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Chapter 18: Underworld

"Weltic?"

When she had first seen the old cook's face, she had been sceptical; after all, humans could look quite alike sometimes, especially if there were trillions around that you could be a duplicate of. But the voice, the mannerisms… the missy of it all. Nobody called her missy. Nobody called just anyone missy.

"I'm sorry, do I know you?" The man questioned, and this time it was Leia herself who remembered she was wearing her disguise, and she was most definitely not going to disable the glamour now, out here, in the open. "Nevermind, we have to move. Young girl alone down here without a working blaster."

It was easy to see the wisdom in his observations, both from what had occurred and what was still happening. Groans of pain indicated some of the thugs she had taken out were already beginning to recover, though their leader was likely out for the count, now that she could take a longer look at the pipe he had been hit with. Even with the unfortunate fate of the first ones to try, others were already beginning to take notice. So yes, having to move was a given, and even if Weltic Volce did not know it yet, she had good reason to trust him.

"Alright," Leia agreed, head on a swivel for any other would-be attackers. An old cook from the Royal Palace, and she was definitely going to find out, how he had ended up down here, was not much of a difference compared to being alone. Thinking it might deter at least some, she continued to hold the fried blaster in her hand for everyone to see.

"Follow me," Weltic ordered, lightly grabbing her upper arm and pulling her along, not waiting for her to get going on her own. She followed the older man who had been cooking her food for about as long as she could remember through the narrow alleys of the Coruscant underworld until they reached a small door in a recess along one of the buildings that formed yet another passageway between the monolithic skyscrapers. He knocked on the door in a distinct rhythm and it was opened from within; Leia could not help but notice the number of mechanical locks that had to be disengaged before the entryway was finally opened.

Having seen Weltic, seeing his wife Advana should not have been quite so shocking, but already having run into Winter, her tolerance for surprising appearances by Alderaanians was somewhat strained to begin with. Just like her husband, now that she could muster them both a bit, with the door closed, she was thinner than the princess remembered, and both of them seemed to have aged quite a bit, even though it had been barely above a year since she had last seen them. The former head servant of the Royal Palace had always been a vibrant woman, shooing around the staff with a verve that had them jumping more than a direct order from the viceroy ever could.

"Are you another refugee?" The former cook began questioning her, when he returned his attention back onto his surprise guest, right after re-engaging all locks and looking through a peephole in the door. She must have looked somewhat puzzled, because he continued, "Your bracelet, it's Alderaanian. You don't seem the type to steal it, and it's not something often sold to off-worlders."

"It was given to me by my father," Leia admitted, before once again sending a tiny jolt of power into the enchantments; she had not even considered the implications of using this particular bracelet, really, it had just been the one she was wearing when Harry had asked her for something to enchant. Now, though, it seemed like a risk. Anyone familiar with Alderaanian culture would have recognized the piece, for sure, and Alderaanians were still considered rebels by the Empire, every last one of them. With her sense for magic constantly evolving, she could feel it when the glamour receded, not that the reaction in her rescuers was not enough to tell her so.

"Your Highness," Advana exclaimed, one hand laid on her heart in shock. "You're… you're alive!"

Then, lacking all the restraint the woman had shown all throughout Leia's childhood and adolescence, she surged forward to encircle the princess in a bear hug.

"I am, Advana," she replied, suddenly emotional as well. With her near-death experience of falling from a hurtling airspeeder and her near-violation by the black-lipped thug earlier, having this woman's arms around her all of a sudden, was too much. "And you know I'd never expect you to call me by any titles, Vana."

Pushing the younger woman away from her, the former head servant started mustering the princess from the top to the bottom, and then once again the other way around. Whatever she had seen must have been at least partly good, for the bear hug came back; this time, though, the fading numbing charm on Leia's hip made itself known, painfully so.

"You're hurt?" Advana observed, immediately moving to pull up the blouse that was covering the bare flesh where her accidental apparition had managed to leave behind a flap of skin. "How did that… never you mind. Weltic, don't just stand there; get the med kit, the Queen is hurt."

It took a while for the 'Queen' to process what had just been said; later, she would blame it on both the enormity of the statement, as well as the casualness with which it was made, with her pain and exhaustion probably playing a part, as well. For the moment, though, her thoughts had screeched to a halt. Unfortunately, with the adrenaline receding, the intense pain flaring up and her overall state of extreme tiredness, there was little recourse, little opportunity left to protest, and she simply collapsed.

OOOOOOOO

Leia's dreams as she slipped from unconsciousness into a deep, restful sleep, were manifold, as they were wont to do when the waking world offered a lot to be processed. The first one she could consciously remember when she woke up, and quite an unusually coherent one it was, had contained her and Harry; the two of them had been riding on a broom, of all things, just like he had told her about from his younger days, with her pressed up against his back, trying to tease him out of concentration. At first, there had not really been anything around, just some rolling hills she had trouble placing, covered in long, lush, green grass stretching as far as the horizon. Then, finally, what seemed both seconds and minutes later, something else appeared at the far edge of these plains. At first, it was just a speck in the distance, but as they neared faster and faster, more details could be made out: the tall towers, a few spires of white, behind them a large lake… it was the palace on Alderaan.

Now that she knew what it was, there was nothing she wanted more than to get there, to be in its halls again. With whispered words she spurned Harry on to go faster, but somehow, like a mirage in the hot desert, the building now seemed to be moving away, and away, and away. She was getting ready to give up, even though it was the last thing she wanted to do, when another thing broke the monotony of her dream. High up in the sky, a new moon had risen, a large crater on its side pointed toward her home, her family, mother and father, aunts and sister.

"Continue with the operation. You may fire when ready."

Tarkin's voice was reverberating all around now as he sentenced her planet to die. It seemed more all-encompassing like this, as if it actually occupied the space the outcome of those orders did within her and had ever since she heard those words.

"Dantooine is too remote to make an effective demonstration…"

It was all happening again now, she could see it. Up above, she could watch as the tributary beams began forming, watch as the immense lance of energy rocked toward her home, yet still she pushed on, now suddenly alone, on a speeder bike… if only she could get there in time, she would be able to do something… then, the dream changed.

This time, it was her and Winter, not moving, just sitting side by side on one of the small hills overlooking the base on Sanctuary, which she now recognised as the ones she had been flying over, earlier. They were talking, though she hardly registered, what they were talking about. Their family? Her sister's crush on a handsome starfighter pilot? Children? Some Alliance business? Maybe it was all of it, maybe none, it did not matter; what mattered was that even as they were still talking, the distance between them seemed to grow. Metre after metre, Winter was moving away, being pulled away, and the further she got, the more she seemed to lose her colour, even more so than normal: blue eyes turned to a dull grey, not unlike the duranium plating of a star destroyer; naturally pale skin began seeming clammy, every pore and every drop of sweat visible, even as the distance grew; white hair was losing its lustre, becoming stringy and bland…

Another change: This time, it was the small underground room that held Sanctuary's ward crystal, through the place was changed quite a bit. The gem on its pedestal remained, but where around it had always been plain walls, the back one was now replaced by a large doorframe. In front of it stood Harry. Older, though by how much was impossible to tell, with both worry and laughter having left lines on his face.

"I've finally found a way to…"

"Your Highness."

"… go home, like I've always wanted."

Leia wanted to protest, tell him this was his home now, the place he had built for himself, for her, for his friends and anyone else who was like him and simply wanted to live in peace, or at least in freedom from the Empire.

"Your Highness!"

Another voice was intruding on her dream now, insistent and all-encompassing, not unlike Tarkin's had been; but where the late grand moff's carefully cultured tones had been disturbingly cool, this voice was tinged with worry.

"YOUR HIGHNESS!"

With a jolt, Leia awoke to find Advana leaning over her, one hand still on her shoulder where she had been shaking the princess awake. Furiously, Leia blinked the… oh, the tears away as parts of the dream, the dreams were coming back to her. Her head was in complete disarray though, and she had trouble separating fact from fiction, reality from imagination right now.

"Queen Leia, you were thrashing in your sleep," Advana told her, looking her over like she had once done when Leia scraped her knee climbing a tree in the palace gardens. It had been one of those rare few times where her father and mother had both been unavailable and all her aunts were out doing… something. She had never been quite sure what it was her aunts were actually doing all day when they were not occupied trying to make their niece more lady-like. "I was worried there was a problem with your wound."

"No, no… just…" she shuddered as she talked, as if acknowledging the nightmares might make them feel even more real than they already had. "Just nightmares. Stressful days bring them out in me…"

"Oh," the former First Servant replied, visibly unsure what to say.

"Vana, you changed my nappies," Leia reminded her, sad and exasperated at the same time. "Say what's on your mind, you know I don't like people treating me like I'm something special."

The older woman, she had to be in her sixties now, if Leia were to guess, seemed to ponder that for a while.

"It is improper." Declaration made, she retreated a respectable distance away, now that she was sure the wound was not making any trouble. Then, lowering her head in a submissive gesture that was completely at odds with the stern taskmaster she had always been for the staff, she added, "I apologize for my tone, as well as the improper familiarity I allowed myself yesterday, my Queen."

"Stop that, Vana," Leia protested, noticing but unable to change how angry she was suddenly getting, without any real tangible reason as to why. "You bandaged up my knee when I fell off that tree, remember? You soothed me until I stopped crying and then carried me to my bed when I fell asleep. You've earned every bit of familiarity and more, and I've missed you, and now… what is it with this Queen nonsense. There's no…"

Choking on her words for a bit, she nevertheless powered through. "There's no Alderaan to be queen of anymore. Every time people call me a princess, I want to ask them 'of what?'."

Seemingly untouched by her outburst, the older woman simply sat there, accepting every last syllable, silently, until her husband called her out of the room, leaving behind an emotional Leia in the middle of an outburst of feeling of which she had no idea, where to channel them. She had not felt like this since before Harry, Arden and, to a lesser degree, Mercer, had pulled her out of her cell on the Death Star, but something about the previous days must have set loose a lot of feelings all at once. With an anguished, angry cry she struck the mattress she was by now sitting on with the undersides of her balled fists, accidentally vanishing two circular holes out of the bed, all the way to the floor. No surprise that, even in a hovel such as this, Advana Volce's floors were clean enough to eat off of them, even under the low piece of furniture.

"You must forgive my wife, Lelilah," Weltic told her as she turned her head to look at the door as he stepped through. "You know she was always more formal. It comes with the territory."

Numbly, Leia nodded. For a while, she simply continued sitting on the bed, alternatively staring at the far wall and at the ground through the two holes she had just made; not that either distance was all that far, given how small the room was. Everything down here, below the upper levels, tended to be cramped, and the Volces' little home seemed to be no exception.

"What was she talking about? Queen?" she eventually questioned, finally looking at the old cook. "There's nothing to be the Queen of, anymore. Alderaan is gone, just a cloud of asteroids."

"Aye, that it is," he agreed, sadness colouring every syllable, and for another moment, the two of them simply shared in grief. "But her people isn't, Lelilah, and the Empire knows that, too. Do you know, why we're down here?"

Leia shook her head; there were, of course, guesses she could have made, given that Weltic and his wife had transferred from the Royal Palace to the Embassy on Coruscant when she became senator, meaning they would have been obvious targets for retaliation attacks once her complicity in the smuggling of the Death Star plans had become known.

"We came down here when we heard your ship had been captured, and a good thing we did. Just two days later, the ISB burned the Embassy down after filching the place for hours on end." Not all that surprising, she considered; the Empire was well known for being rather vengeful whenever it felt slighted, or that its power was unduly challenged. Alderaan and its royal family had most certainly done both, and the Emperor's enforcers seldom shied away from collective punishment. "But the reason we're down here? It's because there are hundreds of us down here. Yes, I could probably find passage off-world for me and Advana, but we can't just leave behind what might be all that remains of our people."

"But you can't stay here, either…" Leia finally understood. As little control as the Empire and its security apparatus might have down here, they would, with time, notice a community of Alderaanians numbering in the hundreds, especially if some of them started trying to leave, did a bad job at it, and were then caught. She prided herself on having withstood the torture on the Death Star, but she was well aware most others would break; she herself would likely have broken in time, though it was hard to admit to that. In fact, it was probably Tarkin's impatience that had her slated for execution, threatened with the destruction of her home planet, instead of simply suffering under the various torture masters the Emperor had available until she would have gladly spilled her secrets and begged for death.

"No, we can't stay here. But to leave, we'd need a leader, someone respected with a claim to the mantle of leadership. The Great Houses are gone, they can't get in the way with their squabbling when the rightful heir steps up, a respected woman in her own right…" Weltic continued, looking at her with hope in his eyes the same way she must have looked up at him when she tried sweet-talking her way into his kitchen to avoid her fussing aunts. "We need a queen."

What a frustrating man he could be… appealing to her sense of duty, that instinctive need to help people, especially her people, in need. And he knew it, most definitely, that he had her with that.

"Long live Queen Leia."

"Long live Queen Leia," said Leia replied dryly, a hint of sorrow to her voice. If this was not going to complicate things, then she was a Hutt. "I might have an idea, where even hundreds of people could go and would be welcomed with open arms, but I need to call someone for that. Do you have a comms unit?"

OOOOOOOO

Several thousand parsecs down the Perlemian trade route, then a few dozen more to the right when coming from the galaxy's centre on Coruscant, Harry and Arden were preparing as well.

"This is taking way too long," Arden decided from the other side of the table Harry was working on, distastefully sniffing the fumes ejected from his cauldron. "And it smells like a rancor's bad breath."

Barely managing to quell the urge to roll his eyes, the wizard looked at her, raised an eyebrow, then returned to brewing. It was exactly 57 seconds later, when he had passed a rather crucial step in the brewing process, that he replied, "You could help me, maybe that would make things go faster?"

"Fine," the witch acquiesced, then added, "But only because it gets me out of your stuffy laboratory more quickly. What do you need, Boss?"

Without further comment, time was of the essence with his potion beginning to boil now, which it was supposed to be doing for just about 30 seconds before the next to last ingredient was added, he grabbed his datapad and transferred a file to Arden.

"Everything I need, including pictures. Wouldn't want to poison ourselves, would we? Most of them grow in my greenhouse, the last three in the forests around here," he explained, already returning to his cauldron. His errand witch was already leaving, too, seemingly eager to finally unearth the mystery of the northern caves. Nevertheless, he felt the need to tell her something before she left. "And it's not stuffy, there's enough ventilation. I first learned potions in a dunge…"

The door swishing closed cut him off, mid-word. Of course.

Three clockwise and one counterclockwise turn of his ladle later, it was once again time to let the nearly finished concoction simmer, this time for an entire half hour. In the meantime, the captain decided, he would turn his attention to what else he still wanted to brew before their excursion. Felix Felicis, while it would have been incredibly useful, was simply not an option; he had not yet been able to find substitutes for many of the ingredients and, frankly, doubted he ever would succeed. That was without even mentioning the time it took to prepare the Liquid Luck. Healing potions were similarly complex and still not his forte, not that it particularly needed to be, given the advanced medical technology all around. No, he would stick to some of the more basic ones, things that technology could not readily replicate without considerable drawbacks. It was that train of thought that had led him to the Wit-Sharpening and Quick-Reflex potions, the latter of which was now simmering away on the fire.

For the Wit-Sharpener, he had unfortunately run out of the root herb he had found could replace ginger in some potions, and so he had sent Arden out with the list containing all the ingredients he knew he needed to stock up on, either because they were commonly used (not that he was brewing frequently) or because they needed to be prepared and stored in some special way. He had in the past been shown the value of being prepared, after all.

With the ingredients still some time out, the Dathomirian would be some time yet, he knew, Harry pulled up a second cauldron for another batch of Quick-Reflex, thinking it might yet come in handy at some later point, maybe the next time they were having to deal with an Inquisitor without a group of soldiers in their backs, armed with projectile weapons. That would probably make things a bit easier. Still, if he planned to use it in combat, he would probably have to train himself and the others with using it, to get the most out of every use. A groan on his lips, he could already see himself brewing much more than he would like in the future. Maybe it was time to step up Arden's potions education. Leia's too, for despite his increased success in the art, it was far from being something he actually liked doing. More of a tolerable necessity than a cherished pastime, really.

A base of ground rancor liver, the closest he had come to finding troll parts anywhere around. Jai'galaar tail feather, three minutes of simmering; Dathomirian Kormif root, a natural stimulant used by the local witches, Arden had informed him. In potions, it did very much the same, only with the drawbacks somewhat cut down. He would have to go back there in time to stock up his ingredients, especially those coming from rancors. Then again, he had heard there were other individuals of the species around, so maybe braving the Imperial blockade was not really worth it.

"Got your greenery," Arden announced triumphantly as she stepped back into the room, barely half an hour later; of course, she would have been used to gathering, now that he thought about it. "Where should I put the stuff?"

Wordlessly, carefully trying to save the potion he had almost ruined when the witch barged in unannounced, Harry pointed toward the ceiling-high racks of preservative jars, each enchanted to keep whatever was inside in the state it was in when it was put inside. Cautiously, he metered out some more Kormif root to soak up the additional alcohol he had accidentally poured in in his brief moment of shock; when the liquid in his cauldron turned to its prescribed colour, he allowed himself to relax, if just a tiny bit.

"First potions lesson, most important potions lesson," he began instructing the Dathomirian with a tight, from the outside perhaps somewhat crazed smile. "You do not just barge into the room, when someone else is brewing, lest they blow something up."

Not looking at all contrite, Arden shrugged a bit, finished sorting the ingredients she had gathered, then heaved herself to sit on the worktop that was circling most of the room, at least where there were no floor-length shelves in the way. "Whatever you say, Boss. What are you making, anyway?"

"Gee, thanks," Harry snarked, then continued more evenly, still stirring his cauldron, "A potion to quicken the reactions of whoever uses it; should give us something of an edge over whatever lives down in that cave. Next is a Wit-Sharpening potion so we don't miss any clues. I'd thought about making a Night Vision potion, too, but I don't have all the ingredients, and some we don't even have around the planet. Getting them might would take longer than I'm comfortable with, so we'll have to rely on the tech built into our helmets. That, or some light charms."

"Ah, those helmets are solid," the Dathomirian declared magnanimously, jumped down from her perch and stalked to Harry's side. "Anything I can do? I'm bored."

"You can…" the wizard began, quickly metred out the correct amount of alcoholic M'risin flower extract, then finished, "Wait another five minutes, then I'll give you your second potions lesson and even let you brew your own batch."

OOOOOOOO

Lacking the ability to properly scout out their target, for the probe droids had continued to prove themselves almost completely useless regarding the mission to locate the lost soldiers, the two were going in blind. Well, mostly blind, as what they lacked in their ability to actually find their lost comrades, the droids had more than made up for in mapping the extensive cave system stretching out underneath that part of Sanctuary. The results of that exploration were… worrying, to say the least.

Most of these structures were exactly what they seemed to be: an expansive mass of natural caves, carved out from under a set of low foothills formed from limestone, just like the mountains they bordered. There was, however, an exception: down one of the shafts, close enough to the surface to the various mouths of the caves usable for exits, there was a part of the entire thing that was, quite obviously, not natural in origin. Unfortunately, that was about everything they knew about it, as the droids had been halted by a strong durasteel door, laid into the solid rock and impossible to slice, at least for the limited processors the little explorers had installed. Harry, for his part, was not really planning on doing any slicing either, and with Arden's express permission and enthusiastic consent, was simply going to either blow the thing up or, preferably, just magic the obstacle away.

First, though, they had to reach that mysterious door, and even with both of them being physically fit, neither were rock climbers or cave divers. Coupled with the ever-present possibility of being attacked from the shadows, it made for a harrowing time.

"Your shield is slipping," Harry reminded Arden over the helmet communicators as he saw the witch's protection charm flicker at the edge. Quickly, she repaired the weakness. "Better. Hold for a revealing charm."

As ordered, the Dathomirian halted in her steady, slow advance toward the mysterious structure deep under the surface. Next to her, the wizard stopped as well, drew his wand into his right hand, swung it around in a wide arc and mumbled, "Praesentia Revelio!"

Just like the multiple times he had done this before, nothing happened; nothing but the earth-shattering revelation of two humans, standing around in a cave. Real surprise there. Still, the absence of everything else was information as well, and not the comforting kind. What could be the reason that, over the entire, respectable range of the presence-revealing spell not a single living thing could be found, nothing but him and Arden? It was simply unnatural.

"Still nothing, go one," Harry told his companion, who was holding up their protections, while he was casting light spells at the appropriate times, as well as the detection spells every few dozen metres. They were lucky the droids had properly mapped most of the cave system by now, for even with magic and the impressive technology of their armoured suits on their side, the labyrinthine underworld they had now found themselves inside would easily have swallowed them, had they not had this survey data available.

Once again with his staff in both hands, Harry darted around as, in the periphery of his hearing, he thought he had heard something…

"Sorry," Arden told him over the comms. "Kicked off a small rock… careful, the stones are brittle."

Trying to calm his beating heart, the wizard nodded and turned back to the front, going on and on. It was, just like it had been for the soldiers who had been down here before them said, hard to gauge the progress of time in the dark. Even though the chronometer in his HUD told him it had been barely two hours since they had begun their descent, it felt like they had already spent days down here.

Another small rock, falling.

Some water, dripping in the distance.

The far-away groan of wind, pushing through the dark passages, like the lungs of an ancient beast, a behemoth, waiting to be awoken.

"We're being followed," Arden announced, maybe five hours into their expedition, around one klick deep into the cave; the terrain was not overly complicated, but the constant stops, the security checks and watchful eyes made them slow. "I hear a rhythmic noise that's not dripping water."

Harry could not sense what she did, could not hear what she heard, but he had not grown up the same way as the Dathomirian, either. If her hunter's instincts and finely tuned senses told her they were being followed, he would take her word for it and act accordingly. Waving her to the front, the wizard himself took over the rear-guard position and unsheathed the blades on his long staff, ready to defend them at a moment's notice. But the expected attack never came, only the disconcerting quietness of the caves, the dark shades behind the stalactites. Rock formations that would have been beautiful, had the situation been another.

Around another hour after Arden had first announced it, the wizard could hear something behind them as well; at first, he thought it was steps, echoing in the dark. But the little sounds were too frequent, too light to be considered human… then again, there was much more out there than just humanity. The light tipper-tapper in the distance, now steadily coming closer, once again had him even more on edge, and he began worrying his heart would never stop beating against his ribs and up into his throat, even once they got out of the cave.

"We should lay a trap," Arden told him what felt like hours later, though it was more likely somewhere along the line of minutes. "Pretend you're resting; take off your mask and drink."

Doing as he was told, Harry sat down on a low, decently comfortable outcropping that seemed like it would serve well both as a rest stop and in letting him jump up on a moment's notice. For a few minutes, the witch had joined in his silent vigilance, taking a few shallow sips from her own flask as well, everything was quiet; the low humming of the shield…

DONG!

Like a church bell rung by an overeager ringer, a loud sound pierced his ears. Figuratively, he hoped, and not literally, for fighting with a burst tympanum was not something he wanted to try. Opposite of him, still sitting on her own rock, Arden had flinched as well, though whether it was from the sound or the sudden impact on the shield she was still holding up, Harry did not know.

The being, the wizard lacked the words to adequately describe what had attacked them with any more accuracy, was now slowly circling the perimeter of their defences, almost as if looking for even the tinies weak spot. It would not find any, but even the attempt was deeply disturbing to look at, especially from this… this monster. It looked like some twisted cross between a wolf, an inferius and a droid, with remnants of rotting flesh hanging from metallic bones and artificial muscle. A pair of red, glowing eyes sat deep inside recessed holes in what must once have been a cranium but was now just another piece of metal, a small container housing whatever remained of the creature's brain.

Whatever else might be said about this cruel amalgamation of flesh and machine, there was no sanity left in it; the malice behind those eyes told of that. Determinedly, the wizard placed the mask back on his helmet, once again completing the hermetic seal, then said through the helmet comms, "Kill it with fire."