“Zeitooine was endless petty bickering and plotting with next to no action.” Dez rubbed his head, warding off the memories of all the headaches that world had caused him. “At least after the first months, once we’d quieted some of the unrest. Once that was over, I didn’t do anything of real significance. On the frontier there’s a chance to act.”

“I guess I should be more like you,” Reath said. “I know I need to embrace this assignment. Any assignment the Council gives us. But I’m not drawn to action the same way you are.”

Dez confessed what he’d hardly admitted to himself: “Sometimes I think I crave action and excitement too much. It can be dangerous, you know.”

“So Master Jora says.” But Reath didn’t sound as though he believed it—he sounded as if he was judging himself, and falling short.

So Dez rose and put a hand on Reath’s shoulder. “Listen, the Force is about balance, right? Ideally it’s about finding balance within each and every individual Jedi. But that’s not the same as finding balance within the Order, which is just as important. We need Knights who crave adventure and Knights who don’t seek it out. Each individual brings different gifts to the Jedi Order. Our job is to appreciate the value of those gifts, including our own.”

Reath gave him a lopsided grin. “Okay. I’ll try.”

“Good,” Dez said, inwardly adding, I’ll try, too.

“Hey, Dez, I have this one question—”

“Okay. Hit me.”

“Did Master Jora ever ask you—do you know why no Jedi can cross the Kyber Arch alone?”

Dez frowned. “No, she never asked me that. And people cross it alone all the time. It’s not like some insurmountable challenge, just a meditative practice, like walking a labyrinth.”

“I know!” Reath breathed out in frustration. “But Master Jora insists nobody can cross that archway alone, and she wants me to tell her why.”

“I’ve got nothing.” Dez shrugged. “All I can tell you is, Master Jora is wiser than both of us put together. If she’s given you a riddle to solve, it’s worth solving.”

Later, once she’d gotten herself cleaned up and freshened up and returned to the cockpit, Affie was disgruntled. “You’re defending the Aytees?”

“They’re gardeners,” Leox said, stretched out in his chair, feet propped on the cockpit console. His eyes were closed, as though he could chat and nap at the same time. Maybe he could. “Stewards of the soil. You threatened their very reason for being.”

Affie sighed and let it go. Of course the droids were only following their programming. Didn’t mean she had to like them.

Besides, she had more important things to tell Leox.

“Listen,” she began. “Out there on the station, up in the higher rings—I’ve found some lines written in code.”