Chapter XXXVI
I don't belong here
Rey:
I've found a way. I'll be back at dawn, if everything goes right.
If it doesn't…, I just want you to know I love you.
And that I wouldn't trade any single second I got to spend with you for anything in the world.
Ben
As the graveyard ground parts under the light of the full moon, and from there an uneven breathing is heard, Kylo stays still on his knees, in a position of absolute reverence.
The almost completely black shadow watches him attentively.
The Lord of the Ren.
"You called, Knight of Ren?"
Kylo lowers his head even more.
"I did, my Lord."
"Speak then, Ren…"
Kylo raises his head and clenches his fists. He inhales deeply, and just when he's about to start…
"Or, perhaps, should be I the one to speak?"
He doesn't know what else to do but closing his mouth and lowering his gaze once again.
"I'm aware of the rules you've broken," the Lord of the Ren accuses him, and his breathing is not unlike what one would heard from a man on his deathbed. Perpetually on his deathbed. "I'm aware of the boy and the girl that you brought back. What can you say about this?"
Kylo makes up his mind (it's now or never) and talks from his place in the dirt.
"She loved the boy."
"And so have countless others, and yet they have died, but I do not recall anyone standing on the way of-"
"And I love her."
The Lord of the Ren pauses. Kylo is pretty sure no one has ever dared before to interrupt him.
Except for him.
Maybe it wasn't the smartest thing to do, but Kylo is certain he's doing the right thing, even if in a clumsy and a little bit unplanned way.
"I'm in love with her. I want to share my life with her."
The Lord of the Ren seems to ponder his words before speaking.
"I remember you, Ben Solo. You were but a child when you became one of us."
"I'm no longer a child."
"No, you are not," The Lord of the Ren seems to laugh, although Kylo wouldn't assure it. "But you grew up in a way that reminds me of one. With no real rules (because the ones you've known, you have broken), with no real limits. And now, you desire to form part of a world you know nothing about?"
Kylo remains prostrated.
"If so my Lord allows."
The Lord of the Ren emits no sound for what seems to last an eternity. Kylo doesn't move a single muscle.
Finally, the most unexpected sound is heard: a deep sigh.
Kylo raises his head just in time to see the Lord of the Ren plop down on the trunk of a tree fallen a long time ago.
"You can stop pretending. I know you're fully aware of what you're doing. Stand up."
Kylo obeys and keeps his gaze forward.
"How did you know about this?"
"I read it in a book. Well, Rey read it in a book, but she didn't understand the words written in the language of the Ren."
The Lord of the Ren nods.
"This is a bit painful," he admits then, and Kylo thinks he's listening to the true Lord of the Ren: a simple old man, too old for all he has to burden, and yet an old man that doesn't stop walking. "When I first created the Order of the Knights of Ren, thousands of years ago, I did it with a sole purpose: to shelter those who were deemed unwanted. Those that suffered unspeakable atrocities and now harbored nothing but a thirst for revenge. Those who would have gutted a man were they to remain without a purpose in the afterlife. That's why I took their anger with me."
A brief pause.
"The anger you felt, young Solo."
"That's true and noble," Kylo agrees. "But it's not my case anymore."
"So I can see."
"Then…?"
The Lord of the Ren gets on his feet once again. He's almost as tall as Kylo, but he won't be intimidated.
"I shall tell you my name, knight of Ren." And he talks like this because these aren't empty words: they're a rite, a prayer, an ending. "And you shall guard it with your life. You will guard it from those unloved, like me, and from those who are loved, like you. And when the time comes, when the sun sets at your door at the end of your new life, it will be me who will come to take you and the name I've offered you as payment for the one you surrendered to me all those centuries ago."
Kylo gets closer to the Lord of the Ren and awaits the end.
"My name, knight of Ren, before I was Lord of the Order of the Knights of Ren, before I was Darth Vader, my name is…"
A terrible thunder is heard then, and the stars disappear from the night sky.
Only a young man is left, on his knees, at the mercy of the raindrops.
A common, ordinary young man, like any other, with all the memories from his past.
An orphaned boy that was mistreated, hit, humiliated.
A young thief full of rage, a quarrelsome man, a bloody corpse on the roadside.
An angered soul that wasn't ever offered kind words, a soul no one ever loved.
An apathic spirit in charge of guiding those who had lost their way.
Yes: a common, ordinary young man, like any other.
A common, ordinary young man that loves and is loved by a simple human girl with stars in her eyes.
The common, ordinary young man that cannot help the tears that stream down his cheeks right there where he is.
Ben Solo.
There's just an epilogue left. It'll be up tomorrow. Thanks for reading!