“Indeed I do. But other beings seem to value copulation as a form of bonding.” Leox then made a face and swore. “Not appropriate. Sorry.”

He meant well, she knew, but Affie hated it when he treated her like a kid instead of as an equal. Fortunately, he didn’t do that much. “It’s okay. I think I heard of sex once already.”

That made Leox laugh. “Just make sure your mom knows I’m not the first person who talked to you about it.”

Every time someone described Scover Byne as Affie’s mom, it warmed her through. “You know, it would be easy to get Scover to like you more. If you’d just wear the Guild coverall once in a while—”

“Up with that I cannot put.” Leox shook his head. “A man’s gotta have standards. And since I lack the financial wherewithal to declare my independence from the Guild, my personhood must be asserted sartorially. In other words, you can take my beads from my cold dead body.”

Affie suppressed a smile. “You know, the Jedi would probably say you were putting too much emphasis on worldly things.”

“My relationship to the metaphysical is my own to judge, Little Bit.”

“Don’t call me that!”

Cohmac Vitus was a man of reason and logic. While he did not deny he possessed emotions, he never allowed them to cloud his judgment—or so he hoped. His precise, mathematical mind preferred the tangible to the nebulous, the quantifiable to the mysterious. More than one of his fellow Jedi had pointed out that this was an unusual frame of mind for a mystic. However, that was part of what Cohmac felt he brought to the Order: steadiness and rationality.

So why did that mindset now feel less like a gift and more like a defense?

Because you are traveling to the place where you first learned the harm that arises from imprecision. From emotion. All that was born between Eiram and E’ronoh.

For a moment he was back in the caverns, Orla shivering at his side, staring in fear at the shapes in the frigid dark.…

Cohmac shook his head, as though he could physically rid it of the memory. The best way to get out of the mind was to exercise the body. Options were limited on a ship that size, but a brisk walk through the corridors would do. He made his way through the Vessel, hoping for privacy. The hope was in vain, as he almost immediately came across Dez rapt in conversation with Reath Silas. “I mean,” Reath was saying, “would you call us monks?”

“Not exactly,” Dez said. “I see you haven’t been able to talk Master Jora out of the Padawan braid.”