She sounded just like Ippi. His late wife said it wasn’t the way they described it in the family holozines, too. Given the massive upheavals that Etain had been through in the last year, the fact that both mother and child had survived was astonishing. There was a lot to be said for Jedi blood.
Mereel walked in and peered over Skirata’s shoulder.
“He’s very quiet, isn’t he?”
“They sleep a lot at this stage.”
“You reckon?” Etain said wearily.
Venku looked like an average baby with nothing remarkable about him except perhaps his head of fine, wispy dark hair, and that ordinariness was the most wonderful thing Skirata could imagine. It was a long time since he’d picked up a newborn and been stunned by it. And it broke his heart that Darman couldn’t be doing this instead.
I was wrong. Shab, was I wrong. I can’t keep the lad from his son.
“You don’t have to go through with this,” Skirata said. “I know what I said before, but you could raise him here if you leave the Jedi Order. Rav’s around, we’re all passing through regularly, you could even go to Keldabe and have plenty of neighbors around you…”
“But what about Dar?” she asked.
“I need to rethink this.”
“I don’t want to be sitting here worrying while he’s fighting, Kal.”
“Women with small kids do that, Etain. It’s hard being the rear party to a man at the front, but they do it.”
“It’s different when I’m serving. I feel like I’ve got some control over the situation, even if I haven’t.”
“And who needs you most now?”
Skirata couldn’t blame her for dithering and changing her mind. He’d had kids of his own and adopted a lot more, but even he found the world was a different place once the child was there in front of you. It changed everything.
And Etain didn’t seem like the naive and well-meaning Jedi who’d enraged him so for thinking it was a good idea to give Darman a son by omitting to tell him she was taking risks. She was a small, thin kid who looked wrung out from the pregnancy, and whose only mistake was to be born with the wrong set of genes in a world that forced a destiny on her from birth. She was just like Darman. He could never blame her now.
“You haven’t asked me something,” she said.
“Birth weight?”
“Don’t you want to know if he’s strong in the Force?”
Skirata trod tactfully. He found he was determined not to think of Venku as a Jedi-in-waiting. That could never be allowed to happen. “Is he? It’s not a given, is it?”
“No, it’s not. But he will be a Force-user. It depends on how he’s trained to handle it.”
She might have been having second thoughts about his future. All she’d ever known before the war broke out was a Jedi clan for a family; stress could make folks default to what they knew best. “And who’s going to train him?”
“I will. I might regret taking away his choice to be a Jedi, but I’d rather offer him the wider world.”
There were times when she really looked like a Jedi, the same way Jusik did, simultaneously both child and ancient sage, swathed in those dull brown and beige robes. Skirata tried to imagine her like a normal young girl of her age, doing mindless fluffy things like worrying about fashion, and felt agonizing guilt for the harsh things he’d said to her when she told him she was pregnant.
He was glad she did it. Darman had a son. It was going to kill her to stay away from her baby, though, and to cover up the fact that she’d given birth. He’d been so sure it was right for Darman not to know about Venku until he was ready for the news. But now he wasn’t so sure.
I took away his chance to name his own son. So where does that leave me?
And Venku was a blend of Force-using Jedi and the perfect soldier, a valuable commodity. Ko Sai’s continued cooperation was being bought with a vial of blood and tissue. There was nothing the aiwha-bait could ever do with it, but she wanted it badly. Skirata was going to hand it to her.
“Et’ika, let’s pick our moment and tell Darman,” he said. “Let’s see if he’s up to it. I’ll know.”
“But I’m not sure how I’m going to face him after lying to him like that.”
“I’ll tell him the truth. I made you do it.”
“But you were right, Kal. It’s already a dangerous situation, whatever I do. There’s no way around it.” Etain held her hands out to take Venku again, and settled him in the crook of her arm. “Once even a few folks know what his parentage is, the trouble starts. Unless both Dar and I desert, that is, and he won’t do that.” She wiped the baby’s mouth. “I don’t think I can, either. I can’t play happy families while this war’s going on, not like that, anyway.”