His face was human and his hands were empty. When she saw him he was already streaking towards her, his long legs eating up the distance between them. She turned to run, knowing it would madden both of them. She stayed just out of reach, only far enough away to tantalize both of them. Then he lunged for her, knocking her to the forest floor and trapping her beneath him. Sliding up her body so that she felt every tense, hard inch of him, pressing her into the ground and raking his teeth against the curve of her neck as he began to drag her skirt up. She reached down and pushed his hand away.

She could pull it up faster herself.


They were getting worse.

She accepted, now, in the privacy of her hut, that he'd been the subject of her earlier dreams. She'd thought he represented danger. But the dreams weren't dangerous any longer. They were merely tempting.

No, that wasn't true; they were still dangerous.

Just in an entirely different way.


Kylo Ren stared at the ceiling of his shuttle. He couldn't lie to himself and say Rey's dreams were unwelcome, but they were becoming increasingly intense. He had no chance of getting back to sleep after that.

Did they affect her the same way? Was she lying in her hermit's den thinking about him?

He was foolish to have come to Ahch-To. After everything he'd done—everything that had been done to him—he was still reaching for something he couldn't name, still nursing a traitorous light against his heart. He felt it in her, glowing like a sun, devastating and purifying. He wanted her like he once wanted power, even as he feared her light. He had no right to be here, no right to want her.

Yet he couldn't bring himself to leave.

He'd only seen her in daylight once, on Takodana. She had been bright and strong and without regret, everything he'd never been. He'd been drawn to her with painful intensity.

Now he was visiting her only under the cover of night, a creature who didn't deserve the sun. He'd been in the shadows for so long he didn't know if he could emerge from them if he wanted.

In the shadows he didn't have to hide; they welcomed him. All his life, they were the only things that wanted him. He'd been ignored, humored, and finally shunted aside, and the shadows that had been lurking at the edges his entire life had moved forward and engulfed him.

He wanted love. He wanted acceptance, he hungered for it. He knew he was supposed to find that with his family. He knew, somewhere in him, that they loved him, Leia and Han Solo and maybe even Luke Skywalker. Yet the more desperately he needed that love the more it seemed to slip away, the more he seemed met with disappointment and puzzlement, until it felt like he was met only with dismissal.

He remembered, sometimes, that it hadn't always been like that, not really. Not when he was fully conscious: He willed those thoughts away as if they dripped poison. But sometimes, in the dreamspace between sleep and waking, he felt warm, and safe, and loved. He felt his mother stroke his hair, felt Han Solo toss him in the air and try to coax a laugh. Remembered Chewbacca carrying him on his shoulders while ululating soothingly. Felt those things as if they were happening, as if he had his entire life before him and nothing to fear or regret, although he'd known fear and regret and anger as long as he could remember.

Then he'd open his eyes and find he was in his quarters, sterile and underheated, and remembered that he loved no one and nobody loved him. Snoke had seen to that.

Kylo had seen to that.

It was ironic, really. His mother had sent him away to Luke Skywalker to learn. But he had never wanted to be a Jedi. Swathed in serenity, like a crystal vase wrapped in tissue? No emotions? No love? That was madness. It was like choosing to amputate a healthy limb.

And yet Han Solo had gone off on his adventures, and his mother had sent him to Luke, and Luke had taught him kindly but distantly, as if he were any student and not his nephew. And finally Kylo could see the benefit to not feeling love, which was not feeling its lack.

He knew he could never relinquish all emotions. He vibrated with them; they burst out uncontrollably. He wondered that he kept them as contained as he did. Telling him to stop having the feelings had been doomed from the start. He could no more extinguish them than he could stop breathing.

But he'd lived without love for years now, and the place that it had once filled ached in its emptiness.

He was fooling himself if he thought she'd ever willingly share his life. The Force bond was an accident, an exquisitely cruel accident. A curse, not a blessing. She would never regard him as anything but an enemy. And why not? He had invaded her mind. Held her against her will. Knocked her unconscious against a tree and then fought her for supremacy. When he'd been unable to suppress his admiration for her and entreated her to join him, she had been disgusted.

And being here with her now, his feelings were only more intense. The first night he'd thought, naively, that she'd be more receptive; surely the dreams were affecting her as powerfully as they were him. And he wasn't fool enough to think they weren't reflecting anything that hadn't already been there. But she would have none of his mastery, the only thing that had ever brought him victory. She was proud and independent, a queen indeed.

She had hated his mask right from the first. She would have him bereft of shield as well. It had been years since he had approached others without a display of dominance, yet he knew he had no choice. Not with her.

He was unmoored, and she his only beacon.

He turned over, gripping the pillow tightly.

He shouldn't have come to Ahch-To.


She was waiting for him the next night, sitting at the same spot as the night before.

This time he didn't wait for an invitation, simply sinking down beside her. He bit down on the reflex to make a provoking comment, a custom of such longstanding he felt almost rude not observing it.

For her he would lay down his defenses.

"I hate this," she said, eyes straight ahead.

Kylo didn't respond. He couldn't be certain what she was talking about, not entirely. There were so many things to hate. But every moment near each other and every word passed between them increased their sensitivity to each other. Her independence, her devotion to those she cared about, her painful integrity; they were all becoming as familiar to him as the feel of his mask. He wondered what she was recognizing in him in turn.

"I just want—"

"To belong," he said, not thinking, and knew he was right.

"Yes." She turned to look at him. "Did you pull that out of my mind?"

"No. That's just what we all want." Belonging. Not with everyone.

Just with someone.

"Even you?"

His laugh was low, bitter. "Especially me."

"Do you belong where you are now? The First Order? The dark side?"

He hesitated. Opened his mouth to answer. Shut it finally, staring into the night.

She waited a long time before she started to worry. He seemed so lost. Younger than she'd realized. Younger than he actually was.

Finally he looked back at her. "I thought I did."

"But not anymore?"

He didn't answer, and she didn't press him.

The sea mist thickened until it wasn't mist and her cloak wasn't doing its job. Rey stood up. "I'm going in."

Kylo clambered to his feet. He turned his face away quickly so she wouldn't read his expression, but she could feel his disappointment.

"Come in."

His head jerked around, and he stared at her in disbelief.

"It's warm in there … comparatively. And dry. Comparatively."

His ship was completely warm and completely dry, but he had no desire to return to it. "All right."

He followed her into her little hut, straining his eyes to catch the details while she knelt by the fireplace and kindled a small blaze. The place was tiny, barely larger than one of the Finalizer's lifts. A pallet on the floor, a small chest. A single stool beside the chest—presumably it also served as a table, when needed.

He didn't want to take her stool, and he doubted she'd appreciate him sitting on her pallet, so he waited for her. She shook out her cloak and draped it over the chest, then held her hand out. For a moment he just stared, uncomprehending, until she waved her hand imperiously. She was taking his cloak. Like this was a normal visit. Like he was a normal person.

His brain tried to recalibrate itself even as he handed over the coal-dark garment, watching as she fanned it open and draped it over her own. Seeing the blackness cover the gray wrap made him feel a little uncomfortable for some reason, and he looked away.

When he turned back she was sitting in front of the fire, easing her boots off and allowing her feet to warm. They were the most absurdly dainty things he'd ever seen, and he had an insane urge to cup his hands around them and warm them himself.

"You can take yours off. If you want," she added as he sank down beside her. She felt a little self-conscious about taking off her boots in front of him, but she was not going settle down in her hut on a rainy evening without warming her feet by the fire. That was ridiculous.

He hesitated and finally decided he'd waited too long to take them off. It would look strange if he did it now. He stretched his feet out to the fire, though, and cringed when he saw how huge his booted feet looked compared to her bare ones.

She noticed the contrast as well and smiled, and he felt himself relax a bit.

"Have you ever been happy?"

He tensed, but he could see nothing but curiosity on her face. "I don't know," he said after a long moment. "I don't remember being happy. I've felt satisfaction when I've done something well. Learned something. I don't know about happiness."

"Even when you were little?"

"I remember … I don't remember being happy. I remember remembering being happy. It's too far away to remember the feeling any more. I just remember thinking of it sometime later. Like watching a holo of me being happy rather than actually remembering it."

"Do you ever think that you were made wrong?"

"Every day."

"Like everyone else has something that you don't? Some quality that made them whole and normal and lovable. And you were just born without it."

"You don't believe that." She couldn't, surely. Not when FN-2187 and Han Solo and the Wookiee had cared about her enough to invade Starkiller Base to save her and the former trooper had taken up arms to protect her.

The sadness on her face shook him, and he remembered, with a stab, the loneliness he'd felt in her. "My family left me on Jakku when I was little. They told me they'd come back for me—maybe they thought I'd stop screaming if they said that. I waited for 15 years. That's how much I wanted to believe that they weren't just getting rid of me. I waiting all those years for them because if I didn't, that would mean they looked at their lives without me and thought about their lives with me and decided they preferred it without me. And I didn't want to believe that, so I stayed. If BB-8 hadn't needed my help I'd still be there, scrubbing junk and checking the horizon."

As much as he'd taunted her by calling her scavenger, he couldn't imagine her trapped on that useless mound of sand and detritus. It was obscene for someone of her power and radiance to be restricted to a life so small and meaningless.

Yet after being released from that trap she opted to remain on this isolated rock and pattern herself after a man who was also powerful and radiant, but had chosen oblivion over life. Nothing made sense.

"Maybe we are missing something," he admitted, rubbing his face. "Maybe we got the Force to take its place."

She looked at him in surprise. Kylo, Luke, Leia, apparently—they were the only Force users she knew. Were they all actually lame creatures made whole with a supernatural ability? "Master Luke and General Organa aren't—they aren't like us," she said finally. They seemed more finished, somehow. Whole.

"Yes, they are. They just show it in different ways. My mother can't bring herself to do anything but fight against whatever monolith she can find. And Luke has buried himself at the end of the galaxy and tried like hell to make sure no one could find him."

"What about Snoke?"

Kylo went still. "He isn't like anyone. His body's just a shell that his power inhabits. Whatever humanity he had was shed long ago."

"Was that what you were trying to do? Shed your humanity?"

"Not my humanity. I told you, I never wanted to get rid of my emotions. But I tried to shed the light side. It didn't work. I've ignored it and starved it and done everything I could do to excise it."

"Are you still trying?"

"No, it doesn't work," he sighed, rubbing his face. The list of things he'd done to make himself whole was long and disheartening. On the walkway at Starkiller, he'd been so desperate. Surely that would complete him, push him over the edge. And yet instead of coming closer, the edge had careened away from view as soon as he'd done it. It was distant and no longer inviting. "I can't get rid of it, nothing works. It's part of me. I've stopped fighting it. I just want to become whole."

She probed at his mind, delicately, delicately. She could feel the truth of his words, and how tired he was. "What's the first thing you remember? As a child?"

"Wanting."

"Wanting what?"

"I don't remember. Just feeling upset at something I didn't have, and longing for it. Missing it like it was part of me."

She didn't realize she'd put her hand on Kylo's until he flinched. She started to pull it back, but he turned his hand over and seized hers, tightly grasping it for a moment before loosening his grip.

"What about you?"

"Being left on Jakku. Begging them not to leave me, and them going anyway."

He failed to stop his hand from tightening on hers. It was so like how he'd been left with Luke that he half suspected she'd pulled it from her mind. "Is that your only memory of your family?"

She nodded.

You're lucky was on his tongue, but he forced himself not to say it. He could feel the bile that rose every time he thought of his childhood and fought it down. Beneath it was a bittersweet longing that stung more deeply than rage.

"Have you ever seen a wolf?"

He blinked. "What? In real life?"

"Umm-hmm."

"No. Only in holos."

"What kind of holos?"

"Fairy stories, mostly. Folk tales. Force training doesn't include a lot of zoology."

She felt a stab of envy. She could imagine him as a child curled up on General Organa's lap as she stroked his hair and read him stories filled with magical creatures. She didn't know how he couldn't remember the happiness in those moments, remember it and hold it close.

"I never heard any fairy stories. What were they like?"

"Stupid. Full of things that weren't possible, with improbable happy endings. Always happy. They made real life feel like a disappointment. In fairy stories everything works out. In real life things fall apart. People can only ever let you down. And you—you let them down as well, even when you think you're doing what's right. In a fairy tale I wouldn't have thrown my life away. I wouldn't have tied myself to Snoke. I wouldn't have broken my mother's heart. But life isn't a fairy tale. Life is dirty and hopeless and permanent."

She absorbed that in silence, unsure whether she should offer some reassurance. What could she say? He wasn't wrong. Nothing he said was wrong.

She winced a little at her own cynicism. There was more, she knew. There were people like Finn, who'd risked his own life to help her. There was—there was—

Her optimistic impulse failed. She hadn't been out in the galaxy enough to know more. She'd left on her mission to retrieve Luke Skywalker only a couple of days after landing on D'Qar with Finn and Chewbacca. She'd traded the desperation of Jakku for the desolation of Ahch-To so quickly her time with Finn and BB-8 seemed like a dream. The possibilities of the galaxy were as remote as they'd ever been.

"There are wolves on Jakku, aren't there?"

She turned and looked at him, her eyes somber. "Luke asked me about them a few days ago. That's why I started dreaming about them. Or you, I guess."

"What did you tell him?"

"Lies."

He looked taken aback, and a ghost of a smile touched her lips.

"I told him about a girl I tried to help. Her mother had died and she didn't have anyone, and she was weaker than the other kids. I felt sorry for her. I told her she could live with me."

"And you made it up?"

"No, that was the truth. But I told him she took a walk after dinner one night and that I didn't go because I was tired. That's not why I didn't go. That's what I told her the first time she asked. I was trying to be kind. I'd been alone for years, and she loved to talk. I thought it would be nice, and it was for a while, but she couldn't stop talking, not for a minute. So I told her I was tired, but she kept pestering me. Finally I told her that she never shut up and I'd go crazy if I had to listen to her for one more minute. She looked like I'd hit her with my staff. She started to cry and ran off, and I was so mad I didn't go after her. I didn't even think about the wolves until the next morning, when I realized she hadn't come back."

His voice was rough. "That wasn't your fault."

"Yes, it was," she said simply. She was surprised at how steady her voice was, how she could accept this with Kylo Ren and not Master Luke. "I don't understand now how I could have been so cruel, but I can't go back and do anything about it. I had to be hard on Jakku. I didn't have a choice. I had to let anger and selfishness and even spite fuel me, because sometimes they were the only things I had."

"The only emotions that didn't hurt," murmured Kylo, nodding.

"If I hadn't had them I would have been just like her. I don't want to be an angry person. I don't want to be selfish. But I can't pretend they're not an important part of me. They kept me alive. I had them before I had the Force. If the Force ever leaves me, if I have nothing and nobody, I know what will see me through."

Acid burned in his mouth. "I understand."

She turned to look at him. She had no idea how he'd react, but she couldn't stop herself from asking. "Why did you—" How did you ask someone why they turned from everyone they knew and committed themselves to the dark side? "Why do you follow Darth Vader's ways?"

She waited, half holding her breath, but he didn't answer. The silence stretched until it became overbearing, and finally she tried to ease its weight. "I never realized an ocean could be so—"

"Nothing else made sense."

She fell silent, reproaching herself for asking him something so private. Something she knew curled right around his soul.

"He spoke to me," Kylo said, his voice hushed. "When Han Solo was off on his adventures and my mother had sent me away, he stayed with me. He was the only one who did. When he began talking about the dark side, I thought he was trying to help me. That everyone else was just giving me empty platitudes, and he was the only one who cared enough to tell me the truth."

She wondered what she'd do if the dead sought her out. Even on this island steeped in Jedi lore, she'd heard nothing. "What does he say now?"

"He hasn't spoken to me since I left Luke Skywalker. I've tried. Even on Starkiller Base, I would pay homage to my grandfather and ask for his guidance, but he's been silent."

Rey frowned. "Why would he suddenly stop talking to you?"

Kylo's expression darkened. "There's no reason why he would. Not if it were him."

"What—you mean—"

"The Supreme Leader is very skilled in mental manipulation. He's the one who taught me. It wouldn't have been difficult for him, especially not with a foolish child desperate for someone to pay attention to him."

Rey felt anger spike inside her, his and her own. The self-hatred lacing Kylo's anger made the back of her eyes ache, but she forced down both the anger and the pity. Snoke had targeted Kylo when he was just a boy, haunting him—lying to him. Why hadn't Luke stopped him? Why hadn't Han and Leia protected him?

"He told me to bring you to him, you know that? Back on Starkiller. He said he was going to show me the dark side."

For a moment she forgot how to breathe, her blood turning to sludge inside her veins. "You—when you said you wanted to teach me—"

"No," he absently, facing the fire, his eyes distant. "I had some vague plan to steal a shuttle, and we'd lose ourselves in the rush off base. I'd never take you to him."

He jumped when her warm hand touched his chin, turning him to face her. He hadn't had regular physical contact since he was a child, and the fact that it was actually happening in real life instead of just his head dazzled him. That it was Rey doing so…

She reached up with her other hand now, cupping his face, leaning towards him. He realized what she was going to do and froze. For a moment panic gripped him and he fought a mindless urge to leap back, forcing himself to remain still as she gently brushed her lips against his.

His lips trembled beneath hers. He didn't pull away, and after a moment his eyelids slid shut.

It had been an impulse borne of gratitude, not much more than a gesture, but his longing awoke her own wistfulness. Instead of pulling back she pressed soft kisses along the fullness of his lower lip, drawing them along to the corner of his mouth.

He reached up and pushed one hand behind her neck, holding her to him. She pulled back just enough to see his eyes open, slumberous, before drifting shut again, and she leaned towards him. She didn't have much experience at this sort of thing—really, she only had experience of sleazy men trying things that got them knocked to the ground—but she'd seen things. Imagined things.

Dreamed things.

Shyly she nudged her tongue against his lips. His hand tightened against her neck, and he parted his lips on a soft breath. She pushed into his mouth carefully, not sure if she was doing it right, and he met her tongue with his own, stroking it along hers until she gasped into his mouth. He sucked at her tongue and she jerked back, panting.

He stared at her, transfixed, before forcing himself to drag his eyes from her and stand up. "I should go," he said, getting his cloak and starting towards the door, such as it was—a plank of wood covered with oilcloth.

She got up and followed him. "It's raining."

He shook his head. "I've been out in worse," he said, opening the door.

"You don't have to be," she told him, not looking at him as she tugged him back from the door and wedged it shut. She pulled a blanket from the foot of the pallet and spread it between the pallet and the fire, then draped another on top of it.

She sat on her pallet and released her hair from its buns, then crawled under the covers still in her clothes. She had some loose clothes she'd been given at the infirmary on D'Qar that she normally slept in, but she wasn't going to change into them in front of him. It was enough that she'd suggested he stay the night. More than enough. It was insane.

It was even more insane that she'd almost asked him to share her pallet. Not to continue what they'd been doing, merely to hold each other. Her desire to be close to him was both sharp and aching, an old injury covered by a fresh burn.

Rey curled on up on her side with a determinedly casual expression and waited for him to settle down as well—or leave. She didn't know what she was thinking, and she pushed any possibilities out of her mind before it could gain hold.

Kylo stood by the door for a long time before turning around. He laid his cloak back on the chest, then removed his cowl and pulled out his lightsaber, setting them on the chest as well. He pulled off his boots and placed them against the wall before approaching the pile of blankets. He felt overdressed, but also like one or both of them might bolt if he removed anything else.

It was absurd, really. He'd been so open with her, so unguarded, that the thought of removing his surcoat shouldn't have concerned him. He'd certainly be more comfortable without it. But the kiss—that unimaginable kiss—had made him sharply aware of things he couldn't quite put a name to, but didn't wish to disturb.

Even eschewing his typical forcefulness, he had begun to feel relaxed rather than vulnerable. So rare a sensation for him, yet it had felt natural with her. Perhaps this other tenseness would pass as well, for both of them.

He wouldn't delude himself about where it could lead. The kiss had been so unexpected, so devastating. He would hold it in his mind and not allow himself to long for more.

But as much as he tried, his mind was a traitor.

"You can pull one of them over you," she suggested when he settled down atop the layers of blankets.

"I'm okay."

"What happened to your belt?''

"It had a tracker in it. I left it on the base before I came to you."

"So they wouldn't…?"

"Umm-hmm."

"What about your ship? Doesn't that have a tracking system?"

"I took care of it. They think I'm somewhere in the Outer Rim."

"Hunting me?"

"Looking for books."

"Books?"

He smiled, just a little. "The Knights of Ren spend more time studying than you might assume."

"You and Luke have a lot in common."

She was surprised when he merely shrugged. "In some ways."

"Were you really going to teach me?"

He turned on his side so he could face her. "Yes. I told you, I've never lied to you, Rey."

"Have you ever thought of leaving him?"

He was quiet for a long time. "Sometimes I've wanted to. But I've done too much. There's no place I can go. I had a chance, but I was too—too—"

She knew what he was talking about, and for the first time anger didn't flare in her to think of it. It was a tragedy. But it was his tragedy, not hers. "It's okay," she said softly. He didn't have to finish.

"No, it's not okay. I let him—I let him in. I tried to empty everything in me that was me, and let him fill it, and then I'd be strong and important. My parents weren't good parents, but they—something was wrong with me. It wasn't just Snoke. If it was just him I should have been able to resist him. My father was right. I was never normal."

She reached out and touched his cheek, and he shuddered. "You can't be anyone else. But you don't have to be with Snoke."

He covered her hand with his and shut his eyes. After several minutes his hold slackened, but she didn't move her hand. As sleep overtook her she wondered what Luke would say if he could see them. What he'd say if she told him that the light inside his nephew still glowed.


He didn't run towards her. His walk was measured, deliberate. She felt the weight of his gaze on her, noted the faint, predatory smile curving his lips.

She leaned against a tree, savoring the moments of anticipation before he reached her.

His expression was arrogant, that of a man certain of his victory. He stopped before her and stood there looking at her, his gaze licking up and down. Neither made a move towards the other, and his smile grew, mockingly.

She slapped him, hard, and he didn't recoil, eagerness in his face. His raised his hands to grasp at her, but before he could she grabbed his face in both hands, dragging him down to her level and biting at his lips, marking them as hers and then covering the redness with heated kisses. He gasped into her mouth and she drew in his excitement, pushing him to the leaf-strewn ground. She followed him down and took her proper place above him.

He could never conquer her. He could only recognize her, and revel in his own conquest.


The first thing she was aware of was a deep, muttered exclamation. She opened her eyes in time to see the door to her hut swinging shut, and realized she was now alone.