Yay, and update after I don't even know how long!

Guys, one of my beta readers has gotten a new job and the other ones dad has cancer and his been undergoing chemotherapy treatments. So, Force Heritage has kind of been put on the back burner, but I'm still here, updating it when I can.

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In answer to a recent question about Winter.

Aruna7 and I did always plan to include her in the sequel stories, and we worked out the back story between her and Leia sometime when we were developing the OT sections of One Path.

We figured:

When Leia was sent to Alderaan, Luke didn't know anything about Winter, so that's why he told Han that "Bail didn't have any children."

Leia was feeling a lot of disconnection and confusion over both of her families, so she may not have been sure how she was "supposed" to feel about Winter in the early sections of the OT, and she should've talked about this more, but I didn't have a chance to do it because One Path shifted perspectives a lot during the OT chapters.

In all honesty, One Path changed a lot from the outline to what ended up online, and several sections were written out of chronological order, so there probably are some continuity goofs, and if this is one of them, it's my mistake. Chalk it up to the Lucas effect.

Chapter 7

The stranger in front of them stopped, but Luke knew better than to lower his blaster. He could feel surprise and curiosity in the tall, masked man who'd come out of the desert, but he also felt anger. This was no Jedi, and he'd been about to attack the boys' home. Luke wasn't sure the blaster would be effective, but Ani wasn't going to be able to duel this man. The Tusken pressed forward with his mind, touching the Force and searching the two boys. Luke clenched his teeth against the instinct to shoot again, to keep the stranger away.

"Kenobi," said a deep voice. It sounded strong and had some of the gravel that Uncle Owen's years in the desert had given him.

"That's right," Luke acknowledged.

"Where is your father?"

"None of your business."

"Luke…" Ani chided him.

"No, Anakin. You trust everyone. This guy is leading a Tusken war party. He doesn't need to know what happened to Dad."

"If I meant you or your family harm, I could take that rifle right now," the stranger said.

"This is my home! This farm belongs to my family, and that house you were about to destroy has innocent people in it!" Luke cried.

"How many more children?" asked the stranger. "Are you boys the oldest?"

"None of your business!"

Luke felt Ani's hand move onto his shoulder. The older brother squeezed gently, and Luke forced himself to take a breath. The Force was roiling around them all like the inside of a sarlacc pit. The stranger eased up his hands in a gesture of peace and lowered his body until he was crouching in the sand. Then he reached both hands toward his belt, removed the hilts of two lightsabers, one from either side, and placed them on the ground in front of him.

"My name is Hett. I was once a Jedi Knight like your father."

Luke wanted to snap back that Hett certainly wasn't a Jedi now, but he bit his tongue. He knew that if he kept talking right now, his anger was going to get them into worse trouble. Ani's fingers stayed tight on his shoulder, warning him. Luke nodded, then looked at his brother.

"I'm called Ani," the older boy said smoothly. "Why have you come here?"

"Tatooine was my home once. The Tuskens are my people," Hett replied.

"Do you still believe in the Jedi Way?" asked Ani.

"What do you know about the Jedi Way?" Hett questioned.

Luke again restrained the urge to snap at the Tusken. Ani was a better Jedi than someone who went around attacking innocent farmers. He had no right to ask a question like that! Ani seemed unaffected, though.

"Probably less than you do, sir. I want to understand how a Jedi Knight came to be in your position tonight," he said.

"These outsiders come further into the desert every year. There are children in the Tusken camps too. Your people have no compunction about killing them or desecrating our holy places. When I came home, my people were in tatters. There are no Jedi anymore. The Jedi Way doesn't work," Hett told him.

He was strangely calm and well reasoned about it. Luke could feel his anger and expected him to start shouting, but he didn't. Luke could only catch glimpses of the man's emotions in the Force, but what he saw was like a slow burning thing in his chest, a well-regulated reactor core that powered everything he did.

"Luke, please put the gun down," Ani said. As he spoke, he lowered his body to the ground and mimicked the Tusken's posture.

"No," Luke shook his head.

Ani twisted to look at him and arched an eyebrow.

"I'm not putting this weapon down, Anakin."

"So much for doing what I say," Ani sighed.

Hett actually chuckled.

"I'm sorry," Ani said as he turned back to face the warleader.

"Your brother is right. I wouldn't put it down either," Hett said.

"Well, you're right too. The settlers have killed Tuskens and we don't recognize any place that your people hold sacred. We don't know much about you. Most farmers and their families assume that you're not entirely sentient. I don't think it would enter their minds that you held anything sacred. I know that's wrong, and I understand that you and your people are angry. But you can't think you've done any differently by attacking people like this. What are you trying to accomplish?" Ani asked.

"I'm trying to win Tatooine back for its rightful inhabitants."

"Is there no chance for a peaceful coexistence?"

"You are your father's son," Hett snorted.

"Thank you."

"The time for peace is past, young Kenobi."

"I think there's always a chance for peace."

"Tell that to my people."

"May I?" asked Ani candidly.

"You'd be killed, and I wouldn't lift a hand to stop it.

"All right. What if I told my people?"

"What do you mean?" Hett questioned.

Ani glanced toward the Lars' living pit and said, "The people who live there are my aunt and uncle. They've suffered a great deal at the hands of Tusken Raiders. My uncle's father lost his leg, and his stepmother was held as a slave and later died. I'll go to him and tell him what happened here tonight, that you spared my brother's life and mine. If I can convince him, he'll speak to the other farmers and get them to call a truce. Then will you speak to yours?"

"To what end?"

"Luke and I want to help find a way for everyone to live in peace here. For your people to be safe in their camps and have their territories respected and for our people to be safe on their farms and settlements."

"Wait a minute, why are you getting me into this?!" Luke demanded.

"Didn't you just say you thought we should try to help?" Ani reminded him.

"We were by ourselves talking. It was just an idea. There wasn't a Tusken warleader with a ilightsaber/i outside my house."

"You see how quickly lofty ideas fade?" Hett asked.

"We will try to get the farmers to call a truce if you'll agree to it," Ani persisted. "Come to a meeting or send representatives."

"No Tusken would be welcome."

"Then name a place, and I'll get my people to come there," Ani said.

"You think a lot of yourself, Kenobi," Hett said.

"No, I just don't have anything to lose by trying. If I succeed, then there's a chance for all this bloodshed to stop. If I don't, nobody's any worse off than they were before."

"Good point, young one. All right. You have one week. There will be no raids by any party under my command until a week from this night," Hett announced.

"How will I contact you to make arrangements?"

"You won't. I'll find you."

"Oh, come on…" Luke protested, but the Tusken stood up, called his lightsabers to his hands and whirled around. He strode back into the desert night and vanished, leaving a heavy silence behind him. Ani watched him go, and then stood up in a smooth, deliberate motion that struck Luke as eerily similar to the warleader's movements a few minutes earlier.

It's a Jedi thing, he told himself. Just Jedi training. Ani isn't anything like that guy.

"What's the matter?" asked Ani.

"You're creeping me out."

"Sorry."

"It's okay. What do we do now?"

"Uh…fill in the hole and go home, I guess."

"Do you want to tell Uncle Owen what happened right now?"

"No, I want to talk to Dad first. If I tell Uncle Owen tonight, he'll have a fit."

"Do you blame him?"

"No, not really," admitted Ani as he moved to start filling in the sand trench they'd dug for shelter.

"Ani, how in the world do you plan to convince him to negotiate with the Sand People?"

"I have no idea."

"Good plan," Luke sighed and started helping him kick in the trench and fill it again.

"Come on, Luke, I had to try something."

"I know . I just kind of expected you to have a plan."

"Why?"

"Because you always have a plan, Ani. You don't do anything without thinking."

"Well, I was trying to come up with a plan to negotiate when we felt the war party coming. I didn't have much time. Maybe Mom and Dad will have something when they get home."

"Do you think they're going to be mad at us?"

"For coming out here?"

"Yeah."

"I don't know. I don't think so. Maybe a little at me, but we didn't have a lot of choice, and I know they wouldn't have just sat in the house if they'd been here," Ani said.

"They'd have told us to stay in the house, though."

"Would you have?"

"No. Would you?"

"Not if you didn't."

Luke smiled.

Ani didn't say much after that. They finished fixing the trench as well as they could and then started toward home. As they went, the only sounds were their footsteps shuffling through the sand. It was a strange counterpoint to earlier in the night, when the noise of the Tusken war party had been all they could hear.

The silence pressed on Luke, and he felt his stomach start to turn as he thought about what they had just done, what might have happened to them, and how Ani had finally managed to drive the Sand People off. Luke had only been able to pick up flashes from his mind, but he'd felt the fear both from Ani and the Tuskens. He knew that somehow, Ani had used his empathic gifts to alter their perceptions, but he didn't know how, and he wasn't sure he liked the idea.

A Jedi mind trick involved using the Force in a similar way. You pressed forward with your will and made a suggestion that a weak-minded person would follow, but it was superficial Force contact and there were no lasting effects. Changing someone's feelings seemed different—wrong in some way that he couldn't define.

Luke didn't feel the same fears that Ani did. He had been afraid tonight when the Tuskens were outside. He was afraid of the Emperor's Jedi hunters and he was afraid of what might be happening to his sister while he was too far away to help her, but none of those things affected him like Ani's fears bothered the older brother. Ani woke up at night from dreams he rarely said anything about. There were times that fear held him locked to a spot, staring at something only he could see. It didn't happen much anymore, but Luke remembered it when they were younger because ithat/i had scared him. He wasn't sure what to ask Ani about the Tuskens, but something kept tugging at him, and he knew that he had to ask something, even if it was the wrong thing.

Finally, as they were nearing home, he ventured, "Do you know what happened back there?"

Luke could see the silhouette of Ani's shoulders tighten, but that was the only physical reaction he allowed himself to show. Ani blew out a thoughtful breath and then ran his fingers through his hair. Then he nodded.

"I think so," he said. "I put my fears into the sandswirl. I used them against the Tuskens."

"Did you do it on purpose or did it just happen?"

"I…I think I did it on purpose, but I wasn't really thinking about it. I just knew I had to do something. They weren't afraid because Hett was there. They believe in him. I had to break that before Hett broke through our storm. So, I just reached down for the only thing I had that I could use, and I did it."

"Are you…all right?"

"Not really."