Odessen was a lovely world, and very much unlike Zakuul.
Whereas the world below her feet was a peaceful habitat of serenity and democracy, Zakuul boasted dark power and tyrannical ideals. It was a city world, built upon the backs of centuries of laborers and industry; overflowing with a boisterous population of placated, mind-numbed citizens. Smothered in control of a government built on the dynamic and ever-changing emotions of a dictator, the world was content to sit stagnantly by as its Empire's fingers slowly seized the galaxy in a possessive throttle. And now, Zakuul was little more than a hungry monster intent only on destroying the galaxy and its freedom.
Odessen, however, was a calm world. There was balance in the Force on this planet, where everything seemed right and one could sigh a breath of relief and bask in its quiet strength. There was a bright airiness to the atmosphere almost other-worldly, and the air seemed almost laced with cold, fresh moisture. One could breathe and taste the dominating oceans and their salts, and there never was a blacker sky with brighter stars. The clouds even seemed to roll with a gentle grace.
Ha'el Soave stared down at the nestled, quiet world from the bridge of the Eternal Fleet's flagship, her hands clasped in front of her, passively. Her eyes were cemented on the rolling figment of clouds, circling the world in beautiful plumes from her place in orbit. The sphere of the planet was riddled with patches of earthy browns and jagged formations of mountain, all overpowered by the man oceans and bodies of water the world boasted. Even orbit seemed fresh and untouched, like its planetary counterpart, though she knew otherwise. Her eyes closed, and she inhaled deeply. The air of the ship seemed heavy and mechanical. Surrounding her ears were the sounds of a full-fledged warship in action, and when she opened them, her peripheral vision caught one of the Knights approach her carefully.
The golden blaze of armor was now right behind her, and Ha'el bristled her shoulders and raised her chin superiorly; regal arch returning to her posture, as if she were actually intently plotting a cataclysmal attack on the serene world beneath her hovering flagship. It was entirely the opposite, however. She'd been content to gaze upon the world's beauty, and had no desire to tear her attention from it for the bidding of a signal Knight of Zakuul.
She exhaled slowly through her nose and inhaled another breath, glancing over her shoulder. Releasing another heavy sigh, this time to show her disapproval, she reached up and swept her hair over her shoulder and then brushed off the sleeve of her gown. The Knight, sensing her disapproval, snapped to attention in a military, and quite crisp, salute. It was a familiar gesture to royalty, and caused Ha'el to come about.
Though the Knight's face was covered, Ha'el knew he was male. "Empress Consort," he began, his voice deep and clear, though suddenly unsure, "I've been asked to retrieve you to the hangar. The Emperor would like to see you before he disembarks."
Of course he would. She thought, but said aloud, "Of course. Proceed, Captain," his shield gave him away as an officer and she dipped her head in compliance, turning from the bridge console and taking one last final look at the world beneath her feet.
"Yes, my lady," was his terse reply. Quickly, the Knight spun on his heel, and briskly marched towards the bridge's door. They snapped open, banged closed behind them, and suddenly they were enveloped in the stretching corridor of the flagship.
Empress Consort Ha'el Soave, or simply known as Consort Arcann, after her betrothed, spent much of her time aboard The Eternal Fleet's flagship, so these halls were not entirely unfamiliar. However, most often her time was spent as one of many Zakuulan trophies – she was decorative as much as she were present, which was to say her presence aboard this ship was of no more use than if there were holes in its hull. She was one of many gallant trophies; a conquered prize of the Eternal Throne, worth everything while meaning nothing.
She had come by her station by pure chance, simply having been born in the right year during the right war, and under the wrong circumstances. Born into a Zakuulan socialite home; her mother had been a wealthy ward of the Throne, spending her life designing armor and other beautiful practicalities for the Throne's military. Her father had been a Knight of Zakuul, until he'd been honorably discharged by the Immprtal Emperor and Lord Valkorion. She had been raised an only child in a family that could have easily supported a small settlement, though instead chose to invest their interests into the Eternal Throne.
Fortunately enough for her, Ha'el had grown up in the ranks of the Knights, shortly after the royal family had boasted twin sons, Arcann and Thexan. She had been documented as a Force sensitive early on, though her mother had never let her enlist, and the Throne never called upon her to serve. Instead, she had trained beside her father in the "beauty of war", as he had called it, and had learned the delicate process of understanding the balance of the Force. Outside, she'd grown up in societal Zakuul among other fortunate children, all basking in the shadow of the Eternal Empire. The shadows which the royal children cast were long and promising for the higher castes of Zakuul, and offered grand opportunity while a million other suffered.
She had been thirteen when she had been taken into the royal household to serve with other children her age. There, she studied the Force intricately among other Knights (as her father had been a Captain and insisted), though she'd been favored to work in communications over the marital ranks. When her combat skills grew, she joined other children in pitting against Thexan and Arcann for practice scenarios and live-action training. Her determination to succeed and impress had earned her respect quickly among the ranks, as did her station, and it was not long until her beauty had sprouted and grabbed the Throne's attention in a throttle hold. She blossomed into a woman beneath the radar of the the Eternal Empire; her curves grew her into a vivacious young lady, and her intelligence set a sharp and strong course for her future.
Ha'el, however, had been content and studious in her work, desperate to please and escape the simmering wrath that crossing the Throne promised. Her quiet existence was all she had needed, and as she continually matured into a woman, she did her best to hide. Most days she had suffered quietly beneath wraps and other loose-fitting clothing, hoping to hide what seemingly everyone had wanted to see. The war disinterested her and made her fearful for the future that Zakuul could have.
However, Valkorion had taken to her immediately, sensing her presence within the Force, and had pulled her from her workings as a Communication Relay in the Spire to a Communications Officer within the Fleet. She had been stationed first on Thexan's ship, and then promoted to Arcann's as Chief Communications Officer, at just eighteen. Her ascent to glory, from there, had been swift – her time with Arcann grew as he stretched out across the galaxy beside Thexan to claim ground in the name of the Eternal Empire, and it was not long after her promotion that Arcann had vested more interest in her than any other officer – or woman, for that matter – on the ship.
Her time with Arcann was a mixture of pleasure and fear – at least, in the beginning. She lived to serve him in the fear of what would happen should she fail, but her time alone with him was different than her time in service. He took in her first a friend, one to confide in that was not his own flesh and blood. It was a short fall from there.
He often walked her through the gardens around the Spire, telling her of his conquests across the galaxy. They sparred together, and trained, and talked. Soon, he became more to her than just a lord or royalty – he became Arcann, pure and unabashed and wonderful, not the brute that he paraded before the Throne that was blood-thirsty and power-hungry. He had a heart for sentiment, and more often than not sang songs from his childhood and recited ancient literature. Among her favorites of their time together was time spent in the royal library, reenacting historical tales and discussing endless topics. He would tell her of his mother, and how he had missed her, while in the next breath swearing her to secrecy with passionate kisses and telling gazes. He would rage about his father as his resentment for Valkorion's lack of interest in their family festered. And, of course, the war continued to drag on, and her understanding of its necessity began to grow. No longer was it mindless - it suddenly had purpose as Arcann rallied her behind the cause and urged her to get involved.
By then, she had surrendered her heart to Arcann, and there was no chance for escape. She too had captured Arcann's attention, and weeks after her twentieth birthday, she had married Valkorion's son after a short courtship and even shorter engagement. She had been inducted in the broken family's Spire, and by no choice of her own, the attention she had desired to escape had thrust her into glory.
In her early years of service, Senya Tirall had been beside her and taken in her a daughter of sorts, especially so after Vaylin had been confined away. Senya quickly became the absent mother Ha'el had left behind in her pursuit of service to Valkorion. Ha'el had been devastated when Senya had left, after she'd tried to rally her own children away from the Throne. Senya had not even been in attendance the day she and Arcann had wed, and Ha'el had lost yet another friend to the war's cruel intentions and consequences. It did not deter her, however, from pursuing a military career beside Arcann, and soon, she became as fully invested as he was, thought from a distance.
And after that, she swiftly became Zakuul's celebrity princess, despite her best efforts to remain anonymous in the recesses of Valkorion's military. Not long after she and Arcann returned from their six month tour of Zakuul's conquered worlds, she conceived a child – the third generation.
Zakuul had been ecstatic with the news of her announced pregnancy, though Ha'el had sensed something rippling in the Force that resembled apprehension, and anger. As she tread within the recesses of the Throne, the Republic and the Sith empires resisted the Empire in more severity, demanding action. The war effort increasingly became difficult, drawing Zakuul's intention to the Core Worlds and distant Outer Rim.
When the war became even more pressing, Arcann and Thexan had gone venturing in conquest, leaving her behind. Madly in love and desperate for action, though heavily pregnant, she had pleaded with Valkorion to send her with the Fleet to run orbital assaults. Of course he had refused, insisting she stay on Zakuul and mind her place while waiting for Arcann's return. The apprehension in the Force grew, and Ha'el felt Valkorion's favor turn from her, and his family.
And then, Arcann's injury had paralyzed the Throne, and for the first time, the war hit home on Zakuul. With the disfigurement of one of Zakuul's sons came the harrowing reality of the Republic and Sith's resistance. Valkorian passively sent more troops to their death while quietly obsessing with other vested interests off world, none of which many knew. When Arcann had returned home half alive, Ha'el's pregnancy had taken a turn for the worst. Dismayed, and afraid for his life; her grief and worry forced her into a much-to-early labor.
When she had lost Arcann's firstborn son, she had lost Arcann, and things had never been quite the same. Thexan had been killed in a fit of rage which Arcann had blamed Ha'el (and then she blamed herself) for, and the Empire had lost a pillar. Arcann became distant, Valkorion became colder (if possible), and the heat of the war raged.
Valkorion's death soon followed, at the hands of the Outlander, and Zakuul had never been the same. The loss of her child had left its mark certainly, and she had not been able to conceive sense, leaving her broken, hallow, and morbid. She threw herself into work after her sons death, and quickly enlisted as a Knight of Zakuul, following after Senya's steps. She quickly became a Commanding Officer, captain of her own section of the Fleet, and a Zakuulan sojourner. However, it was fruitless work, and left her no more emotion and purpose than life in the shadows of the Throne had.
Instead of the love she had felt at Arcann's hand, she instead received passive interest and distance. He kept her at arm's length, much in the way Valkorion had distanced himself from Senya, and focused himself on the war. Now with Vaylin as his right arm instead of Thexan, the war became brutal and almost primal. Innocent worlds cried out as Arcann unleashed his fury and grief across the stars, all while Ha'el bode her time in submission and solitary confinement. Arcann only used her when he returned from war; took his pleasures from her, only to leave again and throw the process back into a lifeless, passionless reciprocating cycle.
It had all been so many years ago that now Ha'el strode the corridors of Arcann's flagship effortlessly, the steps committed to memory but not to heart. She wanted nothing more than victory in the war now, out from beneath the crushing pressures of a world at war and in broken shambles of crushed hope and uncertainty. She didn't want to worry about the war, or the politics, or the pressing and gauged interest of Arcann's subjects any longer. She wanted to worry about her, and Arcann, and Senya - the future of Zakuul.
At twenty-two standard years old, she was all but barren in not only womb but emotion. Her life was a continuously numb cycle, and there was no exit.
She followed the guard in silence, the patrols ducking their heads in respect to her as they carried about their duties. Others stopped to bow, some watched quietly with their heads hung in shameful submission. As the Empress Consort, she was beneath only Arcann, even outranking Vaylin in not only station through marriage, but by military rank. The respect she received was deserved from years of hardship and work, though she relished it only out of necessity.
Now the war had turned, and her attention was demanded elsewhere. The Outlander, Hero of Tython, and Victor of the Core Worlds had demanded the attention of the galaxy in an Alliance against the Eternal Throne, ultimately opposing Arcann's reign in pursuit of peace. The Outlander's pursuit was just and had rallied a large number of foes for the Eternal Throne; a detail of the war that Arcann could not seem to forget, even though the Jedi had killed Valkorion. It wasn't revenge that fueled Arcann's insane obsession with the Outlander, no – it was pure hatred, and fear, of losing the Throne. Ha'el saw it in his eye, and it almost reflected off his cybernetic mask every time the Outlander's name was spoken.
The Knight escorted her into the hangar, where the doors banged open loudly in place, signaling her arrival. A battalion prepped in various sections across the deck, checking their armaments and resolve, eyeing carefully the Empress Consort, His Majesty's Eternal Grace, Commander of Zakuulan Knight forces; Ha'el Soave. Of course she was a daunting figure in her warring dress, complete with armor and a lightsaber, as well as a blaster and the royal crest - she was not to be taken lightly, and her ranks knew it. She focused her gaze from the ranks, instead cemented ahead on the ramp to the observation deck beneath the control tower.
Her gown was heavy as she followed the Knight up the ramp, to where she spotted Arcann, looking out tohis fold of Skytroopers and loyal Knights. His hands were folded behind his back and his chin was raised, and light reflected off his cybernetic arm. She alerted him to her presence through the Force, which he recognized with a slight glance over his shoulder.
The Knight veered off, bowed silently, and left them on the deck to join the battalion. Arcann turned to face her, his chin raised, and she dipped low into the traditional – and required – bow. Her gown, a traditional Zakuulan warring dress, was heavy on her body, but she ignored the pulling material. After a few moments, she could sense Arcann's approval, and looked up to find the unscarred half of his face slightly upturned into a rare, approving smirk.
He turned away from her to study the ranks below, the coldness of the action passing her by out of habit. She rose and approached carefully, reading the Force for any signs of uneasiness or unpredictability from her husband. When she sensed nothing besides the ever-present simmering hatred and anger, she came up behind him and slowly wrapped her arms around his middle, carefully, as she had many times before.
He bristled; the action foreign and rare. She swallowed back a nervous quake that threatened to steal her courage as she rested her head against his shoulder. As usual, Arcann smelled terrifically of oils, incense, and machinery. The lingering effects of perspiration were evident between his shoulders, and when she moved her hands down carefully, she could still feel the warmth from his lightsaber radiating from the chamber – he'd been sparring, again. She closed her eyes; remembering the times so long ago that these moments were tender and sweet, instead of so cold and…fearful.
He didn't move beneath her touch, instead he took her wrist in his hand strongly and guided her around to stand beside him. She didn't remove her other hand from him, though, content to let her fingertips trace along the silken white of his usual robes; exploring the finely chiseled finesse of his arms and shoulders. Arcann, however, stared dead ahead; his usual expressionless features focused on the activity of the hangar in observational command.
His arm suddenly lifted, and he pressed his true hand against the small of her back. Ha'el had tried not to gasp – Arcann had not touched her so intimately in so log a time that it almost scared her. However, she tried not to buckle in the Force, and ducked in quickly to kiss the unmasked half of his lips. This signaled his attention, and he looked down at her, the glowing yellow of his eyes not so intense with as much hatred as usual.
"You called for me," she insinuated, looking out among the ranks. "I assume you are leaving to lead the battalion?"
He shook his head, no. "No, not yet. I simply desired your presence," was the reply.
She was required to need nothing more than that as an answer, and nodded her understanding. A part of her – a part that had slipped into a quiet stasis so long ago – flickered to life, as if sparked gently by an ember and stirred from the recesses of dark grief. She pressed closer to him, her chest constricting tightly, and rested her head against his shoulder. He made no motion to move away from her, but also did not draw her closer.
Something stirred her in the Force, something that was not familiar. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, content for just a moment to reside beside the Arcann she had known and married when she had been young, and time had been different. It was a pleasantness that was so foreign that Ha'el had forgotten what it was – it was contentment. She was content here, with Arcann, watching their troops mobilize for an assault on Odessen. She knew that shortly, they would both be called away to lead the charge against the Outlander and his Alliance, and that once again hate and rage would lace her veins and cloud her mind. The adrenaline of blood would cloud this moment over, and it would be forgotten if she were not careful.
He stepped away from her suddenly, his hand lingering in her own only by fingertips. She corrected her equilibrium to keep from falling, and turned to face him. His eye flecked with something that looked almost like a youthful sparkle, and he guided her away from the railing of the balcony and back towards the exit of the hangar. She followed him casually, as she always did, through the ship. Arcann was silent, until finally they arrived at their quarters on the third deck.
He punched the control panel, and the doors retracted, to where he led her inside. An excited worry brewed within her veins like she had not known for some time. With the Force he closed the doors, locked the controls, and killed the lights, almost frying the panel. He guided her carefully to him, saying nothing, instead fiercely studying her behind his cybernetics that she knew betrayed his true expression. They glowed yellow, as did his eyes, and the cold of his cybernetic arm brushed against her hand.
She became unsure, and slightly afraid. Arcann had not been so forward with his affections for some time, now. Perhaps it was Vaylin's absence that stirred his arousal and interest in her – usually when his sister was around; his rage doubled and was unmatched. But, Vaylin was indisposed with the Fleet on Zakuul, overseeing the GEMINI's, and would not be bothered until the strike on Odessen had commenced. Ha'el couldn't remembered a time Vaylin had been away from her brother's side in the past year and half since they'd been dealing with the Outlander.
She was shaking and didn't realize it until Arcann lifted her hand and gently rested it in his palm.
"You're afraid of me," he said sternly, in his commanding tone.
She shook her head. "No," she clarified, "I am…confused," she dropped her gaze away from him and looked off somewhere on the floor – anywhere was safer than looking into the face she remembered from their first night together. They were both so different now, compared to then, that it was almost suffocating. Too different, and too distant.
In a swift tug, he crushed her against his body, and she squeaked in surprise. A proper Empress Consort; the Eternal Grace, Beauty of the Eternal Throne should not have been so weakly surprised by his actions – it should have been expected. As his leading lady, she should have been prepared for this anywhere, in any moment of any given day. But, time had dulled her emotions and her senses, and lack of affection had muted her to his advances and paralyzed her to touch.
She locked eyes with him, and swallowed a shaky breath.
"You lie to me, Ha'el," He pinned her with a knowing stare; "You're trembling."
She ducked her head in shame. "I know."
After a moment, he placed his true hand beneath her chin and raised it to look up at him. She was unaware that tears had risen in her eyes, and she furiously tried to beat them back with her lashes. However, she wasn't quick enough, and one escaped to trace a crooked pathway down her cheek. She sniffled, turned her face away from him, and reached up to dry her tear.
He stopped her, grabbed her wrist with his cybernetic hand, and did the act himself. Then, oddly enough, his head tipped to the side and she made out what she thought was a concerned wrinkle in his brow.
"I have been this cruel to you, haven't I?"
Her head snapped up and her eyes widened at his declaration – she shook her head, no. She couldn't let him think such things and risk the guilt and shame that would haunt her. As his wife, and Empress Consort of the Eternal Throne, her job was to uplift him and see that he was content and satisfied in every area of his reign. She had lived to serve him as a child, and lived to serve him as his Empress, now.
"No," she shook her head again, "you haven't been cruel –"
He nodded, "Yes I have," before his hand dropped from her chin and he stepped away from her to begin the process of removing his mask. She watched with muted amazement as he went through the disconnect, her stomach lurching as he stifled the grunts and groans of pain she knew the process inflicted. Only once had he ever removed the mask, and it had been a grotesquely painful affair.
However, he discarded the cybernetic as if it were flimsi, and tossed it on the table beside them. She tried not to stare at the healed scars marring the left side of his face, but it was nearly impossible. The beautiful face she had once known had been taken prematurely from her; instead now she was subject to the stoic and expressionless mask of a cybernetic machine that hid the one man she had every truly loved from her. And that, she was certain, was a large part of the distance that had grown between them.
"I have been distant from you, Ha'el," he said calmly, approaching her slowly. She swallowed again, her eyes brimming with tears she knew she would never be able to stop. Her stomach was in her chest, and every nerve simmered with fire that had long been extinguished. She felt like she would throw up in his presence, as he pinned her with a look she had forgotten Arcann had possessed– it was the same look he had given her the night they had been married; of pure admiration and love, something she had questioned was still in his veins.
"I have been distant, and cruel to you for something that is beyond your control. My hatred towards the Outlander's Alliance had hardened me to your presence." He paused and stopped directly in front of her, resting his hand against her cheek. It was warm, and true, and she closed her eyes and gently nuzzled her cheek into it.
"And that is a travesty I never intended."
She nodded, "Arcann, I –"
He shook his head. "I never should have blamed you for Thexan's death," he paused briefly, "or the loss of our son."
Her head hung again, and she moved her head away from his touch. "If I had been stronger, I could've saved him –"
"No," he said with concerned strength, "it was what was to be. By no fault of either of ours." Arcann took her hand and pulled her gently to him, then guided her to the large bed directly positioned in the middle of the sterile quarters. He guided her to sit, then stood directly in front of her.
Carefully he began removing artifacts of her clothing – her outer armor, her chest-piece and bracers, the crown, her lightsaber holster – and discarded them to the floor at his feet. Then he loosened the braid from her hair and fanned it across her shoulders, and worked the first clasp of her gown loose. It fell over her shoulder, revealing her wraps and armor beneath. She looked away, stoically, to a place on the ground.
"I have forced you to shoulder that burden of guilt," he commanded her attention, and she looked up at him standing before her, "and I am sorry. I should not let my anger and drive for victory pull us apart. You are my Empress."
She inhaled sharply, locking gazes with him. "And you are the Emperor. Nothing is more important than the Throne, Arcann. You cannot expect to –"
With a gentle shove to her shoulder, he forced her back onto the mattress. She relinquished, and he knelt beside her on the bed, beginning to remove the articles of his royal robe and lightsaber to the floor around them. Soon, he was kneeling above her, half clothed, exposing the strength and marring scars of his reign and path to glory before her very eyes. He exuded strength like a sun, and she had to revel in his presence; eyes wandering over him as if he was new territory she had never seen. She began to cry this time, sniffling while splayed across the mattress like a child.
Something rumbled in his chest. "As you have said – I am the Emperor. I expect anything that I desire, and what I desire is you, Ha'el – right here, and right now, in this moment." She sucked in a gasp at his forwardness, and her stomach spiraled down into her toes.
He bent, and pressed his lips against the nape of her neck; the mixture of marred and smooth flesh odd against her skin. Arcann had never kissed her without the mask. He had never touched her without its safety, and now she doubted she would ever want anything else again. His hand gently traced up her arm; fingertips electrifying her skin with heightened awareness and pleasure. Her back arched and she writhed against the mattress, trying to contain the sigh of relief that flooded out of her lungs.
And within a matter of moments she was gone into an abyss long since unknown; he was over her, supporting himself on his arms, and her arms were wrapped around him securely as they had been many nights before. He kissed her delicately, he kissed her strongly, and he kissed her passionately like he never had since the war had heightened. He held her like he had in gardens before their lives had been complicated with war and power, and he sang her to like he had in their youth.
And for awhile, he was the Arcann she remembered in the night; and she was the girl he had married in the shadow of the Throne.