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The Sith Lord and the Scientist Section E - Part 2

DAY 20

I wake earlier than I normally do and immediately realize that Ani is no longer curled up next to me, but on the other side of the bed, flat on his back instead. He must have moved sometime in the night without disturbing me. Carefully rolling over to my other side, I slip my hand under my cheek to prop my head up a little and watch him sleep. He looks tired, even with a night’s rest, so I decide to leave him be for as long as I can while I figure out what to say to him.

There have been times when my husband has scolded me privately for something I have said or done in public. Usually, my mistakes have been innocent ones, or ones made from ignorance because I just don’t know everything necessary to avoid making them. He has always understood this and been reasonable when I mess up, but yesterday…

I close my eyes and refrain from sighing. Yesterday, my habit of speaking without thinking it through almost ended in disaster. The Sith Lord was far more concerned with keeping the treaty he had just negotiated intact than he was with whether or not my feelings might be hurt by how he chose to smooth over what I had said. Had I known the importance of that stone to the Hapans beforehand, I would never have mentioned opals from Earth.

Hindsight always clearly shows you your mistakes, I admit, and while I am still a bit annoyed at my husband for how he made me look like a fool, I can’t blame him for doing it. His first priority was the task Palpatine sent him to accomplish, and I had jeopardized that, potentially risking the Emperor’s displeasure in the process. No, there is no point in staying angry at Ani for what he did for the sake of political expediency.

I just hope that the next time somebody thinks it’s a good idea to have me play diplomat that he remembers I don’t know enough to play the part and have a tendency to put my foot in it.

You would make a decent diplomat if you had the proper training, Ani tells me.

I open my eyes and find myself looking into my husband’s. He’s awake.

Obviously, he notes with amusement. You were thinking rather loudly.

‘I would be a disaster as a diplomat,’ I warn him. ‘I am hopeless at lying, as you well know, and I can’t stand the political game playing.’

‘I dislike it as well, but for my own survival I have learned how to play and win at it,’ he admits, rolling onto his side to face me, ‘and if verbal sparring fails, there is always aggressive negotiations - with a lightsaber.’

A smile creeps onto my face. That sounds exactly like what he what he would do.

The Sith Lord brushes his fingers down my cheek. I catch his hand in mine and squeeze it. He’s expecting an explosion of temper from me, but I have already sorted out my thoughts and hurt feelings, and let them go.

‘You’re rather calm,’ he observes, ‘given what I did to you yesterday.’

‘I’m practicing being a Jedi, Sith Lord,’ I tease him.

I can sense him trying to puzzle out what I mean.

‘I let it go, love,’ I reveal to him. ‘I know why you did it, and it’s not worth staying angry with you over it.’

To reinforce my words, I shift myself closer and kiss him on the forehead.

‘I still owe you an apology,’ he decides.

‘You gave me one last night,’ I remind him. ‘Remember?’

***

Remember she tells me, and of course I do.

I brush my hand across her stomach, sense my son within, and know that all is well and no harm has been done. There will be no birth triggered prematurely by what we did last night, by what I selfishly insisted on last night.

Enforced celibacy has made me yearn for her the last month, and driven my passions and self-control to the breaking point. A Sith can only rein in his desires for so long before they must be released in some way - through anger, through fear, through hatred, through violence. I far prefer the sexual route I have chosen to any of those. It’s far more pleasant and for both of us, less dangerous.

I feel fingers slide down my chest, to my groin, but catch them before she can go any farther.

‘None of that,’ I warn. ‘Not today, not unless you are willing to forego any enjoyment of it yourself.’

I release her hand and wait to see what her decision is. Her fingers part my robe, so I let myself relax and succumb to her ministrations.

***

Ani is still in the ‘fresher looking after his medical chores when I help the children dress in their play clothes. While the Hapans had asked for all of us to be at the official nonsense today, I am reluctant to put the children on display here or into any situation where there is a possible risk to them. They will stay on the ship, where they will be safely out of harm’s way. I give another tug on Mikal’s tunic. He’s started another growth spurt and will need a new wardrobe once we are back on Coruscant. That shopping trip should be entertaining, if I can persuade my husband to come with us.

‘Go play in your room until daddy is ready to go,’ I suggest to my three youngsters.

They promptly run for their toys, so I pour myself a glass of juice and sit down at the table to wait for Ani to join me. He’s taking his time today, giving me a chance to let my mind wander.

I don’t trust the Queen Mother at all, and ever since we arrived, my misgivings have only grown stronger not diminished. In the stories Isolder told me this last week, his mother did not fare very well, although to a Hapan, her actions and decisions would probably be seen as justified and admirable. She is cunning, ruthless, and only interested in maintaining her position and hold on power. It does not matter to her who is harmed in her quest for those, either. Her attempts to manipulate her son’s choice of wife and disapproval she has shown for Lady Elliar are not how a mother should behave towards her son and his betrothed, but heeding Ani’s warning to stay out of Hapan politics, I have kept my personal opinions about all of it to myself.

I pick up the datapad on the table, quickly scroll through the file still open on it, then set it down again. The Sith Lord let me read through that treaty yesterday, and little of it is of direct advantage to the Empire other than the trading post which will allow goods from the Cluster to be available outside of it. The most obvious military benefits are for the Hapans; however, Palpatine has what he wanted, a bunch of weird, rare oddities for his collections, and that Gun of Command. It makes me wonder if there isn’t something else going on, some other secret bargain made behind closed doors that I am being deliberately kept unaware of.

The ‘fresher door opens and Ani steps out, his hair wet from another shower. That’s the third time he’s thoroughly washed himself since we came back from Hapes. He must be worried that the perfume had penetrated his armour and soaked into his skin. I pour out his breakfast and take his hand when he offers it.

‘You don’t need to scrub your skin raw,’ I tell him. ‘There’s no trace of that perfume left on you.’

‘If I ever smell like that again,’ he says to me, ‘I want you to tell me right away, since I won’t be aware of it, and I know I will stink of it tonight, after being on Hapes all day.’

He squeezes my hand then releases it.

‘I want you to wear your heraldic gown today, the one with your family’s arms on it,’ he orders, ‘and the set of jewellery with the red corusca gems and coronet.’

I make a face at him. Those had been specifically made for just this occasion and are heavy and uncomfortable to wear for very long. It’s obvious he wants me to put on a show, and that gold and red gown coupled with the gems and heavy golden crown will certainly do that.

‘If it wasn’t necessary,’ he tells me, his voice softening, ‘I wouldn’t insist on it. The Hapans thrive on pageantry and you need to give that to them. I will have something simpler stored on my shuttle, for you to change into after the treaty is signed.’

‘I’ll go pick something out to wear,’ I decide.

I want to be comfortable and fade into the background as much as I can after the pomp and ceremony is done with. Finishing the last of my drink, I get up from my chair, give my husband a quick kiss, and go to look through my choices. In the end, I narrow it down to three possibilities then opt for the plainest one in black mothsilk. The material is soft and feels nice against my skin. That selection made, I go to where Ani keeps his cloaks and remove the gown he wants me to wear. Putting it on will wait until Cyran comes to dress me. For now, I will keep Ani company and help him with his armour.

‘Playing squire?’ he teases me as I retrieve his spare set of armour from its storage compartment and lay it out on our bed beside my gowns.

‘Being useful,’ I reply. ‘Sitting about doing nothing of any importance for days on end becomes boring after a while, and leaves one feeling a bit redundant.’

I feel his arms slide around me from behind as I take his surcoat and cloak from where they are hanging. Turning about in his embrace, I tip my head up to receive the kiss I know is waiting for me.

‘You, my love, will never be redundant,’ he reassures me.

Then, he kisses me again.

***

I help Maia from her seat and wait for Cyran to put the veil over her hair and coronet on her head. She will be stuck with wearing both until after the formal signing ceremony, when I can bring her back to the shuttle to change into something more comfortable. My wife makes a face as her aide steps back. She hates being put on display in this manner, but as with much of this trip, there has not been any choice for either of us. As Hapan custom dictates, she leads us out into the hanger, the sweep of her gown trailing after her.

We are met by the Chume’da Isolder, with his guards as our escorts. It seems that the Queen Mother has decided to err on the side of as much ritual to impress her subjects as she can muster. When we leave the Royal Hangar, Isolder’s guards fall to the back of our procession, to be replaced in the lead by the Chume’doro. The women chosen for this task are close to my height, strong, fit, as well as striking in physical appearance. Their black and purplish-blue uniforms contrast starkly against the white alabas walls of the chambers we pass through on the way to the palace’s throne room.

Isolder easily keeps pace with me, our speed set by my wife moving slowly ahead of us. The Royal Guards are not in any hurry, so I use my time to memorize the layout of the palace, possible routes to the outside, and locations which can be secured against attack, if necessary. This is an old habit born of a lifetime of needing to have both entrance and exit strategies planned out in advance. At times, this routine has saved my life.

Reaching the throne room doors, our group stops while those are thrown open and our presence is announced. Ta’a Chume is seated on a raised dais, above the female courtiers who are kneeling below her. No one rises to their feet until the Queen Mother allows them to. In the background soft music begins playing, the musicians hidden from view, in accompaniment of our progress towards the throne. To the right of the Queen Mother is a table with parchment copies of the treaty to be signed rolled out on its surface; to her left is what must be the chair for my wife. That it is not at the same elevation as the Ta’a Chume’s is a deliberate political statement of how she views the Empire - secondary to Hapes.

When we reach the area in front of the dais, the Royal Guards move to flank it. Maia takes her seat and waits for Cyran to arrange her gown before waving her two aides to their body guard positions behind her. I wait until she is settled then stand to her right, keeping myself in a defensive stance to send my own message. The Empire might be a petitioner here, but is by no means an inferior. Isolder goes up the steps to do homage to his mother and position himself at her right.

The music ceases as the Queen Mother raises her hand and once the principals of this act are in position. Cue the start of the political speeches, I think, preparing myself to listen to a lengthy monologue by the monarch.

She does not disappoint.

***

Only the Jedi training Ani gave me prevents my mind from wandering too much. Political speeches are bad enough when one understands the language, but after twenty minutes the Queen Mother is still speaking in Hapan, to the acclaim of the crowd. To keep myself focussed, I turn my attention to studying those around us. There are very few men in the room and the ones closest to me are Isolder and my husband. Most of the women are elaborately dressed, so my own gown is not out of place. My physical appearance, in other ways, is. Hapan women are on average far better looking than I am - in comparison I am rather plain featured, and stand out for that.

I feel eyes on me and sense the intense scrutiny of someone nearby. They are more curious than hostile, so I don’t bother trying to make them uncomfortable in return. Instead, I narrow down who it is in the crowd, only to discover that it is a teenage girl, whose violet coloured veil prevents me from seeing her face. When she realizes I have found her and starts in response to my own stare, I shift my attention back to the Queen Mother. Just knowing I have identified who she is should be enough to discourage her from anything more than looking.

Ani, I am tired of listening to her go on and on, I admit. At least during long drawn out academic speeches at home I could fake being interested.

The woman in the sapphire dress, he replies, she reminds me of a peko-peko - covered in beautiful blue plumage, but toxic to the touch. Your turn.

What? I answer, puzzled by what he wants me to do.

Pick someone and describe what they remind you of, he explains. It’s a game I would sometimes play to amuse myself when I was stuck at one of the Emperor’s court functions.

The girl in violet, near the pillar, I decide to humour him, she’s like a squirrel from home - curious, but wary. One loud noise or sudden movement and off to her safe nest she will run.

Near the door, the old woman in gold with what must be her two daughters - a female dire-cat guarding her cubs, Ani offers.

I don’t bother asking him what dire-cats or any of the other creatures he mentions are as we trade our comparisons back and forth. He’s more concerned with keeping me quiet and occupied than providing explanations.

The Queen Mother ends her speech in Hapan and has to wait until the cheering stops before she can repeat it in Basic. I listen more intently than I had to the Hapan version, but quickly realize that she has tailored it for us and the few members of her court who will understand it.

She’s almost finished, the Sith Lord warns me.

He must have been following the flow of what was being said more closely than I have been because Ta’a Chume finally wraps up her speech a few minutes later. I know I won’t be expected to say anything. The Hapans do not like attention to be drawn away from their Queen Mother by another woman and I am an outsider, at that. Not sure what to do next, I watch Isolder descend from the dais, go to the table, and write on both copies of the treaty. My husband soon takes the Prince’s place to add his Sith sigil. Before I move to do the same, a gold plaque to use as a writing surface is brought to me then the documents and the same ink stylus the men had used. After writing my name in Sith below Ani’s, everything is taken up to the Queen Mother for her endorsement.

Once both parchments have been returned to the table, rolled and slid into transparent tubes, I know we must be just about done. One copy, the one Isolder now presents to his mother, will remain here, in Hapes’ archives, while the other, taken from the table by Ani and handed to me by him, travels to Coruscant with us.

‘It is done,’ the Queen Mother proclaims, ‘The beginning of a new relationship with the Empire.  Now, it is time to celebrate.’

She claps her hands, signalling the end of the formal ceremony, and chaos ensues. The courtiers flock to the base of the dais, surrounding it, and trapping me in place with the press from their bodies. From what little I can make out of what is being said, none of them have been given the exact details of the document I am holding on my lap, and each is demanding to hear how they, or the planets they represent, will personally benefit.

I feel someone brush against my hand with their own, and quickly hide the small piece of paper I have been given. It is obviously a secret message intended for me, but I have no idea who the messenger was or what might be so important for them to risk passing it to me.

There is a shift in the Force, a subtle movement of it around Ani and I, and it takes a few seconds for me to figure out what he is doing. Although it would be easy for him to do, the Sith Lord cannot shove the women who come too close out of the way because that would make his Jedi-like abilities apparent to all of them. Instead, he has created an area of slight physical resistance to discourage anyone from entering our personal space.

‘It’s time to escape to the shuttle,’ I tell Cyran, who has been pushed forward and into the back of my chair. ‘If we stay too long, and someone doesn’t like what they hear, we could be in trouble.’

Isolder must have noticed my predicament because Astarta is busy trying to clear a path to reach me. The Royal Guards are occupied keeping people back from the dais, so there is no help to be expected from them.

Enough of this, Ani decides when no rescue attempt is successful.

He grabs me by the hand, pulls me to my feet, and steps into the crowd. The Sith Lord nudges those who refuse to move out of his way with the Force, using just enough strength to shift them off balance and allow him to push past them. Cyran and Daini stay close behind us. I suspect they know that if we become separated they will be on their own until they can free themselves from the crush of the crowd.

My husband doesn’t slow his pace until we have left the throne room behind and are walking up his shuttle’s ramp. Once inside it, I let myself collapse into my seat and hand the rolled up treaty to him.

‘I hope that all of this was worth it,’ I tell him when he accepts the document, ‘because I really don’t want to come back here if there are any problems.’

***

If only we could leave immediately, but we are constrained by what the Hapan’s Queen Mother has dictated. There will be a formal feast and entertainment tonight, events we must attend else risk giving offense.

‘We will leave as soon as is politely possible,’ I promise her.

I watch as Cyran removes the coronet from my wife’s head and places it in its carrying case. A ridiculous expense, that, when it will never be worn again. The matching necklace and earrings soon join it. Maia quickly runs her fingers through her hair, loosening the elaborate hairstyle and destroying an hour of her aide’s morning work.

‘Better,’ she sighs, dropping her hands to her lap. “Some of the loops were pulled too tight.’

‘Much better,’ I agree. ‘I like it loose and unhindered.’

‘My Lord?’ Cyran questions when I make no move from where I am standing.

Her eyes flick between me and the door leading to the shuttle’s ramp at the front of the passenger compartment.

Cyran wants you out from underfoot while she helps me get out of this gown and into the other one, my wife interprets for me. Not that it bothers me if you are here to watch, but it will upset her.

I’ll go outside for a few minutes, I decide, humouring them both.

When I reach the bottom of the shuttle’s ramp, I allow myself a short laugh. Once, my wife was so shy she refused to change her clothes in the same room as I, and if forced to, was careful that I saw nothing of her naked body in the process. Now, she would strip in front of her aides and me without any hesitation. The change in her self-confidence is remarkable, and I don’t know if she is even aware of it.

Movement at the hangar door attracts my attention. Isolder has returned, accompanied by a young woman in a green gown, but without his usual personal guards. They rapidly cross the floor to reach me.

‘We need to speak to you,’ Isolder says, ‘in your shuttle, in private, and quickly.’

We have guests, I warn Maia, so I hope you are dressed.

I walk back up the ramp, gesturing to Isolder to follow me, and wondering what is so important he felt it necessary to seek me out in this manner. Maia’s aides jump and step away from her when I open the door. She didn’t warn them I was coming back, probably to avoid distracting them from their task of dressing her.

‘Out,’ I order, pointing to the door I just came through. ‘Only my wife is to remain.’

Maia stares at me then adds, ‘Both of you go. We shouldn’t be long.’

It isn’t until the four of us are alone that she sits, smooths the black mothsilk of her dress and takes a look at our visitors.

‘This is unexpected,’ she says to us. ‘Please, sit, be comfortable,’ continuing once everyone does so, ‘Why are you here, Prince Isolder?’

I watch the Prince carefully. He’s nervous and a bit uncertain, but covering that up under a surface calm.

‘This is the only place I know of on Hapes where my mother cannot spy,’ he admits.

He turns to face me, ignoring Maia, for the moment.

‘Lord Vader, I know that you are the Emperor’s heir and that your wife will be the future Empress, despite that not being officially designated,’ Isolder states, ‘and as Lady Elliar will be the next Queen Mother and I her consort, I thought it best for you both to meet her privately.’

The woman who is sitting beside him pulls back her green veil, revealing a young blonde with brilliant blue eyes and an oval face. She is not as nervous as her betrothed. Perhaps she is less familiar with who I am and what a Sith Lord is capable of.

‘And?’ I prompt.

‘I want a guarantee from you,’ Elliar boldly tells me, ‘a guarantee of continued peaceful relations between Hapes and the Empire.’

‘The Empire has no interest in invading the Hapan Cluster,’ I inform her. ‘There are other more pressing problems to be dealt with elsewhere. Had the Emperor not insisted that I negotiate the treaty personally, I would not be here, but with the fleet.’

‘Then you will guarantee peace?’ she persists. ‘You will give your word on this?’

‘Unless I am given good reason to do otherwise, I have no plans to attack Hapes,’ I reassure her.

The Rebels pose far more of a threat than the isolationist Hapans. If necessary, the two routes into their space can be blockaded, trapping them rather effectively within the Mists which protect them from the rest of the galaxy. No competent admiral would risk his ships trying to find a more hazardous alternate way out. Their best defense can easily be turned against them.

‘Time,’ Isolder warns.

‘We must go before we are missed,’ his betrothed decides.

She replaces her veil, stands, and stares at me.

‘I have no choice other than to trust what you have said, and I am not sure how much I can rely on that,’ she says before leaving, ‘but I do trust your word more than the Queen Mother’s.’

I move from my seat to the doorway and watch them go down the ramp, past Cyran and Daini, and across the hangar. They risked much for a guarantee of their world’s safety from me, a surety I cannot keep if Palpatine decides to attack them.

I feel arms slide around my waist from behind and rest my hands on top of my wife’s.

‘She’s afraid,’ Maia tells me.

‘Of me?’ I tease her.

‘No,’ my wife quietly replies. ‘Of the Queen Mother - and for good reasons. It is not unusual for those who are in her way to meet an unpleasant or untimely end.’

She places a small sheet of paper, one which had been tightly folded, into my hand.

‘Someone slipped this to me in the chaos after the treaty signing,’ Maia admits. ‘I finally had a chance to look at it just before they arrived. It is a warning to us to be careful whose words we believe, and to never trust the Queen Mother or risk being alone with her because she has something planned. The note doesn’t give any details on what that could be.’

I look at the message in my hand, the tiny letters written on it barely legible. It’s either a general warning or a not so veiled threat that could have been given to her by anyone. Tucking it inside my right glove, I opt to examine it in detail later.

‘The feast does not start for another hour,’ I remind her. ‘We must go to that and attend some of the following entertainments. I want your aides to stay close to you, and I will be as near to you as I can manage.’

I step back inside the passenger compartment before shutting and locking the door. Her aides can stay outside on guard duty. We need privacy for a while, and this is the only place on Hapes where we will find it.

‘Stay here, with me, for as long as you need to,’ I offer, pulling her into my arms and settling her head against my chest, soothing her uneasiness.

My wife needs this brief respite from public scrutiny and I need the time to think.

***

The Hapans’ idea for what constitutes a feast is not much different from other formal dinners I have attended elsewhere. I pick at the dessert. It is far too sweet, even for me with my sugar cravings, to eat more than a few bites of it. At least the pink bliz eggs were tasty and the ice fish delicately flavoured. Ignoring the glass of Hapan gold wine, I select the one filled with mineral water next to it and slowly take a sip to avoid answering another question from the Ducha beside me. Part of me wants to find whoever was responsible for the seating plan and Force choke them. At least Elliar, who is seated to my left, has tried to carry on a conversation without delving into politics or other topics I want to avoid. I risk a glance over at the Queen Mother seated on the other side of her son’s betrothed. She’s been listening to what we have been saying, which is one of the reasons I have kept to what should be uncontroversial subjects like the food.

‘The flowers on the tables are beautiful, Lady Elliar,’ I observe, changing the topic.

‘The blue roses are at their best this time of the year,’ Elliar replies, ‘and in full bloom in the gardens. I can show you, if you wish, your highness.’

This is an opportunity to escape, for a few minutes, before the musicians begin their performances.

Ani? I ask my husband, knowing that he has heard everything from his guardian position behind me and between Cyran and Daini.

A short walk should be safe, he decides. Take your aides. I will follow as soon as I am able.

He must be eavesdropping on the Queen Mother again and wants to hear how what she is saying finishes.

‘Let’s go and have a quick look,’ I agree. ‘I would enjoy seeing them.’

Elliar is faster than I am at leaving the table. She waves away Astarta, who goes to follow her, and waits for me to join her at the door.

‘The Princess’ bodyguards will be with us,’ she tells Isolder when he looks over at us to see what we are doing. ‘We are just going to the paan and tik tree grove by the reflecting pools to see the roses and should be back quickly.’

I watch Elliar walk ahead of me, down the path towards the garden with the roses. Isolder’s betrothed is a good match for him, I decide, regardless of his mother’s opinion of her. Unfortunately, I don’t think the Queen Mother will ever let their marriage happen, despite her son’s wishes in the matter.  Elliar is too strong willed to be dominated by her potential mother-in-law, and determined, along with Isolder, to improve the status of Hapan men, a position I am sure that few of the women who rule here would support.

Cyran and Daini are behind me, following at a discrete distance as they have been instructed to do, but I don’t hear their footsteps on the gravel any longer. Turning with the intention of locating them, I find myself facing one of the Chume’doro, her gun raised and pointed at me. There is a flash, the air ripples away from the muzzle, and then I am falling, my legs and muscles failing me, before I hit the unyielding ground.

I wake to the sound of panicked voices, none of which are familiar to me, most of whom are women speaking in Hapan.

‘She’s over here,’ someone nearby says in Basic.

‘Is she hurt?’ someone else asks in the same language.

I don’t open my eyes or move from where I am lying on my side. Ani must know something has happened to me, so where is he?

Anakin… I start to call to him, but one of my rescuers decides to help me, pulling on my shoulder in an attempt to roll me onto my back. Pain sears through my body with that movement, and I begin to breathe in ragged gasps. No, I think, horrified, as I feel liquid run down the inside of my thigh to the ground below.

‘Out of my way,’ I hear the Sith Lord snarl at those around me.

‘Move! Now. All of you,’ Isolder loudly orders, repeating what I assume is the same in Hapan immediately afterwards, when my husband’s command must have been ignored.

***

Isolder’s commands work where mine had no effect, and the women who had surrounded my fallen wife, carrion birds flocking to a kill, finally back away from her. I feel her pain and confusion as I kneel beside her. Something is wrong, terribly, horribly wrong, I decide, as she tries to curl into a ball and block out what is happening to her.

‘What has happened to you?’ I ask her.

There is no response to my question. She can’t answer or doesn’t know how to, I decide.

‘Show me,’ I ask of her instead, lightly touching her cheek as I do so, ‘if you can’t tell me, then show me.’

I share her memory - the flash, the air rippling, her weakness, and collapse.

‘She’s been stunned,’ I tell Isolder, ‘just like her bodyguards.’

Concerned now, I move my hand from her cheek to rest above our son within her, then yank it back once I feel his distress and see the blood staining the ground beneath her.

‘Kreth and sithspawn,’ I begin to curse. ‘She’s miscarrying.’

Time is critical now, so I slide one arm beneath Maia’s shoulders and the other one under her knees. Moving her is going to hurt her, but there is no help for that. In one swift motion I stand, lifting my wife as I do so, and ignoring her cries of pain as best as I can.

‘She needs medical attention, right now,’ I tell the Chume’da. ‘Where is the closest Medcenter?’

Isolder, with a gesture, indicates I am to follow him. As we run through the gardens, shadowing Astarta and his personal guards who clear the way for us, he snaps commands in Hapan through his comm-link. There is no time to return to the Executor, no time to have Leanan sent here. I have no choice other than to rely on the Hapans and whatever medical facilities they have on hand.

***

Pain.

I am lost in a sea of pain.

My body and mind are swamped by the terrible burning, cramping, and tearing inside me. Every step Ani takes only amplifies it.

I don’t try to talk to him and leave our bond alone. He knows exactly what I am feeling.

It is all I can do to not scream or cry out, and hang on until someone is able to help me.

I am set down on a bed, and eased onto my side. Needles slide into my veins and then blessed oblivion claims me.

***

I lay her on the bed and step back, allowing the Hapan doctor and medical staff to do their work. The only way I can help my wife, now, is by not interfering. Rather than be ordered out, I retreat from the triage area, knowing that I will sense any problems before they become apparent to anyone else.

‘You can wait in here,’ Isolder tells me, leading me into a room down the hall. ‘If they need you, they will know where you are.’

Then he is gone, presumably to investigate what happened tonight and locate Lady Elliar. I stare out the window, but my mind is elsewhere, my senses focussed inward on my bond with Maia and outward to the room she is in. She is unconscious and unresponsive to my light mental touch, and likely to remain that way for hours. The door opens behind me, so I turn, to see one of the medics enter with a worried expression on her face.

‘Your consort has lost too much blood and…’ she starts, but I interrupt her.

‘… you need a match for her, but cannot find one,’ I finish for her, ‘because Hapan space has been isolated long enough that her blood type is extremely rare here.’

In other circumstances, her startled reaction at my ability to read the uppermost thoughts in her mind would be almost comical, but not now.

‘I am a match,’ I offer. ‘Take what you require from me.’

‘I will be back right away,’ she promises then leaves to presumably retrieve whatever medical supplies are required.

To save time, I seat myself in the most comfortable appearing of the chairs, and strip off what is necessary - chest plate, gauntlet, and sleeve from my leather body armour on the left side. When the medic returns, I am in the midst of rolling up the sleeve of my bodysuit.

‘Here,’ I indicate with a finger, pointing to the vein running between shoulder and elbow. ‘The lower half of the arm is a prosthetic.’

I ignore the brief spike of pain from each failed attempt and the final successful one which enters the vein. She’s afraid of my Jedi-like Force abilities, I quickly realize, as my blood begins to flow out and I see her hands shaking while she holds the quickly filling drip bag.

‘It’s safe to take one,’ she admits, ‘but your consort needs more than that.’

‘Take two,’ I order. ‘I am large enough to handle that, and there is more stored on the Executor. I shall send for it.’

Isolder returns as the medic finishes with me and leaves. His distress is obvious to me through the Force although there is no outward sign of it on his face or in his voice.

‘Lady Elliar is missing,’ he announces. ‘Your consort’s bodyguards have been brought to the medical center, but a search produced no sign of her.’

I reseal my leather sleeve and shrug the chest plate and attached pauldrons back into place. There’s a com-call I need to make without too much delay.

‘She may have fled to safety and hidden herself, if she realized there was an attack occurring in the gardens,’ I suggest, hoping to avoid a long conversation with the Prince.

‘Perhaps,’ he agrees, ‘a search in the morning…’

This time when the door opens it is the doctor.

‘Doctor Torve,’ Isolder acknowledges her.

She gives him a brief nod, but her attention is on me rather than him. Bad news of some sort is coming, I decide.

‘Your wife is recovering from the surgery,’ the doctor states. ‘The child, we had no choice but to remove from her. He could not survive the separation of the placenta, nor his could his mother maintain the pregnancy with the damage to her uterus.’ She stops, looks at me intently. ‘She will sleep until late in the morning and it is best not to wake her, but I will let you see her, briefly.’

I follow Torve, resisting the urge to outpace her, or to bombard her with questions about my wife and son. The room we enter is different from the treatment and triage area that I first brought Maia to. It looks more like an elegant bedroom than an intensive care medical suite, and I suspect that is more to make the occupant feel comfortable than to impress visitors. I stop when the doctor indicates I am to wait, and watch while she checks the monitors. All seems to be normal, but my wife is pale, perhaps too pale against the sheets covering her.

‘You may stay for a few minutes,’ I am quietly told. ‘Normally this would not be allowed at all, but you are not from our world and I am willing to bend the rules in this case.’

The doctor steps back, letting me take her place at my wife’s bedside. I reach down and cautiously take Maia’s left hand in mine, touching the gold band she wears with a finger while being mindful not to disturb her sleep. For a few minutes, I let my tightly held control go, and simply allow myself to feel grateful and relieved that she is alive. Had I waited to bring her to the med center or insisted on sending her to the Executor, she probably would not have survived. I set her hand down gently on her chest, brush her cheek with my fingers, and carefully look at her. Maia’s face is peaceful, her body still, the only sign of life her chest rising and falling with each slow breath. Her stomach is flat, no longer curving outward, her pregnancy abruptly ended less than an hour ago.

My regulated breathing breaks its normal pattern with my sharp inhalation.

I spin about, but Torve has anticipated my realization and response to it. She opens the door, quickly motions me through it and into the medical suite across the hall.

‘He’s in here,’ she answers my unspoken question.

I stare through a glass window into what must be their intensive care nursery. The infant inside is barely visible amoungst the monitors attached to and surrounding him. From his Force presence I know he is small, weak, fighting to stay alive, and failing. Lifting my right hand, I rest it against the glass, and close my eyes. No, not my son, I think to myself in an attempt to deny what has happened.

The doctor takes my silence as an opportunity to give me all the details I would prefer not to hear, but need to know regardless.

‘He is premature, was starved of oxygen during the abruption and subsequent haemorrhaging, and was affected neurologically by the same stun blast which triggered those,’ she informs me. ‘If it were only one or two of those problems we had to deal with, we could probably manage his care, but our facilities are not as advanced as what yours are rumoured to be. Here, his chances are slim, at best.’

I make a quick decision, based on her evaluation, hoping that it is the right one.

‘Can he be moved?’ I ask.

‘I will take no responsibility for what might result if he is,’ Torve replies.

How typical, I think. Doctors are the same everywhere.

‘Then I will make the necessary arrangements myself,’ I state, pulling out my comm-link and heading back to the waiting room as I do so.

What I need to sort out and set up does not require an audience, only Prince Isolder’s co-operation and approval.

An hour later, Maia’s bodyguards and my son have been successfully transferred to the Executor, and my wife has received another unit of blood from those stored on board my ship. The other tasks I needed Isolder’s help with, he was unwilling to consent to, but few can resist the persuasive powers of a Sith Lord when they are applied directly and forcefully, and he had eventually, if reluctantly, agreed.

Leanan had not said a word to me while conducting her medical evaluations, merely shook her head once she saw what she had to deal with. Before entering the shuttle to leave, however, she had reassured me that any change in condition would be reported to me immediately. My wife will be moved to my ship tomorrow, after she is awake and stable, and after I have tracked down her attacker.

I fully intend to deal with whoever harmed her and our son myself, personally, Hapan law and traditions be damned.

DAY 21

Standing outside the palace, I look towards the gardens and wait for Isolder to join me. Allowing an outsider access to a crime scene he has charge of has cost him some of his pride, but he needs my help, although he is reluctant to admit that.

‘Lady Elliar is still missing,’ he confesses. ‘She has not tried to contact me, and a search of the palace and grounds has failed to find any trace of her.’

‘I can track her,’ I reassure him. ‘Even if she is well hidden, her Force presence will be obvious to me - if she is still alive, that is, and if not, I should still be able to narrow the location you need to focus on.’

Astarta, Captain of his bodyguards, shifts uncomfortably. Like most Hapans she has a healthy distrust of Jedi, and Force users, in general. I know she must have argued vehemently against my involvement in their investigation, only to be overruled by the Prince.

‘Go, then,’ Isolder urges. ‘My mother will have her own security team investigate once it is light enough for them to work. You should have a few hours before dawn, at the most, without their interference.’

‘Has anyone entered the gardens since you had them cleared?’ I ask.

‘No,’ Astarta answers. ‘I saw to that, personally.’

Her resentment is almost palpable. She sees no reason to include me in what she considers to be a purely Hapan matter.

‘Since you do not trust me, even when I have good reason to honestly offer my help,’ I challenge her, ‘why don’t you accompany the Prince and I? Perhaps you might learn something. Just stay well out of my way.’

I take a few steps away from them, stop, and stretch out with my senses to make sure no one else is nearby to distract me. Anchoring myself in the Force, I reach back in time, grasping at the fleeting emotions of those who had walked along this path the previous evening. Most of what I read is of little use, like the brief flickers of courtiers and Chume’doro moving in and out of the building. Far stronger than those are the traces of Maia’s Force presence. Following that impression, I begin to walk slowly away from the palace, halting whenever I lose contact and need to reconnect with it.

Fifty meters from where I first began my task, the fear and shock from the attack on her aides is apparent. This is where Cyran and Daini were stunned from behind, fell to the ground, and were dragged off the path and out of sight by their attacker. Unfortunately neither woman has recovered enough to give me any useful information, or a description of who was responsible for that, and what I am sensing through the Force does not reveal who it was, either. Too many others followed along the same path in the ensuing confusion and their presence has obscured anything of use to me.

‘Here,’ I tell my audience of two. ‘My wife’s bodyguards were stunned here then were moved to and concealed where we found them.’

I don’t wait for a reply but continue down the gravel path. When I stop again, I know I am standing where Maia became the next victim. Her pain has marked this place, branded it emotionally in a way any Force sensitive would easily recognize.

‘This is where my wife fell,’ I reveal, not bothering to confirm that by looking down to see her blood on the ground beside my feet.

Turning to face the reflecting pools, I decide to try that direction first. The grove with the roses was what the two women were heading towards, with Elliar in the lead. If she did not hear the earlier attacks, she may have gone ahead, for a short time, before realizing there was a problem behind her.

As I leave the place where Maia was ambushed, I block the traces she left from my mind and concentrate on the young woman I had met, albeit briefly, yesterday. I sense nothing until I reach the rose hedge between the trees. Caught in the thorns are a few green threads which I pick up and examine.

Surprise. Fear. Panic. Flight.

Each emotion rolls over me in turn.

I stop in place as I suddenly realize what I sense means.

My wife was not the one being hunted. Lady Elliar was the target. She was stalked, trailed, and pursued when she tried to flee.

‘Lady Elliar was here,’ I tell Isolder, handing him the threads which had been ripped from her veils by the thorns. ‘She was surprised by whoever attacked the others, and fled. I will try to determine where she went from this point.’

His fingers close over the fragments of his betrothed’s clothing. He is beginning to suspect the same things I am, but chooses not to voice them aloud yet.

I push past the roses, much as Elliar must have, ignoring the briars’ attempts to grab at my cloak. In the center of the grove is a small fountain ringed by more roses, stone benches, and an elaborately patterned pavement. No footprints can be seen, but directly opposite of where I have forced an entry are two white rose bushes with broken branches between them. The green veil I find snagged head high on one of them provides more information to me.

Dread. Entrapment.

Elliar had run to this side of the grove and backed into the bushes, breaking their branches and losing her veil during her escape attempt. I give that piece of delicate, ruined fabric to Astarta.

‘She tried to run and was trapped,’ I bluntly state. ‘With your poor night vision you missed the threads and veil when you searched this area earlier.’

I drop to one knee and study the ground in front of the damaged roses. Two small indents mark the dirt, without any evidence of a struggle.

‘She fell to her knees, then either stood up on her own or was pulled to her feet,’ I tell them. ‘I cannot determine which one it was because whoever else was here remained on the paving stones. There is no way to tell if she was stunned at this point.’

‘And where did they go from here?’ Isolder asks.

I stand up and pivot about, my eyes following the rose briar hedge around the grove. Only the spot where Elliar forced her way in and I followed afterwards shows signs of a successful breach.

‘Either back towards the palace or down to the pool by using the appropriate path instead of breaking down any more of the greenery,’ I decide. ‘Since no one saw them returning to the palace, it’s more likely they went the other way.’

Moving away from the roses, with Isolder and Astarta close behind me, I walk out of the grove and towards the pool, trying to catch a glimpse of Elliar’s emotional state as I go. A few meters from the water, I stop.

All I can sense of her is pure terror, mixed with horror and desperation, all of those feelings so potent that I am forced to sever my contact to keep them from swamping my mind.

I know what happened to Isolder’s betrothed.

Only a recent violent death can so strongly mark a place.

‘There,’ I reveal, pointing to the reflecting pool.

Isolder is silent, staring out at the water. He does not ask me what I meant by that word, for he already knows. Astarta, however, is not as accepting of my conclusion.

‘Prove it!’ she demands angrily, refusing to believe I am correct.

I look at the Prince. Does he really want to see this, to see her as she will be? What condition she will be in I do not know and cannot tell him in advance. For a moment, I hesitate. Were the situation reversed, with my wife the drowned victim, I would not waver, but I have seen many a dead body, and in various states of dismemberment and decay. Isolder, I am sure, has not.

‘Do it,’ he orders. ‘Bring her back to me.’

‘As you wish,’ I concede.

Focussing my attention on the water, I stretch out my hand and send my senses beneath the surface, below the lilies and delicate plants floating upon it. Down into the depths, into the dark, into the cold; she is resting there. I gently swirl the water, moving her gown to cover her form, then slowly, carefully, I lift Lady Elliar, only pausing when I know she will break the surface. Astarta gasps when she sees the body separate from the water, continue to rise, and float above it towards the pool’s edge, a shower of droplets marking its course. After setting Elliar down, I let my hand fall and step away, allowing Isolder room for privacy and his grief.

There are no marks of violence on her body, no indication on her beautiful, peaceful face that she fought against or struggled with someone, yet she did not go willingly into the water. This was no voluntary suicide. She was ordered to her death, much as the Queen Mother described an execution, only this time the method was by drowning, not blaster.

Maia’s words from the previous day echo through my thoughts. ‘It is not unusual for those who are in her way to meet an unpleasant or untimely end,’ she had said about the Queen Mother, and I have no reason to doubt that Ta’a Chume will not welcome the removal of her son’s future bride. Harming my wife, however, would serve no purpose for her, and only invite retaliation and retribution from me. No, tempting as it is to blame the Hapan ruler for Elliar’s murder and the attack on Maia, someone else is responsible, and that someone probably expects me to go after the Queen Mother as a result.

So, who would benefit both from Elliar’s death and provoking me into killing the Queen Mother? Answer that question and I will have a rather long list of suspects. Far too many covet the position she holds and the advantage gained by marrying a relative to her son, the Chume’da. Solving this crime will be a long, convoluted affair, and I do not have the time or means on Hapes to do it. My primary concern right now is moving my wife and son to proper medical care as fast as possible. Punishing those who harmed them will have to wait.

Isolder raises his eyes from the woman he loved, and has now lost, to meet mine. His face is a mask, unreadable unless one has the Force as an ally. He cannot afford to let anyone on Hapes know just how much her death has affected him.

‘Lord Vader, you don’t need to worry about whoever murdered Elliar, and attacked your wife and son,’ he promises. ‘They will be my prey, as was the one who killed my brother, and I will stalk them for as long as it takes, as I did him, and when I find them, I will utterly, completely destroy them.’

***

I wake to silence and open my eyes to unfamiliar surroundings. Curious now, I turn my head to look around me, trying to determine where I am. This is not the medical section of the Executor, so I must be in a Hapan hospital, albeit a rather luxuriously furnished one. I slide my hand down to my stomach, intending to check on my son, but instead of his bright Force presence within me, there is nothing. Shocked to find that he is no longer there, a bit bewildered and growing alarmed, I push myself upright, ignoring the pain which comes with that as best I can, frantically shoving the blankets down and moving the white robe I have been dressed in out of my way.

My middle is flat, a neat surgical scar across the bottom of it. Hoping to spot him somewhere, I look around the room, only to see nothing resembling a cradle. When I cast outward with my senses, the only Force user I find nearby is my husband standing outside the door. My son is gone, I realize, horrified by what must have happened.

‘No,’ I moan softly to myself, ‘no, no, no.’

The tears come next but I make no attempt to stop them.

***

I feel her pain, her grief, her need for me to be with her, and don’t hesitate before making my decision. Hapan customs demand that I wait for my wife to summon me before entering her room, but this is one time I will ignore that, diplomacy, etiquette, and propriety be damned. I simply push the guards Isolder had stationed on her room out of my way, open the door, and step through it.

Her face is hidden in her hands, and she is still almost as pale as the white robe she is wearing, even after receiving blood from me to replace some of what she had lost.

The door opens again behind me. I need to do this quickly and in a way to placate our Hapan hosts before they object to my actions. Slowly, deliberately, I take the few necessary steps to reach her side, and kneel by the bed, resting my hands on my thighs, with my helmet tipped towards the floor in what I hope is a suitably submissive posture.

Ani? she calls to me, once she realizes I am there.

I don’t reply.

Her eyes move from looking down at me to staring at the guards who are standing in the doorway. One word from her and they will remove me or kill me, regardless of my rank in the Empire.

‘My consort may stay,’ she firmly states. ‘You will leave us.’

They immediately step back, closing the door once they are clear of it, and leaving my wife and I alone.

I keep my eyes lowered and wait. While I would prefer to hold her in my arms to comfort her, and take her away from here back to the safety of my ship, this has to be done on her terms and under the Hapans’ intrusive, unwelcome gaze. A hand reaches down, slides along the cheek of my mask and tips it up. Her face, still streaked by tears, is etched with grief and pain, but there is neither blame nor anger there.

‘Tell me what happened,’ she orders. ‘I want the truth of it - all of it.’

There is no point in concealing anything I know from her and she will feel it if I am lying.

‘You were followed into the gardens,’ I tell her. ‘Someone stunned you. Lady Elliar was found this morning, dead, having drowned in one of the garden’s large pools.’

Maia’s eyes close as she absorbs this information.

‘Why?’ she questions me.

I pause before answering her. This room, like almost all of those in the palace I have spent time in, is probably being monitored and I do not want my speculations to be made public or to make their way to the wrong individuals.

‘I don’t know,’ I tell her aloud, but give a different answer silently.

One of two reasons or perhaps both of them, I reveal my thoughts to her. Someone targeted Elliar and you were in the way, or less likely, you were the target and Elliar was in the way.

My wife is silent at that, thoughtful.

‘My bodyguards?’ she asks next.

‘Stunned as you were, but recovering now, on your flagship,’ I state, more for Hapan ears than hers.

She hasn’t asked about herself or our son yet. I gird myself mentally and emotionally, expecting those questions, the hardest ones to deal with, will be next.

***

I sense the Sith Lord preparing himself for what he is certain I will want to know next. He can stay where he is for a while and think about what he will say to me, I decide - I need to consider what he has already told me. Someone waited until Elliar and I were outside the palace with only a few guards to protect us. Cyran and Daini had been stunned, not killed, and the same had been done to me. Only Isolder’s betrothed had been killed, and I am sure that she was murdered, despite what Ani was implying. Lady Elliar was too strong willed to ever take her own life. No, I do not think I was the intended victim - she was. I was just unlucky enough to be an inconvenient potential witness in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Ani is still quietly watching me, so I ask my next question with a gesture, rather than speak. I don’t know if I can bring myself to say it aloud, so I move my hand, rest it above my stomach and look at him. His breathing stills and I can feel his own emotional pain and reluctance to speak of it. He raises his left hand, so I take it in mine and gently squeeze it. What happened was not his fault.

‘An unfortunate side effect of stunning someone,’ he admits, ‘is that it can sometimes trigger miscarriages in pregnant females.’ He stops, so I squeeze his hand again. I need to hear this. ‘The placenta separated from the uterine wall, according to the doctors, and you started to bleed out.’

I shut my eyes and remember what I had felt: pain, tearing, and what must have been blood running out of me.

‘There was not enough time to take you to the Executor, or to have your doctor sent here. The Hapans did their best, replaced the blood you lost with what they could of mine because no one here was a match, but…,’ his voice trails into silence before he can bring himself to tell me the rest of it. ‘They had no choice. To save your life, our son had to be removed to allow them to repair where you were torn and to …’

‘Where is he?’ I interrupt him, finally working up the courage to ask.

‘On the Executor. Leanan took him there, to care for him properly,’ the Sith Lord reveals, ‘but she does not expect him to survive.’

I tug on his hand, prompting him to get to his feet from where he had been kneeling. Both of his hands are in mine now, my head resting against his chest, while our mutual grief is shared over our bond. My mother once told me that there was no pain greater than that of losing a child, but this must come close to it.
 
‘I want to go home,’ I whisper to my husband. ‘I want to see him, to hold him, even if it is for only a minute.’ Please, Anakin, just take me home.

I will, my love, he promises me. I will.

***

‘I will go make the arrangements,’ I reassure my wife, easing her back against the pillows and giving her hands a light squeeze.

She is in shock, traumatized by the attack and emotionally stricken by the looming loss of our son. I barricade my own feelings of grief and anger away, putting them aside to deal with later. Right now, she needs me to be a secure pillar of strength and calm in the midst of a storm, and I will give that to her despite the personal price I will pay for doing it.

‘I will be back soon,’ I tell her before leaving.

Going to the waiting area for privacy, I quickly finish the comm calls to Executor, ensuring that Trever will arrive shortly with Thirsk and an appropriate set of guards for my wife. Then I focus my attention on the glass of the window and release my frustration and grief into it.

It instantly shatters into a million fragments.

***

I don’t want to be sedated or pumped full of pain killers because I hate being fuzzy-headed, but Trever refuses to move me without them. Leanan, I am sure, would not be so insistent, but she isn’t here and he is, along with his rotten bedside manner.

‘Fine,’ I finally concede after none of my arguments against it succeed in swaying him. ‘Dope me up, then.’

I want to go back to the Executor to see my son, and if this is what is necessary, I will do it.

‘I don’t know which one of you is a worse patient,’ the doctor grumbles, ‘you or Lord Vader.’

My husband doesn’t react to Trever’s observation. Instead he slides back the sleeve of the robe I am wrapped in and holds my arm steady while the doctor finds a vein and injects the medications.  The effect is immediate. I feel myself go limp and everything seems distant and detached from me.  Even the dull ache in my stomach recedes a little.

‘You will be more comfortable during the transfer this way,’ Ani tells me.

He steps away from the bed and watches the medics bring the medical capsule into the room. A regular hover-stretcher would probably have been fine, but I am not going to argue about it. If Ani and the doctor want to make a fuss, I will let them. It takes a few minutes for the Hapan medical monitors to be replaced by the small portable ones Trever had brought with him, and the doctor makes a point of checking Torve’s records against the current readings.

‘Ready to go?’ I am asked, so I nod in response and rest my hands on my chest to keep them out of the way.

When the medics start to roll me onto my side, to get me into position to be lifted, it sends sharp stabs through my middle. I hiss in pain and bite my lip. That hurt. They freeze in place and look over at Trever.  He frowns and grabs his medical bag. Not more pain meds, I think, that will knock me out completely.

‘Allow me,’ the Sith Lord volunteers.

He motions the medics and Trever away. I feel myself lift from the bed and realize he has chosen to levitate me with the Force. Cool. Ani has never done this with me before. It’s a truly strange sensation to be floating in mid-air with nothing touching you, and to be moving without any effort across the room to be set down in the capsule.

That was a neat trick, I tease my husband. Can you do that again? Please? It was fun.

Not now, wife, he scolds a little. The medication is making you a bit giddy.

I resist sticking my tongue out at him, tempting as it is. If he wants me to be silly, I can give that to him. Trever checks the monitors again and ensures that I am comfortable, but I am only wearing a light robe and starting to feel a bit cold.

Here, Ani tells me, laying his cloak overtop of me. You need to keep warm and I don’t want you becoming chilled.

Thank you, love, I reply.

His cloak is warm from his body and smells like his leather armour and roses. He must have been out in the gardens this morning. I pull it up to my chin and settle in for the trip.

Smell’s good, I tell him. Smells like you and smells like roses. I like it.

Go to sleep, little goddess, he soothes. You will be home much sooner, if you do.

There’s no reason to stay awake and I am sleepy from the medications. My eyes slowly close so I don’t resist.

***

‘She’s finally stopped fighting the sedative and fallen asleep, doctor,’ I tell Trever.

‘We should move her quickly, then,’ he decides. ‘I don’t want to use more meds to manage her pain and she will need that if we wait too long.’

I step back and allow the medics to steer the capsule through the door. My shuttle is nearby so there won’t be a long walk to it. As I follow my wife through the corridors, I am aware of the stir our party is making. Word has spread about the events of last night and the Hapans are not sure how to react.

Thirsk and the men he chose to act as guards join us once we leave the Medcenter. All of them are alert, ready, and more than willing to deal with anybody who might be a threat. What happened to my wife and son has generated sympathy for them amoung the Executor’s crew. There was no lack of volunteers to pick from for this escort duty.

Approaching the landing pad, I see that a parting delegation has been sent. Isolder is there, outwardly composed, but inwardly still in turmoil from Elliar’s death. Astarta hovers protectively behind him. The Queen Mother is nowhere in sight, having relegated this task to her son. I stop in front of them, making a point of watching the medical capsule with my wife going up the shuttle’s ramp before saying anything.

‘I expect to be kept informed of the progress of your investigation into the attack, your highness,’ I warn them both. ‘I do not want to return here to deal with that myself, but I will if I must.’

My threat hangs in the air between us, an openly declared challenge for him to meet.

‘Lord Vader, those responsible will be yours to deal with as you see fit,’ he promises in return. ‘I shall send for you once they are in custody.’

I turn away, intending to hurry into the shuttle and leave. There is nothing more to be said and I have little patience or time for the traditional diplomatic niceties.

‘Wait,’ Isolder stops me.

I pause, giving him a chance to finish what he wants to say, but do not face him.

‘There is another route through the Mists,’ he reveals, continuing over Astarta’s protests, ‘a faster way to travel to the Core, but it is more dangerous and requires one of us to go with you, to guide you along it.’

‘Your highness!’ Astarta tries to silence him from saying anything more.

I let out an amused laugh. This is something I had already suspected and he has now confirmed it.

‘I need no navigator,’ I state. ‘The Force will be my guide.’

Thirsk runs down the boarding ramp. Maia must be secured and he has come to see what has delayed me. It is time for us to leave.

‘Tur conter ti'doro nui,’ Isolder bids me farewell in Hapan, ‘and may the Force be with you, Lord Vader.’

‘Brightness guard you against the night,’ I give the Basic translation in return, then I follow Thirsk into the shuttle and turn my mind ahead to the next task I must accomplish.

‘She’s still stable,’ Trever announces once I am seated next to my wife’s medical capsule, ‘and should sleep for several hours. It would be best to transfer her out of the capsule using your method rather than the standard procedure.’

Her grasp on my cloak’s collar had loosened in her sleep, so I reach over, tuck her hands under the fabric and lightly touch her cheek with a finger. The repulsors in the capsule will cushion the shuttle’s take-off and landing, but removing her manually from it to transfer her to a bed in the medlab will only produce more pain.

‘Keep her sedated and quiet until I am able to come to Medical to move her for you,’ I order. ‘We need to reach Rhinnal as quickly as possible, and I am the only one who can plot the necessary course.’ Turning to Thirsk, I add, ‘You will guard her, yourself, Commander. See to it that there is always someone she knows and trusts in the room with her, even if she is unconscious. If she wakes, I do not want her to find herself alone.’

No, Maia does not need more emotional upset heaped onto what she must already deal with, and not having someone she considers a friend nearby will have that effect.

I tap a finger on the seat’s armrest while I consider the possible flight plans to Rhinnal. First, we must clear the Transitory Mists, a group of nebulae which screen the Hapan Cluster from the rest of the galaxy. From there, the Perlemian Trade Route is well known and heavily travelled. If only the Hapans had not been so isolationist, I think in disgust. Had they been willing to open their worlds to trade before now there would be a well-established, fast, and safe route between here and the Core.   
The shuttle settles gently onto the floor of the Executor’s small hangar. A countdown starts to run in my head. How fast can I reach the command deck? How quickly can I get my injured son and wife to Rhire on Rhinnal, to the best medical care available to us?

Pushing up from the seat, I look down at Maia and brush a hand along her face. She doesn’t stir so strong is the hold of the drugs on her. There is nothing more I can do for her at the moment other than ensure we are underway as soon as possible.

‘I will be on the command deck, if you need me,’ I tell Trever. ‘Comm me immediately if she wakes.’

By the time I reach my destination, those I need to consult with have arrived, some in hologram form.

‘Commander Tosack,’ I address the image of the old engineer. ‘Best speed you can extract from the hyperdrive?’

‘She’s rated at two, as you know,’ he answers, ‘but…’

‘Yes?’ I prod.

He’s modified and tweaked and fussed with the Executor’s engines from the time she was under construction. What the ship is rated at on her blueprints and what she can actually do under extreme need are no longer the same.

‘If pushed, for a short time, perhaps she could run at one,’ he reveals, ‘but I wouldn’t recommend it for everyday use.’

That alone would cut our travel time from five days to less than three.

‘Three days,’ I state aloud. ‘I need three days at top speed. Can it be done?’

‘If your lordship and milady require it, it will be done,’ he offers, saluting as he does.

Tosack’s hologram vanishes and I suspect he is now busy driving the engineering crew to prepare the engines for the stress they will be under.

‘Shields, Kallic, can they handle travel through the Mists?’ I ask that question of the Executor’s Captain.

‘Provided we don’t approach too close to the heart of one of the nebulae,’ he answers.

I know the crew are wondering what I have planned, and from what I have asked some of them have probably figured it out. Looking at the nav projections, I can see that we are almost clear of Hapes’ gravity well. In a few minutes, once I hear back from Tosack that he is ready, I will have to take control from the helmsman. Flying my flagship won’t be like piloting my fighter. She will be sluggish and slow in comparison, and I will need to choose my course carefully because of that.

The engineer’s hologram reappears.

‘Clear to go in engineering, my Lord,’ he announces before disappearing again.

‘Clear of the planet and ready to jump,’ Bachenkall echoes him.

‘Give me the helm,’ I order, waving the helmsman aside and taking his place.

Since I designed it, the layout of the controls is a familiar one. Choosing to make our course visible to the crew, I set the nav-projector to broad view so that all on the bridge can see it as a hologram between the crew pits. If they know where we are going, they are less likely to panic or be a distraction while I work. Shutting out the noise around me, I drop into the Force in this place.

Where? I query it. Where is safe? Where is shortest and fastest? Where must I go?

My hands dance across the controls as the answers come to me.

Here and here, the Force leads me along the safest path. Not there. Avoid that area. Turn now, alter course slightly, detour around that young star then onwards once more…..

I lose track of time and place, driven by necessity and caught in the concentration needed to keep to the twisting route I must follow and program into the nav-computer. Only when there are no further obstacles to avoid and my course has taken us to the other side of the Mists, exiting right onto the Permelian Trade Route, do I allow myself to return to the here and now. On the projection, a crazily convoluted flight path has been plotted, but it is a safe one and far quicker than any the Hapans could supply.

Around me is silence and the respectful looks of the crew.

I activate the hyperdrive and watch the view through the front ports shift to that of hyperspace.

‘I will be in Medical,’ I tell them.

No one speaks until after I have left the bridge.

***

I find my mind wandering, caught in a grey world of strange shapes and flashing colours. Voices come and go - Trever’s, my husband’s, Thirsk’s - but nothing they say is clear to me. The grey finally fades, replaced by a distorted and fuzzy view of a throne room. Ani is there, sprawled across the floor in defeat, as is the Emperor, looming above him, and between them is Luke, dressed in black holding a lit green lightsaber. Palpatine’s laughter rings out as he praises the young Jedi’s skill, before ordering, ‘Kill him.’

I react by screaming at them all and striking out at the Emperor’s ugly face.

***

It’s been hours since we returned to the Executor, and my wife has shown little sign of waking. She’s been dreaming, though, her eyes fluttering in her sleep, and I wonder what she is seeing. A few minutes later she is calm again, so I pick up her left hand and hold it close. While having her conscious would allow us to talk about what must be done, I dread having that conversation with her. I have lost a wife, thought I lost a child, and have been through the grieving process for both. She has never had to deal with a loss of either type. At a time when I will need her to be at her strongest, she will be at her most vulnerable.

Her hand pulls hard on mine, her head tossing from one side of the pillow to the other. Nightmare, I quickly realize, and that nasty one about my death which always upsets her.

‘No!’ she screams, suddenly sitting upright and lashing out with her hands before I can soothe the dream away.

I catch her flailing arms, preventing her from falling backwards, and pull her against my chest, pinning her hands between us.

‘You’re safe,’ I repeat until she stops shaking in fear. ‘I am here and I will protect you.’

‘Anakin,’ she softly calls my name.

I tuck the hairs which had escaped from her braid behind her ear and rest my palm on her cheek. The fear induced adrenalin surge she experienced will soon fade, allowing the pain from her injuries and surgery to come to the surface.

‘I am going to help you lie down,’ I warn her, ‘and unless you let Trever give you something for the pain, every time you move it is going to hurt.’

Easing her backwards, I note just how much effort she is putting into concealing the pain she is in. She is stubborn as always, but this is something she needs help with regardless of her desire to avoid the drugs. I nod at the doctor who had entered the room upon hearing his name. He comes to the bedside, looks over at me before turning his attention to my wife. She won’t want to listen to what he has to say, necessary as it is for her to hear it.

‘Lord Vader has already been told what I am going to say to you,’ Trever begins.

Maia stares at him, silent. She’s going to let him finish without interruption. Good. That will make what comes after this that much easier.

‘Emergency surgery like yours has a much longer recovery time than a normal birth, and there was damage to your uterus which had to be repaired as well. You will need to stay here for several days, and your activities will be restricted for weeks after that,’ the doctor continues. ‘You will not be able to lift anything larger than a newborn for at least a month - including your children, and there will be abdominal pain if you move before your body heals enough to be released. I will keep you here as long as necessary rather than let you go early, if you persist in being belligerent about proper pain management.’

My wife looks at me, and I know she is going to come out with a protest of some sort.

‘I won’t let you out of Medical unless he allows it,’ I tell her bluntly. 

She needs to heal properly and I intend to ensure that happens, even if I have to stay in the critical care suite myself to make her behave herself. Her eyes drop to her hands resting on her stomach.

You know I hate being drugged, she reminds me.

If it wasn’t necessary, I admit to her, I wouldn’t insist on it.

‘I will co-operate, doctor,’ she gives in without an outward fight, but I know I will hear private complaints from her about this for quite a while.

If Trever is surprised by her quick compliance, he gives no sign of it. He merely positions the feed for the medication and sets it at the lowest dosage level. At least she should be able to sit up in bed, now, without too much trouble.

‘Leanan will be in to talk to you in a few minutes,’ the doctor tells us as he leaves.

Another report I am already familiar with, and one my wife will have difficulty accepting. There are limits to what medicine can cure even in the Empire, even on the most advanced ship in the fleet, and limits to what the most highly trained and experienced doctors can accomplish. My wife’s personal physician is one of the very best and she is at the point where there is nothing more she can do except pray for the best outcome given a hopeless situation.

When Leanan comes in, she doesn’t bother to ask for permission to sit, she simply drags a chair over to where I am standing and collapses into it. She’s exhausted after almost a day on her feet dealing with one medical crisis after another.

‘I could give you a very long and detailed report of everything that has happened in the last few hours, but I think you would prefer the short version,’ she states, looking back and forth between my wife and I.

‘Go ahead, doctor,’ I encourage her to keep speaking.

Maia’s hand finds mine. I hold it gently, wrapping it inside both my own. What comfort can I give her once she hears all the doctor has to say?

‘First, there is the prematurity - not by much, but that is easily dealt with compared to the other issues,’ she reveals. ‘More difficult is the prolonged lack of oxygen from the placenta separating, and worse still the effect of the stun blast on his incompletely developed nervous system.’

For a moment she turns her face away from us, struggling with her composure and fighting tears.
The dragon has a soft heart under all her armoured scales and does not want to deliver the news no parent wants to hear.

‘I can do no more for him,’ Leanan admits. ‘The brain damage alone - even on Rhinnal there is no cure for that. I can maintain his bodily functions, for a short time, but those will eventually fail, too.’

My wife pulls her hand away from mine and brings it, shaking, to her mouth. Her eyes dart between the doctor and I as she processes what she has just been told - that our son cannot survive and will soon die. I seat myself on the edge of the bed, half-leaning against it to stay in place, and open my arms, anticipating her need for their shelter and the storm of weeping which will follow. She stays in them for what seems like an hour, her body wracked with sobs and face streaked with tears. The doctor slips away, leaving us to share our private grief, and to go deal with her own sense of loss and failure.

‘Maia, my little goddess,’ I softly call to her, once her weeping has subsided. ‘There are things which must be done, and quickly, while there is time left to us.’

She stills against my chest so I know she is listening to me.

‘He needs a name, love,’ I remind her. ‘Do you have one for him?’

‘Anakin,’ she quietly replies.

‘Yes?’ I answer.

‘Anakin,’ she repeats. ‘That’s his name.’

Named for me, his father, named for a hero long gone - named for the one she loves most.

‘Do you want to see and hold him?’ I ask her, remembering what she had said on Hapes.

A nod in response. She’s far too upset to speak more than a few words at a time.

‘Leanan will bring him to you if you wish,’ I tell her, ‘but he will have to be removed from the life support system. Do you still want to hold him, knowing what will happen?’

Our son cannot survive long on his own, but without Maia’s consent to stop treatment, I will not ask the doctor to do it. Arms tighten around my waist. She knows the consequences of what she wants and cannot bring herself to make the decision. I, however, can sense that time is rapidly running out. If she truly wants to see him before he dies it must be soon.

‘Do you want me to bring him to you?’ I repeat the question.

This time I brush the tears from her cheek and tip her face up so she cannot avoid giving me an answer. She closes her eyes, nods again and buries her face in my chest.

I beckon to Thirsk, who had been lurking outside the door on guard duty, motioning him into the room.

‘Commander Thirsk will stay with you,’ I tell her. ‘I don’t want you to be on your own while I go get Anakin.’

She allows me to ease her out of my arms and accepts the soft cloth Thirsk hands to her. My old friend will help my wife compose herself and perhaps distract her a little.

I step out of the room and walk down the hall to where Leanan is standing nearby, waiting for me.

‘She wants to hold him,’ I tell the doctor, ‘and she knows that he won’t survive for very long once you remove the life support. You have my permission to do so.’

‘If there was anything more I could do…’ she starts to speak, but I silence her with ‘… you have already done all that you can, doctor, and I owe you my gratitude for keeping him alive long enough for his mother to say goodbye to him. You do not need to apologize or say anything more to me about it.’

‘It will take a few minutes. I will let you know when he is ready,’ she replies.

I watch her go into the second of the Executor’s critical care suites and turn away for a moment to compose myself. Maia has not seen our son yet, and I have. She has no idea how frail and damaged he is, how hopeless the attempts to save him have been. If only I had reached her sooner, if only the Hapans were better equipped, if only… I ruthlessly cut off that thought. There is no point in considering what ifs or debating the past which cannot be changed. The future is what I should worry about.

‘My Lord?’ Leanan calls to me.

Cradled in her arms, wrapped in a brightly coloured blanket is my son, Anakin. His bright blue eyes are open and tufts of blonde hair cover his small head. She has dressed him in a tiny tunic so that his arms and the places needles had been put in them are not visible. Accepting him from her hands, I rest him against my chest and touch his cheek with my finger. There are no connected thoughts to be detected, nor a response of recognition to a brush of the Force from me. His brain has been damaged, I remind myself, and he is incapable of reacting on a conscious level to anything I might do.

‘Thank you,’ I tell the doctor. ‘I will take him to his mother.’

When I return to Maia’s room, I discover that Thirsk has been joined by Cyran and Daini. Their conversation stops when I arrive, and they quickly excuse themselves, leaving us alone to say goodbye to our son.

‘Here he is,’ I say to my wife as I carefully transfer him from my arms to hers.

‘Anakin,’ she names him, kissing his head, ‘our little boy.’

I push aside some of the blankets and sit beside her, to be close to her for when she needs me. She sings to him the same cradle songs she used to put our other children to sleep, seemingly unaware of the time going by, her focus entirely on our child. As the minutes pass, I watch his breathing slow. He’s gradually slipping away, peacefully, quietly, without a sound, secure in his mother’s arms.

Thirsk peers in at us from the doorway and retreats when he sees that I notice him.

‘Come in, Commander,’ I order, ‘I need someone to take a holo for us, and you are conveniently here.’

He takes off his helmet and removes the communicator from his belt. I wait for him to set it on record mode, then gently slide my arm around Maia’s back, pulling her and Anakin in close to me. This will be the only image we will ever have of the three of us together, and I know my wife will want to keep it with her other family pictures. Thirsk nods as he stores the file, hands the device to me, and excuses himself, returning to guard duty.

Tucking the communicator inside my surcoat, I look down at Anakin again. He’s fading, barely breathing now and his heart beat is gradually becoming irregular. Maia continues singing to him. That’s her way of coping, I decide. A minute later, when he finally takes his last breath and his heart stops, she knows the instant that he is gone. I center myself, find my anchor point in the Force, hold tight to it, and thicken my mental shields. For Maia, our son’s death is a shatterpoint, and I must be prepared to deal with any reaction she has.

It soon comes.

She screams aloud in realization of her loss and soundlessly into the Force, a cry of a mother’s grief and agony amplified a million-fold by her empathy. Her emotions blast invisibly away from her, to impact on me and the Executor’s crew. I sway at the effort needed to deflect them and dull their effects on those around us, but with his close proximity to its origin, despite my attempt to protect him, Thirsk is doubled over on the floor. He takes a few minutes to recover, and in that time Maia has collapsed backwards into my chest, unconscious and exhausted by what she had done. Leanan soon runs into the room, followed by Trever and a few of the other medical staff. All of them are visibly shaken and some of the younger women are in tears.

‘What the flack was that?’ Thirsk, who is leaning against the wall to steady himself, voices what they all are thinking.

‘Empathic blast,’ I admit. ‘I expect some of the crew will be in shock, in spite of my blunting the worst of it. You should go prepare for their arrival.’

Trever quickly leaves, taking all but Leanan with him. She comes over to me, and touches my arm in a gesture of sympathy. Allowing her that brief physical contact, I rest my hand on hers a moment before removing it, then lift Anakin from his mother’s grasp and give him to the doctor. She cradles him carefully, gently, as if he were still alive.

‘She will need to see him again once she recovers,’ I tell the doctor, ‘so have a crib brought in here and place it near the bed with him in it.’

I had spoken to her before about what should be done, what is necessary to help my wife and family with the grieving process, so she is expecting these orders.

‘I agree with you that his siblings should see their mother and brother,’ I decide to heed her advice from earlier in the day. ‘It will be easier for them to accept what has happened if they do, and I will explain it to them in a way they can easily understand.’

Waiting until after the doctor is gone, I close the door behind her with a gesture and hold Maia tightly in my arms, rocking her limp form in them and allowing some of my own held in grief to escape at last.

***

The Executor, Rhinnal, Core Worlds, Year 4, Month 1.

DAY 24

I have been stuck in bed for days, but I am not going to complain to anyone about that, not after everything I have been through. It is quite a relief, though, that Leanan has taken over my care from Trever. Her bedside manner is better than his, and she has been fussing over me like a lioness with one sick cub to care for. This morning, she had Ani transfer me into a regular private room in medlab by levitating me with the Force again. It still hurts if I try to do much of anything, so my husband insisted on moving me himself, and was willing to put up with my teasing him about it.

Pulling his cloak up to my cheek, I rub the soft fabric against my skin and let the feel and his smell on it soothe me. The Sith Lord had sent the Emperor a recorded message when the ship dropped from hyperspace for a few minutes after exiting the Mists and before making the jump from there to Rhinnal. I know he had to tell his master what happened on Hapes, about the treaty, the attack on me, the assassination of the presumptive future Queen Mother, and the death of our son, but how Palpatine will react to that news worries me. None of it was my fault or Ani’s fault; however, we both might be blamed for the mess it turned into anyways.

A tear slides down my cheek before I can stop it. I want my little boy back, I want my son back, and I know that’s impossible.

You are upset again, my husband realizes.

Ever since our son died and I somehow incapacitated a large number of his flagship’s crew, he’s been careful to keep an active telepathic line open between us to let him sense the details of my emotional state. If I start crying or if I am in pain, he knows instantly and comes quickly to be with me, if he isn’t in the room with me already.

I will be there in a few minutes, he informs me.

Shifting from my back to my side, I curl up a bit, close my eyes, and wait for him. This is the position it hurts the least to be in. As I daydream a little, I hear Ani’s regulated breathing and footsteps before I see him.

‘Hi, handsome,’ I tease him in my usual way.

‘Hello, gorgeous,’ he responds in kind.

He’s in a good mood, for the moment.

‘You are still in pain,’ he notes, ‘so I will ask Leanan to raise the dosage and have someone from the Medical Academy check on you.’

‘It will go away eventually,’ I tell him. ‘You don’t need to make a big fuss about it.’

‘Actually, I do,’ he admits, adding, Palpatine wants you examined by someone of his own choosing to confirm what I have told him about your medical condition and the circumstances surrounding Anakin’s death.

He must have been speaking to his master over the Holonet today. It sounds as if I am to be poked, prodded, and evaluated for readiness for breeding, just like a prized brood mare being put back to the expensive stud for mating.

He just wants you to get me pregnant again, as fast as possible, as soon as you can manage it, to replace Anakin with another son for him to take, I guess, completely disgusted by it all. The earliest you can ‘service’ me for him is in six weeks, so tell him that and leave me alone until then.

Silence.

Then a sigh from my husband.

You have every reason to be upset and come to that conclusion, given how you have been treated in the past, he admits, but that’s not why the Emperor and I are worried about your health.

There’s something I haven’t been told yet, and he was holding off on that for some reason.

I feel him sit beside me on the bed and his fingers reaching for mine.

‘The doctor the Emperor is sending to see you is the best fertility expert at the Medical Academy, and probably the most qualified for this task in the Empire,’ he reveals. ‘I was going to have her look at you myself, for confirmation, before telling you what Leanan had already determined.’

‘Confirmation of what?’ I ask. ‘What’s so important that it needs a second opinion of that type?’

His hand tightens on mine. I open my eyes and look up at him. Whatever it is that could be wrong with me, it is not good, and he didn’t want to scare me with it before he was sure it was true.

‘Leanan suspects that the uterine scarring you have sustained will make it impossible for you to carry a child to term again, and that attempting to do so could lead to a rupture,’ Ani quietly tells me. ‘Another pregnancy could easily kill you.’

I spend a few minutes considering that information and its implications.

‘No more kids?’ I finally question.

‘No more kids,’ he confirms, ‘and once the second opinion verifying that is sent to Palpatine, I will personally make sure there won’t be any chance of an ‘accident’ occurring.’

He wouldn’t do that to himself, would he?

To protect you, I would do it without any hesitation, he promises, but from what he said today, I don’t think my master will allow it, even though I would willingly offer to do it. He will insist that you be the one who is operated on instead.

He intends to put you to stud with someone else, I decide, feeling a bit miffed that I might have competition of that sort.

No, he doesn’t, Ani reveals, and I can feel his amusement at my jumped to conclusion. He knows I would refuse to do that under any circumstances because it would be too much for you to bear. The negative response I expect to hear is actually his personal reaction to the idea of being cut in that manner. Most human males are terrified of it because they see it as an affront and attack on their manliness.

And you aren’t at all scared of it? I ask, curious.

No, not really, he admits. I’ve lived through far worse procedures, and I have a family with you already. Retaining the ability to sire more children is less important to me than your safety.

A sudden realization hits me.

If I can’t have any more kids, and he wants your son, and you won’t have one with another woman, what will happen to Mikal? To the girls? I start babbling at him, my panic level rising. Will they be taken away? How will we protect them? There will be no future sons for you to bargain with now…

I sense my husband rapidly spinning shields built from the Force around me, layering them and anchoring them in place on top of me. He’s making sure I don’t flatten any of the Executor’s crew with another wild emotional outburst.

Control, right now, Maia, he orders. Lock it down. You are projecting your emotions again.

I shrink into myself at his words and do as I am told. He knows that I am not able to effectively manage or control the projective empathy our son’s death has unlocked, and that the more upset I am, the worse it gets.

Come here, love, he soothes, offering to hold me for a while and calm me down. I need to train you how to control that before it creates any more problems.

I tuck my head under his mask’s chin and rest my cheek on his chest armour. More lessons from him, and these will be necessary ones for me.

Since you are so worried about it, I can tell you that Palpatine will never take Mikal, Shmi, or Cat from us, he reassures me. He made that promise to me before and repeated it today. You are far too fragile emotionally to handle any stress like that, and he won’t risk a breakdown by you affecting me through our bond. He needs me and I need you to be stable if I am to be of any use to him.

He won’t risk it now, I think to myself, but that tells me nothing about what might happen in the future, when Palpatine no longer requires my husband.

Coruscant, Core Worlds, Year 4, Month 1.

DAY 26

***

I ease my wife out of my arms and settle her on our bed, being careful to not rouse her out of the sedated sleep Leanan had drugged her into. The pain from her injuries on Hapes is almost gone, but the surgery she underwent yesterday has left her with another incision and some discomfort from it. As I pull my cloak over her shoulder, the cuff on her arm flashes, indicating that the latest dose of medication has been administered. She will sleep for several hours, I decide, giving me time to do a few things I had put off.

‘Rest, my love,’ I tell her, tracing her cheekbone with a single finger.

If she stirs or wakes, I will know.

Cyran has taken the children to play in the garden, to prevent them from waking their mother and to let me work undisturbed. My quarters are quiet and feel empty with their absence, but I know they will be back and full of stories to tell me about their adventures around my castle, too.

The various gifts from the Hapans to my wife have been transferred here from the Executor, and the more valuable ones are piled in shipping crates in my office. I survey the stacked boxes and debate what to do with them. Palpatine has a strong penchant for collecting trophies - artwork, weapons, exotic and rare artefacts. He has a need to publically demonstrate his wealth and power, and likes to cultivate a reputation for cultural refinement, both of which I can’t be bothered with. My preference is to avoid that sort of pointless clutter.

I open the first, small box. This one has the court clothing for the children in it, so I move it to a corner of their bedroom and leave it there for later. The next one I pull the lid from is full of packing material, with a golden harp in its center. Perhaps that should be a gifted onwards to an orchestra. In another small container is the jewelled dagger. I slide the blade out of its sheath and admire the workmanship. Beautifully made and with a razor sharp edge, it is completely impractical for combat and of little use to me, but maybe my wife would like it to wear with one of her formal gowns. It needs to be locked away somewhere safe, so I stash it in the same hidden compartment as the Sith soul trap, away from the curious eyes and hands of my children.

An hour later, I have only a few crates left to sort through. Randomly selecting the smallest one, I find in it a stoppered metal jar. Unlike most of the Hapans’ gifts, it is unornamented, its beauty in its form, and the richness and soft glow of the gold it is made from. I set it in the center of my desk and stare at it. This is something I do have a use for. Pulling my attention away from it, I open the largest remaining box and find a letter resting on the top of what is packed inside. That can wait while I see what else is in it, so I set it aside for later. The first item is a leather jewel case, and I know that this is not something Maia had been presented with at the gifting ceremony. Under that are four medical storage units, clearly labelled in Basic as containing custom made prosthetics for me.

I snatch the letter from my desk and start reading.

“Lord Vader, I will not have the opportunity to publically or officially thank you for returning Lady Elliar to me. That would raise too many questions, and discretion on both our parts is required, for now. We have both suffered losses, and while there will never be a way I can ever compensate you or your wife for yours, in friendship between us, I can at least offer to you what I know you might have need of. - Isolder”

***

‘Mommy’s sleeping,’ I hear Mikal say.

‘No, she’s just starting to wake up,’ his father corrects him.

I open my eyes but I am still feeling a bit groggy. Ani is out of his armour, for the first time in days, and wearing his favourite set of black Jedi Master robes instead. Our children are seated around him on the floor, and they are all busy putting together one of the large puzzles.

‘Don’t move,’ my husband warns. ‘I want to check on you before you do anything.’

He shoos the children away to their bedroom, and comes over to sit down beside me. His hands are warm against my skin when he folds back the cloak and blankets, and opens my nightgown to look at the latest incision.

‘Healing well,’ he decides, ‘and there won’t be a scar once the bacta peels off.’

‘So much for you getting ‘the cut’,’ I tease him. ‘You were right about your boss cringing too much about that to let you go through with it.’

The thought of that conversation between the two Sith Lords makes me smile. I bet neither one of them expected they would ever have to deal with that topic. Ani isn’t bothered at all by the prospect of a vasectomy, but Palpatine must have been squirming inwardly when my husband made his request to have it done.

‘He was rather … uncomfortable,’ Ani admits, ‘and he was concerned about putting you through another surgery so close to the first, but knew it would be necessary. He will keep me on Coruscant for a while and send you with me when I rejoin the fleet, to allow me to look after you, because of that.’

I tug on his sleeve. He responds by helping me to sit up and letting me lean against him. The pain is less today than it has been, and I am starting to itch where the scar from the emergency c-section is healing.

‘I need a bath,’ I tell him, ‘and Leanan said I could have one.’

‘You just want me to move you around with the Force,’ he replies, amused by my request, ‘but I want you to try standing and walking on your own.’

‘Ani,’ I begin a protest, only to have it cut short by his mouth on mine.

It’s our first kiss since…

Since before Anakin died, my husband finishes my thought.

He doesn’t let me pull away from him and escape from the kiss he started. I yield to him, and he doesn’t hold back. This is a lover’s kiss, seductive and intense, but comforting and gentle, too. When he does release me from it, I set my head on his shoulder and shiver a little at what I feel from him and for him. The Sith Lord has loved me from the day we first met, and my love for him predates our first meeting by years, but there are times, even so, when I wonder about the strength of what exists between us.

‘Let’s see how you are on your feet,’ he decides.

He stands up and I rest my hands in his when he offers them to me. I know he can pull me up onto my feet effortlessly, but I need to do this for myself. His hands are there to steady me, nothing more. Taking a deep breath, I push up off the bed, willing myself not to fall over. When I take a step forward, Ani matches it with one in reverse. Once in the ‘fresher, he lets me sit down carefully on the chair he had brought in there and fills the bath with warm water for me.

‘I don’t think I can climb in and out of it,’ I admit. ‘Standing up from the bed is one thing, from sitting at floor level is another.’

‘Then I will help you,’ my husband tells me.

He does exactly that, but only the minimum and only when I require it. I know that this is deliberate on his part because he does not want me to become too dependent on him. Once my bath is done, my hair washed and dried, we retrace our path, me stepping forward, him in reverse in front of me until we are seated beside one another on the bed.

‘I think you will be fine by tomorrow,’ I hear determination in his voice and a bit of worry, too.

We both know what has been scheduled for tomorrow afternoon, and it is something I really don’t want to attend. The finality of it. That inevitable, unavoidable last goodbye. I look away from my husband and bite my lip, hard, drawing blood. Control it, I remind myself, before he gives you a sound mental rap for losing it. A few tears escape from me, but that’s all.

‘You can always share it with me,’ Ani offers.

The barriers he normally keeps around his mind drop. I touch his cheek, then hold his hands in mine, knowing what his generous offer means and what it will do to him. He will feel every bit of my grief and loss, and I can’t bring myself to do that to him, not after he has been my safe haven and strength.

‘A mother’s grief,’ he whispers to me, ‘and a father’s pain.’

I feel a drop of water splash on the back of my hand and look up at him, startled. The Sith Lord is weeping soundlessly, his eyes closed, his own feelings of loss and despair, which he had kept hidden from me, now revealed. I lean forward and take him in my arms, holding him to my chest and rocking him gently in the same way he had held me, being strong for him, and easing his sorrow as best I can.  

DAY 27

***

I wait for Cyran to finish helping my wife dress and debate what I should say, if anything at today’s ceremony. There is no requirement for a speech on my part, so perhaps I will simply stay silent.

‘Stop fussing so much,’ I hear Maia say to her aide. ‘I am not going to wear any jewellery. Just put the veil on and leave it at that.’

A minute later she comes to join me. Her gown is plain in cut, but rich in material, black mothsilk without anything to break its starkness - a formal mourning dress. I meet her eyes though her face is not visible under her veil. That will be her only shield today at what I had wanted to be a quiet, private event, but which at my master’s insistence has become a semi-public official ritual.

‘You might want to wear this,’ I tell her, showing her the open jewellery case Isolder had sent.

Inside is a royal coronet. Delicately made of silver coloured mythra wires and the rarest of black stones, the dark equivalent of the ice moons she had called opals, it is a crown worthy of her and suited for a Sith Lord’s wife.

She stretches a finger out to touch it then pulls her hand back, uncertain what to do. Cyran quickly removes the veil, but lets me place the coronet on Maia’s head before covering it with the fine mothsilk again. The stones flash beneath the veil with every movement she makes. My wife is not aware of it, but she is wearing the equivalent of half my personal fortune today.

I wave her aide from the room. Today will be difficult for both of us, and a few minutes alone now will make what will come later easier. My wife reaches for me, so I pull her close, hold her hands tight in mine to reassure us both.

‘Don’t start crying, little goddess,’ I soothe her. ‘I know it will be hard, but do your best.’

‘Anakin,’ she whispers.

‘If it becomes too much for you,’ I offer, ‘just turn around and I will be there for you. You don’t have to look. You don’t have to watch. No one will expect that of you.’

I slide my arm around her waist and give her the physical support she needs to take the walk to the hangar. It is a short flight in my shuttle and soon I am guiding her out of it and to the funerary temple.

She looks about as we walk, orienting herself as I have taught her to. The place we need to go to is at the end of the street and lining the route are thousands of my troops. Thirsk and the 501st are here, forming an honour guard, and they bow their heads in acknowledgement as we pass. At the door, red garbed royal guards are waiting, but do not bar our passage. Beyond is a semi-open courtyard, ringed with the few I had personally invited and others the Emperor had insisted be there. I ignore all of them, including my master. The only person I am concerned with today is my wife.

Our place is at the center, next to the pyre with our son resting on it. I lead Maia there slowly, letting her adjust to the situation and not rushing her. I know how hard this will be for her. Palpatine is directly across from us, too far away to speak to, but close enough that he can see everything that happens. There is silence around us as those in attendance draw closer.

I am brought the torch. Maia stares at it and I feel her begin to tremble. This is the moment she has been dreading; her grief and pain will be on display for all to see.

Turn around and I will catch you, I tell her.

She does exactly that, collapsing against me the moment I throw the torch away from us and ignite the pyre. I pick her up, cradling her in my arms and settling her face against my body so she does not see any of what follows. Palpatine’s insistence that she be here for our son’s cremation is the worst cruelty he could inflict on her. If he had wanted a public demonstration of exactly how fragile she is, he has now seen it for himself with his own eyes.

Don’t look, I remind her when she stirs a little. It is almost finished.

The flames have died down now, leaving only ashes in their wake. I stay where I am, holding my wife, until those are gathered up and placed into the golden jar I had sent here.

Are you able to stand on your own? I ask her.

She nods in answer so I set her down, steadying her for a moment. When the jar is brought to her, she accepts it without any hesitation.

I want to take him home, she tells me.

This is something she needs to do on her own. I step back from her, giving her some space, but staying close enough to help her if she asks for it. The crowd parts for her, silently watching us leave. There are no cameras to record this, no reporters from the media, here. Any description of my son’s funeral rites will have to come from one of the witnesses, and none here would be so foolish as to speak with the press directly.

When we leave the temple, a ripple passes through the assembled troops, weapons reversing and the troopers resting their hands atop their blaster’s butts, with their heads bent and eyes to the ground. This gesture is the greatest mark of respect they can show, and one only used for the dead. My wife must realize this because she stops in place, motionless and unsure how to proceed.

Walk just ahead of me, I advise her. Don’t look at the men, keep your eyes up and forward, and pace slow and even. I will be right behind you.

She manages well enough, until we reach the security and privacy of my shuttle. Then her hands begin to shake and she immediately sits down in her seat. I take the golden jar from her, set it aside gently and lift the veil off of her face. There are fresh tears there, but these are ones born from gratitude at the care she has been shown by the troops she has never met, and not a result of her grief.

‘My men adore you,’ I reveal to her. ‘They owe their loyalty to me as their commander, and they respect and fear me, but you and our children, they love.’

I take my seat beside her, hold her hand and give her the time she needs to dry her face and compose herself.

‘They would do anything to protect you,’ I continue, ‘and when word got out, as it always does, about what had happened to you, and Anakin’s death, they wanted to do something for you to demonstrate that.’

I gently squeeze her hand. Every man who was on shore leave, and every trooper and crewman who had made the request to come was here today. Not one of the 501st remained on the Executor, and the ship’s bridge is staffed by a skeleton crew. Few military leaders can command such respect as she has earned from them by simply being who she is.

Thirsk comes into the shuttle and pauses when he sees us. His helmet is off and face calm, but I know he felt Maia’s grief that day, as did many others. It has marked them all.

‘My Lady,’ he says to her.

‘Commander,’ she replies. ‘Thank you. Please tell the rest of the men, thank you.’

‘I will,’ he promises, snapping a salute to me before departing.

‘Let’s go home,’ I decide. ‘You need to rest and I want to spend time with my family.’

***

Part 3

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