A tall female Senali with pink coral studded in her short dark hair beckoned them inside. "Meenon said you were arriving. Welcome, welcome! Let me introduce you. I am Ganeed, Meenon's sister. These are my sons Hinen and Jaret, and this is Jaret's wife Mesan and their daughter Tawn. That is Drenna, my youngest, and Wek, my sister's boy, and Nonce, and my husband, Garth, and my father, Tonai. Oh, and there's my elder mother, Nin, and the baby, we call her Bu."

A small boy tugged on Ganeed's tunic. "And me!"

She put a hand on his head. "Of course, Tinta. I didn't forget you. I saved you for last because you are so important."

Obi-Wan nodded to the bustling, busy group. He knew he would never be able to keep the names straight. He had recently begun memory training at the Temple. He could redraw a tech blueprint that he had only glimpsed for ten seconds or recite a complicated formula he had just heard once, but he still was not very skilled at remembering the names of a crowd of living beings. He counted on Qui-Gon to do that.

One of Ganeed's sons, either Jaret or Hinen, sat at a long table, peeling fruit with a young Senali female. Was it Wek or Mesan? The elder Senali stood at a stove, stirring something in a pot that smelled delicious. A young man rocked the baby, and a slender young Senali female with silvery hair sat in a corner, mending a fishing net. Everyone seemed to be talking at once, and he could not distinguish any one voice except for Ganeed, who called for everyone to be quiet. Finally she picked up a pot and spoon and banged on the pot bottom. The clan members finally were still.

"There," she said with satisfaction.

Taroon remained a stiff presence by Obi-Wan's side. Obi-Wan felt just as awkward. He admired the way Qui-Gon swung his leg over a stool and began to speak earnestly with Tinta, admiring a toy in the small boy's hand. Obi-Wan did not have the knack of ease with strangers.