A/N: Weeeellll...*sheepish grin* I didn't end up posting on time. Sorry about the unplanned hiatus. First it was hay, then work, then a series of extremely nasty writers' blocks (we're talking Stonehenge here folks). But here we are and, goodness, does it feel good to be back! Shout out to all of you lovely people out there who have stuck with this story, favorited and followed, and reviewed even while I was MIA. I can't tell you how exciting and motivating it is to hear people's opinions!

I have about ten chapters that I've written over the last six months (my word, it really has been that long) with more in the works. That being said, I'm probably going to transition to a bi-weekly update of this story, depending on how the writing is going. I've hit a couple of slow places over the last few weeks and I don't want it to happen again and accidentally write myself into a corner.

I want to thank you all again for your patience with me and also wanted to give a HUGE shout out to my beta Leona2016 who has been the absolute BEST! (You rock!) Also a big thank you to FenrisInside who continues to be an awesome idea generator/suggester! Thanks so much to the both of you!

Well, anyway, I hope you all enjoy this chapter and I hope it's worth the wait:)

Rey tried to suppress the anxiety churning in her stomach as she watched the silvery streaks of hyperspace through the viewscreen.

"You're sure about this?" she asked.

"Absolutely. We have a store of crystals you can choose from for your saber. Besides, if I don't bring you to meet them soon Mela will hunt me down."

Rey tried to smile but faltered when something beeped on the control panel. Her mind instantly started to replay the layout of the entire ship in her head. She'd scoured it from wingtip to wingtip before they left and had found nothing out of the ordinary. Surely it couldn't be another mechanical failure.

Relax, Rey, said Ben's voice in her mind. It's just a hologram.

Rey watched over his shoulder as the image of a man flickered and jumped. She could tell he was tall, even from the low-quality image, and she saw at a glance that he would be a formidable match in battle, perhaps even for Ben.

"We got your message that you're on your way. Mela's so excited that she's already down in the hangar bay."

Ben chuckled.

"Sounds about right."

"Decha and Taryn are here too. Just brought in supplies and parts for the ships," he said. "But you know Taryn. He's under a ship right now trying to figure out the bugs in the cloaking device, according to Mela."

"Did he find anything?"

"'Course he found something. Doesn't he always?" the man laughed. "Apparently it was a crossed wire this time. He's complaining that it's not enough of a challenge and driving Mela up the wall."

"If he keeps this up, I'll find him a project that will keep him so busy he won't have time to complain," Ben muttered.

Rey smiled her first real smile of the day. Her apprehension began to fade.

"We should be arriving within the next quarter hour," Ben said, speaking loud enough for the comm to register his voice again. "Everything clear for docking?"

"Yeah. Hangar bay is open and waiting for you to get here."

"Sounds good. We'll see you in a few minutes."

The hologram nodded, then flickered off with a flash of blue light.

The rest of the flight was silent, but Rey's mind was not. Her thoughts drifted from crystals to Knights of Ren to sabers and back again, trying to imagine what would happen in the coming hours. Decha had seemed friendly enough, but how would the other Knights react to her presence? She glanced down to her fingers picking nervously at the strip of dark cloth knotted around her wrist. What would they do when they found out?

Don't worry about it, Ben spoke in her mind. We won't have to hide here.

Rey chewed the inside of her lip and didn't respond. The anxiety was back in full force, but before she could voice her hesitation, the ship lurched out of hyperspace. Before them, a huge transport ship floated through space, high above an unknown planet. Rey saw the green and blue of a fertile world and wondered briefly what it might be like on the surface. Her musings were cut short as Ben navigated through the open hangar bay and landed.

Rey took a deep breath before Ben opened the hatch, then followed him out through the roof of the TIE. She had just dropped to the ground beside him when she was seized from behind in a fierce hug. She squawked and instinctively reached for the saber at her belt. Ben's voice in her head stopped her a second before she ignited it and struck out at the person behind her.

Easy, Rey, he said. Mela's not an enemy.

Her fingers left the saber hilt, slipping to her side. The arms around her shoulders did not release her and the unseen figure kissed her hard on the cheek.

"Kylo Ren, you've brought me a sister at last," came an excited voice in her ear.

Ben chuckled.

"Yes, but she doesn't like to be surprised from behind. You were several seconds away from losing an arm."

Mela immediately released her and Rey whirled to face the woman, muscles tensed and ready to spring backwards out of arm's reach.

"She's about as bad as you, isn't she Kylo?"

"Well, the Finalizer isn't a place where you can let down your guard. We're both on edge."

Mela's shrewd gaze seemed to bore a hole into Rey and she took a step backward, edging toward Ben.

"I see," Mela said in a voice that suggested she knew more than she let on.

She took a step toward Rey, extending her hands in a way that reminded Rey of someone trying to coax a frightened animal out of a hiding place. Her pride stung a little, but not enough for her to respond. Mela took a step and then another, reaching down and taking Rey's hand in her own. Rey thought about flinching back, but held herself still. Mela smiled, unwavering blue eyes holding hers. They seemed to go on forever.

"It's good to meet you at last, Rey."

Her words seemed to break through the anxiety that had frozen Rey to her core, freeing her from a crystalline prison through which she could see the world, but not touch. She tried a tentative smile.

"It's good to meet you as well."

Mela grinned.

"She speaks!"

The jibe might have stung if it hadn't been said with such a genuine expression of joy. Rey felt herself warming to the girl. Mela took her arm and drew her aside.

"Kylo didn't tell me anything about you," she said, "so we two are going to have to remedy that."

Rey glanced back to Ben, who nodded.

"I've got to go talk to Cy and the others anyway. Don't let me keep you."

Mela bounced excitedly and looped her arm through Rey's, leading her out through a door and into a long corridor.

"You'll have to tell me everything about yourself," she said. "Kylo barely let slip your name and that you were our age. He's been so tight-lipped about you."

"I'm just his apprentice."

Mela made a sound somewhere between a snort and a laugh.

"That's bantha fodder and we both know it, so don't insult me by lying. I know my brother, and I'm quickly learning to know you. There's something between you stronger than the bond of apprentice and master. I can see that at a glance."

Rey felt herself flush red to the ears, but didn't reply.

"I want to know who you are and where you came from," Mela amended, shifting the subject away from the one Rey didn't want to discuss.

"I come from Jakku," Rey said, "and I'm nobody, really. I just happened to get caught up in all…this."

She waved a hand vaguely in the air. Mela gave her a hard look.

"You make it sound like an accident."

"It was!" Rey laughed, shaking her head.

Mela crossed her arms.

"There are no accidents, Rey. Not where the Force is concerned."

"But I came across the droid that started it all by complete chance. If I hadn't, I would still be out in the middle of the desert, scavenging for parts."

"Was it truly by chance?" Mela asked softly.

Rey thought back to the day she'd met BB-8. She'd been sitting outside the AT-AT walker she'd made her home with the old Rebellion pilot helmet blocking out all noise but her thoughts, thinking about going inside to escape the last vestiges of the day's heat. Something had grabbed her attention as she sat there in the stillness. Now that she thought, she could remember a strange music, on the very edge of her hearing that had driven her up and over the walker and running out across the desert to find its source. She never had, but she'd stumbled across BB-8 in the net of a Teedo.

"No," she whispered. "No, it wasn't."

"No," Mela agreed. "So as I say, nothing is an accident."

"How do you know?" Rey asked her.

"Because nothing that I have seen has proven to me otherwise," Mela smiled. "You, certainly, are not here by accident. I have not come to be here by accident. It is all choice, and the guidance given us through the Force. It is a gift to lead us through paths that are simply the branches of a greater plan. All will happen as it is meant to happen."

Rey smiled.

"You speak like the old Anchorites on Jakku, who claimed they could see the future."

Mela raised an eyebrow and gave her a mischievous smile.

"Didn't Kylo tell you?" she asked. "I can."

Rey stared at her.

"You can see the future?" she asked. "You're a far-seer?"

"On my good days," Mela said. "It's not always clear. Sometimes it's just a feeling, or a dream I don't understand until it appears in a different shape in reality."

"But you can see the future."

"We all can and do. I've just refined my ability."

Rey blinked.

"I can look into the future?"

"Perhaps. You may see glimpses. Usually, it's something the Force decides. Even I can't just peer through time whenever I want to. Besides, it's tricky. Sometimes something won't happen if a choice is made differently, or a dream won't come true at all unless the seer acts upon it. The latter is what brought about Vader's rise, if the stories are to be believed."

Rey sucked in a breath, the name of Ben's grandfather sending a cold thrill through her. The man had held power in his hand, a power for which she had yearned ever since the aching hunger opened inside her when she surrendered to the dark side. What she would give-had given- for power.

"Careful, Rey," Mela said in a low voice of warning. "With that line of thinking, the dark side will take everything from you."

Rey gaped at her.

"You can read my thoughts?"

"No, but I can sense your hunger for power. I would warn you that the dark side will take all you have to give and then more, never satisfying you with the little it gives in return."

"There is no other way, now."

Mela held her gaze for a long minute.

"So I wasn't wrong when I felt you fall to darkness, then," she muttered, seemingly to herself. "I had hoped-"

She didn't sound angry, or disappointed, or even sad. The words came out flat, as if she had resigned herself to them. Rey's face flushed with shame.

"I was so tired of fighting," she explained. "I just gave in."

Mela let out a long sigh.

"I wish I could say that I fought," she said, running fingers through long blonde hair.

"Didn't you?"

Mela laughed.

"If I had fought, I wouldn't be breathing today."

"The night Luke's school was destroyed?"

Mela nodded.

"By then Snoke had Kylo so bound up in fear he hardly recognized us. Luke's betrayal destroyed any trust in us he might have held onto. It took us years to gain it back."

"Ben would have killed you?"

Mela's head jerked around.

"What did you call him?"

"Ben?" Rey asked, hesitant.

"He lets you call him Ben?" Mela asked, incredulous. "He hasn't let anyone call him that since we left Luke's school in ashes."

Rey shrugged.

"He asked me to."

Mela laughed in amazement and shook her head.

"You amaze me, Rey of Jakku," she said.

Rey fingered the bracelet of cloth.

"I'm not anything special," she said.

"Neither am I," smiled Mela. "Yet, here we are."

Rey kept silent and twisted her bracelet until it pinched her wrist. Mela's eyes tracked the movement and went suddenly wide. She seized Rey's hand, examining the fabric through narrowed eyes.

"What is that?"

Rey felt a stronger urge to lie than any she could remember.

"It's just something that we do on Jakku when we promise someone something," she hedged.

The half-truth came out more easily than she'd anticipated, and she was surprised that the words didn't taste foul in her mouth. Mela didn't seem satisfied.

"Like marriage vows, for instance?" she asked, voice hard.

Rey glanced at her from the corner of her eye.

"How did you-"

"You're not nearly as good at veiling the truth as you think you are," Mela said. "What in Chaos possessed you to bind yourself to him?"

"There was no other way for me to go," she said. "In this, at least, I sensed the will of the Force, as I never did before."

As Rey spoke, Mela's face went pale and her lips clenched together as her eyes took on a faraway look. Rey wrenched her hand from the fingers tightening their grip on her own and stepped back and away, fearful again of this strange woman with her strange gift.

"That son of a bantha," Mela whispered, more to herself than to Rey. "I warned him years ago-"

She started to pace back and forth across the hallway, clearly agitated. Rey felt confusion and anger clouding her thoughts.

"What?"

Mela pulled her forward and shoved her through a door.

"Wait here for me to come back," she said. "I need to talk with my brother. You would only complicate things."

"Wait a minute!" shouted Rey, making for the door. "I'm not just going to stay here."

Mela's face twisted into something like pain.

"Please, Rey. I'll explain everything later, but this is important."

"What is so important about a bracelet?" Rey asked, anger roiling as she struggled to maintain control. "And why can't you tell me now?"

"Because it isn't your responsibility. I don't know how much Kylo has told you about what we do here, but if he's as close-mouthed as he usually is, it isn't enough for me to start talking."

"At least tell me what my bracelet has to do with any of this."

Mela's face went a shade grayer.

"This is one of those times I was talking about when a dream only makes sense in light of reality," Mela said. "And I had a bad one last night."

Rey felt a freezing cold sweep over her and she took a step back.

"Just stay here?" she asked.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," Mela said. "I'm sorry about this."

With that the door shut and Rey heard a lonely pair of feet hurrying away. Silence settled over her, leaving her feeling cut off from the rest of the world. She turned about to look, for the first time, at the room in which she had been charged to remain. To her surprise, she found herself in another training room. Weapons were stacked neatly along the walls with several dozen metallic orbs Rey guessed were a sort of droid. She saw rods made of wood and metal, hilts of practice sabers, and an odd machine sitting in one corner that appeared to be a flight simulator.

"What is this place?" she asked the emptiness.

When no reply came, she sighed and sat down against the wall closest to the door to wait. She couldn't help the irritation that crept in. As the silence continued on, the irritation gave way to frustration, then anger in its own turn. She wasn't even thinking when she reached out with the pent-up rage and wrenched the Force around her, it was instinct.

In the time it took for her to blink, she found herself looking at Ben's back as he stood tall above her. She recognized the music of the bond between them and the low lilting melody it always took on when they traveled across space to come near to one another. And yet, it was all different. For the first time, she could make out his surroundings, like a veil before her eyes that almost eclipsed her view of the room around her. Over his shoulder, she could see Mela pacing the floor, and Decha with his arms crossed by the door. There was a strange man in a grease stained tunic, his short brown-blond hair spiked with grime. Another man that Rey recognized from the hologram stood apart from them all, watching the proceedings from a corner. None of them seemed to notice her.

"It didn't alarm me at first- I thought it was just the bond between a master and apprentice, beginning to grow together as companions- but when I saw the bands, it brought back my dream and I started paying closer attention," Mela was saying. "Kylo, there's something wrong with your bond with her. It's like nothing I've ever sensed before. It's almost like a living thing itself- and it's growing stronger."

"I know," Ben said, running his fingers through his hair.

"Then how do you explain it? Surely it isn't natural- not something that runs this deep," Mela's eyes were wild. "You don't think it's what that old prophecy speaks of, do you? The one that cult believed in?"

"The prophecy of the Sith Eternal?" Ben asked incredulously. "No. Put your mind at ease about that, at least, little sister. Snoke was the one that bridged the space between our minds to form the bond. He claimed he did it to trap Rey- to draw her in."

"Snoke?" Mela asked, face going an even paler shade of gray.

"Why do I get the feeling you're about to tell me something I don't want to hear," Ben asked.

"Because I am," she said. "I saw Snoke in my dream last night. Clear as day. Snoke, and those bands you and Rey are wearing around your wrists."

Rey saw Ben's fingers twitch at his sides. His agitation began to take on a few shrill notes, echoing her own.

"I can tell by your face that you're not telling me everything. What else did you see?"

Mela's expression was tense.

"Kylo, there was a child. Snoke is looking for a child."

Ben flinched.

"You're sure?"

"I am. And you're an idiot for coming. If he finds them-" her anger broke and she continued in a softer voice. "If Snoke was the one to bridge your minds, he can trace you here."

"He can't do that, can he?"

"Just how strong do you think your bond with Rey is?"

"I don't know. It's second nature for me, Mela. I can't be objective about it."

"I felt your connection through the Force across millions of clicks the day Snoke bonded you. I didn't know what it was then, but the second you both climbed out of your TIE, I knew."

The man standing in the corner nodded.

"Kylo, if I can sense it, then I can guarantee you Snoke can. You'll both have to cloak yourselves if you stay for any length of time."

Ben rubbed a hand over his face and Rey heard Mela let out a long sigh.

"What were you thinking?" she asked. "I warned you against binding yourself to another when we were children."

"Dreams lie."

"Dreams do, but the Force does not. Kylo, I warned you that a bond would be your death."

"And it was. Ben Solo died when I was bonded in apprenticeship to Snoke."

"Then Ben Solo is stirring in his grave. I see glimpses of the boy I remember even now. She is good for you, Kylo, but I am afraid that she will also be your doom."

"It's Snoke I'm worried about, not Rey."

"But what if the dreams are connected?" Mela pleaded, gesturing to his wrist. "What if this is the bond?"

"The Force might not lie, but it doesn't always reveal reality as it is. You are always the one quick to remind us that we cannot see all ends."

"I'm still worried," Mela sighed.

"As we all should be," said Ben. "Snoke is not an enemy to underestimate."

Rey saw the tense line of his shoulders. His apprehension was a low and terrible music in her ears that set her on edge. She stood and went to his side, sliding an arm around his waist. A strength in trial. She felt the pressure of the band at her wrist as she remembered her promise. At her touch, Ben started, then relaxed as he recognized her presence.

"What was that?" Mela asked, head whipping toward them as her eyes narrowed to slits. "Rey?"

Ben shifted his position and Rey stepped out from behind him.

"I'm here. Have been almost from the beginning, I think."

"You need to leave. The longer you stay in the bond, the easier it will be to find you both."

Ben turned to her and nodded.

"Go ahead. I'll come find you in a few minutes."

Rey hesitated, anxiety and a desire to hear more keeping her in the bond. Ben took her hand and squeezed, sending a jolt through her.

"Go, Rey. There's more riding on this than you know."

"Then tell me so I don't do something wrong again," she said, her annoyance with the secrets that surrounded them giving her voice an edge.

She pressed a kiss against his cheek in farewell, then stepped away from him, letting go of the Force as she did. The veil before her eyes vanished to be replaced by the darkness of the training room. She sat, back to the wall, rolling everything she'd heard through her mind. Part of her wanted to cry and another part wanted to scream in frustration. Even with Ben- even in her own mind- Snoke still stalked them. Their bond, something they could neither understand nor fully control, might be Ben's undoing. She buried her head in her hands and tried to stop thinking.

But her thoughts would not be silent. They were loud with the questions that swirled through her mind. What had Mela meant by Snoke looking for a child? Why would he need one? She was on the verge of getting up and going to find Ben and his knights to start asking questions when a door at the other end of the training room opened. To her surprise the boy she remembered from Abafar stepped through.

"Parvan? What are you doing here?"

"Master Decha brought supplies and I got to come along. My sister's here."

"Your sister?"

Another head peered around the doorway, long dark curls cascading over her shoulders. Behind her, several more children stepped from beyond the doorframe. Rey felt their eyes on her, studying her. She could not look away. Children. If he finds them-. Mela's words began to make sense.

"Who are you?" asked a little Togruta boy.

"That's Rey," exclaimed Parvan before Rey could open her mouth. "She's Master Kylo's apprentice. Decha told me so."

"Really?" asked a Twi'lek girl a few years younger than Parvan.

"He's scary," came another voice.

"Is not," said Parvan, arms crossed over his chest. "He's the one who brought me and Hala here."

"Are you really Master Kylo's apprentice?" the Togruta asked her, taking a shy step forward.

"Yes I am," she said.

"Are you afraid of him?"

"No."

The boy gave her a tentative smile and took another step forward. He bowed.

"My name's Sati," he said politely. "Why did you come here?"

"I came with Master Kylo," she explained, her own mind crowded with questions and with the new faces and voices. "I have to make a lightsaber and I need to pick out crystals."

Parvan grinned.

"We can help you!" he exclaimed, his excitement clear to be seen from the way he bounced on his toes to the enormous smile splitting his face.

"What?"

"I know where Master Cy keeps the crystals."

There was a chorus of agreements from the other children.

"Master Cy says we get to pick ours out in a few years," said Parvan. "But this'll be almost as good."

Before she could object, several small hands had clamped around hers and were tugging her to her feet.

"Come on!" said Parvan, jumping about like one of the crickets Rey remembered trying to catch as a child in the sands of Jakku.

They guided her through the corridors, deep into the interior of the ship, pulling her along if she slowed to look around her. She caught fleeting glimpses of training rooms like the one in which she'd waited, something that looked like a mess hall, and a room with strange bluish lights shining over plants as green as any she'd seen on Takodana. The children didn't even glance at them. They only stopped when they'd reached the last door in a narrow hallway that branched from the main thoroughfares.

"This is it," Parvan said, almost dancing in his anticipation.

Rey edged the door open with the Force and stepped over the threshold. None of the children crossed behind her, instead peering through the doorway. Rey stood uncertain. It seemed wrong, somehow, to be here without Ben.

"Aren't you coming?" she called back to them.

Sati shook his head.

"Master Cy said if he caught any of us in there before the Gathering, he'd feed us to a sarlacc."

Rey covered her smile with a grimace, her dark mood fading a little.

"And you sent me in?" she teased.

"Master Kylo wouldn't let Master Cy feed you to anything, especially not a sarlacc."

Rey grinned and fingered her bracelet. So, they were intuitive as well as curious. It was a dangerous combination. The smile disappeared, and her stomach twisted when she remembered the pain of Snoke's torture and imagined him doing the same to the little ones around her if he ever found them. She didn't want any part of that.

"Well, aren't you going to pick?" asked one of the Twi'lek children.

The voice broke her out of the dark thoughts and brought her back to reality. Her attention shifted to her surroundings and an involuntary gasp left her. There were crystals everywhere, stacked in piles against walls and lining shelves higher than her head. All were translucent, but the light refracted through them so that they bathed the room in a rainbow of pale and ghostly colors.

"How do I know which ones to choose?" she asked.

"They sing to you," the little girl called Hala said. "Can't you hear them?"

Rey strained her ears. She could hear quiet music from the hundreds of crystals, but nothing that sang to her or drew her to them, other than their beautiful colors. She tilted her head, listening harder. Nothing.

"I don't hear anything."

Parvan's face was a mask of confusion.

"I can hear them right now," he said, gesturing to one corner of the room. "There's one over there that's louder than all the others."

There was a chorus of agreements, but with each child pointing to a different part of the room. Rey tried again to listen, with the same result. The irritation that began its slow constriction around her chest made her twitchy and restless. Unable to hold still, she started to pace the room, ear cocked for the slightest hint of a song. The emptiness in her gut started to gnaw again, aching and cold.

She reached out and plucked two almost identical crystals from a pile, studying their facets as if her stare could make them yield their secrets. They were cold to the touch and seemed to grow quieter. In a moment, they were all but silent. In frustration, she reached out and wrenched the Force around her, bending the music toward the crystals. She twisted it around their quiet notes, drawing out the music and forcing it to harmonize with hers. As she did it was as if something lurched inside her, and a tingle of electricity ran through her fingers as it did when she found Ben in the bond. She closed her fingers around the crystals so tight that the hard edges dug into her skin. They were warm in her palm. Rey felt a slow smile spread over her face. The holocron was wrong.

She had the strength, now she just had to make the weapon.