The ritual was not nearly so mysterious nor as complicated as the text led Rey to believe.
Ben knew his stuff. Prepared the fires in perfectly spaced mounds, laying her with her unbandaged leg in the center.
Without the benefit of the bandage's pressure, warm water, or the herbs, or especially a massage presently being applied to her leg, the pain overrode the rest of her mind long enough for her to craft up a string of expletives woven tightly in a way previously unheard by human and alien ears alike.
The words were not spoken aloud, but by Ben's pause and look of shocked admiration, she could tell they had bled through. She didn't really care.
Having the bandage off was excruciating. Her whole leg stung and vibrated at the surface, while the insides burned with the soreness of swelling. The splint had been digging harshly into the top of her foot every time she hopped or hobbled about, and now left a bloodied spot. She really wanted to crush the splint into a thousand pieces once they were done here.
"You're aware this is a Jedi meditation - peace, tranquility, and all that," he couldn't contain his smile though he tried. Rey just grumbled to herself as she stared at her discolored leg.
Ben sighed and rocked back on his heels. The fires hadn't been lit yet.
"You're not allowed to judge, Prince of Darkness," she muttered mostly to herself. He went rigid. She knew she shouldn't have let her pain get the better of her like that.
"Center yourself."
It was not a request.
Shame laid upon her like a blanket. It didn't matter that it was said half jokingly. It dredged up enough painful memories. An apology would only worsen things.
Ben stepped in a circle around her, lighting the fires as he went. Once the smell of the burning herbs swirled about them, he seated himself next to her but outside the fires, legs crossed and eyes focused. Rey straightened her back and let her eyes slip shut. Let him lead the way.
It felt like falling. On and on and on, through what she could not tell. Someone else might have been frightened. She might have, as well, had his steady presence not been there to gently tug her in the right direction.
Visions of her childhood danced before her eyes. Running, running, running…from other scavengers. From raiders. From herself. From her truth.
Nights curled tight around a worn doll. No other company to be had.
Flickers of a boy. Dark, messy hair, over ears he hadn't yet grown into. Watching an argument from an empty room. The words were indecipherable, but his loneliness was not.
Her teen years, now. A man that pursued her throughout the Outpost. Leered at her in a way that made her feel ill. Never spoke to her. But he watched. Even woke to him in her home once. Watching her. He fled before she could. She rarely slept after that. After weeks of this, she saw him arguing with Plutt at his stall window. No salvage in hand, but still bargaining. Trying to buy something. Her.
She stabbed him in the leg. He rescinded his offer.
The boy again, hair longer now, face thinner. A haunted look to his eyes. A holo in his hands. An image of a woman. His mother.
The woman that hadn't spoken to him since she'd sent him away. Away with a man that held him at arm's length, a man that offered no warmth to him.
This wasn't what they were here for. This was all wrong. Rey felt as though she'd slipped beneath the surface of something she was meant to stay away from.
There was a hand, outstretched. She couldn't reach it, had already fallen too far away.
It snatched her in a fierce grip and dragged her to the surface.
There was something else here. All she could see before her was a milky haze. Slowly it populated at the edges of her vision. Greens, blues, yellows…life. The trees and animals of the planet. The villagers. Their kindness. The dark looming of the city they knew nothing about.
This place felt surreal. The colorful birds flew overhead without their song.
"Is this where we're supposed to be?" Her words echoed in a way they shouldn't have.
She was not speaking of the meditation.
"For now." His words were too distant. She couldn't see him.
"Please," she stepped through the dense underbrush, desperate to find him, "don't leave me here."
"You will never be alone again."
Rey's eyes opened. Winced at the brightness of the sun on her face.
She was in a field, laid flat on her back. Still at the center of the mounds Ben had built. Only ash now.
"How is your leg?"
The sound startled her. She stared up at him, still in the same position he had been the night before. Watching. But not as the strange man on Jakku had.
Protecting.
She shuffled into a sitting position. Stared down at the leg that had been bent oddly, at the skin that had been too swollen, too dark.
Now flawlessly smooth.
She gave her ankle an experimental roll.
Nothing out of the ordinary.
She couldn't believe it. Even looked at him in disbelief. He nodded.
"I'm not carrying you back to town."