Клаудия Грэй: Into the Dark

“What if they don’t show?” Reath asked, half hoping the answer would be, You get a whole new assignment and start over!

Dez shrugged. “We’ll find another ship. Surely somebody’s headed out there in another day or two.”

“A day or two? Forget that .” Orla Jareni folded her arms across her chest as she leaned against one of the nearby struts. She seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, almost luminous in the dark gray mundanity of the spaceport. While Reath and Dez wore common mission attire, she had on snowy robes that were uniquely hers. “I’m ready to get out there. Trust me, there’s at least one ship in this spaceport that wants our money badly enough to take us straight through the Maw, if need be.”

Reath only knew Orla Jareni by reputation, but that reputation was a memorable one. Orla had recently declared herself a Wayseeker—a Jedi who would operate independently of the dictates of the Jedi Council. Some Jedi, from time to time, found themselves drawn to a period of solitary action, whether that meant meditation on a mountaintop, helping revolutionaries on a tyrant-ruled world, or even, in one legendary instance, becoming a minor singing sensation on Alderaan. All paths could lead to a deeper understanding of the Force, Reath had heard. Personally he didn’t buy it. Still, if the Jedi Council respected Orla’s decision, so would he. It seemed she felt her path led to the frontier.

Her appearance was as strikingly individual as her choices. She was an Umbaran, with the stark pale skin and high cheekbones common to that species. Her white robes were so pristine that they made her skin appear to have some small measure of color by comparison. Her hair, drawn back into a smooth knot, was a silver nearly as dark as black. Everything about Orla was angular, from the joints of her double-bladed lightsaber down to the corners of her knowing smile.

Which she was giving Reath right then, because he’d been caught staring. He ducked his head and hoped he wasn’t blushing.

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” said Master Cohmac Vitus as he walked up to join the waiting group. His resonant voice beneath the hood of his golden robe made each word sound like a judge’s weighty pronouncement. “Hardly any commercial traffic is headed toward Starlight—at least, so far.”

Reath didn’t know Master Cohmac well, though he would’ve liked to. The human man was renowned as both scholar and mystic. He seemed to have footnotes in half the books Reath read, on topics as diverse as ancient Force rituals and high-crisis hostage negotiations. None of that fully explained the mystique that hung about him. Master Cohmac stood at average height for a male of human or near-human species, but seemed taller because of his slender, angular build, the thick black hair he wore almost to his shoulders, and the gravitas of his presence.

Until recently, Reath had often seen Master Cohmac in the Archives. He’d spent many hours seated not far away while both of them dove into holocron after holocron. So why would Master Cohmac have requested a distant duty posting on the frontier? Then it hit Reath: Oh, right, he’s also a folklorist. He’ll be collecting the local histories and legends, probably.

He wondered whether that might be dangerous for Master Cohmac, who was known to be highly sensitive to the Force. Going someplace so wild would surely expose them all to influences none of them had yet dreamed of.

Only then did Reath realize that Orla Jareni and Cohmac Vitus were walking toward each other, gazes locked, half smiles on their faces. “Now, see, I could’ve sworn,” Orla said, “that I once heard you say you’d never return to that patch of the galaxy again.”

“It doesn’t matter how far we run, or in what direction,” Master Cohmac replied. “In the end, we always come back to the beginning.”

Slowly, Orla nodded. “Yes. It’s time for me to bring things full circle.”

What could that mean? Reath and Dez exchanged glances that suggested they were equally curious, but equally unwilling to pry.

At that moment, Reath’s attention—and everyone else’s—was distracted by a ship flying through the spaceport, rather low, then landing squarely on the pad where their transport ought to have been. It was an unusual ship, at least to Reath: its plating was dark blue, and its cockpit and engines both rounded to the point of being bulbous. Either it had been built a very long time before, or the beings who built it didn’t bother keeping up with technological developments—which was a troubling thought. As it settled onto the pad, the Jedi all exchanged glances.

“Looks more like a transport ship than a passenger craft,” Master Cohmac said.

“Who cares? It can make hyperspace, can’t it?” Dez grinned as displaced air ruffled their hair and robes with a hiss.

Reath frowned. “Maybe?”

No sooner had the ship settled onto the platform with a heavy metallic clunk than the hatch popped open. From it emerged a young girl—possibly Reath’s age, no more than a year or two older, with tan skin. Her long brown hair hung free as she strode toward them wearing a normal pilot’s coverall, an unusually neat, pressed one, in the same distinctive shade of blue as the ship itself. On the sleeve was stitched a star-shaped crest in dark orange. She put her hands on her hips and studied them all as though disappointed. “You’re the passengers for Starlight? I thought we were picking up a bunch of monks or something. You look…normal.”

“We are your passengers, and could be called monks of a sort,” said Master Cohmac without any sign of surprise and only a slight pause before asking, “Are you the pilot?”

She grinned and pointed her thumb at the door. “Of course not. I’m the copilot, Affie Hollow. He’s the pilot.”

A teenage copilot seemed questionable to Reath, but when he looked in the direction she was pointing, all those questions vanished, replaced by far more pressing ones. Questions like: Is that man’s shirt open to the waist? Is he holding out his arms to us like he wants a group hug? Does he want a group hug? Is that guy on spice?

No—how much spice is that guy on?

“Beautiful children,” said the pilot, with a laconic drawl and a huge grin. “I’m Leox Gyasi, and I hereby welcome you to the vessel.”

There was a brief pause, which made Reath feel better; even experienced Jedi weren’t totally sure how to approach this guy. Dez finally stepped forward with his usual charm. “Dez Rydan. A pleasure to know you. What’s the name of your ship?”

Leox and Affie shared a glance, clearly in on a joke that was about to be sprung. “Already told ya,” Leox said. He was a tall, tan, and rangy human, and his wavy dark blond hair looked as though it might not have been combed recently. Possibly ever. “Our vessel is called…the Vessel . I named it not for the container itself, but the space within the container that gives it its value and purpose. To remind me to look beyond the obvious, you know?”

That sounds like Master Yoda on spice , Reath thought. Which was either a very good sign or a very, very bad one.

“ Love it,” Orla said with apparently genuine relish. “So, can we see our bunks?”

Affie made a face. “About that. We’re really more of a transport ship”—Master Cohmac gave Dez a look that seemed to say, Just our luck —“but we’ll set up some partitions and cots for you.” Affie’s narrow face lit up when she smiled. “Just because we’re a last-minute substitution doesn’t mean we can’t make it comfortable.”

Leox cut in: “That is, if you’re not super particular about your personal definition of ‘comfort.’”