Two

Leia Organa lay in the dark, her fingers clutching the sheet over her head, hiding from the shadowy room. She stifled a sob. Momma never left her alone in the dark when she tucked her in. She began to cry softly, remembering her promise to Mother. From tomorrow onwards she wouldn't even be able to visit Momma and talk to her.

Than, with the ability to negotiate fine print which would make her a great diplomat one day Leia remembered the wording of her promise to Celeste and smiled. She had said nothing about not visiting Momma this night. She would go she decided, even though it meant braving the palace grounds in the terrifying dark. She would go tell Momma why she couldn't come any more, and that she loved her.

Forcing herself to take deep calming breaths the way Momma's friend Ben had taught her, Leia pushed back the covers. Then, in a rush, she ran through the dark room to the window. She struggled with it a moment in the dark, trembling. It finally swung open, and she leaned out. It was not so dark on the grounds, and the distant lamps that illuminated the garden made the dark less threatening. Leia swung her legs over the windowsill, and reached out to grab the branch of the tree that grew near her window,. The bark was rough and scratchy, and she jumped out of her window, holding on to the branch, hung from it a moment and pulled herself up onto the tree, heart pounding loudly. She sat still for a moment. She could still go back to her room.

Lithely, she climbed down and ran into the dark garden.

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Vader walked toward her grave again, feeling again that inexplicable pull. In the cover of the night it was no longer necessary for him to maintain his disguise and so he strode with more ease that he had last time, being able to concentrate only the call of the force.

As he walked he thought about his wife. She had still loved him, he knew, from what he had felt of her dying thoughts. He knew he had not still loved her. The dark side left no room for emotions like love. Revenge, now, revenge he could understand. He would take great joy in punishing Organa for depriving him of his wife.

Vader was so preoccupied with his reflections that he did not feel the presence near the grave until he was very near it. As he approached the bushes he felt…. "Amidala?" he whispered. The presence was like hers, soft and female and gentle.

Than he chided himself for his foolishness. Of course it wasn't her. As he neared the grave he saw a little girl with long brown hair in a frilly white nightgown crouching at the foot of the grave and sobbing. She sniffled, lost in her misery as she whispered softly "Momma."

Vader froze in shock and the little girl whirled to look at him, backing away in fear. He studied her face, noting its extreme pallor. She had large brown eyes and she looked terrified. Despite her muted presence in the Force he knew her, knew that this was his child. She was the image of Amidala. So that was why she left, he thought triumphantly, to keep her daughter safe. But why? The child seemed to have only small potential for the Force. She had conquered her flight reflex, he noted, feeling a faint sense of pride at her courage.

"Who…who are you?" The girl stammered. Then, obviously recalling some lesson in deportment she added a small, cautious "Sir?"

"That depends," Vader said slowly, "on who you are, child."

The elfin child looked at him, her brown eyes huge. She drew her small body straight and said regally, "I am Leia Organa, Princess of Alderaan".

So, Amidala had given the child to the Organas, he thought, feeling a fresh spurt of rage. His child, to be raised by rebellious scum. The child was waiting, so he said "Last I heard, Celeste Organa was in good health".

"Celeste is my mother" Leia explained earnestly "Momma was Momma". Then, to answer his noise of incomprehension, she continued "Momma loved me".

Vader looked at the diminutive girl who was undoubtedly his daughter and felt her suppressed grief. She sniffled again, rubbing her eyes, looking frail and lost and prompted by some instinct he couldn't understand, Vader drew her into his arms and awkwardly held her against his breastplate while she wept. The child shivered, and he drew her closer and moved his cloak so that it covered her.

In dying, Amidala had undone her actions when she left him, he thought with a dark sense of satisfaction. He would never leave this child to the Organas. She would be his child, his apprentice. And if Amidala watched from somewhere beyond life, he hoped it made her furious.

He would take her away from here, he decided, to Coruscant. And when he displaced the Emperor, he would have an heir who was bound to him by blood. It would have been good if she had had his strength in the Force, but she wore her mother's face and if she carried any of their combined genes, she would be a worthy heir. She continued sobbing softly all the while he was thinking. After a while she was silent. "Who are you?" Leia asked again.

Vader scanned his daughter with the Force, curious as to why he she had inherited such little talent. For a while he saw nothing but, driven by an arrogant belief in his own bloodline he probed deeper. It didn't make sense, that the daughter of the Chosen One should be nearly Force-blind. At last he found something. It was subtle, almost undetectable. He examined it and stiffened angrily. There were barriers blocking most of her access to the Force, reducing what should have been an enormous gift into one that was almost insignificant. He studied the Force Block and recognized the maker almost immediately. Obi-Wan truly had much to answer for. The blocks hadn't hurt Leia yet, but if they were not removed before she grew up, they would become permanent, depriving her of her heritage forever.

"Leia" Vader said, drawing on memories of his mother as he set the child down and looked into her eyes "I am your father".

Leia's tears stopped, and she pulled away from the scratchy breastplate and stiffened. The huge man in black loomed over her. Her father? Bail was her father. Sometimes, when Celeste wasn't around, Bail carried her on his shoulders and played with her. This giant was her father?

The dark man gave her a moment and continued "Bail and Celeste Organa stole you and your mother from me. I've been looking for your mother for six years; I didn't know you existed or I'd have looked for you as well."

That didn't sound right. Leia frowned. "Why did mother let them?" she asked.

The dark man sighed as he answered. "They told her that they would harm you if she tried to escape" he said.

Leia looked at the dark man who said he was her father. His story made a strange kind of sense to her young mind. It explained many things, like why Momma looked sad sometimes, when she thought Leia wasn't watching, or why Momma and Celeste sometimes fought about her. It also explained why Celeste had been mean to Momma.

"I am taking you away with me" her father said.

Leia though about resisting, screaming and then did not. If he took her, she would not have to live with Celeste. And the dark man had sounded lonely. She was lonely too. In the end, it was the hint of sadness that she felt from him which decided her. He had loved her Momma too, she thought.

She walked with him, unresisting, her small hand engulfed in his dark gloved one. The dark man walked and Leia ran to keep up. She was panting after he had gone a few steps. The Dark Man paused and then he picked her up. Leia laughed as he swung her through the air before settling her effortlessly on his shoulders, relieved. He acted like a father should, she decided, enjoying the view of the garden from the height, And she wasn't scared of the dark anymore, because he looked stronger then all of the bad things out there.

Vader felt his daughter's body growing heavy with sleep and shifted her to his arms. She was a light bundle, almost weightless. Leia's eyes closed and she nestled against him trustingly. It was clear to Vader that she was a loved child; no frightened child would walk off so calmly with a stranger no matter how she disliked her adoptive mother. Since Bail obviously loved her, he would refrain from punishing the man, Vader decided. It would be enough of a horror for the man to imagine what might have happened to the lovely little girl who he would never hear from again.

Leia slept quietly in the passenger seat of the shuttle, worn out by her long night. Vader looked at his sleeping daughter and covered her with a blanket, remembering that his mother used to do the same thing for him sometimes.

He wouldn't remove her Force Block yet, he decided. The Emperor might see even this delicate child as a threat. Or, almost as bad, he might decide to take her to train, like Mara Jade and undo his own hold on her allegiance. All the Emperor needed to know, Vader decided, was that he had decided to raise his daughter. The Emperor would like that, Vader knew, he would think that it gave him leverage in case Vader tried to replace him. And with the Force Block, Palpatine wouldn't know enough to realize that the child could be a threat to him. Ben Kenobi might actually have done him a favor.

Vader hadn't bothered to dream of the future for a long time. But now, it seemed he had an advantage the Emperor couldn't expect. So he sat next to Leia and plotted and planned all the way back to Imperial Center.