Title: Half-Light
Author: Savage Midnight
Rating: G
Disclaimer: Star Wars and all related elements belong to George Lucas. No copyright infringement intended.
Summary: She is allowing him his hate and his anger, as they did not, to seek vengeance in an unjust world, to wield its darkness and finally destroy it, because that is what he needs.
Author's Note: My first Star Wars fic. Nothing too big. Just a little fluff and a little darkness and a lot of cheese. Bob's your uncle.
She knows what people see when they look at her.
They see a woman half-dazed and dreaming, floating along on a tail of broken memories that cut deep and sharp, leaving scars they will never see. They see a ghost with lifeless eyes vanishing around corners and into the darkness.
Not one of them dares to follow. They cannot. They will find nothing but empty corridors and shadows because when she is not here she is somewhere else.
She spends less time making memories these days than she does reliving old ones. Whether it is happiness she seeks or heartache she knows not; they are both entwined, darkness and light like it always was and will always be.
Some days she will cry for what she has lost, for what he has become. She blames herself, sometimes others, and wonders why they never granted him his hate.
They are to blame, she thinks angrily. Those who allowed him no anguish or anger and in the end forced him to cling to it. He was only human. Her sweet, beautiful husband who lost so much and was given so little in return.
The boy they drove to apathy was now the man that cared for no one, and she hates them for it.
But she rarely has time for her hatred these days. It has no place here in the light.
She knows where to find him and her feet carry her without thought. The beautiful lake retreat at which they married is still as startling as it was that day and she takes a moment to appreciate it. She misses her home, though she has been back many a time. But the colours are not as splendid as they once were, nor the rolling hills and heavy waterfalls as magnificent. They are a mockery of happier times and she cannot bear to look.
But it is different here, she tells herself. This is home.
He is waiting for her like always. His hair is short, his Padawan braid tucked behind his ear like she remembers. His cerulean blue eyes are clear and bottomless and there is no darkness there, no hatred. There is only softness in them.
"Here everything is soft. And smooth."
He reaches out to her and it is like the first time he touched her. He is nervous despite his confidence and his fingers tremble against her skin as he draws a hand up her arm.
He watches her the whole time with the eyes of man, intense and unwavering. He has never looked at her any different and the unconditional love in his electric gaze has never weakened. She has seen those eyes dark and angry and broken but they have always been for her. His love only for her.
"Anakin," she whispers and he smiles that crooked smile that she fell in love with. She has never managed to figure out how he can seem like both a boy and man at the same time, and she knows she probably never will.
Her husband was always an innocent. She knows people will never understand it, not for all the evil he has done, but she knows it as she always has. He is still the little boy who was forced to leave his mother behind on Tatooine, who was refused the right to bleed like everyone else when she died, who wielded his hatred and his anguish like a weapon because he had been wronged. His revenge had been bitter, unfulfilling, and there would always be that thirst for justice that would never be quenched.
Like a defensive child he fought back against those who tried to hurt him and the people he loved. So simple, yet somehow it had become something more, something dark. And still beneath the darkness was that indestructible innocence that drew her in like a moth to a flame.
She sees it now, in the shyness of his smile and the tenderness of his touch. He leans down to brush soft lips against hers and she notices how his mouth trembles against her own.
His touch is sure and certain despite the fact that he is shaking. His hands comes up to hold her face, fingertips sliding against her jaw, his thumbs following the curve of her cheeks. He tilts her face up to kiss her again, and again, light butterfly kisses that drive her wild until she's pulling him against her more tightly, demanding more.
He smiles that smile again, a little smug this time because he knows what she wants and he knows he' is the only one who can give it to her. Just as she is the only one who can make him tremble in such a way, he is the only one to feed her passion until it is something that she can no longer control.
But for now control is hers and she wraps a hand around the back of his neck and pulls him down. His lips crash against hers, his tongue sliding out to tangle with her own and she moans deep in her throat.
I love you, she wants to say, though there is no need. He knows it, as she knows with everything she is that he loves her. They have never needed words. One look is enough.
She brings her other hand up to bury in his hair and finds it has grown. His locks are soft and long now and when she pulls back he wears no Padawan braid. His face is older, somehow, more tired, and she sees in his eyes the darkness she has come to hate.
"Anakin," she whispers again. Same name, different face, and she steps back, tears stinging her eyes. He does not belong here anymore, not in the sun with the rolling hills and heavy waterfalls. This is not his home. This is not her husband.
"You can't be here anymore," he says as he stares at her with broken, angry eyes. "This isn't your home."
No! she wants to scream. No! This is my home! I belong here! We belong here!
But she says nothing. The words stick in her throat and all she can do is watch helplessly as shadows begin to creep across the landscape, casting the meadows and the hills and the waterfalls into darkness. Soon there is nothing but the dying sun and a deathly silence.
And him.
The shadows are crawling towards him, towards them. They seem to steal up behind him, wrapping her husband in a deathly cloak, sliding across his face until she can see nothing of him, not even his beautiful blue eyes.
And then the darkness seems to freeze, hovering just out of her reach as if it reluctant to touch her, to taint her.
She wants to step forward, to reach out to him, but she is rooted to the spot. A part of her is afraid of what will happen if she takes that step. Will he reach out for her? Save her? Or will she stumble? Fall to the darkness where she will never see him again?
She only has seconds to decide. Despite the shadows she can see him, sliding backwards, further and further out of her reach. The sun is creeping lower, nothing more than a burning ember on the horizon now, and soon darkness will fall completely.
She shakes her head, tears burning a trail down her cheeks.
"I can't save you," she cries and wills him to understand.
I'm too afraid. If I follow you things will never be as they were.
Things are not supposed to be this way. There should be laughter in the hills and sunshine in the meadows and now there is nothing. Only darkness and silence and somehow you have made it this way. You have made this dream your nightmare and it is no longer a place I can go.
I cannot follow you.
"You don't belong here anymore," she hears him say again, in that soft, musical voice she remembers so well. She closes her eyes to the sound and bows her head.
"No," she whispers and something in her breaks. He is right. She no longer belongs here, with him. He is not the boy she fell in love with, not the man she married. He is both and yet he is neither and she cannot save him this time.
And he cannot save her.
She turns away then and the light is shining heavy behind her. She walks into it on steady feet, expecting it to burn, but she feels only calm tranquility.
But then something breaks and her resolve shatters. She falters momentarily and turns to look back. She cannot see him, only shadows, but she knows he is there, watching.
"I'll wait for you," she promises, because she knows somehow that he will follow her one day, though he cannot follow her now. And she cannot guide him in the darkness, only in light, and something in him knows. She is allowing him his hate and his anger, as they did not, to seek vengeance in an unjust world, to wield its darkness and finally destroy it, because that is what he needs. She knows the innocence in him will prevail one day and bring him home and she will be waiting, as he waited for her.
Then he will be whole.
Then they will be whole.
The shadows seem to splinter around her, separating and sliding back towards the horizon. He is no where to be seen when the darkness has lifted but she peers up at the clear sky that glitters an unearthly cerulean blue and knows that he is out there somewhere.
She turns away, then and disappears just as he did, the rainbows of her gown shimmering magnificently as she goes. There is silence here, too, but there is warmth and light and she knows this to be home.
And she will wait for him.