NABOO
Varykino
21 BBY
As soon as Ryoo and Pooja are asleep, Ruwee and Jobal request a meeting, startling everyone present at the table, but particularly Sola and Padmé. The Naberries were a very open and close-knit family, so it was unusual for discussions to require such a formal appeal.
"As you know, your mother and I aren't getting any younger," Ruwee begins. Though Anakin and Darred had been invited to sit in, it's clear his father-in-law's words are meant first and foremost for his daughters.
Years of political training staying her tongue, Padmé sits very still at his side. She isn't panicking exactly, though her hand clenches several times before Anakin threads his fingers with her own. Smiling gratefully at him, Padmé squeezes hard once, letting him anchor her rising anxiety. Sola, on the other hand, has shallower reserves of patience.
"Papa! What in Gungan's hell is this all about?"
Anakin had always liked Sola. Not one to mince her words, she could be brutally direct but was never cruel. The unique refreshing balance had instantly won Anakin over.
"Is there something we should know, Papa?" Padmé asks softly, more diplomatically.
"Your mother and I are fine," her father says sternly, eyeing his eldest. But Ruwee is a kind man, and never stays angry with anyone for very long. Actually, come to think of it, Anakin is fairly certain he had never seen Ruwee actually ever angry. Annoyed, sure. Exasperated, yes. But never outright angry.
"When you've been surrounded by three very strong women for as long as I have been, Anakin," his father-in-law had once said to him. "There's nothing to get mad about anymore. I am male, therefore, I am always, have always, and will always be wrong." Smiling wryly, he had chuckled at his own joke. "And while you and Darred have toed the line, neither of my sons-in-law have done anything particularly provoking enough to earn my ire just yet."
"I'll consider that both a compliment and a warning," Anakin had replied.
This had earned him a hearty clap on the back and Ruwee's utmost respect. "Good man."
"Settle down. We just wanted to discuss Varykino with you and how you want to handle its e-vent-ual," Ruwee continues, drawing out the word with as much snark as the endlessly patient man can muster, before finishing, "inheritance."
The last word sends Anakin into a tailspin. His chair screeches loudly across the flag stones, betraying his discreet attempt to scoot back from the table. "I really shouldn't-"
"Sit down, son." Somehow Ruwee manages to sound simultaneously firm and sympathetic. Padmé's fingers find the crook of Anakin's elbow as he replaces himself in his chair, another scrape of wooden legs across the terrace bringing him forward again. "You're part of this family so this conversation concerns you, too."
"The current conditions have the estate passing down through the Naberrie name." Twin pairs of blue and brown eyes turn to regard Anakin and his wife. "Now that we are trustees, your mother and I have been discussing how to amend the trust terms but wanted your collective input."
Padmé is quiet at his side. Her stare is laser-straight on her parents, not because of any upset emotion but direct with impenetrable focus. In the Force, Anakin feels her fold into herself as her mental wheels churn at incomprehensible speeds to solve the puzzle before them.
Which baffles him when he remembers her signature on their marriage certificate. The Naboo never presumed the taking of any spouse's last name when it came to matrimony; an individual decided solely for themselves how they would be known from that momentous occasion forward. To see Padmé mull over her decision for less than a minute only to adopt Naberrie Skywalker as her married moniker had made Anakin burst at the seams with dual pride for both families. With Naberrie still inscribed - intrinsically and literally - in her identity, the reason behind her pensive mood now mystifies him. A few more second of stubborn silence and his rising confusion wins out.
"But you didn't drop Naberrie when you took my name," he whispers to her in a side conversation even though he knows almost everyone can hear him. It's a statement as much for his own reinforced benefit as it is everyone else's. "Why then…"
"Papa doesn't want to inadvertently exclude our children, Anakin."
A different weight settles around the room, snuffing the "Oh" from his parted lips though it still leaves the shape. Another brand of discomfort threatens to drape the gathering in its blanket. For once, Anakin doesn't know how to dispel the unnerving tension.
Thankfully, Padmé Naberrie Skywalker's experience in this arena. It's hardly the first time he's grateful to call her his wife.
"May Anakin and I have a moment to sidebar?"
The rest of his family exchange quick glances before Jobal nods their collective consent. Padmé turns to him, liquid brown eyes locking into his with magnetic force.
Ani?
Yes, my love?
Her lower lip disappears under her teeth when she feels the connection crackle to life. Then her victorious private smirk mellows into sudden sobriety.
What do you think?
I thought we had tabled the children talk.
Padmé winces, but gamely holds his gaze, even when Sola whispers a little too loudly, "I'm soooo jealous they can do this."
I know we haven't revisited it yet, but if you have ever thought about it, do you have a preference what their last name would be?
Bold of her to assume there would be multiple younglings. Bold of him to assume he would ever say no to her. She had been so terrified to abandon this dream and he had been so terrified that because of her love for him, she would.
I haven't.
The glow in her eyes dims at his admission, but he leans closer, trying to impress his explanation upon her.
Considered anything about their last name because it wouldn't matter to me.
Her eyes light up, a watery sheen casting beautiful shades in their brown depths.
Naberrie. Skywalker. Naberrie Skywalker. Skyberrie.
She laughs openly, wetly and swipes a roaming tear away.
"What did he say?" Sola asks.
"Hush!" Jobal scolds.
It doesn't matter to me.
But you said Skywalker had sentimental origins to you.
He had said that. On their honeymoon, in this very villa, he had whispered her new name like an enchantment. Over. And over. Etching permanence into his incantation, her husky laugh had rumbled into his bones. She had teased him for his wonderment, had pressed herself to him and pressed him for the details. But that was a story for a future moment.
Padmé waits for his answer patiently, a little line forming between her brows when he hesitates.
It's not usual that slaves get to keep their names. First. Last. Sometimes even at all. My mom…
Her fingers thread through his, but Anakin knows the contact isn't because she 's afraid to lose him due to lack of physical connection. At this point in their relationship, their Force bond thrived just as well with or without it. At the reassuring squeeze between his fingers, Anakin starts again.
My mother got to keep Skywalker when she had me. For both of us. It meant so much to her when sometimes the only way to trace slave lineage was by bloodline…
When Anakin trails off this time, Padmé frowns at her inability to keep up with his head.
"That's it!" he whispers. The solution swirls into something more than misty musings, rising to the surface like a newborn emerging into the world. "That's it!" His chair scrapes again but this time with excitement.
"Ani? I—Oh!" He doesn't have time to dissect why Padmé's aura sparkles then mellows in the blink that it takes her to decipher his exuberant energy shift.
"What's it?!" Sola shouts.
"Bloodline!" Anakin exclaims.
Several sets of eyes watch the overly amped Jedi Knight more warily than they had when they learned he was their kin.
"Rewrite the trust so that Varykino transfers based on the Naberrie bloodline." Anakin gestures between himself and his brother-in-law. "That makes us irrelevant and keeps the villa in the family."
Darred raises an eyebrow. "Thanks… I think?"
"No, no! Hear me out!"
"Ana-kin," Padmé says, her tone gentle despite the warning stressed on his second syllable. Her own mother beats his wife to the history lesson.
"Bloodlines have caused significant turmoil in Naboo's past," Jobal explains. Her voice, as always, is soft, kind, and warm. "It's not a period any of its current denizens wish to repeat."
"Or honor, or reawaken," Padmé adds. She presses her lips together apologetically.
"But it's the easiest way," Anakin starts, then corrects himself as another notion pops into mind. "The only way."
More than one head tilts at his confusing insistence.
"Let me get this straight. You want to keep Varykino within the Naberrie family, but do not want to slight newcomers to that family, correct?" Anakin surveys the gathering, commanding their attention with his rhetorical pause. Ruwee decides to answer anyway.
"You are correct."
"But if you insist in inclusivity over the generations, you give leeway to every new set of trustees to alter the terms and conditions of the trust."
"Sounds downright democratic. Can't have that, now can we?" Sola winks at her sister who, judging by the increasing scowl on her face, doesn't find the jest nearly as entertaining. Faintly, a conversation in a meadow encroaches at the edges of Anakin's mind. Pushing down the memory, he soldiers forward with his case.
"Besides, if you are suggesting Darred and myself be written into the text, I hate to break it to you but you would have to leave me out in the cold anyway."
More head tilting, this time with furrowed brows.
Until Padmé's smooths with sudden understanding.
"Because Jedi can't hold property."
"I knew I married you for a reason."
Playfully, Padmé rolls her eyes at him.
"A bloodline clause protects the property, maintains its ownership within the family, and entitles future generations the benefits previous relatives wished to bestow to them."
Anakin sits back down, his grin beaming brighter than the brilliant sunset.
"And to think you wanted no part at the start of this conversation." Despite her teasing tone, Padmé's luminous smile threatens to rival his own.
"A decision I may come to regret," he agrees.
CORUSCANT
Imperial Palace
17 BBY
"I want Varykino."
Darth Vader didn't move. He had worked far too hard to control the flinch anytime another sad lifetime threatened his focus. The dark side churned away, as riotous as ever, a spectral shield of secondary armor. The black armor he always wore never betrayed his physical tells.
"And I want you to get it for me. Now."
His Master's barb was purposeful. The assignment dragged across him the same way Vader had dragged himself up that Mustafarian hellscape. Painful and intentional. A design to determine if he could survive it.
He might have laughed had his respiratory regulator allowed him.
"The takeover will be hostile in nature," Vader said. "Are you sure the timing is wise?"
Palpatine cackles the way Vader sometimes wishes he could. Not amused but unhinged.
"Are you so lacking in your own confidence, Lord Vader?" The ancient Sith Lord's eyes glow with yellow glee. "It's yours to take. Simply show up and claim it."
An eerie sensation stirs in his veins, thrumming with an energy he has not felt since…
Viciously, Vader spurs the Force to banish the burgeoning tremor.
"It's not."
Slowly, Palpatine rises from his throne, hunching forward to peer at his apprentice's mask as if it would melt away to reveal the flippant face beneath. The irony that his helmet, crowned by the very one likely now cursing it, is responsible for the perceived deception is not lost on Vader.
"Records indicate that Varykino passes in name to the Naberrie family and its living members. The sister should be easy enough to eliminate so I do not understand your hesitation, Lord Vader."
"That information is incorrect."
The energy pulses with anger. On whose behalf Vader does not care to know.
"The documents state…"
"It's a trust, my Master."
Vader bows, seemingly in deference for his interruption but uses the movement to collect himself. Extreme care was necessary whenever these memories threatened to emerge. Diving too deeply into them felt like drowning and took its toll on him - physically and emotionally.
Reveal too much and you'll have betrayed more than just one trust.
Vader squashes the ingrate's voice before it further poisons him. Focus. Shallow steps. Those were the only ways to bury this nightmare.
"The trust decrees that only direct descendants by the bloodline have a claim to the island villa."
Palpatine sneers as much as the subdued voice laughs, but Vader suppresses the shame before it can rise to the dangerous surface. He got the point across, without having to dredge up names he doesn't care to remember.
His Master's sneer turns into a snarl.
"You mean to tell me that Anakin Skywalker has no claim to Varykino by name?"
Once again, Vader is grateful for the stoic façade of his impenetrable mask. It would do him more harm than good if Palpatine witnessed the involuntary curl of the heathen's burned lips. The voice-modification even sounds like Vader too.
"That name no longer has any meaning to me."