Her eyes closed, and she was gone.
He lay his head on the cockpit floor and held her hand. He did not know, at that moment, what living was for, if he had to carry this pain.
Anakin had been out of his mind with the frenzy to find her. He had attacked the ships again and again, determined to slip through.
When he saw that a ship had crashed, he had thought Padme was dead, and his heart had become a fist. Revenge was all he wanted.
And then as he swooped down he had seen her, blaster rifle in her hand, her face turned up toward him. He held her to him only seconds later.
"I'm afraid for Siri," she whispered.
Obi-Wan climbed out of the ruined ship. He came toward them. Something in his face, his walk was different.
"She has joined the Force." He spoke the words to them, but he was looking down at Magus. The bounty hunter was beginning to stir. Taly gripped the blaster tighter. Anakin saw strain and anguish in his face.
He wants to shoot, Anakin thought.
For the first time since he'd known Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin was afraid for his Master. He saw the way he looked at Magus. His eyes were dead, as if now there was nothing at his feet, not a living being, just clothes and hair and skin.
Obi-Wan activated his lightsaber.
Padme looked at Anakin, her eyes wide. Say something, her face pleaded. Stop him.
Anakin recognized that there was something here he could not stop.
Taly's breath caught. He did not take his eyes off Obi-Wan.
Obi-Wan crouched down and held the glowing lightsaber to Magus's neck. He locked eyes with Magus. Anakin saw the flare of fear in the bounty hunter's eyes.
"You kill without thought or feeling," Obi-Wan said. "But I am not you."
He stood.
"Take him aboard," Obi-Wan said. "He is now a prisoner of war."
Chapter 33
The codebreaker was lost in the Battle of Azure Spaceport. The fusion furnace blew, an explosion that came close to leveling the spaceport itself. The smoke that rose served as cover for the evacuation of Republic ships. General Solomahal was captured with the codebreaker as he attempted to escape with it. He blew it up instead of handing it over. Two days later, he managed to escape and was given another command.
The Separatist forces bombed Taly's laboratory. All his notes and documents were lost. It could take him years to reinvent what he had discovered… if he could reproduce it at all. In the meantime, he was taken in secrecy and transported to a Republic outpost.
On Coruscant, Anakin and Padme met before dawn in her apartment on her veranda. It was their favorite time to meet, under cover of darkness, but with the beginnings of morning freshness in the air. Even in the darkest of times, it made them feel hopeful.
"I am being sent away again," he told her. "Obi-Wan and I leave this morning."
"There is a vote I must attend this morning," Padme said. "So we must say good-bye here."
"A vote is so important?"
"They are all important now. Senator Organa needs my support."
Anakin made an impatient gesture, but he did not want to fight. He was still struck with the horror of almost losing her. But he did not understand these Senate votes, useless during a time of war when only battles won mattered.
"I will wait for you to return," Padme said. "I will wait as long as I must."
Anakin's eyes lifted to the Jedi Temple. What did they know, Yoda and Obi-Wan and Mace, of this? Of this moment of agony, being torn from his wife. He fought for them and alongside them, but they no longer had his heart. They no longer understood him.
He had thought for a moment on Azure that Obi-Wan had loved Siri. He thought he'd seen it in his Master's eyes after she had died. But Obi-Wan had stood over the man who had killed her and spared him. If he had loved Siri, could he have done that? Of course, it was what a Jedi should do. But the way Obi-Wan had spoken had been so measured. With a temperament like that, it was impossible to love, Anakin was sure.
With Padme, he had passion, and he was whole. The stars began to disappear above, and a thin line of orange indicated the sun was beginning to rise. They would lose the cover of darkness. They would once again be Jedi and Senator.
He would once again be split in two.
For several nights now, Obi-Wan had not been able to sleep. He lay on his sleep couch. He closed his eyes. He hoped to dream. He could not.
So he walked. Through the Temple, the glow lights a faint blue. He did not seek the places that reminded him of Siri. He couldn't do that, not yet.
Oddly, he thought of Qui-Gon on these walks. He remembered, as he had not remembered in years, how he had known that Qui-Gon had walked the Temple halls at night. He had taken him sapir tea, he remembered. He had tried to comfort him, even though he knew there was no comfort for him.
If Anakin knew of his grief, he didn't mention it. He, too, had risen early — Obi-Wan had seen him heading toward the exit. Anakin had always been restless, had always needed to escape the Temple to think. Something was between him and Padme. Obi-Wan would not ask. In some ways, he envied it. Let Anakin make his own decisions.
He found it extraordinary that at the time of this grief, when he had lost Siri forever, he did not question that their parting twenty years ago had been the right thing. He saw that clearly now, more clearly than he had ever seen it. Love was different from possession. He had loved her. That was enough.
…I live with the heartbreak of losing her. But I am living, Obi-Wan. I am continuing to walk the Jedi path.
This was what he had learned — the Jedi had kept him from her. But the Jedi had taught him how to live with losing her.
Obi-Wan stood by the window. The blues and grays outside were changing, warming to pink. Orange streaks lit the sky. The space lanes were beginning to fill up with flashes of silver. Another day. Another mission.
He was ready. He had learned something else, something important. Once he'd thought he had to lock away memories of love. Now he was no longer afraid of them. He could live with them. He could breathe in his sadness and remember his joy.
At last he had learned the secret that Qui-Gon had always tried to teach him. It had taken him years of loss to learn it. It had taken a death that had sent him to his knees. But he had finally learned it. He had learned to live with an open heart.