Peace of the Jedi [Sequel to Sword of the Lanterns]

Chapter Thirty-Two- Instructions

Jaina didn't know whether to cry, shout for joy, or hug Padme, but as she'd cried enough today and was now exhausted, she settled for standing there.

"You're my grandmother?" She repeated. "Anakin's wife?"

"Yes," Padme nodded, smiling. "He killed me shortly after our children were born."

"Oh," Jaina cringed. So much for romance and sappy reminiscence.

"He was much like Jacen," Padme walked towards a bright yellow star, with a brown tinge ringing the edge. "He thought he did not have a choice. After I told him that I was pregnant, he received dreams of the future, that I would die in childbirth. Darth Sidious tricked him into thinking that the dark side of the force would save me. When I tried to stop him-"

"He killed you." Jaina knew that Anakin wasn't a saint. That's why he had helped her, so she could help him to atone for his sins. 

Padme nodded. 

"Where is he now?" Jaina asked, "Why can't I sense him? Why won't he appear."

Padme pursed her lips. "Brakiss found Anakin's ashes on Endor. Where your Uncle Luke buried him."

"He's under the influence of a Black Lantern ring," Jaina sat down, letting out a long sigh.

Padme sat next to Jaina. "The Black Lantern rings will not affect anyone whose soul is at peace after their death. Though the Jedi are taught that death is the way of the force, many carry a grudge from their deaths, whether by a Sith or a bounty hunter, or by the clones from Darth Sidious's Order Sixty-Six. Or if they're like Anakin, their spirits were held back by the force for a further purpose. The rings will amplify their powers with the force, so you need all the help you can get." 

Jaina nodded.

"You'll be facing a lot of people you know, Jaina. People you loved and lost."

Jaina's heart shrank back. "I'm going to be fighting Jacen, too, aren't I?"

Padme looked at Jaina, sadness in her eyes. "I'm sorry. There isn't anything I can do."

"Well can't the force do anything?" Jaina stood up, waving her arms at space. 

"The Black Lanterns will not listen to the force. Brakiss, and whomever he works for now, have turned the force on itself, creating the anti-force that fuels their Black Lanterns and keeps them in a state that is neither life nor death." Padme explained.

"If the force is so great, then couldn't they have made a way to stop it!?" Jaina said, "After all, it's done so much to mess up our lives and the lives of our family; shouldn't it have spent more time preventing this from happening!?" She stopped, watching as a star flickered out before her eyes.

Padme placed her hands on Jaina's shoulders. "The force did make a way to stop the Black Lanterns. It prepared you."

"Oh, and a bloody good job it did!" Jaina shoved her away, "My brothers and half my friends are dead, my aunt and mentor is dead, I'm drinking myself to a stupor every other week so much that I can't even sense the force, I broke my Lantern ring, my trainee doesn't trust me anymore, and I'm at the point where I don't even want to be a hero anymore!" 

Before her words could fade away, Padme threw her arms around Jaina, holding her tight. 

"Oh, Jaina, you precious child, if only you could see what is coming," She said, holding Jaina tightly. Jaina hadn't been held in a motherly embrace for so long. this almost felt...wrong. But she let herself be held.

"What's coming?" She whispered. Maybe she didn't want to know.

Using her thumb, Padme wiped a tear from the corner of Jaina's eye, and she felt like a little kid again.