Remnant: Force Heretic I (17 page)

Tahiri didn’t know how to answer. She knew that she could get up and walk out of the door anytime she wanted, but she didn’t know what would happen after. The dreams hadn’t stopped; if anything they’d become worse. If she left now, they would gnaw at her as they had before, and before she knew it she would be back in the infirmary again, still unable to explain to everyone just what was happening to her.

She didn’t want to leave; she felt safe here. But she also
couldn’t stay forever. The infirmary was for sick people, and she was—

What? What
was
she, exactly? She didn’t know, and that was the problem.

Leia placed a hand on her arm, and Tahiri realized that she still hadn’t replied to the question.

“I want you with us when we leave,” Leia said softly.

Tahiri felt herself recoil in surprise. “You can’t be serious.”

Leia frowned. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Tahiri struggled for the words that would help make sense of everything that was happening in her head, but none were forthcoming. So she made excuses instead. “I’m not a very good pilot,” she said. “Or a politician!”

“But you are a Jedi Knight, Tahiri,” said Leia. “And that is something else entirely.”

“You have Jaina,” Tahiri pointed out.

“Who is also a colonel, and has other responsibilities.”

Tahiri didn’t know what to say.
You’re a Jedi Knight.
The words didn’t sound right, didn’t
feel
right, and that only renewed her guilt and reinforced her belief that she had betrayed her friends. Worse, she had betrayed the memory of Anakin.

Had
he
ever felt such self-doubts
? she wondered.

It was unlikely. None of the Solos seemed to be burdened with such a weakness. They always knew exactly who they were and what they were doing. They were the most focused people she had ever met. The most
sure
of themselves.

Except for Jacen. He had doubts. She knew that he was still wrestling with his relationship with the Force and the council that Luke Skywalker had formed. Perhaps she should have spoken to him while she’d had the chance. But it was too late now. He was in a completely
different part of the galaxy, and who knew when he was coming back?

“We all have doubts about ourselves, sometimes,” Leia said, and Tahiri was appalled to realize that she had fallen silent again. “It’s part of what makes us sentient beings, Tahiri. Doubt makes us examine ourselves and all that we do. And without the ability to do that, we become nothing short of monsters. I had doubts when I joined the Rebellion, all those years ago, and I had doubts when I married Han. But it’s unlikely that Grand Moff Tarkin had doubts about destroying Alderaan.” She paused for a moment, reflectively. “Don’t be ashamed of doubt, Tahiri; it’s a perfectly acceptable feeling.”

Tahiri was surprised to see tears sparkling in Leia’s brown eyes, although whether they were for her destroyed home, she couldn’t be sure. Then Leia reached out a hand and placed it over Tahiri’s.

“I think,” Leia said, “that you need the chance to find out who you are, Tahiri Veila, and I’d like to give that chance to you. What do you say?”

A chance to find out who she was
 … For a moment, Tahiri froze, wondering what Jacen had told his mother. Was this some kind of game? But when she looked into Leia’s eyes, all she saw was softness and sympathy. There were no games. This was real.

You will always be family to us
, Jacen had written. The notion of family tugged strongly at her. Her parents had been killed in a raid by Sand People on Tatooine when she was a toddler. She was taken in by Tusken Raiders and raised by Sliven, who had died not long after she had been taken to the Jedi academy. She had no one else in the universe, except—

No
, she told herself, forcing down the darkness that rose like a tide inside her.
I will not think these thoughts!

So she nodded. “Thank you,” she said, forcing a smile.

“And I’ll try not to be too much of a burden on you all.”

Leia smiled back and squeezed her hand. “You will be an asset, Tahiri. More than you realize.”

Some of Leia’s warmth stayed with Tahiri after she had gone, but not for long. Night had fallen, and there was a slight chill to the air stealing through the open viewport. Tahiri closed it and curled under the covers, shivering. The scars on her forehead were aching, as though a vise was tightening around her skull. She sensed someone else in the room with her, but was too afraid to lift her head and look.

If I ignore her
, she told herself,
maybe she’ll just go away.

“Tell me more,” Nom Anor said. He stared across at I’pan sitting opposite him, the light from the fire flickering on his haggard features.

I’pan nodded eagerly and did as he was told. “As they near the end of their quest, the Shamed One Vua Rapuung and the
Jeedai
Anakin Solo are stopped by another group of warriors—this one even larger than the one before. This group once served under Rapuung himself, before he was Shamed. They challenge Rapuung and question why he is consorting with an infidel.

“ ‘I have nothing to be redeemed for,’ Rapuung tells them proudly.

“ ‘We know your claims,’ the warriors respond.

“ ‘You believe me cursed by the gods?’

“ ‘Whatever you are, whether cursed or not, you have clearly gone mad. You fight with an infidel against your own kind!’

“Now, Rapuung can understand why these warriors would think him gone mad—he would have surely felt the same had he seen another warrior fighting against
him with an infidel at their side! But his circumstances allow him no choice; this is his only way to fight for the truth.

“So, Rapuung challenges the warriors to defeat him alone, without the
Jeedai
at his side, so that he may prove his worthiness.”

Nom Anor narrowed his eyes. “But did you not say before that he had no amphistaff?”

I’pan nodded, standing to give his retelling more impact, his arms gesturing with theatrical flair. “ ‘Take up a weapon, Rapuung,’ the warriors insist. ‘Do not make us kill an unarmed man.’

“But Rapuung is determined. ‘I have triumphed thus far without weapons,’ he says. ‘If the gods hated me so, would they have allowed this?’

“The warriors have no good answer to this, nor to his skill in battle, and, with the
Jeedai
’s blessing, Vua Rapuung defeats them single-handedly.”

Nom Anor listened with the same rapt attentiveness as the others in the small fugitive group, huddling around the heat radiating from the fire. In the story, which took place on the captured world Yavin 4, Vua Rapuung was supposedly Shamed by the gods and therefore his implants wouldn’t take. Believing that he had in fact been betrayed by his former lover, the shaper Mezhan Kwaad, he sought revenge on her. Along the way, he came across the Jedi Anakin Solo who assisted him in his quest, teaching Rapuung the Jedi heresy as he went. Initially reluctant, the Shamed One had been converted, much to the horror of those who had once known him. Even the Shamed Ones didn’t defy the gods.

What happened next was quite unknown to Nom Anor, even though he had studied the events that had taken place on Yavin 4 in some detail, analyzing the details of a quite different heresy: that of the shaper Nen
Yim, who had also been stationed there. She, along with Mezhan Kwaad, the same woman in I’pan’s story, had been trying to bend the mind of a young Jedi girl over to the ways of the Yuuzhan Vong. Ultimately, the experiment had failed, and both Mezhan Kwaad and Commander Tsaak Vootuh had been killed in the girl’s escape. Nom Anor knew all this; he had seen recordings of some of the events I’pan was relating; he had even met the Jedi Anakin Solo briefly while in the Yag’Dhul system. His spies had brought word of various versions of this story circulating through the lower castes. But he had never heard anything like the rest of the story that I’pan was relating to the attentive group.

“Go on,” said Niiriit Esh, the former warrior who governed the small band of underground dwellers that Nom Anor had come to call his companions.

I’pan crouched down again to take up his tale, every eye present fixed unflinchingly upon him as they waited for him to continue. He was a good storyteller, and was clearly in his element relating the adventures of Vua Rapuung and the Jedi.

“On the landing ramp of the ship that would take them to safety, Commander Vootuh and shaper Mezhan Kwaad are forced to confront Vua Rapuung and the
Jeedai
,” he went on. “Out of respect for what he once was, Rapuung demands that he be allowed to question his former lover in order to clear his name.

“ ‘I see no ‘Vua Rapuung,’ Commander Vootuh says. ‘Only a Shamed One who does not know his place.’

“ ‘It is not I who is Shamed,’ Rapuung replies. ‘Do as the
Jeedai
says, and know the truth.’

“But shaper Mezhan Kwaad only sneers at this, saying that there is no sense in listening to the demented lies of Rapuung. ‘He fights by the side of an infidel,’ she says. ‘What more do you need to hear?’

“Then from the crowd that has gathered by the ramp steps Hul Rapuung, Vua’s brother. He is a proud warrior with no stain upon his honor. ‘Do you fear the truth, Mezhan Kwaad?’ he asks. ‘If he is mad, then what harm will speaking to him do?’

“Mezhan Kwaad has no good reply to this, and Commander Vootuh, having already exposed the shaper in treachery, allows Rapuung one question of his former lover. But he informs her that she must answer truthfully, for the truth hearer will surely detect any lies uttered.

“Vua Rapuung stands tall among those who revile him and asks his question.”

The chamber in which they sat was silent as they waited for I’pan to reveal Rapuung’s question. He paused deliberately, dramatically, his gaze flitting briefly to each one sitting there before speaking again.

“ ‘Mezhan Kwaad,’ Rapuung says, ‘did you intentionally rob me of my implants, ruin my scars, and give me the appearance of being Shamed? Did
you
do these things to me, Mezhan Kwaad, or did the gods?’

“The shaper is silent for a moment, the look on her face too horrible to behold. She has been trapped, and all present know it.

“ ‘There are no gods!’ she cries.” I’pan stood tall, his hands reaching for the ceiling, as if this in some way would make the shaper’s exclamation more powerful than it already was. “ ‘This wretched thing that stands before me is
my
doing!’ ”

Everyone gasped at this—all except Nom Anor who, while intrigued by the story, was not as easily impressed by I’pan’s histrionics.

“Then,” I’pan said, lowering his arms to his side, “with a base treachery that overshadows any she has shown before, she strikes Commander Vootuh and Rapuung, killing them both.”

A sigh of remorse and disappointment went up from the group listening to the story. Nom Anor could empathize. The Shamed One Vua Rapuung had been vindicated at last, only to die an animal’s death moments later, unable to defend himself against the biological trickery of the shaper.

“There the matter might have rested,” I’pan said, “but for the
Jeedai.
Before the treacherous Mezhan Kwaad can escape, she is slain by the infidels. They defend Vua Rapuung’s honor at great risk to their own lives. They are alone on this world, surrounded by an army of mighty Yuuzhan Vong warriors who even now move in around them. Not even their superior powers—their
Force
—can possibly save them.

“As a group of warriors loyal to the old gods move forward to do battle with the brave but doomed
Jeedai
, another group confronts them, led by Hul Rapuung, the redeemed Shamed One’s brother. Out of respect for Vua’s memory, he says, the
Jeedai
should be allowed to go free. They saved one of the warriors’ own number from shame and dishonor; do they not, then, deserve to live?

“No, say the ones who cling to the old ways. The
Jeedai
are infidels. They defy the gods.

“Pointing at his brother’s cooling body, Hul Rapuung responds: ‘How many of you fought with him? Who ever questioned the courage of Vua Rapuung? Who ever doubted the gods loved him?’

“A muttering rises from the ranks of warriors gathered around him, and the two factions grip their amphistaffs tightly.

“ ‘You will die,’ say those who stand before Hul Rapuung. ‘What is the point of that?’

“ ‘A salute to the
Jeedai!
’ cries Hul Rapuung in defiance,
striking at the air with his spitting amphistaff. ‘A salute of blood!’

“The two parties clash, Yuuzhan Vong fighting Yuuzhan Vong, old teachings versus the new. Amphistaffs rise and fall, whipping and snapping at vonduun crab armor. Warriors die at the hands of those they once called allies—and it is those touched by the
Jeedai
heresy who fall. Outnumbered by the followers of the old way, of Yun-Yuuzhan and his servant, Supreme Overlord Shimrra, those who stood for the honor of Vua Rapuung fall to the last warrior.

“But their sacrifice has not been in vain. When the victors turn from battling their fellows to destroy the infidels, they find that both the
Jeedai
Anakin Solo and his companion have escaped.”

I’pan paused to sip from a cup of water. His audience sat in silence, caught in the events of that distant day on Yavin 4.

“Then the Jedi heresy should have ended there,” Nom Anor said. He scanned the faces of those around him. “But you are all the spawn of that heresy, are you not?”

I’pan nodded, taking his place in the circle around the fire. “It
would
have ended,” he said, “had it not been witnessed by the Shamed Ones watching from the edge of the battle, by the shapers’ damutek. They spread the word, and that word continues to spread—from mouth to ear among those like us. There
is
another way for us Shamed Ones, a way that leads to redemption. We have found a new hope, and the word for that new hope is
Jeedai.
”

I’pan bowed slightly to indicate the completion of the tale. Although those gathered had probably heard the story many times over, they had sat entranced throughout the telling as though listening to the words for the
first time. There was a smattering of shoulder slapping from around the group, while a couple of others stood and moved away to perform other duties.