But not too far; if Master Ken.o.bi was up to mischief, C-3PO had to be in a position to alert Captain Typho and the security staff on the spot.

Senator Amidala certainly didn't seem inclined to treat Master Ken.o.bi as a dangerous outlaw . . .

Quite the contrary, in fact: she seemed to have fallen into his arms, and her voice was thoroughly choked with emotion as she expressed a possibly inappropriate level of joy at finding the Jedi still alive.

There followed some discussion that C-3PO didn't entirely understand; it was political information entirely outside his programming, having to do with Master Anakin, and the Republic having fallen, whatever that meant, and with something called a Sith Lord, and Chancellor Palpatine, and the dark side of the Force, and really, he couldn't make sense of any of it. The only parts he clearly understood had to do with the Jedi Order being outlawed and all but wiped out (that news had been all over the Lipartian Way this morning) and the not-altogether-unexpected revelation that Master Ken.o.bi had come here seeking Master Anakin. They were partners, after all (though despite all their years together, Master Anakin's recent behavior made it sadly clear that Master Ken.o.bi's lovely manners had entirely failed to rub off).

"When was the last time you saw him? Do you know where he is?"

C-3PO's photoreceptors registered the Senator's flush as she lowered her eyes and said, "No."

Three years running the household of a career politician stopped C-3PO from popping back out and reminding the Senator that Master Anakin had told her just yesterday he was on his way to Mustafar; he knew very well that the Senator's memory failed only when she decided it should.

"Padme, you must help me," Master Ken.o.bi said. "Anakin must be found. He must be stopped."

"How can you say that?" She pulled back from him and turned away, folding her arms over the curve of her belly. "He's just won the war!"

"The war was never the Republic against the Separatists. It was Palpatine against the Jedi. We lost. The rest of it was just play-acting."

"It was real enough for everyone who died!"

"Yes." Now it was Master Ken.o.bi's turn to lower his eyes. "Including the children at the Temple."

"What?"

"They were murdered, Padme. I saw it." He took her shoulders and turned her back to face him. "They were murdered by Anakin.''

"It's a lie-" She pushed him away forcefully enough that C-3PO nearly triggered the security alert then and there, but Master Ken.o.bi only regarded her with an expression that matched C-3PO's internal recognition files of sadness and pity. "He could never . . . he could never . . . not my Anakin .

Master Ken.o.bi's voice was soft and slow. "He must be found."

Her reply was even softer; C-3PO's aural sensor barely recorded it at all.

"You've decided to kill him."

Master Ken.o.bi said gravely, "He has become a very great threat."

At this, the Senator's medical condition seemed to finally overcome her; her knees buckled, and Master Ken.o.bi was forced to catch her and help her onto the sofa. Apparently Master Ken.o.bi knew somewhat more about human physiology than did C-3PO; though his photoreceptors hadn't been dark to the ongoing changes in Senator Amidala's contour, C-3PO had no idea what they might signify.

At any rate, Master Ken.o.bi seemed to comprehend the situation instantly. He settled her comfortably onto the sofa and stood frowning down at her.

"Anakin is the father, isn't he?"

The Senator looked away. Her eyes were leaking again. The Jedi Master said, hushed, "I'm very sorry, Padme. If it could be different . . ."

"Go away, Obi-Wan. I won't help you. I can't." She turned her face away. "I won't help you kill him."

Master Ken.o.bi said again, "I'm very sorry," and left. C-3PO tentatively returned to the sitting room, intending to inquire after the Senator's health, but before he could access a sufficiently delicate phrase to open the discussion, the Senator said softly, "Threepio? Do you know what this is?"

She lifted toward him the pendant that hung from the cord of jerba leather she always wore around her neck.

"Why, yes, my lady," the protocol droid replied, bemused but happy, as always, to be of service. "It's a snippet of j.a.por. Younglings on Tatooine carve tribal runes into them to make amulets; they are supposed by superst.i.tious folk to bring good fortune and protect one from harm, and sometimes are thought to be love charms. I must say, my lady, I'm quite surprised you've forgotten, seeing as how you've worn that one ever since it was given to you so many years ago by Master An-"

"I hadn't forgotten what it was, Threepio," she said distantly.

"Thank you. I was . . . reminding myself of the boy who gave it to me."

"My lady?" If she hadn't forgotten, why would she ask? Before C-3PO could phrase a properly courteous interrogative, she said, "Contact Captain Typho. Have him ready my skiff."

"My lady? Are you going somewhere?"

"We are," she said. "We're going to Mustafar."

From the shadows beneath the mirror-polished skiff's landing ramp, Obi-Wan Ken.o.bi watched Captain Typho try to talk her out of it.

"My lady," the Naboo security chief protested, "at least let me come with you-"

"Thank you, Captain, but there's no need," Padme said distantly. "The war's over, and . . . this is a personal errand. And, Captain? It must remain personal, do you understand? You know nothing of my leaving, nor where I am bound, nor when I can be expected to return."

"As you wish, my lady," Typho said with a reluctant bow. "But I strongly disagree with this decision."

"I'll be fine, Captain. After all, I have Threepio to look after me."

Obi-Wan could clearly hear the droid's murmured "Oh, dear."

After Typho finally climbed into his speeder and took off, Padme and her droid boarded the skiff. She wasted no time at all; the skiff's repulsorlifts engaged before the landing ramp had even retracted.

Obi-Wan had to jump for it.

He swung inside just as the hatch sealed itself and the gleaming starship leapt for the sky.

Darth Vader stood on the command bridge of the Mustafar control center, hand of durasteel clasping hand of flesh behind him, and gazed up through the transparisteel view wall at the galaxy he would one day rule.

He paid no attention to the litter of corpses around his feet.

He could feel his power growing, indeed. He had the measure of his "Master" already; not long after Palpatine shared the secret of Darth Plagueis's discovery, their relationship would undergo a sudden . . . transformation.

A fatal transformation.

Everything was proceeding according to plan.

And yet . . .

He couldn't shake a certain creeping sensation ... a kind of cold, slimy ooze that slithered up the veins of his legs and spread clammy tendrils through his guts . . .

Almost as though he was still afraid . . .

She will die, you know, the dragon whispered.

He shook himself, scowling. Impossible. He was Darth Vader. Fear had no power over him. He had destroyed his fear.

All things die.

Yet it was as though when he had crushed the dragon under his boot, the dragon had sunk venomed fangs into his heel.

Now its poison chilled him to the bone.

Even stars burn out.

He shook himself again and strode toward the holocomm.

He would talk to his Master.

Palpatine had always helped him keep the dragon down.

A comlink chimed.

Yoda opened his eyes in the darkness.

"Yes, Master Ken.o.bi?"

"We're landing now. Are you in position?"

"I am."

A moment of silence.

"Master Yoda . . . if we don't see each other again-"

"Think not of after, Obi-Wan. Always now, even eternity will be."

Another moment of silence.

Longer.

"May the Force be with you."

"It is. And may the Force be with you, young Obi-Wan."

The transmission ended.

Yoda rose.

A gesture opened the grating of the vent shaft where he had waited in meditation, revealing the vast conic well that was the Grand Convocation Chamber of the Galactic Senate. It was sometimes called the Senate Arena.

Today, this nickname would be particularly apt.

Yoda stretched blood back into his green flesh.

This was his time.

Nine hundred years of study and training, of teaching and of meditation, all now focused, and refined, and resolved into this single moment; the sole purpose of his vast span of existence had been to prepare him to enter the heart of night and bring his light against the darkness.

He adjusted the angle of his blade against his belt.

He draped his robe across his shoulders.

With reverence, with grat.i.tude, without fear, and without anger, Yoda went forth to war.

A silvery flash outside caught Darth Vader's eye, as though an elegantly curved mirror swung through the smoke and cinders, picking up the shine of white-hot lava. From one knee, he could look right through the holoscan of his Master while he continued his report.

He was no longer afraid; he was too busy pretending to be respectful.

"The Separatist leadership is no more, my Master."

"It is finished, then." The image offered a translucent mockery of a smile. "You have restored peace and justice to the galaxy, Lord Vader."

"That is my sole ambition. Master."

The image tilted its head, its smile twisting without transition to a scowl. "Lord Vader-I sense a disturbance in the Force. You may be in danger."

He glanced at the mirror flash outside; he knew that ship. In danger of being kissed to death, perhaps . . . "How should I be in danger, Master?"

"I cannot say. But the danger is real; be mindful." Be mindful, be mindful, he thought with a mental sneer. Is that the best you can do? I could get that much from Obi-Wan . . . "I will, my Master. Thank you." The image faded.

He got to his feet, and now the sneer was on his lips and in his eyes. "You're the one who should be mindful, my 'Master.' I am a disturbance in the Force."

Outside, the sleek skiff settled to the deck. He spent a moment rea.s.sembling his Anakin Skywalker face: he let Anakin Sky-walker's love flow through him, let Anakin Skywalker's glad smile come to his lips, let Anakin Skywalker's youthful energy bring a joyous bounce to his step as he trotted to the entrance over the mess of corpses and severed body parts.

He'd meet her outside, and he'd keep her outside. He had a feeling she wouldn't approve of the way he had ... redecorated . . . the control center.

And after all, he thought with a mental shrug, there's no arguing taste . . .

The holding office of the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic comprised the nether vertex of the Senate Arena; it was little more than a circular preparations area, a green room, where guests of the Chancellor might be entertained before entering the Senate Podium-the circular pod on its immense hydraulic pillar, which contained controls that coordinated the movement of floating Senate delegation pods-and rising into the focal point of the chamber above.

Above that podium, the vast holopresence of a kneeling Sith bowed before a shadow that stood below. Guards in scarlet flanked the shadow; a Chagrian toady cringed nearby.

"But the danger is real; be mindful."

"I will, my Master. Thank you."

The holopresence faded, and where its huge translucency had knelt was now revealed another presence, a physical presence, tiny and aged, clad in robes and leaning on a twist of wood. But his physical presence was an illusion; the truth of him could be seen only in the Force.

In the Force, he was a fountain of light.

"Pity your new disciple I do; so lately an apprentice, so soon without a Master."