Plot Summary
The Yuuzhan Vong have claimed Coruscant as their new capital, and the survivors of the battle of the planet, including the Skywalkers and the Solos, escape to rendezvous with other survivors within the Hapes Consortium. Meanwhile, in the Myrkr system, Jaina Solo and the survivors of the mission to exterminate the voxyn escape aboard a captured Yuuzhan Vong frigate named the Ksstar in order to meet up with Jaina's family on Hapes. On the Ksstar's heels is the likes of Khalee Lah, the fanatical warrior son of Vong Warmaster Tsavong Lah, and his charge, Priest Harrar. Their pursuit of Jaina and her comrades convinces Jaina to rename the captured Vong ship the Trickster in order to play mind games on the invaders; as one of their goddesses, Yun-Harla, is a trickster, Jaina's audacity is looked upon as blasphemy. As this happens, the Skywalkers and Solos' Jedi friends sense Jacen Solo's death, although, strangely enough, Jacen's family members themselves don't sense this.
On Hapes, Jaina's dead brother, Anakin, is given a proper funeral via cremation. Meanwhile, former Hapan Queen Mother Ta'a Chume sees how weak the current Queen Mother, and her daughter-in-law, Tenenial Djo is. Since the Hapans had suffered a grievous loss against the Yuuzhan Vong at Fondor about a year earlier, that loss sent waves of loss and pain into the Force-sensitive Tenenial that caused her to miscarry her unborn child. As a result, Tenenial became weak, both physically and emotionally from the trauma of the experience. So Ta'a Chume looks to find a replacement for the weak Queen Mother. Tenenial's own daughter, Tenel Ka, is unlikely due to her owing to her Jedi and warrior heritage. Jaina, on the other hand, in the midst of her brothers' losses and her anger and hatred for the Yuuzhan Vong, displays a commanding air about her that makes her a potential candidate to replace Tenenial Djo.
Meanwhile, Jaina, with the help of Kyp Durron and Jagged Fel, fights back against the combined forces of the Yuuzhan Vong and their supporters. However, these experiences begin to pull Jaina closer to the dark side of the Force, just like her grandfather, Anakin Skywalker, considering how she practically embraced it at Myrkr in the previous novel. In the end, however, with the help of her friends and family, Jaina is able to overcome the temptations of the dark side, remembers her place as a Jedi, and rejects Ta'a Chume's offer to become the next Hapan Queen Mother. Instead, in the wake of Tenenial Djo's mysterious death by poison, which was no doubt plotted by Ta'a Chume herself, Tenel Ka assumes the throne in time to combat the incoming Vong fleet prepared to invade Hapes.
As for Khalee Lah and Harrar, the former's experience in combating Jaina has driven him to feel such shame and self-loathing that Harrar assists in his suicide. The priest himself wonders whether or not Jaina herself is the human avatar of Yun-Harla herself.
Read more about this topic: Dark Journey (novel)
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