[Junior Jedi Knights] - 03(23)

“Help me, Tahiri!” Anakin cried into the deafening churn and the sea of frightened cries. He fell, and the sands tossed him in a dizzying rush.



“Anakin, where are you!” Tahiri screamed as her friend’s fear reached out from the globe and filled her senses. There was was no answer.

“This is not the way it’s going to end!” she cried into the darkness. “Anakin!” Tahiri called over and over with her voice and the Force. A glimpse of his orange jumpsuit appeared, then disappeared as the sands violently whirled. “Anakin, I’m here!” Tahiri cried.

Anakin heard Tahiri’s voice through the sands, and struggled toward it, his hands still firmly clenching the small hands of two Massassi children. He pressed forward, toward Tahiri’s cries, until he ran headlong into the crystal. Anakin pressed the backs of his hands against the globe, letting the pain of the field course down his arms until he was certain that Tahiri had seen him.

Then he focused on the field, once again using the Force to weaken it. He sensed Tahiri joining her strength with his. Sands wrapped around Anakin’s legs like the tentacles of the creature on Tatooine and tried to draw him back into the center of the globe. Anakin fought to keep his footing, to concentrate on weakening the field. But he was growing tired, and the current was close to toppling him and breaking his resolve. Before him the field’s strength began to flicker and falter.

There was no more time to wait. Anakin reached forward, ignoring the ripples of pain that ran down his arms and made him cry out. He thrust his fists through the field, feeling the dank air of the chamber beyond. Anakin forged ahead, pushing through the field with the last of his strength, absorbing its weakened power in dull aches and hot flashes. Suddenly he was through, his hands drawing the children behind him in a steady stream.

Anakin forced his mind back to the field, joining Tahiri in a last effort to weaken its power as the children streamed from the globe, hand in hand. Minutes later it was over, the last child emerging from the globe’s cursed grasp. Anakin sank to the stone floor.

“You’re free,” Tahiri said softly to the countless children who crowded the chamber. Their small, spiritlike forms were almost transparent. Cloaked in white robes outlined in shimmering blue, they stood silently before the Jedi candidates.

“Do you think they understand?” Tahiri asked as she sat down beside Anakin.

“They understand,” Anakin answered, sensing the children’s growing wonderment and joy. One of them walked toward the Jedi candidates. He reached out a small hand and gently touched both of their faces. Anakin felt the brush of a feather across his cheek at the touch. Then the Massassi child bowed and moved back to the other children. Slowly they all began to fade from sight, until the last glimmering blue outline disappeared. They had finally returned to their people.

The curse was broken; the children were freed from their imprisonment.

“Do you feel it?” Anakin asked Tahiri.

Tahiri nodded. “Peace to all,” she replied softly.

As Tahiri and Anakin moved to leave the chamber, they heard a sharp sound behind them, and whirled. The golden globe was cracking, its surface lined with running veins of white. Then, in an instant, the sphere broke into a thousand shards of crystal, and the golden glitter which had once filled it spilled out into the chamber, now just lifeless yellow sand.

Anakin and Tahiri left the Palace of the Woolamander. Their eyes quickly adjusted from the gloom to the soft morning light of the jungle. And to the figure of Jedi Master Luke Skywalker as he stood on the crumbling stone steps of the palace,

Master Ikrit by his side. Luke Skywalker studied Anakin and Tahiri. His face conveyed relief at seeing the two Jedi candidates safe.

“The curse is broken?” Luke asked softly.

“Yes,” Anakin answered his uncle.

“You have both done well,” Ikrit rasped, his big brown eyes gleaming in pride at Tahiri and Anakin.

“You know everything?” Anakin asked his uncle, gesturing toward Ikrit.

Luke Skywalker nodded. He wrapped his arms around Anakin’s and Tahiri’s shoulders.

“I am very proud,” Luke said, his eyes meeting theirs.

Slowly the group walked back toward the Jedi academy. For the first time in a long time, Anakin and Tahiri were not heading toward danger, but simply toward the future-adventure, the Force, and their ultimate goal: to become Jedi Knights.