“Mom! Who hit you?”
“Forget that, Ben.” She hugged him to her, a really desperate and crushing embrace. “I’ve got some questions and I will absolutely not be stalled this time.” She had hold of his shoulders, eyes scanning his face as if she was looking for injury. “This is between you and me, I swear, not your father.”
They ended up in a tapcaf in the Osarian quarter. The table was greasy and the elbows of Ben’s jacket stuck to it every time he leaned on them, but nobody knew them here. Even if the food had been appetizing and not searingly hot, Ben wasn’t hungry.
Mara lowered her voice. “I want to know why you’ve been to Vulpter.”
Ben was stunned. How could she possibly know? Who’d talked? It was completely classified. Most of the GAG hadn’t even been briefed on it.
“I haven’t.”
“You can stop the game. I know where you’ve been, and I have a horrible feeling I know why. The whole planet’s seen the news.”
Mara just stared at him, not blinking, suddenly not his mom at all. He was supposed to deny everything. He stared back, silent.
“I could ask Jacen, sweetheart, but I’m not sure I could believe him if he told me what the time was.”
“You know I can’t talk about my work, Mom.”
“Oh, I know. I’ve never hidden my past from you, so I know exactly what your work entails. I can talk to you like a grown-up, Ben, because once you do the kind of job you’re doing, you’re not a kid any longer. Do we understand each other?”
Ben thought of Jori Lekauf and felt his stomach starting to knot and shake. He desperately wanted to blurt out that his buddy had died and that he wanted to roll time back to before he’d fallen into this mess, and thatthat
“Mom …” He couldn’t get it out. She put her hand on his and squeezed. “Mom, if I tell you, will you tell me who hit you?”
“Okay, it was Lumiya. I caught her, but she got away. I gave her a good hiding, and she won’t get away next time. Nowyour turn.”
Ben took a deep breath. This was either going to make everything better, or be the start of something disastrous. He couldn’t tell: all his Force impressions had deserted him.
“I did it, Mom.”
“Involved … or did it?”
Ben’s mouth took over without his permission. “Folding-stock Karpaki, frangible round.”
Mara actually sat back in her chair and her left hand moved as if she was about to put it to her mouth. Her right hand was still clamped tight on his.
“Okay,” she said.
“Lekauf was killed, Mom.” Ben couldn’t remember if she knew Lekauf or not. It didn’t matter. He needed to say his name and tell someone. “Jori got killedhe got killed to save my skin.”
Mara busied herself sipping from the cup in front of her. Osarians liked very strongly scented herbs, and Ben knew he’d never be able to smell that aroma again without being dragged back to this awful moment.
“Why did you do it, Ben?”
“Orders. I was the best person to do it.”
“Your whole company is suddenly short of snipers? Whose orders?”
“Jacen.”
Mara was doing a reasonable job of not reacting, but Ben wasn’t fooled. She was furious. He could see it in the whiteness of her skin, and the contrast with the yellowing bruise around her eye made it even more noticeable.
“Okay, sweetheart,” she said. “Let’s not tell your dad, because he’ll rip Jacen’s head off in the mood he’s in at the moment. Can you face coming home?”
“I don’t think I can sit and have dinner and not talk about this to him.”
“Okay, so where are you planning on going?”
“Home. Jacen’s apartment.” Ben could see she wasn’t keen on the idea. “Or Captain Shevu’s place.”
“Wherever you feel safest, Ben. I won’t force you to come back with me as long as you swear you’ll come to me the second you have problems, okay?”
“Okay.”
“I’m sorry about your friend. I really am.”
“Nobody’s ever going to know how brave he was.”
“I know.”
“Are you angry with me? Stupid question. You must be.”
“How can I be, after what I used to do?” She gripped both his hands as if she was afraid he’d run away. “This is what we made you, isn’t it? We wanted you to be like us. We wanted you to be a Jedi and do your duty …”
Mara was quiet for a while, gazing out the window onto the skylane packed with traffic and clearly thinking hard.
“You still haven’t told me how you knew, Mom.”