It's as small as he could hope. Leia insisted on no more than two newsfilers present, and she settles on three. She's got one of the last of her surviving gowns. Luke dragged Han out to buy new clothes with Leia's credits, and they both look pretty sharp today. Luke insists on sitting back a row while the front row is for the more important people Leia had to invite. "I should bring a date," he's said twice now, but he's sitting with Wedge. Han is almost positive they're not going home together tonight. Lando grins at him from a seat in the front row. He's been so busy with work lately Han hasn't even been able to coax him out for a sabaac game. Han's best friend in the universe insists on standing up beside Han, and cries through the whole thing, the big softy.
Everyone is watching them. He supposes he should do this right.
Leia's beautiful. She's always beautiful, whether covered in grime or dressed for a state occasion, but today she's far more beautiful than he's ever seen her. Han holds her hands in his and repeats what the officiant tells him to say. If part of him wishes they were doing this on Corellia where plural marriages are legal, well, every groom has one or two regrets he's smart enough not to say to his bride.
He has her on the floor moments after they arrive at their hotel on Spira. She has him on the sofa twenty minutes later.
The honeymoon lasts a week. They're fighting within two days. Han thrives on crashing against Leia, and even when her eyes are flashing in anger at him, the sex is amazing. Leia's been training with Luke, a little at a time, and she can pin Han down two times out of three. It's intense. Neither throws a punch, because they're both clear that's a line not to cross. Words draw blood better every time. His teeth rattle when his head hits the wall, and her wrists are bruised in a pattern he doesn't like to think about during the daylight hours.
They cut the trip short by day five and hurry home. She's got work. He's got more jobs from Captain Syndulla if he's ready to take them on, and he is.
But first, they return home, where Luke already has dinner waiting for them. He doesn't ask how the holiday went, only passes them dish after dish of their favourite foods as they wait for Chewie to retire to his own room and for the droids to shut down for the night.
Han bumps into Leia on their way back into their room. For a second, he expects her to explode at him. Instead, Luke tangles his fingers in her hair and suffocates her with a kiss like a drowning man. "I missed you," he says, lips red from the kiss when at last he pulls away to pull Han into an equally desperate embrace, mouth alive into his. Something in his eyes worries Han a lot right now.
"We're back. We're not going anywhere." Clothes. Clothes are hard, and Han's hands can't work his own buttons fast enough. He's got no hope for untying what Luke's wearing, and Leia's practically inside an entire building of fabric. Fingers manage to find skin soon enough. Luke's hand is on Han's prick just the way he likes it, and Leia's breasts are pressed against Luke's chest, and they haven't even hit the bed yet.
He longs for speed and thrust and yes, but Luke is slow as space. It's a second wedding night, this one thoughtful and exploring. Han paces himself, kissing reminders into Leia's skin of all the reasons he loves her, burning touches against Luke's back as he slicks him open with oils before sliding into him. He sets up a calm rhythm he can't maintain, glacially steady while Luke's mouth is buried between Leia's thighs. The pair of them are in communion again, a perfect feedback loop sharing the pleasure each feels across the bond, and radiating back into Han like a pressure wave. He can feel every motion of Luke's tongue delving into sweet moisture exactly where Leia needs him, and he can feel the thickness of his own prick stretching Luke wide, and he feels the hot pressure and wet friction climb up his own spine as he tries to make this last.
Nothing compares. Nothing could.
He gets the call on his personal communicator. Han's out late on his own errands. He's at a bar making contacts. The New Republic can use good pilots, but they won't always have work for him and he likes keeping his hand in, just in case. Nothing illegal, not for the husband of the Senator (at Large), but not exactly work Leia wants to know about later.
"Is this Han Organa?"
He pauses. "I kept my name. But yeah."
"Sorry, sir. This is Constable Friar. My partner and I found your brother-in-law intoxicated in public. We'd like to avoid the press, and I'm sure you would as well. Please come and retrieve him and we'll speak no more of this."
Han stares at his communicator for a moment. "Sure. Give me your location and I'll be right there." He gets the information, grabs Chewie, and hurries.
Constable Friar has an open hand and a sly smile, and Han is not in the mood. He's got enough credits on him to buy the pair's silence as they lead him to Luke. He's passed out in the plaza where the ruins of the Jedi Temple lay bare and empty to the sky.
"Drunk," says the other constable, shaking her head and tsking. "Take him home. Let him sleep it off."
Han ignores them, checking Luke's pulse and his breathing, before he checks his eyes.
Luke doesn't drink, not since right after the first Death Star. Han thought it would be a great idea to show the kid a good time, let him get over his griefs the old-fashioned way, maybe even find a friendly pilot and get him laid. Instead, Luke drank a lot, and vomited for about two days. He hasn't touched the stuff since. Han doesn't think that's changed, and a sniff of his clothes confirms what he already suspected.
"Force trance," he says to Chewie though he's not sure how he knows. He just knows. "Come on. We'll get him home." The two of them heft Luke against their shoulders. Han glares at the constables. "I don't know if you've heard, but the Senator's brother is a Jedi. If you interrupted his work, I wouldn't want to be in your shoes."
Luke is out cold for days. Leia sits by his side when she can break away from work, holding his hand. "I can't reach him," she says. "He's gone somewhere far away."
Han suggests medical attention, more forcefully as the hours pass. "He needs water and food. He might need brain surgery."
"We can give him water," she says, and lets drops fall into Luke's slack mouth one by one. The rest of his body functions have paused, and thank whatever Force is watching out for them because Han loves him but he's not changing bedpans. They wait.
It's almost precisely three days later when his eyes open. He coughs into a sitting position and accepts a glass of nutrient water. There are dark hollows under his eyes. Even the small amount of time without eating has left his clothes hanging on him like a shroud on a skeleton.
"What have you done?" Leia sits beside him, not angry, but so worried Han's sure he sees grey poking through her hair for the first time.
"My research."
She lets out a hard breath. "This again?"
"I have to, Leia. I have to know."
Han often feels like he's come into a conversation late. "Gonna share?"
The twins exchange a glance. Han hates when they keep things from him. Leia says, "Luke's been researching Vader and the Dark Side."
A cold spike nails him to the floor. "You what?" He wants to shake Luke until his brain falls into place. "That stuff is dangerous."
"I have to understand," Luke says in a tired voice. "I need to know why he turned. I went to the Temple to read the stones. I had to relive the day he went to the Dark Side."
Han knows some of the legends, and he's learned more of the history. He doesn't want to know what Luke just relived, but Luke pushes on. "The day Vader rose to power, he slaughtered hundreds of Jedi. Most of them were children. To step completely into darkness, a Jedi must kill someone they love. I had to know who it was." Leia takes his face in her hands, but even Han can tell Luke has shut that place away from her. "You're happier not knowing."
She drops her hands into fists in her lap. "Did you find what you were looking for?"
"I felt him. The blood in the stones, the terror." His voice is chilly, dead. "I sensed his mind imprinted everywhere. I felt all of them crying out one by one as he killed them."
There's a blaster out in the sitting room. Han can reach it. He can't in a million years picture himself firing. Leia's stronger than he is, and if they are watching the destruction of the man they both love, she'll take the shot.
"He loved her." Luke is only speaking to Leia now. "Stamped everywhere was his fear for her, and his love for her. He fell because he loved our mother too much."
Leia doesn't move. "That doesn't change anything," she says, enunciating her words carefully. "He was evil, and he's dead now."
"He wasn't evil to begin with. He was frightened, and he was lost. The Emperor turned our father because he thought he could protect our mother and instead he killed her the day we were born." His hands slip down and unravel her fists like yarn until their fingers entwine. "Vader was supposed to be my first kill, and they almost succeeded because he threatened you, Leia. He knew I was enough like our father that I would do anything, become anything, to keep you safe. I would have struck him down, and I would have turned to the Dark Side." He squeezes her hands so tightly the skin on both sets of hands turn bone white. Han wants to step in, break Luke's grip before his artificial hand shatters Leia's bones, but he can't move. The air is crackling with the same oppressive energy Luke carried back with him from the second Death Star.
Leia bends into Luke and kisses him softly. "Now you know."
"I can still fall. As long as I love you, I can be turned. And I will never not love you."
"Then if you are turned and if you do fall, I'll cut you down myself. All right?"
Something passes out of Luke, like a nightmare finally released upon waking into sudden sunlight. His shoulders slump, and the air clears. He lets Leia pull him into a hug, and he whispers, "All right."
They don't speak of the incident again. The constables either believe Han's story or accept his payment, and never leak the juicy tidbit to the press. It's fine. It's going to be fine. Luke doesn't sign up for any more cargo runs or missions to distant systems. He doesn't go back to the Temple, but instead buries himself in Jedi lore, what remains after the long boot and eager matches of the Empire.
Leia has another treaty to negotiate, this time in person. Han flies her there, picking up odd jobs for the new Republic along the way there and back. It's an unsteady life, which is how he likes it, and they're spending enough time in space for Chewie to be happy.
Luke hasn't given up on his Vader obsession, no matter how much Han and Leia wish he would. As soon as they dock, he's rattling off information he's learned about Light and Dark. Over dinner, he talks about the books he's found, carefully hidden away until the right hand opens the lock. "The First Jedi Temple could have been the key," he says, passing the bread. "Apparently there's lost lore still there."
"How would you know?" Leia asks. "It's lost."
"The Jedi Order said the specific spells were never allowed to leave the original world. Too dangerous."
Han knows Luke. "So you want to go find them."
Luke pauses. "I don't. Not now. There are reasons the Temple was abandoned." There's something else, something he isn't saying. "It's a thought experiment. I keep thinking there should have been some way to turn Vader back to the side of good."
Leia wears her 'not this again' expression. "You did, Luke. You said he turned back at the end."
"I wish I could have saved him before the end. I don't know if I could have. The spell is dangerous. Even trying to locate the First Temple is dangerous. But the lore says the Force can restore a fallen Jedi to the light if a powerful enough Jedi works the incantation and makes the right sacrifice." He's got that distant smile again. "It's a daydream. He's gone. But I wonder, if I'd known, and if I found the Temple, could I have saved him?"
Han doesn't like talking about Vader any more than Leia does. They both spent time with the torture droids. As far as he's concerned, the bastard is better off dead and forgotten. He's also not keen on the word 'sacrifice' considering what Luke said about how Jedi fall.
"What kind of sacrifice?" Leia asks, also quick to notice the keywords in her brother's rambles.
"It's a sacrifice of self," Luke says, glancing at both of them as if he's not suggesting he would have committed suicide to bring Vader back to the Light Side. "It's a paradox, though. To be a truly powerful Jedi, you must surrender your emotions and attachments. And to work the restoration, you have to love someone enough to stand in their place for utter annihilation. The Order worked very, very hard to ensure there was no one capable of both." He took a bite of his bread. "Thought experiment."
Han shares a look with Leia. They'll file this under 'Luke being weird again' and move on. Han never forgets the faraway look in Luke's eyes, though, and in times to come he often thinks about the steely thought underneath:
I could have saved him.
They've been together two years. Han is buried deep inside Leia, numb and happy from their coupling. Luke is sticky beside them, his hand covered with a mess because watching them was enough to set him off. It's nice. It's cozy.
Leia ruins the moment. "I think we should have a baby."
It's ice water on his brain. Han pulls out from her, feeling the rush of fluid covering their thighs as he does. Like most women, Leia has always been in tune with her own body, and has practiced regulating her fertility. Given the number of times she's taken her twin brother into her body, this has been a blessing. That's all about to change. Han's mouth is even slower than his brain. "What do you mean you want a baby?"
"I didn't say want. I said we should have."
Luke's eyes are closed. He finally opens them. "That's a good idea. You've always wanted children of your own."
Leia nods. Never a husband, she always said, but Han can't count the number of times she's spoken longingly of a family. Leia does everything on her own terms.
Han considers arguing. He doesn't. Kids have never been a priority for him, but he's not opposed to the notion. And maybe, just maybe, giving Luke a kid to dote over will be enough to pull his head out of the past for good.
She starts by denying them both sex for a couple of weeks. Han decides this is the perfect opportunity for a little one on one time with Luke, a chance they've been lacking now that Luke doesn't come along for the missions. Instead, Luke shuts the door to his own bedroom and meditates. All. The. Damn. Time. Han has gone from as much sex as he can stand to no sex at all. This is a terrible transition, and Chewie does not care to listen to him complain, pointing out unsympathetically that Han knew they were both nuts when he fell for them.
He does finally convince Luke that they don't have to be celibate while waiting for Leia to get herself into tune. He is at his most convincing on his knees sucking Luke down like water. Before Luke can return the favor, the door rings. This is the first time Han has ever had to entertain a visiting dignitary waiting for Leia while coping with a painful erection. He really, really, really hopes it's the last. Luke isn't worried, oh no, and gives the dignitary the most satisfied smile Han's ever left on someone's face. Jerk.
The days pass. Leia tells him over breakfast when she's ready. Han says, "Great, so you cancel your plans for the day, while I..."
"Tonight." She kisses him on the nose before bouncing off to work.
He doesn't honestly believe he's going to die before the day is out, no matter how deadly blue balls feel at the time. It's a long day nonetheless under Captain Syndulla's orders. Today he's helping to unload a freighter and assisting Chewie with the repairs. Several times, he bangs his hand or his head thinking about tonight.
"I'll leave you two alone," Luke says as soon as they're back home for dinner.
"Stay," Leia says, hand on his. "Please stay."
It's no different from any other night they've been together. Han keeps telling himself this, as he kisses her, as Luke kisses down her neck. They've been together hundreds of times. But this time, he's sliding slickly into her, and he knows. He knows this time is special.
Luke settles himself beside her, kissing her mouth as Han makes short, deliberate thrusts. Their hands join at where Han enters her, fingers pushing her towards her peak. He wants this, wants her to have this. He buries his face in her hair and drinks her in as they make this new thing together. He's glad he waited away from her. It's only been a few weeks, but everything is new again, and Han comes hoping for good tomorrows.
They make love over and over for the next few days. Luke pours oil to warm in his hand before readying Han to accept him. He fits just right and Han can't think, not here poised between them, not with Luke warm against his back and Leia warm against his chest, not with his balls so heavy he can't move but can only be moved between them. Then it's Leia's turn to be loved between them, Luke spending the better part of an hour opening her just as he opened Han, and Han amazed at the sight of himself buried inside her. He feels Luke inside her, filling her, stretching her against where Han is sheathed deep. Leia's face is caught in an emotion Han can't name and tries to kiss off her, but she holds his lips in her teeth and moans as they find their rhythm together, filling her and waning like an ocean on a forgotten world. Luke's thoughts bind them, pull out their pleasures into each other, and Han feels himself impaled twice over, feels the tight, hot push as Luke drives deeper, feels the crash of Leia's orgasm whip into him and knock him senseless into his own.
His arms aren't long enough to hold them both the way he wants to, after, when Leia is fast asleep and Luke is resting lightly. Han tries anyway.
He doesn't know why he's remembering Lando's words now, but he can't get the phrase "This won't end well" out of his mind.
TBC