Leia - Age 6

A Mother's Gift

"Just a little more, Sabie!"

Instead of responding to her charge's call, Sabé kept her eyes down for a moment and pretended to study her intended footfalls among the craggy terrain. Sometimes it hurt too much to hear Leia use the same nickname her mother had bestowed on Sabé years ago during handmaiden training. Deep down she knew it to be a cruel coincidence, but there were times she felt as if Leia were Padmé come to life all over again. She took a measured step over a large rock, inhaled sharply and lifted her head. All Leia would notice was a smiling face.

Later, after this special day, Sabé would remind the little girl that princesses didn't use nicknames. It was to be Sabyne or mistress, nothing else. Sabie was too close to Sabé, in more ways than one. It was a name, simply put, that was too dangerous.

"I'm coming," Sabé huffed. For an afternoon excursion, this was turning into quite a climb. Leia had led her over rugged paths and through winding forest trails in some ridiculous pursuit. Even with her specialized training, Sabé was having a hard time staying oriented toward home. And that was starting to worry her. "Leia, it's getting close to the time we should turn around."

"-most there," Leia said, never looking back as she scampered up a large boulder with Wuickly at her side.

"We better be, missy," Sabé grumbled to herself. Today was definitely not the day to deliver her ward home later than expected. The ramifications…

Wiping that thought from her mind, she scurried up the same boulder Leia and the wuicka had just topped. The little girl was waiting there. Sabé's gaze met Leia's, then followed the brown eyes as they shifted across the wild Alderaanian landscape.

Abruptly the breath left Sabé's lungs and all thought ended in a haze of memories. She was transported back to a spot that now only existed in her dreams.

The boulder upon which they stood wasn't merely a boulder but the lip defining the edge of a vast meadow. Sabé's eyes followed Wuickly as he bounded across a plain of grass. The green sea stretched out endlessly, waving in a gentle breeze. Occasionally a cluster of flowers would peek through, pockets of yellow and white enjoying a rolling dance, or Wuickly would leap into the air in pursuit of a Ployi moth. Beyond all that, far enough away to seem impossible but close enough she could just make out the distant rumble, a wall of falling water provided the scenery its perfect backdrop.

It was…Naboo. Home. A happier time and place. Memories swam before her eyes as her vision blurred.

"Finista Valley," Sabe whispered breathlessly.

A tiny hand clasped hers. "What did you say?"

Sabé inhaled with a start. Padmé. She could feel her lost friend here, in this place. Her breath was in the breeze, her laugh in the whisper of the bobbing flowers. Even her determined spirit thundered over the falls.

They were a fitting tribute to a woman who had given everything to the galaxy and expected nothing in return. It was an appropriate reminder to Sabé of her duty, to her countrymen and an old friend. Reliving a lost youth would gain them all nothing. Her shoulders drew tall; her eyes blinked away the threat of tears. "Nothing. I said nothing of import."

Leia yanked on her protector's hand. "It sounded like Finest Valley to me."

The former handmaiden bit back a gasp. Instead she simply smiled politely, bending down to Leia's eye level. "What did you say?"

The child blinked and drew in an exasperated breath. "I said, it sounded to me like you said, Finest Valley. How did you know what I had named this place?"

Not even years of practiced indifference could dispel the shock that washed through Sabé. Somehow she managed to sit on the hardened ground before gravity overcame her trembling limbs.

"Sabyne, are you all right?"

She swallowed, then swallowed again. She could do this. While posing as Queen Amidala during the blockade she had endured worse. Spare the passion for the people, she heard Padmé whisper in her head. Some things are better left unsaid.

You can do this.

"Sabyne?" The little girl's eyes reflected depths of concern as she shook Sabé's shoulder.

Sabé managed a faint smile and reached out to her. "It was the climb. That is all. The air was different where I came from."

"Was?"

Kriffin' gundarks! Nothing got past this child. She was so like her mother it hurt. Padmé had a few more tricks, though. We need a diversion, Padmé's voice whispered in her mind.

Sabé was inclined to agree. A startling urge nudged her into action, and an instant later Leia was squirming in her arms. As she tickled Leia, the child wiggled like a Yando worm, screeching and protesting amid a fit of giggles.

"S-stop. Stop. Stopstop stop!"

Acquiescing, Sabé pulled her hands back. Leia flopped helplessly into her lap. The child alternated between wheezing to catch her breath and laughing at phantom sensations from their game. In that precious time, Sabé gathered her wits and began to ponder what had just happened.

Was the name Finest Valley simply a chance choice in a million? A coincidence? Or did some part of Padmé speak to Leia like an inner voice?

Was it that blasted Force?

"Is she…going to be like her father?" Sabé asked him.

"Do you mean a Jedi?"

"Yes."

"She has the gift -"

"It's not a gift, you arrogant fool. It's a curse!"

Sabé sensed tremors rising from her core, and fought them with her durasteel will. Going to that place, where rage and hate scratched at her soul, would serve no end. If Leia was beginning to exhibit the signs of Force sensitivity, Sabé would do her duty and inform Bail. It didn't change anything. How could she blame a child for the sins of a father or the fools who engineered his madness?

She would love and protect Leia to the bitter end. Whenever that might come…

"You're angry," Leia said softly.

Blinking, Sabé returned to the moment. "Not at you."

"You're not?"

"Why would I be?"

Leia lay still in her arms, not looking away, not fearing the repercussions…

Suddenly Sabé understood. "How did you know about this place?"

"I found it the day Wuickly ran away," the child answered hesitantly.

"Oh." It was all Sabé could manage. She remembered that fateful afternoon. For one minute Sabé had left her charge unattended – a mere minute's lapse – and Leia had gone missing. In the hours she had scaled these mountains searching for the lost girl, Sabé had inflicted so much more chastisement upon herself than Bail had upon learning the news. Leia was her duty; Bail would have been well within his rights to tie Sabé to the nose of the next launch and jettison her into space for her failings.

By the grace of the water gods, they had found Leia and her scruffy wuicka not far from this very spot. Safe and sound.

"I won't ever run away again, Sabie," Leia whispered. "I pr–"

Placing her fingers across the girl's tiny lips, Sabé said, "Don't make promises you can't keep, Leia. They always lead to heartache."

Leia shifted her small head so she was free to speak. "I'll try."

Sabé smiled fondly, remembering the end of that awful search. She had slumped to her knees and taken Leia into her arms. The child had cried in relief at being found; Sabé had cried because she hadn't broken her promise to Padmé. In the end, it was Leia who had been the comforter, and the child had never stopped trying to apologize for the pain she had caused her friend and protector. "I know you will."

Surveying the meadow once more, Sabé decided she didn't need to know how Leia had come to this place. It was knowledge enough that Naboo would live on, in places like this, in herself and Leia. Imprinting in her mind the image awash with greens, blues and whites, she sighed. "It's time to go, little one."

"Oh-kay." But Leia stayed as she was, resting in Sabé's lap.

She gave the child a gentle shove. "In the next eon would be helpful."

"I'm going as fast as I can," Leia griped, rising and brushing herself off.

Sabé chuckled. Padmé had been the same way. If the day's prospect was unappealing, it had taken a whole cadre of handmaidens to get her out the door. "Don't you mean, as slow as you can?"

Leia crossed her arms and stomped over the rise, back the way they had come. Sabé whistled to Wuickly, then followed. After the initial challenging descent to the main path, they fell into an amicable silence, each taking note of flora or fauna along the way but not intruding on the other's thoughts. The wuicka was the only one with something to say, barking and haruffing at whatever caught his eye along the trail.

Eventually Leia reached over and snaked her fingers into the handmaiden's. Something troubled the child, but Sabé knew enough to wait for the explanation. Not until they were within eyesight of the Organa's summer estate, nestled with the cliffs of the Hiku mountain range, did she offer one.

"They're going to throw a surprise party when we get back, aren't they?"

Sabé paused, tugging Leia to a halt with her. What was she to say? This child saw everything, even what was hidden. While the skill would serve her well in life, especially if she followed in Padmé's footsteps, it made it all but impossible to fabricate a believable illusion. Weeks of delicate planning by the palace staff for naught. Leia had known all along.

"Yes, they are," she answered. "And everyone has worked extra hard, especially your mother. It would be a shame for them to meet with disappointment –"

"I'll act surprised," Leia insisted.

"I know you will." Sabé stroked her porcelain cheek, still soft like baby skin. So young, yet so grown up. Sabé smiled. "Look on the bright side, at least you'll be having a party."

Leia tried to return the sentiment, but her mouth remained a thin semblance of a smile. "Yes, a party."

"Don't you want a party?"

"No. Well, yes. But…" Leia sighed. "I do. But not one of Mama's parties. She'll invite important people. I'll have to say polite things to each one of them. Then we'll have to sit and eat fancy food and smile for the endless toasts when I can't even taste the wine. And when that is done, I'll have to open a million presents that I can't ever play with." Leia ended with a resigned huff.

It was all true. Nothing Sabé could say would change the fact that in five minutes Leia would be immersed in exactly what she didn't want. "I'm sorry. It's not the kind of life day you were hoping for."

Leia blew her bangs. "I know Mama is trying, but she doesn't understand me like you do. Can't you just explain to her that all I want is a party with a couple of my friends with real presents and a real surprise?"

Sabé's shoulders drew up. The last thing she needed to do was give Brehu advice about Leia. One attempt was enough; only Bail's firm stance had kept his wife from sending Sabé packing after that particular incident. Even though she was opinionated, Sabé knew there was a time and place to make a stand. Sending Leia's mother into high orbit was a sure path to losing the one thing that meant anything in Sabé's life. For her charge's long term safety, she couldn't risk speaking out. Not now, not about this. Someday, perhaps, Leia would understand why.

At a loss, Sabé allowed the tiny pendant that always twined around her wrist to slip down. Fingering the cool surface, she felt for the familiar grooves that provided solace when nothing else could. Padmé, what should I do?

When all else fails, smile, Padmé whispered from the netherworld. So Sabé did. She continued to rub the smooth curves, picturing the carved japor resting on her queen's - her best friend's - collarbone. Few were lucky to ever see Padmé in that casual a setting. If they had, they would have known the truth of the woman inside. That simple necklace, an expression of love from a boy to a girl, had kept Padmé going through the darkest hours of the Republic, when it would have been easier to fold to the pressure of oppression.

Often Sabé wondered if she should have left it in Padmé's hands in the crypt, a final token of a love lost. Yet something had driven her to return on the night after the funeral, something had urged her to take it. Not even the Jedi had tried to stop her when they had happened upon each other.

"Take it," he said from under his dark cowl. "She would want you to have it. For the future."

In this moment Sabé understood why. Kneeling down, she unwound the necklace from the place on her wrist where it had stayed since that fateful night. "I want you to have something."

"A present?" Leia asked hesitantly.

"A surprise."

"A surprise?"

Sabé hesitated. "It has to be our secret, though. No one else can know."

Leia nodded her head decisively. "I can keep a secret."

Sabé knew she could; one more way she would carry on Padmé's legacy – faithful to the last. Even at her sixth life day, Leia had an amazing propensity to comprehend the concept of honor. "Close your eyes."

The little brown eyes had disappeared behind their lids before she finished.

"Do you remember the tale of the princess who gave up everything to save her people?" Sabé asked while draping the familiar worn cord over the child's head.

"Yes," Leia whispered.

"Well this belonged to that very princess." Sabé knelt back on her heels. Wetness came to her eyes at the sight of Padmé's japor snippet hanging from Leia's neck. For the future. Perhaps the crazy wizard had been right about something after all. Batting away a tear, she said, "You can open your eyes now."

TKL/dl