AN: Minor warning for a heated make-out session, but nothing that warrants a higher rating.
I'm scared and I'm not sure that you are safe,
but your eyes seem to say that you are good
– "Lion", Rebecca St. James
Eldra's eyes opened to the familiar sound of waterfalls, and she was nearly blinded by the sunlight shining down through the glass ceiling.
She was lying on a soft patch of earth, and the young Jedi breathed deeply while she ran her fingers through the blades of grass. The Room of a Thousand Fountains could always be relied on to calm her down after a stressful mission. She closed her eyes again and let the peaceful atmosphere settle around her.
A thought nagged her at the back of her mind, telling her that this wasn't real. She ignored the feeling. She'd lived in the Temple her whole life; why wouldn't this be real?
"Obi-Wan, get back here!"
"Siri, you started it!"
The voices of her friends forced Eldra to open her eyes again, and she sat upright to look for them. They were running across the grass, Obi-Wan out in front with Siri in hot pursuit, and every Jedi Knight or Master they passed just rolled their eyes and shook their heads at the antics of the two Padawans. Eldra herself shook her head with a smile as she climbed to her feet.
Obi-Wan reached her first and quickly dived behind her. "Eldra, protect me!"
"I don't think even Master Yoda could protect you from Siri," Eldra laughed.
"You can bet the Force on that," said Siri, when she reached them. "Eldra, let me at him! He cancelled my holovid queue!"
"Only because you dunked my toothbrush in the toilet!"
"And I only did that because you and Reeft ate all of my Wookie Cookies!"
"I don't see you dunking Reeft's toothbrush!"
"I didn't need to. All I had to do was glare at him."
Eldra frowned. "Is that why he's been hiding behind Bant and Garen all this week whenever you're around?"
Siri nodded. "Yep. Are you going to step aside?"
The Twi'lek turned to Obi-Wan and shrugged. "Sorry, Obi. You've got two offences and she's only got one. Fair is fair."
Before Eldra could make way for Siri, Obi-Wan Force jumped backwards and landed on the small wall that surrounded one of the fountains. "Oh no, what a shame. It seems I have the high ground."
Eldra and Siri exchanged glances and smirked. They then raised their hands together and Force pushed Obi-Wan backwards. He didn't have time to block their attack, and fell face-first into the water. Giggling, Siri and Eldra raced over to the fountain and quickly dunked their friend back under again when he came up for air.
"Padawans! Or should I be calling you Younglings?"
They didn't need to turn to know who it was.
"Kriff! It's Master Windu!" Siri grabbed Eldra's hand and dragged her away. "Come on!"
The two girls raced through the Temple hallways. Eldra let herself laugh at the top of her lungs, and somehow it felt as though it was her first real laugh in a long time. She couldn't understand why; she'd been laughing with her friends the previous day.
They turned a corner and suddenly skidded to a halt at the sight of the three older Jedi standing before them, in deep discussion. Two of which were their masters.
Leora Ori, Adi Gallia and Qui-Gon Jinn all turned their heads to acknowledge the two Padawans. Each of their eyebrows rose while maintaining hard to read expressions.
"Um…" Siri was the first to compose herself, and quickly shifted into a casual stance which Eldra quickly imitated. "Greetings, Masters. Good day for a jog, isn't it?"
"What have you done now, Siri?" Master Gallia asked, getting straight to the point.
Siri held her hand over her heart. "It hurts, Master. Truly it does. We've done nothing. Isn't that right, Eldra?"
The Twi'lek nodded. "Yep. Nothing at all."
Her own master's eyebrows shot higher. "Really?"
"So then tell me, girls," said Qui-Gon, hands on his hips, "why my Padawan is soaking wet from head to toe?"
Both Padawans turned around to see an annoyed Obi-Wan stalking towards them, leaving a wet trail in his wake. They both bit down on their lips to stop themselves from laughing at him.
"I don't think I've ever been this wet in my life," he told them both, once he was stood before them. "Nothing short of a desert could dry me off."
Eldra blinked, and suddenly they were no longer standing in the Jedi Temple. The roof and the walls and the pillars were gone, and the floor had become sand. They were all standing in the middle of a giant, empty desert with twin suns blazing overhead.
Siri was no longer beside her. Eldra turned around and saw her standing with Obi-Wan, his robes as dry as the sand that surrounded them. The pair were embracing, but in a way Eldra had never seen before: like lovers. What was more, they looked older than they had been only moments ago; Obi-Wan had grown a beard, and Siri seemed more confident in her own beauty.
The most startling thing about the sight, though, was the small girl running circles around them. She had Siri's blonde hair and Obi-Wan's blue eyes; there was no doubting who her parents were. Said parents were watching her with proud smiles.
Eldra turned back to the three older Jedi, but stared in horror at the sight of her master lying before her in a pool of blood. The Padawan barely noticed the change of scenery; the wreckage of a ship scattered around them with smoke filling the air. The familiarity of the picture told Eldra that it had happened before, but her memories were clouded.
She looked up in time to see a red blade pierce into Qui-Gon's gut. Her scream lodged in her throat, and she felt all the air leave her lungs. The Jedi Master fell into a heap next to a reactor vent that had suddenly appeared, his blue eyes lifeless, and Eldra wanted to run to him but couldn't. Something was holding her feet in place.
Adi Gallia had her lightsaber out and was deflecting blaster bolts from an unknown source. She was standing in the dimly lit hallway of a ship, sweat dripping down her forehead, her movements hindered by exhaustion. It was no surprise when a blaster bolt hit her from behind, knocking her to the floor. Eldra still couldn't move.
Terrifying laughter suddenly filled the air, making her sick to her stomach. The ship hallway went dark, and from out of the shadows a hooded figure appeared. His fingers sparked with blue lightning, which he wasted no time in directing at her. Eldra fell backwards and screwed her eyes shut, waiting for the pain.
It never came. She opened her eyes again to find that someone had jumped in front of her and taken the hit. He screamed and convulsed as electricity shot through him, forcing him to his knees. Turning his back on the hooded figure and bending over, he kept himself in front of Eldra despite the pain he was experiencing. Then Eldra noticed that he was also shielding something else. There was a small bundle on the ground before him – a small bundle that was moving.
The lightning stopped, and the figure took in several deep breaths in order to recover before looking up at her. It was Maul.
His yellow eyes weren't as vivid, and the emotions in his eyes were ones she'd never seen before, at least on him. Her mind was so muddled that she couldn't name them, but the one that she could she didn't want to acknowledge, because it seemed impossible that someone like him could feel anything like the raw and overwhelming love that was surrounding them both.
With desperation in his every movements, Maul pushed the bundle towards her. And in between breaths, he said, "I… promised."
The bundle began to squirm.
Eldra realised with a start that the bundle was a baby, but before she could reach out and hold the child, the darkness vanished and was replaced with sunlight. The hooded figure and the baby vanished, and at first so did Maul. But when she shot to her feet and looked around her, Eldra found him standing on her other side.
Their surroundings were nothing short of paradise. Lush plant life, beautiful blue skies, a clean lake stretched out before them… Eldra looked down at her bare feet and dug her toes into the warm sand. Unlike the sand in the desert, which was rough and hard, this sand was soft and comfortable.
A pair of arms encircled her, and Eldra let her head rest on Maul's chest, which he reacted to with a purr. There was no fear; instead, she felt safe.
She didn't know how long they stood like that, but eventually Maul placed a finger under her chin and tilted her head up to face him. His eyes looked almost brown with tints of yellow still visible, and Eldra could no longer deny the feeling she saw in them.
He leaned forwards and pressed his lips to hers. It was soft and wonderful, and Eldra kissed him back enthusiastically, and continued to do so even when they both fell onto the sand. Eldra could feel herself growing hotter, and she hurriedly started removing her clothes while Maul removed his, and they kept kissing and touching each other and something was building and growing and her lower regions felt like they were on fire…
Eldra sat upright with a gasp.
The cloudiness of her dreams faded, and she remembered where she was. In her room, in Maul's apartment. The captive of the Sith.
And she'd just had a dream about doing… that with one of them.
Her inner thighs were wet, she realised. She leapt out of bed and hurried into the refresher to clean herself up. As she did, she tried to contemplate what she'd seen in her dreams. Master Ori taught her that while some dreams were visions of things to come, other dreams were just, well, dreams. And those were the result of her mind unwinding as she slept. Everyone had them.
It was more than likely that the bits with Maul were just dreams; a result of what she'd been doing with him over the past couple of weeks. Maul had been quick to take advantage of the new development between them, kissing her whenever he got the chance, so long as he asked her first and she said 'yes'. Which she did, for the most part.
After cleaning her thighs, Eldra placed her hands either side of the sink and leaned against it, head down. She'd been trying to go with the flow and pretend that the kissing didn't affect her, but it did. And not even in the right way. It should repulse her, that a Sith was kissing her, only it was doing the opposite. The warmth that was growing within her steadily, day by day, was coming close to consuming her. She'd hoped things wouldn't get that far, but clearly her dreams had other ideas.
Kissing was one thing. Doing that was another thing entirely.
And what if the dreams were more than that? What if they really were visions?
Recalling the way Maul had looked at her… Eldra wondered if that would be so bad. Being a Jedi meant that romantic relationships were forbidden, but time away from the Order had revealed a desire hidden deep within her; a desire to feel wanted by someone, to be loved. Especially by someone who wanted her because of who she was rather than because of what she looked like. And what she'd seen in his eyes…
No matter what the dream meant – whether it was a vision or not – she knew that there had to be some good in him. The Force wouldn't show her this if it wasn't true.
But part of her still rebelled at the whole situation. Sure, maybe he had it in him to care for someone else, and maybe she could be that someone else. But he was still a Sith Lord; still an enemy of the Jedi. He still wanted to kill everyone she held dear, and he was still holding her against her will. Well, his master was, but Maul was going along with it. And sympathising with him didn't mean she excused his actions.
It brought her back to the other parts of her dream; the parts she was almost certain were visions of things to come. Her master's death had already occurred, but the other two… The red blade that pierced Qui-Gon Jinn worried her the most, because there was no doubt that one of the Sith Lords holding her captive would be responsible. She was less certain of what could be the cause of Adi Gallia's death. A mission gone wrong?
At least she could be sure that Obi-Wan and Siri were fine. Though she didn't know what to think about what she'd seen. The two of them together, romantically? With a child? The pair tormented each other; would they last long enough to settle down and have children before they annoyed each other to death?
Eldra shook her head. That wasn't her most pressing issue. She closed her eyes and saw Qui-Gon's death again, and wondered if there was any way she could stop it.
All she could do was push forwards with her plan. If there truly was some good in Maul, and if he could come to care about her… She could convince him to let her go. Maybe even convince him to come with her and escape the iron grip of his master.
Eventually, she left her quarters and made her way into the main apartment. She passed by the open door of the training room, stopped, stepped back and stared.
From what she could tell, Maul had been engaged in some early morning training, judging by the destroyed training droid laying in pieces on the floor. That wasn't what had caught her attention, though. No, it was Maul stood by the medical unit, patching himself up, with his shirt removed.
He'd done it before many times, and Eldra had never paid him any mind. But after what she'd experienced in her dream, she couldn't help but notice how sculpted his chest was. And all she could think about was being pressed against it in his arms, a thought that made her throat go dry.
Maul looked up from what he was doing, and upon seeing her his eyes lit up in a way that was definitely not adorable (nope, she was not using that word to describe a Sith Lord). He hurried over to her, not stopping to put his shirt back on, and Eldra knew instinctively that she was in deep trouble if he was going to do what she thought he was going to do in his state of half-undress.
"May I?"
It was strange, how a Sith Lord – who by his very nature should be selfish and have no qualms about taking whatever he wanted – always asked permission first before they kissed. He was supposed to represent the greatest evil of the galaxy, and yet in this regard, he was above many men who called themselves moral.
"Teeth check," she said, because the second time he'd kissed her she'd noticed how dirty his teeth were, and had ordered him to clean them if he wanted to keep doing this with her. He'd grumbled about it but did as she asked, and she reasoned that since he didn't smell, the dirty teeth were more about him trying to look intimidating and less about any lack of personal hygiene.
The young Sith rolled his eyes, but showed her his teeth all the same. They were clean. "Do they meet your approval?"
She nodded. "They do. Continue."
Lightning fast, Maul swooped in and their lips crashed together. It felt like he was consuming her with the ravenous hunger of a starving man, and not wanting to be the submissive one, Eldra responded in kind. She pushed him back into the training room and used the Force to shut the door behind them.
His hands explored her body with a confidence he'd lacked the first time he'd done so. This hesitation, she guessed, had been forced upon him by his lack of experience with touching someone he didn't want to kill. Eldra explored him in return, allowing her instincts to guide her as she pressed her hands against his bare chest, feeling both his hearts beating with excitement.
Every time she touched him, he purred. It was a sound that had taken her by surprise the first time he'd done it, but it had since grown on her and she found herself wanting to make him purr as much as was physically possible. It was actually quite funny, that this Sith Lord had gone from reminding her of a predatory Vornskr to reminding her of a touch-starved Tooka.
As the kiss intensified, Eldra's whole body tingled with pleasure. She could feel the fire burning beneath her skin, and as flashes of her dream danced in her mind, the desire for more grew stronger until she was reacting to it and pulling Maul to the floor. They fell together and landed side-by-side, and Maul didn't have time to ask what was happening before Eldra clambered on top of him and kissed him again.
A voice in her head was screaming at her to stop, to think about what she was doing. But it was being drowned out by her dream repeating itself over and over, telling her that there was nothing wrong; that it was the will of the Force.
It was also about being in control of the situation. She was not a victim, and she didn't want to become one. If what she'd seen in her dream was an inevitable outcome, then she wanted to be the one to initiate it.
She was definitely in deep trouble.
The past couple of weeks had been a revelation for Maul.
Every inch of his skin burned from the fire that had been ignited within him. Started by the Padawan, Eldra Kaitis, who was meant to be his enemy. But his greatest foe was becoming something more; someone he needed.
He'd thought that kissing her repeatedly would sate his desire, so whatever feelings he had for her could fade. Then there would be no more confusing urges distracting him from his destiny. But they had instead done the opposite, leaving him wanting more from her.
What he felt for her wasn't going away. Instead of being rid of her, all Maul wanted was to keep her.
Apart from the instance when she'd patched him up, he'd never been on the receiving end of a positive touch. The only form of touch he'd ever known was pain, from Sidious and anything else that had gotten close enough to land a blow. Because of this, he'd flinched beneath her gentle touch the first couple of times, before quickly growing used to it. Now all he wanted was for her to touch him all over.
Maul could hear the four beats of his hearts hammering in his ears, quickening their pace as the kiss deepened. He was lost in her touch; drowning in the light that surrounded her. When she pulled him to the floor, he fell with her willingly. And when she clambered on top of him, he held her in place and let her lead the way.
He never wanted her to stop.