The novelization of JJ Abram’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker not only extrapolates on how the Emperor returned to the franchise, but also provides further insight into Leia’s Jedi training with her brother, Luke.
StarWars.com revealed an excerpt from Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Expanded Edition. It finds Leia helping to train Rey in the ways of the Force. During their training session, Rey asked Leia about her Jedi training under Luke, wanting to know whether he was angry with her for quitting. Leia informed Rey that, although he was disappointed with her decision, Luke ultimately understood and that "he held out hope that I’d return to it someday."
Digging deeper into her own training, Leia reflected on the regime her brother put her through on Ajan Kloss, a place that Luke described as "Nice Dagobah."
“Leia had trained right here, in this very spot. She reached out and touched the tree trunk reverently. A large bole of bark had formed around an old wound. It was almost sealed shut.
Leia had been the one to damage the tree. She’d swung for Luke with her lightsaber and missed, slashing into the tree trunk instead. This tree had been healing itself for more than two decades.
Oh, Luke, I hope I’m doing this right, she thought. Leia was no Jedi Master, but she had learned from the best. And not just from Luke; over the years she’d occasionally heard the voice of Obi-Wan Kenobi through the Force, and even more rarely, that of Yoda. Some days it had felt as though she’d learned from the Force itself. She was first and foremost a politician and a general, but she had accepted her Jedi legacy and embraced it as best she could.”
Their training, though intense, was also good spirited with Luke often teasing his sister as he put Leia through the same regimes Yoda did with him:
“Many years ago, not long after the Battle of Endor, she’d discovered the meditative power of sound. She and Luke had stolen away for some training, and somehow she’d ended up standing on her hands while Luke slung good-natured taunts her way. Even with help from the Force, her shoulders had started to burn, her arms wobble. They’d already spent the last hour sparring with their lightsabers, and her body was exhausted.
“You know,” Luke had said, his voice smug, “when I did this on Dagobah, Yoda was sitting on my feet.”
He said that a lot back then. When I did this on Dagobah . . . It was obnoxious and completely unhelpful. So Leia reminded him, “You’re being obnoxious and completely unhelpful.”
“I also did it one-handed,” he added
He was trying to provoke her, to teach her a lesson about anger and impatience, and all that nonsense. Luke had forgotten that his student was a superb strategist who’d already benefited from a royal education. Leia would not be provoked.”
Near the end of the scene, Leia recalls how Luke told her she would help him become a better teacher. Although he highlighted how her footwork was “terrible,” he shared how adept she was with her lightsaber before pointing out how, when it comes to the Force, there were some aspects and connections she was naturally good at.
Written by Rae Carson, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker Expanded Edition is now available to purchase.