Star Wars: Heir to the Sith (Part 2)

Chapter 21: "You must stay on a straight path. If you wander you might fall."

Ella squeezed Neerada's hand as they lay together on the carriage floor, wedged under the seats. She couldn't take her eyes off the intense stare of the older woman.

Somewhere not far away, an explosion reverberated and the tram began to shake as the shockwave gained, driving the air before it.

"Don't turn away Ella," Neerada said. "Open your mind."

Open your mind . . .

The shockwave heralded a maelstrom of sound that brought with it a wave of debris. The remaining windows were cracked and two were shattered as stones were hurled into their panes. The tram shook wildly from left to right, threatening to fly off the track.

Open your mind . . .

The blast entered the carriage too. From all sides Ella was beset by a tearing wind that carried minute sand particles on its strength, blinding her.

"Urgh!"

Open your mind . . .

"No! Don't take her - not my child! Not my child!"

The woman's voice screamed in Ella's head, blocking out the sounds of the explosion. Ella opened her eyes fully, suddenly aware she was free to do so, aware there was no more raging wind or debris about her.

Aware that she was far, far away.

"Please!" The woman's voice shouted again. "Not my child–"

"Mummy–"

"Take the girl. Burn the village. Leave no survivors." A metallic voice uttered the words through the helm of a stormtrooper.

A vision jolted her to alertness. Blackened skeletons, with smoke and steam rising over them, under a blue sky and a yellow sun. A girl, perhaps nine or ten years of age, being carried off over the shoulder of a stormtrooper to a waiting lander, a Star Destroyer overhead.

Ella wept.

"No!" She screamed. "Leave her alone! Leave us!"

Us!

She had screamed those same words before. She knew it now. A long time ago.

No–

She had tried to scream the words, but they hadn't come. She had seen everything, but she had been hidden away when the Empire had come and had lacked the courage to give voice to her anger.

Ella screamed again. The memories, the visions, the curse, whatever it was that was dominating every aspect of her mind, would not give, not so long as that powerful grasp remained clutched to her hand.

"No . . . no . . ." she wept.

Open your mind . . .

A wooden necklace in the shape of a vast tree with a yellow crystal eye swung against a man's chest as he walked under a hot sun, bearing a precious burden in his arms. A baby.

Ella.

She knew it was her.

And at his side walked another, a girl of five with bright red hair. He gave her a smile and slowed.

"It isn't far now. You will be safe here. They are good people."

His face was kind, but his eyes seemed to carry more weight and probe more deeply than someone of his years.

But we weren't safe there, Ella . . . we weren't . . .

"How much longer until we get there?" the girl at his side asked.

"Not far. You remember the fallen statue we passed?"

"The one with the broken sword?"

A sad look passed over his face, though the sun was coming down from behind his shoulder so Ella couldn't begin to perceive his details.

"That's right. It is twice as far as that."

"Twice?"

"Yes." He smiled again and knelt to offer her the water. She drank greedily. Always the sun was behind his shoulder. No matter which way he seemed to turn.

"But if you take each step twice the length of your last, then we should get there very quickly. Do you think you can do that?"

The young girl looked confused.

"Is that a trick?"

"Not for you," he said. "One day, you will find out how to do so."

"Let's try now!"

The girl took the length of two steps in one, stretching to do so. She walked for several more as the man followed.

She turned and smiled, biting her lip.

"This is hard!"

"You must stay on a straight path," he told her. "If you wander, your steps take longer still. And worse . . . you might fall."

They walked to the top of a hill. Over the summit, a small village lay beyond. Backward and poor, with many technologies that the galaxy took for granted missing.

Still, it seemed a happy place. A place where people were free.

The baby reached up and stroked the necklace. The carving of the tree rocked under her touch and a yellow crystal at its centre seemed to warm–

Ella felt her hand in the comforting embrace of another.

"I will take her," the same man said again, but years later. "I will not fail her again. Nor her mother. We all owe her so much."

"And her sister? What's happened to her? Is she dead?"

"No. No. But there are worse things than death, my friend. I fear what she might become–"

Hate.

"I surrender! Don't shoot–"

A kneeling man shouted into a storm, his hands raised above him. A young woman, in a tight clad officer's uniform, and followed up by several stormtroopers, calmly pointed the muzzle of her blaster into his face and pulled the trigger.

Anger.

"Wait! I have information! I can help–"

A man crawled before her, backing away, slipping on the mud, his empty hands spread out for mercy.

A red blade ran him through, piercing his heart.

"Argh–"

Fear.

"Not my children! Not my children–"

A large alien female with wide bulbous eyes and green skin begged her, standing between her and the spawning ground of her race.

"The Prophecy must not be realised. The Jedi must not return."

"No! No–"

The red blade again, severing the reptilian being from her shoulder to her waist, cutting her in two.

And then the spawning grounds of her people, undefended.

A single grenade thrown into the waters, so easy it could have been careless.

The dark side . . .

Ella opened her eyes.

The woman's grip remained strong. Her eyes were still open.

"W-what have you done!" Ella screamed. "What have you done!"

Neerada looked shocked. "What I had to do! There was no other way!"

Ella ripped her hand from the Assayer and pushed herself away.

"No! You are a monster–"

The tram rose off the track and slid sideways, carried on the wave of the detonation.

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