I returned to the hospital to meet with Rey's doctor who thankfully informed me that the additional scans and tests confirmed that, despite Rey's weight loss, and obvious physical abuse, the baby was healthy. Since the medication did help with her nausea, and she was able to keep food down, they would release her in the morning. I'd already arranged for her to start seeing a trauma specialist at the end of the week.

Rey startled as soon as I walked into the room, coming fully awake, her hand going to protectively cover her belly. She relaxed when she recognized me, and eased back down onto her pillow. Most of her injuries had healed, the worst of her bruises still dusting her skin with yellow splotches. The deathly sharpness of her face hadn't started to fill out yet, but some color had returned to her cheeks and lips, at least.

I left the door open, and moved to sit in the chair, but she reached for me, so I went to her, taking her boney hand in mine.

Her huge, dark eyes searched my face and she frowned. "Are you going to tell me what's wrong?"

"I hadn't planned on it." I admitted.

Her face hardened. "You can't do this." She said, a razor sharp edge on her voice. "You can't shoulder this by yourself. It's too much. Let me in, let me help you."

I dragged my thumb along her knuckles, back and forth, as I thought of everything I needed to tell her. "I don't want to upset you." I admitted, looking at the bare skin of her third finger.

"Do you still want this?" She demanded, and my eyes flew up to meet hers, the heat draining down my face.

All I could manage to get out was a strangled "What?"

"Do you still want this?" She repeated. "Me. To be married to me."

Every word ripped the hole in my chest wider. "Yes." I whisperedaround the burn in my throat.

She laid a hand on the swell of her belly, her face clouding. "I'm not….the same." She said, at length.

My grip on her hand tightened. Of course she wasn't the same. She'd been changed by her trauma, broken down by it, and had had no choice but to rebuild with the pieces she had left. The Rey that had been taken from me wasn't the Rey I'd gotten back, I knew that. "You survived." I reminded her.

"It doesn't make the things I did to survive any less terrible." She said, lost in her own head, her thoughts, her memories.

"I still want you." I assured her. "I still want to be married to you." I didn't care what she'd done, what she'd had to do, it didn't change anything. If we had to get to know each other again, start from the beginning, I'd do it. Do it, and be grateful.

When her eyes met mine, they were wet with unshed tears. "If we are going to make this work, we have to be honest with each other." She insisted. "You have to talk to me."

I let out a sigh, tilting my head back, all of my instincts clamping down, refusing to move. Talking wasn't something I was good at, or comfortable with.

"Kylo-"

I'd never heard that level of irritation from her. "I'm sorry." I said. "It's just hard." I didn't want her to hate me. I didn't want her to know what a disappointment I was.

"Do you think I don't know that you're married?"

My heart stopped, a chill coursing through me as I looked down at her. I thought she'd be angry, or hurt, but she was neither, gazing up at me like we were discussing the weather instead of the other woman I'd been forced to marry.

"How-" I gasped out.

Her shoulder lifted in a half hearted shrug. "Getting you another wife was the entire reason I was taken."

My brow crinkled. "It wasn't the contract?"

"No, he-" She let out a breath. "When he bought me, he bought a girl to just be a wife."

"You've never been just a wife." I assured her.

"I know." She said with a nod. "And, he knew it too, and he was threatened by it."

So, he took her from me and sold her because I loved her. Because I'd made her consort. Because he saw the change she'd started in me.

"That just makes me wish he'd died slower." I said, letting my anger filter into my tone.

"You killed him?" Rey asked.

"Ushar did." I just hadn't stopped him.

Her eyebrows pulled together. "How? They're warded against you and your Knights."

"Ushar resigned as my Shadow Guard. He revoked his vow of fealty, and surrendered his title as a Knight of Ren." I told her. "Then he killed him."

There was a storm of wrath and resentment in her eyes when she said, "Good."

"Not that the contract matters." I said. "The fact that you're pregnant reinstates our marriage."

Her face fell. "And, what will happen to the girl they bought?"

I raked my fingers through my hair. "She'll have to be returned to Cyrilla."

"To be sold again." Rey whispered. "You can't let that happen."

"If I don't, Elmi has every right to march in here and take her. I have zero claim to her once our contract is dissolved. Which it will be, as soon as your pregnancy is announced."

She thought for a moment as she brought a hand up to absentmindedly chew on her thumbnail. "We have to have this practice outlawed."

"I know-"

"No, Kylo, listen to me!" She snapped. "The baby is a girl. If we can sense her power now, imagine what it'll be when she's twelve, or twenty. There is not a royal family in this galaxy who wouldn't want to breed that power into their bloodline."

She was absolutely right. In fact, the bids for her would start as soon as the galaxy learned that she was a girl, whether it was before she was born, or after. I shook my head to dispel those thoughts. "Don't you know that I would never let that happen?"

"Of course I know." She said, "But, if there's anything that the past three months have taught us, it's that as long as this is legal, it'll continue to happen, whether you let it, or not."

And again, she was right.

"I'll get the law changed." I promised.

Her frown deepened, and she looked away, a line forming between her brows. She was silent for several agonizing minutes before she took a breath. "Have you found him?"

I opened my mouth to ask who she meant, but stopped, noticing her change in demeanor, then knew who she was asking about.

Zaugustus.

"No." He'd fallen a few pegs on my priority list.

She looked back up at me and I realized that she was trembling. "You can't stop." She said, her voice a shaking, broken plea. "You can't stop just because you have me back." Her eyes filled with tears that spilled over in streaks down her face. "You have to find him, and you have to stop him."

I wanted to hold her so badly that my muscles ached with restraint, my heart fracturing as I watched her lose her grip on herself, and slowly fall apart.

I lifted her hand that I still held, and cradled it between both of mine. "You got out." I said, softly. "I'm here. You're safe. He will never come near you again, I swear."

She turned toward me, revealing her tear stained face in all its glory, and it made my chest hollow out. "There are so many others." She said, her voice breaking.

"I know." I told her. My rampage through the galaxy may have gotten everyone's attention, but it didn't even put a dent in Zaugustus's empire. "I'll find him."

Her head lifted from the pillow, her red rimmed eyes slicing into my soul. "Promise." It was part question, part command, and it was heavy with desperation.

It was the only thing she'd ever asked me to do, the only thing she'd ever asked of me, and I squeezed her hand, hoping she could see my sincerity when I said, "I promise."

She pulled her hand away from mine, and rolled over onto her side, putting her back to me and pulling the blanket up to cover her shoulder. I could feel her shutting down, withdrawing into herself, and the Force hummed as she put a shield around herself.

"Rey-" I started.

"I'm tired." She said, dismissal clear in her tone.

I swallowed the lump in my throat. "I'll let you get some rest, then." The sting of her rejection made my voice quake. I closed the door behind me as I walked out.

The townhouse was dark, but I found Ap'lek, Trugden, and Cardo on the couch watching a movie. Vic was in the kitchen, lilac colored gloves up to his elbows and his hands in soapy water as he washed dishes. I went to the fridge, and popped a beer open, draining it in a few gulps before tossing the bottle in the trash, and grabbing another.

He gave me a sideways glare as I kicked the door closed.

I hated it. I hated how the rattling in my head and the shaking of my hands seemed to slow. I hated that I knew I'd tell myself that I was only having a few beers, but only until I was alone and could drink something harder. I hated that I would hide the empty bottles so that I wouldn't see the evidence of how bad it had gotten, and I hated the fact that Vic looked disappointed in me. I hated how much that hurt.

"Where's Beau?" I asked, leaning against the counter.

The water sloshed as he retrieved a plate to wash. "Outback recruiting woodland animals to come clean our house."

Because she was a princess, living with seven guys. "Funny." I said, flatly.

He shrugged. "I try."

I sighed, and put my beer bottle down. "I don't know how to tell her about Rey."

"You just need to tell her, you know? Like a band-aid." He suggested, not looking up. "Because all this sulking around waiting isn't doing anyone any favors."

I glowered at him, though he didn't see it. "You can't want her to go back."

"Of course I don't want her to go back." He admitted. "But only because I know how much she hates it there." He shrugged. "Which, I get, because if id been locked up for half my life then married off to a basket case who doesn't give a single solitary fuck about what I did, I wouldn't want to go back either."

My eyebrows pulled together. Did he just call me a basket case?

Well, that was fair.

"Plus, you probably want her to stay." I picked up my bottle to take a drink.

He stopped, and slowly turned his head to look at me, his eyes narrowed. "What are you getting at?"

"I saw you two the other day."

He raised a blond eyebrow. "When she threatened to kill me?"

"Don't act like that's not your thing." I deadpanned.

"Wasn't gunna" He countered. "And while I admit that I have a somewhat questionable moral compass, it's not questionable enough for me to get involved with your wife."

I felt heat flood my face. "She is NOT my wife!" I growled, louder than I intended.

He pointed at me, sudsy water dripping from his gloved finger. "She is until she's not." He reminded me.

I snorted, and took a swallow of beer.

"You called?" I heard Beau ask. I looked to see her coming down the stairs, her red hair pulled up into a messy bun. She wore a pair of flannel pajama pants, the legs rolled up to free her feet, and a white t-shirt. She moved past me to the fridge, humming gently as she pulled a bottle of juice out of the door. "I heard you yelling about someone not being your wife and came a-running."

I opened my mouth to answer her, but Vic spoke instead. "No, we were just talking about you behind your back."

"You guys are the worst girls I've ever seen when it comes to gossip." She said, and took a sip. "Was it interesting, at least?"

"Ky thinks we're having some forbidden love affair."

I shot him a wide eyed glare.

"Dammit, Vic." She huffed. "You weren't supposed to tell him until after the contract was voided."

"Yes, but I could not help myself!" He said, rushing toward her and falling on his knees at her feet. He put his lilac gloved hands over his heart. "I cannot live another day without you Beau-Tryze Posey April Sonnet!"

She pursed her lips as she stared down at him. "So then you'll be dropping dead soon?" She turned to walk back upstairs. "Praise the Force."

He stayed on the floor, on his knees, until her footsteps faded, and he sighed. "I just came a little."

I took in, then let out a long breath and shook my head. "You're sure it's not questionable enough to get involved?" I asked, watching him get to his feet and come back to the sink.

He showed me his gloved palms. "I never said I didn't have my own motives for wanting you to tell her that she can stop pretending to be married to you."