They were in the middle of the Aldera Pass when Vader brought his horse crashing to a halt, raising his hand to signal to them to do the same.
"My lord," Piett asked, tugging on the reins to trot up beside him. "Is something wrong?"
Vader said nothing—just pointed at a small blockage on the road ahead that branched off the pass, up into the mountains. There was a desk, a gate, several stacks of hay, wood and wagons stretched across much of the road, and scuff marks and horseshoe prints pounded into the ground.
"Is that an Imperial checkpoint?" Veers asked, dismounting to examine it in more detail. It was indeed the sort of thing the Empire set up in all the major roads in their territory, with a dusty logbook on the ground and everything. "The bastards have some nerve, setting it up here."
Vader was only half-listening—his head was turned to the Pass ahead, gaze tracking over a thoroughly rocky and torn-up road.
"Palpatine is bold," he said. "It is no surprise that he would send his minions to die in an attempt to regulate and monitor movements in areas beyond his grasp. Particularly since his attempt to wipe out Alderaan entirely failed. The farmers who use this road would be rarely equipped to fight back."
"He's stifling their trade and renewal?"
"Possibly." Vader dismounted himself, then, but he didn't walk through the checkpoint. He stopped at the dropped logbook, and flicked it open to the last page it had been written on.
"Well whatever they were doing, it failed," Veers continued, glancing around. "Looks like someone put up a fight and drove them away."
Vader lifted his gaze. "No. The necromancer who came through here killed them."
Piett blinked. "My lord?"
"Look at the road ahead. Do you think any ordinary fight could do that?"
"No," Piett glanced at the shattered pass again, "but—"
"We have a change of course." He closed the logbook with a snap. "I had assumed that if he was in this part of the mountains, as I sensed through the bond, he would be headed to Alderaan. And indeed, at one point, he was." He held out the logbook.
Piett took it and frowned, flicking to the right page with difficult; the leather cover had largely protected it from the rain, but the edges of the pages were still wetted, and they stuck together. The last entry read, Beru Lars and Cliegg Lars, mother and son, farmers going to Alderaan for market. It was dated several days ago.
"My lord? I don't understand. How could you tell—"
"Beru Lars is my stepsister," Vader said casually, as if that wasn't momentous information to Piett, Veers, and all the other soldiers in this company he'd trusted with the vital task of finding his undead son. "Luke dusted in Theed. You are aware how dusting works, General?"
"I am, sir."
"Then you understand my prediction for where he appeared. Beru passed him off as her own son to protect him, or prevent questions—and they were going to Alderaan for market. They would have likely returned a day or two later."
Piett swallowed. "He did this?"
"Yes."
Veers cut in, "What, exactly, did he do?"
Vader held out his hand and closed his eyes.
Piett had seen his lord commune with the dead, or spirits, enough times to know when to stay quiet and simply wait.
But it took longer than usual. Vader stood for an age, his arm out, his brow creased with effort. He looked like a statue dedicated to military thought, with his famous, intricate helmet under one arm, the wind blowing his cloak around his armour, his feet planted firmly on the ground and his face of the utmost concentration.
Then he broke out with a sigh. "They are gone."
The soldiers rustled awkwardly, confused. It was Piett who dared ask: "Sir?"
"The undead soldiers who manned this station. They are gone—true dead. Luke seized control of one of them, shot the other to pieces, and banished their souls… apparently purely on instinct."
Not even the helmet could have hidden the proud tint to his voice; the smile curling his lips sealed the impression.
Piett tried very hard not to be disturbed.
"The soldiers are gone. We cannot learn anything from them." He affixed the helmet back on his head and turned to stare at Piett, his eyes gold behind the visor. "But we have a new destination, now. It is nearer than Alderaan. Good."
His voice dropped, low and fierce, "I will not let Palpatine take him from me again."
Piett didn't bother asking. When Vader climbed onto his horse again and rode off, up the narrow side road and into the higher peaks, he just followed.
"You can go back to the farm, Beru, I swear it. I'll be fine here."
Beru frowned, and lifted her hand to his cheek. "Are you sure?" she asked, as if she didn't have the cart behind her, Eopie well-rested and ready, her profits and traded goods piled high in the back while she was wrapped in a fine, warm coat Leia had gifted her. Luke watched the movements of her shoulder with the motion as well, but it seemed that his hasty spell had healed her wounds just as effectively as it had his. "I don't want to leave you alone—"
"I am sure," he insisted, putting his hand over hers on his cheek gently. "I trust Leia—she trusted me, in the past, and I trust her now. She can help me. And we're looking into the spellbooks she has in the palace, to see if there's a spell there that can restore undead memories. Things are looking up."
"And you're sure you don't want me here to ensure they don't look down again?" She gave him a fond, exasperated look.
He smiled back at her. "It's not that I don't want you here. It's that I'm sure Uncle Owen misses you, and could use you back."
Beru sighed. "Always thinking of others, you," she admonished, flicked his nose, then took a step back. The crunch of gravel underfoot broke the spell of quiet between them, and a cold wind blew against him; he shivered.
"Send me a pigeon if something goes wrong!" she called once she'd climbed into the driver's seat. "Send me a pigeon anyway! It was lovely to meet you."
"You too!"
He smiled broadly and waved, and waved, until Eopie had trotted around in a circle, the wagon was out of the palace courtyard, and trundling down the road ahead. He kept his gaze on it until it was out of sight.
Then he turned around and went back inside.
Leia was waiting for him in another little study off the main throne room; he wandered through the vast hall, gazing up to the white and lilac patterns on the marble pillars, the great crimson rug that rolled over the steps up to the two thrones on the dais, all cast in blue and gold patterns under the stained-glass skylight of a mountain horizon that took up much of the ceiling. Luke craned his neck to look up at it, footsteps echoing loudly in the silence, before he trod on the carpet and the clacks muffled to faint thuds.
He watched the thrones for a moment, realising he had never in the past few days seen Leia sit in either one of them, then ducked into the small side door tucked behind the left of the dais, concealed by long curtains.
Inside was a desk sandwiched between shelves and shelves of dusty books. Leia was seated behind it, in a dark blue, high-collared dress and half-moon reading spectacles, her hair drawn up behind her in a crown that dripped diamonds. The sweeping sleeves trailed across the book she was reading as she picked up her pen, dipped it in ink and scribbled something down.
Luke, even dressed in an emerald jacket with brass buttons and tall, shining boots as he was, felt very out of place.
A feeling which dispelled the moment Leia looked up at the door of the door closing quietly, taking off her spectacles and grinning at him, gesturing for him to sit opposite her.
"I found a spell in that book your grandmother had—"
"When—" Luke blinked at the book she was reading. "When did you get that?"
"I noticed you were struggling with it, so I had a glance through it, and… hm." He flushed, not wanting to admit that reading, especially the intricate hand that book was written in, was difficult, but she didn't blink at it; she continued, "Well, I think I've found a spell to restore memories. It has to be cast by you, and it's been mainly constructed from other research… but yes. I have something."
"You're a sorceress?" he asked, accepted the sheet of neatly folder parchment she passed him.
She smiled, a little shyly. "Not as good as you. You were teaching me for a while. You were meant to come back in the autumn to continue, but now you show up here."
"Oh." He didn't know how to respond to that, so he just unfolded the paper and glanced at the word written there.
It was written in the script of Death Speech, and he found that easier to read than common; he murmured the words to himself, feeling a slight thrill of magic through him at their flutter on his tongue, but nothing happened.
"It needs intent," he theorised, at the same time as Leia said the same.
She laughed a little. "Yes. Do you want to try it then?"
He nodded. "I will—"
And then there was an almighty bang, like the violence of doors thrown open.
Leia sat up sharply, frowning. A strange pattern of footsteps echoed through the throne room outside. A three-legged gait—or a person with a cane, he guessed.
"Stay here," Leia ordered, and strode out of the room to greet the intruder. He glimpsed magic in her fist before, with a swirl of her snow-white cape, she was gone.
The door slammed in a satisfying way, and Luke crept forward to open it again, ever so slightly, peering out from behind the doorframe.
Leia had stopped in the middle of the room, her face the colour of milk. "You," she hissed, and reached for the rapier sheathed at her side. Its grip spun around her hand in swirls, glimmering with some form of enchantment.
She took a step forward, rapier poised and pointed. "Guards, arrest this man!" she shouted. "You are not welcome here."
"Your guards will not be interrupting us, Your Highness, have no fear of that," replied a smooth, cultured voice. It grated on Luke's ears—familiar, familiar, familiar.
"Your Majesty," Leia corrected. Her words vibrated with fury.
"Majesty. Of course. Forgive me." The speaker shuffled into view, his fine cane thudding against the carpet as he did. The sight of that stung too: it was tall, of a dark, wrought wood and a silver head shaped like a skull. He knew that cane. "That was my doing, after all."
Luke crept forwards—out of the study, behind the great indigo curtains—to get a closer look.
He was not a particularly tall man, but he had a presence and command that sucked all attention to him, like the velvety black robes of his were a vacuum. He had a hood thrown back over his shoulders lined with plum silk; all his finery almost disguised the hideous expression on his unnaturally, painfully smooth face, of twisted smiles and gleeful eyes and trembling chins. His skin was white and sallow, his hair so thin as to be non-existent, and Luke knew with a chiming certainty that this was a necromancer who had tried to cheat his own death one too many times.
To spurn Death is to make them your Enemy, the book had said.
Luke wondered how close the Emperor was—because surely this was the Undying Emperor?—to fighting a blood feud against the very power he wielded.
"Yes," Leia gritted out. She had not lowered her rapier, and had even shed her cloak; he got the sense she was perfectly willing to stab Palpatine on her own, guards or not. "And what have you done now? Where are my guards?"
"Nothing your necromancer shouldn't be able to fix."
Luke stuffed his fist into his mouth to keep from screaming.
Leia said nothing. "I have no necromancer. I hope you are therefore offering to fix it yourself."
Palpatine stopped walking, clasping both his hands around the head of his cane. He stood there and let out some low, grandfatherly chuckles for several minutes before he passed his cane to his left hand and resumed stalking forwards. "I am offering no such thing, Your Majesty. I know he is here."
Leia stood her ground. Palpatine didn't flinch, even as he was now close enough that a simple thrust of her rapier would have pierced his heart. "I have no idea what you mean."
"Such loyalty from an undead dog to her master," he said maliciously, and she flinched then, mouth opening just enough to snarl. "But I grow tired of your reticence. Tell me where the Prince is."
Leia's face went slack for a moment. She half-turned her head towards Luke in his hiding place, then shook it, as if to dispel the whispers.
"Nowhere," she got out thickly. He noticed bloody spittle fly from her lips; she'd bitten her tongue to keep herself from obeying the command. "I know of no prince hiding here."
Prince.
Luke still had no idea what that was supposed to mean.
"I think you do. Tell me where he is."
"No!" She tilted her head, worked her jaw, her shoulders shuddering. "No, I…"
"Cease resisting, and tell me."
She sucked in a breath and clamped her jaw shut, tears spilling over her cheeks, hand lashing up to clap over her mouth.
Luke burst out from behind the curtains and shouted, "Stop!"
He threw out his hand, tried to feel Palpatine's bones like he had those soldiers', tried to force him back—
Palpatine laughed and tossed his cane back to his other hand. With a dismissive swing, he batted it at Leia, still hunched over and trembling; she leapt out of the way and got her rapier up in time to parry, but he wasn't interested in the attack. She was out of his path now, so he advanced straight forwards. Towards Luke, who narrowed his eyes.
"Excellent try! Excellent technique. But I am not undead."
"You look it," Luke shot back.
Palpatine's face twitched in annoyance, but he smoothed it into another sleazy smile. "I see that death, resurrection, all that dusting and amnesia to boot did not affect your nerve, my son. Good. It was always useful, when directed at the right people."
Luke opened his mouth to shoot something back again… then froze.
The words rang in his head.
My son.
"What," he said. Then, louder: "What."
"I understand that you seem to have fallen in with," he shot Leia a curled lip and a sneer, "a ragtag anti-Imperial crowd, but I hope to correct this soon. You'll regain your memories soon."
"What."
"You are my son," Palpatine said, still smiling. "The Prince of the Undying Empire, my heir and my apprentice. Or did you think that any common necromancer would be able to obliterate two soldiers like that so easily, without even remembering the technique?"
"I… No!" Luke took a stumbling step back. "No! I spoke to my aunt, I know who my mother was, I know who my father was—"
Palpatine's brow creased. "Oh, I never intended to usurp the positions your birth parents held in your life, son—not at all." The way he called him son was both identical and so, so different to Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen's. "But Anakin was a beloved friend of mine, and though Padmé and I had our disagreements, she was dear to me as well. I took you in, after they died. Made you the prince—and the powerful sorcerer—they would have wanted you to be."
Luke's eyes were the size of moons.
He didn't know what to think; horror was thick in his gut.
"I understand that this must be shocking to you," Palpatine said gently. "You still have no memories. But am I not familiar? Do you not receive flashes of memory, when I say these things—my palace, the Empire, your training—"
He did.
He did have… flashes… of Palpatine training him, of a great bloody palace, of…
"But… I remember Piett." He remembered that general too, teaching him to fight with a rapier, a shortsword, a scimitar. They were flashes, painful to examine, but… "He knew me."
"Piett was one of my finest generals, before he defected from the Undying Empire to that tiny warlord's cause." Palpatine sighed. "Of course he knew you. He was the one who tried to take you to Vader, kidnap you, in the name of using your power for his lord's aims."
Luke didn't know what to say.
He didn't know what to think.
"And then on the way, in the scuffle, you died." Palpatine turned his face away and blinked fiercely for a moment. "Vader resurrected you—likely in the hope of using you, and your power, as his vassal. Death Speech is an effective method of controlling the undead, but it is always stronger from the necromaster to their servant."
He turned his head to Leia. "Just like you did with the Queen of Alderaan, after we wiped out so much of her kingdom. It was a superb idea on your part."
"What?"
He and Leia said it in unison; he glanced at her, searching for help, but all he got was a glare. "I didn't—" He stumbled back again. "I couldn't have—"
"Is this true?" Leia demanded.
"I couldn't have—"
"I was so proud of you, Luke," Palpatine took the remaining steps forward and laid a hand on his shoulder, "when you came up with the idea. Alderaan was not cooperating with us—they were resisting most irritatingly. Killing so many of them, including the royal family, then resurrecting the youngest, least experienced member, to put her in a position where she has no choice but to obey your commands? It was the perfect plan to get Alderaan to toe the line. The perfect puppet."
"Is this true?" Leia shouted.
It echoed loudly in the room. Bounced off the marble, the skylight, the walls, mocking him. Leia's face shone gold under stained-glass.
He begged, "No! It can't be."
Leia pressed, "Do you remember him?"
"I… yes, but—"
"Is this true!?"
"I…" He took a deep breath and floundered. "Maybe. I don't know. Maybe."
"Maybe—"
"Stop!" he gasped out, eyes blurring. "Please, just stop! Shut up!"
She shut up.
He could see the muscle spasming in her jaw, but she was silent, and said nothing.
"Precisely like that, my son. Do not tolerate disobedience."
Luke was going to be sick.
A hand went on his shoulder again; another on his chin. It tilted his face up to meet Palpatine's yellow eyes, crinkled in sympathy around the corners.
"I know that this will be difficult," he said. "I know that you dusted in areas unsympathetic to our empire, and spoke to people unsympathetic to our cause. The rabble, the rebellion… they lack the foresight to see the full picture, and they do not understand what either you or I have done to bring peace to this mountain range. You have only heard the one side of it; I implore you, allow me to show you the other side, so it is less of a shock when we cast the spell for your memories to return and you can once again see the truth of your place in the world."
He released Luke's chin to hold out his hand. It was laden with rings, dull and cold.
"My place?" Luke echoed. "What use does an Undying Emperor have for an heir?"
"None, one might think. But you were special—I loved your parents, and I loved you. I have trained you, you have helped me rule; you are not only my heir, you are my right-hand, my advisor, my apprentice. And even if you were not, it never hurts to be cautious."
He was still holding out his hand.
"I know this is a shock to you," he said gently. Luke closed his eyes; the gentleness there, the care in his voice, was what hurt the most. "I know this must be confusing, and it must be painful. But I want only the best for you—and I want my son back, after he was kidnapped and killed by my enemies. When your memories return, I will be there for you during the recovery process, every step of the way.
"Will you come with me?"
Luke eyed the hand.
He glanced at Leia, still frozen like a statue, glaring at them.
His father noticed the gaze. "I doubt that if you do not, you will be welcome here for much longer."
Looking Leia in the eye, he could tell that easily.
He was an Imperial orphan deep in enemy territory.
Those undead soldiers he'd obliterated… they'd been trying to save him, hadn't they? They'd been trying to return him home.
Everyone he'd fought against…
Everyone he'd condemned…
His legs were shaking. His arms were shaking. He didn't know if he could stand.
He less took his father's hand. Then he fell into him, and let him hold him up as his shoulders heaved with dry sobs.