notes: Again, my second beta (princess-sansa-of-ithilien) was busy, so this chapter only went through one beta (absynthe-minded). I hope it still is good... I wanted to get it to you all this weekend, though, and now seemed as good a time as any.
I hope you enjoy!
CHAPTER 12
Weeks bled into months. Danyil and Cora appeared again, and they joined Ninth Brother and Thirteenth Sister in their insults and their abuse. Leia collected bruises like she had once collected dresses, and as the months bled into a year, she counted the number of broken bones to a total of twenty-two.
They beat her daily, kicks and punches and cuffs to the side of the head. They called her names: called her stupid, worthless, no one. They laughed at her, and derided her, and acted as if she was less than the scum on the bottom of their shoes.
"Why?" Leia demanded one particularly brutal day. She was angry and frustrated and close to tears. "Why do you do this?"
"Because we want you to hate us," Ninth Brother replied in his calm, even voice.
Leia screamed at him, and fought to keep from lunging. In that moment, though she knew she shouldn't, she hated him with all the fire of the Force at her command. The urge to wrap herself in it—to summon it and use it—was almost overwhelming. But she checked herself, reined herself in, bound her anger and frustration and pain into a tight ball and buried it deep inside her chest. She knew that attacking them would only result in another beating—and she had already suffered two that day, leaving her limping and with both a swollen right eye and a split lip. Even worse, it would do exactly what Shmi had warned her so many times not to do.
"You must resist them," she told Leia every time they met now. "They want you to hate, and through that hate to Fall."
"What do they mean by Fall?" Leia asked.
"They mean to fall to the Dark Side—to let the Dark Side consume you."
"And what is the Dark Side?"
"It is the antithesis of the Light. It is hatred, and anger, and destruction. It is death. It is feeding on the gluttonous, rabid parts of the Force, and in turn letting it swell you with rotted, reeking power."
"I don't want that," Leia said.
Shmi smiled and pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Good. Then fight them. Don't let your hatred or your anger consume you."
"How do I do that?" Leia asked.
"That is something you must figure out for yourself," Shmi replied.
Leia struggled with that. She imagined torrential downpours dousing the fire of the Force—but still it crept through and out, smashing Danyil to the floor and throwing Thirteenth Sister into the wall. She ripped up the wood flooring of the practice court, and made dents in the walls with the fury of her desperation.
How? she wondered. How am I supposed to stop this?
The answer came unexpectedly, on a day worse than most. It had begun with Ninth Brother dislocating her shoulder, and by mid-morning Leia's left eye was swollen shut beneath a fractured eye socket, and her lips, teeth, and chin were a bloodied mess. Her arm still hung useless at her side, painful and cumbersome, making it difficult to move or even walk without agony.
"You're nothing," Danyil said, and punched her to the ground.
"You're useless," Cora added, delivering a sharp kick to Leia's stomach. She grunted and curled up, trying to protect her chest and face.
"Use the Force," Thirteenth Sister demanded, leaning down and grabbing a fistful of Leia's hair, dragging her upright. Leia whimpered, her scalp hurting and her dislocated arm agonizing. "Show us that you're worth something—anything." She let Leia go. Leia slumped to the floor, crying silently.
Ninth Brother knelt by her side and smoothed a hand down her back. "We're just trying to help you, 851," he said softly. "We're trying to get you to unlock your power. If you'd just cooperate, we wouldn't have to hurt you."
Leia shook her head. "But I don't want to unlock my power," she said miserably through her tears. "And besides, you're cruel. You're not trying to help me. You're just mean."
Ninth Brother sat back on his heels. "Imagine our threats and our condescension and our cruelties as durasteel arrows," he said. "Imagine them piercing you, and through those holes pouring your inner power. That is what we are trying to do to help you. Do you understand?"
Leia did understand. But that had given her an idea.
In her mind's eye, over the glass covering the fire of the Force, Leia imagined durasteel shields falling into place. They covered the glass, covered the Force, covered everything but the faintest gleams of light creeping through the seams.
When the Grand Inquisitor came to her later that afternoon and flung her against the wall, ordering her to fight to get down, and threatening to leave her there all night if she did not, Leia imagined again those shields. She took all the memories of the insults, took all the pain and fear in her body, and fed them into the shields. The shields grew strong and resolute, and Leia did not use the Force. The Grand Inquisitor let her down after an hour, but ordered that she not visit Dr. Ammit for the rest of a long, miserable week.
The Grand Inquisitor disappeared for a time, only to return a month later with a fresh scar on his face and a fresh temper darkening his mood. He struck Leia into the wall hard enough to fracture her skull, leaving her in the Medical Wing for nearly a week while her cranial swelling went down. When she returned he was in an even blacker mood.
"You will use the Force," he informed her, "or I will kill you."
Leia could feel his lie, and to spite him spat in his face. He wiped the spittle from his cheek with a slow and purposeful hand, then crushed her windpipe with a clenched fist. Leia gaped and gasped, dragging her nails uselessly against the skin of her throat, trying to rip away the invisible cords choking her.
"Use the Force," the Grand Inquisitor ordered, taking a threatening step closer.
Leia dug her nails into her neck and strained to drag in a breath.
"Use the Force," the Grand Inquisitor growled.
Leia imagined the durasteel shields settling over the glass separating her from the Force. She would not use the Force—could not touch it through the durasteel bands laying over the glass, though chinks of light seeped through the cracks—and he would not kill her. Of that she was certain. His lie had been slick and sharp, lurking within his words like daggers and a viper. The faintest burn of the Force snaked its way between the shields, through her veins and in her marrow. It was just enough to warn her of the deceit, but too weak to deal any damage.
With a snarl, the Grand Inquisitor released her. He turned to Danyil and Cora, waiting against the wall, and motioned for them to draw near. "Beat her," he ordered, and stalked from the room.
That night Shmi hugged her tightly. "I'm proud of you," she said. "You've learned well."
"Thank you," Leia murmured into Shmi's shoulder, burying her face in the sweet-smelling, homespun cloth of her dress. She hesitated, then looked up at Shmi and asked, "It's not wrong of me to use the Force to see if people are lying, is it?"
"No," Shmi said. "Though you must be careful—any use of the Force can be an open door."
"I'll be careful," Leia promised. "I'll only ever use it for that."
Shmi pressed a kiss to the top of Leia's head. "For now, at least," she murmured, much to Leia's confusion.
Leia's tenth birthday came. It was celebrated with a shattered femur and a trip to the Medical Wing.
"Happy birthday, 851," Dr. Ammit said, sitting down on the bed Leia was resting in. Reaching into a pocket of lab coat, he pulled out a small, wrapped gift. "I'm probably not supposed to be giving you this," he told her, "so don't tell anyone. But here." He gave it to her, and Leia eagerly unwrapped it to reveal a small container with a slightly squashed piece of cake.
She ate it quickly, licking the frosting from her fingers, and smiled at Dr. Ammit. "Thank you," she said, when he took the container back from her. Leaning forward, mindful of the pain still radiating out from her leg, she gave the doctor a quick hug.
"You're welcome, 851," Dr. Ammit said kindly.
It wasn't until later, after he had left and Leia was alone, that the tears came. She curled onto her side beneath the blankets and, pressing the knuckles of her right hand into her mouth to stifle the sound of her sobs, cried. His gift was the first truly kind thing anyone in the real world had done since Tobias had given her the hug the last day before he died—a thought which only brought more tears as Leia remembered her friend.
Other than Dr. Ammit's infrequent kindnesses and Shmi's increasingly sporadic visits, Leia's only comfort was Luke. He visited her at the house by the lake every night, and together they explored the surrounding countryside and played in the gardens.
"I can't swim," Luke admitted sheepishly to Leia one night, when she suggested they swim out to one of the islands dotting the waves. They were seated on a bench down at the lakeside, watching the sun set over the water.
"You can't?" Leia asked, surprised. She had thought everyone in the galaxy knew how to swm.
Luke shook his head. "Desert planet," he said, "remember? Water's too precious to waste on swimming pools. Except for maybe the Hutts." He pulled a face. "Even if the Hutts do have pools, though, I've never seen one."
"Well then I'll teach you," Leia said brightly.
"Really?" Luke asked hesitantly, hopefully. "You would?"
"Sure," Leia said, smiling. "I don't see why not."
"I'd like that," Luke said. "I'd like that a lot."
After that, they spent at least an hour every night down in the lake, first splashing around in the shallows, then venturing out into the deeper water once Luke grew more confident. Leia dredged up every memory she could of her father teaching her how to swim. Luke was too big and she was too small for her to properly hold his belly up above the waves, as her father had done to teach her how to float, but they compromised by kneeling close to the shore where the water was barely thigh-deep.
After two months, Luke was confident enough to risk swimming out to the nearest island. That night they lay on the sand and watched the bright stars come out overhead, backed by the arm of the galaxy.
"It's beautiful," Luke breathed. He turned his head so he could look at Leia.
"It is," Leia agreed, still staring up at the night sky. "You had to get really far out into the mountains to be able to see the stars this clear back home on Alderaan," she said. "Papá said it was the light pollution from Aldera and Corsieen blocking them out."
"Corsieen?" Luke asked.
"A city a little farther north than Aldera," Leia told him. "It's older than Aldera, and used to be the Northern Continent's capitol back before the Organas united the planet under their rule."
"Who built Aldera then?"
"The Organas," Leia said.
"Neat," Luke said, and sounded like he really thought so.
Leia smiled, trying to ignore the pang of homesickness that speared through her. She hadn't realized, until she started talking about it, just how much she missed home—missed the mountains, the palace, the city she had grown up in. In that moment, she would have given anything to go back home.
"I hope I can go there someday," Luke said after a moment, breaking the silence. "I'd like to see the mountains, and the palace, and the city."
Leia looked at him, off-handedly wondering if he had read her thoughts—if he had somehow known what it was that she missed the most.
"I hope I can see your planet too someday," Leia said, turning back towards the star-studded sky. "I've never seen a desert before."
Out of the corner of her eye, Leia saw Luke flash a grin. "There's not much to see," he said, "but sure."
That was the last conversation they had. The next night, when Leia opened her eyes to the house on the lake, Luke was nowhere to be seen. She hunted through the gardens and through the house, and waited for him for long hours on the bench by the water—but to no avail. Luke did not appear.
She did not dream of Luke again, even as weeks bled into months.
Neither did Leia dream of him in the field filled with machines. She had done so four times more, each time a little different. In one dream he was dressed in a blue shirt and shorts, the same hat pushed back on his head as he worked elbow-deep in one of the machines. In another he sat on one of the fence slats, a dome-shaped droid by his feet, chattering happily to it while he ate a sandwich. In the third he was following a short, stocky, middle-aged man around, carrying the toolbox, handing the older man whatever tool he asked for. In the last dream, which Leia had only two days before Luke vanished, he was pulling vats out from beneath the machines and testing the water collected there with a long, thin rod.
As time passed, she ceased even to dream about the house by the lake. A great sorrow, rich and deep, filled Leia when she thought of it, late at night as she lay awake from pain or anxiety, or during the longer days filled with abuse and ridicule. Thinking of it made her feel aching and empty, as if she had lost something very precious to her.
And she missed Luke—missed him with a longing so sharp it tasted like copper in her mouth.
One day about three months after Leia had last dreamed of Luke—she knew this because, after the second night of his absence, she had begun counting nights—the Grand Inquisitor halted her with a hand on her shoulder on her way out of the practice court, Sixth Sister in the lead.
"What am I going to do with you, 851?" he asked her, eyebrows drawn low.
It had been many weeks since Leia had seen him last. As the months had become a year, he had disappeared more and more often and for longer and longer periods of time, leaving her to Ninth Brother, Thirteenth Sister, Danyil, and Cora. Their orders, it seemed, had not changed for all the time that had passed—still they tormented and abused her, dealing pain and insult alike in an attempt to make her angry and lose control.
She had not, however, lost control for many weeks. The last time had been after they shattered her collarbone a month and a half before. She had screamed in agony, and with her scream had shattered half of the ceiling tiles and thrown all four of her trainers into the walls. They had picked themselves up slowly, and then Ninth Brother had brought her to the Medical Wing to be tended to by Dr. Ammit.
"If you would only do what they wanted, 851, they wouldn't have cause to hurt you," Dr. Ammit had said woefully. She had been sitting in a large bed in a larger room filled with identical cots, recovering from a surgery that had placed metal pins at the center of the shattered bone. She had still been groggy from the anesthesia and was only half-coherent.
"Hm?" she had asked, turning bleary eyes on Dr. Ammit.
"If you just did what they told you, they'd stop hurting you," he had told her again. "Wouldn't you like that?"
Leia had given a tiny shrug—and cried out with pain, in spite of the medication dulling the nerves. She had gasped and made a grasping grab for her collarbone, only to abort the movement before she could touch it.
Dr. Ammit had reached out and taken Leia's wrist in one of his large hands, guiding it back down into her lap.
"I wish you'd at least think about it," he had told her softly. "About doing what they want," he had clarified, when Leia turned a confused gaze on him.
"I have," Leia had said, her words slurred and only half-formed.
"Then why do you keep refusing them?" he had asked her, clearly frustrated.
"Because it would be worse if I didn't."
Dr. Ammit had shook his head. "But why?" he asked.
"I can't tell you," Leia had replied and sighed, leaning tiredly back against the pillows. Her eyes had slid shut, opened, then shut again.
Dr. Ammit had sighed. "I'll leave you to rest," he had said, and patted Leia on the hand. "I'll see you tonight, 851." But Leia had already been asleep.
Now the Grand Inquisitor continued to stare at Leia for a long moment, Sixth Sister half-in, half-out of the doorway, Leia awkwardly turned to follow her. He watched her, and she watched him and ignored Sixth Sister's hard eyes on her back.
At last the Grand Inquisitor said, "Last chance, 851. Accept your hate, and accept your training."
"Or what?" Leia challenged.
"Or you will suffer."
Leia laughed at that, harsh and loud. "I thought I already was," she said.
"Last chance," the Grand Inquisitor said again, sweet and soft.
"No," Leia said coldly. "I'll never do what you want. Ever."
The next morning Sixth Sister never came for Leia. Leia frowned and tried the door, but it did not open.
At first it was nice. Leia went back to sleep, and slept until mid-morning, at which point she rose and used the toilet and washed her face and hands. The silence was, at first, comforting.
As the morning slid into afternoon, however, the silence began to grate on her. She was so accustomed to the insults and to the beatings that, though it was nice to be pain-free—or mostly pain-free; she had a black eye and a swollen lip from being slapped the day before, as well as what she suspected was a cracked rib—it felt strange to be left alone.
"Hello?" she called, banging on the door as afternoon graduated to evening and still Sixth Sister did not appear. "Sixth Sister? Ninth Brother? Thirteenth Sister? Danyil? Cora? Grand Inquisitor?"
Only silence answered her cries, and her palm went numb from hitting the door.
Evening merged into night. Leia felt it in her head and in her bones, in the internal clock that kept her nights and days aligned. And still Sixth Sister did not come.
At last Leia gave up and curled into bed, forcing herself to close her eyes. It was difficult; she was used to facing off against her trainers, and used to being hurt. It felt strange to go to sleep after having done nothing all day.
When at last she slept, after many long hours of trying, she did so fitfully, dreaming many uncomfortable dreams.
She dreamed of mechanical men, the spit of red lasers from their wrist blasters echoing over a harsh, nasal repetition of "Roger, roger, roger, roger…"
She dreamed of men dressed in white and blue-streaked armor marching up a long, sloping stair to a broad plaza, headed by a man dressed in black and bearing a tongue of blue flame.
She dreamed of a world burning.
She dreamed of a wrinkled, scarred man lifting his hands to the ceiling, and softly, over the sound of deafening cheers, a woman's voice saying, "So this is how liberty dies—to thunderous applause."
She dreamed of her father holding a tiny baby wrapped in a blanket, and of a red-haired, red-bearded man carrying a second babe in the corner of his singed, brown cloak.
She woke sweating. She swung her legs off of the bed and rose, crossing to the sink. Turning on the cold water, she splashed her face and neck, then leaned over the basin and took long, deep breaths.
They were just dreams, she told herself, letting the water flow over her fingertips. Just dreams…
The next day was just as long and boring as the day before. Leia paced around her room, took a nap, and paced some more. She washed her face again, and wondered if she would be brought to the large shower they had her wash in once a week; it had been seven days since her last shower, and was time.
No one appeared to take her, however, and Leia was left to curl up in bed after another fruitless, anxious day.
The third day dawned to find Leia already awake and once again pacing. She was bored out of her mind, and had begun to pick at her arms out of nervous energy.
Just let something happen, she thought. Something. Anything. As accustomed to them as she was, she would even take a beating over the mind-numbing, anxious silence and nothing that had been her life for the past three days.
As if her plea had been answered, the door to her room slid open. Leia turned to find the Sixth Sister standing there, grim-faced and serious.
"Come with me, 851," she bade. Then, without waiting to see if Leia was obeying, she turned and strode down the corridor.
Leia followed warily, not wanting to face the consequence of disobeying—she had long ago learned to choose her battles.
They entered the lift, as Leia usually did, but when it stopped and the door opened, it was not to the long hall lined with practice courts. Instead the walls and floor were made of duracrete cinder blocks, and the ceiling was lined with pipes. The air had a wet, dank smell, and it was cool enough to make Leia shiver when she stepped off of the lift after Sixth Sister.
"Where are we?" Leia asked.
"Beneath the Inquisitorial Building," Sixth Sister informed her. "Now be quiet."
She led her past iron doors locked with thick bolts, their hinges on the outside and small windows covered with sliding panels set above Leia's head. Red-blinking keypads were fixed to the wall beside each door, a shock of contemporary technology in the midst of an otherwise archaic design.
Sixth Sister halted outside one such door and punched a code into the keypad beside it. The keypad blinked green,and the bolt shot back. Sixth Sister reached forward and tugged the door open, then stood aside to let Leia precede her into the room.
It was small and bare, but for a drain at the center of the sloping floor and a pair of shackles attached to the back wall. Everything was permacrete but for the metal door and the shackles.
Sixth Sister guided Leia to the back of the small room and, pulling her hands behind her back, locked her wrists into the shackles above Leia's head. Leia tugged at them, but they had no give, and she only succeeded in biting the edges of the metal into her soft skin.
"What am I doing here?" Leia asked, turning to look at Sixth Sister.
Sixth Sister did not reply. She simply turned and left the room without saying a word, allowing the metal door to swing shut behind her. Leia heard the thud of the metal bolt sliding back into place—and then silence.
Leia stood there, arms shackled overhead, and waited.
In the end, she did not have to wait long.
The door swung open and Cora appeared, a length of chain in her hands. She stepped aside once she was in the room, ushering a bound and gagged figure ahead of her. The figure shuffled into the room, and halted when they were even with Cora, not daring to take a single step further.
Cora reached forward and pulled away the gag. Startled, the figure looked up—and froze.
Leia's blood ran cold.
It was Sabé.
Sabé, along with Rebécca and Malothar, the Captain of the Honor Guard, had been the one to teach her how to fight—how to fall and how to roll, how to punch and kick, how to deflect and block. She had been the one to show Leia how to take apart a blaster, and how to put it back together again. She had been the first one to instruct Leia in the art of shooting.
"You're going to need to know these skills before you grow old," she told Leia, when Leia asked her why they had spent two hours going over how to construct and deconstruct a small holdout blaster.
"But we're pacifistic," Leia said, tongue stumbling over the large word.
Sabé laughed at that, though Leia did not know why. "Where did you learn that?" she asked.
"Papá said it at dinner last night," Leia said.
"And do you know what it means?" Sabé asked.
Leia shrugged. "It means we don't fight," Leia said.
"That's right," Sabé said. "But what isn't right is that Alderaan is entirely pacifistic."
Leia frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I mean," Sabé said, "Alderaanians are very careful about what fights they choose to take part in. Oh, Alderaan claims to be pacifistic—and they are, as a rule. But in the end, Alderaanians are always in the thick of things."
"What's that mean?" Leia asked.
"It means Alderaan is meddlesome," Sabé said. "And though they claim to be pacifistic, in reality they rarely are."
"Oh," Leia said. "So why do I need to learn how to put a blaster together?"
"Because one day you're going to be in the middle of a fight, and your blaster is going to short, and you're going to need to know how to fix it. Now, let's go through it again, shall we?"
The Sabé of now, however, looked very different from when Leia last saw her. Her hair was shorn jaggedly short, and she was wearing an ill-fitting, lumpy, grey jumpsuit with a number burned into the breast. Half-healed cuts and fading bruises littered her face, and her wrists were chained together before her.
"Sabé?" Leia asked, barely daring to breathe. "Sabé, is it...is it really you?"
"Leia?" Sabé gasped, and took a single step forward.
Cora struck. Sabé cried out, Cora's fist smashing into her cheek and sending her staggering. Chains rattled as Sabé lifted a hand to her smarting cheek.
"I'm sorry," Sabé said quickly, backing up so that she was not standing ahead of Cora.
Cora snorted. "Better," she said, and dropped the chain. Then, turning, she left the small room, closing and bolting the door behind her.
"Leia," Sabé gasped again, as soon as they were alone. This time when she took a step forward, there was no one there to strike her back.
She was at Leia's side in an instant, chain dragging behind her. Sabé touched Leia's left cheek, then her right, as if to make certain she was real. "You're not dead," Sabé said, tears welling in her eyes. "Gods, I can't believe it. You're not dead."
"You thought I was dead?" Leia asked, shocked.
"Yes," Sabé said. "But nevermind that. All that matters is that you're here."
Leia tugged again at the shackles binding her wrists to the wall above her head. Again they did not give.
"Leia," Sabé began, "I—"
The door opened, and behind Sabé's shoulder, Leia saw the Grand Inquisitor enter the room, followed by Cora. Cora was carrying a long leather whip in her hands. It glinted strangely in the room's harsh light.
"Come here, prisoner," Cora commanded as the door swung shut.
It looked like a shutter falling over Sabé's face. Her eyes went from bright and alive, her lips half-curled into a smile, to dead. Her eyes turned to ash, and the smile died a painless death on her mouth.
Turning, Sabé obeyed. Cora held out a keychip, which she slid over the shackles holding Sabé's wrists. The shackles popped open and fell to the floor, the chain falling after it. Cora gave it a kick, sending it rattling into a corner.
"On your knees, prisoner," Cora ordered.
Sabé knelt.
Cora shook out the whip. Then, with a grunt of exertion, she brought it up and around, then swinging down toward Sabé's unprotected back. It struck—and stuck, shredding through the cloth of her jumpsuit.
Sabé screamed. And screamed again as Cora gave a great yank, pulling the whip free of Sabé's back in a spurt of blood.
Leia cried out, echoing Sabé's scream with one of her own. She strained against the shackles, feeling the edges bite deep into her wrists, and struggled to reach her old teacher. "Sabé," she cried, breathless and already close to tears. "Sabé!"
Sabé screamed again as the whip struck and flayed her, this time tearing off a long strip of skin and cloth, rather than sticking in her flesh. Cora grunted, brought the whip circling around, and struck again. Sabé pitched forward at the blow, only just managing to catch herself on her hands.
Cora struck again—and again. Sabé screamed each time, though the sound got weaker and weaker with each blow.
"Stop," Leia begged, looking first at Cora, then at the Grand Inquisitor. "Please, stop."
Sabé screamed again.
"Please, I'll do anything," Leia promised. "I'll use the Force. I won't fight you. I'll be good. I promise."
The Grand Inquisitor looked at her amiably and said, "I'm afraid we're past that."
"Please," Leia pleaded. "Whatever you want me to do, I'll do."
"I want you to hate," the Grand Inquisitor said. "I want you to hate so much that it consumes you. I want you to Fall."
"No," Leia said, and began to cry. "No, please…"
"It is your choice, 851," the Grand Inquisitor said. "Put a stop to this and Fall, or watch your precious teacher die."
Sabé cried out weakly, hands spasming against the duracrete floor. Blood dripped from her back and to the duracrete beneath her, running in long, curving rivulets to the drain.
"Choose, 851."
"No," Leia begged.
Sabé pushed herself upright, her arms shaking. "No, Leia," she said. "Don't—" She jerked and fell forward as the whip struck again, arms crumpling beneath her.
Anger and hate welled in Leia's chest, hot and sticky and black. It rose in her like bile, like rot, stealing away her breath and replacing her heartbeat with shuddering malice. She wanted to vomit it out—wanted to spit it at Cora, at the Grand Inquisitor standing and watching on. She wanted them to die screaming.
Sabé picked herself back up, using strength Leia hadn't known she could still possibly posses. "Don't do it, Leia," she said. "Fight him. Don't let them win—" She cried out and fell forward again as the whip struck again, and again, landing face-first on the floor.
No, Leia told herself, swallowing her anger and hate back. No, this is what he wants. I can't let him win.
Another lash fell.
But Sabé—
"Make your choice, 851," the Grand Inquisitor said. "You don't have much longer."
At their feet, Sabé went limp.
"Sabé," Leia cried, straining forward. Sabé made no move to answer her. "Sabé please. Get up."
"Already she may have lost too much blood," the Grand Inquisitor said. "Already you may be too late."
The anger and hate dripped from Leia's lips. The glass wall standing between her and the Force shuddered, and cracked. The fire trickled into her veins, hot and tempting, begging to be used.
It would be so easy, Leia thought. So easy...
But no. No, I can't. I—
The whip caught in Sabé's back again, and Cora ripped it free. Sabé did not move.
One, two, five more lash strokes fell. Sabé remained motionless, even as her blood speckled Cora's boots and crept ever farther over the floor.
The fire of the Force swelled in Leia, begging to be released. She held onto it with her fingernails and teeth, only just keeping it bridled.
No, she thought, even as stroke thirty, forty, forty-five fell on Sabé's unmoving back. I can't let them win.
At last, panting and sweating, Cora halted. She strode over and knelt at Sabé's side, and placed two fingers under Sabé's chin.
A long moment of silence followed. Then Cora said, "She's dead."
Leia screamed.
The Force exploded out of her, striking and ricocheting off the confined walls of the cell. Permacrete buckled and cracked. The iron door bulged, groaning and screeching. Cora's head snapped backwards with a sickening crack, and she flew into the wall behind her. She landed on the floor in a crumpled pile, blood leaking from her eyes and nose and ears.
The Grand Inquisitor himself was knocked back, but he maintained his stance. Air swirled around him in a whirlwind, eddies of the Force buffeting the air as he pushed out against Leia's strike.
The whirlwind died. The Grand Inquisitor straightened. "Well done," he said. "Do that a little sooner, and you may save the next one."
Leia's blood ran to ice. "The next one?" she asked, feeling suddenly small and afraid, even in the wake of the Force, still trickling through her.
The Grand Inquisitor strode over to her, gripped her chin, and forced her face up. "Yes," he said calmly, yellow eyes piercing. "The next one. You haven't Fallen yet. You lost control out of fear and pain, not out of hate, or because you gave yourself over to the Dark Side—though I think the hate is there. Yes," he said slowly, "I can feel it in you, mounting. Yet you won't let it take control. A shame, really. You could have saved her if you'd just let it out."
Leia jerked away from the Grand Inquisitor's touch, glaring. "I won't Fall," she snapped. "I won't. I can't."
"And why not?" the Grand Inquisitor asked, folding his arms over his chest.
"Because— Because…"
Why couldn't she? Leia wondered suddenly. How many people would be hurt, and even killed, in their attempts to make her Fall? How much violence and death would be wrought in their hunt to seduce her to the Dark Side? How much suffering could she prevent if she just gave in?
For a second, Leia almost did it.
But then—no. To give in, she realized, would be to spit in the faces of all those who had suffered—had died—for her sake. Sabé. Rebécca. Everyone who had died trying to keep her from Twelfth Brother's clutches. Her father…
No, Leia thought. Shmi is right. I can't Fall. If I Fall, all I'll do is hurt people. I'll become just like the Grand Inquisitor. Just like Twelfth Brother. I'll hurt and kill, and like Shmi said, I'll bring death and destruction.
I can't Fall, Leia decided. I have to keep fighting.
"Well?" the Grand Inquisitor asked. "I can see you thinking about my words."
"No," Leia said, looking up at him with a glare. "I can't Fall. I won't let myself Fall."
"We shall see," the Grand Inquisitor said, turning away. And with that he left, the buckled door swinging shut behind him, leaving Leia alone with a corpse.
~oOo~
Leia didn't know how long it was before someone came to take Sabé's body away. It was long enough that her mouth and throat were cotton and her stomach gnawed greedily at her ribs for want of food. It was long enough that she grew tired, the cuffs holding her upright and keeping her from sitting. Her legs began to shake, and she sagged in her bindings, the edges of the shackles biting into her wrists and drawing blood.
It was also long enough for the body to start smelling. Leia wrinkled her nose and breathed through her mouth—but even that was not enough to keep out the sickly sweet stench of flesh rotting. The taste coated her tongue and crept down into her lungs, imprinting on each of her thoughts.
She would never again question what rotting flesh smelled like, Leia thought.
At last, however, someone came.
The buckled door swung open to reveal two men dressed in hazmat suits, masks covering their faces and thick, protective padding covering them from head to toe. They moved cautiously and cumbersomely, bending over to grab Sabé's hands and feet and hoisting her into the air. They carried her between them out the door, which closed again, leaving Leia alone.
She was not alone for long, however.
No more than a quarter of an hour had passed when Ninth Brother appeared in the doorway. He smiled at Leia, and said, "Come along, 851. This cell is untenable now, thanks to your outburst. We need to move you to one better equipped to handle you."
Leia frowned at that, and tried to question Ninth Brother as to what he meant. He said no more, however, even as he scanned a keycard across the shackles holding Leia's hands to the wall, and even as he led her out of the room and down the hall.
"I suggest you don't try anything foolish like escape," he told her sternly, halting and turning to face her in the doorway. "There is only way in and out of this level of the IB, and there are Inquisitors teeming the halls above us, as well as Stormtroopers. The IB is at the heart of the palace construct, meaning you would not only have to escape this building but the palace itself."
Leia looked at him and said, "When have I ever tried to escape?"
Ninth Brother laughed at that. "Never let it be said that 851 isn't courageous," he said to the air around them. "In fact, I think you have more balls than half of the Inquisitors put together." He shook his head, but Leia thought there was something akin to fondness in the movement. "Well come on then, 851," he said, and turning led the way down the corridor.
He brought her to a room at the end of the hall. There were two bolts on the door instead of one, and there was no window. It took two seperate keycards to unlock, and when Leia was ushered inside, she found herself in a prison of white.
The walls and ceiling were covered with a thick, resistant material that, if Leia had to guess, was a mixture of cloth and plasti. It was springy to the touch, but rough like sandpaper. Leia suspected it would not shatter and buckle like the permacrete of the last cell had.
A chain and pair of cuffs hung from the ceiling in the far back corner. It was to these that Leia was led. Ninth Brother lifted her arms above her head and fastened the shackles around her wrists, sealing them with a hiss and a snick.
"You'll have enough slack to move around some," Ninth Brother said, "but not enough to reach the door." Then he patted Leia on the head and left the room, closing and locking the door behind him. Leia heard both the bolts slide into place with a thud-clang. She imagined that the air shuddered at the sound.
The chain was too short for Leia to sit. She sagged in her bindings, legs already weak and tired from her time in the permacrete room. Her feet dragged along the ground and her knees nearly reached it—nearly, but not quite.
After a while she fell asleep. She was tired—so very tired—and it didn't matter that her wrists hurt with a deep, aching pain, nor that it was difficult to breathe with her arms above her head and her weight hanging from them. She hadn't slept in the permacrete room, and her exhaustion swept up and over her, bearing her down into slumber.
"Oh, Leia," Shmi murmured.
Leia opened her eyes to the warmth and blue sky of the desert.
The warmth was comforting, and sank into her bones to soothe the aches and pains she felt in her wrists and shoulders. Clouds hung in a dark band on the horizon, thick and grey and ominous, and Leia shivered. She did not like the look of them, and could not help but fear what they portended.
She looked back at Shmi, who stood a few feet away. Seeing her gaze, Shmi opened her arms in silent invitation—an invitation which Leia took without hesitation. Shmi hugged her tightly, and then leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of Leia's head.
"I hurt," Leia said into Shmi's chest.
"I know," Shmi said softly. Then, even softer, she added, "It's okay to cry."
Leia burst into tears.
"Why?" Leia sobbed. "Why did they kill her?"
"Because they want you to Fall," Shmi replied evenly. "And they're getting desperate."
Leia cried harder.
"She...she's…" Leia's voice fell away into sobs, and she clutched at the back of Shmi's shawl with tight, desperate fingers.
"She's home," Shmi said, and tightened her arms around Leia. "I know that doesn't take away the pain of her parting, but she's happy. She's one with the Force now."
"But she's gone."
"She'll never truly be gone," Shmi promised her. "Not so long as you remember her—remember the good times and the bad, the happy and the sad. Not so long as you can feel the Force."
Leia sniffed, and pulled away just enough to wipe her nose on the back of her hand. "I miss her," she said miserably.
"I know," Shmi said. "And that's okay." Leaning forward, she smoothed the loose hair off of Leia's forehead.
"Be brave," Shmi said, kneeling down in front of Leia. She reached out and gripped Leia's shoulders. "Be brave, and be strong. They will do anything to make you Fall—but if you do, you will bring darkness to the galaxy."
Leia nodded. "I know," she said. "I...I won't Fall."
Shmi smiled, and rose just enough to kiss Leia's forehead. "I'm proud of you," she said, and smiled.
And then the desert blurred and ran, and began to fade.
"Don't leave me," Leia cried, reaching for Shmi.
The door to the cell opened, the bolts shooting back with a clang-thud, snapping Leia awake. She sniffed and blinked, feeling the tackiness of half-dried tears on her cheeks and chin.
The Grand Inquisitor entered, followed by Thirteenth Sister who had a dark and thunderous expression on her face, and a bound and gagged Malothar. The Captain was bruised and bloodied, his hair shorn short and his shirt and pants ragged and stained. His eyes were gaunt and hollow. He was dripping wet.
"No," Leia gasped, and ran into the end of her chain as she strained to reach him.
Thirteenth Sister kicked Malothar's feet out from under him, and he crashed to the ground with a muffled grunt. Then she reached down and yanked the gag from his mouth.
"Any last words?" she asked.
Malothar's eyes were wide on Leia's face. "Princesita," he whispered. "You're alive." It was a gasp of wonderment, of awe, of relief so profound it made Leia want to cry.
"Malothar," Leia said plaintively.
Malothar, who had sung Leia to sleep during her afternoon naps when she was still small enough to need them.
Malothar, who had run through the Palace halls with her on his back.
Malothar, who had teamed up with Rebécca to sneak her into the kitchens to steal snacks and treats.
Malothar, who had been the first to teach her how to wield a staff, to fall, to fight.
She looked up at the Grand Inquisitor standing off to the side, and said, "Please don't do this. Please."
"Release your hate," the Grand Inquisitor told her. "That is the only way you will be able to stop us from killing him."
Malothar paled. "Leia," he said, quick and desperate, "be brave. Be strong."
The Grand Inquisitor nodded at Thirteenth Sister. Thirteenth Sister pulled a baton from her belt and flicked a button on the side. Electricity sparked, yellow then blue, between the two metal prongs jutting out from the top of the rubber-wrapped stick. Then, standing clear of him,
Thirteenth Sister jabbed the prongs into the back of Malothar's neck.
Malothar spasmed, eyes bugging out of his skull and jaw locking. Blood from his bitten tongue seeped out of the corner of his mouth to drip down to his chin, and he gave a stunted, choked off groan of pain.
Leia screamed and fought against the binders and chain holding her back. "Malothar," she cried, tears welling in her eyes and spilling down over her cheeks. "Stop it," she demanded, glancing up from Malothar's purpling face to Thirteenth Sister standing behind him. "Stop!"
Everything in her burned—anger, desperation, the Force. It crackled between her bones and ignited in her blood, boiling and demanding to be used. It was born of her anger, of her terror, of her love for the man being tortured in front of her, and her feelings and the Force battered against the iron bands she had locked over the glass.
"Stop!" Leia screamed.
Abruptly, Thirteenth Sister stopped. "I will stop," she intoned, voice flat, eyes glassy.
Malothar gasped and pitched forward, only barely catching himself on his hands before face-planting. He looked up, eyes wide and amazed, and looked at Leia.
"Leia?" he asked, tentative.
The Grand Inquisitor laughed suddenly. "Oh my," he said, clearly pleased. "I wasn't expecting that."
Stepping forward, he touched Thirteenth Sister on the shoulder and said, "You will continue torturing this man, and you will not stop for any reason."
"I will continue torturing this man, and will not stop for any reason," Thirteenth Sister repeated. She flicked on the baton and jabbed it between Malothar's shoulders.
"No," Leia cried, fresh tears streaming down her face. She did not understand what had just happened. "No, please!"
"Release your hate," the Grand Inquisitor said calmly, voice cutting through the buzz of the baton's electricity, through Malothar's groan. "Become what you were destined to be."
I want to, Leia thought. Anything to save Malothar.
But...but no. I don't want to. I don't want to become what they want me to become. And I promised Shmi…
But was that promise worth Malothar's life?
"Make your choice, 851," the Grand Inquisitor said. "Or it will be too late."
What do I do? Leia thought desperately. What do I do? WhatdoIdo?
"Choose!" the Grand Inquisitor snapped.
"I—"
Malothar grunted, and his eyes rolled back into his head. He collapsed forward and landed on his face, and did not move.
"Malothar?" Leia cried, straining forward. "Malothar!"
But Malothar did not stir.
Thirteenth Sister pulled the baton away from Malothar's back, then moved to kneel beside him. She put two fingers beneath Malothar's chin, then looked up at the Grand Inquisitor and nodded.
"He's dead," Thirteenth Sister said.
Leia screamed.
This time when the Force snapped out of her, it did so like a whip. The narrow cord of power wrapped around Thirteenth Sister's throat and constricted—then twisted sharply. Leia felt it in her mind and in her bones—felt the snap of her neck, felt the resulting rush of delight in her heart. The Force sang in tandem, dark and bloody and rich enough to drown her.
It would be easy—so very, very easy—for her to drink of that dark and bloody power. She would rip the binders from her wrists, and would attack the Grand Inquisitor. She would rip him to pieces—would scatter his flesh and blood and bones to the corners of the cell. Then she would force open the door and would find and kill Sixth Sister, Ninth Brother—everyone who had ever touched or hurt her.
She reached for it, ready to grab a hold of the promised power and use it to exact her vengeance.
She stopped.
No, a part of her shrieked. This is wrong.
The Force felt slick and smooth, like oil. It felt black and scarlet threaded through with rotten yellow. It felt like death, like pain, like screams. It felt like tears and like poison.
And Leia knew what it was she felt: the Dark Side.
She drew back. This was what Shmi had warned her about; this was what she had promised to Shmi she would not do. She would not Fall—and that meant not touching or using the Dark Side. That meant not letting herself be swept away by her desire for vengeance. That meant binding her power beneath the bands of iron and not touching it—not here, not now, not like this.
She would not touch it and use it, no matter how alluring the prospect of its power was.
The Grand Inquisitor looked from the bodies on the floor to Leia standing still at the end of the length of chain. He folded his hands behind his back and watched her for a long moment, yellow eyes glittering.
"You almost did it," he said. "Didn't you? You felt it—felt the Dark Side."
"I won't Fall," Leia said.
The Grand Inquisitor laughed. "Maybe," he said. "Maybe not."
"I won't," Leia said again.
The Grand Inquisitor just smiled, and turned. "I will see you in a few days, 851," he said over his shoulder, and he left.
~oOo~
The door opening shook Leia out of her dazed stupor. She blinked, coming back to the room, and straightened in her chains. She expected to see the Grand Inquisitor, or perhaps Ninth Brother or Danyil, or even Stormtroopers.
She was not expecting the Emperor.
He stopped a few steps away from Thirteenth Sister's half-rotting corpse, and folded his arms into the sleeves of his dark robe. For a long moment he only looked at Leia, watching her watch him with eyes hidden by shadow. Then he sighed, theatrical and false to Leia's ears, and said, "Oh, my poor child."
Leia glared at him. "I'm not a child," she snapped.
The Emperor laughed, but he conceded, "No, I suppose you're not—not after everything you have endured.
"It would all end, you know," he added. "All you have to do is drink of the Dark Side and you will be given a nice room and good food, the prettiest clothes you could dream of, even servants of your own. It would be like you were royalty again."
Leia hesitated. That sounded good—sounded nice. She was tired. So tired. All she wanted was to rest, to be free of the torment and the pain.
Falling would give her that.
But she remembered Shmi, and her warning.
Was it worth it? Would Falling really be that bad? Was a nice room, good food, and pretty clothes worth becoming a weapon of the Dark?
No, Leia decided. It's not worth it. I'll hurt people—people like Tobias. I won't become that.
She shook her head. "I don't care," she said stoutly. "I won't Fall."
The Emperor sighed. "Yes, the Grand Inquisitor did say that was your line." He smiled then, lips curling under the shadow of his cowl, and Leia shivered. "I wonder if you truly know what you mean when you say it, though."
"I understand enough," Leia said.
"Do you?" the Emperor asked mildly. "I wonder."
He smiled again, and stepped over Thirteenth Sister's and Malothar's corpses. "My poor child," he said again, coming to a halt in front of Leia. "You don't know when to stop fighting, do you? You are very much like your mother in that way."
Leia stiffened. "You knew my mother?" she asked cautiously.
"I knew her quite well," the Emperor replied.
"Oh," Leia said with a frown, not knowing how to respond to that.
The Emperor reached up and patted Leia's cheek. "Your stubbornness will only bring you pain and sorrow," he told her. "Especially when I have already foreseen your end. I know where your destiny lies—and it lies with me."
Leia jerked away from the Emperor's touch. "No," she said, harsher than she expected. "No."
"Believe what you will," the Emperor said, "but the end will come to pass as I have foreseen it. You will break and you will bow."
"No," Leia all but shouted. "No, I won't."
"It is your destiny," the Emperor said. "Just as it was your father's."
Leia froze. "You knew my father too?"
"Of course I did," the Emperor said. "I'm the one that made him into who he is today." He hesitated, and then a sly grin snuck up his lips. "You know him too, child."
Leia gaped, shocked. "I do?" she asked.
The Emperor nodded. "Would you like to know who he is?"
Leia gulped, and looked away. "But how?" she asked. "Anakin Skywalker died at the end of the Clone War, days before I was born. That's what my Papá always said. So how can I know him?"
The Emperor laughed. "Because your Papá lied," he said.
The truth was that she did want to know—but she wasn't sure if this was somehow a trap. Would the Emperor use that knowledge as a way to get her to Fall? Would he be able to use it against her?
As if he had read her thoughts, the Emperor said, "It's not a trap, child—just information."
Leia looked back at him. "Yes," she said quietly. "I would like to know."
The Emperor's smile broadened. "Very well then," he said. He paused dramatically, then announced, "Darth Vader is your father."
Leia blinked, thinking she had heard wrong. "What?" she asked.
"Darth Vader is your father," the Emperor repeated calmly. "Anakin Skywalker Fell and became Darth Vader."
Leia shook her head. "No," she said softly, disbelieving. "No, it's not… He can't be… He—"
"Search your feelings, child," the Emperor said. "You know what I am saying is the truth."
"But," Leia began, only to fall silent, something black and horrible rising up in her throat and choking off her words. She looked down at her feet, bare and cold against the permacrete floor.
The Force was crying out at her. She could hear it through the glass and iron. Yes, it seemed to scream. Yes, yes, yes.
No, Leia thought. No, that can't be true.
But, as the Emperor had said, she could feel the truth in his words. She could feel it like stone and diamond and crystal. He was not lying to her; and the Force continued to cry out in a loud voice of a hundred thousand tongues, all saying the same thing, over and over again: Your father, your father, your father…
"So you see?" the Emperor said. "It is your destiny to be with me, just as it was his."
Leia trembled. "No," she whispered. "No, that's not—that can't be true." She looked up from the floor to the Emperor. "I won't let it be true," she said softly, savagely.
"We shall see, my child," the Emperor said, smiling. "We shall see."
END PART 1
end notes: So part 1 is complete. What did you guys think? (To all my lurkers: Now would be a really great time to leave a comment. Even a simple "I liked the chapter" really brightens my day. In fact, I was talking to someone recently who I didn't even know was reading, and her comment about how she was loving the fic really gave me the boost I needed to post this chapter. So, just so you know, even tiny little comments go a long ways for an author...)
The narrative takes a breather after this, and gets a little bit lighter. So if any of you are feeling wrung out and exhausted after all this darkness, just hang in there for a little bit longer. It gets better. I promise. (And then it gets worse, buuuut that's not for a little while.)
Again, I hope to hear from you guys. But most importantly, I hope you enjoyed.
