Sacrifice

And then he sensed . . . amusement.

The presence—now at the door to the apartment, he was sure—was like a cloud of billowing smoke in his mind. He could almost see it. As he felt it becoming more solid, more real, more here, it suddenly lit up as if a silent explosion had lifted it in a ball of soaring flame.

Lumiya.

Lumiya.

Luke rushed to the front doors, at the same time concentrating hard on using the Force to jam the two sets of doors in the corridor outside that stood between the apartment and the lifts. He'd trap her. She'd lied. Mara was right. All that nonsense on the resort satellite, all that I-mean-you-no- harm was just a feint, mocking his indecision—

The doors parted with a gasp of air and Luke sprang into the corridor with his lightsaber raised. One set of doors was wedged open with something, trying repeatedly to close and making little mechanical groans each time the inner edges hit the obstruction and bounced back a few centimeters. There was no sign of Lumiya.

But she'd been here seconds before. Luke could almost taste her on the air. It was as if she'd sprayed perfume too liberally and was leaving a cloud wafting behind her, except it was a scent of darkness, not rare oils. Frustrated and furious, he strode down the corridor to see what had jammed the doors apart.

It was a pair of black boots, army boots with segmented durasteel plates around the ankle, the kind that Ben wore. He parted the doors with a Force push and squatted to recover the boots.

They were Ben's. Not only did Luke recognize them, but he also felt Ben in them when he picked them up. Luke rarely jumped to conclusions.

But he was certain who'd left them there, and what the message was: If I can take personal items from your son, I can take him, too.