>“Oh, my life was never in danger, dear girl. But since you seem unable to understand what actually happened here, I will tell you. Everything that happened today happened only because I allowed it to. True, your sorry little movement struck its blow, but it did so too soon, before the time was ripe and before it was mature enough to pose a serious threat. And now it’s exhausted itself and will grow into nothing. What’s left of it after today, do you think?”
>Hearing an echo of Cham’s words come from the mouth of the Emperor was too much.
>“Shut up,” she said, looking away and hating herself for the tears that welled in her eyes. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
>Cham was left, she told herself. He, at least, was left.
>“Ah, she begins to see now,” the Emperor said. “Perhaps you thought the events today would spark a rebellion? Ah, you did.” He laughed contemptuously, the sound gouging itself into Isval’s brain. “That was never going to happen, my dear. Your little movement was a candle that I encouraged you to light and now … it has gone out, igniting nothing.” He knelt and looked her in the face. His eyes were as empty as a corpse’s. “Nothing.” He stood, looking down on her. “Lord Vader.”
>Behind him, towering and dark, Vader ignited his lightsaber. Isval heard her death in the sizzle of its blade. The tears in her eyes dried, replaced by defiance, by anger, by hope kindled in the knowledge that Cham, at least, had escaped, that the fire of rebellion had not gone out because he carried it.
>She stared up at Vader, unafraid. “I hate you and everything you stand for,” she said. “But when I murdered, I murdered out of love.”
>Vader raised his blade, his breathing loud and steady. When he spoke, his voice was as deep and hollow as a funeral gong.
>“I know precisely what you mean,” he said, and slashed.
>Her decapitated body fell at Vader’s feet. He deactivated his blade.
