4

Roganda Ismaren was not quite a friend and not quite an enemy and this was not quite a social visit.

Regardless, Leia allowed her to link her arm through hers. They'd taken Roganda's private airspeeder to the subterranean levels, where the alien species had been pushed over the last two decades. Thousands of atmospheric dampeners stripped excess carbon dioxide from Coruscant's atmosphere, but like everything on Coruscant, higher was better. The subterranean air was rank and stale but the finest clothing couldn't be purchases in the human quarters. In the ethnic, multi-species quarters, the black market thrived; fine cloth was imported cheaply and laboriously hand-stitched at local fashion houses. Prices were still high, at least by Leia's standards, but they weren't as exorbitantly expensive as prices on the upper levels, where stores marketed fashionable clothing that was 'untouched by non-human hands'.

They looked at gowns made of shimmersilk, ottegan silk and taffeta. Stores crammed row upon row of the finest silks and taffetas, sei-weave and linens into their narrow spaces. Before long, Roganda was spending thousands of the emperor's pocket credits.

"At least down here they don't cater to that dreadful Imperial chic that's so popular these days," Roganda exclaimed. Everything about Roganda Ismaren was a study in stark contrasts. She had a child's breathy voice and a woman's body; she had sharp angled brows and gently curving cheekbones, her skin was a palette of pale creams against the jet-black of her hair. "Grey, grey, and more grey." She seized Leia's arm. "Let me buy you something."

"I don't need anything."

"For the club then?"

Leia shook her head but Roganda insisted, because it wasn't actually her credits. She held up a skirt of see-through Zoosha fabric. "Does this remind you of anything?"

"No."

"What about the night you cut your wrist and almost died."

"It was an accident," Leia said.

Roganda continued digging through the racks of gowns. "I have news."

Leia didn't want to ask. In seven hours, she would be having her fourth flying lesson with Han Solo. She was imagining the way Coruscant looked from space, a planet of dazzling lights, like gemstones and glass broken up together, and she did that until she was verging on being rude. "What is it?"

"I'm three months pregnant."

"Oh." Leia quelled her gut reaction, her disgust (she knew very well who the father was), before it could surface. "Congratulations. That's wonderful."

Roganda's eyes manifested a cunning joy. "He's not the father," she whispered, as though she knew what Leia had been thinking. "It's Sarcev Quest. Now I've told you a secret." She said it as though Leia too, should tell her a secret. When Leia wouldn't, she selected an amber gown and held it up against Leia's frame. "Luke told me it wasn't an accident."

"He was wrong." Leia wondered when it was that she managed to speak with Luke, and what else went on between them. "This isn't my colour."

"How about this one?" Roganda held up a pleated off-the-shoulder dress of cyrene silk that was sheer enough to be an under-dress. It was iridescent green, and shimmered like the wings of Jabiimi dragonflies in sunlight.

"It's lovely," Leia admitted.

"Try it on." Roganda ushered her into a dressing room. As Leia slipped the dress over her head, Roganda said, "I thought you were dead when we found you. There was so much blood. I nearly fainted. Were you singing the night before last?"

"No."

"I commed you twice and you never answered."

"You should have left a message. I must have switched it off by accident." Leia was grateful for the privacy of the dressing room. She would have to be more careful when she flew, plan her excuses ahead of time. Once they reached the atmosphere, she was out of range. Predictably, Roganda was keeping tabs at the bequest of Palpatine.

Leia exited the dressing room and smoothed the gown over her hips. The heat-set pleats hugged her body. "What do you think?"

"We have to take it." Roganda fussed with her hair. "You should wear it up."

A short time later, they were outside waiting for the airspeeder to pick them up. Roganda began complaining about the air quality, and for once, Leia felt her grumbling was warranted. Beside the dress shop was a fortunetellers' stand. It advertised both tea and purified air.

Leia pointed. "Let's go in and wait."

"No." Roganda grabbed her arm. Her fingers pinched. "She's probably a mind-witch."

"Hardly."

"She's a screamer."

"She's an Ayrou," Leia corrected. "She can tell you if it's a boy or a girl."

"A med-droid can do that."

"Consider it a test; see if she's any good."

"Hm." The notion intrigued Roganda. "All right."

The fortuneteller's stand was tiny and cluttered; bolts of imported fabric were propped up against the walls, and more, unrolled fabric hung from the ceiling and covered the windows. Leia purchased two bottles of water and settled Roganda down at the tiny center table. Then she set several credit chips in the coffer.

The fortune-teller was descended from an avian species. Her face was bony and her cheekbones jutted back and out where a human's ears would be located. A mane of black-violet feathers tumbled over her shoulders, the feathers carefully arranged fan-style. She asked them both to briefly hold her seeing stone.

"What do you seek?" The Ayrou's high-pitched voice warbled like sandpaper.

Leia nudged Roganda gently with her elbow. "Ask."

"Am I to bear a son or a daughter?"

"A son." The Ayrou's feathers shivered. "There is trouble ahead of you."

"What?" Roganda gasped.

"Your labour will be long and difficult. You will scream for something to ease your pain and it shall be denied you, even as your flesh tears." The Ayrou leaned forward. "My dear, he knows. The birth shall be your punishment."

Roganda's face was pale and she was quivering like a young whisperkit. Leia vaulted to her feet angrily. "That's enough. We're ready to go."

"What about your question, my dear."

Leia's jaw locked. "I don't have one."

"You dropped credits in the coffer. An answer awaits you."

"Give me the credits back."

"It's too late. The answer is already here." She preened her fan of feathers with talon-like hands. "Not when you ask him to," she warbled. "Not when you ask him to."

In the airspeeder, Leia put her arm around a sobbing Roganda, feeling poignantly sympathetic. She activated the privacy screen so that the driver couldn't listen in or watch them. "It's all right," she soothed. "She doesn't know what she's talking about."

"No one knows what he can be like," Roganda sobbed. "He gives me to his most esteemed guests, governors. I'm nothing more than a belonging, something he shares." Roganda wiped her eyes with the hem of her dress. "This child could belong to a handful of men," she hissed. "He can't know."

Leia winced inside. She'd heard rumours, stories, from Luke. "You could leave," she whispered softly. I would help you, she almost said, but she knew better.

Roganda looked stricken, as though Leia had told her she planned to murder the Emperor. "I can never leave." Through tears, she asked, "What was your question?"

"I hadn't thought of one yet," Leia lied.

She'd sensed the power in the medcentre room before she even awoke. It was warm, unlike the cold chill of the Emperor. When she opened her eyes, she saw a man who was both strange and familiar sitting on her bed.

"You're so…. beautiful." He shook a head covered in dirty blond hair. "I don't know why I can't remember you."

"Luke?"

"Yes. I'm Luke."

She sat up awkwardly. Her right arm was encased in a clear suction cast; she could see bacta against her bare skin, against the cuts on her wrist. She closed her eyes slowly and opened them. He didn't disappear and his weight still bent the bed.

"Why did you try to kill yourself?"

"I didn't." She hadn't thought about the consequences of what she'd been about to do. "It was an accident. I didn't want to wear his gift," she says.

In the preparation rooms at the rear of the Senate rotunda, the gifts from the Emperor had been waiting for them, wrapped in gold paper and tied with jewelled ribbon. When Leia had picked up the dress, she'd seen her hands shimmering behind the fabric as though she held them beneath running water. Loveti moth fibre was soft, light as air and, when un-dyed, utterly translucent.

The preparation rooms were private; she hadn't seen the other girls, didn't know how they would react. She'd peeked out through the slatted door and seen Roganda Ismaren proudly marching toward the Emperor, high breasts jiggling, the pink of her nipples and dark pubic hair showing through. In horror, Leia had watched as the emperor received her, his hungry eyes half-obscured by melted folds of flesh and a concealing hood. As that was unfolding, one of the chaperones had said to another outside her door, "How lovely Roganda looks in blue."

Then, Leia had understood it was a game. Just as it would have made more sense to have the gowns delivered to the finishing school, but the Emperor's mind tricks couldn't extend that far. To refuse would be to reveal herself.

The Emperor made everyone so nervous that decanters of wine had been set out in the preparation rooms. She'd seized a goblet, filled it with wine and gulped down half of it while staring at herself in the mirror. She couldn't remember if she'd thrown a punch at the mirror, or if she'd thrown her entire body, but upon impact, the fragile glass shattered; her wrist had snapped back, and shards had cut across both arteries. The blood had spurted up against the mirror and rained back at her. The colour had drained from her face until she was a ghastly shade of white, and the wondered it she was bleeding out from the top down, and if it really mattered any more… She'd gathered her gift - several thousand credits worth of loveti moth fibre - and wrapped it like a tourniquet around her wrist. Then, she'd crumpled to the floor and waited for someone to find her.

"Are you like me?" he asked.

"What do you mean?"

"You knew about the dresses didn't you?" he asked. "You were the only one who refused to wear it. And the girl with black hair… who is she?"

"Roganda Ismaren," Leia said.

"Yes. She was the only one who wore nothing beneath it."

It was a test, Leia thought. She realised why he was there; they thought she'd attempted suicide and that assumption had engendered her with power. She also realised that she was still in the Imperial Palace.

"Oh," he said. Then, "oh," again, as though he'd forgotten something important. "The Emperor is worried about you."

Hostility rose like a dragon. "If he sent you-"

"No one is forcing you to do anything. That was his message. End of message. I'm angry with him."

"Why?"

"For not telling me about you before today." He leaned close enough that she could see he had a broken blood vessel on his left eyelid. "Are you like me?"

"What do you mean?"

"I thought you knew."

Later, she would recognize the slight pressure against her mind, the sudden desire to offer the truth to him, to offer him anything. At that moment, she thought she made a choice. She wanted so desperately to tell him the truth. "Yes."

"Why don't they know?"

"I don't want them to know."

"I won't tell them," he said. "Your secret is safe with me."

For the first time since old Etti Durasha had died, Leia felt as though someone cared about her. She threw her arms around him. "I've been waiting for you to come back for so long."

It had been a child's dream, a child's wish.

It was as though no one had ever touched him, hugged him. There was a long awkward moment before his arms remembered what to do. "I would have come back," he said. "I swear, if I'd remembered."

"Punch it!"

Leia punched it. Inertia rammed her back against her seat as the ship launched into hyperspace.

This nights' flying lesson had been her best yet. At the asteroid belt, she'd successfully navigated the Spirit of Nyenthi'Oris around a series of jagged, pitted asteroids, and, when one had suddenly upended and swung towards the old YT-1000, she'd altered course, accelerated and avoided a potentially serious impact without breaking into a sweat. Finally, she'd plotted and executed the return jump to Coruscant without his stepping in once.

"I did it!" she exclaimed.

"You sure did." Han Solo was grinning proudly. He always wore black and was prone to deadpan jokes, but he had a sensuous, relaxed way of moving and piloting, as though nothing ever bothered him.

Leia unbuckled her crash webbing, hopped up from her seat, leaned down and kissed him because she knew he wouldn't first. He caught the back of her head and kissed her as though they were never coming out of hyperspace. His bottom lip was deliciously full and soft between her teeth. Her stomach fluttered. He ran his hand down the outside of her thigh.

She felt like her chest had been wrapped in a restraining band when she drew her head back. "I need to bring us out of hyperspace."

"You have two minutes," he said with a wry grin, although she hadn't seen him check the console chronometer. "The observation deck of the yacht starship has a dining table. They're cooking right now."

"They?"

"The chef and his assistant."

She hadn't noticed until then that he hadn't brought a bag.

"You didn't think I was going to keep feeding you cold restaurant food?"

She laughed. She didn't know what she thought. "Will they be gone before we arrive?"

Han shrugged, his hand still sliding up and down her outer thigh. "Worried."

"Cautious."

"They'll be gone."

She sat back in her seat, strapped herself in and rested her hands on her knees.

On the walk to the yacht starship, everything had changed between them. She could still feel Han's kiss on her mouth and he clutched her elbow as he steered her up the onramp, close to him, no longer at a polite distance. They entered a long airy hallway, made more spacious by dozens of viewing portals on one side, and thick black and gold carpeting made up of repeating geometric motifs that made the floors look as though they stretched on for over a hundred metres. Thin strips of gold that tapered off into arrows and pointed towards at least three other passageways and five closed doors.

"This way," Han proclaimed with a grin, opening the door to a supply closet. "Oh wait. " He scratched his head. "I could have sworn that was the turbolift."

"Are you sure this is your ship?" she asked.

"Kind of," he said. The next hatchway opened to a refresher.

Leia began laughing.

The next was a utility closet.

"Fine, you try the next door."

The next was a bedroom.

"This isn't the turbolift," she declared.

"Nope." Eyes alit, Han Solo crossed his arms and propped himself up in the hatchway. "Oops."

"Indeed." She'd been tingling with anticipation since they stepped onboard. They kissed until she was nearly breathless. He flattened one hand against the center of her back; the other slowly moved over her breasts, cupping them in turn.

She crossed the threshold and peeled the bodysuit down to her waist unabashedly.

He stooped and brush-kissed her collarbone. "I wanted to do this the night I met you," he murmured, walking her backwards toward the bed.

"In your suites above the Manarai?" she whispered. She tugged his shirt free from the waist of his trousers, slid her hand up over the smooth skin along his lower back. She ran her fingers through the soft hair behind his ear.

"With the red dress."

"I'll wear it next time."

"Really?"

"Maybe." She helped him remove his shirt, and his trousers. He had the body of a natural athlete, lean and muscled. She went to remove the entire bodysuit, but he caught her hands. He took the edge of the bodysuit from her fingers and peeled it down as if he were unwrapping a gift. He picked her up behind the knees and pushed her back onto the bed. He ran his mouth lightly over her thighs, between her thighs, over her stomach. He kissed her again, his tongue entering her mouth as one finger slipped inside of her.

She arched her back slightly. She was wet and warm and she really wanted this, the kick in her gut of penetration, all the way down to her toes, and right that second, not in fifteen or thirty or forty-five. She was strong enough to pull him down, her legs pulled him to her, and he guided himself in.

He was too tall for her, but she scrunched her legs up around his back and he curled his torso and it worked. He slipped his hand beneath her bottom and hoisted her so that that he was tight against her and only her head and shoulders rested on the bed. At first, she kept her eyes closed and they didn't talk. She let him move, let him read her body language and adjust.

The sex was good. She was tense from the flying lesson, still wound up and nervy after making her first hyperspace jump. The tension slowly poured from her muscles into the layers of the expensive mattress.

Han massaged her, from the nape of her bent knee all the way up to her collarbone and over to the soft underside of her upper arm as though he wanted to squeeze every drop of pleasure, every touch. The throb was spreading like a flush across her loins, like wires crackling and circuits racing, they were heavy and full. Even though her body was hot, she couldn't feel her fingertips anymore, as though there were numb from cold, so she pressed the insides of her wrists against his shoulders, breathing so shallowly that the inside of her ears buzzed. She let her legs fall from his back, slack.

She liked to let it happen that way, be at the mercy of it.

When the spasms began, Han kissed her greedily, as though he were drinking it in, tasting her deliriousness. Usually, she sought to separate herself from Luke; they never made love and she hated to let him kiss her when she came. She hadn't shared that with anyone since Iolu. This was different though. She liked the way their shuddering bodies mimicked one another. The final thrusts against her womb were so deep that they were almost painful, but she embraced the pain as she did the pleasure of orgasm, all connected and part of the whole.

The pillow cradled her neck and head. She turned to the right and saw large, decorative tiles, with the same motif as the carpets, based on the ancient Corellian star. The jolt back to reality was acute. It had been three years since she'd felt a stirring within her like this. Since Iolu. It would make her fragile. It would weaken her. And it would put him in danger. They'll hurt him, she thought, they'll hurt him if they find out. She fit her fingernails into a long angry vibroblade scar that angled just above his left hip. Han sucked in air between his teeth, and at first she thought it hurt him, and then she realised she had unconsciously clenched her entire body and he was sensitive right at that moment.

"Maybe we…" She rolled the tip of her tongue along Han's throat and stretched her arms around him, so that he wouldn't think she was casually ending the moment between them. "The dinner," she concluded.

"That's right," he replied.

She was aware of her nakedness only when he climbed off her, and light-headed when she sat up. She shook her head so that her hair fell forward and covered her breasts. She almost panicked when she looked down. Her body was marked with evidence, flushed and red. Warm fluids, the aftermath of sex, seeped onto the bed.

Even the fresher had ornate golden tiles.

When she exited the fresher, she eyed the bed and said, "We can't leave the room like this."

"I have people who clean up."

"And they talk."

"My people don't talk." He opened a closet. Inside hung half a dozen silk robes in as many colours. He grabbed one and shrugged into it.

"You keep robes for guests?"

"This is my partner's cruiser. It's part of his master schmoozing routine. He likes his guests to feel comfortable."

"Oh."

He picked his clothes up and laid them on the bed as though he would be coming back later. She followed suit, then donned a navy blue robe that swam over her wrists and ankles. She let him lead her through a series of hallways to a small turbolift. She'd never been on a pleasure cruiser before (although the Emperor owned several), and never imagined that on her first time she would be padding around in bare feet.

When the turbolift doors opened to the observation deck, the aroma of roast gorak, fine herbs and malla petals overwhelmed her. The observation deck was three times the size of her apartments on Coruscant. Located atop the yacht starship, it offered a panoramic view of the skyhook and the stars beyond. There was a lounging area, with several leather couches stationed around a low dining table, which was set for two.

On the way to the table, Han pointed her toward the bar. "Do you really prefer ale or were you playing hard to get the night we met?"

"I prefer wine," she confessed guiltily.

"Did you lie about anything else?"

"Not that I recall at this moment."

Han chuckled and his comlink rang. "Pick something out, will you," he said.

She crouched and perused the contents of the wine-fridge, then selected a fine bottle of Sullustan wine. She set it on the counter and set about cracking the seal. Han casually set his hand on her backside and rubbed it, saying, "Yes. Yes. I told you that already. Uh huh. Fine."

Slowly, she poured wine into each glass, three fingers below the rim. She liked the way his hand felt over the silk, the way the fabric undulated against the back of her calves like tepid water. She wanted to close her eyes, lean back and sip her wine; pretend this was her right, that this was his right.

She was sorry when the call ended.

"Pardon. Business."

"I'm sure it never ends with what you do."

"It doesn't. Hungry?"

"Famished."

The comlink rang again. He threw it in the small trash compactor beside the bar and hit the switch. It emitted several chirrups and died with a satisfying squeak-crunch. "That should take care of that."

She sat at the table faced with the strange sensation of just having just slept with someone and mixed up the boundaries. "Was that wise?"

Han began serving slices of gorak meat and malla petals. "Is this?"

"I don't know," she said. The slitherhorn player had described Han Solo as a man addicted to his work, but the more time she spent with him the more she realised the rumours were true only on the surface. "It depends. Do you miss it?''

"Miss what?" He held the spoon over a miniature earthenware pot. "Sauce?"

"Yes. I mean your old life. Smuggling? Flying?"

He passed her a plate. "There are pros and cons to both. Or were. I spent years with my ass on the line, nearly being killed. The credits came and went, depending on the jobs I worked. Now, the risks I take are strictly of the financial sort. People underestimate how much like the business world smuggling is – it is part of the business world. The greater the risk, the greater the return. Some of my current associates are slimier than my old smuggling contacts, and I knew a lot of… slimy ones."

"You sell arms legally. You probably smuggled them illegally."

"I prefer to think of my current business in terms of defense. We have clients with very special and particular needs."

"Do you consider me a client?"

"I'd call you a hobby." He grinned. "Most women want only one thing."

"To sleep with you?" she teased. She'd had several sips of the tart wine and it was already affecting her.

"That and my penthouse." He stabbed at a piece of gorak meat. "But my ex got it in the settlement."

Leia took a bite. The gamey meat, covered in a tangy berry sauce, dissolved like butter on her tongue. "This is delicious," she said.

"Should be. The chef I hired used to work at Nova Nova."

Leia regarded him blankly.

"It's the best restaurant on Corellia. In Coronet City."

"I'll remember that if I ever make it there."

Leia thought about Roganda. Roganda's ambitions had been simple; she'd wanted a position within the Imperial Palace, would have done anything to gain power, to gain material things, to gain status, even parade herself naked. Palpatine had chosen her alone that night, perhaps charmed by her audacity. She'd always assumed that they were fundamentally different, but right at that moment, she didn't know that they were.

"I need one more favour," she said.

"On top of everything else," Han guffawed.

"Unless you're doing business there, I need you to promise you won't return to the Manarai. They watch me there."

"They?"

"They. You understand?"

"I think so." He let his hand fall beneath the table. He squeezed her knee reassuringly. "Sweetheart, whatever it is you're running away from… whoever it is, everybody has a past."

"I don't have a past." She took another large bite of gorak meat and chewed, staring through the transparisteel at the galaxy beyond, wishing she could throw herself into it and be lost forever. Then she swallowed and said, "I have a present."