The Unchronicled Adventures of Ahsoka Tano, Book Eight

Chapter Two: The Stranger

LUX BONTERI

Lux lay awake, watching Ahsoka sleep. She was so beautiful… and he loved her to no end. He truly was grateful that she was his wife, but he almost always could tell that she was hiding something.

And that feeling had never been stronger than it was today.

He slipped soundlessly from the bed, careful not to wake her. She immediately rolled into his designated side of the bed, and he smiled. Then he walked out the door. His destination was one of his favorite places in the Temple, aside from his secret lair: the tall, arching window right next to Ahsoka’s room.

He pushed the shutters open and let the feeble pre-dawn light wash over him. Parking himself on the windowsill, which was wide enough to sit on, he looked out at the spectacular view of the Utamar region of the planet Cialone.

Suddenly a bluish shape appeared in front of him in the hallway. He gasped, and nearly fell from his seat. What is that? He asked himself.

“Is– Is someone there?” he said aloud. There was no answer.

He had only seen a Force-ghost once before, but that time it had been Ahsoka, and not an actual ghost. But from what others had told him, they looked like normal people, except that they were tinged slightly blue in color, and seemed to be able to stand on thin air.

“Who are you?” he tried, again with no response.

Then the shape reverted into that of a middle-aged man. He was struck by how similar the man’s features were to his own. They weren’t exactly alike, as this man’s face was a little longer, but they were very close. His hair, which was pushed back, was also a similar shade to Lux’s.

He was wearing a black cloak with white designs at the hem and edges, and a simple pair of loose white pants and boots and a grey shirt with a pale green sash. He put his hand out, and Lux stiffened, suddenly remembering that he was unarmed.

“I won’t hurt you,” the apparition said, in a strong and warm voice. “I just want to talk to you.”

“Why?”

“Because there are things that you don’t know about your family. Things that your mother, Mina, wanted to stay buried.” The man fixated him with a pair of blue-grey eyes that were hauntingly reminiscent of his own. “Things that I can now tell you.”

“What’s there to tell?” Lux said, sighing. “My father died years ago, in a battle pitting the Separatist forces against the Republic. My mother died at the hands of Dooku’s thugs a year later.”

“That’s not the whole story,” the man replied. “Your father isn’t dead.”

“What?” Lux’s eyes widened, then narrowed again, hard and cold. “No. This is a trick! It has to be! My father is dead!”

“Your stepfather is. Not your father.”

Lux said nothing, too shocked to speak. This… this thing was telling him that his father, whom he had thought had died over the course of the Clone Wars, and now that his father…

“Isn’t really your father,” the specter finished.

Lux managed to speak again. “How…?”

“I can tell you, Lux Bonteri, if you can meet me at the ancient well in the Utamar forest. You know of the place I’m talking about. I will see you there.” Then the man began to fade.

“Wait!” Lux called. “I don’t even know your name!”

“It’s Enarion,” he said. “Enarion Jarrus Dume.”