The Witch's Tree
A Halloween fanfiction challenge, late as usual.
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The ancient stone walls surrounding the city were impressive. They were meant to be impressive, an outward manifestation of power, protection, and privilege. Built in the days before blasters and laser cannons, they had effectively guarded the city for centuries against marauders, and invaders, and change.
More impressive still was the giant tree growing just outside the gates of the city, its massive gnarled limbs reaching outward and upward casting great shadows in all directions, dwarfing the petty stone structure of man, a testament to the power of the Living Force. Its strength and vitality unstinted, unlike the walls that where a dead reminder of bygone days, remaining past their usefulness only because the effort to remove them had become too great. The descendants of the people who built them lacked the will or the fortitude for such an endeavor.
According to legend, the tree had always been there. There had been no seed, no sapling, it had towered into the heavens for the entire recorded history of the planet. It was revered as well as feared. It was said that its sap could paralyze and to taste its rare fruit brought certain death. Yet the locals also believed that to run your hand over its smooth yellow bark brought luck and to sleep in its shade brought strength and wisdom.
Wisdom that was much needed today Qui-Gon Jinn thought with a sigh, as he stood at the window looking out on the city, the treaty papers he had been working on the better part of the day, incomplete and unattended on the table behind him. Time was running short and a solution to the city's problems had yet to present itself. There was important work to be done. And yet he remained at the window, watching for the return of his apprentice.
Qui-Gon did not know why he allowed the distraction. The work was certainly tedious, but he had known worse. He was a devoted teacher and master, but hardly a doting creche-mother. And yet he found himself at the window each afternoon at the hour appointed for his padawan's return to the city.
He heard the laughter and voices first, then the massive forged iron gates to the city were slowly opened by the armed sentry droids, an odd pairing of the ancient with the new. A group of teenagers entered, the sons and daughters of the old royalty, the last of their kind. The Jedi were here at the request of the ruling families to help dismantle the oligarchy and establish a more modern form of government. Not an easy task for a society so steeped in tradition and unaccustomed to change.
Qui-Gon's eyes automatically sought out his padawan learner. A boy of fifteen, a boy who by appearances was very much like all the other boys in the group.
Obi-Wan Kenobi blended easily in the crowd of young people. He joined in the talking and laughter as if he had been a part of the group for years, not the odd handful of days since their arrival, the glint of a lightsaber hilt at his belt the only reminder that he did not share the carefree existence of his companions.
Qui-Gon watched his padawan casually step back and take a rear guard position as the group slowed to move through the security checkpoint, continuing an animated conversation with a young princess even as he checked the area for danger. Few observers would have noticed the slight hand signal motioning to one of his companions to take over the watch position as he kept the rest of the party moving through the gates and into the city.
Even at a distance Qui-Gon was amused to read irritation in the slouch of Siri Tachi's shoulders as she stepped back and assumed an apparently careless stance, leaning against the wall as she discreetly scanned the area for any sign of a threat. She was not one to take orders easily.
No, these two were definitely were set apart from the others despite outward appearances.
Still, it was good to see his apprentice enjoying himself with others of his own age. Perhaps that was what drew the Jedi master to the window each day, this brief glimpse of a life Obi-Wan might have lead. An ordinary life, the type lived by most teenagers on thousands of planets, a life filled with friendship and home and attachment, a life far different from that of a Jedi padawan.
Qui-Gon was thoughtful for a long moment before calling himself to task. It was not an existence either of them would have chosen, and pointless to dwell on what might have been. It was time to get back to work.
Qui-Gon turned at last from the window, ready to resume work on the treaty and the endless tangle of protocol and procedure that seemed to be the final barrier to bringing about some much needed change.