Eve awoke early the next morning, the bright, warm sunlight bathing her face and drawing sleep from her eyes. She stretched and yawned, got up, and blearily poured cold water into a bowl. She dunked a washcloth in it and scrubbed her face thoroughly and then proceeded to scrub her teeth with a twig, salt, and soda.
Her morning toilet complete, she threw off the simple linen shift she wore and pulled on her bedraggled tunic, smoothing out the many wrinkled with her hands to little avail. Boots and belt went on next, followed lastly by her battered pouch. Thusly garbed, she threw open her door and went out to meet the day.
"Oh, Banna, good morning!" she greeted merrily, recognizing one of the passing servants carrying two buckets of spring water. The young lady curtsied as much as she was able, burdened as she was, and returned the salutation warmly. Eve stepped up to help her with one of the heavy buckets. "Let me take one, please," she said with a smile.
Together, she and Banna went to the kitchen and poured the water into a crank-pump reservoir. "Thank you, Princess," Banna said, curtseying with more freedom. Eve nodded, gave her one last smile, and picked up a bread roll on the way out.
She munched on her breakfast with relish, savoring the warm, fresh taste. It had come straight from the oven and was lightly buttered. "Oh!" she said with a start, blinking. "Our guest will want something to eat, too." She went right back into the kitchen and found a wicker basket, piling in several rolls, a wheel of cheese, and a small stone jug of milk with cream. These she took with her on her merry march up to the guest chambers.
"Hello?" the girl asked, knocking a few times on the guest chamber door. It opened slowly, a pair of sleep-glazed eyes peering out from behind. Eve smiled and hoisted the basket. "I thought you might want some breakfast. It's not much, but it's good."
"Oh…good morning, Eve," Angela murmured tiredly. She seemed to be moving at half-speed. "That…breakfast? Wonderful. Please, come in." Her words came out slowly, as if she were struggling through the motions of morning ritual while everyone else was already moving beyond her.
"Are you all right?" Eve asked in concern.
"Just…tired. Not…a morning…person."
"Obviously not," the girl agreed with a chuckle. She pushed open the door and set the basket at the bedside. Angela wobbled to it, sitting down at the edge of the cot. She picked up a buttered roll and bit into it numbly. The Jedi ate mechanically, seemingly unable to taste the food. Eve frowned.
"You must really be tired if you don't like the rolls," she said petulantly. "Come on!" she shouted suddenly, "Wake up!"
Angela's eyes snapped open in surprise at the increase in volume. She almost choked on the roll as a result, a spectacle that sent Eve hurtling into laughter. "Sorry," she apologized over her giggles. "But you really should try the rolls."
After she had recovered from her near-fatal episode, Angela shot the girl a withering glance. "These rolls had better be good," she warned playfully. "You almost killed me to get me to eat them." She bit into the bread again, and her eyes widened. "Wow! You're right, this stuff is good."
Eve watched the Jedi devour one roll and then another. She picked up a roll herself and split it open and then she broke off a piece of cheese and slid it between the halves. "Do you not eat freshly-baked bread where you come from?"
Angela shook her head. "Not usually. It's all prefabricated, dehydrated, or artificial. I haven't tasted anything remotely like this."
The girl did not understand all of what the Jedi said, but she caught the meaning of her words. It surprised Eve just how different Angela's universe was from her own. To never taste fresh bread? What kind of food do they eat, then? she wondered. The Jedi was a truly mysterious and complex being to her young mind, full of experiences she had never known. But clearly, the reverse was true as well.
Angela had just finished drinking a cup of cold milk, cream and all, when she said, "Eve, could you tell me more about your village? I did not see much of it last night, obviously, and I'm very curious about its people and its environment."
Eve had expected such a question. There were few visitors to her little village, as distant from larger clusters of civilization as it was, but almost every traveler that did come through asked the same thing. She was more than happy to answer it.
"We're a small, self-sufficient farming town," she began, "and we make our living the only way we know how—by working together. There aren't very many of us, but there's enough to get all the chores done. We plant wheat, mostly, though there are a few gardens near the sunnier sides where we grow lettuce, potatoes, carrots, and radishes. A few other things, too. We have vineyards along the mountainsides and orchards of apples and oranges along the foot of them. Mostly, though, we grow wheat.
"We just finished the harvest yesterday, actually. Everyone gets excited during harvest time. After the harvest we have a celebration. You're welcome to join, if you'd like. It started tonight. Anyway, everyone who can work, works in the fields on harvest time, even the children. The only ones who don't work are the really young children, the really old adults, the medicine woman, and the millers. Even the blacksmith leaves his forge to separate chaff from wheat.
"But even if you're not working in the fields, you're working. The old folks watch over the young children, who catch fish or small game most of the day. Whatever they catch is prepared for the harvest festival. They really get into the hunt right now because they're the only ones catching any food; everyone else is harvesting. They like the responsibility of feeding everyone. It's good, because it teaches them duty and responsibility.
"Today we'll be preparing for the evening festival. There's no work today, except to get the tables set up, the dance poles put up, and the food cooked. A lot of people my age will be looking for future spouses because there's a belief that the moon that rises the day after harvest will bring fertility and good luck to those who are in love."
Angela smiled and asked mischievously, "Are you looking for a future husband yourself?"
Eve colored slightly and shook her head. "I thought I was going to, but the boy I was looking for already confessed to another girl. I don't mind; they knew each other for a very long time. Actually," she said while clasping her hands against her lips, "I don't know why I mentioned that to you, a complete stranger. Sorry."
Angela shook her head. "Don't be. You don't need to talk about it if you don't want to."
"Actually, I feel kind of comfortable…telling you. I don't know why. It feels like you'd understand somehow. It's a good feeling." Eve colored again. "I'm sorry—I didn't mean for that to sound so odd."
The young Jedi laughed. "I said don't worry about it. I'm not really sure why you feel all right telling me these things, but I'm honored that you hold me in your trust, especially since we don't know much about each other."
"Will you tell me about yourself, then?" Eve asked.
Angela settled back into the cot and nodded. She pillowed her head against her arms. "There's not much to say about me, really. I ran away from home to avoid a marriage I didn't want, my father hates me, my mother's dead, and my…my significant other died about a few years ago."
Eve looked down, her hair tumbling before her face. "I'm sorry to hear that. My condolences about your mother and husband."
"Er…he wasn't my husband," Angela admitted quietly. "But he made me feel like we were married. It was a wonderful thing I had with him."
"Do you miss him?"
"Of course. He and I were inseparable."
The girl leaned back on her elbows, relaxing on the floor. "Could you tell me about him? Your lover?"
The young Jedi seemed reluctant at first, but ultimately capitulated. "He was very handsome, but most people you fall in love with will look good to you. But he was really handsome—and that's not an exaggeration. His looks, his charm, even the way he glanced at you got him into so much trouble when he was younger. But he was the kind of man who thrived on trouble and excitement. I guess you could say he was a thrill-seeker and a troublemaker. But I loved him for it."
Eve laughed. "He sounds like someone a mother would tell her daughter to stay away from."
Angela shared in her mirth. "Yes, he was. He was a real rogue."
"And do you miss your mother?"
The Jedi's face went hard, pallid. "I…I can't say that I do. We did not part on good terms, and while I'm sorry that it ended that way, I don't miss her at all. We never really got along very well. I know that must sound cruel, but…but that's how I feel."
Eve lowered her head again. "I never knew my mother," she whispered. "But I think I miss her. Or at least I miss not knowing her." She turned her soulful eyes to the Jedi. "Maybe you should reconcile with the memory of your mother. Do not leave this ghost of bitterness behind."
Angela's eyes went hard. "I don't think you have any call to say that, Eve. You know nothing about me or my family life. I don't even know why I told you any of that stuff about my mother. Forget I said it."
"Wait," Eve pleaded, seeing the Jedi raise barriers around her. "Wait, I'm sorry if what I said offended you. I did not mean to. My people are very family-centric, though we a communal people. In a way, everyone is family in our village. Births and deaths, marriages, and every little victory are ours to share. It is how we live and survive. No one is ever truly alone because everyone is family here."
"It is a pretty lifestyle you lead, then." Angela sounded cold, distant, hard.
"The point is," Eve pressed, "we love each other as family. Any qualms we have, we reconcile because we're family. Families work because you trust, love, and reconcile. Your mother is dead, and you live on with bitterness in your heart. Do you really hate your family so much that you'd leave it at that? I do not know you, that is true, but I cannot believe that someone—anyone—could have such hatred."
Angela seemed to grow more distant. "There are some really hateful people out there, Eve." The distance suddenly grew shorter between them, and the young Jedi smiled. "But you're right. I don't hate my family. I'm…I'm angry with them, but I don't hate them. I disagree with them, but I wouldn't wish anything bad on them." A wry chuckle escaped her. "Thanks for setting my head straight, Eve."
The girl smiled. "You looked like you needed it." She stood and took Angela's hands in hers, helping the Jedi to her feet. "Come, enough dreary talk. I want to show you the village. Maybe if I show you how we live like one family, you'll find it in yourself to truly reconcile with your mother."
"I'd like that."
Angela had to admit—the valley was truly beautiful. The wind played through her hair, making the brown strands dance to its gentle music. The air was cool, but not too cool. It was just pleasant enough. It smelled of freshness, crispness, and wheat. Again, not too strongly, but just enough. Indeed, now that she reflected on it, the valley, the village, even young Eve herself all followed some form of moderation. Nothing was too much, nothing was too little. She saw little bits of evidence—in moderation, no less—showing this aspect of their simple lifestyle.
Eve led her through the dirt streets of the village, showing her everything. The houses were of mud, hardened in the sun, with thatch roofs. Each was simple in construction, each used the same design, but each was also different in some way. The differences were subtle though, moderate after a fashion. A little string of colored beads over the main entrance or a set of glazed pots holding wildflowers placed by the door. Little things like that gave the houses an individual character. But in all, the houses reflected the villagers: a unified family made up of unique individuals.
The villagers themselves seemed cast from the same mold, but at once different from each other. From the smallest child to the oldest adult, they wore simple tunics like Eve's, with boots, laced sandals, or leather wrappings around their feet. Some wore belts and pouches, others wore sashes. Many women wore togas, but even those flowing clothes were cut of the same material as the tunics. But again, there were little differences. A bracelet of woven grasses adorning a slim wrist, a bandana cut from hide tying back a boy's long hair, a buckle made from shining stones ornamenting an otherwise plain belt. One family, one mold—made up of scores of unique people.
Angela plucked at her own clothing. Her black clothes were being laundered, so she wore the tunic and sandals of a young woman of the valley, at least for now. The plain woolens were comfortable, if baggy and unflattering, but she wished that the villagers' typical dress included trousers. She felt odd walking around without pants. She fought the urge to tug her tunic's hem lower. The blasted thing only came to mid-thigh. The sensation made her so uncomfortable that she broached the subject to Eve.
"Wait," the girl said suddenly, "didn't you put on the shorts?"
Angela colored in a mixture of humiliation and heated annoyance. "There were shorts?"
"Yes," the girl said innocently. She raised the hem of her tunic, revealing a pair of leather shorts. They were very stout shorts. They were shorts that existed. "Didn't you get one?"
"No!"
That sent the girl into an unstoppable fit of laughter. Angela took some small comfort in knowing that she kept her lightsaber at her belt. In her current attire and current mood, she was more than capable of taking the first hand that tried to lift up her tunic.
"We'll get you some shorts when we get back to the tower," Eve promised over her giggles.
"This isn't funny," the mortified Jedi protested. The girl just kept on laughing. Unique individuals, indeed!
Eve argued otherwise. "But it is! You see, only girls who were really looking to pick up a husband would walk around without their shorts. Boys looking for wives do something else, but I don't know what it is. It's one of those things no one else knows. In fact, the boys don't know about the shorts thing, either. It's become something of a game, trying to figure out what the 'special thing' is that the other sex does when they're looking for spouses."
"And no boy has tried to lift your tunic?" Angela asked, astonished. After living in the dregs of the galaxy, where cutthroats, scoundrels, and drunkards ran as rampant as slime behind a Hutt lord, the idea that the males of the village had not bothered to look in the most obvious of places was baffling. She just could not believe that there was a whole village of chivalric men who did not try to peek under a girl's skirt.
Ran would die of laughter if he heard about this, she thought with amusement. By the Force, he'd probably take the initiative and pull up as many tunics as he could!
"No, not to my knowledge," Eve said. "Well, I'm sure that after a boy's married a girl, he gets to find out. But he never tells anyone else. It's a tradition. It encourages marriage, you see. It's like a prize, finding out."
Angela had to admit that there was some sound logic in that. "That's some trick, Eve. Put a leash on a man for the rest of his domestic life just to find out one little thing." The girl stuck out her tongue impishly. Obviously, she completely agreed with her assessment.
The Jedi fidgeted, tugging down her tunic. "Do you mind if we head back to the tower for a bit?"
Eve smiled innocently at her. "Feeling cold?" she said wryly. Angela was amazed that the girl could deliver such a remark without looking smarmy.
"You could say that. Can we please get some shorts?"
Eve's laughter did not stop until they reached the tower.
