The official site shares an exclusive excerpt from Daniel José Older’s middle-grade novel entitled Star Wars: The High Republic: The Race to Crashpoint Tower.
Lula, her Jedi Master Kantam Sy, and Lula’s Force-sensitive friend Zeen are called upon to return to Zeen’s homeworld Trymant IV to learn more about the Nihil who attacked Zeen’s people.
Jedi Master Kantam Sy paced back and forth on the deck of the Star Hopper as PZ1-3 navigated them closer and closer to Trymant IV. Sy was tall and slender, with sharp cheek-bones and an impressive topknot. They seemed older than their actual age, in part because they often walked startlingly slow as a form of meditation. But Lula had seen Master Sy in action, and that gentle easygoing demeanor was nowhere to be seen when lives were on the line.
Lula and Zeen slid into the seats at their stations. It was strange to be the only two young people on the Hopper. The bridge was normally alive with chattering and laughter, Farzala cracking jokes and Qort explaining something complicated while the others gossiped or traded tips. But everyone else was off fighting an army of carnivorous plant creatures called the Drengir, and only Zeen and Lula were left.
Stars shimmered in the darkness outside the transparent dome covering the whole top level of the Hopper. Lula and her friends would sometimes take their sleeping bags up and lie on their backs late at night, watching the galaxy spin past.
“Listen up, listen up,” Master Sy said, already in action mode. “We’ll be landing in a moment. The last time we were here, things were very different, of course. We had some confrontations–”
“Almost died a whole bunch,” Lula added helpfully.
“And made a new friend!” Sy said, flashing a winning smile at Zeen. “Now we’re here for a very specific reason, and that’s to follow up on a lead from Jedi Vernestra Rwoh. I’ll let her fill you in.”
The small blue image of a girl not much older than Lula flickered up from the holo. This was Vernestra Rwoh? She had a slender, kind face and long straight hair. She wore the traditional temple robes, both simple and ornate, and stood with her back very straight. But how could she be so young? A prickly flash of emotion rose within Lula, and she tried to push it away. Envy. A very un-Jedi-like feeling indeed. She crinkled her nose with the strain of getting her emotions under control.
Ever since she could remember, Lula Talisola had been determined to be the greatest Jedi of all time. She knew this ambition wasn’t very Jedi-like, either, but she figured she had time to get that part under control amid all her other training. And anyway, if she trained hard enough and excelled at every possible skill, she wouldn’t have to worry about becoming the best; she just would be the best!
So she studied and trained and meditated, at least twice as much as all the other Padawans she knew. And she stayed at the top of her clan. She figured she was on track, for the most part. Meeting Zeen, seeing what she could do with the Force, even without training–that had thrown Lula at first, sure. But Zeen had quickly become one of her best friends, and Lula found she couldn’t be bothered to wonder how amazing a Jedi Zeen would’ve been if she had been raised in the Jedi Order instead of suppressing her Force sensitivity–not when they were having so much fun together.
But Vernestra had already become a full Knight and she was so young! Who was this girl?
A sharp nudge from Zeen ripped Lula from her spiral of overthinking.
“Ow! What?” she whispered.
“You’re doing it again,” Zeen hissed back.
“Doing what?”
“Thinking too hard about something and not paying attention to what’s going on around you!”
Lula was extra annoyed because her friend was right. “How do you know?”
“You’re grinding your teeth.”
“And so,” Vernestra was explaining, “I looked deeper into the files from the Trymant IV disaster and discovered the story of your cohort and Zeen Mrala.” She nodded at Zeen, who acknowledged her with a shy wave. “The Nihil raiders you came into contact with might have something to do with the ones I faced on Wevo. From what I understand, their attack on Trymant IV didn’t follow their usual raid patterns.”
An awkward moment passed; the young Jedi looked directly at Zeen. She was waiting for Zeen to say something, Lula realized. But Zeen’s head tendrils pointed directly down, tensed, and her brow was furrowed. The whole mess with Krix and everything that had happened since was too much to get into, especially with a strange Jedi on a flickering hologram.
Read more here. Preorder The Race to Crashpoint Tower from Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk, arriving on June 29th.
