That sounded better.

"I'll prepare a plan and submit the records within the hour, sir," Kett said.

Much better. It felt right, a good beginning to a complicated mission.

Sienar drew up his shoulders and set his jaw firmly, star ing with steely determination at the potentially nauseating and twisting view outside the ship until the port covers closed all the way.

He then stepped aside and climbed down. A slender, pipe- frame, dark blue navigational droid mounted the pulpit to perform its essential and quite boring duties.

Anakin squirmed on the cramped transport, unable to see through the small ports placed inconveniently behind the seats. All he could see was a flash of sky and a lumpy green horizon. As the transport flew south, they were moving in and out of the terminator, and the cabin grew light and dark alternately until the transport veered to the west and they flew toward the youth of the day.

The transport offered only the most basic comfort on their trip: four seats, narrow and slung beneath a low ceiling, and a closed cabin door between them and the pilot. Obi-Wan could sense a human behind the door and nothing more. The transport was a familiar enough model, a light expeditionary vehicle often carried inside larger vessels for close-in exploration. Nothing exotic here.

"This is no way to run a planet," Anakin said.

Obi-Wan agreed. "They behave as if they have recently suffered problems."

"With Vergere?"

Obi-Wan smiled. "Vergere was given no instructions to disrupt. Perhaps with the unknown visitors she was sent to investigate."

"I don't feel anything like that around here," Anakin said. "I can feel the Force in this entire planet, and in the settlers, but…" He grimaced and shook his head.

"Nor do I feel anything unexpected," Obi-Wan said.

"I didn't say I couldn't feel anything unexpected."

Obi-Wan leaned his head to one side and looked at his Padawan. "What, then?"

"I don't expect what I feel. That's all." The boy shrugged.

Obi-Wan knew that Anakin was often much more tuned to small variations in the Force. "And what do you sense?"

"Something. . large. Not a lot of little curls or waves, but one big wave, a really big change that's already happened or is coming. I don't know how else to describe it."

"I do not yet feel such a combined surge," Obi-Wan said.

"That's okay," Anakin said. "Maybe it's an illusion. Maybe something's wrong with me."

"I doubt that," Obi-Wan said.

Anakin held his hands behind his neck and sighed. "How much longer?"

The transport landed with a shudder an hour later, and the hatch instantly swung down with a harsh squeal and banged against hard ground. Warm, thick air flowed into the cabin, scented with something at once floral and rich, like a freshly baked dessert.

Anakin found the smell appetizing. Maybe they had fixed food for the visitors-breakfast or lunch.

But as they bent low to climb out of the craft, no tables spread with food awaited them. Instead they found themselves on a broad platform suspended between four huge dark trunks, the middle portions of boras thick and squat as barrels, each over a dozen meters in diameter. Overhead, bright sun filtered through rank upon rank of layered foliage, many meshed canopies of growth that shaded their surroundings and made it seem as if they walked in deep twilight. Obi-Wan helped Anakin down the ramp, eyes darting right and left. They both straightened and faced a tall, strong-looking human male in long black robes decorated with brilliant green medallions. He stood well over two meters in height, much taller than Obi-Wan, and his face was pale and blue as Tatooine milk.

"You're on Zonama Sekot," he said. "A planet of considerable beauty and firm tradition. My name is Gann."

"A pleasure to meet you," Obi-Wan said as he and Anakin approached the tall man. Judging by his color and bearing, he was native to one of the inner Ferro systems, reclusive and not always compliant with the laws of the Republic. Ferroans were a proud and independent people who seldom welcomed outsiders and almost never traveled far from home.

"Where are your ships, the really fast ones?" Anakin asked, bored by this adult show and his enthusiasm getting the better of him.

"This is my student, Anakin Skywalker of Tatooine," Obi- Wan introduced. "I am Obi-Wan Kenobi."

Gann looked down on Anakin and his expression softened. "I, too, have a son," he said. "A special student. Many sons and daughters. That is what we call our students here. Whoever they are born to, we are all mothers and fathers and teachers. I'm afraid you will not see one of our ships for some days, young Anakin." He returned his attention to Obi- Wan. He swung out his arm. "We are at what we call the Middle Distance, our first home on Zonama Sekot, where we settled twenty Ferroan years ago. Sixty standard years. Not that time means the same here as on any of the Ferroan worlds, or on Coruscant."

"Our accents give us away?" Obi-Wan asked.

"Even a few months on the capital world imparts a distinctive speech," Gann said. "Zonama Sekot has its own approach to letting time pass. I feel as if I have spent my entire life here, and yet, it might have been only a year, a month, a week…"

Obi-Wan gently interrupted this reverie. "We wish to purchase a ship," he said. "We have the money, and we are ready to engage in the tests and the training."

Gann dramatically drew up his thin black eyebrows. "Ritual first. Answers and tests much later."

The Ferroan turned at some vagary of the wind, a brief whistling sound through the canopies high above. "The view from here is not the best," he said. "Come with me. I need to introduce you to Sekot."

Obi-Wan and Anakin followed Gann to a gap between two of the huge trunks that enclosed and supported the platform. He opened a small gate thickly woven from reedlike stalks and gestured for them to pass through. Walking between the trunks, master and apprentice stepped out onto an exterior platform bathed in sunlight and overlooking a scene even more spectacular than that which Charza Kwinn had shown them aboard the Star Sea Flower.

Gann folded his arms and smiled proudly. Morning mists were rising from a wandering river valley, its depths still lost in shadow fully two kilometers below the platform. Along the upper walls of the valley, tier upon tier of dwellings and platforms covered the bare rock faces, held in place by great brown and green vines. The vines hung from great-rooted boras straddling knife-sharp ridges, topped with more brilliant purple and green canopies. Several airships navigated the calm morning currents between the ridges. These were made up of clusters of rigid tube-shaped bone-white balloons strapped side by side and stabilized by more outrigger balloons. The airships followed lengths of ca ble strung across the valley, supported at hundred-meter intervals by trunks thrust up from the sides. Even now, an airship was threading its way through the circular crown of foliage at the top of a support.