Star Wars: Duel of the Fates

Chapter 59

Rey looked into the far distance, the monastery still impossibly far away.

"And here I was thinking you were such a fast runner," Luke Skywalker's voice said.

She glanced to the side and saw him stood a little away from her, a luminous blue figure. He was in the same clean clothes he'd worn the first day she had seen him.

"Master Skywalker," she said, "Are you really here or is it like the other things I've seen?"

"I can sometimes appear...if the force wills it. But here...here is different, it doesn't quite follow the same rules."

"Is it you that's been calling me?"

"...No."

"But I've been seeing visions and hearing a voice..."

"It's the nature of this place...it might be a graveyard but there are strong echoes of an ancient presence. Sometimes it reaches out...it's already started testing you."

"Seeing my parents and Darth Vader?"

He nodded, "It seems to be pitting you and Ben against each other."

"Is that why we've been drawn to the same places?"

"So it would seem."

"What do I need to do?" Rey asked.

"Find the dagger that you've seen in your visions and destroy it. But you don't have much time; Ben is already at the entrance now."

"It's too far, Master."

"This isn't a place bound by the normal laws of the universe, Rey," he said looking her in the eye, "It channels the force, it's the conduit it flows through. Reach out, do you feel it?"

Her despair setting over her and sank to her knees, "I can feel it, Master but...the monastery...it's over the horizon."

"Rey, there are no horizons here," he said kneeling beside her, taking her hand and placing it on the ground, "Imagine yourself where you want to go. See it in your mind."

She closed her eyes and saw the monastery from her vision.

"See it, Rey," Luke said, "See yourself there."

She could see the rising crest of the three peaks, the middle one with sharp scalloped edges, and the thin break at the monasteries centre where light bled out into the cold shadows.

Luke's voice started to sound distant, "Remember, Rey: you're never alone. We'll be with you...always."

Inhaling, she opened her eyes and found herself just outside the monastery on a large exposed platform surrounded by eight short pillars.

Jumping to her feet she ran straight up the narrow steps and through into a round arena.