Even your families—to share anything of this will expose them to the same danger we all face. No one can be told. No one.”

Padmé watched them all nod, and what could she do? What could she say? You can keep your own secrets, but I’ll have to tell my Jedi husband, who is Palpatine’s beloved protégé …

She sighed. “Yes. Yes: agreed.”

And all she could think as the little group dispersed to their own offices was Oh, Anakin—Anakin, I’m sorry …

I’m so sorry.

Anakin was glad the vast vaulted Temple hallway was deserted save for him and Obi-Wan; he didn’t have to keep his voice down.

“This is outrageous. How can they do this?”

“How can they not?” Obi-Wan countered. “It’s your friendship with the Chancellor—the same friendship that got you a seat at the Council—that makes it impossible to grant you Mastery. In the Council’s eyes, that would be the same as giving a vote to Palpatine himself!”

He waved this off. He didn’t have time for the Council’s political maneuvering—Padmé didn’t have time. “I didn’t ask for this. I don’t need this. So if I wasn’t friends with Palpatine I’d be a Master already, is that what you’re saying?”

Obi-Wan looked pained. “I don’t know.”

“I have the power of any five Masters. Any ten. You know it, and so do they.”

“Power alone is no credit to you—”

Anakin flung an arm back toward the Council Tower. “They’re the ones who call me the chosen one! Chosen for what? To be a dupe in some slimy political game?”

Obi-Wan winced as if he’d been stung. “Didn’t I warn you, Anakin? I told you of the … tension … between the Council and the Chancellor. I was very clear. Why didn’t you listen? You walked right into it!”

“Like that ray shield trap.” Anakin snorted. “Should I blame this on the dark side, too?”

“However it happened,” Obi-Wan said, “you are in a very … delicate situation.”

“What situation? Who cares about me? I’m no Master, I’m just a kid, right? Is that what it’s about? Is Master Windu turning everyone against me because until I came along, he was the youngest Jedi ever named to the Council?”

“No one cares about that—”

“Sure they don’t. Let me tell you something a smart old man said to me not so long ago: Age is no measure of wisdom. If it were, Yoda would be twenty times as wise as you are—”

“This has nothing to do with Master Yoda.”

“That’s right. It has to do with me. It has to do with them all being against me. They always have been—most of them didn’t even want me to be a Jedi. And if they’d won out, where would they be right now? Who would have done the things I’ve done? Who would have saved Naboo? Who would have saved Kamino? Who would have killed Dooku, and rescued the Chancellor? Who would have come for you and Alpha after Ventress—”

“Yes, Anakin, yes. Of course. No one questions your accomplishments. It’s your relationship to Palpatine that is the problem. And it is a very serious problem.”

“I’m too close to him? Maybe I am. Maybe I should alienate a man who’s been nothing but kind and generous to me ever since I first came to this planet! Maybe I should reject the only man who gives me the respect I deserve—”

“Anakin, stop. Listen to yourself. Your thoughts are of jealousy, and pride. These are dark thoughts, Anakin. Dangerous thoughts, in these dark times—you are focused on yourself when you need to focus on your service. Your outburst in the Council was an eloquent argument against granting you Mastery. How can you be a Jedi Master when you have not mastered yourself?”

Anakin passed his flesh hand over his eyes and drew a long, heavy breath. In a much lower, calmer, quieter tone, he said, “What do I have to do?”

Obi-Wan frowned. “I’m sorry?”

“They want something from me, don’t they? That’s what this is really about. That’s what it’s been about from the beginning. They won’t give me my rank until I give them what they want.”

“The Council does not operate that way, Anakin, and you know it.”

Once you’re a Master, as you deserve, how will they make you do their bidding?

“Yes, I know it. Sure I do,” Anakin said. Suddenly he was tired. So incredibly tired. It hurt to talk. It hurt even to stand here. He was sick of the whole business. Why couldn’t it just be over? “Tell me what they want.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes shifted, and the sick fatigue in Anakin’s guts turned darker. How bad did it have to be to make Obi-Wan unable to look him in the eye?

“Anakin, look, I’m on your side,” Obi-Wan said softly. He looked tired, too: he looked as tired and sick as Anakin felt. “I never wanted to see you put in this situation.”

“What situation?”

Still Obi-Wan hesitated.

Anakin said, “Look, whatever it is, it’s not getting any better while you’re standing here working up the nerve to tell me. Come on, Obi-Wan. Let’s have it.”

Obi-Wan glanced around the empty hall as if he wanted to make sure they were still alone; Anakin had a feeling it was just an excuse to avoid facing him when he spoke.

“The Council,” Obi-Wan said slowly, “approved your appointment because Palpatine trusts you. They want you to report on all his dealings. They have to know what he’s up to.”

“They want me to spy on the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic?” Anakin blinked numbly. No wonder Obi-Wan couldn’t look him in the face. “Obi-Wan, that’s treason!”

“We are at war, Anakin.” Obi-Wan looked thoroughly miserable. “The Council is sworn to uphold the principles of the Republic through any means necessary. We have to. Especially when the greatest enemy of those principles seems to be the Chancellor himself!”

Anakin’s eyes narrowed and turned hard. “Why didn’t the Council give me this assignment while we were in session?”

“Because it’s not for the record, Anakin. You must be able to understand why.”

“What I understand,” Anakin said grimly, “is that you are trying to turn me against Palpatine. You’re trying to make me keep secrets from him—you want to make me lie to him. That’s what this is really about.”

“It isn’t,” Obi-Wan insisted. He looked wounded. “It’s about keeping an eye on who he deals with, and who deals with him.”

“He’s not a bad man, Obi-Wan—he’s a great man, who’s holding this Republic together with his bare hands—”

“By staying in office long after his term has expired. By gathering dictatorial powers—”

“The Senate demanded that he stay! They pushed those powers on him—”

“Don’t be naïve. The Senate is so intimidated they give him anything he wants!”

“Then it’s their fault, not his! They should have the guts to stand up to him!”

“That is what we’re asking you to do, Anakin.”

Anakin had no answer. Silence fell between them like a hammer.

He shook his head and looked down at the fist he had made of his mechanical hand.

Finally, he said, “He’s my friend, Obi-Wan.”

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said softly. Sadly. “I know.”

“If he asked me to spy on you, do you think I would do it?”

Now it was Obi-Wan’s turn to fall silent.

“You know how kind he has been to me.” Anakin’s voice was hushed. “You know how he’s looked after me, how he’s done everything he could to help me. He’s like family.”

“The Jedi are your family—”

“No.” Anakin turned on his former Master. “No, the Jedi are your family. The only one you’ve ever known. But I’m not like you—I had a mother who loved me—”

And a wife who loves me, he thought. And soon a child who will love me, too.

“Do you remember my mother? Do you remember what happened to her—?”

—because you didn’t let me go to save her? he finished silently. And the same will happen to Padmé, and the same will happen to our child.

Within him, the dragon’s cold whisper chewed at his strength. All things die, Anakin Skywalker. Even stars burn out.

“Anakin, yes. Of course. You know how sorry I am for your mother. Listen: we’re not asking you to act against Palpatine. We’re only asking you to … monitor his activities. You must believe me.”

Obi-Wan stepped closer and put a hand on Anakin’s arm. With a long, slowly indrawn breath, he seemed to reach some difficult decision. “Palpatine himself may be in danger,” he said. “This may be the only way you can help him.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I am not supposed to be telling you this. Please do not reveal we have had this conversation. To anyone, do you understand?”

Anakin said, “I can keep a secret.”

“All right.” Obi-Wan took another deep breath. “Master Windu traced Darth Sidious to Five Hundred Republica before Grievous’s attack—we think that the Sith Lord is someone within Palpatine’s closest circle of advisers. That is who we want you to spy on, do you understand?”

A fiction created by the Jedi Council … an excuse to harass their political enemies …

“If Palpatine is under the influence of a Sith Lord, he may be in the gravest danger. The only way we can help him is to find Sidious, and to stop him. What we are asking of you is not treason, Anakin—it may be the only way to save the Republic!”

If this Darth Sidious of yours were to walk through that door right now … I would ask him to sit down, and I would ask him if he has any power he could use to end this war

“So all you’re really asking,” Anakin said slowly, “is for me to help the Council find Darth Sidious.”

“Yes.” Obi-Wan looked relieved, incredibly relieved, as though some horrible chronic pain had suddenly and inexplicably eased. “Yes, that’s it exactly.”

Locked within the furnace of his heart, Anakin whispered an echo—not quite an echo—slightly altered, just at the end: I would ask him to sit down, and I would ask him if he has any power he could use—

—to save Padmé.

The gunship streaked through the capital’s sky.

Obi-Wan stared past Yoda and Mace Windu, out through the gunship’s window at the vast deployment platform and the swarm of clones who were loading the assault cruiser at the far end.

“You weren’t there,” he said. “You didn’t see his face. I think we have done a terrible thing.”

“We don’t always have the right answer,” Mace Windu said. “Sometimes there isn’t a right answer.”

“Know how important your friendship with young Anakin is to you, I do.” Yoda, too, stared out toward the stark angles of the assault cruiser being loaded for the counterinvasion of Kashyyyk; he stood leaning on his gimer stick as though he did not trust his legs. “Allow such attachments to pass out of one’s life, a Jedi must.”

Another man—even another Jedi—might have resented the rebuke, but Obi-Wan only sighed. “I suppose—he is the chosen one, after all. The prophecy says he was born to bring balance to the Force, but …”

The words trailed off. He couldn’t remember what he’d been about to say. All he could remember was the look on Anakin’s face.

“Yes. Always in motion, the future is.” Yoda lifted his head and his eyes narrowed to thoughtful slits. “And the prophecy, misread it could have been.”

Mace looked even grimmer than usual. “Since the fall of Darth Bane more than a millennium ago, there have been hundreds of thousands of Jedi—hundreds of thousands of Jedi feeding the light with each work of their hands, with each breath, with every beat of their hearts, bringing justice, building civil society, radiating peace, acting out of selfless love for all living things—and in all these thousand years, there have been only two Sith at any time. Only two. Jedi create light, but the Sith do not create darkness. They merely use the darkness that is always there. That has always been there. Greed and jealousy, aggression and lust and fear—these are all natural to sentient beings. The legacy of the jungle. Our inheritance from the dark.”

“I’m sorry, Master Windu, but I’m not sure I follow you. Are you saying—to follow your metaphor—that the Jedi have cast too much light? From what I have seen these past years, the galaxy has not become all that bright a place.”

“All I am saying is that we don’t know. We don’t even truly understand what it means to bring balance to the Force. We have no way of anticipating what this may involve.”

“An infinite mystery is the Force,” Yoda said softly. “The more we learn, the more we discover how much we do not know.”

“So you both feel it, too,” Obi-Wan said. The words hurt him. “You both can feel that we have turned some invisible corner.”

“In motion, are the events of our time. Approach, the crisis does.”

“Yes.” Mace interlaced his fingers and squeezed until his knuckles popped. “But we’re in a spice mine without a glow rod. If we stop walking, we’ll never reach the light.”

“And what if the light just isn’t there?” Obi-Wan asked. “What if we get to the end of this tunnel and find only night?”

“Faith must we have. Trust in the will of the Force. What other choice is there?”

Obi-Wan accepted this with a nod, but still when he thought of Anakin, dread began to curdle below his heart. “I should have argued more strongly in Council today.”

“You think Skywalker won’t be able to handle this?” Mace Windu said. “I thought you had more confidence in his abilities.”

“I trust him with my life,” Obi-Wan said simply. “And that is precisely the problem.”

The other two Jedi Masters watched him silently while he tried to summon the proper words.

“For Anakin,” Obi-Wan said at length, “there is nothing more important than friendship. He is the most loyal man I have ever met—loyal beyond reason, in fact. Despite all I have tried to teach him about the sacrifices that are the heart of being a Jedi, he—he will never, I think, truly understand.”

He looked over at Yoda. “Master Yoda, you and I have been close since I was a boy. An infant. Yet if ending this war one week sooner—one day sooner—were to require that I sacrifice your life, you know I would.”

“As you should,” Yoda said. “As I would yours, young Obi-Wan. As any Jedi would any other, in the cause of peace.”

“Any Jedi,” Obi-Wan said, “except Anakin.”

Yoda and Mace exchanged glances, both thoughtfully grim. Obi-Wan guessed they were remembering the times Anakin had violated orders—the times he had put at risk entire operations, the lives of thousands, the control of whole planetary systems—to save a friend.

More than once, in fact, to save Obi-Wan.

“I think,” Obi-Wan said carefully, “that abstractions like peace don’t mean much to him. He’s loyal to people, not to principles. And he expects loyalty in return. He will stop at nothing to save me, for example, because he thinks I would do the same for him.”

Mace and Yoda gazed at him steadily, and Obi-Wan had to lower his head.

“Because,” he admitted reluctantly, “he knows I would do the same for him.”

“Understand exactly where your concern lies, I do not.” Yoda’s green eyes had gone softly sympathetic. “Named must your fear be, before banish it you can. Do you fear that perform his task, he cannot?”

“Oh, no. That’s not it at all. I am firmly convinced that Anakin can do anything. Except betray a friend. What we have done to him today …”

“But that is what Jedi are,” Mace Windu said. “That is what we have pledged ourselves to: selfless service—”

Obi-Wan turned to stare once more toward the assault ship that would carry Yoda and the clone battalions to Kashyyyk, but he could see only Anakin’s face.

If he asked me to spy on you, do you think I would do it?

“Yes,” he said slowly. “That’s why I don’t think he will ever trust us again.”

He found his eyes turning unaccountably hot, and his vision swam with unshed tears.

“And I’m not entirely sure he should.”