CHAPTER VIII

Sacrifices

The trickle of sand through the thin stem of the old-fashioned glass chrono was the only sound in the room for a very long time. The two that stood staring at each other through the glass mirror might have been life-like statues of marble. They were so still, so locked in their reflected gaze, one could hardly believe that they breathed. Their eyes gave them away though: blue and brown were stormy and pained as they studied each other intently.

There was a story that their cousin had once told Padmé and Sola when they were very small children living in the house on the mountain. He was their favorite cousin because when it was bedtime, and all the children in that big extended Naberrie household were tucked in the gigantic bed by the window, he would preside over them like a King and bestow upon them his stories. Part tales from the far corners of the Galaxy, part village folklore and part pure fantasy, his stories were utterly magical and they wove their spell of enchanted belief in the hearts and minds of his younger cousins. Years later, when most of the memories of her family's life in the village were blurred and faded at the edges like worn-out parchment, the memory of those stories remained sharp and clear in Padmé's mind.

Padmé remembered one of her cousin's stories the morning after she saw Anakin Skywalker's reflection in her mirror. That morning, the suns rose over the distant mountains and shown at her face where she sat by her office window, studying her hands. Sometime during the night, she had shifted the chair so its side rested against the wall and she had settled in it primly, her back flushed to it, her feet tucked in beneath the seat, the back of her hands flat, fingers splayed on her lap. Other than that, she had not moved in over six hours. She should have been stiff and in serious discomfort from her severe posture; her muscles should have been screaming in agony. Instead she felt nothing. She was utterly numb.

The only thoughts in her head were the details of the old story. It was a tale of a distant land, further than the furthest world from Naboo. In that land, the air was so cold that it rained frozen water and the ground was covered in white sheets of ice; there was no plant life, there was hardly any life at all. The ruler of this land was its Queen, a human female who was as pale and cold as her land. She was cold right to her heart and her veins were filled not with blood, but with ice water.

Padmé looked from the sun to the pale-veined palms in her lap, watching for the moment the pink lines disappeared entirely, waiting to see when the liquid running beneath the pale skin turned frozen and colorless.

At the sight of him she had gone numb with shock, her emotions draining out of her like blood from a wound and leaving her completely absent of feeling and thought. Distantly, she watched his blue eyes through the mirror, watched the way they looked at her, over her, his gaze devouring her.

She knew when his eyes found the scars that were barely visible through the see-through cloth on her back because they widened with horror.

"Padmé," he said hoarsely, taking a step forward, his hand outstretched to touch her.

It was the sound of his voice, filled with so much anguish and longing and the sight of his lips forming her name that broke the spell. Suddenly, she was her own reflection and her name spoken with his voice was the pebble that cracked her through. Splinters of emotion spiraled from her centre like spider web cracks on glass.

"Oh, Padmé," he repeated, and his hands were on her shoulders.

They were like flat slates of coal on her skin, and their scorching heat permeated the thin membrane, rushed through and poured into every cell of her body like liquid lava. Her fever had returned and that was as good a reason as any to pull away from him. Rather she leaned into his embrace. Her heart was beating so quickly she thought it would fail at any moment. Her eyes could not tear away from his reflected gaze.

As she watched, his eyes flashed at her flushed skin with dawning realization. "You are not well," he said hoarsely. His hands slid from her shoulders to her upper arms; his brow strained and his eyelids shut tightly in concentration.

Then cool relief coursed through her like a gushing spring and the heat in her face and body receded until it was only the bands of skin where his hands encircled her that were warm.

He gasped and his head fell forward, resting against her hair, his own thick hair a wonderful abrasive on her skin. She could feel his deep breathing damp, loud, and infinitely pleasurable against her neck.

She leaned back against him, no other thought in her head than to feel him as close to her as possible. A silent part of her noted that this was why she had not wanted to see him in the first place and then it fell completely silent when he whispered her name against her skin and she shivered violently. The urge to turn in his arms and enter fully into his embrace was overpowering. The reasons why she should not were becoming increasingly obscure.

Tell me, o virgin sister mine, during those secluded, isolated days you spent with him in the lovely Lake Retreat, did he manage to make it into your bed?

Her sister's words suddenly echoed, soft and mockingly in her ears.

She jerked out of his arms at once. She could see his eyes widen in hurt and confusion and she looked away, determinedly donning her veneer of aloofness.

The sun's rays winked mischievously through the overhead tree leaves and a few of them danced across the face of the man that was lying bundled in his cloak at the foot of the tree. He rolled from the glare to lie on his other side. A brightly colored bird alighted from one of the branches and perched on his shoulder, twittering shrilly. He opened his eyes and stared at it blearily. The bird gave one last shrill and joined its fellows in the branches overheard. Now fully awake, Anakin sat up, tucking his knees beneath his chin. He stared blankly around the clearing where he had slept. The undergrowth was flattened where he had earlier stomped on it in rage. The glade was sheltered with large trees and wild bushes. Besides the singing birds, the forest around him was silent.

Anakin inspected his hands.

He had fashioned a glove for the prosthetic before he left Coruscant. He removed it now and examined the delicate gears and rods that now took the place of his right hand. The metal was high-quality bio-steel, resistant to moisture and extreme temperatures and did not rust. It glinted in the twinkling overheard light, blinding him. He scrutinized his left hand. The skin on his palm was pale from all those weeks in the Healing ward, and although the recent self-inflicted wounds were healed, it remained still tender and bruised. In many ways, the metallic prosthetic was better than the natural hand: it was stronger, more flexible, durable… Anakin studied the differences for long moments then he got to his feet carefully and stood in front of the tree he had been leaning on. He balled his fists and smashed them into the bark.

The birds fell from their home, shrieking loudly in rage. Anakin ignored them. He was studying his hands again, the way the left hand had cut open where it was bruised before, and the way the right had merely bent along the stress and then, as he watched, returned to its original shape. So, it was also elastic. He noted this with a grim satisfaction and then smashed his fists into the tree again. And again. The birds that had returned to their home flew out again and to him, flapping their wings scoldingly. Their neighbors in the other trees also flew out to see what the commotion was about. Oblivious, Anakin slammed his fists again. Then again.

Blood seeped between the grooves of his fingers down to his wrist and dripped on the ground, splashing against his boots. The metallic wires took a little bit longer to return to their original shape. He was steadily battering the tree with his fists. There was a cry in the distance, probably from some forest animal hearing the commotion and warning its kind. Again. Again.

Again.

Again.

"I never expected to see you again. What are you doing here?" Her voice was an icy whisper.

A few moments out of his embrace and she looked as inapproachable as the Queen a nervous boy had met all those years ago on Coruscant. All the fears and insecurities that he had kept at bay since he woke up so many hours ago on another world rose up at once at the sound of that voice, so formal, so emotionless, so unlike the voice of the woman who had pledged her love to him.

He fumbled with his jerkin, pulling it from his utility belt and frantically searching beneath his inner tunic. Her eyes widened but she did not turn around. His hand touched the smoothened parchment and he drew it out from his tunic.

He held the letter up so she could see it in the mirror. Her mouth fell open

"I got your letter."

Her large eyes looked from the letter to his face and then quickly away. Her back rose and fell.

"Did you read it?" she asked at last. She continued before he could answer, "Because if you did, you would have realized we have nothing more to say to each other." Her voice was icier than before, if that was even possible, dismissive.

No. He was imagining that. How could she dismiss him now, after what they had been through together? After what they had become to each other? Even now the kisses she'd given him burned in his mouth. He hadn't imagined those.

"I want to hear you say it to my face, Padmé. I want to you to look me in the eye and tell me we can't be together."

Her eyes met his steadily in the mirror. "We can't be together."

Fear was like a cold wind whistling through his bones, trying to cool his over-heated blood. His fingers fisted convulsively over the letter.

"Not to my reflection," he said with courage he barely felt. "To my face."

Her chin lifted arrogantly. For a horrible moment, he thought she would actually turn around. But then she looked away. She did not.

"My lady?"

Padmé looked up from her hands (which were still pink beneath their paleness: was the sun keeping the water in her veins warm?) and into her handmaiden's frightened face.

"Yes, Dormé."

"I've been looking for you everywhere," Dormé exclaimed, relief and something close to anger in her voice, "have you been here all night?"

Padmé turned back to her meditation of her hands. "Yes, Dormé."

The handmaiden looked around apprehensively. "Has he… gone?"

"Yes, Dormé."

"We've had this conversation before, Anakin."

Her voice was so cold, so controlled, her body so controlled and rigid. Was this his Padmé? The girl that had comforted him, the woman that had spoken to him softly, her body language that of warmth and compassion, and eventually desire? It was as if he was looking at a stranger. Even the back of her neck looked different than he remembered it. Harder. Perhaps some malignant spirit had possessed the body of his beloved.

But he knew better. This was not Padmé. This was Amidala and she was as hard and intractable as the lifeless doll idol she strived to be.

Give up, his voice of reason, the voice of his Master, told him resignedly.

No.

He forced himself to sound rational. Impassioned words would not move Amidala. "You didn't let me finish then. Anything is possible." She made a noise of dispute but he went on, overriding her, "I understood everything you told me in that letter. You don't want to take me from the Order and you won't have to. I've left. I'm not… I'm not a Jedi anymore. We're free."

She drew in a sharp breath. So he had shocked her. He had shocked himself. The words had just flung out from him; he had not planned on saying them. And now, his heart pounded with desperation, with fear at all that he was willing to sacrifice for her.

But how could he continue to serve if she was the price he had to pay? At what point will that self-denial become self-destruction? She was worth it. What they had was worth everything.

He could feel the surprise rolling off her erstwhile closed senses in waves. The eyes that looked at him now through the mirror were wide and stunned; her face was no longer so pale.

"No." She whispered at last.

"Yes," he insisted. He took a step closer to her. "I have to return to Coruscant and hand over my lightsaber and swear the oaths of leave-taking and all that. But I've left in my heart already. What's left for me to do is just ceremony."

She closed her eyes as waves of relief coursed through her. Taking her relief for gladness at his decision, he took another step to her and reached for her. He had won her.

She opened her eyes and took a frantic step forward, away from him; his hands fell to his side in defeat. Suddenly, a tide of impatience rose up in him.

"What is it?" he asked, impatient and confused. "I've left the Order: what else stands in our way?"

"You haven't left the Order," she replied. Her voice was no longer cold and emotionless although it was obviously trying desperately to be. He could feel the edges of passion along her modulated tones. He clung to that sign desperately. Oh, he would make her feel before long. "You're officially a Jedi until you have taken those steps. As far as the rest of the Order is concerned, you are still a Jedi."

"Formalities. I'll be finished with them and back on Naboo within a day. Padmé…"

"You will do no such thing," she snapped. Now there was clear anger in that voice, anger bordering on irritation.

His own temper flared. "Don't tell me what to do!" He was as incensed at her tone of voice as he had been in the Queen's court not so long ago. And her refusal to look at him fully was maddening. He wanted to grab her shoulders and spin her around until she faced him.

"I will if you insist on acting like a child!" she retorted at the top of her voice. "I want you to leave, Anakin." He recoiled as if she had slapped him. "I will arrange for your transport to Coruscant this very night. You will return to the Temple and your life as you know it. I do not want to… to ever see you again." She finished falteringly and bowed her head.

Her words cut him, cut through him, deflating his temper, crippling him with pain. He swayed on his feet.

"You don't mean that," he said hoarsely.

She did not answer. Her white neck was exposed; he could not see her face.

"Oh stars, please tell me you don't want that!" He cried.

"What I want is of no consequence, Ani," she whispered.

"You told me you loved me," he reminded her desperately, "on Geonosis, in your letter. You told me I had your heart."

"You have it still, now and forever. I cannot keep yours."

"Why are you saying this?" He shouted. "Why are you doing this?"

For long moments, there was silence. They stood there, frozen in their places: Her head bowed and her shoulders slumped. His own shoulders had started heaving with dry sobs; his chest was a thick knot of pain and fire.

She raised her head and he could see his own pain reflected in her eyes, in the tears that stood in them. "You are special, Anakin," she whispered. "You have the chance to fulfill your destiny, to be great and glorious, and to use your gifts to do much good in the galaxy. I cannot take that away from you."

"I don't want it! Without you I don't want any of it!"

She smiled. Bitterly. "Don't you know? It's never a matter of what we want, Anakin but of what we must."

He swayed again. "No." And with energy borne more out of sheer desperation than actual strength, he cleared the distance between them in one stride. His hands reached for her shoulders and he turned her to face him.

Anakin had no clear memory of how he made his way to that forest last night - or was it early this morning? - and he had no memory of how he made his way out of it. One moment, he was standing in a small glade, his broken hands hanging loosely by his side, the vague sense of predators behind him - the next moment, he was in the plaza in front of the large spaceport. Fisted hands bandaged with scraps from his tunic hung in gloves at his sides. The little that could be seen of him beneath his dark cloak looked wild and dangerous.

The flight officer remembered him from the day before - barely. He attended to the Jedi with trembling hands and dropped the key card twice before he placed it in the gloved palm.

He watched the dark hooded figure disappear with the inexplicable relief of a man who had just had a very close shave.

"Senator?"

The tension of tortured emotions, frazzled, coiled and strained, was only heightened at the inadvertent interruption.

Anakin's eyes flew from her face to Dormé's and then with a loud sound, he stalked off to the other side of the room.

Padmé's eyes followed him hungrily, desperately, memorizing the way his legs strode, the way his hips did not sway, the way he clenched his fists tightly by his side, and the angle of his neck. Even in his anger he was graceful, sleek like some sort of barely tamed beast of prey. She tallied all these points to be stored away in her memory. She prayed that one day, in the very distant future, she would be able to open that part of her mind called "Anakin Skywalker" and look at these memories with nostalgia like old holos.

"My lady?"

Dormé's anxious voice drew Padmé's attention to her. Her handmaiden had entered the room fully and was now looking from Anakin to Padmé with utter puzzlement on her face. "How did he get in here?" she asked anxiously. "My lady, do you want me to…?"

"Dormé, why don't you retire for the night? I will make my way to my chambers when I am ready."

Anakin looked up sharply from his brooding stance in the corner. His eyes focused on Padmé's small figure.

Dormé stared at him distrustfully. "But my lady…" she began in protest.

"Do as I say, Dormé," Padmé said in that authoritative tone that she hardly ever used.

Dormé bristled. "Of course, Senator," she said stiffly.

She stood in the doorway, apprehension still evident on her face until the door slid shut.

"She's been like that all morning," Dormé's voice whispered over her head. Artoo's long beeps were like low wails.

"Could you turn your head to one side, Senator?"

Padmé did so at once. From the corner of her eye, she could see strange silver-plated instruments projecting from the numerous appendages on the EM-DEE droid.

"I have work to do," she said passively.

"You've refused to leave the window all morning. You've refused to eat. Your hands are frozen. If you had a fever I might think you delirious, I don't understand some of the things that you've said to me," Dormé's tear-filled voice sounded so far away. "You aren't really listening to what I am saying now, are you?"

"I am," Padmé said truthfully. "I am sorry, Dormé."

"And to the other side?" the EM-DEE asked.

Padmé titled her head and the medical instruments went out of her view. She could now see the slowly flashing lights on Artoo's dome.

"EM-DEE," she said.

"Yes, Senator?" She could still hear its whirs and clicks.

"Did you check my blood?"

"Your pressure is rather low, Senator, but once again there is no sign of infection from your previous injuries. On the other hand, the symptoms of your previous fever have disappeared -"

"It's turned into water, hasn't it?"

Dormé moaned. Artoo emitted a high-pitched panicked whistle.

"I beg your pardon, Senator?" The EM-DEE asked tonelessly.

"My blood has turned to water, hasn't it? Freezing water."

"No, Senator."

"Check again." Padmé felt Dormé reach for her hand and clasp it firmly. Her handmaiden's hot hand scalded Padmé's cold one but Padmé did not have the heart to pull away. "My heart is frozen, so my blood must be as well."

Artoo thrilled woefully.

"Of course, Senator."

She sank bonelessly into her chair. Her legs no longer had the strength to support her - that was how far gone she was. She was literally throbbing with pain. Her aloof façade had long since abandoned her and she was now a hopeless mess of emotions.

He gave her no quarter. He flung himself at her feet, catching her hands in his.

"Please." He looked up at her with eyes that were so wounded and yet still so filled with hope that her soul quaked within her at the sight. "Please, Padmé."

Out of a compulsion that would not be denied, she took her hand out of his and placed it against his cheek. He leaned into it, closing his eyes. She could feel his pulse beneath her fingertips, his breath fluttering against her skin. His lips turned to her hand and he kissed her fingers with an intensity that seared right up her arm to her very core.

"I love you… Don't do this… Please…" he murmured, interspersing each plea with kisses.

She was crying silently, tears running down her cheeks unchecked as she held his head to her lap and bent over him. "You're not making this any easier for me."

He turned to her other hand. "I'm not going to."

"We can't be together," she said for what must have been the hundredth time that evening.

"This is where I belong," he said simply.

As did she. What was wrong with her? She thought frantically. Why was she so determined to hurt him and herself?

She lifted his head up and he was crying: those eyes, those wonderful blue eyes shimmering with pain and fear. She traced the paths of tears on his cheeks, leaned over and kissed all of them.

"I want you to promise me that when you leave here," he made an unhappy noise, "that you will return to the Temple. That you will not abandon your training. Promise me this, Anakin."

"Don't make me, Padmé. Please don't -"

Her lips found his. They kissed long and hard and when the kiss ended, they were both gasping in pain. He was trembling so violently that she could barely hold onto him. She bent his head and kissed the crown of his hair.

"We'll find each other again," she said.

He shook his head fiercely. He threw his head back and his eyes glared at her accusingly.

"We have each other now," he cried. "Don't throw this away. Don't throw 'us' away."

"I don't have a choice."

Mid-transit between Naboo and Coruscant, the lone Jedi pilot of the shuttle craft switched the controls into autopilot, un-strapped himself from the pilot's seat and fell to his knees, sobbing violently.

"Why? WHY? Answer me!" He asked them all: the Force, the stars, the billions of people that inhabited the systems of starlines zooming past his craft.

There was no answer. The Force was silent. The starlines flickered without a pattern. The people he was now sworn to protect for the rest of his life continued their selfish lives oblivious to his confusion and pain.

And the galaxy revolved around its imaginary centre, indifferent to the agony and sacrifice of two insignificant individuals in its chaos of time and space.

The letter was lying where it had fallen on the floor. He picked it up and held it in his hands for a while, seeing the smudges of black ink and red blood, tears and sweat; it smelt of her perfume, his blood; the emotions of raw pain and rawer passion grazed the edges of his skinned nerves.

This was all he had now of her. All she was willing to give him.

Tenderly, he folded the worn parchment and he placed put it back in its place between his tunic and his chest.

"Anakin."

He straightened to his feet rigidly. It was his turn to keep his back to her and this time there was no mirror to show her his face.

He could not bear to look at her.

"May the Force be with you."

His ribs closed over his heart and he felt his fragile calm threaten to shatter again.

The Force could not dwell in the soul of the damned.

Without another word he ran, leaving his soul behind in that sun-walled office as he disappeared into the darkness of the night and his own desolation.

"I'll be fine, Dormé," Padmé murmured. "I have unfathomable reserves of strength."

The tear-streaked face of her loyal handmaiden hovering above her tried to smile. "Oh my lady, I hope I did the right thing."

"You did, my friend," Padmé said gently. She snuggled in further in her mother's quilt. No bed ever felt as comfortable as the one in her room, her own room with the sun-colored walls in her parents' house.

At her other side, Sola leaned over to brush a loose curl off Padmé's forehead. Padmé smiled sleepily.

"Baby sister," Sola said, a weak attempt at teasing that did little to disguise the utter franticness she had felt earlier, "I do hope that whatever you did to put yourself in this state was worth it."

Padmé did not answer: she had not heard the question. The broth her mother had force-fed her had worked. She was sinking fast into deep sleep, into a sleep filled with dreams of a man with weeping blue eyes begging for mercy from the cold heart of the Snow Queen.

The trickle of sand through the thin stem of the old-fashioned glass chrono was the only sound in the room for a very long time.