All that weekend, Sereine lay feverishly in his bed, tossing and turning, getting up at intervals to run to the fresher, bringing up yellow bile long after her stomach was empty. Then the diarrhea started. She soiled herself and crouched in his shower, feeling too dizzy and weak to get up. At last, he sent 11-4D in, who determined she needed fluids and inserted an IV in her arm, running electrolytes into her and a drug to stop the nausea and cramping.

11-4D brought her cold cloths for her forehead, 11-4D changed Sheev's expensive sheets and cleaned his soiled bed. 11-4D ordered her comfortable nightgowns delivered—not the sexy wisps she had hanging in Sheev's closet—and brought her a pill to help her sleep.

Sheev was nowhere to be seen. Sereine did not know if he was even still in the apartment.

On the morning of the second day, she rolled over and opened her eyes, feeling so weak she wondered if she could even get up to walk to the fresher. She glanced around Sheev's sumptuous red bedroom, spying 11-4D gleaming in the early morning sunlight that filtered through the closed blinds.

"4D? Is the master here?" 11-4D always referred to Sheev as the master, as in, "The master will be late this evening and requests you make yourself comfortable and wait for him. Would you appreciate some dinner?"

"The master is working in his study," said 11-4D. "Do you think you could try a little warm tea?"

Sereine pushed her hair out of her eyes. She hadn't even felt like braiding it, which she must always be careful to do before lying down at night. She sighed; the matted mess from two nights of tossing, turning, ups, and downs would take her half an hour to brush out.

She felt the tears start. "Has he been here the entire time?"

"He has. He's slept in one of the guest bedrooms."

Sereine turned over and clasped a pillow to her chest. Why the sudden change? One moment he was gifting her diamond earrings and happily escorting her through the most star-studded night of either of their lives … and then he abandoned her because she was sick. What it would have meant to her if he'd just crouched beside her and rubbed her back for a bit! What it would have meant to her if he'd thought enough of her to offer to bring her tea himself!

11-4D hovered there for a moment, then said, "I will return with some warm tea for you."

Sereine was passionately in love with him, and she knew Sheev understood that; words forbidden had still been said and heard. His behavior said he loved her, too … until this weekend. It was as if he didn't care at all how miserable she felt. Almost as if he were angry with her. Tears finally escaped and soaked into his fine pillow.

Why would he treat her like this?

Senator Palpatine—Lord Sidious—lay on the wide couch in his study, paging through a speech Sereine had written for him last week upon which he hadn't gotten around to offering her his feedback yet.

A month-long Senate recess was before him; that meant yet more office hours at home, meetings with the King, and the Naboo Society for Emancipation had invited him to speak while he was in system. Routine speeches he was assigning more and more to staff now, but anything on emancipation he still gave to Sereine and ran through at least once with her.

If she were going to live, he reflected, wrinkling his nose. The stench from his ensuite fresher the other night tended to indicate something had already died in there.

It would have had to be his prized deluxe oversized mattress. He had already replaced a bed on her account; now he would probably have to replace the mattress, too.

Mistresses could be expensive.

He looked up to see her hovering in his open doorway, as if his thoughts had summoned her, in a nightgown that, while unattractive, was at least clean. She still looked weak and wan, but her hair was freshly brushed and hung in a thick braid over her shoulder.

He raised one brow at her. "Are you feeling better?"

"Yes, I am," she said, and then, inexplicably, "Are you still angry with me?"

"Angry with you? Why would I be angry with you?" Well, he hadn't been a moment ago.

She opened her mouth and then closed it again, and stood there in the doorway, swaying a bit.

Now he was irritated. "Sereine, what is this foolishness?"

"I don't know why else you wouldn't come in and see me. I was sick, Sheev. It seemed as if …"

She looked down and took a breath and looked up again. Sidious held back a frustrated growl. Any time he saw that, they were in for a time- and breath-wasting discussion.

"It seemed as if you didn't even care how I was. Which makes no sense, after …"

Sheev sat up and put his datapad down, attempting to place it and not throw it. "Obviously, I knew you were ill, Sereine. It appears that roe spread you took such a liking to was actually tainted. Everyone who ate it ended up violently ill; it appears the caterer will be going bankrupt over this. Quite the scandal."

She stood there, and he added, "Of course I care how you are, Sereine. I sent 11-4D in to look after you."

She said, "But you … didn't care to look after me."

"What was I to do?" he said, and quite reasonably, he thought. "I can't give you IV fluids. It was that or transport you to the hospital. And 11-4D believed it had things quite well in hand, so I left the droid to it."

"But …" she said.

Sidious heaved an irritated sigh and turned to face forward on the couch, endeavoring to mask the anger in his eyes—not very well, he feared. "Sereine. Out with it."

"But," she said, and swallowed. "The droid can't kiss me or hold me, or say he's sorry I'm ill. Only you can do that, and … I would have liked it." Her voice wavered and her eyes dropped to the floor. "I would have liked it very much. It would have helped me."

Not only did Sidious mentally recoil from the sense memory of the sweat, the drool, and the smell, but he found himself quite bewildered. "'Reine, I did help you, I sent you the droid, which has taken very good care of you." He glanced toward his datapad, which was looking much more attractive right now than this discussion, and added, "If I had behaved this way as a small boy, my mother would have knocked me into the next parish."

She raised her eyes and stared at him with a curious blank expression.

"But …"

Now he was angry. "But what?"

The dark side burned in his breast as he watched her standing there, uselessly opening and closing her mouth.

At last, she said, "Sheev … do you really …?" And then stopped.

"Sereine, is there something you want?" he snapped. "If there is, you will need to tell me. And if there isn't, I am busy." He reached over and picked up his speech.

She walked a few steps toward him. "Yes, there is something I want."

Sheev Palpatine summoned every ounce of patience he had left. "And, that is?"

She crept forward two more steps, holding out her hand. "I want to feel you holding me," she said. Her voice wavered a bit, which made Sidious feel like jumping out of the window. "You're so warm and solid and strong, and your arms feel so good around me. It would make me feel better. That's what I want."

Sidious stared at the floor, considering what she had said, an odd blankness filling his mind.

He said the first thing that came to him. "I can see how that might make sense." Perhaps. His own mind was a confusing fog on the matter.

Her russet brows half-raised and she blinked at him. "Oh. Well, I guess I'm glad to hear that."

"I presume you took a shower?" he said.

Her mouth pressed into a thin line, upturned at the ends. "Yes, I did," she said, with a soft note of sarcasm.

Illness was not something one sought succor for; Sidious had known that since he could walk. Illness was a terrible annoyance and a weakness, sometimes life-threatening. Certainly not something one displayed for … for what?

She stood there with her hand out, reaching for him. Truly, he wasn't angry at her, he reasoned. It wasn't her fault she was born a weakling, a puny thing, dead to the Force and only fortunately possessed of the talents she did have.

She may fuck like a Sith, but she wasn't one, of course.

The couch was a bit too narrow. He stood up; then he thought to take the back cushions off of it. He piled them at one end and lay down again, on his side this time, leaving his datapad on the floor.

He patted the cushion in front of him. "Come and lie down."

She did, pressing her back to him, half-raised on the cushions as he was, curling her little bare feet next to his shins. The cushions were just soft enough that he could wrap both arms comfortably around her.

She snuggled backwards against him, her hair soft against his neck.

And, she was right, this did feel good.

"I think this would be an opportune time to watch a holofilm, what do you think?" he said.

"I would love that."

They settled on something, and Sidious, unwilling to get up, surreptitiously called the holocontrol to his hand using the Force, safely behind Sereine's head.

"Do you think you can drink some hot soup?"

"I think I can."

Sidious summoned the kitchen droid and ordered her some hot nerf broth with noodles. "You seem better, Ederra. I presume you feel better."

"I think I'm through being sick. It's just, my stomach feels sore." She guided his hand over a spot. "Right there."

Sidious could not heal her with the Force, of course. Sith did have some limited techniques, but he had always found much more important topics to study and had never gotten around to them. But the dark side could generate a little heat, and that might be helpful. He warmed her skin, directing the Force through his hand, and she sighed and snuggled closer.

"You feel so good," she whispered. "Thank you so much."

They fell asleep together like that, and slept that way until morning. She woke him with a passionate kiss, and scampered off to his fresher.

Sidious found then that he felt so warm, so comfortable, so content, he didn't want to move.

And something about that felt distinctly uneasy.

He stirred and forced himself to his feet. Walked to the window, watching the early morning speeder traffic pass.

This was different around sex, of course. Sith had no concept of too much sex. Times like this were a matter of course around that, and he was fortunate that Ederra was up for that as much as he was. Nights like this could be excused around that. After all, wasn't that what mistresses were? Tender little things one got as carnal with as they would tolerate? From time to time?

But this felt … too indulgent, somehow. Too soft.

Too light.

Lord Sidious ran his hand across his stomach. A bit too much padding there, for his liking. Ederra's love of good food encouraged him to eat, and she still had the boisterous metabolism of a young person. At nearly forty-five, Lord Sidious did not.

Well. It was far too early to allow this to happen, any of it.

And some of it never should.

Lord Sidious decided it there, on the spot. One Pan Ferren needed to be eliminated. An AI specialist, head of his own company that performed important research for those who built OOM droids and seated on the directorate of the Trade Federation these past several years. A bit too pacifist and law-abiding for Sidious's purposes. The master had decided some time ago that this director should make way for someone else. Sate Pestage had informed him that Pan Ferren was a hobby mountain climber, scheduled to climb Appenza Peak this week on vacation.'

A climbing accident. Perfect. Lord Sidious had intended to assign this assassination to young Maul, who, after his pitiful performance on Ord Mantell, sorely needed it. However—

Sereine appeared in the doorway again, shrouded in her gray working cloak, datapad in hand.

"What's this?" said Sidious.

"Emergency call from the office," said Sereine. "A damage control for a client. I have to be gone for at least a week."

"Gone where? Are you sure you're up to it?"

"Doesn't matter if I'm up to it. It's a damage control situation and it's a client; I can't say no. Suntilla."

Sidious laughed. "Finally got himself found out, did he?" It was an open secret that the Senator from Suntilla had a severe gambling problem. Apparently now it wasn't so secret. "Good luck with that."

"I'm going to push him into treatment or I'm going to dump him. Prime time to intervene," she said. "You're going into recess, so it's perfect."

Sereine stole close for a kiss and he wrapped his arm around her. "Do take it easy, Ederra. Get some rest." Suntilla opposed the Sith's interests at the moment anyway. She lingered over a few more quick kisses, then brushed his nose with hers and whispered, "I have to go, I have to go." And sprinted.

And while some part of him felt her absence, another part of him felt the need for the power of the dark side, yearned for the sensation of it rising inside of him during a kill.

It made for a most disconcerting sensation.

Appenza Peak, it was.