The Final Prophecy (Star Wars: The New Jedi Order, Book 18)

ONE She was being followed. She paused and wiped a damp wisp of yellow hair from her forehead, touching in passing the scars that marked her as a member of Domain Kwaad. Her green eyes scanned through the many-legged gnarltrees, but her stalkers weren't yet showing themselves to the usual senses. They were waiting for somethingreinforcements, probably. She hissed a mild shaper's curse under her breath and started off again, picking her way over moldering logs, through sluggish mists and dense brakes of hissing cane. The air was a wet fever, and the chirps and trills and bubbling gulps from canopy and marsh were oddly comforting. She kept her pace the samethere was no reason to let them know she was on to them, not yet. She did alter her path subtlyno point in going to the cave until this was dealt with. Or I could lead them there, she mused, attack them while they deal with their inner demons . . . No. That seemed somehow like sacrilege. Yoda had come here. Luke Skywalker had, too, and so had Anakin. Now it was her turn. Tahiri's turn. Anakin's parents hadn't very much liked the idea of her coming to Dagobah alone, but she'd managed to convince them of the necessity. She believed that the human and Yuuzhan Vong personalities that had once shared her body had become one seamless entity. It felt that way, felt right. But Anakin had seen a vision of her, a melding of Jedi and Yuuzhan Vong, and it hadn't been a pretty vision. She'd thought at first, after the joining that had nearly driven her mad, that she had avoided that outcome. But before she moved on, before she put those she loved at risk, she had to consider the possibility that the fusion of Tahiri Veila with Riina of Domain Kwaad was a step in the fulfillment of that vision. Anakin, after all, had known her better than anyone. And Anakin had been very strong. If the creature he had seen was lurking in her, the time to face it was now, not later. So she'd come here, to Dagobah, where the Force was so strong it almost seemed to sing aloud. The cycle of life and death and new birth was all around here, none of it twisted by Yuuzhan Vong biotechnology, none of it poisoned by the machines, greed, and exploitation all too native to this galaxy. She'd come to visit the cave to explore her inner self and see what she was really made of. But she had also come to Dagobah to meditate on the alternatives. What Anakin had seen was all of the worst of Yuuzhan Vong and Jedi traits bundled into one being. Avoiding becoming that was paramount, but she had a goal beyondto find the balance, to embody the best of her mixed heritage. Not just for herself, but because the reconciliation of her dual identity had left her with one firm beliefthat the Yuuzhan Vong and the peoples of the galaxy they had invaded could learn a lot from each other, and they could live in peace. She was sure of it. The only question was how to make it happen. The Yuuzhan Vong would never create industrial wastelands like Duro, Bonadan, or Eriadu. On the other hand, what they did to lifebreaking it and twisting it until it suited their needs, wiping it out entirely when it didn't pleasewas really no better. It wasn't that they loved life, but that they hated machines. There had to be some sort of common ground, some pivot point that could open the eyes of both sides and end the ongoing terror and destruction of the war. The Force was key to that understanding. The Yuuzhan Vong were somehow blind to it. If they could actually feel the Force around them, if they could feel the wrongness of their creations, they might find a better path, one less bent on destruction. If the Jedi could feel the Yuuzhan Vong in the Force, they mightGreg Keyes is the author of 'The Final Prophecy (Star Wars: The New Jedi Order, Book 18)', published 2003 under ISBN 9780345428752 and ISBN 0345428757.