Author's Notes: Thank you again for reading, and I do hope you enjoy this tale. This chapter takes on a bit of a lighter tone, as the pirate captain is lightly inspired by the character "Esmeralda Maria Consuela Anna de Sevilla" from A.C. Crispin's Pirates of the Caribbean novel, "The Price of Freedom."
As always, I hope I have captured the spirit of Assassin's Creed and Star Wars, and that I have done justice to weave an enchanting fairy tale with these worlds.
Disclaimer: I make no money from this hobby, but I don't let that discourage my imagination.
Chapter 6 – The Pirate Den
Sweet Halcyon
Outer Rim Asteroid Belt
Gavan looked over to the observation chair in the cockpit and felt a small wave of relief that Kaelyn had opted to sit with him while they drifted through the veiled pathway in the asteroid field. He had told her that they needed to make a small supply run to replenish his food stock and that he had a friend amongst the pirates here who would help them. They were still skirting the Outer Rim, hiding amongst the planets where the Imperials had opted to avoid. There was more of a risk for smuggling and pirate traffic in this region, but Gavan had made contact privately with the one pirate he had known for a number of years. Edee Nekyaw had promised safe passage for him and that she would be more than willing to replenish his supplies from the warehouse where she kept her Imperial-raided stash.
Following the route that Edee had provided to him, Gavan maneuvered Sweet Halcyon through an outer band of physical asteroids. Once the ship was safely within the two-mile stretch of broken planet, the rest of the route required navigation from the coordinates that Edee had supplied to him long ago. Edee had employed a very shrewd strategist who covered the path to her hidden den with holographic asteroids that shifted in a natural rhythm with the physical ones. Only by following the holographs could a ship move through safely. Any other path that was attempted usually resulted in the debris of ships that floated by Sweet Halcyon.
There was a silence between Gavan and Kaelyn as he maneuvered the ship, and he suspected it was because she didn't want to distract his concentration. Gavan decided not to tell her he was more than familiar with the route, and as Sweet Halcyon scaled an asteroid the size of a Star Destroyer, the viewport suddenly opened up to the underside of the enormous rock. Slowly pushing on the lever for forward momentum, Gavan guided the ship into the crevice that was only about two ship sizes larger than Sweet Halcyon. At the end of the opening was a magnetic shield that had sealed down the base of operations where Edee was stationed.
Maintaining his coordinates, he followed the instructions he was given to land within the magnetic shield in a dock that was currently housing only about half of Edee's normal fleet. Bringing Sweet Halcyon to a soft landing, he shut down the engines and saw a handful of Edee's crew moving towards his ship with Edee making her way towards the front of the group.
Kaelyn finally took in a full breath once they had landed on solid ground. She couldn't believe that nearly two weeks ago she had been running from her home, only imagining what kinds of wonders the galaxy offered. In this time, she had seen hyperspace travel, a moon that had more life than the planet it orbited, stars that were nowhere near her night sky, and now she could add traveling through an asteroid belt to that list. Even more astounding was that she could also say that she was actually inside an asteroid. The guilt of her Imperial past was finally receding, and she was able to again feel a sense of ease and wonder, allowing her to enjoy the marvels she only dreamed existed.
Aware of Gavan leaving the cockpit, Kaelyn followed closely behind him and steadied herself as they moved down the ramp and into the artificial atmosphere of the asteroid.
The woman that they saw amongst the group from the cockpit viewport was now at the front of the small ensemble. Each of the three men and two women around her had a hand ready near their weapons, but the woman motioned for them to relax and stay back with one simple hand gesture.
Gavan smiled as he saw that Edee had not changed one bit in the years since he had last been in her company. His calculations had her now nearing her fifty-sixth year, and she had somehow maintained her exotic beauty. The pirate had dark skin that required no cosmetics, as she had only minimal wrinkles near her eyes – most likely from her ability to smile as easily as she did. Her face was heart-shaped with the placement of her dark, wide eyes giving her a young appearance. Her long, once-black hair had faded to gray and was braided in an intricate design at the back of her head, with the strands falling in thick curls down the rest of her back. She wore a layer of light tan and red beneath a deep, scarlet-colored long coat, and a thick belt at her waist was wrapped snugly around her where the holster housed her large blaster. The remainder of her weapons were hidden, much like Gavan had been accustomed to doing.
"You look good, Gavan," Edee commented as she moved to within arm's length of him.
"And, you always do," he replied with a smile.
Then, Edee took Gavan in an embrace that confused Kaelyn. She had assumed at first that maybe they were former lovers, but the hug was much more indicative to one shared between a mother and a child. However, there were no such physical features or characteristics shared between either, and Kaelyn started to wonder if Edee had adopted Gavan during his childhood. When they broke their embrace, something passed between them, but neither shared it with her.
"This is Kaelyn," Gavan said, indicating her with a sweep of his hand.
Edee stepped forward and offered her hand to which Kaelyn shook uncertainly. Of course, she knew that she would not receive the same kind of personal greeting as someone with whom Edee obviously had a history, but she felt awkward about it because Gavan had offered no detailed information about his personal relationship to Edee with her. It took her off-guard, and she felt as though any grace she had ever been taught in her life was erased, leaving her as the uncoordinated young woman that she was in Torace's presence.
"Thank you for having us," Kaelyn offered, trying to think of something to say to this woman who was entirely out of any league Kaelyn could ever expect to know while in her secluded existence.
"I trust Gavan with my life," Edee told her, breaking her grasp on Kaelyn's hand and maintaining her bright smile. "And, I offer you both my hospitality. Whatever you need, it will be provided. Now, let's get you two settled into some accommodations. We're having roasted nerf-steak tonight, compliments of the Empire."
Kaelyn bristled for a moment as she and Gavan followed behind Edee. Unable to stop herself, she asked shyly, "The Empire?"
Edee didn't slow her pace as she led them into her den, laughing at a joke that only she understood. Her melodic laugh was entirely not what Kaelyn would have expected for having asked her question, but it seemed entirely in character for this mysterious woman who knew the even more mysterious Gavan.
"Any pirate can plunder from a merchant," Edee said proudly, "But it takes a really keen one to know how to do it from the Empire. You'll find no love of that self-absorbed regime in this base. If you've got sympathies for the Empire, I've got an airlock that needs testing."
"Kaelyn has had some negative experiences with the Empire, Edee," Gavan explained, aware of Kaelyn displaying both confusion and a decent amount of fear in her eyes. "She's still a bit uneasy about it."
"Then, you are as safe as an infant kanga-bear in its mother's pouch here," Edee said, waving any further discussion of it away. "Now, down this hallway at the end is a room on the right you both can use."
Watching the color drain immediately from Kaelyn and feeling his own momentary paling at the thought, Gavan quickly intervened. Edee did not know that he and Kaelyn had been sharing separate sleeping quarters on his ship, and her assumption had taken them both aback. Additionally, he knew he had to stay adamant that they stay as separate as possible because he was continuing to maintain his secrecy about his skills with Kaelyn.
Clarifying with a tone that required no argument, Gavan told Edee, "Two rooms."
"You must have forgotten then," she said looking at Gavan with an innocent smirk. "The rooms have a dividing door. If you lock it, she won't be able to bother you in your sleep."
Kaelyn paled even more than she was a moment ago while feeling the heat of red embarrassment burn on her cheeks. She momentarily lowered her head and turned it away from the entourage she was within, swallowing hard to push aside the discomfort she felt while she took a few seconds to compose herself.
Edee shot Gavan a look to which he gave just as equally back, letting her know that the situation with Kaelyn was delicate and that he would ensure the pirate was given the details about the shy, young woman later.
"Well then, I suppose we should see how that dinner is coming along," Edee said, shifting the subject to ensure Gavan understood that she had received his silent message. Instead of pushing on information at the moment, Edee continued with leading them through her den as they kept moving towards the dining hall.
Edee Nekyaw's Pirate Den
Outer Rim Asteroid Belt
The meal that evening had been awkward for Kaelyn, as the pirates happily shared their friendship and company amongst each other. The crew in attendance consisted of honest male and female aliens and humans who were defiant people that wanted to do their part to see that the Empire recede back into the shadows from where it came. Gavan sat amongst the pirates, giving the impression that he had known at least a few of them from some time in his past, and he easily fell into their mannerisms and their jovial mood.
Edee was cordial and friendly during the entire feast, but Kaelyn could still feel the older woman's eyes on her, and the weight of questions behind them bothered her greatly. However, Edee had opted to not confront Kaelyn regarding those questions, but instead maintained her light-hearted spirit. She was a woman who had a great deal of confidence in herself and received immense respect from the crew she commanded.
Watching Edee was an experience that Kaelyn had never seen before. Despite the countess title that Breanne Wynsridge had, she never spoke so freely or had the same kind of admiration from others that Edee had earned. It made Kaelyn want to understand the pirate more, to see if there was anything that she could learn in order to give herself more confidence and be less shy around others. Even Gavan had a different kind of sparkle in his eyes in Edee's presence – again it was not romantic from what Kaelyn could tell – but instead, he showed deep respect for the pirate, as there was definitely some kind of history between them that she didn't understand.
Feeling like an outsider looking into a party where she was not invited, Kaelyn took the chance to retire to her room for the night without hesitation as soon as it became available. The pirates had broken up from the dinner, each of them moving onto recreational activities or scouting missions or just getting rest. Kaelyn had taken a moment to properly thank Edee for her hospitality, finishing up her gratitude with a request to return to her room so that she could catch up on some rest. Gavan had given her a quizzical look, but he did not object, as he could see in her mannerisms that she was out of her element. And, Kaelyn had decided that if Gavan had any kind of relationship with Edee – regardless of what it was – she would not interfere in it by maintaining her awkward presence.
After Kaelyn had departed from the evening meal, Edee invited Gavan into her business office, bringing out a bottle of sweetened rum that she had confiscated from a shipment destined to a moff on Corellia. While Edee opened the bottle and poured the rum into glasses, Gavan stepped silently around the small office, his eyes looking past all the paintings of the galaxy in times past, focusing instead on the one image that was not celestial in subject, but was earthly. The painting that caught his eyes was an oil canvas depicting the docks on a shoreline that Gavan remembered Edee telling him was in the province where she grew up on Naboo. It was done in blues and greens with a sunset in oranges and reds, and the shoreline was littered with seashells on white sand. A sail skiff hovered on the water in the distance, its white canvas bright against the other colors of the water and the sunset.
Turning from the artwork, Gavan saw Edee offering him a blue-tinted glass filled with the sweetened rum, the same as hers. He took it, and she lifted hers to touch his, a gentle clink sounding between them.
"To survival," she toasted, "That you are heeding my lessons, and that I have surprisingly made it this long."
"Agreed. To survival," he replied.
They both took a decent mouthful of the rum. Edee then sat in the chair behind her desk and propped her brown-booted feet upon the black-varnished wood. Gavan took the chair on the opposite side of the desk and settled into the blue velvet cushion.
The pirate looked at Gavan as she brought another tilt of the glass containing the dark, amber liquid to her lips. This time, she took a more refined sip rather than a mouthful. "Tell me about the girl, Gavan. She's not your type."
Slowly swirling the rum in the glass, Gavan rested against the back of the comfortably furnished chair, noting that the furniture was an upgrade since his last time in Edee's office. He leaned his elbows on the arms and found himself envious that he didn't have one of these blue-velvet seats of his own on his ship. Then, again, he didn't exactly have a large enough ship to put a business office in it that would afford him a place for such seating comforts.
Keeping his eyes on the movement of the rum in the glass, he kept his reply slightly guarded, wondering how long he could string Edee along in the mind games she had taught him. "Stowaway."
The way Edee's soft and melodic laughter filled the small office on her ship, it almost made the cold steel of the walls around them have a musical ring in them. If it wasn't for those paintings and the tapestry she had on the wall depicting an outdated Republic-Era map of the galaxy, he was certain the office would echo in that melodic tone of hers.
"Stowaway is not in your vocabulary, Gavan. In fact, taking a crew is something you do only when it is absolutely necessary because you don't like the extra responsibility. So, why didn't you dump your stowaway yet? Does she know about you or what we are? Is that why you haven't let her go yet?"
Swallowing a mouthful of the rum in his unhurried way, Gavan couldn't help but be sucked in by Edee's large, brown eyes. Whenever she wanted an answer from him, she always had this way of doing that, and for whatever reason she was one of only two people he knew who could stop him cold. Briefly reminded by the other teacher of his who could pull the same staring tactic on him and see more than he ever wanted to reveal, Gavan had sometimes wondered if his mentors had some kind of Jedi training that he somehow missed attending.
"Okay, stop with that staring. You know how I hate it," he said, realizing that he had no chance of making Edee play guessing games, and she would always beat him with that maneuver. He silently pushed aside the absurdity that his mentors were Jedi. Even he knew that they were simply highly observant people who had more than enough life experience to understand the things he was still figuring out. He leaned forward to set the nearly half-filled glass on the desk before him.
"I kept everything about me and what we do hidden from Kaelyn. She doesn't know, and I intend to keep it that way because I don't plan on keeping her around longer than necessary. When I picked her up on Blyne, I noticed that she's sheltered but more resourceful than even she realizes…"
"My dear Gavan, your words betray that you are going soft," Edee now interrupted in a teasing tone. She took another sip from her glass to hide the knowing smirk on her lips.
"Edee, you would know more about going soft than I would," he shot back with a wink. "You have a crew."
Opening her hands before her in mock surrender, she continued to hold onto the glass in her left hand and set her feet back onto the floor as she leaned forward. Showing her former pupil that she was putting an end to the banter for now, she said, "Touché. Now talk."
Growing serious, Gavan brought his eyes back to Edee's and considered how much he should tell the woman who had been his teacher and mentor during most of his youth. She was as trusted as any number of his associates, whether they were former or current. Edee, however, also had ways of trafficking information, not all that different from what she could do with goods and supplies, and he had decided that it would be in his best interest to leave the matter of looking into Kaelyn's classified information with her, as she had ties in the data-slicing realm.
"Kaelyn's complicated," Gavan started. "She is born of Imperial nobility and trying to run as far away from it as she can. She's also in an arranged marriage she's trying to escape. But, what surprised me most is that she felt actual guilt when we had stumbled upon a refugee outpost that had been gutted by the Imperials. It somehow changed her when she saw the remnants of the families that were there. Kaelyn refuses to go back home, feeling a personal responsibility to the refugees because of who she is."
Giving the glass a slight swirl, Edee set it on the desk and leaned back in her seat, absorbing this information. "There's more to both stories, Gavan. Tell me your concern with Kaelyn and then we'll finish up with the refugee situation."
"I tried looking into Kaelyn and her past, to confirm that what she told me was true," he explained. "Everything she told me matched to what I found, but my instincts warned me to dig deeper, and that's when I came across the classified data on her and the Wynsridge family. Something about her isn't transparent, and before I give her to the Rebellion for them to find her a new home, I need to know she's not some kind of sleeper agent or other danger to them."
Edee rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "I have a few slicers that have gotten into and out of Imperial databases without leaving a digital print behind. If it were anyone but you, Gavan, I'd have to charge a lot for this. But, before I put them on this assignment, you need to be absolutely certain that whatever we find is something you can live with knowing. If she's a danger to the Rebellion – or more importantly to us – it would be your responsibility to handle it."
Gavan fell back against the chair and released a tense breath. His instincts weren't letting this go, and he knew he had to follow the information to wherever it led. He just hoped that whatever he found would offer him enough information to make the right decision, and especially a decision he could live with making. "There's something about her not adding up, Edee, and I have to know."
The pirate nodded, "Okay. I'll get my slicers on it. Now, what about that refugee situation aren't you telling me?"
Gavan leaned forward now, knowing that Edee would understand the severity of what he discovered. He also knew she would get the word out to the others and make them aware as well.
"There was a Templar present during the refugee raid on Quam," he explained shifting his thoughts to the question she had posed. "So'r had taken one out before he died. I found both their bodies when I was supposed to make a supply drop. It seems that the Templars have either been hiding within the Empire all along or they have committed their allegiance to the Emperor."
Now, Edee took her glass and downed a heavy mouthful. When she set the glass back on the table, it clanked loudly. "Kriffing bastards. It was hard enough to take them out before the Empire, but now they'll stay hidden within its protection."
"Edee, I'm asking you to warn as many of us as you can. You have more accessibility for mass encrypted communication than I do. We all need to adapt new methods to get ahead of the Templars, otherwise, they'll slaughter us before we can get remotely close."
"Consider it done, Gavan," Edee said softly. Picking up her glass in a toast again, she kept her voice soft. "To So'r. May the barriers you pass to the next life give you the peace you didn't have here."
Gavan picked up his glass once more and offered a silent toast to match Edee's. He had done all he could now. Edee would see that a warning was placed to the others, and she would get the information he needed to finally know what to do about Kaelyn.
"Gavan," Edee prompted, her voice growing soft, and her eyes showing a concern that was rare for her. "I have heard stirrings of Templar activity on Tiandul – with specific regards to an Imperial named Elstan Hurster. I had chosen one of my agents to investigate it, but I haven't dispatched her yet. It would seem with your well-timed visit I'd rather offer you the task first. I don't know the extent of Hurster's activities, other than there were sightings of Templars on his compound."
Growing quiet and reflective at the mention of Tiandul, Gavan nodded slowly. He had a familiarity with the planet, and just thinking about it had brought back a landfall of memories. It had been a long time since he had visited his old training grounds, and he owed it a long-overdue visit.
"I should be the one to look into it," he told her.
"I expected as much. Now, go get some rest," Edee told him, seeming to read his thoughts as he was thinking about the place he always considered his home. She then stood from her desk and set the bottle back in the cabinet of her office, changing the subject to bring the light back into his eyes. "I'm putting you in my gauntlet tomorrow morning to see if you've kept up with the blaster skills I taught you."
Smiling finally at the thought of Edee and her obstacle-laden courses, Gavan stood from the chair and left Edee's business office to return to his room.
After he arrived at his temporary quarters and stepped inside, he looked to the divider door between the rooms that were his and Kaelyn's. He put his hand on the bolt that would secure them shut, but hesitated. He told himself that she was innocent and harmless, sheltered and naïve, and they had gone nearly two weeks without any incidents on his ship.
He stood like that for a moment longer, as he realized that if Kaelyn truly was as innocent and naïve as she appeared, then the last thing she needed was to see just what he was. On Sweet Halcyon, he didn't have the concern of hiding his true self because his cabin was locked and restricted and he could leave his equipment where it belonged safely. However, in a room with a double-entrance, he couldn't take the chance that Kaelyn wouldn't cross that barrier – whether provoked or unintentionally – and stumble across the small arsenal of weapons that made him who he was.
Pushing the lock into place, it sounded much louder than he expected, seeming to be an explosion in the silence between their two rooms. However, that click also signified a reassurance that Kaelyn would not be asking him questions that he was not prepared to answer.
