As for the family? He doubted they would welcome him with open arms. Maybe a vibroknife between the ribs?

That Dis understood.

Ro had questions of his own. How many of them were left?

“The faithful?” Kufa barked a bitter laugh. “Not enough. You’ve seen it out there. Seen them, with their golden robes and flashing blades. So resplendent. So glorious. The guiding light of the galaxy.” She gave another snort. “They are guiding us to destruction. The faithful know it, as we knew it on Jedha. As we knew it on Dalna. But the recreants are in the ascendant and the tide can no longer be turned.”

That seemed to worry Ro, who clutched his furs around him. “But if you truly believe the war is lost …”

“Why do we come here? Why do we return to the Shrine?” She spat, the thick glob of phlegm sliding down a jagged stalagmite like a scumslug. “We don’t. The ice caves are empty, the Leveler forgotten. I doubt even the attendants still function. We shall see.”

“But you …”

“I haven’t stepped foot in these tunnels for over a decade.” The shame in her voice was evident, and without warning the woman spun around, as sure and steady on her feet as Dis was unbalanced.

“Is that why you are here, Cousin? Do you bring us hope? Will you reopen the Hand? Will you deliver the message?”

Ro shook his head. “It is not my place. I am no prophet.”

Kufa searched his mask, eyes narrowed as if she could see through the frosted glass. “Maybe. Maybe not. All the best prophets have been lost at one point or another. That is how they find the Path.”

And so they continued, the slope becoming all the more treacherous. The discussion stopped but the unease remained. No, it grew. Intensified. Something Dis had never experienced, not even when he was run out of the nest.

He reached out with the Force, his feathers bristling beneath the pelts. Ro stopped, turning back to him as he slipped the wingblades from his shoulders, holding them ready by his side.

“Udi?”

“We must keep going,” Kufa insisted, the light droids keeping pace with her, leaving Ro and Dis in increasing darkness.

The Eye took a step closer.

“What is it?”

Dis stood rigid, ready to act. Ready to defend.

“I don’t know,” he finally answered. “There’s something missing.”

Ro leaned in.

“Tell me what you’re feeling?”

“I feel nothing,” Dis said bluntly. “Our gifts are not like the Jedi.”

“You don’t receive warnings?”

Dis shook his head. “No, but we sense vibrations.”

“That’s how you can pilot through meteor storms and comet fields.”

“We can tell the movement of things. In flight. In battle. But down here, in the tunnels …”

He reached out again.

“There’s nothing.”