#sovo writes
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waiting (candle event, radri ver, 3k words) ↴
—✧✧✧—
As the light from the window recedes, casting her journal into shadow, Radri sets a candle upon the candle holder on the nightstand, then reaches over the side of the bed, rummaging around in her pack for flint and steel. As she fumbles around for it, Xan glances over from his place beside her, and extends a hand.
"Allow me," he says. With a small gesture and a whisper of a command, the wick catches flame.
"Oh," Radri says, looking up the lit candle, "Thank you."
She abandons her now unnecessary search, and opens her journal once more. Xan glances over again.
"I never found the chance to ask what you write about," he says.
"Mm?" Radri narrowly avoids leaving a blot of ink on the page, and gives her pen a dissatisfied frown, resolving to be more careful. "Normal things, I suppose. What happened today, what quests are in progress, what supplies we expended…."
"A summary of events, then, rather than a collection of personal reflections?" Xan says. "Did you keep such a journal in Candlekeep, as well?"
In Candlekeep? She had never considered it. Imagining it now, her entries would have blended together in their sameness; her days were a mixture of lessons and chores, with the only real variables being the subjects she was taught, and the people around her.
"I didn't keep a journal at all," Radri says. "I was always so tired of writing by the end of each day—the last thing I wanted to do was light a candle and write into the night." She gives her current setup a wry smile.
"But now that I'm gone… there's something comforting about the routine," Radri says. "The scent of paper, the ink… even the flame. Though Candlekeep isn't so full of candles as its name would suggest."
Then she blinks, and lifts her gaze from her journal, glancing over to him.
"I remember seeing that you have a journal, as well. Don't you keep track of similar things?"
"Of our every encounter, foe, and death?" Xan says. "If I dwell too long on what has happened to us, I soon grow astonished at the fact that we are even still alive—and against my will, the mind wanders. I prefer to keep my entries to more pleasant reflections."
"Pleasant reflections?" Radri echoes, curious, "Like what?"
"What else?" Xan says, gazing at her softly. "Thoughts of you, and our love."
—
Radri swirls the liquid wax around in the flat pan of the candle holder, drawing circles around the dying flame. Just as the wick is about to run out, she catches the flame on a fresh one, and sets the new candle beside her closed journal. Her journal entry for the day is complete; she is tired, and she is long due for reverie; and yet, something keeps her awake.
Xan. She sighs, staring into the dull, abandoned pool, watching the wax slowly begin to solidify again. She doesn't know why she's still waiting for him. He prefers to study his spells alone—and she has often fallen into reverie waiting for him to finish—but never so consistently or so often as in these past several days. A shadow has fallen across his dark, gray eyes, and though she lingers in bed, pretending to still be in reverie to ensure he gets all the hours he needs, he hardly looks rested.
When she asks, Xan says nothing. But—she hasn't really asked, has she? Are you alright, is no true substitute for, I'm worried about you. Is something wrong? Is it something I did? Are you avoiding m—
Radri gives her head a sharp shake. No—it does no use to jump to conclusions, and she's been through this dance before. All she has to do is wait for Xan to come tell her everything.
…No, that's not it. The last time she had waited, in just a tenday he had formed a conviction to leave her forever.
Radri stands, sending the candle's flame flickering in the residual breeze of her movement, worry suddenly taking hold in her chest. Her heart is set—she's going to go find him. Xan is probably still at that worn table on the floor below; at this hour, there are none but the stillness and darkness of night to keep him company. Her mind made up, Radri crosses the room in three quick strides, and opens the door—
—And comes face to face with Xan, who stumbles back a step in surprise.
"Radri," Xan gasps. With the glimpse he'd caught of her expression, he sends a cautious glance behind him, before facing her again. "You—you looked as if you were about to storm a dungeon. Are we leaving already?"
Then he looks past her, into the room, where the wax carnage by the candle holder she's been using to stave off the darkness serves as clear evidence of her sleeplessness.
"…Or have you not even rested yet, at all?" Xan looks worriedly down at her. Radri feels, for an instant, abashed to have raised his concern—but no, she has to collect herself. She is worried about him. And she must say it!
"I… I couldn't," Radri says. Yes, a good start—
"I…" she continues, and now, she should ask him now—
"I hadn't yet received your kiss goodnight." NO!
But her excuse has already left her in a nervous rush of words, too late to be swallowed now. Xan, understandably, stares at her—and mentally, she buries her face in her hands. How could her resolve have fled her so quickly?
"I… did not know it was that significant to you," Xan says, slightly puzzled, and it takes her a second to remember what she'd said that he's responding to, "Forgive me for the oversight."
Leaning carefully in, as though partly convinced that she might prove to be an illusion once he touches her, Xan leaves a simple, light kiss on her cheek. When he pulls back away, he seems silently astonished at having confirmed that she is, in fact, real. But Radri's mind holds no room to process this observation; her fingertips rise to touch the kiss he'd placed on her cheek, and her face reddens in embarrassment. He'd… he'd humored her… but perhaps this is the best approach. After all, it's not in her nature to tackle an encounter head-on.
"Are you going to come in and join me?" Radri asks. Though she tries for casual, her voice seems, to her ears, to betray her hours of waiting and doubt. But if Xan thinks the same, it does not show, and he does not refuse her.
Xan moves through his nightly ritual, putting his spellbook upon the nightstand and leaning his moonblade against it, so that he might always have it on hand. Meanwhile, Radri feels as nervous inside as she did the first time they'd shared a room, and finds herself standing still at the foot of the bed, uncertain what to do with her arms.
Xan lays down on the bed, then looks up at her. Perhaps it's just her, or the distance, or the flicker of the candle—but she thinks she sees amusement in his eyes.
"Come here," Xan says fondly, and in that moment, the spell of her nervousness is broken. She hastens over and falls into his arms; Xan's soft, breathy chuckle floats across the top of her head.
"If you were in such a hurry, you need not have waited for me."
She curls up closer, nestling her head against his chest, her ear pressed to his heart. He misunderstands; what she'd waited for is his closeness.
"Will you take my hand?" Radri asks; she misses his company in reverie. Xan sighs.
"I am in no state to show you my memories of Evereska tonight, if that is what you were hoping for."
"I don't want to see, so much as I just want to be with you."
"Well, then, I am already with you." Xan kisses her hair. Her heart clenches, and she tries again.
"Xan… has something been troubling you, lately?"
"I am surprised that you would ask me this," he says. "Many things trouble me, Estel'amin, and at many times." Though his answer is neutral, something beneath it is just slightly tense.
"Does it have to do with me?"
"You are on my mind too often for these troubling thoughts to never lead back to you." But he had hesitated… just barely.
Radri finds her breath caught in her throat. This is the moment; she cannot bear to blurt out any more excuses.
"Is it why you wait for me to fall into reverie, first, before you join me?" Her heart beats so loudly that it nearly drowns out the sound of her own voice in her ears. "I—Is it… why you've been been avoiding me?"
In the aftermath of releasing those words from her mind, she barely registers the fact that Xan's body has stilled, his breath frozen in his chest; her thoughts, many and jumbled, tumble forth, fighting for the chance to form on her tongue.
"I—I'm sorry," Radri finds herself stammering. "After all… it's an uneven arrangement, isn't it? You have such a beautiful city to show me, and I only have books and repetition—the same story, day in and day out. And then I finally left, only to start having these visions… these nightmares. Why would you want to live through them with me? I understand, really. I should never have—"
"Radri."
With one swift movement, she's no longer curled up against his chest, but laying on her back on the bed itself. Xan is leant over her, his arms on either side of her shoulders, his face cast into uneven shadow by the curtain of his hair. She can't help but notice the dark circles beneath his eyes, which are still apparent even in this dim light—but more than that, what strikes her is how pained he looks by her words.
"Is that what you think?"
Radri feels, suddenly, that she's gotten the answer very wrong. She's transported back to Candlekeep: one of her tutors stares at her from the board, tutting at her, as Imoen, sprawled casually at the desk next to hers, signals secretly to her what she should have said instead.
But the Imoen of her mind's eye has no choice but to fade away without helping her; there is nowhere in the world that contains knowledge of what Xan is thinking right now, except for Xan himself.
"What," she says, quietly, "Should I think instead?"
Xan, surprisingly, does not answer immediately. He seems, for the first time in a while, lost for words—though not for a lack of emotion for them to express. She watches his expression shift, from reflection, to frustration, to helplessness, to—
"I have been trying to shield you from my struggles," Xan manages at last, "But I see that I have failed."
Pulling away from her, he continues, "I… I keep having visions."
"I am alone with you on a beautiful glade—and we are ambushed by monsters. I join you in your reverie—and wake up next to your lifeless corpse. I let down my guard, and you are taken from me—" He pauses, taking in a shaky breath, eyes glazed over by the memory, "And there are many more. You cannot imagine the perils my eyes see."
"There were always fears, Radri. Fear of dying, fear of losing you, of hurting you, of dragging you into the void of my lonely, desolate existence… But now they are not simply that: they are live nightmares I cannot escape, and I dread my reverie every night. How can I share it with you, when I know what my mind will show you?" Xan says, and pulls his gaze away from her, bowing his head. "I am lost, Estel'amin. Lost in darkness… and even the candles of your room are not able to drive it away."
Radri begins to reach out to him, but pauses, his words still running through her head. She feels like she's forced this from him; she's sorry to have pushed him. Perhaps, if she'd just observed in silence longer, she could have guessed that this was what troubled him… but she can't help but think back to that first night, when their shared reverie went awry. Even with her tears, her confession, his words, and his comfort, what she remembers above all is relief, to no longer be holding all of her fears inside.
So she brings herself to him, and she holds him close.
"You can show me," Radri says. "I wish I knew what to say to drive this darkness away… I wish I could do for you what you do for me. But I will always be here to listen."
"I want to know everything about you, Tahlimil," she confesses; despite having spoken it in her mind many times, his name is still new on her tongue, and she feels his breath catch to hear it. "Not just your hopes, but your fears. Not just your shining moments of happiness, but your present sorrows. I want to be here with you, through all of it. There is not a moment in which I would wish that you had spared me… I don't think it's possible for us to spare each other, anymore."
Her heart is beating loud and fast in her chest; she wonders if he can feel it, if he can tell that she feels more nervous and vulnerable now than she does when she whispers to him that she loves him, before all the eyes of the world. Xan, held close, now pulls away to look her in the eyes.
"Estel'amin," Xan says, "I…"
He looks taken by disbelief and awe; he looks as if he wishes to kiss her. But then, another thought comes to him—and she can spy this exact moment, by the sudden look of resolve in his eyes.
"There is a question that has been on my mind for far too long," Xan says. "I have agonized over when to ask it, but I think it can only be now. I feel as you do. I would share everything with you: my memories, my emotions, my life… and I would know you, in turn, as dearly and intimately as I have only ever known myself."
He takes her hand; his fingers, and the rings upon them, are normally cool upon her skin, but tonight they exude pure warmth.
"I wish to forge the bond that will unite my world with yours," Xan says. "I wish to have you in my arms, Estel'amin… will you have me?"
The building elation that she'd felt throughout his first sentences falters, stuttering to a halt. Suddenly, their closeness comes to the forefront of her awareness. His touch, his gaze, and even the mundane way the fabric of their clothes has tangled together around their bodies; to notice these things now leaves a weight in her chest.
"Are you afraid?" Xan asks, softly.
She can't respond; he does not push her.
"I know," Xan says, and if Radri were less preoccupied by her thoughts, she would note that his tone betrays a hint of nervousness, "This commitment is far too great to fathom in a single moment. An elven bond is the closest intimacy I could have asked of you; I have had many days to reflect on it, and yet I have not granted you the same. I am not so fragile that I will turn away from you if you refuse me tonight."
Hearing that, her head jerks up, startling him slightly. Refuse him—in this? How could he imagine that she would, when even in the earliest of their days together—after she, by a miracle, had managed to convince him to stay—she had thought secretly, wistfully back to the kind of bond she had only ever been able to read about in books?
"No… No, I have been thinking on it, too," Radri says, and clutching the emotion in her heart, admits, "I am ready for our bond—but it is all I am ready for, right now."
"Then our bond is all I ask."
Shocked, she looks up at him.
"What do you mean?" Radri asks, "You… you're still willing, to...?"
"Radri," Xan says, a fond, relieved smile pulling at his lips, "Our bond is the one part of my question that I had always feared you would refuse. The rest can wait until the day you wish for it."
For a moment, she can do nothing but stare in disbelief. That feeling of elation returns, building little by little, replacing the heaviness in her chest.
"Can you ask me again?" Radri says, feeling somewhat breathless, "S—so… so that I might accept properly?"
"I have longed to forge the bond that will unite my world with yours," Xan begins again for her, and adds, with a look of unbearable tenderness, "I love you, Estel'amin. Will you have me?"
And at last she answers in a whispered, "Yes."
—
When Radri wakes, Xan is sitting up beside her, already awake himself. She stretches her arms out to hug him around the waist, and closes her eyes again.
"You've spent less time in reverie than I," she grumbles, "How is it that you're already awake?"
"Is it your wish that I return to bed, then?" Xan asks, brushing through her hair with an idle hand. "I will… But first, I noticed that you were running short of candles, so I brought you one."
Xan presents her with a lit candle. Radri, sitting up, beholds it with bewilderment.
"I… Thank you, but… if you're already burning it now, won't it go to waste?" Radri asks, looking at him. Still new to her heart, his presence and his feelings there are not yet easy to sort through, but she manages to single one out: anticipation.
"There is more to it, Estel'amin," he whispers, pressing a kiss to her cheek, "Just trust me."
Holding the candle between them, he faces her seriously.
"I wish to give you a promise, together with this candle," Xan says. "I… I feel you, now, as clearly as I feel myself. I know your fears as sharply as I know mine. And I promise: while you are here, with me, in reverie or in the waking world, you will not run out of candles, and whenever you have need of me, you will not find me wanting. —If you do have need of me, that is."
He extinguishes the candle, and looks at her with a slight smile.
"I almost do not believe it, but I feel… hopeful," Xan says. "And there, the candle is out. Do you forgive me for squandering it, now?"
"Yes," Radri says, barely managing to voice the word with how touched she is, and clearly past the need for any apology of his. "I'm… I…"
Xan just gazes contentedly at her, looking more at peace this morning than he has in days, and rather than trying to put into words what she feels after hearing what he said, she just wants to hold him. So she does.
"I suppose you will want us to return to reverie now," Xan says, his voice slightly muffled by the arms she's thrown around his neck. "I appreciate your offer to serve as my blanket, but it will be difficult to kiss you goodnight in this position… and I know how you cannot bear to forgo it."
"What even are you talking about," Radri groans, having reached her limit for deciphering spoken words the moment Xan's candle went out. There's simply too much information: from her heart, her head, this bond, and even the sun, whose rays are now peeking irritatingly in from the gap in the curtains at the window.
"Nothing," Xan answers, feeling all of this from her, and deciding to postpone his teasing for later. They have time. This hour, this day... and yes, perhaps even tomorrow.
—
full xan/radri compilation
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Hi I literally love y’all and thanks to these games I’ve now found a major need for more Ford/reader And Stan/reader fanfics
rosie: hey we love u too!! and psst i have some not to toot my own horn but
thank you for playing !
sovo: wink wonk i've had a whole handful up on ao3 for ages
#i write Fairly Above Average things#if ur lookin for some ford n stan content#rosie answers#Anonymous#sovo answers
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Can you make dipper pines hand writing into a font?
I can, however, someone already has! The great @sovonight recreated all three cipher fonts and Dipper's handwriting a few years ago, which you can find here! She ultimately inspired me to make my font recreation of Ford's handwriting, and helped me out a tiny bit in the process. If you don't know Sovo, I would highly recommend checking out their work! Even though they aren't really as active in the fandom anymore, they still have a lot of great GF stuff in their store and their art is top notch.
#gravity falls#chloe answers#stanford font#stanford regular#ford font#font#dipper#dipper pines#ford#ford pines#sovonight#she also has some really nice teas on Adagio that I personally love#they've gotten me through college#idk if she has links to that on her profile but#if you search Gravity Falls on adagio.com you should find it
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Leftovers: Noosa chills out with gelato; White Claw catches new wave with its Surf line
Leftovers: Noosa chills out with gelato; White Claw catches new wave with its Surf line
Leftovers is our look at a few of the product ideas popping up everywhere. Some are intriguing, some sound amazing and some are the kinds of ideas we would never dream of. We can’t write about everything that we get pitched, so here are some leftovers pulled from our inboxes.
Yogurt maker Noosa puts the chill on frozen gelato
Noosa maker Sovos Brands is making its first foray into frozen…
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Probiotic Yogurt Market: Key Players, Applications, Outlook, SWOT Analysis And Forecasts By 2030
The analysts at Future Market Insights (FMI) followed a multidisciplinary approach during the pandemic to study the growth and development of the Probiotic Yogurt Market. The report features insights on the current growth dynamics and the major revenue reforms prevailing in the market as of 2020 along with the key takeaways over the forecast period 2021 to 2031.
The team of researchers at Future Business Insights are focussing on research and market study to produce different Probiotic Yogurt Market forecasts and predictions at both national and international levels. They have considered several leads of information pertaining to the industry like market figures and merger estimations to assess and produce reliable and informative insights on the Probiotic Yogurt Market.
The report on the global Probiotic Yogurt market provides an up-to-date analysis of the existing scenario of the market along with the latest drivers and trends, and the overall environment of the said market. This report comes with an objective as well as an in-depth study of the existing state aimed at the growth of the key players, strategies of the market, and prominent drivers of the market. The report also makes the involvement of the important achievements pertaining to the launch of new products, regional growth, research and development, product responses, and market achievements. In addition to that, the regional growth of the prominent market players has been included in the report so as to provide a 360 view of the said market.
The following players hold a significant share in the global Probiotic Yogurt market:
The writer will create content on the general strategies of market players. And then will write the key players in the market are:
Danone S.A.
General Mills, Inc.
Nestlé S.A.
Fonterra Co-operative Group Limited
Groupe Lactalis S.A.
Mother Dairy Fruit & Vegetable Pvt Ltd.
Meiji Holdings Company, Ltd.
Chobani LLC
FAGE International S.A.
Good Karma Foods, Inc.
Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group Co., Ltd.
Sovos Brands Intermediate, Inc.
The Coconut Collaborative
Yofix Probiotics Ltd.
GT’s Living Foods LLC
COYO Pty Ltd.
Ehrmann AG
Forager Project, LLC
Lancashire Farm Dairies
Olympic Dairy Products Ltd
To Get Sample Copy of Report visit @ https://www.futuremarketinsights.com/reports/sample/rep-gb-3259
Segmentation
The report provides insights on the important highlights and current trends prevailing in the market. This helps the readers to gain a deeper understanding and form an unbiased opinion on the market. Numerous segmentations have been provided for this market based on:
Product Type
Drinkable Probiotic Yogurt
Spoonable Probiotic Yogurt
Source
Animal-based
Plant-based
Soy Milk
Almond Milk
Coconut Milk
Others
Queries Solved
What is the size of the overall Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market and its segments?
What are the key segments and sub-segments in the market?
What are the key drivers, restraints, opportunities, and challenges of the Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market, and how they are expected to impact the market?
What are the attractive investment opportunities within the Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market?
What is the Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market size at the regional and country-level?
What are the key market players focusing on?
What are the strategies for growth adopted by the key players in Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market?
What are the recent trends in Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market? (M&A, partnerships, new product developments, expansions)?
What are the challenges to the Probiotic Yogurt Market in the growth of the Food and Beverage Market?
What are the key market trends impacting the growth of the Probiotic Yogurt Market in the Food and Beverage Market?
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The report includes authentic analysis of the market and the present developing trends in the market affecting the growth. FMI speaks to stakeholders across the spectrum, including C-level executives, distributors, product manufacturers, industry experts.This ensures that the data collected is from highly reliable sources.
We provide accurate insights on various market trends to enable businesses to make informed and beneficial decisions to attain competitive edge over key players.
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heyyo you in on the sovonight dating sim project? do you mind telling us about your experiences/how it's going?
Yup I am! I’m writing for Ford and, Let me tell you, i’ve been having the time of my life working on this. I’ve written more than I have in the past two years! Everyone’s nice and super good at what they do. I’m so excited to see the whole thing to completion!
I don’t know how much I can talk about it though, about what I’ve written or things that are planned. Sovo said they’re waiting to have something solid before posting, so I dunno if it would be good to talk about Specifics.
This post, which you’ve probably seen, sums up where we’re at right now. I can’t wait to talk about it more!!
#I Feel Cool#hehe#THANKS FOR THE ASK#I'd love love to talk about this but AAAAAAAA#Gravity Falls Dating Sim#just#just let it happen
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REVIEW: WITCHES OF LYCHFORD BY PAUL CORNELL (AND A RANT ABOUT CLASS)
Those she talked to who wanted the store to come here had hardly embraced evil. They talked about how hard things were, how they needed to shop more cheaply without spending a lot of money on petrol, how they and their relatives needed the jobs Sovo would provide. There was something of a class divide there. Those who weren’t well off tended to back the store on the basis of economic survival.
As Lizzie had seen so many times with victims, the harder your life had been, the harder it was to give yourself room for ethical choices.
(Witches of Lychford, p103)
“Victims” – remember the word “victims”.
I’m going to start with two apologies – or one apology and one partial apology. First, I apologise for starting a review with a longish quote from the book I am reviewing. I’ve always thought this is a bit lazy, but it’s no exaggeration to say that these two paragraphs made me so angry – punch walls and slap innocent bystanders angry – that I thought it was worth pulling them out and considering them in detail. And, second, I apologise, in advance for writing a review that won’t talk much about the plot, writing or anything else within the covers of Paul Cornell’s Witches Of Lychford except the way it talks about class.
Actually, I’m not really apologising for that one. Consider it more of a warning about what is to come.
I don’t imagine Paul Cornell will be bothered that I was annoyed by his book. This little novella has been very popular, warmly reviewed, award nominated and the basis for not just a sequel but also a soon-to-be-released third book. Lychford and its witches appear to becoming the foundation of an ongoing series. And Cornell writes well enough – his style is restrained and understated (English, you might even say), there’s nowhere where the writing really takes flight stylistically, but nowhere either where you’d be offended by the gratuitously stupid. If you like this sort of thing, and people evidently do, there’s no reason why you won’t like this.
The threat represented by Sovo is not just the coming of an external evil. As the passage above makes clear, there is an enemy within. People are being seduced by its promises (and its associated cash). The mayor has been corrupted, good citizens are being won over and, on the northern edge of the town, in the gloomy, distasteful housing estate (“The Backs”) the unethical poor are rumbling discontentedly. We don’t actually see many of these people in Cornell’s novella, his Lychford focuses very firmly on the middle class, but those that we do see are weak and corruptible: like Jade Lucas, who will do anything including, literally, kissing the arse of the devil, for a slightly better job with Sovo.
Now, Cornell’s position is clear. The intrusion of this edifice of global capital into his England, (this precious stone set in a silver sea) is a BAD thing – even without the accompanying diablerie. His protagonists – especially the old witch Judith and the vicar Lizzie – are fighting to preserve the good and ancient order of Lychford with the church at the centre of the town, local boutique shops serving a discerning citizenry, respected ancient boundaries and the worthies of the town council (not a political party in sight) making the decisions that matter.
The poor, in falling for the devilment and the tainted silver offered by Sovo, are not necessarily evil, but they are weak, ignorant of what is really at stake and therefore incapable of resistance. They do not appreciate what really matters about Lychford. They are willing to surrender its history, traditions and order for fripperies: a wage, a place to live, ambitions to be more than shadows banished to the periphery of their town and this story. Their need for the basics of survival leaves them without the necessary backbone to make the ethical choice, thus someone must do the right thing for them. Someone smart, someone with the right background, someone who can be trusted to preserve order.
This mixture of lack of respect and paternalism made me very angry.
Yes, it’s true, poverty limits the choices and opportunities of those who experience it, but it is also true that in these communities people work hardest to make the right choices for themselves and for their families. It is poor communities that bring their kids up right, teaching them to respect each other and look out for each other, and do so despite every day being a struggle to make basic ends meet. It is precisely these communities where people make the bravest ethical and political choices, where they show the greatest strength, despite having least and it costing them more. And, of course, some fail but failure is not unique to their class.
It has, in recent history, been those who have had the most room for ethical choices – an infinite number of rooms, all en suite and with pretty bay windows looking over unspoilt rolling countryside – who behaved selfishly, who enthusiastically consented to the destruction of social safety nets and enriched themselves through the sale of public assets. It was not the poor on council estates who created the instruments of economic destruction that lead us to a decade of austerity and lost opportunity. It has, over and over again, been the comfortable and secure – those who can afford to buy nice houses in the ancient heart of Cotswold market towns – that have made the immoral choices that undermined the social values they claim to value so highly. And all the while they have continued preaching to the poor about their lack of moral fibre.
The poor are not just victims and the choices they make are not born just from their weakness. The truly strange thing about Cornell’s Lychford isn’t the presence of witches and demons and fairies. The truly strange thing is that the author can imagine that the situation is so bad that a large number of the town’s citizens might be willing to make a deal with the devil, but he can’t imagine that their choice might be a rational response to their discontent at the shitty end of the stick that they get from the traditional order that his protagonists are fighting so hard to defend. If he can imagine that the crappy jobs offered by an evil global corporation can be so appealing to the inhabitants of The Backs, why can’t he imagine that the cosy status quo of Lychford needs a kick up the arse rather than just assume that these poor souls are too weak, too ignorant or too lazy to do the right thing?
The Witches of Lychford ends with order restored, of course. The town has been saved from the evil of a supermarket opening on its doorstep and the rest of the world from the hell it would have unleashed. Lizzie, the vicar, has her faith back and Judith, the old witch, has Autumn as an apprentice to whom she can pass her ancient wisdom. All is restored and Lychford can stay just as it has always been.
Except, what about those of this happy breed of men who are still huddled on the edge of town in their grim council houses? Where will they work? How will they feed themselves? How will they live in this brave old world of their gentile Cotswolds’ dormitory town?
Cornell never tells us. The people of The Backs are entirely absent from the denouement of Witches of Lychford. It’s almost as if they never really mattered – almost as if this book was really only about preserving a certain type of English house “against the envy of less happier lands” and the depredations of our unhappy present.
There is one moment in the epilogue that is, I think, revealing. Cummings, the devilish supermarket manager, returns to tempt Lizzie in her church. There is a pile of money – tainted to be sure, but offered without strings – with which Lizzie could do good, could help those poor souls about whom she cares so much. All she has to do is take it and use it. Instead, she burns the cash in a show of defiance, to spite Cummings and his works. The idea that she might ask the poor what they want to do with the money, that they might be capable of making an informed decision for themselves, never seems to occur to anyone. Things go back to the way they were, Lizzie promises to hold a bingo night to raise some cash – knowing it will never be enough.
The Witches of Lychford has been well received. Its comfortable vision of middle Englishness has clearly struck a chord with readers and reviewers. I’m sure that Cornell and his novella’s heart are in the right place. He doesn’t really want to write poor people out of the world. I’m sure, too, that he’s sincere in his argument that the defence of traditional communities against the unfettered trampling of global big business is the decent, progressive thing to do. The problem is that the alternative for the hidden masses that so lightly impinge on his story is a return to a society where they are seen but not heard, not paid attention or money and not much cared about.
Lychford is a lovely place to live. A place worth defending. It just isn’t a place for everyone.
Witches of Lychford by Paul Cornell (Tor.Com, 2015)
This is an extended version of the review first published in BSFA’s Vector, no. 286
REVIEW: WITCHES OF LYCHFORD BY PAUL CORNELL (AND A RANT ABOUT CLASS) was originally published on Welcome To My World
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promise
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"It is true, then, that this Bhaalspawn is an elf? How unfortunate. Then again, it was inevitable that Bhaal would mar our people; it is a small mercy, at least, that she was not raised among us."
"…And why is that?" Xan asks.
"Her violent nature. It inhibits her ability to live peacefully in our society." An eyebrow rises—in response to the expression on his face, Xan realizes. He composes his features, glancing neutrally down at the report in his hands. His writing is neat, thorough… and carefully objective.
"She has no more violent a nature than most adventurers, simply trying to make their way in this world," Xan says.
"Is that so? What led you to this evaluation of her?" A wave of a hand. "Point not to her good intentions; they matter little when her actions lead only to bloodshed."
"I can only ask to be believed as one of her earliest and most constant companions," Xan says. "She finds no joy in the path she has been set on, and is as much at the mercy of the coming chaos as we."
"…I see." The words contain a sense of surprise—he was not expected to speak of her this way. "Well, it matters not in the end. She should not be a concern for long. No doubt another of her kin will dispose of her, as she disposed of Sarevok—and so it will go on until this period of chaos, too, is swept behind us."
Dispose of her? Xan's grip on his report weakens; the papers shift, threatening to fall.
"Ah, hold a moment." A shuffling of papers on the desk. "I nearly forgot—there is another assignment for you. You will be traveling to Athkatla. We believe that—"
"I refuse to go." Barely aware that his lips have moved, it takes Xan a moment to realize that the words were his—and that he is now being stared at.
"Ahem—well, let me first describe it to you in full. I know you may not think yourself qualified, but I assure you, you are—"
"I resign."
—
"You seem to contemplate your moonblade more often these days," Radri says.
Xan looks abruptly up from the exposed flames of the moonblade, and sheathes it quickly before she can see much of it. Letting the door to their room close behind her, Radri joins him by the window, noting upon her approach the way that he casts his gaze upon the windowpanes—quiet, and subdued. This alone is not unlike him, but his grip on the moonblade's hilt is tight, and as she'd said, she's noticed him watching its flames frequently ever since their reunion.
"Is something… wrong?" Radri asks.
Xan pauses, a breath held, before sighing and meeting her eye.
"I can hide nothing from you, can I?" Xan says.
Xan turns away from the window, the sunlight upon him shifting away from his profile and falling into bright lines upon his shoulders, instead. His hand is still on the moonblade's hilt, his thumb beside the gem on its pommel. Radri recalls that despite the lack of light in Mulahey's lair, the moonblade's gems had displayed brilliant flashes of color when she opened the chest it had been held captive in… but now, they appear dull and ordinary.
"I was going to wait until I was certain beyond a shadow of a doubt, but I think I am only deluding myself to hope otherwise now," Xan says. "My moonblade's flames have dimmed."
What?
"It—it isn't dying, is it?" Radri asks, despite feeling that her guess is unlikely; she fears that any other explanation would mean worse.
Xan casts his gaze down towards the dusty floor between them, pausing to consider his next words.
"As I think I mentioned once, this blade will outlive you and I for a long time yet," Xan begins. "No, it is something else. I thought at first that it was scolding me for failing to protect you from Irenicus… but those were my own feelings. Unfortunately, I suspect it is displeased with my departure from Evereska and the Greycloaks."
"Why?" Radri asks. "You haven't abandoned your duties. Like with the child, in the Temple District—you didn't need to be a Greycloak to help her."
"The moonblade's judgment is not a system of points and tallies, Estel'amin," Xan says. "If I commit senseless murder one day, but then save a life the next, do you think my moonblade would consider my transgression forgiven?"
"You know what I mean," Radri says. "You're still Xan, after everything. Your heart hasn't changed."
His gaze rises to meet hers with a solemn look.
"Hasn't it?" Xan asks.
His eyes are patient, waiting for her at his guidance's conclusion—and when she finds it, her brows flinch upwards in hurt.
"Me? But I…" Radri says, her gaze flicking down to the moonblade before returning to his eyes, "It only sees me as a Bhaalspawn?"
"I cannot say for certain how it sees you," Xan says, "But it understands what I am willing to do for you."
"What… What you're willing to…" Radri says, feeling faint, imagining what he would possibly need to do to draw the moonblade's ire, "No, you wouldn't do anything like that."
"How can we know? It is said that a man does not know his true limits until he is pushed to the brink of desperation," Xan says, and sighs. "Besides, I cannot be sure that the journey ahead will afford me the luxury of choice. Who can say what your fate will drive us to? Will there always be a better option? If presented with two evils, my death is certain, no matter which I choose."
"But—wouldn't the moonblade recognize that you're in a difficult situation, and be merciful?" Radri asks.
"I do not think it possible," Xan says. "Because as long as I am with you, there is a third choice: abandoning you. As I refuse to do so, I can only bear the consequences."
Consequences. Death. She knew the moonblade could kill him, but had never considered it a possibility—despite all his self-deprecating comments, Xan has always struck her as a steadfast and competent wielder. To think that she might be what changes that….
"Despite everything, we are, in a way, fortunate," Xan says, his voice filtering back into her awareness. "We have the courtesy of a gentle warning. It could have given no indication until the day it killed me, instead."
His tone is light—for him—and while his words are spoken almost sarcastically, she gets the sense that he's trying to reassure her.
"Is there nothing I can do?" Radri asks, feeling even as the words leave her that she already knows what his answer will be. Xan's resigned nonchalance fades, leaving only sadness in its place.
"There is nothing for you to do. It is my choice."
She should nod, she thinks; she should accept this as solemnly as he has, and exit without worrying him. But an unmistakable feeling of dread has already begun to burrow into her chest, and though she can duck her head, she cannot raise it. Cut off in her field of vision, Xan moves towards her, his hand reaching out.
"Radri…"
"No," Radri says, a distant part of her hating her failure to bite back her words, "No, it's fine. Khalid is dead, Imoen is gone, Jaheira is cursed, and now you are too."
With a forced, bitter smile, she turns on her heel and escapes the room before she can cry in front of him.
—
"You are still awake," Xan says, surprise apparent on his face. The small flame in his hand flickers as he slips into their room, night having long fallen outside.
"Just thinking," Radri says, though to tell the truth, her past few hours have been spent staring quietly out of the window with her journal untouched by her side. Pushing herself off the bed, she snags the candle from the side table, and meets Xan where he stands by the door; he lets the flame in his hand die, lighting the candle, instead.
"And you? What keeps you up so late?" Radri asks, recalling the echoes of another night. "No visions, I hope?"
"If only I could say that none remain, save for the one that stands before me," Xan says. "But, no. None that I have not come to expect."
"Deep in study, then?" Radri asks, stepping away to return the candle to the side table.
"One could say that," Xan says, and sighs. "I have been studying the moonblade again."
Radri stills. After she had run out of their last conversation, Xan had not brought it up again—and she, both ashamed of her response and preoccupied with worry for Jaheira's more immediate curse, had not either. In the end, Jaheira's curse had been resolved in a matter of days, but she doubts that Xan is here now to tell her the cure to his.
"…Has it gotten worse?" Radri asks.
"At this point, you would be able to see "worse" without my telling you. No, I have other news," Xan says. "If my moonblade were to attempt to strike me down, there is perhaps a way that I could survive it. I have discovered a way to divert part of the damage, so that it is shared between myself and another."
She blinks.
"You… You can survive it?" Radri asks.
"I may have a chance to," Xan corrects her, but it hardly tempers her response: in an instant, she has him in a tight hug.
"Xan," Radri breathes with relief, "Just tell me what needs to be done, and I'll do it. I have more health, too, I can take more of the damage—"
"Estel'amin," Xan says, his hand cupping her cheek and lifting her gaze to his, "When did I say that you would need to be the one to bear it with me?"
"Why wouldn't I be?" Radri says. Xan sighs.
"And to think, I agonized over this to such a late hour," Xan says. "Yes, in the end, you are the only one I can ask. To divert the damage, a connection must be established with the moonblade—not a true connection, only a fraction of one, guided by my hand. Normally, even this would be impossible, as the moonblade will accept ties to none but its wielder… but we are bonded, our spirits intertwined in the Weave. It will know nothing."
Xan separates himself from her gently, taking her hands into his, and looks seriously into her eyes.
"However, I cannot guarantee that this will work as I have planned," Xan says. "Even if we are successful today, there is a chance that the moonblade's wrath will be too great for us to bear, and you may very well end up dying alongside me. If you are at all hesitant, we will leave this here, and it will be as if I never spoke."
"I'm certain, Tahlimil. I want this," Radri says.
But at the sound of his name, a strum of uncertainty travels across their bond—when, usually, the emotion that her use of his name elicits from him is affection. Uncertain herself if she had felt that correctly, Radri searches the depths of his eyes—but she finds the same uncertainty there, as well.
"…Are you hesitant?" Radri asks.
Xan's eyes widen, caught—and as his gaze falls from hers, she notices what she had not recognized to be courage in his shoulders, as well.
"How can I not be?" Xan confesses. "The moonblade's consequences should be mine to bear, and mine alone. This is one burden I am not meant to share."
"...Then you don't think this is the right thing to do," Radri says, feeling the beginnings of a dull resignation grow in her heart. But rather than agree with her, the corners of Xan's lips rise in a faint, self-amused smile.
"No, I do. I feel I must have gone mad to think so, but despite everything, I do. It is only that, from this moment forward, all I can do is hope against hope that my choice is understood," Xan says, then his smile fades. "I seem to have found myself experiencing many of these moments, in these past months…."
His last sentence is spoken less to her, and more to himself—and he looks tired again, worn, like he did on the day of their reunion. The urgency of before forgotten, Radri reaches up to brush the shadow of his hair aside from his eyes, and trails the caress to hold the side of his face gently in her palm.
"Sounds exhausting," Radri says, softly. "Will you tell me?"
Xan's gaze rises to meet hers, and free from shadow, a trace of candlelight flickers in his dark eyes.
"Stories for another time," Xan says—and yet, his gaze is tender, and a weight seems to have been lifted, as if another piece of resolve has found its place. He draws her touch to his lips, and kisses her hand briefly, before releasing it back to her.
Unfastening the moonblade from his belt, Xan holds it between them, its grip held loosely in one hand, and its sheath in the other.
"This is your last chance to change your mind," Xan says.
Radri's gaze runs across the moonblade; its brilliant flames are hidden at present, and she has never stared very long into that fire when she had the chance, but she has an imprint of them on her mind's eye—perhaps from Xan's memory.
Radri meets his eye, committed, and Xan inclines his head.
"Then lay your hand over mine," Xan guides. "I will begin."
—
The pillow at the back of her head is firmer than usual. Scrunching her closed eyes further, Radri shifts, trying to ease the stiffness in her neck. She had had the strangest vision: a storm had visited her, and pain had followed, painted in vivid flames…
"Radri?" The word is hushed, relieved—and opening her eyes, Radri finds Xan looking worriedly down at her.
The pillow is him, she thinks, and then, Why am I…?
"You fell unconscious as I finished the spell," Xan explains, upon seeing the slight disorientation in her eyes. "I was barely able to catch you."
The spell—the moonblade. Radri sits up, her eyes finding the moonblade, which lays beside them. She doesn't know what she should expect. The moonblade doesn't look any different, and besides a faint headache that has already subsided, she doesn't feel any different, either.
"Did it work?" Radri asks.
"I believe so, though I hope we will not have to put it to the test," Xan says. "But that is not my concern at the moment. You cried out in pain…"
Xan takes her face into his hands, looking over her with worry—but all she feels now is relief, and she leans affectionately into his touch.
"I'm alright, Xan," Radri says. "In fact, I feel much better."
"Better?" Xan echoes. "You do remember what you have just agreed to?"
"Of course," Radri says, an effortless smile blooming on her face. "You're safe."
"…Safe-er," Xan concedes, though his expression carries all the words he's holding back. She's only secured him a chance; as long as he's tied to the moonblade, he's still doomed.
But at least we're doomed together, Radri thinks. She nestles in against him, floating on the feeling of having been able to do something to help, after all the helplessness of these past few weeks.
"We're really in this together now," Radri murmurs to herself, and sighs. "Almost like we're married."
Her head rests against his shoulder, but instead of accepting her into his embrace as usual, Xan stills, his surprise flitting across their bond.
"Married?"
"Ah—Wait, I meant—" Radri rushes, ready to take back her words, but Xan relaxes, drawing her close and kissing her hair.
"I suppose it is," Xan says. "Right now, your safety is all that matters, but perhaps once Irenicus is taken care of, we will be able to hold the ceremony. During those days we spent on the road, before everything, I imagined it would be a grand event, held in Evereska…"
Xan speaks wistfully, his head leant against hers—but Radri pulls herself away.
"You still want to marry me?" Radri asks, looking at him in disbelief.
"Yes?" Xan says, puzzled by her question—then his expression falls. "Do you… no longer wish to?"
"No," Radri starts, before rushing to clarify, "No, I mean, I do wish to! But, I thought… You know, given…"
"That you cannot enter Evereska? That was just a remnant of a dream; we can be wed anywhere you wish," Xan says.
"No, it's—"
"The size of the ceremony?" Xan asks. "If you desire it, it can simply be the two of us, although I assumed that at the least you would want Imoen present—"
"A Bhaalspawn," Radri forces out before she drowns in his consideration, "How could a Bhaalspawn associate herself with your House?"
She can't face him, but their bond communicates the conflicted emotion she hides on her face to him regardless. The sequence of his response follows: a shard of surprise, then a fierce protectiveness, which becomes a familiar warmth.
"Why should that matter?" Xan says. "My House will soon fall out of memory outside of Evermeet; my siblings have already left in the Retreat."
His touch finds her shoulder, but she does not relax.
"So I will never meet them?" Radri asks. "So you will never see them, ever again? Suppose we survive this, and live long—how will you explain me to them?"
"My life is my own. I will not have them judge me for it," Xan says; though subtle, there is an edge in those words. "Besides… I am not as close with my siblings as you are with Imoen."
"Your other ties, then," Radri says. "You do not think much of them, but you have them—many more than I."
"My other ties are of even less consequence," Xan says, growing serious and concerned now. "Radri… you know I care little for what others think. What is this really about?"
This is about him. This is about how, since the moment she read Gorion's letter, her life has well and truly torn apart at the seams—and how, since their reconciliation in the catacombs, she has not yet seen Xan hesitate to tear his apart to match her. She cannot regret her newly formed connection with the moonblade—not when it can save him, and allow him to stay with her—but she can add it to the cost of their love, and feel its weight press down upon her.
"I don't want you to do this for me," Radri says, her throat growing tight with emotion. "You shouldn't have to do this for me. I am the reviled Bhaalspawn—"
"And I am the moonblade wielder, and yet you now bear part of my burden with me," Xan says. "Would you deny me the same?"
"That's different," she says, "It's my fault to begin with."
"You may as well say that I am at fault, for choosing to follow you," Xan says, "Or Alaundo is at fault for writing his prophecies, or Bhaal is—well, perhaps we can all agree that Bhaal is at fault. Or is it the very nature of our world itself that is at fault?"
She doesn't respond, and in her silence, Xan wraps his arms around her in another embrace. His head rests beside hers, and his voice emerges low, and quiet.
"You wish to spare me, Estel'amin, but I am not content to be spared," Xan says. "Let me bear this with you."
His comfort is tempting, familiar. She had sheltered in it in Candlekeep's catacombs; in Baldur's Gate, when her heritage had become public knowledge; and in this same room, weeks ago, when Xan had found his way back to her and she had cried in his arms, Irenicus' pain still fresh in her mind. She wants to close her eyes and accept it again, but her thoughts run on: How long can this last?
One day, Xan will come to his senses, and he will regret having thrown everything away for her. What awaits her is either his death or his resentment...
...She should just let him go.
A pang shoots through Radri's heart at that thought, and echoes in Xan's. His compassion, his worry, rise in her chest—and enveloped in his warmth, she cannot bring herself to refuse him just yet.
"Okay," she whispers, at last.
"Will you promise it?" Xan asks. "Will you bind us together, as I did?"
There is a twinge of desperation in those words, as though he knows what she had just considered. A weak smile pulls the curve of her mouth upwards, for no one's benefit but her own.
"I'm not the one with the sentient sword," Radri says. "There's no need for binding. Besides, I don't have any spells."
"You do," Xan says. "Your kiss, for one. And I wish to be bound to you—so there is, in fact, a need."
Radri finds the strength to pull away from his embrace to look at him; Xan is determined, and completely serious. The line of her mouth breaks into a wobble.
"You are so…" She doesn't know whether she wants to laugh or cry; she releases a puff of a breath that could be the precursor to either, "Ridiculous."
The look on Xan's face softens, and in lieu of words he simply closes his eyes, presumably waiting for her binding kiss.
"Xan… really," Radri tries.
But as he waits, and she gazes upon him waiting, a small glimmer of hope emerges in her chest—not that her kiss can be any substitute for a spell, or that she has any ability to bind them together outside of their existing bond, but that she can believe him. Xan has weighed his sacrifices; he knows them better than she. And here, there are no monks, no Phlydia, no Keeper of Tomes, with a thousand words of warning and misplaced compassion that wind through her past to say but one thing: You are more trouble than you are worth.
"I promise to let you bear this with me," Radri says, at last. The words leave her more easily than she had thought—and miraculously, she feels lighter for them. A corner of Xan's lips rises.
"And…?"
Feeling a bit silly, she nevertheless leans in and kisses him lightly on the forehead. When she pulls away, Xan's eyes are open once more, bearing the warmth of candlelight within them as he meets her gaze.
"Thank you, Estel'amin." His love and sincerity wash over her through the bond; she blushes.
"N-Now—shall we go to bed, at last? Or are we going to exchange promises until sunrise?" Radri asks, standing quickly to avoid acknowledging the heat in her face. She holds a hand out to Xan, who gazes up at her with a faint smile upon his lips.
"To bed," Xan confirms, and rises to join her; he kisses her warm cheek.
She sits at the side of the bed, and waits for Xan to retrieve the moonblade and lean it against the side table, as always. When his attention is hers again, he accepts her hand, and the candle is extinguished with a quiet command.
#xan x radri#sovo writes#i realized that since i don't plan on having xan die i don't NEED to write the moonblade connection thing in#but then i was like no it's fine. it's more interesting this way
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desire
—✧✧✧—
some context (set after the following fic, but still context)
contains the lightest brush of sexual content known to man
—
Xan's gentle fingers work through Radri's hair, smoothing the last of her tangled strands. A final wash of warm water follows, streaming down her tresses and over the curves of her bare shoulders, leaving them clean.
"There," Xan says, and kisses the top of her shoulder, "It is done."
The bath sits to their right, filled with warm water from which rises a pleasant fog of steam. It's large enough to hold the two of them side by side; Xan allows her to enter first, then follows. Sinking into the warm water beside her, Xan tips his head back against the rim of the tub with a content sigh.
With the damp strands of his hair pulled back from his face, Radri can see his profile in its entirety; his eyes are closed, and the corners of his lips rest neutrally, casting an ambiguous light upon his expression, but she can reach inside her heart and know: in this moment, he's at peace.
Xan opens his eyes, glancing at her.
"You're smiling," he says.
Radri finds that she is. Rather than hide it, she lets it stay on her lips; she's happy, and she wants him to see.
"I was just thinking," Radri says. "Mere days ago, we were in the ruins of the old city, preparing to face Sarevok."
"And now we are here, granted a room in the Ducal Palace," Xan follows for her. "Truly, for all the outcomes I imagine for us, I can never predict the one that you will lead us to."
"I've never stayed anyplace like this. Even this bath is so… lavish," Radri says. The ceilings seem to rise so high above her; she wonders how they fit all these rooms into the height of the building. Beside her, Xan sighs.
"It is still nothing compared to what I could show you in Evereska," Xan says. "In the baths, the water is heated to the perfect warmth, and leaves the skin feeling soft. The air is scented, sweet and inoffensive, and strings of green leaves tumble down the pillars…"
"The baths?" Radri asks, both interested and amused, for she will never tire of his constant comparisons to Evereska, "You've never shown them to me."
At that, Xan gives her a sidelong look and a raised brow.
"I think you forget a crucial element of my memories," Xan says, "Namely, my own self's presence in them, at the time of the event."
"If it's about your state of dress, you're already unclothed now," Radri says.
"Of course, now," Xan says, "But to have shown you earlier, I would have…"
There's a slight furrow in his brow, now; she wishes to smooth it again, so in the middle of his words, Radri leaves a kiss upon his bare shoulder. His train of thought stops.
"Radri…?" Xan says, and since it's within her reach, she leans up to kiss the tip of his ear.
To her surprise, Xan does not voice her name again, or ask what she's doing; he's grown still, and the slightest flush has begun to develop in his cheeks, spreading there from the tips of his ears that she had so easily shown her affection to. Beholding him now, something stirs in her heart, and Radri folds ripples into the water between them to leave another kiss, this time on the line of his jaw.
But as she draws away, Xan sways in to follow, and meets her lips with his own. Warm, soft… his kiss coaxes her lips open, and she accepts, letting herself melt into his lead. In the background, she notes distantly the sound of droplets meeting the water, and connects it to the rising of Xan's hand, which has come to the base of her head, tangled in her damp hair, holding her to him. Still, there's space between their hearts that she could lessen, so she does her part to reduce the distance, drawing closer to him until she has met his chest with her own. He accepts her with a welcoming hand at the small of her back, and Radri finds her head tipped back against the rim of the bathtub, until at last Xan pulls his kiss away.
"Estel'amin," Xan whispers, and Radri opens her eyes, meeting his gaze. She dips into their bond, and finds love; a trace of disbelief, even after all this time; and something else, foreign to her. Focusing in on their love, Radri smiles up at him.
"I love you," she says, and tilts her head up, meaning to kiss him again—but Xan turns, letting her catch only the corner of his lips, instead.
"Not yet," Xan says, managing the words with an uncharacteristic amount of difficulty. "Have… have you had your fill of the bath? Shall we go to bed, then?"
"Not really," Radri says to his first query, and to his second, "Are you tired already?"
She had felt nothing like that from him, and indeed to her eye he appears fully awake and aware. The budding blush of earlier has deepened, casting an obvious wash of pink across his features; it's a sight that she so rarely gets to see that she's loathe to abandon it now.
"I see," Xan says, sounding like a man who's been sentenced—perhaps not to death, but to something approaching it. "Then let us stay a moment longer." He returns to his place beside her, though a strange caution is laced through his movements. Worried, she turns to face him.
"You don't have to stay," Radri says, though again she can find nothing through their bond that suggests he's in pain, emotional or otherwise. "I'll miss the look on your face, but I can find it again in reverie."
"Really?" Xan asks, "And how do I look, to you?"
"Endearing. So very endearing," Radri says, and admits, "It makes me want to hold you close and kiss you again."
Xan sighs; though she can feel that he's flattered, there's an undercurrent of regret there, too.
"It will have to wait, I'm afraid," Xan says, "I am not quite ready, yet."
His pink cheeks… his closed expression. All of a sudden, Radri understands.
"Oh," she says, her face reddening almost as much as his has, "Oh. Was it—that I—?"
"You have given me a gift, Estel'amin," Xan says, "It is one thing to commit the curves of your body to memory, but it is another entirely to know how it feels to hold you against my skin… and I must stop there."
"Must you?" Radri asks, and only when Xan stares at her does she realize, mortified, that she's voiced the words aloud.
"You… have no matching desire to continue," Xan says, stating the obvious with a trace of uncertainty, as though wondering if she had in the span of a conversation been abducted and replaced by a doppelgänger, "And I would not have you push yourself for my sake."
It's true; he can feel her heart as clearly as she feels his, and the extent of her desires have not changed.
"No, but I…" A part of her craves the look on his face; there's something so satisfying in his yearning, his longing, his flushed features, his desperation… "I want to see you."
Xan says nothing, and Radri burns, staring into her reflection in the water, too afraid to see what expression he might be wearing after hearing her words. But the bond cares not for her fear; she knows what his answer will be before he even says it.
"Then let us move to the bed."
—
Xan has donned one of the robes by the bath, and wrapped it closed around his body, even though they'll only be unwrapping it, she imagines, once they begin. Besides the robes, he's otherwise unclothed, and though she could have changed into her usual lounging attire after toweling off, Radri has chosen to match him.
She finds herself arriving at the bed first, and takes a seat by her pillow, her legs folded to one side beneath her. Xan is slower to join her, and she's given the chance to observe the way the silken robes hang from his body; despite having fastened them properly around his waist, one of the sides has already begun to fall away, revealing a generous glimpse of his chest. Radri finds her face growing warm again, and glances away as the bed dips, marking his arrival.
"Still so shy," Xan says, fond. His hand rises to caress her cheek, coaxing her gaze back towards his. "The sight is yours, and was yours not five minutes ago."
"W—well," Radri says, "You hid it away again. And…."
And we haven't done this before, she thinks. Knowing what she's asked of him, what they are here to do, everything feels different. Despite having no vision into her thoughts, Xan seems to understand what she's left unsaid, and gives her a soft smile.
"I only thought that you might enjoy undressing me," Xan says. "Or would you rather that I do it myself?"
Un… undressing him…. Before her conscious thoughts have even managed to turn this concept over in her mind, her fingers have risen to the smooth fabric, betraying her desire. Xan's smile grows, and he takes her hesitant fingertips, raising them to his lips.
"You can touch me, Estel'amin," he says, and kisses them; elation runs from his lips to her heart, and she feels as though he has sealed both his permission and unspoken request into her body. Xan guides her hand to his cheek, leaving her fingers draped along the side of his face and his jaw, then waits with patient eyes.
Her heartbeat is in her ears again. Xan's skin is soft, and as Radri drags her fingers down the column of his neck, she observes the new prominence of his every breath, every minute tensing of muscle, and every beat of his heart, pulsing against her fingertips. Her touch arrives at the hollow of his throat, and here she finally pulls her gaze away from the subtleties that had so mesmerized her, and looks to the task ahead: freeing him from the confines of his attire.
Her fingers slip beneath the neckline of his robes, dragging it aside. As the fabric slides away, revealing the pale skin of his bare shoulder, a slight shiver runs through him, felt by her in turn through her fingertips. Feeling endeared, Radri leaves a spontaneous kiss in the space between his neck and shoulder.
"Estel'amin," Xan sighs; her name brushes against the side of her neck, and she feels him leave a kiss upon her hair. She had had a vision—the robes, pooled around his waist, with only the tie left to undo—but it is far less important to her now than hearing him, feeling him, sigh against her again.
"Tahlimil," Radri whispers to him, "Will you kiss me?"
His hands find the curve of her waist, the back of her neck, and draw her to him; Radri raises her lips to his, and lets him fall into her. Whispered words escape him between kisses, words in elvish of love, beauty, and gratitude, which melt sweetly into her heart. Her confidence bolstered, she continues her hand's journey from his bare shoulder, pushing the sleeve down his arm; reading her intent, Xan relinquishes his hold on her waist to let the sleeve fall away. Left without this anchor, the smooth, silken fabric slips free of his shoulders entirely, leaving his chest bare.
"Estel'amin," Xan sighs again against her, and pulls away; she wonders for an instant if she's done something wrong, but when his gaze finds hers, there is nothing but love and longing in his eyes. "May I?"
His fingers rest along the neckline of her own robes, just short of teasing beneath it; he wishes to undress her, too. A sudden sensation of vulnerability descends upon her, coupled with a renewed flush on her cheeks; she's nervous, but with anticipation.
"Please," Radri says, internally glad now that she had decided to don a robe as well. She expects him to slip it off her shoulders as she had done for him, but his fingers slide just beneath the hem and slip slowly down, following the neckline's steep descent towards her waist. She had not tied her robes very securely in her nervousness and haste, so it takes only a single, deft pull to undo her knot, and then her robes hang freely, framing a bare strip of skin down the center of her body. Even more is revealed in shadow: while the robes follow the slope of her breasts, it only does so until their apex; beholden to gravity, they leave no coverage for the skin beneath. Xan has already seen her; Radri reminds herself of this, and yet she remains shy beneath his gaze.
"Will you look at me?" Xan asks. Only then does she raise her eyes to his. The flush in his cheeks has deepened; his eyes have grown dark, and seem to be set upon her with the intent of drinking her in. His fingers, still holding the tie of her robes, now release it to reach out to her skin—only to stop short, hesitating. She'd wanted to see him, to touch him; she's given him no similar permission.
"You can," Radri finds herself saying in a near breathless whisper, "If… If you wish… you can touch me, too." In the wake of Xan's hesitant silence, she guides his trembling hand to her skin, letting one side of her robes slip off her shoulder as she pulls his touch to the curve of her waist—then, in a slow drag, she guides his hand up. His palm finds the tender swell of her breast, and here, his silence breaks; he releases a low, breathy rendition of her name. Xan kisses her, and in doing so he leans her back—back, against the pillows. Lowering his head, his lips find her neck, and his soft hair pools upon her skin; Radri releases a breathy laugh at the way it tickles her jaw, and feels him smile against her.
"I love you," Xan whispers there, and trails his lips down to leave a kiss upon her heart, "My Radri, Estel'amin."
The points of his nails ghost over her tender skin as he explores her. His fingers find the bud of her nipple, and her breath hitches; Xan stops, raising his head to meet her eye, and flushed, Radri gives him a nod. Though she half expects him to lower his head again, he doesn't; Xan's eyes remain locked on hers as his fingers begin their gentle massage, and his other hand travels up from her hip to slide beneath the fabric upon her other breast. His touch is hot, releasing rare sparks of pleasure from her, and Radri can't help but squirm beneath him, her back arching for his attentions. Watching this, he smiles.
"Xan," Radri breathes, her hand grasping his shoulder, "I—Ignore me. Let me feel you."
She feels in their bond his quick acquiescence, but in practice, he takes his time; Xan drops his head to her lips, kissing her leisurely, before he parts to give her a loving, almost dazed look.
"I cannot ignore you," Xan says, "Your body so inspires and invigorates the mind…"
His fingertips trail down the curve of her body, from her breast, to her stomach, to her hips, leaving an excess heat in the wake of his touch that all seems to rise into her flushed cheeks.
"It—it's not much," Radri finds herself stammering, embarrassed. Is this what he thought, too, when he saw her the first time? "I… I know, it's…"
"Beautiful," Xan says, and kisses her neck again, "For it is your body, and you are so, so beautiful…."
"Xan," she says, "T—Tahlimil. I… I—"
And her breath catches, feeling something hard press against her inner thigh, through the silken fabric of Xan's half-donned robes. When she slides her thigh against his length, his hips twitch forward in response, seeking her friction and warmth—and when she looks up into his eyes, Xan's boldness has faded, overtaken by embarrassment.
"Estel'amin," Xan says, with some difficulty, "I cannot kiss you to your heart's content if you indulge in my pleasure."
The look on his face is completely new to her, avoidant and almost shy. Though a part of her is satisfied to see it, the rest wonders if she's pushed him with her request, after all.
"Would you rather that I not?" She asks.
"It… it is not a question of rather, but of your wishes."
"But what about yours?" Radri asks, worried now. "Did—did you perhaps wish that I not ask for this after all?"
"I only wonder how much pleasure you could derive from the experience," Xan says. "It is a simple event, and brief—and no doubt made briefer by your presence before me."
"But you would enjoy it?"
"I would," he admits, ever honest with her.
"Then I want to," Radri says. "Will you let me?"
After a long, long gaze, Xan only nods; and while the bond, as well, communicates this simple acceptance, beneath it lies a hidden depth: a roiling wave of yearning, love, and want. Radri sighs internally with relief; she has not pushed him too far.
"Would you lie back for me?" Radri asks. Xan complies, lying easily back against the pillows, and as she sits up to trade positions with him, Radri finds herself with another opportunity to observe the full length of his body. His musculature creates such sharp and delicate shadows; they draw lines down the column of his throat, shift upon his chest with the rise and fall of his even breaths, and then descend into the folds of his still-fastened robes, the tie of which lays low upon his waist. Though the robes do their part to hide the bare skin of his hips, they cannot conceal the presence of his arousal, which has already tented the fabric.
Radri finds herself staring, for a moment, at the way his breath moves through his chest, his stomach, and even, ever so slightly, bobs the tip of his arousal. Then she runs her gaze back up to his face, where his eyes meet hers with less of the heat of earlier, and more cool calm. Xan's desires are still apparent in their bond, but the wave that she had felt earlier has fallen still, blanketed by a layer of nervousness. Radri realizes then, too, that Xan has fallen quiet.
"Will you talk to me?" Radri asks. Xan looks at her with a trace of confusion.
"Now?" He asks, "About what?"
"Anything. I miss the sound of your voice," Radri says.
Xan raises a brow, his nervousness now layered with amusement.
"I must admit, few have ever told me that before," he says, "And none so sincerely. What shall I talk about? My love for you? The taste of your lips? The feel of your body against mine?"
Her blush returns to her face, ignited again in full force; through their bond, Radri feels a bloom of satisfaction from him, given form by the slight smile on his lips.
"N—none of that," Radri stammers, and his satisfaction only deepens, "Perhaps—I wish to know, how you… pleasure yourself."
There are moments when she feels his love for her and his pleasure intertwine, and crescendo into a release—but it is a secret kept for when he is apart from her, concealed from her attention by occurring only when she should already be deep in reverie.
"I want you to guide me… I want to feel you gasp, against me," Radri confesses, "And I want to look into your eyes as you do."
Xan stares into her eyes, and must have searched their bond, for he appears astonished to have found her wants sincere.
"Shall I tell you what I imagine, then, in those moments?" Xan says. "You are there. You are always there…"
He reaches for her in a wordless request, and she lowers her head to his, meeting him in a kiss.
"You kiss me," Xan whispers, against her lips. "Your hand rests against my chest. I cannot feel the touch of your fingers through the layers of my robes, only their weight and warmth…"
She places her hand upon his chest, and he takes it, dragging it higher, to rest where it had in his thoughts. His other hand buries itself in her hair, curving along the base of her head to pull her into another kiss; the leisurely pace of before is gone now, and he seems… almost desperate.
"It is our last meeting," Xan says. "I must go—or you must—and this is your last, sweet gift farewell. I dare not hold you too tightly, but you slide your arms up across my shoulders, and press the length of your body to mine…"
She does as he describes, returning them to the sensation she had felt only briefly earlier in the bath, of her bare skin against his; a slight pleasure sparks as her breasts, her nipples still firm and sensitive from his earlier attentions, press against his chest. Her thigh slips between his, sliding once more against the firmness of his length. Instinctively, his hips buck up against her, and she feels the fabric begin to slip.
"Not yet," Xan gasps against her, stilling his hips, "Estel'amin…"
"You have me in your arms," Radri murmurs to him, "What next?"
"Your body, your lips… they are intoxicating," Xan says. "My arousal grows, but I cannot yet bear to let you go, and can only pray that you do not notice. You whisper so sweetly that you love me… you promise that we will see each other again."
"We will," Radri whispers, and kisses him again, "We will. I love you, Tahlimil… we will always find our way back to each other."
"Then, you feel it… my distraction… my shame. I have so narrowly failed to conceal it from you. I would never ask… and yet you offer."
Heart beating faster now, her hand slips from his shoulder, trailing slowly down his side to find his still-clothed hips. His hand, trembling, comes to rest over hers.
"You feel me," Xan says. "You drag your hand along my length… and despite the fabric between us, I imagine that I can feel your skin upon mine…"
She thinks that his hand will guide hers, but Xan seems too drenched in anticipation, so Radri sends her touch lower herself, approaching the hardness still pressed against her thigh. Her fingers drag along his length; the fabric is thin enough that she can feel the contours of his arousal underneath. Xan has now tensed against her, determined to hold his hips still, but when her thumb smooths over his tip, he releases a shaky breath and thrusts up into her hand.
"Estel'amin," he sighs, "Your… your touch, is so different from mine…"
Radri smiles, and dips into their bond again; the nervousness of earlier has long since disappeared.
"I have felt you through your robes," she reminds him of his place in this story, "Now, do I undress you?"
"Yes," Xan sighs again, the 's' held into his exhale. His eyes have fallen closed, and he's begun to rock into the soft friction of her thigh.
"How is it that I undress you?" Radri asks, content to watch him.
"It does not matter," Xan says. "There are always too many layers to contend with… they are gone."
"Mm," she murmurs in acknowledgement, and abandons his arousal for a moment to undo the tie at his waist. With the smooth texture of the fabric, and all his movement, the knot has already been loosened and comes free with ease. The robes slip away from his hips, at last, and his body is left bare.
She cannot see his length from here; she would have to pull away from him, and she's loathe to abandon the contact between their bodies, the way his every breath can be felt against her. But she can feel it anew, and as her fingers stroke up to his tip again, she finds that a small amount of fluid has welled there; she draws a lazy circle there with her thumb, and he releases a soft moan against her.
"You are undressed," Radri murmurs. "And now?"
"Now you wrap your fingers around me," Xan says, breathily, "As you build my pleasure, you bring your lips to mine, and you kiss me… You have me promise, that…"
She wraps her fingers around his length, and Xan abandons his words in an exhale of pleasure; Radri kisses him, capturing the end of the sound. Other such sounds follow as she drags her hand up and down his length in cadent strokes, sinking into their bond to read the waves of his pleasure. His gasps, of her name, of yes, of please, are like a melody to her ears, sweeter than his early morning aubade. The rocking of his hips, which had been in time with her hand's movements, now begins to grow desperate.
"Tahlimil," she whispers, and kisses the corner of his lips so that she might not silence his voice, "What do you promise me?"
He is lost, almost lost—but not so far that he can't follow one last direction from his beloved.
"That I'm yours," Xan breathes, "Yours, only yours."
Through their bond, which had until now been overwhelmed by his pleasure, Radri feels a tug of need—for her acceptance, her approval, her love.
"You are mine," she promises, and kisses him; she feels him push into her hand, and his body arch into hers, as his climax washes over him. His lips grow slack against hers as all tension leaves him, and he sinks into the pillows, utterly spent.
Radri gazes at his half-lidded eyes, and the neutral line of his lips, so red and bruised with kisses. If she looks into their bond, she knows she will find his contentment.
"Did this please you?" Xan asks, when he has found his voice again. Radri smiles.
"It did," she says. Xan sighs in relief, and with a murmured spell, her hand is cleaned of his come.
"Well, I hope you have no other plans for the evening," he says, "For I would now like nothing more than to fall into reverie."
"Can I join you?" Radri asks.
"Still you ask, after all we have shared," Xan says, with drowsy amusement. "When would I ever desire to refuse you?"
Personally, she can think of quite a few scenarios in which he might refuse. As if he'd had a clear view into her thoughts, his lips quirk up into a partial smile.
"I have nothing to conceal from you. You have already seen me at my most desperate… my most undignified," Xan says, and takes her hand, intertwining his fingers with hers. "Tell me, Estel'amin… What might you wish for us to share tonight?"
And though she is tempted to ask for his original fantasy, she feels that what he had just led her through has already surpassed it. Radri curls up beside him, holds their joined hands to her heart, and asks to see those elusive, Evereskan baths.
—
? after
full xan/radri compilation
#xan x radri#sovo writes#since hearing the magical sequence of words i have found the will to post this
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the comprehensive xan x radri post! unlike their tag, everything here is categorized and sorted in nice chronological order 💖
last updated: 1 / 2 / 2024
— — —✧✧✧— — —
baldur’s gate i
— — —✧✧✧— — —
The Outline
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Xan: *sigh* Go ahead. Ask me why a mage carries a sword around.
Radri: Wh—what?
Xan: You were staring, and quite obviously. The sooner I satisfy your curiosity, the sooner we can direct our attention back to the dangers that surround us, so that we may endeavor to survive the day ahead.
Radri: O-oh, that's not why I... I'm sorry. It's a moonblade, isn't it? You don't need to explain.
Xan: So you are instead surprised that I so severely contradict the tales told of our people, for I do not sing songs and revel in the joys of life? *sigh* I've heard it all before, and I—
Radri: What? No! I'm sorry—I should just take my leave!
—
(In the early morning, at the inn.)
Radri, pleadingly: Imoennn, you know I need you to bargain with the shopkeeper for me!
Imoen: Bargain with 'em yourself. 'M sleeping.
Radri: Please, Imoen, no one else can do! You're so charming and peppy and disarming—
Imoen, pulling the covers back over her head: 'N exhausted! Jus' fork over the extra gold pieces, who cares.
(Radri steps out of the room, letting the door close behind her and falling back against it with a huff.)
Radri: Ugh! Really— (She freezes, realizing she's not alone in the hallway: Xan is there, mid-stride, just passing by.)
Xan: Is something wrong?
Radri, embarrassed, straightening immediately: No! Nothing. I—I'm headed to the store before everyone else wakes. Do you... need anything?
Xan: No; I have all I need, and an excess of supplies can just as readily doom a party as a lack of them. But shall I assist you?
—
(Xan glances over at Radri, who is very rigidly looking ahead, and sighs.)
Xan: I should not have said anything yesterday. It was presumptuous of me, and it is far worse to have your gaze avoid me entirely.
(Radri gives him a startled glance, then looks back away quickly.)
Radri: No, no—I'm sorry. It was rude of me. I'm just unused to being in the company of another elf... and a stranger.
Xan: You have known the others for a long time, then?
Radri: Oh, no. Imoen, sure, but I only met Jaheira and Khalid a couple weeks ago. But because they knew my father, they don't feel quite so much like strangers. Not to mention, one only has to nod through Jaheira's conversations to survive them... and Khalid does not ask more than pleasantries.
Xan: I see. Since I ask more than pleasantries, do I trouble you?
Radri, panicking: No! Not at all. It's refreshing, if anything. And really, I—I'm grateful for your help, I mean, to travel alongside a defender of Elvendom, is...
Xan, subdued: Do not think the moonblade makes me invincible, Radri. It is often more trouble than it is worth. And you should save your praise: I have not yet accomplished anything in service to you beyond placing myself in your debt.
(Radri glances over at him again, daring for the first time since Nashkel to actually catch a proper glimpse of his face: his expression is solemn, and his dark eyes are dull. The rest of the walk is spent in silence, until at last they reach the shop. Xan holds the door open for her.)
Xan: Imoen is usually the face of your transactions, I gather?
Radri, embarrassed: You heard all that earlier?
Xan: I can serve in her place, if you wish.
Radri: Oh—yes, thank you! Here, I have a list…
—✧✧✧—
Imoen: Radri... Radri! Whatcha doing, spacing out? You've gotta stir, or the stew's gonna burn!
Radri: Oh—sorry, Imoen.
Imoen: Really, if you'd had any chores back at ol' Puffgut's place, he woulda chewed you out already. What's on your mind, anyway?
(Radri's gaze drifts away from the cooking fire and back over to Xan, who's working on his spellbook alone. Imoen follows her line of sight, and looks back at her in apprehension.)
Imoen: Oh, no. Don't tell me you've let his attitude infect ya.
Radri: No, I… (She hesitates, wondering if she should share.) I walked with him in his memories, last night, of Evereska. It was so beautiful... his eyes shone as he spoke… but when we woke from reverie, it was all gone. Sharing his memories with me had only made things worse. And worse still, I didn't know what to say.
Imoen: I don't think even the best speaker on Faerun could brighten his day, Radri. Don't let it weigh on ya.
Radri: *sigh*...
Imoen: *gasp* He's already gotten to ya! Radri, quick, ya gotta smile—it's the only way!
Radri: Imoen, hold on—stop! I'm smiling, I'm smiling—the stew!
—✧✧✧—
Compounding Fluster [crossposted on ao3]
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Poor Substitute
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Special Treatment (skip the second one in the link, it comes later)
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Firewood
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By the Fire
—✧✧✧—
(Xan exits the inn with enough haste to send the lit lantern by the door frame swinging slightly on its hook. The lantern illuminates a quiet side street, and its light conveniently slants over the alcove in which Radri sits, quiet and curled up with a book, against the wall of the building. Radri looks up at his arrival; even from here, with a view only of the back of his head, she can gather that he's searching for something he lost.)
Radri: Xan? Are you looking for something?
Xan, turning quickly, relieved: Radri!
(In an instant, she recognizes that he was, in fact, searching for her. It’s a habit of hers to slip away—Imoen had assured Jaheira and Khalid of that, in the early days. Surely Xan had been met with the same exchange, and yet here he is. In a way, she can’t help but feel flattered.)
Xan: Why are you not inside with the others?
Radri: It's... a little loud inside. Too much noise…
(Now that she says it out loud, the reason sounds silly to her ears, but he doesn’t question it.)
Xan: I see. Still, I would feel better if you were not out here alone.
Radri, gesturing to the spot beside her: There's room for you, if you'd like.
Xan: If a shadow in the night emerges to slit our throats, I will not have the awareness or the speed to protect you, I fear. But perhaps my death would grant you some time to escape…. Very well, if you will have me.
(He joins her, and at this angle, catches the name of the book she's reading.)
Xan: The Dead Three? Of all the books that you have rifled through in search of spells and gold in our travels, I did not know you had deigned to take any one title with you.
Radri: This was Firebead's reward; I couldn't bring myself to sell it.
(She returns her gaze to the book, and sighs.)
Radri: I don't know why I keep returning to it. I'm not even reading the words anymore. I know the story, I just…
(She hesitates; what lingers on her mind is something she has been unable to utter to the others, and that she has even avoided confronting in words herself. It is a fear, really, one that the others would surely attempt to talk her out of… but not Xan. Haltingly, she speaks.)
Radri: …Do you ever feel like you're standing on a precipice? …At the very edge of falling. And it's as if… the body knows what lies beyond the edge, and is pulled to meet it… but the mind holds it back.
(With her eyes gazing distantly through the book’s pages, Radri fails to catch the responding quiet, longing glance that Xan sends her way.)
Xan: ...Yes. (Then he looks away, disappointed in himself to admit,) I experience the sensation daily.
Radri: I fear it, I think, but there's no use in dread, nor anticipation. What waits for me is already here. And I… and I….
(Radri falls into silence, feeling a chill move up her neck; on the book's open pages, her hand has begun to tremble. She flips the book shut, and grips it closed tightly.)
Radri: But never mind. It's getting cold, and late, and I shouldn't keep you here any longer. Shall we go to bed?
(She stands, and offers her hand to him. Xan stares at her.)
Xan: To bed?
Radri, pink: Oh—I'm sorry. To reverie, I mean. (Her offered hand withdraws partially, subconsciously, as she reflects to herself,) Though I suppose after so many nights, you must long for quiet, too. N-never mind. I'll ask Imoen—
(She doesn’t want to be left alone tonight, and Imoen’s unconscious company is better than none. But then Xan, composed again, accepts her hand before her doubt can rescind it.)
Xan: No, let us go together. Though it can only be a temporary illusion, I find a peace of mind in our rest together.
Radri: Really? (She ducks her head, her gaze drawn to the comforting sight of their joined hands, a touch which has already begun to take the chill away.) I'm... I'm relieved that I have not yet imposed on your kindness.
Xan, distantly, to himself: "Kindness." I wonder if it is….
—✧✧✧—
[crossposted on ao3]
"Will you guide me?" Radri asks.
"Guide?" Xan echoes, then gestures around them with a shrug. "It is a standard estate. There is the entrance hall, the drawing room, the parlor—"
"I lived in Candlekeep, Xan," Radri says, "The structures of "standard" living spaces are not exactly known to me."
"You say this as though there are no tomes on floor plans and architecture—but, no, I see that they must have been too dry for you to grant them your attention," Xan says.
He sighs, and holds out his hand.
"Very well... I will give you the tour."
Her hand slips easily into his, and a familiar jolt of joy and disbelief flits through her heart, unchanging no matter how many times now she has taken his hand. Unlike in the waking world, where their clasped hands facilitate the link between their minds, here, the gesture holds no practical use. For how readily and naturally he offers, this must all be second nature to him—but somehow, she's unable to reconcile the image of his offered, open hand with the way that she has so often seen him draw his cloak tighter around himself, as though the fabric were a barrier that could close him off from the world.
As they walk, Xan speaks in his low and solemn tone, describing to her the history in these halls; in the portraits, and artifacts; in the people that walk past, the figures of memory, their faces bearing a dreamlike quality. Radri finds herself staring, turning to look at them as they pass, subconsciously slowing until Xan's hand on hers acts as a tug.
"Come," he says, "We have almost reached the garden." She notes that they are already leaving the interior after only having passed through the common areas—wherever the chambers may lie, they are above, or further within.
Scattered sunlight spills in through the windows, filtered by the leaves that rustle gently against the panes from the outside. Warm yellow and deep green tones, abstracted by the thickness of the glass, make the windows appear to glow from within. Ahead, a rectangle of sunlight marks the presence of a set of glass doors, and they pass through them to a veranda, where the greens and yellows of earlier burst into detail and bleed vibrancy into the air around them, filling their surroundings with color.
Here, her hand falls from his, and her feet take her ahead on their own. A path, lined with flowers, winds into the swaying shadows of the trees, and her steps slow in these shadows, falling easily into silence.
"Radri?" Xan calls, with some worry, to have seen her disappear—but Radri does not call back, her hand pressed to her silent smile. There is no danger here in the calm of the past; perhaps she will loop back and surprise him, or perhaps he will follow. There sounds a rustle of leaves, a dragging of fabric—yes, he will follow.
She keeps two steps ahead, and yet traces a rhythm that she remembers easily, a pattern that she had learned at Candlekeep. Its memorization had been inevitable seeing as, for years, she'd had only the same set of shadows to train in. It is no wonder, she thinks idly, that her skills had remained in plateau until she had left. Her eyes, half lidded, can make out the obstacles now: this path to silently round the hay bales... these steps to slip past the barrel... this way to reach the door, and with practice, open the door without a sound. To her surprise, her hand, outstretched in memory, finds a handle. It is not crafted in an elegant arc, like the ones inside the estate, but bent into the bold angles of a firm, humble bracket. A flash of dread passes through her, but it is too late: she pulls.
The man behind the door turns at her entry, and his eyes gleam in satisfaction and glee.
"Oh, goodie goodie!" He cries, "I've gone and found ye first! You are the ward of Gorion, no doubt?"
Her mouth works, but her voice is gone, stolen by the sensation that has numbed her and turned her legs to lead.
"Not much of a talker, eh? I apologize for this sordid business, but I must have your head," he says, and advances upon her, bearing the tell-tale glint of a blade. With a vicious grin, he drives the dagger forward to meet her, and though her body tenses, knowing how to escape, she can't move—she can't move—
Her eyes shut tight, and a hand grasps her arm, pulling her sharply back. There is a clatter, followed by a heavy, dead thud, and she is spun around by her shoulder, as another hand comes to her cheek—trembling, light—Xan.
"Radri... Radri? Please... look at me."
But when she looks, she does not meet his eye; her gaze drawn away, cast back over her shoulder at the fallen man, who lies not dead, but unconscious.
"It is only a memory," Xan reminds her, drawing her away. The door closes, and they are back in the garden—but, her heart beating fast and high in her throat, she pulls away.
Away, away, and out of reverie. The night air is cold on her skin; her pillow is damp against the back of her neck; and her hand, clasped in Xan's, is nearly slick with sweat. Tugging herself free, Radri curls onto her side, moments before Xan gasps belatedly awake beside her.
She hears him shift, turning to her... then pause, silent, no doubt forming what he wants to say.
"Candlekeep," Radri says for him, cutting his unspoken question off before he can say it. "It happened in Candlekeep."
"I had thought that the first attempt on your life happened at the Friendly Arm," Xan says. "The others...."
"I never told them," Radri says, and her voice begins to tremble as her words spill out, "I—I mean, you saw it, what a... what a poor attempt, the... the man wasn't even armored, that—that dagger was all he had... what kind of leader would—would—"
"Would have frozen?" Xan says, quietly. "You were home, where you had been safe for decades, as long as you can remember. You were not prepared, and a moment of fear is nothing to be ashamed of."
"I can't have any moments of fear."
"Oh, but you should," Xan says. "I recommend it. No one is invincible, and the few true fearless are bound to foolhardiness and doomed to an early death."
Slowly, Radri lifts her head, gazing back at him. Her eyes are still damp with tears, but no pity shows in his; his gaze only softens, bearing relief. She wipes the tears from her face with the side of her hand, until Xan silently offers a handkerchief. He is quiet for another beat, and then,
"That day," he begins, slowly, "will you tell me what happened?"
She had thought that she had long swallowed the words, but now they rise, pressing against her closed lips. There is no magic at play, here; only time, and memory, and his quiet patience.
"He missed," she says. "The dagger, it... it only cuts me above the brow... and lands in the wood beside the door. He wrenches at it... there is an unruly nail, you see, Dreppin always did swear he would fix it... and though I have my opening, all I can do is stare. I had driven my blade into the hearts of countless illusions just earlier, but—but I'm too afraid to stab him. Then, I hear the wood crack, and I panic: I knock him out with a blow to the head."
Radri laughs, weak, and empty; Xan remains silent beside her.
"You know, the funny part is, I stepped back out into the sunlight and it was like nothing had happened. Parda asked, but... I thought that was it, so... I didn't say a thing. But then—but then—you have to guess," Radri says, feeling almost lightheaded, like something in the air has sent her mind spinning. Judging by the grave look on his face, she doesn't expect Xan to humor her—but he does.
"There was a second attempt," he says. "Just when you had thought it was safe again."
"You're right," Radri says, faintly, feeling strangely empty now. "I stabbed him that time... there was blood, on my new armor... surely Karan had seen it, and yet... I still couldn't say a word."
She falls silent, clutching the handkerchief in her hand, her eyes dry now, and her cheeks sticky with tears.
"I'm sorry," Radri says.
She ducks her head, unable to see the way Xan blinks from compassion into puzzlement, blindsided by her apology.
"For what?"
She doesn't know; she can't put it into words, knowing only that shame fills her chest. Shame, for being here in front of him—for craving his attention so deeply and totally when she has done nothing with it but worry him. Danger did not used to follow her; things did not happen to her. She had always been quiet, inconsequential, like a shadow in the halls.
"F—for," Radri begins, and then her hitched breath overtakes all other words, and she can only shake her head silently as she attempts to hide herself again.
Xan sighs. She curls in tighter on herself, sure that whatever he had seen in her has lost its luster now. Perhaps, if she had not accepted his offer of shared reverie, she would have been able to bear the facade for even just one day longer.
But then, fabric shifts, and instead of standing and walking away, he leans in, holding her.
It is a tentative embrace, and to some degree, it is awkward: she has brought her knees up to her chest, hunching in upon herself, so Xan is left to drape himself over the mountain she has made. His head tilts against hers, but it is held rigid, and leaves no weight upon her; and there is the slightest tremor in his fingers, whose touch is similarly feather-light, although they curl into the folds of her blanket, still draped around her. This balance is held for one frozen moment, until a sob escapes her, and whatever restraint he had had breaks, pulling his warmth and weight to her as though a new source of gravity had manifested in her chest.
"Forgive me," Xan says, quiet and low, "My arms can provide little comfort, but I am afraid that my words would provide even less."
She wants to speak; memories crowd in her chest, memories of Candlekeep, so unchanging across the decades that they all merge into a blur. She is the obedient child, quiet as she is told to be; the daughter of a storyteller, able to pluck the morals from any tale; the reader staring down at a thousand pages, for whom the world starts and ends between the covers of a book. She is an observer, nothing more. She is not seen. She is not seen.
And yet here she sits, painfully present in the real world, in the grounding weight of Xan's embrace. A great part of her wishes dearly again to hide—but a budding fraction feels nothing but sweet relief.
When at last she can exist again, she lifts her head, and Xan releases her immediately. She raises her gaze to meet his, and Xan looks pensively back at her, until he reaches out to tuck her hair back behind her ear. He places a kiss upon her forehead, and though fleeting, weightless, and gentle, with that kiss the last of whatever insecure words she'd held on her tongue are gone.
"The next watch is mine," Xan says, unfazed, as though he had not just turned some layer of her reality over. "If you wish, you can join me until you are ready to return to reverie."
He holds out his hand to her, and she takes it, allowing that familiar spark of elation dance through her fingers and up into her heart again.
—✧✧✧—
Friends
—✧✧✧—
Then I Shall Stay [crossposted on ao3]
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Newly Vulnerable (the second one in the link)
—✧✧✧—
Art Exchange
—✧✧✧—
First Impression / Attention
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United in Misery
—✧✧✧—
Waiting [crossposted on ao3]
(extra art)
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Recognition [crossposted on ao3]
—✧✧✧—
Stealthy Care
—✧✧✧—
Fever
—✧✧✧—
[Next is two versions of the same idea—I couldn’t pick one to throw out]
Radri: I think I've perfected my system—see? (She begins unfolding pages out of her journal, which each expand to a size larger than the journal's cover itself.) Map. Local maps. Open quest list. Closed quest list. Inventory—
(A regularly-sized page flutters out from the complicated arrangement; Xan retrieves it for her, then pauses.)
Xan: What is this ominous page of untitled dates?
Radri, freezing: Oh, um, a record of every... quail I have seen. I mark down the day.
Xan, raising a brow: I did not know you were a quail enthusiast.
Radri, quickly taking the page back: Well, we still have a lot to learn about each other.
—
(A quail passes by in the underbrush.)
Xan, flatly: Ah, there is another one. Will you mark it down?
(Radri, who’s about to reach unwillingly for her journal, pauses, then huffs.)
Radri: Fine! It's a record of every day that I have seen you smile! I am sick of marring it.
Xan, stunned: What? Why would you feel the need to conceal that?
Radri, annoyed: Because you'll say that I'm silly for keeping it, that we will all turn to dust, and that the work I put into recording these things is pointless because it is futile to preserve anything—a struggle which one would think I am intimately familiar with given that I spent my entire childhood in a giant archive.
Xan, fond: Oh, Estel'amin, even in your anger, your beauty is breathtaking to behold. Come here.
(Radri looks at him, and grows even more annoyed, though she still lets him gather her into his arms. Her face is now pink.)
Radri: I am still not marking down today.
—✧✧✧—
(Radri’s head rests against Xan’s shoulder as they rest together; he brushes absent-mindedly through her hair with his fingers, watching the way the last of the day’s sunlight plays across the strands, as they did so many nights ago.)
Xan: Do you remember that first night by the fire, when I arranged your hair?
Radri, eyes closed in contentment: Yes… it's a memory I used to revisit often. It was the first time I saw you smile.
Xan: I... I did?
Radri: You had this faraway, peaceful look on your face... I was unable to return to reverie for hours afterwards. I just kept picturing your smile when I closed my eyes.
Xan: A restlessness that I can relate to all too well. But... you spoke in the past tense, earlier. Is the recollection no longer to your liking?
Radri, defenses low, drifting off: It was a beautiful smile, but once I loved you I couldn't bear it anymore.
(The brushing stops.)
Xan: What do you mean?
Radri, realizing what she confessed: I-I mean… Well, I… My glimpse of it was clearly stolen, and it was not meant for me—you were no doubt recalling a memory. (She sits up, looking away, embarrassed.) When I began to wish dearly that you would look at me like that, I didn't want to see it anymore.
Xan: Well, it is fortunate that you now have memories to replace it, then.
Radri: ...
Xan: …Estel'amin, I know for a fact that I have smiled more with you than I have in the past four decades.
Radri: ...
Xan: *sigh* My beautiful, beautiful Radri, what doubts yet linger in your mind? What reason would I have to be false with you?
Radri: None.
Xan: None.
Radri, unable to contain it anymore: But sometimes, surely, you're just smiling at the beauty of nature around us! How could I presume to have factored into any part of that joy? I merely happen to be present.
Xan, dryly: Yes. Surely, you just “happen to be present” in all of the happiest memories of my life. Radri, there is coincidence, and then there is causation. You can believe me when I say that you are the cause.
Radri: ...
(Xan tilts her face towards his, leaning in to kiss her on the cheek.)
Xan: If the countless words I have spouted in our months together have not been enough to convince you, what shall I do to show you? (As he leaves his kiss, he catches sight of the welling tears in her eyes.) Oh, Estel'amin...
(Radri turns her face quickly away again, covering it with a hand.)
Radri: No—I'm not sad, just touched!
Xan: Your earlier laments are wasted on yourself; you should lend them to me, who seems only capable of making his beloved cry. Though, it gives me the opportunity to kiss away your tears. Shall I?
Radri, lowering the shield of her fingers a fraction to glance back at him disapprovingly: That sounds unpleasant and salty for you.
Xan: And yet I would readily perform the gesture. Do you glimpse now the depths of my devotion?
(As he waits for her acknowledgement, her eyes widen in surprise, and she forgets to shield herself entirely.)
Radri: Oh... you're smiling.
(In his own realization of it, the smile is gone in an instant—but the memory remains.)
—✧✧✧—
A Gift [crossposted on ao3]
—✧✧✧—
Radri: I used to dream of finding someone to share all that I am with. I still cannot believe that I've found you.
Xan, touched and blushing a little, hiding it quickly: I dare not ask if I am all that you dreamed of. —And yet, there are the words now, hanging irrevocably between us. Let me guess: you envisioned gallant knights, white horses?
Radri, laughing: Do you think I immersed myself in love stories? That would be Imoen, not me.
Radri: I… It may be silly to say, but… I couldn't bear them. They were other people's stories; there was no place there for me.
(Xan looks at her softly, understanding; embarrassed, she doesn't meet his eye.)
Radri: B-besides! Even when I dared dream, I could never have imagined you.
Xan, unsure if he should be flattered or insulted: …
Radri: I mean—! You're… so… you.
Xan, unimpressed: I am… so… "me". Surely, in another life, you could have been a wordsmith.
Radri: Agh, just give me a second!
Radri: You were… so… intimidating, to me. Speaking to you felt like walking on a tightrope. ...As a child, I imagined that I would feel instantly at ease. That no matter where I was, with this someone, I would feel a sense of belonging… like I could finally come to rest.
Xan: …
Radri: And that's you.
Xan, blindsided: Radri—you very clearly defined how that is not me.
Radri: Not in the beginning, but it is now. (She waves a hand to the side idly.) A lot had to happen, of course, which I could not have imagined as a child—but, anyway. What about you? (She leans into him, wearing a lighthearted smile.) Am I all you dreamed of?
Xan: If you must know, I dreamed of little; I felt early on that I would not be one to continue on the family line, and chose not to dwell on romance.
Xan: But…
Xan: You have been all that I dared not dream of, Estel'amin. In knowing you, I realize that I have starved myself, for a long, long time…
(He kisses her hair, and she accepts it shyly, too touched to say anything. Xan gives her silent, flushed face an amused look.)
Xan: No response? Ah, I must still intimidate you, I see. (Smoothly, he takes her hand.) Perhaps more exposure will help.
—✧✧✧—
Xan: Sigh…
(Xan glances over at Radri, who hasn't looked up from her journal.)
Xan: Sigh…
(Xan glances over at Radri, who still doesn't look up. Xan sighs for real.)
Xan: It used to be that you would look up at my every sign of distress. (Radri finally looks up at him, but Xan looks away) Oh, how I wish big, strong Radri would come here and comfort me…
Radri, laughing a little: Alright, I'm here. What is it that troubles you? A general malaise?
Xan, frowning a little: Is malaise not already general?
Radri: …
Radri, pulling away and cupping her hand around her ear: My apologies, my lord, but I'm getting another call, from Lady Adventure—
Xan: Wait—
Radri: And she doesn't mind if I don't look up my every word in a dictionary—
Xan: Radri! (He sighs and turns away, giving up) I should have known better than to ask for your attention.
Radri, with a little smile: Oh, but I just remembered that I prefer your company to hers, so I redirected her call.
Xan, feeling sorry for himself: If only that were true.
Radri, teasing: Is what I'm hearing a general malaise?
Xan, still too sorry for himself to meet her eye: It is something, alright.
Radri: Well, perhaps I can work my magic.
—✧✧✧—
Rational Grief Response
—✧✧✧—
Storyteller / Return to Candlekeep
—✧✧✧—
[The first rest after being freed from Candlekeep’s jail; they’re still underground.]
(Radri has hidden herself away in shadow; it’s only through their bond that Xan is able to find where she’s retreated away from the rest of the group. He can’t see her, but he knows she’s nearby.)
Xan: Estel'amin... Will you speak to me?
(For a moment, he fears that he’s mistaken, that she’s not here and that he is only speaking to dust and cobwebs—but at length, she responds.)
Radri: We have nothing to talk about.
(Her voice… he’s facing the wrong alcove. He turns, searching for her direction.)
Xan: You are displeased with me, and for good reason. What I said was uncouth and unwarranted, and it will never happen agai—
(She interrupts his apology, barely listening, her tone clipped and dismissive.)
Radri: You should return to the others. I want to be alone.
(This alcove. He’s sure of it… he thinks. Something is off about her tone of voice, and he realizes that it suggests she’s not angry at him. If not him, then….)
Xan: …I do not think you should be alone in a time like this.
(A bitter laugh—and a fortunate scrap of light hits the familiar crimson of her cloak. There she is, in the darkness: her back is turned to him, and her hair spills dark across her shoulders, which are hunched in on herself as she hugs her knees to her chest, her form made small and cut off from view in the shadow of a cracked pillar. He would like nothing more than to rush over and embrace her—but he waits.)
Radri: Why? Are you afraid that I will spontaneously burst murder and chaos into existence around me if I am left unsupervised?
Xan: Radri—
Radri: The prophecies are written, after all, and I have already been dragging trouble around with me since I stepped out of Candlekeep. All of these spells, these nightmares, and that damned book—I knew it, I knew something was wrong with me! (In the midst of her anger, something in her voice breaks, leaning into sorrow.) You saw it too—dread filled your eyes when you looked at me. And yet when I pleaded with you, you stayed. We sealed it all with a bond that must not break... oh, how deeply you must regret it now. I will never be anything more than an unwanted burden, shuffled between keepers—I am sick of this life!
(He feels for a moment like he’s looking into a mirror—not this lament, but another, though are they not in a way all the same story retold—and the sorry hatred and bitterness in her voice seep readily into his thoughts like an old, unwanted friend. For that moment, he feels it; in the next, he lets it go.)
Xan: Rage at me for my thoughtless words as you will, but do not malign our love. It is true that I once sought to leave you, but it was nothing but the act of a coward, so afraid of the thought of losing you that he believed he would rather live with a hole in his chest than stay and love you. Indeed I knew nothing, for now that I have known your love, nothing across all the Planes could ever convince me of abandoning you again. I have never regretted our bond, nor dreamed of breaking it.
Xan: And what of Gorion? Was he not a father to you—did he not love you as his child? You do yourself and his memory a grave disservice to speak of yourself this way!
(Radri, who had remained unmoving, flinches at his words then with a choked, muffled gasp of breath; he pales, pulling back, worried now that he has overstepped his bounds. And yet, still, he cannot bring himself to leave her entirely to her suffering.)
Xan: If you truly wish it, I will leave. But I fear I cannot believe your request if you do not face me and say it. Please, Estel'amin... will you look at me?
(His heartbeat, loud in his ears, keeps him from any internal estimate of the passage of time. A thought, persistent at the back of his mind, tells him to leave now before he ruins what he has with her any further—and yet he stays.)
(Her cloak slithers across ruined tile, and her form retreats fully behind the blocking pillar… and then she emerges, standing, facing him as he’d asked. Her expression is solemn, and her dark eyes are dull, though something in her gaze still glimmers.)
Radri: I wish I were nothing.
(It is not the truth, and he is relieved for that. He takes a cautious step towards her—and as though he had broken some sort of silent stand-off, Radri’s lip begins to quiver, and then she’s crying, her tears spilling freely down her face. She makes no move to wipe them away; and neither does he, really, because when he rushes to her, he holds her, pulling her to his chest and kissing her atop her head, uncaring of whatever cobwebs certainly cover them both.)
Xan: If you were nothing, how could I hold you? How could I kiss you?
(He kisses her again; she has made no move to hold him in return, but this is a fatigue he understands, and he holds her tightly enough for the both of them.)
Xan: It is painful, I know, but you are here, and my heart is with you—and so is that of your sister, and of your father's old friends, who have through your just leadership become your own. (After just the barest pause, he adds reluctantly,) And I suppose even Viconia must feel some tiny, miniscule shred of supportive, positive emotion somewhere in her heart for you, which is a miracle in itself.
(She is silent, but then,)
Radri: …You referred to her as my sister… Imoen will be overjoyed to hear this.
(It’s too early for her to jest in earnest, but he finds himself holding onto the unlikely hope anyway.)
Xan: Ah, of course, out of everything I have said, this is the one word that sticks. Does this bring a smug smile to your face? I will imagine that it does.
(Radri pulls away from his embrace, which he relaxes, but does not release entirely—nor does she make the full effort to leave. Instead, she gazes quietly at him, seemingly merely in want of the sight of his face. He appreciates the sight of hers in return, but while some life has returned to her endlessly deep eyes, sorrow still lies within. He runs a gentle thumb across her cheek, still stained with tears; he has never truly regretted his nature, but he comes close now.)
Xan, quiet: What should I do, Estel'amin? I am no use in lifting spirits without a spell; that craft has always eluded me. Shall we return to the others, who will surely do what I cannot?
(Rather than accept readily, she glances down and away.)
Radri: I'm... not ready to face them yet. Can you stay here with me... just one moment longer?
Xan: Then I will.
—✧✧✧—
Desire [crossposted on ao3]
—✧✧✧—
(In the early morning, in Baldur’s Gate. Radri rouses from her reverie, only to see Xan already packed for his journey, and making his final preparations before he is off.)
Radri: Were you going to leave without waking me?
(Xan turns to face her; his expression holds some disappointment, but also a resignation, and to a subtler degree, a quiet gratefulness.)
Xan: That was my intent, yes. Though I should have known that it would not be so easy to slip away from you undetected.
(He leaves his backpack on its chair, and sweeps back over to the bed, leaning down to lay a gentle kiss upon her forehead. Radri gazes up at him, still blinking away the last sensations of her reverie.)
Radri: But why?
Xan: Why? If you could see yourself now, you would understand why. It was hard enough to muster the will to pull away from your resting form, let alone resist the pull of your vulnerable, open gaze.
(She snags his sleeve as he begins to pull away.)
Radri: I will walk you to the city gates.
Xan: You will not. If I let you accompany me to the gates, the moment I step through them you will declare, “I will walk you to the next town,” and so it will continue until your next words are “I will walk you to Evereska.” No, I must hold you here, and hold firm.
(She's a little put out—he's got her dead to rights. Radri sits up, glancing about the room.)
Radri: You have everything? Spellbook, components, potions—?
Xan, dryly: Yes, you have provided me with enough health potions to outfit a full adventuring party, and I thank you for your confidence in me.
Radri: …Perhaps I should accompany you to the next town anyway.
(She moves to swing her feet over the edge of the bed, ready to get dressed—but Xan stops her with a firm, unamused gaze.)
Xan: Radri, what am I, a fresh-faced youth being sent on his first adventure? (He sighs, and sits at the edge of the bed, taking her hands in his.) I would like nothing more than to take you back to Evereska with me, but its gates are closed to you. Would you have me be so cruel as to force you to wait outside for me as though you were a stranger?
Radri: You could.
Xan: No. You are my hope, my world, and my soulmate. I could not. Besides, it is you who insisted so adamantly that I keep our relationship a secret—not that I planned on telling my superiors anything in the first place, since it is a personal matter. If we were seen together, the nature of our relationship would be known instantly.
Radri: How so?
Xan: Estel'amin, have you forgotten already how you have transformed me? I would need to study for a hundred years to conceal the love I have for you—and I have no desire to, for I would wish for the whole world to know.
Radri, red: Surely not the whole world.
Xan: Indeed, the whole world. Were this land not ripe with our enemies, I would shout it from the rooftops, and spell it out in the sky... but you have already begun to shrink away from me in terror, I see. Do not worry; I will be discretion itself.
Xan: So, are you satisfied with our farewells? May I take my leave now?
(Radri looks at him, and at the backpack on the chair, and at the ceiling and walls of the room that surround them—a room that, without him, will surely feel large, cold, and empty. She will not be alone after he is gone; the others are still here in the city, ready for adventure, wherever it may take them. Still, she feels as though she is about to return to the loneliness she had lived in in Candlekeep: surrounded by many, yet seen by none.)
(Xan, after waiting and watching throughout her silence, begins at last to pull away—but she holds on, one last time.)
Radri: Are you not going to kiss me?
(A deeply tortured look flashes through his dark eyes, which she recognizes now to be of the kind that he used to send her in their early months together. It spells a yearning for that which he believes he should not have—and before she can wonder what it is that he has forbidden himself this time, he leans in, kissing her. He lingers, tender, savoring the moment… as does she. As they part, at last, he gives a soft, gentle sigh.)
Xan: Now I will think of little else but the taste of your lips. You have ruined me, Estel'amin, and yet I carry your soul with me happily, with all the contentment of a man oblivious to or uncaring of death...
Xan: I promise, I will return to you as soon as I am able.
—✧✧✧—
Sad Influence
— — —✧✧✧— — —
baldur’s gate ii: soa
— — —✧✧✧— — —
Reunion
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Birthday Wish [partially crossposted on ao3]
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Promise [crossposted on ao3]
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Innate Evil
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Xan: Do you think your father would have approved of me?
Radri: Hm? My human father, or my divine father? Because from what I've read, Bhaal was a cruel and difficult god to impress, and you haven't the temperament for his methods of worship.
Xan: (shivers) No, and I am glad I do not. I meant Gorion, of course.
Radri: ...
Xan: ...You are giving it more consideration than I thought. Never mind, Radri—it was a foolish question, and perhaps I no longer wish to hear the answer.
Radri: I think he would have liked you. We shared a similar sense of humor; he would have enjoyed your jokes.
Xan: Yes, these famous jokes that I myself am not aware of. I see, so I would become a court jester to not just the princess, but the king, as well.
Radri: I think if you were a court jester, it would be to the king first, and to the princess second. —And did you just liken me to a princess?
Xan, red: A slip of the tongue, I am sure. Though given the abysmal attitudes of nobility in the human lands, you deserve far better than to be compared to—well, let us just move on so that I do not inflate your ego any further.
(Xan turns his gaze back to his spellbook, ready to return to their earlier comfortable silence—but Radri takes his hand in hers with a soft smile.)
Radri: You make me happy, Tahlimil. No matter what he might have thought of you... he would be glad for that.
(The corners of his lips rise slightly, in what has almost become a regular occurrence… then the smile falls.)
Xan: I... mentioned before, my dreams, where my parents disapprove of our relationship....
Xan: I think they would have their misgivings. Certainly about the way that I have thrown everything aside for you, like a lovesick fool... a fool that perhaps I am. I have left my career... left Evereska... and indeed, one could say I will begin to shirk my duty next, though I have not been struck dead yet.
Xan: But I think if they had the chance to know you, they... they...
Xan: *Sigh* Never mind. This is a pointless line of thought. I cannot imagine what they would think, and I will not see them again for an eternity, and that is only if I am lucky. I regret having brought it up.
(Radri gazes quietly at him, then tilts her head against his shoulder, the contact gentle and light. He does not tense, so she squeezes his hand lightly, pressing their palms together: for the briefest moment, some of what burdens him is shared with her.)
(He sighs again—not sharp this time, but soft—and he tilts his head against hers.)
—✧✧✧—
[A while after this exchange:
Xan: I wanted to enchant a ring for you, but this one overshadows everything I will ever be able to give you. How ironic that it comes from the Shadowmaster of Athkatla.
Radri: And how unfortunate that none of us can even wear it, our equipment being what it is. I would rather have your ring, instead.
Xan: A mere bauble will not protect your life, and I have no time to enchant it properly. Perhaps in the future... but no, I have distracted myself from what I wanted to say.]
Radri: I've been thinking about your ring.
Xan: My ring...? Ah, the one that has yet to be made.
Radri: But it already has, hasn’t it? You’ve carried a ring with you ever since you returned from Evereska.
Xan: You noticed? I can slip nothing past you, I see. But it is not complete, Estel'amin—as I alluded to before, it is unenchanted, and as such, it is yet nothing.
Radri: It is not nothing. Its current form is to its advantage: enchanted, it would have to compete with the other enchanted equipment I carry, but unenchanted, I can wear it always.
Radri: Even now, it would bring me courage—or, would you rather that it raise my sense of self-preservation, although as I keep trying to convince you, it is already appropriately high?
Radri: I... I suppose we speak so much of the future now, and of dreams of a quiet life, and when we’re so far from all of it, I’d feel one step closer to…. Oh, never mind. I feel like I’ve stolen a secret from you; I'm sorry, I won't mention it again.
(She looks away, out across the cityscape; in the sunset, even the slums district appears awash in glittering gold. Beside her, Xan remains quiet for a moment, then retrieves something from the pocket of his robes.)
Xan: This ring has been passed down in my House. Through trial and tribulation, and the endless march of time, its magics are gone, having long served their purpose; it holds only its history now. I carried it with me from Evereska thinking, perhaps, that I would give it new life—that when it was ready, I would present it to you in ceremony...
Xan: But perhaps I have been thinking too long.
Xan: Here. My ring, unfinished and unpresentable as it is. If it pleases you, even in such a state as this, it is yours—but I promise you, I will strive to make it worthy of you someday.
Radri, meeting his eye warmly as she accepts it: I love it, Tahlimil. It is already worthy.
Xan, embarrassed and relieved: Why does my mind insist on tormenting me with thoughts of your judgment, when my heart already knows what you will say? Though now that it is on your finger, perhaps it is time to let go of my frivolous dreams of holding a formal ceremony. We may as well just find a quiet spot in which to say our vows.
Radri: No, we must still have the ceremony. Because you wish for it, it must be so, and it will be grand and beautiful.
—
Radri: I lost it.
Xan: Lost what?
Radri: I lost it! Linvail's ring! I had already been thinking of getting rid of it since it only takes up space in my backpack, but—to not even be able to recoup the barest fraction of its value by bringing it to a shop?! Oh, I can't believe I—Xan?
(Radri looks up in time to see Xan shaking in silent laughter, which then bursts out in a full laugh.)
Xan: Of course! Of course, you would care so little about a ring powerful enough to belong to royalty that you let it be misplaced! What an absurd life it is we lead!
Xan: Meanwhile, mere trinkets are given the treatment of kings—even the blooms I had set upon your hair a year ago were kept carefully preserved in your journal, as though they were imbued with a lifetime's worth of magic and not merely painfully ordinary. Sentiment will not save your life, but you hold it dearer than the things that could.
Radri, half insulted: I think I strike an appropriate balance between sentiment and practicality.
Xan: Oh, Estel'amin, smooth the furrow in your brow; I do not laugh at you, but at myself. I see that even if I spent centuries in study, you would not love the ring I enchanted for you for its boons, but for my efforts. What pointless, pointless jealousies I bear…
(His rare mirth fades as he sobers once more.)
Xan: But I am sorry that the ring was lost—it was truly in a class of its own, and now you will earn nothing for it.
Radri, still in shock and awe of what she’s just witnessed: No, I... think in the end, it paid for itself.
—✧✧✧—
Dragon Slayer [crossposted on ao3]
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Just Friends (a direct redraw)
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A Monster
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The Graveyard Encounter (an outline of changes)
[At the inn, after Xan survives and Bodhi lies dead:]
Xan, at the tail end of asking Radri a question: ...What do you think?
(He turns to her, but Radri has her head down, and clearly hasn't been listening to him.)
Xan: Radri?
Radri, quiet: You nearly died.
Xan: I know. Admittedly, I am still shaken by the encounter. If it were not for you and my moonblade, I would have been transformed into something abhorrent... once again, you have my gratitude, Estel'amin.
(Xan seems content to leave it at that, but Radri isn't. She lifts her gaze to his, revealing the tears in her eyes.)
Radri: But it was so close.
Radri: If I hadn't formed a connection to your moonblade—If I hadn't asked the right question that day—
Radri: W-would you even have told me on your own? That it was possible? Or would you have kept silent, and died today?
Xan, worried by how shaken she looks: Radri... none of us are ever far from death. Though it may not look it, every day is like this one. Luck, coincidence, and sheer miracles save us—
Radri, firm, distraught: Our actions save us.
Radri: And today I could do nothing but watch—Don't you understand?
Radri: I-it's not like I couldn't get there fast enough.
Radri: I was right there—but it's like I was frozen again, and—
Radri: And I would've had to watch you die—
(Radri's voice breaks, her tears falling—and Xan, truly concerned now, goes to hold her)
Xan: You did act, Estel'amin. I could not have been saved without your will.
Radri: ....
Radri, unable to word the turmoil she's feeling, just repeating: It was too close.
Xan: I know.
(Radri just lets herself be held for a moment, instinctively searching for him through their bond again, but it's too faint for her to feel anything close to what she did in that moment in the graveyard, when the urgency of the moment had lended her a single-minded determination. She pulls away to look at him—the dusty shoulders of his robes, his combat-mussed hair, the fading scar on his cheek... his worried eyes. She'd caused that, by making a bigger deal of this than he had.)
Radri: Tahlimil?
Xan: Yes?
(She'd wanted to ask that he not leave her sight for the time being, but holds the words back.)
Radri: You... you were asking me something earlier, weren't you? I interrupted you.
(Xan can tell that's not what she wanted to say, but lets her change the subject—and knowing how affected she still is, he changes his question, too.)
Xan: I asked... if you wished to join me in the bath.
(The tub the Copper Coronet provides is barely big enough for one person to soak in, let alone two; Radri tries to communicate this, but in her current state, it comes out as:)
Radri, caught off guard, puzzled: I... but... the inn, it doesn't... what, take turns?
Xan, warm, amused at her sentence fragments: No, no. Would you believe that I discovered a bath house nearby? Far too late to enjoy after our escapades in the sewers, but perhaps it was waiting for when it would be most needed. There is a private room we can share. What do you think?
Radri: Oh. I... I think that sounds nice.
(Xan's small smile becomes relieved as he sees the tension in her shoulders already relax a fraction.)
Xan: Then follow me.
— — —✧✧✧— — —
baldur’s gate ii: tob
— — —✧✧✧— — —
World’s Saddest (Hypothetical) Chosen
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Innate Evil, Self Accusation Edition
—✧✧✧—
[The TOB scene where Xan cooks her an omelette.]
(While Radri begins to eat, Xan just leans his chin on his hand, gazing contentedly at her.)
Xan: When this is over... when we have made our home... I would cook breakfast for you each morning.
Radri: I see you don't wish to suffer through my meager skills in the kitchen.
Xan: I could never find any aspect of my lady wanting, and your skills will grow with time. No, I would cook for you to love you.
(It’s been so long, and he’s said that he loves her so many times, that Radri imagines she should have developed at least some resistance to it by now—but she hasn’t. She blushes, touched.)
Radri: Are you not going to eat, too?
(Xan gazes dreamily at her blushing features, fully content.)
Xan: Oh, I have already been fed, and most heartily. If I had known even earlier the extent of what shy expressions you reveal in private...
(Radri blushes harder.)
Radri: Each day it becomes harder to believe that you are the same man who spent ten minutes gathering the words to ask if he could kiss me.
Xan: Ah, but I am not the same man. I am remade each time I wake and meet your eyes; each day I walk at your side; each night I rest my beating heart beside yours. I have been transformed a thousand times over, and wish to be again.
Radri, gathering him a forkful: I think you should be transformed by this omelette.
(Xan takes the bite from her fork, and his expression falls, disappointed.)
Xan: Oh... I do not think I added enough salt, after all.
—✧✧✧—
silly alternate universes
radri was raised “evil”
radri was raised in evereska
#i didn't even know what to title this. 7000 words of me getting this ship out of my system??#sovo writes#baldur's gate#honestly though the way he was like 'she'll get over me' after the effect he had in HERE is like. i dont think so my man#xan x radri
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firewood
-~-
Glancing around the camp, Jaheira raises a brow.
“Why has Radri not yet returned with the firewood?” Jaheira asks, her gaze finding Imoen’s, who gives her a clueless shrug. “It has been too long. Someone should—”
“I will look for her,” Xan volunteers, and rises from his spot to set off towards the trees, matching the direction Radri had gone in. The moment he leaves earshot, Imoen meets Jaheira’s eye with a delighted grin and a nudge.
“What did I say? He’s gotta be sweet on her,” Imoen says. “He barely let you finish talking!”
“Or perhaps he is simply concerned for a fellow companion,” Jaheira says, though as she turns back to her task of laying out the herbs she’s collected, the curve of her lips holds some amusement. “If they are not back in ten minutes, let me know.”
—
Radri’s red cloak should stand out easily in these surroundings, but Xan has yet to see any trace of the vivid fabric. Unbidden, his mind conjures up all manner of sinister reasons for her delay: beset by monsters, caught in a magical trap, kidnapped by—
There. A sliver of red, pulling him from his thoughts.
Xan alters his course, heading directly towards it, uncaring of the brush underfoot as he makes his path. Red, the color of Radri, marching ahead, her cloak fluttering in the wake of her steps yet sinking into shadow when she wills it; red, the color of blood, soaked into her sleeves, staining her skin in splatters and streaks. He’s lost count of how many times his heart has frozen at the sight of it, fearing it to be her own, until Radri catches his eye with a small, reassuring smile: I’m alright, it’s okay.
When Radri’s figure comes into view, he’s relieved to see that she appears to be unharmed. What surprises him—and makes him scrutinize the scene to determine if she hasn’t been put under a charm of some kind—is how she appears, dare he think it, carefree.
Her shoulders are relaxed as she steps and twirls between collecting firewood, her cloak sweeping around her light feet. A bundle of wood is nestled in the crook of her arm, its rigidity a poor partner for her fluid movements, but she doesn’t seem to mind. She hums a rendition of one of the melodies they’d last heard at the inn, then breaks out into song for the lyrics she remembers. She would make no bard, but the genuine smile he glimpses on her face holds charm enough for one to forgive her forays off-tune. The only magic at play here is her, Xan thinks, and finds himself lost in the sight… until suddenly, Radri stops.
Xan wonders why she had stopped, and realizes belatedly that he had snapped a twig underfoot. Radri whirls around, dropping the wood to go for her swords, but freezes when she sees it’s only him.
“Xan,” Radri breathes, her voice hushed and surprised. Relief is plain on her face, before it’s quickly replaced by something else—which he doesn’t manage to catch a glimpse of, because she ducks her head, dropping down to pick the firewood quickly up again.
“Um. I. Did I take too long again?” Radri asks.
In short, yes. But somehow he’s still too struck by what he’d seen to communicate this verbally in a timely manner, and Radri, head still ducked, decides not to wait for his answer and hurries past him, back towards camp.
“Radri,” Xan manages, finding his voice again. She halts, ahead of him.
“Yes?” Radri glances back at him, habit overriding her need to hide her face, and he sees what she was trying to conceal: cheeks aflush with pink, and eyes that hold a bright embarrassment in them.
What was he going to say, again? What could he say, after that? The firewood had made a poor partner, he’d thought. A better one would be…
A better one would keep her alive, not imagine taking her hand and joining her.
“Consider not venturing out alone next time,” Xan says. “If I had instead been an enemy—”
“I know,” Radri says, interrupting him. “I will.”
The look in her eyes has changed, and she gives him a small, forced smile, before turning to head back towards camp again. The pace Radri sets is slightly challenging, as if despite heading to the same destination, she doesn’t want him to catch up.
Or perhaps it’s just him, and his thoughts which now occupy themselves with deciphering that parting look in her eyes. Xan finds himself returning to camp after the fire has already been prepared, crackling merrily away upon the gathered wood.
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a gift | xan/radri
✧ — ✧
It is early in the morning, and the light in the inn's room is dim. Radri opens her bleary eyes to find Xan already awake and sitting up in bed beside her, flipping through his spellbook by the light of a candle on the side table. Rather than turn the other way and go back to sleep, she sits up herself, joining him in quiet preparation for the day ahead. Opening her journal on her lap, Radri unfolds the maps she has collected of the surrounding area, and begins to plan out their journey. Xan's turning of pages settles into the background of her thoughts, periodic and soothing, its rhythm interrupted only once for Xan to give her a glance of acknowledgement, brief but fond.
As her gaze passes over one of the taverns on the map, the sight of its name brings a small smile to her lips, and her fingers are drawn to the homemade amulet around her neck: Imoen's gift to her. Xan had been surprised and somewhat intrigued to declare that indeed, the necklace carried a protective enchantment from the fragments that had been crafted into it, although how the magical properties survived despite not being properly repaired, he could not say.
"Xan, when is your birthday?" Radri asks, now that the thought is in her head. Xan glances up from his spellbook, thinks for a moment, then returns to his work with a slight shrug.
"As chance would have it, it is today," Xan says, as idly as though he were commenting on the weather. For a moment, she thinks this must be an uncharacteristic jest, but the longer she regards him, the more convinced she is that he is, indeed, serious.
"Today?!" Radri exclaims, at which Xan sends her a startled look of confusion. "Why didn't you tell me earlier? Oh, now I have no time to prepare!"
The maps must go—or, no, perhaps they should stay. She could take him somewhere. But would he even like that? Is there even anywhere to go? What in the world is there to show someone who has been traveling the land much longer than she has? How could she possibly find it, when even after their travels thus far, she still remains on the inside just a sheltered child of Candlekeep?
"Radri," Xan says, his calm voice interrupting her panicked thoughts, "There is no need to prepare anything. It is a day like any other; I am content to let it pass without acknowledgement."
"No, no, I have to think," Radri says, and then it comes to her. "Wait. Yes! Here, you will decide where we go today."
She pushes her maps into the little valley of the blankets between them, with a bright, relieved smile. Xan stares at her, then at the haphazard pile of maps.
"Ah. The gift of responsibility. I suppose I should first declare that I will endeavor not to get all of us killed," Xan says, and sighs, reaching not for the maps, but for the journal still on her lap, which lies open to her latest entry. "We were in the middle of some winding quest, correct? We may as well see it through."
"What? No! I'm not putting you in charge to finish quests," Radri says, flipping the journal closed and pushing it aside to emphasize her point, "What do you want to do today?"
"It is hard to say," Xan says, sending her a flat look and a raised brow, "You already took "let it pass without acknowledgement" off the table."
She would let it pass, but… he already asks so little of her, and gives her so much. There is no sense of obligation there, he has made that clear, but what she wants is not so much to repay him as it is to express all the emotion in her heart. Her love, her gratitude, normally locked behind her paltry words—here is a chance, and yet, how can she celebrate him if he insists he needs nothing?
"Isn't there anything, anything at all that you wish for? To take a day's break in peace and quiet, or to study your craft without thinking about what it will be useful for in a quest, or…" As her words trail off into his silence, Radri sighs, her shoulders falling as she looks away. "Never mind. If there is truly nothing that you desire, then today will be a day like any other."
She pulls the pile of maps back into her lap, tidying them back into her journal. Perhaps they will just finish that aforementioned quest today, and if so, she already knows where to go. The quiet page-turning of earlier does not resume however, and a moment later, Xan's silence is broken with a sigh.
"If you are determined to grant me something, then I ask for a kiss," Xan says.
"Just a kiss?" Radri asks, confused. "Are you certain? You don't want something less… mundane?"
"There is nothing mundane about it," he says.
When she meets his eye, he is sincere. She would have preferred a gift that took some effort from her—perhaps then, it would feel like enough—but if this is all he wishes, then it will be so. Radri places her journal to the side; she crosses the little valley in the blankets between them, and closes her eyes, waiting for him to claim his kiss.
"Ah," Xan says, interrupting her wait, "But I must receive the kiss from you, otherwise it will not be a fitting gift."
She freezes. Come to think of it, Xan has always initiated every kiss they've shared.
"I… I…" Radri finds herself stammering, suddenly helpless to do anything but stare into his gray eyes. There had been a twinkle there, a glimmering wink of light—but in a heartbeat, it is gone.
"Or, I need nothing," Xan says, with a slight shrug. "A day like any other."
"No," Radri says, "No, I will…"
She's no longer fully conscious of her words, her thoughts bent solely upon the task before her. She leans in towards him, ever so slightly—the first step is, of course, to close the distance—but with what she swears is the trace of a smile at the corners of his lips, he relaxes into the cushions at his back, reclining so that if she wants to meet him, she must come in closer towards him again. In the back of her mind, she registers the sight of his spellbook—it is closed, now, but not carelessly, her old ribbon marks his place—and it rests to the side of his idle, relaxed hand, which now lies open. Open, and available to hold her, to pull her to him—but aside from his steady breaths and the few blinks that interrupt his patient gaze upon her, he does not move, waiting for her.
Her hands find their places to bring her back to him, pressing palm-down into the mattress to either side of his reclined form. Her heart, beating loudly in her chest, would have her believe that she were facing off against some dangerous beast, and not the petal-soft lips of her beloved that rest just five inches away from her own. While he must be fully aware her turmoil, Xan's clear gray eyes betray nothing—and as though knowing they are her last lifeline, he closes them at last, waiting patiently for her kiss.
Radri stares at his closed eyes, his eyelashes, the gentle waves of his hair, and the stray lock that so often escapes it, which brushes a serpentine curve down to his lips.
Five inches… just make them zero.
Four…
Three…
Two…
…Overwhelmed, she buries her face in his shoulder.
"Last I checked, that is not where my mouth resides," comes his idle comment, "As is evidenced by the fact that I am speaking unimpeded."
"I know," Radri says, in what she intends to be a normal response, but which comes out as more of a muffled moan of despair.
She has the sense that he is smiling now, but she refuses to lift her head to see it. His arm shifts against her, the movement felt in the shoulder she has found shelter against, and a caress follows, moving across her hair to the nape of her neck. A kiss is pressed to the top of her head.
"Perhaps this is my gift instead," Xan says. "A quiet morning in which I may delude myself with illusions of your safety."
"You can have that any morning."
"Not any morning," Xan reflects idly, "But I have already done it before, I suppose. I have collected as many as five seconds before our doomed reality makes itself known again."
Hearing that, she has to kiss him. Radri lifts her head up from his shoulder, looking determinedly back down at his lips.
"Now I have a sense of what our enemies experience when they face you, I think," Xan says, with an amused tilt to his brow. As he regards her a while longer, though, the look in his eyes shifts, and his tone is nothing but fond as he murmurs, "Ah, and there is the sight that I have become accustomed to."
It's only when he points it out that she becomes aware of the building warmth in her cheeks. As always, she burns hotter under the compounding effects of his gaze and her own awareness, and Xan sighs, lifting his hand to run his cool fingertips across her cheek in a gentle caress.
"You do not have to force yourself," Xan says. "I consider myself fortunate that you permit me to show you affection in such ways to begin with; it does not need to be returned in kind. Shall we leave this behind, and face the day?"
"Wait," Radri says, a new spark in her thoughts, and she grasps his hand in her own. "May I…?"
Xan's gaze flicks down to their joined hands, then rises to meet hers, understanding in his eyes. He nods, and this time, when he closes his eyes, so does she.
There is a place within, where the troubles Xan lifts from her shoulders escape her being; where the melody he strums across their bond comes to rest once it has sung through her veins; where an echo of his soul rests beside hers, both calm and restless, both troubled and content. He had guided her on how to form the bond, but he had not guided her on how to navigate it. You will know, he'd said—and she does.
She gathers it all. Her love, yes, and her affection, her desire, and her gratitude—but also that which is wordless, including the vivid memory of just a few moments earlier. She wants him to know why she'd frozen, what she had felt, when he had first laid back and closed his eyes and she had gazed at him with such desperate and nervous and hungry affection that it had overwhelmed her and sent her to the shelter of his arms. She would have kissed him a thousand times, if only she could move, if her love were any less, if the look of patient serenity on his face were not so achingly beautiful, if, if, if—
"Estel'amin," she hears, soft and strained from his lips, as though the word had barely escaped being choked in his throat, and Radri's eyes open in an instant to find Xan's gaze clinging to hers in desperation, his gray eyes dark and vulnerable. She releases him, and he reaches up and takes her face into his hands, and she is not so much pulled as she is drawn, meeting his lips with hers. The kiss is tender, as is the next, and the next, until they part, far too soon. But it is only so that Xan may scatter his affection elsewhere upon her, his kisses finding her cheeks, her eyelids, the tip of her nose—
"Xan," Radri says, the syllable edged with laughter, and at last Xan releases her, though the way he gazes at her says he would have continued for some time longer. As she gazes back, however, she realizes something—and as naturally as breathing, she leans back in and presses a simple kiss to his lips.
"There! Your gift, fulfilled at last," Radri declares, lightly flushed and pleased with herself.
"Oh," Xan says, a slightly dazed look still lingering in his eyes, "Of course. That... was the gift, here."
—
full xan/radri compilation
#sovo writes#a normal 2k words set in bg1#dw despite appearances the gift is not 'buy my silence / for 8000 gold a month i will stop'#xan x radri
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undone, part 1 | atton/exile, sith exile au, kotor 2
part 1 | part 2 | part 3
✧ — ✧
“So,” says Jaq.
“So?” Says the apprentice, expectantly. “What do you think?”
“You want me to help you game the prestige system by rigging all the trials in your favor, obtaining the headmaster’s resources and authorization codes, and destroying her trust in me in the process?” Jaq pauses as though to take that in, and follows it with, “What’s in it for me?”
“What isn’t in it for you?” The apprentice asks, incredulous. “The headmaster treats you like trash. She has you running around the academy like you’re her personal slave, not a trained Jedi killer. Don’t you want to, you know, stick it to her?”
Jaq sits back and pretends to consider the offer, a smirk hidden behind his hand. Jaq’s often seen this apprentice running errands around the academy, kept too busy to tackle the prestige tasks that could elevate him above his peers. Unlike him, though, Jaq holds no such resentment towards his “master.”
“You know, I see your point,” Jaq says, “But I’m going to need a more tangible reward if I’m going to help you.”
“When I ascend and claim her title—”
“And those are the words I was hoping not to hear,” Jaq sighs. He stands, cracking his knuckles, and the idle action alone is enough to motivate the apprentice to take a cautious step back. “Look, kid—plot and scheme all you like. Stab your master in the back, I don’t care. But the headmaster? She’s off limits.”
“But she—”
“I don’t care what you think of her. You’re rolling this little plan of yours back, effective immediately. And if you ever think about hurting her again, you’re out,” Jaq says.
“You—you don’t have the power to make that decision,” the apprentice says weakly.
“Don’t I? I have the headmaster’s ear,” Jaq says. “And even if she doesn’t believe me, I’m a "trained Jedi killer,” aren’t I? I’ve never hunted a Sith before, but, well… I think I can make it work.”
Jaq’s smirk has stretched across his face now, and the apprentice gives him and the barely concealed weaponry lining his jacket one look before hurrying out of the room, intimidated. Amused, Jaq calls out a parting, "Good talk!” to the apprentice, only to see them freeze a moment later, just a short distance outside the door.
Curious, Jaq approaches the closing gap between the doors, but can only catch a last glimpse of the apprentice’s robes before they shut, leaving only muted audio.
“G-good evening, Darth Vidious,” Jaq hears the apprentice stutter, tone quiet and respectful, in stark contrast to the way he was talking about her earlier. Even through the thick stone doors, Jaq can feel the familiar, dark weight of Vidious’s presence outside. His amusement fades, and he tries to sink back into the shadows, but the sliding doors draw back open to reveal Vidious’s hooded form—and reveal Jaq to her. The apprentice slips away into the shadows of the quiet hallway, and Vidious lets him go, gesturing only for Jaq to follow her.
““Good talk”?” Vidious asks him. Jaq resists the urge to rub at the back of his neck, a nervous habit that she knows him well enough to recognize as such.
"Just collecting student feedback on the new electronic lesson system,” Jaq says. Vidious gives him a look, but his mental shield is enough to dissuade her from seeing the truth, and she accepts his words as they are, turning her attention back to the walk with a sigh.
“I’ve made edits to the lesson programs,” she says. “You will return them to the other Masters tonight.”
The sun has long set; none of them will be happy to see him. But now is not the time to question her—not when Vidious has taken, and will continue to take, the brunt of the academy’s bitterness.
“What did the apprentice say?” Vidious asks. At his brief confusion, she prompts, “About the new system.”
“He doesn’t like it,” Jaq admits, knowing it’s what she expects to hear anyway. “None of them do. But you know how it is—they’ll come around eventually.”
Vidious remains silent; skeptical. Jaq tries again.
“Everyone understands these are ultimately Revan’s orders,” he says. “You can’t be faulted for this.”
Vidious doesn’t look at him, this time. Jaq chooses to believe it’s because she knows he means it.
They’ve arrived at her quarters. The doors open, and Vidious enters. Jaq waits silently upon her doorstep until he’s waved inside.
—
The landscape here is green, lush, and full, as far as the eye can see—the polar opposite of Korriban’s arid climate. Cela’s hood is down, leaving her face open to the cool air, and she closes her eyes and just breathes.
She always forgets what it feels like to be free of Korriban’s pressure. Newly centered, she shoulders her pack, just as Jaq steps down from the exit ramp.
“You’re bringing that whole thing again?” Jaq asks, and Cela spares him only a glance before she turns away.
“I’ll need the equipment for the tomb,” Cela says. Amusement rises from him in response, but she feels no such thing, setting her shoulders and walking off with a frown. Though Jaq calls out for her to wait up for him, she doesn’t slow. She knows he’ll catch her soon.
—
As Korriban’s landing pad sweeps into view, she can already spot the lone figure waiting at the steps below to greet them. Cela sighs and pulls her hood back up; Jaq, who glances at her movement from the pilot’s seat, quickly pulls his gaze back away before she can turn to meet it. As the ship settles, Cela stands and makes her way to the exit.
As usual, Whinu is already walking up to her, even before the ramp has come fully down. She’s granted only the barest last moment of quiet as he waits for the ramp to hit the surface of the landing pad, and then the questions commence.
“Headmaster!” Whinu says, coming forward to meet her halfway down the ramp. “How was the search? Were you successful?”
“It was fruitless,” Cela says, moving forward without waiting for him. He turns quickly, following her without skipping a beat, telling her he has further ideas on where to search next.
She will never become used to the conversations on Korriban. No matter how innocuous the words, the speaker always has a certain look in their eyes—vicious and cutthroat. Cela knows Whinu only wastes his words on her because he aims to succeed her, but any number of the dead ends she has found on the scattered planets he has pointed her to are preferable to a day spent at the academy. She tilts her head, a signal that she’s listening, and Whinu yammers on.
—
“Still holding out for that sweetheart of yours?”
It’s a slow hour at the cantina; the bottles strung up inside, revolving slowly in the near-dead air, are the second most interesting thing in the place. The bartender pours out his shot, and Jaq gazes pensively into the liquid.
“Yeah,” Jaq sighs longingly, leaning his cheek on his hand, as he turns the shot glass idly. The images of the few other patrons in the place are tiny and distorted in the glass; only three figures are there besides him. “I’ve been waiting two years for her to walk through that door. I mean… not that door, exactly, but—to meet me in the middle. You know?”
“Uh huh,” says the bartender, skeptically. “Look, buddy, if she hasn’t yet, it doesn’t sound like she likes you much.”
“No, she does,” Jaq says, with a faint smile on his face; then it fades. “She’s just been under so much pressure. Ever since she got here, really. Her job keeps her busy all the time.”
The bartender, oblivious to Jaq’s newly subdued mood, only scoffs.
“Yeah, alright,” she says. “Take it from me: unless your girlfriend’s in charge of the whole Sith academy up on that hill, she just doesn’t like you.”
“She is, actually.”
“What—? You mean the Darth Vidious? Ha!” The bartender barks out a laugh. “Okay, now I know you’ve got to be joking. I don’t think she even knows you exist.”
The bartender’s still laughing to herself when Jaq straightens in his seat, having spotted the other three getting up to leave.
“Yeah, I guess she wouldn’t know her own right hand man,” Jaq says idly, and downs the shot. He pulls out a loose handful of credits. “So how much do I owe you for the juma?”
The bartender is uncharacteristically silent, and Jaq looks up to see her face has paled.
“Uh… I… It’s on the house,” she says.
Jaq pockets his credits again. Then, on second thought, he drops a few onto the counter anyway; genuine conversation’s hard to come by on Korriban.
“See you next week,” he calls as he leaves, then sets out on the heels of the trio.
—
“Bury them,” Vidious commands. The Sith academy hopeful is crumpled upon the cracked earth, their limbs loose as though there were no struggle, though the face Jaq tips over with his boot is twisted in agony. While his mind tells him he’s dealt worse fates, a strange air hangs about the corpse, and his gut tells him this is the worst fate of all.
“Bury them?” Jaq repeats, hollow. “How?”
The earth is too dense to carve into; even the excavation took months to make a dent in the planet’s surface. No one would bat an eye at the body, anyway; here, death is frequently delighted in.
Vidious stalks up to him, and in her shadowed eyes beneath her dark hood, he sees something like fear.
“I don’t care how,” she says. “Hide them, at least until they rot.” There’s an acid that will do it, his training tells him, but Vidious sweeps past him before he can relate this to her.
It’s only as he watches the flesh melt away, baring the sickly white bone underneath, that his goosebumps finally fade.
—
The Masters of the academy sit before her in a half circle, their table a crescent that terminates in two sharp corners that point to either side of her. Cela sits alone at a height above the rest, feeling, amid the cacophony, barely present.
The argument that rages before her has become all too familiar in these past several days. She’s heard it all: that the academy’s foundations are too ancient to be tainted with the installation of these modern terminals; that the Dark Side was never meant to be understood through the dull medium of written texts, let alone through emotionless programs; and that these “lessons” would only discourage students from maiming each other in dark hallways, and where would they learn their strength from then?
Cela casts her gaze across the room. A few Masters have even worked themselves up into shouting matches, their white-knuckled fists gripping the edge of the thick stone table. Among them, only Whinu is subdued and contemplative—and as though feeling her gaze on him, he looks up and meets her eye.
Cela glances away—but it is too late. Whinu stands.
“Everyone, everyone… please,” Whinu begins, gesturing with his hands spread outward, quieting the entire table. “We need not argue amongst ourselves, but direct our displeasure towards the propagator of this change.”
“And who will convince the Dark Lord of the Sith to change her mind? You, Darth Whinge-u?” Says the Master beside him, her upper lip curled in disdain. A titter of amusement ripples across the table; Cela does not join in.
“No, no, not me,” Whinu says, gracefully ignoring the jab. “And not you either, dear Arekus. Indeed, none of us could ever sway the great Darth Revan… but you, Darth Vidious.”
“Her most prized General, who ended the Mandalorian Wars,” Whinu continues, “Who proved herself so worthy from that feat alone that she was granted the title of Headmaster.”
There is a brief silence, as Whinu’s words echo out and the other Masters take this suggestion in. Even without use of the Force, Cela knows what they must be thinking. Revan had placed her at the top of the academy hierarchy with no experience; with no vetting; with no support from the other Masters at all. Whinu alone had been the apprentice of the previous Headmaster—who of course had met an untimely demise—but once Revan had handpicked Cela and dropped her in with the wolves, all the Masters had felt equally entitled to the role. If it could be Cela—who hadn’t emerged as a Dark Jedi on Revan’s side until a year after the invasion of the Republic began—it could have been anyone.
Dissent coalesces into unison. Now all the Masters are calling for Cela to pass their complaints up the chain—to speak directly to Revan. And once again, she feels that pressure building greater than ever: the jealousy, the resentment, the very malice of Korriban itself.
She takes all of this in… and Darth Vidious raises her head at last, needing only one word to still the room: “Enough.”
In an instant, the room is silent. A true silence, held by Vidious’s displeasure, which thickens the air in the room, settling into their throats and lungs, threatening them to hold their tongue or choke.
Vidious’s words are low and deliberate, knowing her voice is felt all throughout the room.
“Darth Revan will not be informed of your complaints,” she begins. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Arekus’s mouth open to speak, but Vidious compels it back closed with a curl of her fist.
“She will not be told,” Vidious continues in a calm and measured meter, “Because Revan’s orders are absolute. You will make the system work, and anyone who is found shirking their responsibilities to me, the academy, or the Dark Lord of the Sith herself, will answer to my wrath.”
To underline her words, she holds the air in her grip for a moment longer, then releases them all to wheeze in their next breaths. The argument does not resume, but she feels the glares of all twelve sets of eyes upon her, their animosity freshly renewed.
—
By the time Cela returns to her quarters, long shadows have stretched across her room, cast by the last of the day’s harsh light. Everything is as she left it: the rumpled blankets upon her bed, the datapad filled with unfinished work upon her desk, and even the cup of steeping tea beside it, which has surely grown cold and bitter in her absence. She moves to flick on the lights—and freezes, noticing movement in the shadows.
None of the Masters could have made it here before her, but any one of their servants could have. Thinking this, she Force grips the air there blindly, and drags what she finds into the light, revealing—
“Whoa, hey! Easy, it’s just me!”
Startled, Cela releases him, and Jaq stumbles into her desk, pulled by his residual momentum. Her datapad is knocked from its perch, and she reaches for it with the Force, but Jaq catches it for her first, his reflexes faster. He holds it out to her. Cela pulls the datapad roughly from his hand, no longer shocked, but annoyed: for a moment, he’d scared her.
“Explain yourself,” Cela demands. “What are you doing here?”
“We just got a new shipment in,” Jaq says, somewhat pained, massaging his struck hip. “Thought I’d let you know that I evaluated it this afternoon.”
“By waiting for me in the dark,” Cela says.
“By being discreet,” Jaq corrects. “I know you like your privacy—I didn’t think you would want me to advertise that there was someone waiting for you.”
Cela feels her shoulders relax just a fraction. Of course; she needn’t have worried. This is Jaq, after all: he would no sooner obey a Sith Master than defect and join up with the remaining Jedi. Of all those here, Jaq only answers to her—and, she suspects, only does so because of her close ties to Revan.
A pressure makes itself known in her hand, and Cela realizes she’s still gripping the datapad, tight enough to leave a mark. She pushes it back onto the desk, an action that Jaq follows idly with his gaze, before he turns his attention back to her.
“So,” Jaq begins, a little too casually. “Meeting not go well?”
Jaq has that look on his face. She knows, that he knows, exactly how poorly it went. Still, she takes the invitation to heave a frustrated sigh, and pulls her heavy, oppressive cloak off her shoulders, throwing it across her chair.
“I’ve lost ground with them again,” Cela says. “Whinu always manages to single me out. They wanted me to bring their concerns to Revan—but I had to deny it. I tried to reach her, days ago, but all I was allowed to speak to was her droids!”
Jaq folds his arms, leaning lightly back against her desk.
“Was it her secretary droid, or her assassin droid? Because don’t let the assassin droid fool you—the secretary manages to be worse,” Jaq says.
“I don’t know,” Cela sighs, pulling a tired hand across her forehead. “They keep changing—or being upgraded. I can’t tell which.”
“I’m starting to think these decisions aren’t coming down from Revan,” Jaq says. Cela’s gaze snaps to his in confusion, and he shrugs, “I mean, programming an academy? Only a droid would think that was a good idea.”
Cela almost smiles at the joke, and Jaq’s own faint smile begins to brighten in response, but the weight of reality is never so far from her mind, and the corners of her lips soon drop again, falling into a serious frown.
“It doesn’t matter,” Cela says. “As far as I’m concerned, it’s Revan’s wish—and as Revan’s wish, it will be done. No matter the cost.”
She doesn’t know when her gaze had dropped to her hands; doesn’t know when her hands had balled into fists, either, painful and trembling. She can feel Jaq’s eyes on her once more. Part of her wants him to try again—to tell her another joke—but he remains silent. After a moment, he pushes himself off her desk.
“Come on,” Jaq says, “I’m taking you out.”
He grabs her cloak from the chair and holds it out to her. Cela only stares at it.
“I’m in no mood for the cantina,” Cela says. After all, Darth Vidious could never be seen there.
“Not talking about that,” Jaq says, with a light chuckle. “I mean the hopefuls I rounded up. Three of them, this time; you looked like you needed them.”
He gives up on handing her the cloak, and just drapes it across her shoulders himself instead, walking around her to arrange it correctly, then pulling the hood up for her. The movement is clumsy—the cloth does not lay flat, and the hood has pulled strands free from her braided and arranged hair—but Cela barely notices. All she can hear is her heartbeat, pounding in her ears.
“What did you say…?” Cela says, but her voice is too low. Jaq has turned away, walking to the door. That familiar fear gripping her heart now, she slows him with a drag of the Force.
“Cela, what—”
“What did you mean when you said that,” Cela presses. The fingers of her half-raised hand, held open in manipulation of the Force, tremble and twitch against her will.
“Nothing,” Jaq says, confused. “I thought you could use the kills because of all the stress you’ve been under lately. Did… did you not want that many?”
Cela breathes out in relief. He doesn’t know. Of course he doesn't—he’s an assassin, a hunter. Bloodlust is the only hunger he knows. Her heartbeat fades from her awareness; her hand lowers, relaxed. Jaq is still staring at her when finally, calm, she raises her head and meets his eye.
“Ever thoughtful,” Cela says. “Three is fine.”
—
“You left quite an impression on the young ones,” says Master Vash. “You’ve inspired many of them to follow the path of the Jedi. Even I did not leave unimpressed.”
“Thank you, Master Vash,” Cela says, accepting the praise with a bow of her head. “But I only mirrored what Master Vrook demonstrated for us when I was a youngling myself.”
Master Vash shakes her head with an amused smile.
“Don’t be so quick to discount yourself—an excess of humility can harm you just as easily as its absence,” she says. “Recognize your strengths; take confidence in them. You have a natural instinct not just for leadership, but for mentorship.”
“Mentorship?” Cela says. “I… don’t mean any offense, but guiding younglings through a demonstration of the Force is far from mentorship. Anyone could do it. Myna did, just yesterday. —I, I mean.…”
Cela holds her tongue, embarrassed at the slip; but Master Vash doesn’t fault her for it, only moves with it to make her point.
“But does she also help padawans in the same way? Her peers?” Master Vash asks. Cela remains silent, and with a gentler tone Master Vash answers for her, “You do. I’ve seen you; you center them, calm them, even connect with them in a way few others do.”
“You have much training left ahead of you, of course—and at times you lack patience,” Master Vash acknowledges, “But I believe you have the makings of a great Jedi Master, should you choose to walk our path.”
Cela bows her head once again, meaning only to give an elegant and subdued acknowledgement of Master Vash’s praise, but cannot help the flattered smile that blooms across her face.
—
A hand on her shoulder pulls her from slumber. Groaning, she only curls the pillow of her arms tighter beneath her cheek. The desk she is slumped over is hard and cold, but she needs just a moment of rest to return to her studies; surely the scholars of the Jedi Archives are not so impatient that they can’t spare her that.
“Pssst, Cela. Come on.”
That voice… she had known nothing of that voice in her time as a Jedi. Even though the fog of sleep begins to lift, she only screws her eyes shut tighter, swatting the voice away.
“Leave me alone, Jaq,” she mumbles. “I never gave you permission to enter my quarters….”
“We’re not in your quarters,” Jaq says, quietly, as though not to be overheard. Quietly… as though there were others around—
Cela lifts her head so quickly that her hood flaps against her eyes. Her surroundings come into view beneath the edge of the black fabric, revealing her to be sitting in the academy’s library. From behind a pillar, a couple students peer at them, their curious faces peeking out from behind the carved stone. As soon as Cela’s gaze falls upon them, though, they startle and depart.
Cela pulls her datapad towards her and stands. As soon as she does, her head swims, but she grits her teeth and wills the weakness away; if she sways now, and Jaq is seen helping her, her reputation would suffer for it. She checks the time, and is relieved to find that she could only have been asleep for half an hour, at most.
“You should really get some rest,” Jaq says. Cela ignores him, pushing past him to leave.
“I don’t have time to rest,” Cela mutters. If the Masters of the academy are against her, fine. She’ll do it all herself. Let it not be said that she was the weak link in Revan’s empire.
“System integration, reprogramming,” she lists to herself, “Combat forms, secondary abilities—”
“Wait!” Jaq calls. Cela glances back; Jaq was still standing by the alcove he’d found her in, but now, with her attention, he jogs back up to her.
“I just remembered—Whinu had a message for you,” Jaq says. “He says he’s got another lead.”
“So soon?” Cela asks, certain Jaq must be mistaken—but on second thought, she can believe it. “It must be an apology for putting me on the spot before.”
“I’m sure that’s it,” Jaq agrees. “You know, the ship’s still ready to go. We could leave today.”
Memory crashes over her: she remembers stepping into that lush clearing, the feeling of lightness, and that simple breath of air. Even if their destination isn’t quite as healing as that, any place would be an improvement over the hostility of Korriban.
“Then make your preparations,” Cela says. “We leave now.”
—
Jaq practically runs to the ship. The mechanics milling about the hangar turn to stare at him as he passes them, only used to seeing him saunter and loiter about, wearing only wry or sarcastic looks. Jaq’s still grinning with relief when he reaches the ship: who knew all it would take to help her was a little white lie?
So, the sacrificial trio hadn’t worked. Of course it hadn’t. They were caged; it wasn’t organic; there was no hunt. He had hunted them. But even better than the release of a kill, is a release from responsibility. He’ll take her back to that green planet. He hadn’t been too fond of it himself—too much local flora for his taste, and only a small town stood nearby—but he could tell that Cela had loved it. She’d even smiled as she walked beside him, and their hands had almost brushed….
Lost as he is in memory, it takes him longer than he should to realize that the loud mechanical sound he’s hearing is no longer coming from the hangar bay doors, but from the ship itself. Climbing onto a nearby crate to gain some height, Jaq spots a stray repair droid clinging to the roof of the ship, working busily away at a join between the panels.
“Hey!” He yells. The droid turns its eye to him for a moment, then has the gall to return to its work, ignoring him. “No, hey! Stop that!”
“I thought I told you guys, I wanted that fixed after I took her out today,” Jaq says sternly, when the droid finally stops to listen to him. “It’s nothing but cosmetic damage, and it can wait until the weekend. Got it?”
Seeming to understand, the repair droid scuttles away at last, leaving him free to catch a glimpse of the work it’d left behind.
“And one more thing,” Jaq yells out after the droid, “Get your welding protocol checked!”
—
Cela expects relief to wash over her as she watches Korriban shrink away in the viewport. Though she feels it, it’s overshadowed by her elevated heartrate; the nausea in her stomach; and the headache building in the back of her head. Jaq glances over at her.
“You can sleep, you know,” Jaq says. “I’ll wake you up when we get there.”
Though she is tempted, and Jaq had been right earlier to say that she needed rest, Cela shakes her head. She’ll sleep once she’s there.
Her leg bounces slightly as she stares vacantly out the viewport. One moment Korriban is there, suspended in darkness, and the next, rays of bright white have swept the sight away, pulling them into the swirling blue of hyperspace.
“Oh,” Cela says.
“Yeah?” He looks over at her.
“I left so quickly, I forgot to ask Whinu for on-site coordinates. I should message him now.”
Cela reaches for the ship’s comm, but Jaq stops her by the wrist.
“It’s fine,” Jaq says, a little too quickly. “I got the coordinates for you. It was all part of the message.”
Cela gives him a suspicious look, and tries subtly to shake off his hand—but he holds firm. He’s serious.
“Okay,” Cela says slowly, still holding onto her composure, but just barely. “Then what are they?”
“Uh,” says Jaq, “Two-ninety-two, four, and fifty-six?”
“Stop the ship.”
“No, wait—Cela!”
She makes a grab for the hyperspace lever, but Jaq does too, the wrap of his fingers pressing her palms painfully into the metal grip.
“Cela—” Jaq says, struggling against her pull, “Stop—I’m the pilot here, you can't—”
“Don’t try to pretend it’s all technical—” Cela grits out, drawing on the Force to help her, “You always complain about how simple it is!” With that, she overpowers him and pulls the lever back, and they’re snapped out of hyperspace. Jaq checks the diagnostics display immediately, flipping a couple switches in quick succession as though they mean something, but Cela is too angry to care.
“What’s the meaning of this? You know how much work I have at the academy. You know what I have to deal with! What was the point of lying to me?”
Jaq meets her glare with a matching one, not sorry in the slightest.
“Because I could see that you needed this!”
“I don’t need this,” she seethes. “What I need now is to return to Korriban, and rid myself of a certain pilo—”
The ship shudders, sending her stumbling from where she’d risen to her feet in anger. Blindly, Jaq grabs a handful of her cloak and pulls, putting her roughly back in her seat; his eyes are once again glued to the screen.
“Sit down. Buckle in,” he says. “Something’s wro—”
Cela barely has enough time to process what Jaq would’ve finished saying before the ship shakes and shudders once more, then finally barrel rolls over, veering sideways. Unable to get the seat’s buckles to clip together, she abandons them, reaching out to brace an arm against the wall. Beside her, Jaq wrestles with the controls as red lights flash across the length of the control panel. They’re careening, ship tumbling stem over stern, and Cela’s last sight is of a pale crescent passing across the front viewport, flashing by again and again, as it grows ever larger—
—
Cela stumbles out of the damaged ship. The first thought that occurs to her is that this landscape is disappointing. The cliff they’ve landed on is far too pale and barren, and the chasm that stretches out beyond the edge of it would surely have spelled certain death, had they crashed just a few meters forward.
Behind her, smoke continues to billow out of the wreckage, and Jaq emerges from it, coughing and waving it away. The sight of him alive would usually cheer her, but she’d lost all her cheer on the way here. She greets him with a lightsaber to the throat.
“You planned this,” Cela hisses. “You sabotaged me.”
“What? Cela,” Jaq says, open palms held up in appeasement, “Let’s just slow down, alright? We just crashed, we’re lucky to be alive—”
“You’re lucky to be alive,” she snarls, and presses forward a step; Jaq has no choice but to back away lest her blade singe his throat, even though it brings him closer to the smoldering metal behind him. “Admit it—you engineered the crash hoping it would knock me unconscious. While I lay there bleeding, you would take your chance to strike.”
“Cela, I’m a great pilot, but even I can’t fake a crash like that,” Jaq says. As if on cue, the ship punctuates his statement with a small boom, raining fiery bits of metal into the air behind it. Cela glares at him with renewed suspicion, not entirely certain he doesn’t secretly have some command of the Force, and Jaq continues, desperately pointing to his head wound, “And come on, I’m the one bleeding here!”
“Then whose fault is this?!”
“No one’s!” Jaq says. “Sometimes these accidents just happen! Sure, most of the time it’s because you get shot out of the sky, but sometimes—”
Jaq cuts himself off mid-sentence, looking accusingly into the middle-distance.
“That droid,” he says. “There was a repair droid on our ship before we left!”
“Stop trying to distract me with new information!” Cela cries. “Perhaps someone sabotaged the ship. Perhaps Whinu, the only person besides myself who has access to both the droids and that part of the hangar, was the only one who could have done it. But that doesn’t change the fact that you lied to me!”
“That’s what you care about?” Jaq says in bewildered anger. “Have you met me? I lie all the time!”
“But not to me!”
The words leave her in a painful cry; it rips across her raw throat, leaving her breathless and heaving. Somehow, though, she feels lighter for it—and Jaq stares at her in quiet shock as Cela begins to laugh.
“I’m such a fool,” Cela says, helplessly. “I wanted to believe you for so long. Whenever you waited for me, whenever you comforted me… I wanted to let you in. But you were only toying with me—making it more personal for when you finally twisted the knife. Your transfer to the academy never did make sense to me. Why would you come to Korriban, when you loved your work as a Jedi hunter?”
For the first time since Cela has known him, Jaq is struck speechless. She’s thankful, really—every word out of his mouth has only ever served to endear himself to her further, only convinced her to ascribe to his actions a myriad of flattering motivations. She watches Jaq’s mouth work silently, stopping and starting as he tries to word his response, until finally, his voice is freed.
“The work wasn’t what I loved,” Jaq manages at last. The look in his eyes is unbearably tender; the tone of his voice frames his words as a deep, dear admission; but it only serves to break Cela’s spell of bitter amusement, leaving a hollow smile behind.
“Don’t try to fool me again, assassin,” Cela says. “I know every emotion I feel from you is a mask. I know why Revan placed you here.”
She disables her lightsaber and lets its warm metal roll from her fingertips, dropping it to the ground with a dull thump. Somehow, Jaq looks more disturbed to witness that than when she’d had her blade up to his throat.
“I’ve failed in everything,” Cela says. She’d thought the admission would hurt more, but she only feels dull inside. “Failed to conquer the academy, failed to realize Revan’s vision… failed to see the threats around me for what they are. I won’t entertain you any longer, Jaq. Just do as you were told.”
She bows her head, defeated. With no hood to conceal the world from her, she can still see Jaq’s boots in her periphery, just paces before her. She closes her eyes just as he takes his first step—ready to die by his hand, but unwilling to watch him do it—but finds herself embraced instead.
“I’ve never been anyone’s pawn but yours,” Jaq says. “I thought you knew… or maybe I was too afraid to spell it out for you. I only came to Korriban for you.”
Cela has never felt Jaq like this. His jacket is rough against her cheek; the fabric of his sleeves have dragged new folds into her robes; and the embrace he holds her in is almost… hesitant. It runs contrary to the way he has always presented himself, and she notices then, too, that his mind feels different.
Jaq had explained his training to her, once. Lust, impatience, cowardice… all emotions thrown up to convince Jedi to overlook the hunter in their midst. She didn’t blame him when he continued keeping those walls up on Korriban; in fact, she’d grown used to them. There’s a smoothness to the technique—a simplicity—and in a place as crowded with emotion as the academy, she’d come to appreciate the way he broke himself up into such easily recognizable elements, a place of rest amongst the noise.
She doesn’t feel that simplicity now. She feels… a knot. Twined together, uncertainty-anger-fear, coiled up, hunger-resentment-guilt, and running through it all, a thread of—
As soon as she touches upon it, Jaq flinches, and she realizes she’s reached out too far.
“I’m sorry,” Cela says, finally opening her eyes. The wrecked ship is still behind them, but smoke is no longer in the air.
“It’s fine,” Jaq says. “I want you to see.”
But his fingers, now curled tightly into her cloak, say otherwise.
“I’ve seen enough,” Cela says. A flash of hurt, then dull resignation, passes across the surface of his mind, and his breath stills against her. But she doesn’t pull away; she leans into him, not with mind but with body, and holds him too, as tightly as she’s long yearned to.
Relief overwhelms her—not only her own, but his. He tilts his head in against hers, pressing his cheek into the inner corner of her shoulder, and his hesitance melts in the warmth between them, leaving only their embrace.
#sovo writes#sith exile au#basically: jaq is cela's only oasis in korriban's hellish landscape but cela is half convinced he's a mirage
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undone, part 2 | atton/exile, sith exile au, kotor 2
part 1 | part 2 | part 3
✧ — ✧
The smoke may have died down, but the danger of the wreck itself remains. The ship's hull emits a long, eerie creak, and several panels begin to separate from it, bolts bursting free of their joins in staccato accompaniment. Just as Cela begins to form the thought that they should move, Jaq pulls her away, and the last of her cloak is swept free of the wreck as the base of the ship crumples under its own weight, creaking forward and crunching down onto the earth where they'd both just stood.
“Well, there's no repairing that," Jaq says. "Come on, let's get out of here—we're lucky the embers haven't found the fuel line."
There's only one path down from the ridge, and Jaq sets off towards it. Cela follows, but glances back—perhaps they should try to scavenge something from the wreckage, like her bag of supplies, or a medpack—and then the wreckage pops.
"There goes the fuel line," Jaq comments, not even bothering to look back. Flames rage anew, and Cela backs away quickly, taking long strides to catch up to Jaq on the path. As they leave the wreckage behind them, her eyes are drawn to the blood that had spilled down the side of his face; the sight that had given her a sense of vindictive satisfaction earlier now leaves her sick.
"Jaq," Cela says, "Your temple..."
"Oh, right," Jaq says, prodding lightly for the wound, and finding it when he winces; his fingertips come away stained with blood, and one rub of his fingers smears it. "You wouldn't happen to have a medpack, would you?"
The only medpacks they had were lost with the ship, but thanks to the feast Jaq had gifted her weeks before, she has enough energy to heal him.
"Stop here for a moment," Cela says. "I'll heal it myself."
Jaq, who had stopped immediately when she'd asked him to, backs up the moment she makes her intent clear in her lifted hands.
"Whoa, hold on," Jaq says, his open palms held up again, though she isn't even threatening him anymore. "I don't think we need to go that far. I mean, a tiny little cut like this? It'd just be a waste of your time."
"If it's nothing, it will cost nothing to heal," Cela says.
"Yeah, but—you know, I just..." Jaq says, looking anywhere but at her.
As he fumbles for words, Cela wonders why he's making this exchange so much longer than it needs to be. Jaq has never refused her healing before, and has always been glad for her attention. But… things aren't the same now, are they. He knows now how little she's trusted him these last several months. She should be grateful that he's even still standing by her side—and she should take his cues when she sees them.
"Never mind," Cela says, turning away from him quickly, returning to their descent down the path. "On second thought, I should save my energy. There may be trials ahead."
She doesn't need to search his emotions; his relief is obvious. She tries not to think too deeply about what this must mean, and continues onward.
As they round a bend in the path, the view before them opens wide to reveal the land below, and Cela sees that what she had assumed to be a chasm up on the ridge is more of a canyon. Geometrical shapes are carved into their side of the rock walls that frame the narrow valley, and the path ahead passes through the structures, back and forth, as it descends ever downwards towards the valley floor. As Cela looks closer, she recognizes the structures for what they are.
"A village," Jaq says, then glances to her. "You're going to have to lose the cloak."
"What for?" Cela asks.
"It makes you look too much like a Jedi," Jaq says. "These people are close enough to Korriban that they've probably gotten caught in the crossfire—and those scorch marks in the canyon suggest they've seen a dogfight or two. They won't care what side we're on, only that people like us have hurt them."
Cela considers this, then pulls her cloak off her shoulders. Jaq takes it from her and begins to roll it up, disguising its form.
"Hold on," Cela says, unclipping the lightsaber from her belt, "Wrap this within."
Her double-bladed lightsaber is unmistakable outside the volume of her cloak, and the glint off its metal would be spotted upon approach. Jaq, however, doesn't take it from her hands, looking upon it with apprehension.
"Are you sure?" Jaq says. Already in a delicate state, Cela's patience withers; she can understand his new caution towards her, but towards all things Jedi? Have they gone back in time?
"How else am I going to conceal it?" Cela asks. "Tied up in my hair?"
"Well—okay, but, there's no safety on these things, right?" Jaq says. "One accidental press of a button and it could take someone's arm off."
"You forget that it hangs from my belt without stabbing me in the foot," Cela says. She could take her cloak back and wrap the weapon up herself, but she wants him to understand. Cela pulls Jaq's hand to her, placing the lightsaber deliberately into his grasp. The resulting look on his face would suggest that her lightsaber was simultaneously a priceless artifact, and a live charge; belatedly, it occurs to her that she's never actually let him hold it.
"Try activating it," Cela says.
"What?" Jaq says, incredulous, somehow managing to recoil in a way where his burdened hand never moves. Amused, and committed now, Cela wraps his open fingers around the grip.
"Go on," Cela says. "I want you to see."
The emotions that cross his face in the wake of her words range from caution, to anticipation, and finally to business-like determination, the kind that she sees in him when pain and death are to follow. But for all the weight that Jaq places upon the action, when he presses the button, nothing happens.
Jaq's expression falls into a curious mixture of relief and disappointment.
"I... thought I'd heard anyone could activate these," Jaq says, after a heartbeat's delay, as though he'd discarded a set of words before the ones he'd spoken. "Heard this story about a guy who tried to use a lightsaber he looted off a Jedi. Sliced his leg clean off."
"That doesn't surprise me; attempting to use a lightsaber without training is foolish. But, activating the kyber requires an element of intent," Cela says. "There are no "accidental" presses. For my lightsaber, even less so. It's keyed to my Force signature, making it harmless in anyone else's hands."
Cela takes her lightsaber back, activating it herself, and its bright red blades emerge immediately from the hilt with their familiar, low, electrical buzz. Another press, and they're gone again—and she returns the weapon to Jaq's hand. Jaq stares at it with a new element of fascination.
"I didn't know lightsabers worked like that," Jaq says.
"They don't. This was one of Revan's experiments," Cela says. "The kyber was synthesized for me, specifically."
"Huh," Jaq says, and begins to wrap the weapon into her cloak at last. "So that's why you traded out your old lightsaber?"
"My old lightsaber...?" Cela echoes, confused.
"You know, the one you had before Korriban. The one with the leather grip, that open kyber chamber."
A burst of memory alights at this reminder; she knows what lightsaber he means. Cela remembers breaking her kyber into shards herself, letting Revan pluck what facets she wished from its remains as she stood aside and looked upon the dead pieces with a heavy weight in her chest, thinking they could never glow again. Cela remembers the sickly feeling that had taken her to see Revan's accomplishment made real, unable to bear the red that had shone out from the chamber that had once glowed her familiar, viridian green.
Once alone, Cela had broken the lightsaber open again. She'd pulled the kyber from its chamber, and looked upon it for a long time, wondering if it would have been more of a mercy to have let it lay dead than to have let Revan resurrect it. She never arrived at her answer. But when she reassembled the lightsaber at last, she made it into a stranger's: the open chamber traded out, the debossing sanded down, the unraveled leather strip of the grip discarded. She had no longer seen the point in dulling the chill that the bare metal left against her palm.
If Cela looks back on it objectively, it was no different from swapping the sight out on a blaster. She had modified her weapon; nothing more. And yet….
"All done," Jaq says. He presents the finished cloak-bundle to her; its ends have been tied to form a makeshift strap for her to sling over her shoulder. Cela moves to do so, but Jaq stops her.
"Hold on," Jaq says. "You still look... Jedi-like."
Cela looks down at her wrap-front tunic, her boots, and the belt at her waist that was clearly designed to hold a lightsaber in balance. He's not wrong, but the lingering mixture of nostalgia and regret in her heart tip her easily towards irritation; what does he expect her to do about that?
"What more could I possibly remove?" Cela asks, only to be surprised when Jaq is the one to remove something instead, shrugging out of his jacket.
"Here," Jaq says, holding it out to her. Cela only stares at it, and Jaq nods towards it. "Put it on."
"But—I can't," Cela finds herself saying, stupidly. "It's yours."
Revan's Jedi hunters have no uniform. Disguised assassins as they are, they're free to wear whatever they like as long as it doesn't hinder their work. Even now, though Jaq is officially only a pilot on Korriban, no one had seen fit to force him into standard dress—or dared to. Jaq has worn this jacket in all the time Cela has known him, and unlike other elements of his life he'll swap out as they suit him, she's seen him mend it.
"It's not going to hurt you," Jaq says, and Cela realizes he's talking about the small vials of poison, the mines, and the array of daggers that line the inside of his jacket. "My tools require intent, too."
Suddenly embarrassed at the thought that he'd assumed she bore the same apprehension he had, Cela takes the jacket from him quickly.
"Fine," Cela says, pulling it on. "Do I look acceptable now?"
His jacket is almost as heavy as her cloak, but feels far from familiar. Where her cloak had draped in thick folds, Jaq's jacket holds its structure, attempting to drag its sleek lines across her body the way it does for him.
It's not meant for her, but Jaq looks her up and down, and smiles.
"Perfect," Jaq says. "You know, it kind of suits you."
Distracted as she is by what he could mean by that, Jaq gets a head start on her, already setting off down the path once more. Cela slings her disguised lightsaber across her back and follows.
—
Despite their precautions, the inhabitants of the village are not happy to see them. The first door Jaq knocks on remains closed, the space behind it rustling quickly into silence, and as their backs are turned, all the doors in the buildings nearby shut themselves with faint clicks as well. The windows around them stand open, dark, and eerie, shadowed by the overhangs above, and Cela thinks she catches a glimpse of the whites of someone's eyes. Without form, without words, the villagers' gazes bore into their backs as they walk past the scars upon the walls, the fallen pillars, and the broken buildings that spill onto the path like eggshells, cracked open by the telltale marks of a blast. They have no choice but to pass through the village without pause.
Only on the outskirts, mere meters from the surface of the valley floor, can they stop to assess their surroundings. Cela can't help but glance back at the buildings above, but besides having grown hazier with the distance she's traveled from them, their dark windows and alcoves remain unchanged. Jaq, however, looks ahead, squinting into the distance.
"Hey," Jaq says, pulling her attention. "Do you see what I'm seeing?"
Cela looks out onto the rocky landscape of sparse brush and pale dirt ahead, attempting to follow Jaq's line of sight, and spots an odd dip in the opposite valley wall, where the face seems to have been carved out, dipping in and down into the earth. And sitting within it…
"A ship," Cela says. "What is it doing out there?"
She glances back at the village, which had housed its speeders in fenced-off hollows along the path. Somehow, she can't imagine them choosing to keep a ship all the way out there.
"I don't know, but we're taking it," Jaq says.
Cela looks at the ship, again. It sits at a considerable distance away, and now that her adrenaline from the shipwreck has faded, the soreness in her eyes has returned to the forefront of her attention, along with a headache. Jaq glances at her, and though Cela fights her need to yawn, he beckons her to the rocky wall that frames the right side of the path.
"Let's rest first," Jaq says. He sits, leaning back against the wall, and pats the earth next to him for her to join him. Displeased that he'd seen through her, but touched by his concern, Cela goes to sit quietly beside him. She moves her bundled-up lightsaber to her lap, and leans her head back against the wall, trying to ignore the discomfort of its uneven surface against her skull. After a moment of this, Jaq speaks.
"You can lean on me, if you want," Jaq offers. "My shoulder's free."
The speed at which she accepts is embarrassing, but after being rejected from healing him, she's far too relieved by his gesture to care.
—
"You won't eat?" Cela asks, gesturing to the fowl-like creature on the fire. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Jaq notes that she'd been careful enough to place it close to him so that he doesn't need to shift his injured leg to reach it, but Jaq doesn't make any move to take it, his hard gaze still on her.
"Why are you helping me?" Jaq asks.
"What do you mean? We're partners."
"Don't give me that," Jaq sneers. "We might be fighting for the same cause, but you're on a different path from the rest of us. An upcoming Sith Master, aren't you? So what do you want from helping me?"
"I want you alive," Cela says simply, and Jaq's annoyance grows.
"Why—because all life is precious? Because it's the right thing to do? Don't try that on me," Jaq says. "You've gone through plenty of other hunters before me. You choose the easy way out—tossing us into the fire the moment it threatens to singe your robes."
Cela looks unaffected, still picking steadily through the sparse meat on her skewer.
"If that's what you want to believe, you can," Cela says. "But I do want you alive. You're sharp, quick on your feet, and always where you need to be. One step to the side, and you would have been crushed."
"By the boulders you brought down," Jaq says.
"My command of the Force has never been very elegant," Cela says. "But you made the right choice. Had you not moved through, our Jedi would not have fallen for my feint. But I hope next time, you'll help me retrieve them alive."
"Why? They'd have only ended up being more work later," Jaq says.
"Oh—no," Cela says, "They would still lay dead now. I mean only that I need to kill them myself."
His mind catches on her particular choice of words—needed, instead of wanted?—but is soon distracted by Cela picking up the skewer of meat meant for him.
"Hey—hey!" Jaq says, as she begins to tear the skin open, revealing the cooked flesh underneath. "What happened to "this ones yours"?"
"Does this mean that you feel like eating now?" Cela says. In lieu of an answer, Jaq merely snatches it from her—but when a small amused smile crosses her face, he realizes he's fallen for her trap.
"Alright, what have you done to it," Jaq demands. "Clever—eating your own first so I can't demand that we swap skewers."
"You're overthinking it," says Cela. "I'd gladly eat it for you to prove it isn't poisoned, but you're the one who needs the strength."
"Ha! Poisoned—I never said poisoned," Jaq says, then wonders what that even implies. "So you've—so this, then…."
"Jaq," Cela says, her voice softer now. "Vigilance doesn't mix well with recovery. Will you please believe that I value you highly enough not to kill you, for at least long enough to finish a meal?"
Jaq looks over at her. Her eyes are not quite gentle, but they're tired. She'd helped him limp all the way down to base camp, and will again to reach the ship, where the last of their medpacks are.
He takes a bite from his meal, at last. In a near imperceptible drop of her shoulders, Cela relaxes.
"I made some tea as well," Cela says. "Here… the warmth will help."
She pours out a cup of the herbal stew he'd watched her make, and moves to hand it to him—then pauses.
"And it's not poisoned, either," Cela says. Jaq flushes, hot on the back of his neck.
"I didn't even say anything that time!" Jaq says, defensive. "Just hand it over."
—
Jaq wakes to a roughness against his cheek, a throbbing pain at his temple, and a hand gripping his shoulder.
"Jaq. Wake up," a voice says. He's drawn towards it, swaying forward before he even opens his eyes and registers its owner.
"Cela?" Jaq says, his own voice still rough with sleep. Something crawls down his cheek, and he swipes a hand across it, only for his fingers to come away red with blood.
"You've reopened your wound," Cela says. "I should heal it—please."
Her hand is still on his shoulder; it would be easy for her to raise it and bid his flesh to knit back together, but Cela waits for his answer.
Jaq knows that her healing is harmless. Whenever she had passed the Force through him, most of what he'd felt was her steady touch upon his skin. The actual mending of his wounds had slipped past his senses, insignificant unless he chose to concentrate upon it. If she heals him now, though, he's not sure what he'll feel—and it's that uncertainty that deters him.
But as he stays silent, the concern in Cela's eyes only deepens, growing pained. It occurs to him that she must be feeling what he feels—his wound, mirrored, as if it were her own.
"Go ahead," Jaq says, at last; he'd be a poor companion if he couldn't even bear the Force for the moment it takes for her to heal him. His reluctance must show, however, because Cela's expression softens.
"It will be quick," Cela promises, needlessly. "Painless."
It's not pain he fears. Cela places her fingertips along his temple, closing her eyes, and he braces himself for another glimpse at the vastness that had overwhelmed him, but he feels nothing like that: he feels her.
Her worry, her pain, and then, her calm. These three pass through him, like a whisper past his awareness, and on the other side of her emotion, he falls through: to the relief he'd felt in their embrace; to the assurance he feels at the helm of a ship; to the simplicity of a blue sky on a sunny day, where the glare of the sun winks upon the bright and silver buildings as he stares up at them, knowing nothing yet of the hidden stars beyond. Cela shows him this... and he wonders how she could show him this... and all the tension in his held breath is released in a sigh, as he relaxes.
Jaq opens his eyes, wondering when he'd closed them, to find Cela's attentive gaze on him. Taken by all that she'd shown him, a question spills from his lips before he can stop it.
"How do you do that?" Jaq asks. "I mean—heal?"
"How do I heal?" Cela echoes, surprised at his question; Jaq reflects that he's never actually asked her before. "Well, it… it requires two parts: knowledge of the body, and the wielder's state of mind."
"Do you use memories?" Jaq asks, unable to stop himself again, and amends, "…For the state of mind, I mean."
"Sometimes," Cela says, slowly, looking at him carefully. "It helps invoke emotions I associate with healing. Are you… feeling alright?"
Jaq's not sure what he feels—there's a weightlessness in his chest, and he wonders if she feels it, if she carries it with her, how she pulls what she needs from the Force without drowning in it—but with another breath, and long-enforced self discipline, he shakes his strange mood off.
"Never better," Jaq says, putting on a quick grin. He stands and offers a hand to her. "Are we heading out, or what?"
—
They set off towards the ship. As they walk, all Cela can think about is the work that's surely waiting for her upon her return, and she trudges forward determinedly. Jaq, however, appears relaxed beside her, a levity to his every step.
"You know," Jaq says, out of nowhere, "This is the perfect chance to fake our deaths."
"Hm," Cela says, uninterested in hypotheticals, but Jaq goes on.
"I mean, Whinu already thinks you're dead. So since you hate it there, and I hate it there—"
"I hate it there?" Cela asks, interrupting him. Jaq laughs as if she's just told a joke, but his mirth fades when he meets her eye.
"Wait, you're serious?" Jaq says, surprised. "Come on, Cela, tell me one thing you like about the place."
She opens her mouth, ready to retort; she holds a place of authority and respect not just in the academy, but in Revan's Sith hierarchy, by extension.
But it's never brought her anything but dissent, stress, and sleepless nights—and Jaq knows this. If she had to pick something she liked….
One thought comes to mind, but she swaps it quickly out for another.
"The fresh food," Cela says, before she can think her answer over any further. Jaq gives a puzzled laugh.
"Uh, yeah, right," Jaq says. "You and I both know they're just fancy re-hydrated rations. Plus the rare native fruit, which—"
"Is disgustingly bitter," Cela admits.
"Shouldn't be considered edible," Jaq says. "Yeah, exactly. Now try that again."
As the ground passes underfoot, each step reminds her of the soreness in her back and shoulders from sleeping upright, and she seizes her next answer.
"My quarters, then," Cela says. "They're more spacious than any rooms I've had before."
"Really? Is that why you only use a fourth of it?" Jaq says. "I mean, you basically just move between your bed, your desk, and your door. And you've got all those shelves and stands for artifacts—but you just shove them in a corner."
"I don't need to use the space to enjoy it," Cela says, her tone growing defensive despite herself. "It's… it's a Jedi habit. To live simply and frugally."
But even as a Jedi, she'd had her trinkets. Colorful stones; an array of clips for her hair; charcoal drawings from a dear friend; a silver statuette from a merchant she'd escorted through a dangerous trade route, once. After she joined the war against the Mandalorians, her belongings grew bloated with tokens of those they'd lost, so many that they would have spilled from her cupped hands, unending. She had guarded them, thought it her duty to send them forward to their loved ones, but after Malachor she passed the burden onto someone, anyone else.
On Korriban, Cela had kept nothing. Her old things no longer held their shine, and everything that came to her was dull—save for the very pilot who's looking at her now, wordlessly communicating to her through his unconvinced eyes that he knows her last words were full of bantha droppings.
"I have everything there I need to survive," Cela amends neutrally, subdued by honesty. The look in Jaq's eyes softens.
"Yeah, but we could survive anywhere else," Jaq says, and it warms her to hear him say "we." "Things have been bad, but they're changing. I hear about places taking in refugees all the time, like Nar Shaddaa—"
"Ah," Cela says with understanding, "For your pazaak habit."
Jaq makes an offended noise.
"Come on, I only play for pocket change," Jaq says, "And it's a good way to get intel!"
"Two thousand credits was pocket change?" Cela says, amused. "I hope the information was worth it."
"That was different," Jaq says, "I was trying to impress you."
The words are said lightly, but the way he seems uncertain of his decision to speak them lends them truth, and Cela can only watch as the tips of his ears turn pink, her own voice made silent by her surprise.
There was always too much wrapped up in their time together before Korriban. The echoes of Malachor V; Jaq's distrust of her; and the way they had grown close but had never spoken plainly to each other about it at all. Cela had never quite known where she stood with Jaq—and Jaq had always shied away from addressing it, preferring to keep his cards close to his chest.
But Cela hadn't known where to look for his affection, then. Now that she knows where it lies, she can see the truth woven through his actions, both before his arrival on Korriban, and after.
"Well, we're here," Jaq says, stopping ahead of her. "The ship."
Cela looks up from her thoughts to find that they are, indeed, here at the ship. Nestled beneath a mess of pale vines, the ship sits crookedly in the hollow, its nose buried in the dirt. Its landing ramp is partially extended, forming a small ledge beneath its open entrance.
"Looks like she had a rough landing," Jaq comments, looking over the scrapes along the outside of the ship. "The hull looks intact; let's hope the inside's the same."
The ledge of the landing ramp is at shoulder height, and Jaq grips it, pulling himself up. He steadies himself against the frame of the entrance, peering into the darkness of the ship's interior.
"How does it look?" Cela asks.
"Not bad," Jaq says. "A bunch of dead leaves and animal droppings, but I'll be happy if this thing flies. Want a hand up?"
He extends a hand to her, and Cela steps forward to take it, but pauses as something pulls at the edge of her awareness—a sense of unease.
"In a moment, " Cela says. "I want to examine our surroundings first. Try powering it on in the meantime."
"Got it," Jaq says, and disappears inside.
Cela walks slowly along the ship's perimeter. The hull is unremarkable—it's mildly damaged, but as Jaq said, it's perfectly intact—and the vines that whisper across her cloak as she passes through them seem innocent enough. But if this ship was abandoned by its owner… why is it here? Why hasn't it been scavenged for parts?
The sloped ceiling of the hollow is bumpy and irregular, catching upon her shoulder as her steps bring her around to the nose of the ship. She turns her gaze to her shoulder, but then finds her gaze pulled down, to where the sloped ceiling meets the ground—at least, where it would meet the ground. Instead of a seam, she finds a gap, where the vines and the ivy upon the floor tumble into the darkness of what must be a cave below.
Without warning, the ground rumbles with a pulse of energy, and Cela stumbles back away from the gap, fearing for a split second that she might have fallen in.
"Hey, it works!" Jaq's triumphant voice echoes to her from inside the ship, muffled but audible. "And all it took was a little rewiring."
As though summoned by the disturbance, something silver flashes in the cave below. Though her instincts caution her against it, Cela stares into the inky black, and as she does, she realizes the truth: it's no longer mere shadow, but a pupil—belonging to a large eye.
"Jaq," she warns, "Get ou—"
Silver flashes in her vision once more, but this time it slams into her side in a blow that steals her breath, sending her tumbling to the side, away from the ship. A scaly paw emerges from the cave, crushing the pale ivy, and its claws drag dark streaks into the ground where she had just stood. Jaq hangs out from the ship's open entrance, calling her name, his eyes alert and on her but unable to see the threat for the vines that curtain the ship. Fallen on her side, Cela clutches her waist, palm pressing into the ache of bruising skin, but her searching fingers find no lightsaber upon her belt.
Her lightsaber. Her cloak. Cela scrabbles at her shoulders for it, but finds the bundle gone, and tosses her head up to see that it had fallen away from her, laying on the ground a few meters away. Another paw hooks into the earth, the creature seeking to drag itself up from its den, but Cela moves too, ignoring the pain to bring her legs back under her, pushing herself upright.
"Get the ship out of here!" Cela calls to Jaq. "I'll distract it!"
She keeps her gaze on him just long enough to see him nod and disappear back into the ship. Meanwhile, the creature's snout has emerged, snarling and shaking clumps of earth from the ceiling of the hollow as it bashes into the narrow opening of the cave, fighting to break through. Cela pulls her lightsaber to her hand with a tug of the Force—she'll slay the creature while it's trapped—but the full bundle of her cloak meets her palm, blocking her from her blade. With a frustrated growl, she pulls at the knots Jaq had tied—who'd asked him to make such thorough work of its disguise?
The ship scrapes across the earth in creaky, shuddering starts and stops, separating with difficulty from the mold the earth has formed beneath it. Even as the ship's hull escapes the earth at last, rising unsteadily into the air, the vines and lines of ivy wound across it pull taut, unwilling to let the ship go. But the roots of these plants cling to the walls of the hollow with the same strength, and Cela glances up in time to see the ship win the tug-of-war, only to pull apart the wall that separates the hollow from the cave, freeing the creature in a rain of soil.
Cela grits her teeth, takes hold of the fabric of her cloak with the Force, and pulls it apart, sending it flying into tattered shreds. She activates her lightsaber at last, the sound and vivid red light sudden enough to pull the creature's attention away from the escaping ship. The creature sets its eyes upon her, and snarls.
Cela's muscles burn as she drives herself to dodge the creature's swipes, her heart thudding loud in her chest in a combination of apprehension and adrenaline. She's slow, out of practice, and though her lightsaber is ready in her hand, she can barely find the opportunity to use it—until at last, the creature rears back, giving an unnecessary roar that deafens in this reverberating hollow, and Cela sends her lightsaber spinning forth, slashing across the tender scales of its underbelly. The creature falls heavily onto its front paws, shaking the ground and sending her stumbling back. Cela glances up to the hollow's exit, and sees the ship breaking free of its last vine—her task is done.
Cela begins to back away, mapping out her escape. But the creature no longer seems interested in her—it shakes its tangled mane as though to clear its head of pain, and turns away, deeming her more trouble than she's worth. Relief almost takes her, until the creature pauses and stares for a moment, its neck drawing a line pointing straight at the escaping ship.
No. No, no. The creature lunges for its new, flying prey, its sharp claws drawn, and its tail sweeps behind it, almost knocking Cela over again. She ducks, and sprints for clear ground, her hand outstretched—there is a Force ability she had heard of once that can influence a beast's mind, and if there were ever a moment for her to miraculously understand it, it would be now—but no such ability comes to her fingertips.
Instead, urgency overwhelms her, crowding into her chest as fear crawls up her throat. That ship may be their only hope of getting off this planet, but more importantly, Jaq is still inside. With that thought, all the remaining shreds of the Force within her are bent to her will as she reaches forth and crushes the creature from the inside, squeezing until its bones splinter—its organs burst—
—And she and the creature's mangled corpse collapse to the earth, as the world falls to black.
—
The wound has burned his shirt to his flesh, carving a line that slashes across his chest. Cela applies a medpack to it, but it feels futile—the kolto gel seems unwilling to seep into his charred skin.
"Give me another," Cela says, holding out her hand, but no cold plastic meets it.
"We're out," Jaq says. He holds up their last one, its kolto chamber broken and empty, all its healing gel escaped through the cracks. "It's fine—the fight's over. I'll tough it out until we finish our mission."
But as Cela peels another panel of his armor away from the line of the wound, she finds that at its deepest, the searing blade that had struck him had dug in even further than she'd thought. Jaq seems to know, the quiet, resigned expression on his face held only by pure will, the corners of his mouth tensing against the pain. This is the kind of wound that demands a kolto tank, or threatens to leave lasting damage.
The Force itches at her fingertips, and Cela stills, uncertain. It's been a long time; she can no longer imagine the Force in her hands being used for anything other than suffering, but for the first time since Malachor, she wants to try.
"Hold on," Cela says, as Jaq begins to pull away. Looking back, he settles slowly back onto the seat beside her, meeting her with a questioning gaze. She lifts her hand to his wound again, holding her palm just above it.
"This may feel… strange," Cela cautions, "But it will help. Can I…?"
"I let you use that shielding ability on me, didn't I?" Jaq says, averting his gaze. "Go ahead."
Cela closes her eyes, sweeping her thoughts aside, and reaches out to the damaged flesh beneath her palm. She can feel him tense, sensitive to the light touch of the Force she uses to assess the wound. There was a time when she was practiced enough that such an assessment felt like nothing, but rather than disappointment, all she can register is relief that this still feels familiar. Sinking into her work, the outside world loses its significance, until she hears Jaq's intake of breath in astonishment.
Light, trapped between her palm and his skin, shines out from the cage of her fingers. As it fades, and she moves her palm away, the wound is still there, but it is shallow—faint.
"I'm… sorry," Cela begins, seeing that she hadn't been able to heal it fully. "I…."
"Wow," Jaq breathes, touching the trace of the wound with his fingertips. "Cela… you can do that? I thought Sith could only take, not heal."
"Many choose to forget their training in the ways of the Light side rather than take advantage of it," Cela says. "It requires more effort, but I can still heal… as long as I have the energy to."
"So can I take this as a sign that you like me?" Jaq says, with an easy grin. "I mean, I've never heard of you healing anyone else you work with. I must be the exception."
"You are," Cela says, "Exceptionally foolish for stepping in to shield me in the first place. What was going through your head?"
—
Cela's body weighs on her as she comes to consciousness. Her limbs are heavy, and that trace of a headache is back behind her eyes. She shifts with a groan, lifting a hand into her line of sight, displeased to find her fingers trembling once more. She stills them by force, wrapping them into an empty fist, and shifts, sitting up. Her surroundings come into view: the ship, which has been swept free of debris, and the valley floor visible through the open door, where the sky above has grown dark.
As her senses return to her in full capacity, Cela becomes aware of a slight rattling in the hull, a mild clanging sound outside, and a few swears. Jaq.
Before she can even rise from floor, though, Jaq must hear her, because the metallic sound outside stops dead in its tracks. Jaq's head and shoulders emerge in the corner of the open door, and upon seeing her awake, he clambers up the side of the landing ramp, pulling himself up into the ship.
"You could walk up the ramp," Cela points out to him, though her voice is tired and quiet. "How long have I been unconscious?"
"Hours," Jaq says, kneeling by her side and looking carefully into her eyes; he brushes her loose hair aside with a gentle hand, his fingertips grazing her cheek. "I was starting to think you weren't going to wake. I tried to figure out what brought you down, but I couldn't find a single scratch on you."
A familiar chill has yawned out within her chest, its tendrils the ones sending tremors through her hands, and Jaq's warmth creates too sharp a contrast. She pulls away from his touch.
"A false alarm," Cela says. "I overexerted myself; that's all."
The worry in Jaq's eyes does not fade.
"It didn't look like that to me," Jaq says. "It looked like—"
"Jaq," Cela says firmly, "Please."
Her fingers are curled tight again, her nails digging into the skin of her palms, binding her hands together; Cela holds firm, pressing hard, to allay the trembling in her hands. Though Jaq's concern remains obvious, he does not push her further.
"Fine. Just try not to overdo it, alright? You did a number on that thing," Jaq says. "I'd call it overkill, really—that final move of yours even tugged the ship in."
"It what?" Dread rises in her throat. If she hadn't been careful—if her command of the Force had slipped free of her control—if the ship had been crushed along with the creature, with Jaq trapped inside—
"Just a little," Jaq amends quickly, seeing how she's paled. "But don't worry—it barely moved, and the engine could take it. The ship made it out fine. See?"
Jaq goes on, talking about how he'd begun tuning it up as she slept, but all Cela can focus on is him: moving, breathing, alive.
—
"So, where to?" Jaq asks, pulling up the navigation system.
"Korriban," Cela says, assuming the exchange is merely a formality. "Where else?"
"Yeah. You're right," Jaq says, gazing down at the visual on the screen. "Our fuel's low. With the short distance we came to get here, Korriban is the only place I could get us, anyway."
As Jaq brings the ship into the air, Cela belatedly remembers Nar Shaddaa. It had only been talk—Jaq's tone had been light—but perhaps, underneath, he had been serious. She has no way of knowing now; the clarity he had shown her before is gone, and his emotions are again simple, smooth in the Force.
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gray | atton/exile, kotor 2
✧ — ✧
Cela first meets Atton’s eyes on Peragus. Not through the force cage that holds him—the field is too bright, and with her head swimming from sedatives, battle, and the Force, she has to look away—but later, when she falls to her knees from the pain of Kreia's loss, and Atton rushes to her, pulling her back to her feet. She looks at him, then—but through the tears spilling down her cheeks, she sees nothing of his eyes but a blur.
Then comes Nar Shaddaa. Like Telos, she watches Atton keep his head down, slouching to avoid unwanted attention. But unlike Telos, he begins to meet her eyes on his own. Always, though, through some cruel slant of light, his irises themselves remain cast ambiguously in shadow. It's only when he runs up to her to press antidote packs into her hands, moments from the docks, that she sees them in the light. In that brief moment, she can only process the thought that under the neon lights, Atton's dark eyes bear shards of bright, impossible purple.
She remembers that purple, as she stands silently in G0-T0's prison. She remembers it so vividly that when Atton arrives—breathless, scratched-up, smelling of scorched cast-plast and a cold metallic tang—she’s surprised to look again and find his eyes a shade of amber. A reflection of the ship's yellow lights, she catches herself thinking, but warmer. Later, she remembers the color to be as warm as his hand had been, when he had nearly caressed her cheek in relief before he had come back to himself, letting his hand fall to her shoulder instead.
(When he tells her about his past, she does not meet his eyes. At first it is a choice, but it soon becomes a necessity. By the time his tale ends, he begs—without words, without awareness, but the plea reaches her nonetheless—for her to look at him. She can't.)
On Dxun, in the dreary half-light of dusk, she returns to the ship tired. Atton is near the entrance when she steps in, and their eyes meet, though he soon looks away. She thinks, in that moment, that Atton's eyes appear hazel, a matching pair to the moss, the mud, and the pooling rainwater outside.
(When she forgives him, she doesn't tell him, for his sake. But she does tell him that she will train him as he wishes. He leans in—earnest, determined to prove himself—and in his eyes she thinks she catches a glimpse of faint, but full, green. She blinks, and his irises are cast into shadow once more, ambiguous and unidentifiable in the dim light. The afterimage of her lightsaber blade, perhaps—printed upon the insides of her eyelids.)
By Dantooine, she knows what to expect. She doesn't wonder so much as idly predicts that Atton's eyes will appear blue like the vivid sky above. Her prediction is confirmed—and Atton gives her a suspicious, curious look as she peers at him, yet he doesn't say anything, used to her habits by now—but she’s unprepared for the shade after all. Next to Mical's rings of innocent blue, Atton's eyes are muted and dark, like the blue one would find in the shadows of dry stones along a river bank, where the color of the sky has been reflected once, then once again.
Now, on the ship, Atton's eyes again borrow colors from the winking lights of the control panels scattered around him: blue, red, and green. After traveling with him through so many hues, though, she has long seen them for what they are, and a mere heartbeat after the word slips absentmindedly from her lips, Atton's hand shoots up to his hair, self-conscious.
"Wher—I mean, what are you talking about?" Atton forces his hand back down to his side, casual. "What gray?"
"Your eyes," Cela says. "They're gray."
"Oh," Atton says. He relaxes back in his seat with a chuckle. "Yeah. I hear it all—green, hazel, whatever—but they're just gray. To be fair, I don't stick around long enough for people to get it right."
Her comment resolved as a false alarm, he angles his head idly back towards the diagnostics screen, but Cela lingers on the subject.
"What was that about?" Cela asks, and when Atton feigns ignorance, she hazards a guess. "Are you worried about graying?"
Atton gives a slight grimace, but shrugs, noncommittal.
"Well—you know. With all the Sith we've run into, something could've rubbed off on me," he says.
"And the passage of time?"
"Maybe that too," Atton admits. "It doesn't matter, I know. But…."
"For what it's worth, I think you'll age well," Cela says, leaning forward to brush through his dark hair, following the curve of his ear. "Gray running through your hair would only make you look... hmm... distinguished."
"You think so?" Atton asks, amused but now flattered. He leans indulgently into her touch, meeting her questioning gaze with an easy, lopsided smile. "I guess I have to take your word for it. After all, with all the hours you've spent staring at me, you're practically the expert."
"Staring?" Her cheeks warm against her will. "I don't stare."
"Says the Jedi who bothered to figure out what color my eyes are."
"It was—training," Cela says, though she's already aware she's backed herself into a corner. "Ob… Observation training. It's important on the battlefield."
"The battlefield of my eyes, you mean?"
Atton's smile grows smug as her cheeks burn hotter, and Cela is tempted to turn her hand to push his face away, but Atton, sensing it, merely tugs her wrist aside.
"Come on, Cela," Atton says, lower, now closer than before. "Admit it: you like looking at me.”
By now, something would have interrupted them—an alert, perhaps, or a member of the crew, careening in with questions or complaints. Even Atton seems to have that thought, as her stuck voice sends the look in his eyes leaning into uncertainty. He's about to back away when, at last, she makes the admission that’s fresh in their hearts, still new since their matching confessions only mere nights ago.
“I do,” Cela whispers. “I love you.”
Atton freezes, and then he’s away from her in an instant, his hand covering his face.
"Wait—You can’t—That’s unfair," he says. She can just barely make out the color of his eyes through the gaps between his fingers, no longer ambiguous, but as gray as the ship’s metal around them. "What am I supposed to do against that? I’m...."
“Dee-deet deet!”
They both startle; T3 trundles in. Though she can feel Atton’s disappointment next to her own, she reads relief from him as well. She takes the opportunity to stand; Atton lets her go.
As she walks away, though, she hears the last of his voice from the open doorway:
“I’m guessing you’re here to tell me about the dip in engine efficiency I already know about,” Atton says gruffly, hiding his break in composure. T3 deets in response, and she can practically feel Atton bristle as he answers, “An anomaly in your thermal readin—? No, I’m not red!"
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undone, part 3 (end) | atton/exile, sith exile au, kotor 2
part 1 | part 2 | part 3
✧ — ✧
"Whinu claims he had nothing to do with it," Cela says, as soon as the door closes behind her. She moves to pull her cloak off her shoulders, before remembering that her cloak is gone, and abandoning the movement. Jaq is at her desk, leaning against the edge of it, leaving the chair free for Cela to take with a tired sigh.
"And you believe him?" Jaq asks.
Jaq's tone is neutral, leaving the judgement solely to her. Whinu had been insulted by her accusation, and had insulted her in turn, saying outright that Cela had plenty of other enemies at the academy to accuse instead. Beneath her anger, Cela had felt in that moment that she'd burnt her last, tenuous bridge at the academy, but she'd had to persist. The access codes, the timeline, the motivation, everything pointed to him. And yet….
"I don't know," Cela says. "I'm no longer sure of my judgement of him. But… Jaq, you've been on many interrogation assignments, haven't you?"
A strange look passes through Jaq's eyes, before he forces a casual laugh.
"Yeah, but breaking a Sith's different from breaking a Jedi," Jaq says, "And I'm out of practice, anyway. I'm just a pilot, now, remember? You need any ships flown, I'm your guy."
"Of course," Cela says, not so taken by the mystery of her assassination attempt that his somber air passes her by. She nods to his jacket. "A pilot who carries a small arsenal with him wherever he goes."
"Hey, old habits die hard," Jaq says, with an easy shrug, and Cela is glad to hear his tone is light once more.
Perhaps she can set this mystery aside. She had feared that Whinu or another Master would take advantage of her absence to claim her title, but nothing had happened. And for all that she's been through in these last few days, she's emerged better for it: the academy is still against her, but she's now assured that Jaq stands by her side.
"Jaq," Cela begins slowly, casting her gaze down to her cold hands, "Do you remember the last shipment you collected for me?"
Cela has never asked for Jaq's help in rounding up hopefuls. At some point, he had just begun doing it, offering them to her of his own volition. Cela had interpreted his help as some jab at her own weakness, but beneath her doubts towards him, she had long grown grateful for his silent devotion.
"I find myself in need of another," Cela says. "The sooner, the better."
Instead of the immediate yes she'd expected, Jaq frowns to himself, shaking his head.
"I can't. Nothing's coming in right now," Jaq says. "Word is, recruitment efforts are waning now that most Jedi are dead or dying. The academy's still getting students, but they're coming direct from the torture chambers."
"And the academy would be expecting them," Cela finishes for him, and Jaq only nods.
Cela falls silent, unable to suppress the cold in her chest. She had always known Korriban's supply would run dry, but had never thought it would happen so soon—not when she truly needs it. With the state she's in, the most she could do is mind-trick a gizka. She can feel the Force around her more acutely than ever, flowing throughout the academy, winding through its inhabitants; it drifts so near, and yet denies her grasp, taunting her.
"There are other ways to let off steam, you know," Jaq says.
"I'm not stressed," Cela says, her tone harsher than she intends it to be, and Jaq just gives her a raise of his brow, as if to say, And you were saying?
"I'm not!" Cela insists. "I'm—I'm just—"
There's just Korriban, bland and bleak and threatening, all around her again. There's just the academy, so full of plotting minds and jealousy and vehemence. There's just the vacuum in her chest, chilling her to the bone, threatening to eat her alive.
And there's Jaq, who's watching her now, who's closer to her now than she has ever let him be before, and yet—for all that she wishes he would reach out and help her—can do nothing.
"I'm just… not used to feeling the weight of the academy again," Cela finishes, hollow. "It is a temporary thing."
It's a familiar wall that she reaches for—so familiar that Jaq's body language closes off in response, taking her words as a push away.
"Right," Jaq says, subdued. "Well, I just remembered some repairs I have to do anyway, so—"
"Wait!" Cela says, and it's only when Jaq looks to her with a mixture of puzzlement and astonishment that she realizes that she's snagged the edge of his sleeve as he turned to leave.
"Yeah?" Jaq says, his tone edged with hope. "What is it?"
"Perhaps a moment at the cantina would help us both," Cela says, "If you're willing to join me?"
—
The cantina is a bright light in Korriban's dusk, filled to the brim with the liveliness of the evening crowd. Cela's gaze passes across the room, recognizing the mechanics from the hangar; workers and archaeologists from the dig; and guards from the academy. The only person she doesn't recognize is the woman behind the bar, who stares at her in open shock before spinning quickly away to wipe down more glasses. Jaq leads her towards the booths lining the back wall, where the din of the cantina is quieter, sinking into the backdrop.
Cela stirs her drink idly, the ice within it long melted so that it no longer makes a sound. She doesn't remember what Jaq had gotten her—it doesn't sharpen the mind the way Jaq claims juma does, at least, she needs her wits about her—and it doesn't matter, as such trivialities are far from her mind right now. The soft light around the booth melts against Jaq's features, leaving a touch of gold upon him that softens his sharp smirks and scowls as he talks over the day's work at the hangar. His grey eyes shine amber, like setting suns through the haze of dusk, and a sigh escapes her as Jaq continues on, oblivious.
"So I looked into it," Jaq says, "And yeah, if it's going to take that long to go through official channels, we should keep the junk ship for now."
"And our rogue repair droid?" Cela asks, resting her cheek on her hand, only to be startled by a cold sensation as she nearly sticks the stirring spoon to her. Thankfully, Jaq doesn't notice, and Cela quickly sets the spoon on the table, a safe distance away. Surely she's stirred enough.
"I didn't catch its serial number, so I sent them all in for inspection," Jaq says. "Mechanics weren't happy with that, but we're past the busiest part of the month, anyway. It does mean I'll be working on the junk ship myself for the time being, but it's worth the trouble. With the way cargo ships only stop in periodically to deliver supplies, we could be left trapped here if any brave Jedi decide to ambush u…"
His gaze drifts over to hers, and he interrupts his words with a smirk.
"Oh, so it's the idea of us all dying gets you smiling, and not a single one of my jokes?" Jaq says. The smile on her lips surprises her, disappearing as soon as she notices it—but Jaq doesn't tease her further; his gaze only softens.
"No, it's just…" Cela hesitates, wondering if she might be saying too much, but that ease and lightness in her shoulders guides her to continue, "We're on Korriban, and yet it feels like we're together for one of our old missions. As though we could step out of here and be... anywhere."
"Yeah, I miss it too," Jaq says, and she notices then just how wistful she had sounded, for him to respond in the same way.
"Why don't you go back?" Cela asks; she's long been curious. "The work here is tedious and unchallenging; I see how this place stifles you. They would take you back, easily."
Jaq only shrugs, glancing down at the table.
"It just isn't the same without you," Jaq says. "I don't want to work with anyone else."
I came here for you, he'd said. A sentiment that would've sunk sweetly into her heart if it weren't for everything keeping her here. If he had hoped to convince her to return with him, he'd sought her out in vain.
"Don't think of me," Cela says, quietly. "I am glad for your company, but Korriban has a way of wearing its inhabitants down to shadows of themselves. I would not want to see that happen to you, when you could thrive somewhere else."
"Funny," Jaq says, "You took the words right out of my mouth."
Cela looks at him, and realizes what he's saying.
"Jaq—I can't leave," Cela says, stunned, and Jaq shrugs.
"Why not?"
"I'm the headmaster."
A couple heads turn from the tables beside them. Cela hushes herself a moment too late, but Jaq replies, unfazed.
"Last I checked, you have twelve replacements who'd happily kill to take your place," Jaq says. "Besides, once you leave, it's not your problem anymore."
She has long dreamed of throwing up her hands and telling the Masters to sort the academy's troubles out amongst themselves, rather than turn on her—but….
"I still have a duty to Revan," Cela says, quietly. "It's her wish that I remain here."
"Yeah, but Revan's not watching this place anymore, is she?" Jaq says, meeting her eye. "If she doesn't care about it, you shouldn't either."
It could all just... go away. Without explanation, without logic, she and Jaq could escape into the night, and leave the Masters to fight amongst themselves over the empty title she'd left behind come morning. No one would notify Revan of the change in command—and with Revan's frequent turning wheel of projects, it could be a year or more before her personal attention returned here.
"You could go anywhere," Jaq says. "An army's not the only place that could use a Dark Jedi like you."
"A rogue Jedi who had abandoned both sides would soon be found and dragged back," Cela points out. "If I am to walk free, I would never be able to use the Force again."
"Not necessarily," Jaq says, "You're a healer. People would be willing to cover for you."
In that one word, this hypothetical escape crashes back down to the earth. A bitter smile takes her lips, holding back more complicated emotions that she hasn't touched in years.
"I'm no healer," Cela says. "It was a pleasant thought exercise, Jaq, but my place is here."
"But why not? You heal me all the time," Jaq says. "Just do that for other people."
"It doesn't work like that. You're—different. A special case," Cela says, and Jaq chuckles, giving her an amused look.
"Alright, I know an excuse when I hear one," Jaq says. "I've never been a special case in a good way in my life. What's the real reason?"
"I'm serious!" Cela insists.
"Sounds like a Jedi lie to me," Jaq says, though his tone is teasing—and Cela's face warms, both out of indignance and what she's about to say.
"Force healing isn't like kolto," Cela says. "I can't use it whenever and however I want. I need to feel a certain kind of genuine emotion towards the receiver—emotion that I can no longer muster towards most people."
Cela watches for Jaq's response, and wonders if her burning face and beating heart might reveal to him the full implications of what she's just confessed, but Jaq's lips quirk to the side in confusion.
"What does that mean?" Jaq says. "Cela, can't you just drop the cryptic Jedi talk and tell me?"
She lets go of her breath in a frustrated sigh.
"No," Cela says adamantly, and turns away from him, taking a long drink from her glass. In their silence, the din of cantina roars back into her awareness, bringing her pieces of conversation that float past:
"—so I say to him, look, you find me another pair of power converters, and I'll—"
"—can't stand these Hssiss, we're running out of antidote packs—"
"—still making preparations, the Dark energy readings are overwhelming—"
A pair of archaeologists walk past their table, leaving Cela with that last shred of their conversation as they leave. Beside her, Jaq plays with the empty shot glass in his hand, muttering, "Something she feels towards me but no one else…."
"Jaq," Cela interrupts, too pulled by urgency to wonder what guesses are going through his head, "Those archaeologists. Do you know what site they're talking about?"
Jaq blinks, brought out of his subdued and thoughtful state.
"Oh—yeah, I've heard about it," Jaq says. "It's another tomb they've been digging out for weeks now. It's got some kind of strong stench around it. I say it's just the dead guy inside, but they say it's Dark energy, and they're making all these preparations and requests for it. I bet the forms are going to cross your datapad soon, if they haven't already."
Cela is on her feet before she fully registers her movement, and only glances back at Jaq when he calls her name, puzzled.
"It's getting late," Cela says, by way of explanation. "I'm returning to my quarters."
She doesn't address her abrupt action, or the way that this is hours before she would usually turn in; and thankfully, Jaq points neither out.
"Alright," Jaq says, "But you're not going to stay up all night working again, are you? Because you know those forms can wait."
There's that concern in his eyes again; now that Cela knows his sincerity, it's hard to push it away. Jaq is always looking out for her; he wouldn't want her to head into the tomb alone. Perhaps… she could tell him—
But as Cela looks at the lively flush in his cheeks, and the bright gold in his eyes, her uncertain words die in her throat. The Force is dangerous in her hands. She's only just opened her heart to him again; she fears what would happen if he walked in.
"I'm not," Cela lies. "Good night, Jaq. Take your time without me."
—
When Jaq leaves the cantina at last, the sky is long dark, and only a couple stragglers remain inside, their silhouettes hazy in the dimly lit windows. He hadn't meant to stay so long, but something about a lively room leaves just enough space for his thoughts, and he'd had many to sort through.
His hand has gone absentmindedly to his temple, touching the very spot Cela had healed just days earlier. Jaq pulls his hand back to his side, curling his fingers closed. He has all the pieces to understand what she'd said. Healing is an ability of the Light side—she'd told him this—and he's seen the Light. It had left him shivering, drowned in the vastness of it, haunted by the way the world looked through the eyes of the other side. But… he had felt none of that at Cela's hands. What she'd shown him was anything but grand and unknowable, it was... familiar. It was as if she'd known he was afraid to see the Force again, and had eased it for him.
Gratitude curls up in his chest, but guilt is there to meet it. She hadn't known. And it's precisely because he's kept all these secrets that Cela—Cela, who faces all challenges with a cold determination and set shoulders—had broken down and cried in front of that wreck of a ship, not from the pressures of Korriban, but from a fear of him. A chill grips his heart at the memory; he never wants to see that look on her face again. He had always thought that she walked beside him knowing the way in which she marked his limits. Anyone, but her. No one, but her.
But that small, troublesome voice in the back of his head pipes up: he has never wanted to let Cela to know just how far he'd go for her. He's had his moments of self-justification—it's more noble, isn't it, to serve her quietly from the shadows—but he's long known that his reluctance is due to pure cowardice, tied up in that itchy sense of self-preservation that's kept him alive all these years. Even that glimpse he had shown her of his uncovered heart had taken all his willpower to hold open. And Cela… and Cela….
Cela had given it back to him. His affection, still wrapped within his fear and his guilt. The Light, tamed to fit into the palm of her hand. He's back at the start: an emotion that she feels for him, but no one else. He's close, but he's afraid. Because if he wants it, then all these tricks and shadows and lies he's built up around himself have to go, to leave room for her.
"Easier said than done," Jaq says to himself, then pauses, looking up. "Wait, where the hell am I?"
He'd been heading towards the hangar, but a glance around shows him that he's wandered onto a dig site, his boots upon the gradient of a shadow cast by an entrance dug into the cliff face, within which lies a path that only seems to slope down. Jaq looks cautiously in, reaching a hand out to the side of the entrance to support his lean in, but the moment he makes contact, an overwhelming wave of emotion hits him: urgency, wrongness, danger.
"Cela," Jaq says, because his responding pull of protectiveness would emerge for no one but her, "You didn't go back to your quarters, did you?"
Sparing only a second for a steadying breath, he heads in after her.
—
Jaq knows he's entered the tomb proper when the dug-out soil of the cave fades into tiles of dusty ceramic, which run alongside carved reliefs that line the wall and stretch into the shadows ahead. It takes a moment for Jaq's eyes to make out the entrance to an interior chamber ahead; the workers had installed lights in the cave, running wires down from the surface, but none hang here. He runs a hand along the wall, following the lines of ceramic down the path, and that feeling of foreboding crawls up his fingers once more.
There's just enough light to guide him into the chamber—into the empty chamber. For a brief moment, Jaq's heart drops, but he's heard stories about these tombs: about the ones that torture their trespassers, and the ones that don't want to be entered. Surely this is one of the latter; and surely Cela had left her touch here, had marked the way ahead, even though she had been foolish enough to go on her own.
A thought bothers him, nudging at the back of his mind—what is she looking for in a place like this?—but Jaq waves it away. He needs all his focus to make out the reliefs on the walls in this terrible, dim light, and that foreboding is still—
That foreboding is still guiding him. His eye catches on some text on the wall, probably some sort of ancient Sith riddle, but he doesn't need to play their games when he has her. Jaq places his hand on the wall once more, closes his eyes as he's seen Cela do for her use of the Force so many times, and holds still as that danger, alarm, fear crashes over him, sending spikes up beneath his skin. She's so close, he can almost feel it—
—And a low, grinding sound comes into his awareness. Jaq opens his eyes to see a carving in the wall, a piece of which has been depressed by a push of his fingertip—a hidden switch. With a step back, it's released, and the wall that had pretended to be a dead end before begins to pull away from the ceiling, sinking into the floor. Jaq grins to himself in relief, but relief soon becomes confusion as the light in the room begins to fade, cut by a rising line of shadow cast along the falling wall. He turns back in time to see the last gap of light between the chamber and the hall outside disappear into the ceiling, as a second wall slides into place.
Of course: a trade. With these people, there's no give without take. Jaq shakes the residual shiver off his shoulders. Whatever—he doesn't need that door open anyway, not until he finds Cela. But... that feeling he's been following is gone.
Thoughtlessly, Jaq clutches at his heart, as though emotion were a physical item that could be lost then found, but it's vanished. That can't be right. Jaq doesn't know much about the Force, but he doesn't think it works like this. He can't run out of awareness. That'd just be stupid.
A nervousness tugs at his lips, a reassuring smile that has no one to see it, alone and sunken into darkness as he is. Cela's here… right? Unless he'd just imagined it. Unless he'd just been tricked. It wouldn't be the first time, but it hurts more now, now that he's walked into it. Something gives in Jaq’s chest, and when he sways slightly, finding a wall behind him when he takes a step back to steady himself, he just lets himself slump against it. What is he doing? Assuming that Cela's here, based on one bad feeling? Assuming that Cela needs him, when he'd been left behind?
Take a hint, Jaq. Cela knew what she was doing when she left him for Korriban. She'd seen enough in their time together to see through him, to all the ways in which he's weak. And she'd been right: when he'd seen that Light without her there to make sense of it—without her there to prevent him from ever seeing it at all—he'd ran, afraid, in the direction of the closest safety he knows. He'd told her he was here for her, but the truth is in a twist of the words.
A ragged breath escapes his lips, and horrified, he clamps a hand over it, silencing himself. This tomb is mired in Dark energy, whatever that is, but like the others scattered in the valley, it could hold all manner of creature inside, from a common mynock to a wandering Hssiss. Jaq doesn't have any antidote packs on him; for all the supposed precautions that line his jacket, he'd rushed in after all.
Then he hears a shuffle of fabric against the floor... a step of a boot. When a light shines through the darkness, in the familiar vivid red of a Sith lightsaber, all Jaq can feel is relief.
"Cela," Jaq says, quickly wiping the dampness from his eyes, "You're alright."
"Yes, but are you?" Cela asks. The light rises to illuminate half of her face—oh, how he's missed that half of her face—and she extends a hand to him, helping him up. "You look shaken."
"You know me. I'm fine," Jaq says, though the quick grin on his face has never felt more like a lie. "What are you doing here? I felt—I mean, I thought, that you were in danger."
"Ever vigilant," Cela comments, with a small, fond smile that lifts his previously leaden heart. "There is no more danger here than there is in one's mind. This is a proving grounds, of sorts. I came here to conquer my doubts."
Cela holds her lightsaber aloft before them, revealing their surroundings in its red glow. Rather than a wider version of that chamber he'd stood in, what lies before them is some kind of underground arena, with stands that stretch out to either side, circling a pit in the center. Jaq steps forward for a better look, doubting his eyes; he's sure he would've seen hints of a structure this grand before that wall sealed the way behind him. But all thought escapes him when Cela places her hand on his shoulder and draws in close, the fabric of her robes moving in a whisper against his back.
"I'm glad you're here," Cela confesses. "I was waiting for you to follow me."
"Well—you could say something next time," Jaq says, turning to her, but Cela rests her head against his other shoulder, and her hand moves into a loose embrace across his chest, holding him; he stills against her softness.
"Do you truly not know what I was trying to tell you?" Cela asks, softly. "In the cantina."
Her breath ghosts past the shell of his ear, a kiss of warmth against the cold; he holds back a shiver.
"I think I do," Jaq admits.
"Then what will you tell me in return?" Cela asks. "A confession for a confession."
But an unease crawls up his neck, and he has the distinct sense that they should get out of here.
"Look, Cela, I feel the same way," Jaq says, "And I'll say it, properly, as many times as you want, but—can we leave this place? It's giving me the creeps."
He still has too much to tell her, too much that might change her mind, and he'd rather not rush it here and now, not inside this tomb. But Cela laughs, low and drawn out, tipping her forehead against his shoulder. Jaq wonders if the bartender had gotten her drink wrong, if Cela weren't drunk after all, but when he turns to face her, her eyes are dark and unreadable in the lightsaber light, and hold no amusement anymore.
"Not that confession," Cela says. "The other that you owe me."
"What are you talking about?" Jaq is aware of now of another, building nervousness under his skin, layered upon the unease; different from what he'd followed for Cela, it's a portent for himself. "You know, relationships are built on—"
"Relationships are built on respect," Cela interrupts him, and takes a step forward; with her lightsaber drawn before her, all he can do is step back, startled, dropping down a stone step. "A respect you refuse to show me when you continue to hide the truth from me."
"Uh—Cela, I—" Another step, and another, steadily pushing him away from the entrance. "I'm lost. Help me out here. What—what truth are you talking about? Because I—"
"This is about the Jedi," Cela says, low and serious. "I know all about your last interrogation assignment. I know how you almost left."
Speechless, his veins run cold, and he stumbles down the last step, backing away until the arch of his boot rocks over the edge that separates the stands from the pit below. For a split second, his balance is gone, until Cela reaches out and grabs a fistful of his collar.
"You ran to me like a coward," Cela says, coldly. "You think I can't see the way you cling to me? How you hope to use me? Not just as a distraction from the spark of the Force that lies in your heart, but as something more?"
"That's not true," Jaq says, desperate even to his own ears, but Cela only holds him further out from the edge.
"Be honest with yourself, Jaq, in a way you have never been with me," Cela says. "What else did you seek of me?"
"I…" His voice fails him, breaking upon his words, "I wanted it to be you. If anyone was going to train me... I wanted it to be you."
"Finally," Cela says, with a cold satisfaction, but Jaq can't stop looking for the warmth in her eyes.
"But I didn't come here to use you," Jaq says, his words as rushed as a plea, "I came here because I couldn't leave you behind. They're destroying you here, you know that—"
"And a coward that can't even bear the Force can save me?" Cela asks.
"I can bear it now," Jaq says. "I can bear it, if it's you."
"Then prove it," Cela says, and in an uncurling of her fingers, lets him go.
Weightlessness is followed by impact far too soon, and he groans in pain, finding himself upon the dusty floor of the pit. Cela's figure swims in his hazy vision as she looks down at him from above, and he watches as she deactivates her lightsaber and tosses it over the edge after him; it strikes the dirt next to his hip.
"Pick it up," she commands. "Stand and face your opponent."
"You're crazy," Jaq says, pushing himself off the ground with a wince. "I don't care what's going through your head—I'm not going to fight you."
But Cela ignores his words, folding her hands behind her back, and looking out into the area behind him. Jaq realizes that there's more than one red glow illuminating the place—and there has been, for some time.
"You must take his place," Cela says. "There is only the Dark side, or death."
Jaq feels like a mind trapped as his body moves for him, turning to face the figure behind him. Twin lightsabers rise to reveal their wielder: his own corpse, staring back at him.
—
Revan's reinforcements are late, and with their forces struggling, the Mandalorians may yet turn the tide of battle. Cela knows she must give the order—and Jaq, beside her, gives her a solemn nod, prepared for the sacrifice—but she isn't. Somehow, Jaq wears the robes of a Jedi; somehow, his heart beats next to hers; and she would trade the galaxy to spare herself from feeling not only her wound created anew, but the agony of the Mass Shadow Generator tearing through him, tearing through her.
"I can't," Cela says, betraying the Light for her attachment to him, betraying the Dark for her unwillingness to complete the test. "I can't do it."
"And the sacrifices you've made to stand here?" Jaq says. "Your kyber, your family, your Order. What are they worth if you don't commit to your path?"
"It's not the same," Cela says. "I haven't lost you yet."
"You will," Jaq says, his eyes cold and unkind, "When I see you for what you are. When that time comes, do you want to face me with the Force, or without it?"
"You..." Care about me, she wants to say, but the words catch in her throat, "You'll understand."
Jaq sneers, cruel.
"And I joined Revan for my generous sense of understanding, did I? You're a Jedi, Cela. You'll always be one of them, looking down on the rest of us. Even if you spare me now, one betrayal is all that stands between my blade and your throat."
Jaq advances, and Cela steps back, maintaining a buffer of distance between them.
"Will you walk away from here with the power to keep up your act—or will you show me what you really are?" Jaq says, low and mocking. "Lost, and broken. Worthless without the Force."
Cela's back hits one of the consoles on the bridge, having backed away as far as she can, and yet Jaq still advances, gripping her jaw in his hand, twisting her face up to look at him.
"Love is fleeting," Jaq says. "There is only the Dark side, or death."
Jaq's eyes are on hers, their grey as opaque and uncaring as the sharp edge of a vibroblade, and Cela shuts her eyes, no longer able to stand his gaze.
Power is what kept her going, but in that time when she had believed that she stood alone on Korriban, lost in a sea of hostility, what use was her power then? Cela had never felt more unlike herself—and until she had healed Jaq of his injury, she'd forgotten what she'd once held in her heart.
And yet Cela cannot fathom turning away. She's never known how one could bear it: to hear the Force and never be able to grasp it again; to feel like this, forever.
But before she can voice anything, Jaq's cruel touch is pulled away. A sensation of falling lifts her heart to her throat, and a gloved hand grips hers, pulling her through—and Cela's eyes fly open, seeing not the bridge or the stormy skies of Malachor, but the mundane and familiar interior of the headmaster's ship, the one that she and Jaq had left in flames on that pale speck of a planet.
Her hand is still held, tight, and her gaze trails up her rescuer's arm, to the shoulders of a familiar jacket. Jaq's back is turned to her as he scrolls quickly through the screens at the pilot's seat, and scenes fly past in the front viewport: sandy dunes, barren land, a cantina interior, a forest floor.
"Jaq?" Cela says, and hears in her voice a trembling, fearful shadow of herself; with a breath to gather herself, she tries again, firmer. "Jaq, what is this?"
"Hold on," Jaq says, "I'll find it—any moment now."
"Find what?" Cela says, pulling away. "If this is another trial, I—"
But when Jaq turns at last to face her, his eyes hold none of the cruelty of the tomb’s trials, bearing only concern and warmth—he’s real. With a shaky breath, relief drives her forward, and Cela finds herself throwing her arms around him, pressing herself to his chest.
"Wow, you're really glad to see me, huh?" Jaq sounds relieved, relaxing and wrapping an arm around her in return. "For a moment there, I thought I'd never find you."
"Wait," Cela says, pulling away to look at him, "How did you find me? How are you here?"
"It's a long story," Jaq says. "You know, I almost got fooled by this other version of you, but then I saw myself, and—well, you have no idea how many places I waded through to find you."
"You're navigating inside this place," Cela says, disbelievingly. "But you shouldn't have been let in. These trials, the Force, it…"
"I guess now is as good a time as any," Jaq says, and with a hollow smile he shrugs and says, "I'm Force sensitive."
"What?" Cela says, faintly, pulling away from his grasp, but Jaq steps forward to meet her step back, reaching out to her.
"No, I know," Jaq says. "That's what I thought, too, but Cela, it's okay—"
"What part of this is okay?" Cela says, pushing his hand aside. "What possessed you to follow me? You should have stayed where I left you—far away from this place!"
Cela regrets her words when hurt flashes in Jaq's eyes, but his determination soon replaces it.
"I heard you," Jaq says. "You were calling for me—I didn't imagine that."
"You fell for a trap. You shouldn't have listened," Cela says, even though she knows he's telling the truth—the truth, for once, she doesn't want to hear. "I was fine where I was. I was in control. I always am."
"Then you have a funny way of showing it," Jaq says, sarcasm coloring his words. "Were you fine when you panicked at me rounding up hopefuls for you, trying to help you? Were you in control when you crushed that creature guarding the ship?"
Cela opens her mouth to answer, when the ship trembles, and she looks up quickly, eyes wide and afraid to find Malachor in the viewport again. Nothing fills it but dark, vast space; and when her attention returns to him, all the harshness in Jaq's demeanor is gone, leaving only the hurt beneath.
"Cela," Jaq says, "Please—I know something's happening to you. I thought it was just stress, but—whatever it was that overcame you, whatever it is that you're scared of—that's why you're here, isn't it?
"If you just tell me what's happening, maybe I can help," Jaq says. "Maybe this touch of the Force inside me can be good for something for once. Whatever you need of me, if you show me, I can—"
"You can't. I can't let you help me," Cela says, pulling away from him before he can take her shoulders in his hands, blanket her in more frustratingly gentle words. Though the Force can't be manipulated here, she pulls something like it to her hands to hold him apart from her, fearing that her resolve will break—and the ship shudders in response, protesting the barrier, but Cela ignores it, her voice strengthening in conviction.
"This isn't some monster we can kill, some night terror. This is the Force itself," Cela says. "After Malachor V, they called us all ghosts for witnessing so much death that day, but I was one who felt it. I held a tie to every last Jedi, every last sacrifice, and I felt their deaths scream across the Force, magnified tenfold in the intimacy of my mind.”
"I couldn't bear it,” she confesses. “I couldn't listen anymore. I cut them all from me, severed every last tie, including mine to the Force. But the Force must run through all living things, and the price I pay to live is to steal what shreds of it I can from others. I drained it from every Jedi we hunted, every doomed hopeful you brought to me, and now—"
She laughs, helpless.
"Now I can hurt you in the same way," Cela says. "You've seen the kind of death I deal; it had disturbed you. Aren't you afraid?"
She expects Jaq to look upon her as what she is: a shambling disaster, a tragedy past its ending. The metal of the ship around them strains, and the stars in the viewport begin to melt and marble into space, becoming the lightning of Malachor V once more—and yet, when Cela raises her gaze to Jaq's at last, the look in his eyes is fierce and determined, centered only on her.
"I’m not," Jaq says, “But you are. You’re just trying to scare me away.“
"Jaq," Cela says, despairing, "You don't understand—"
"Maybe I don't," Jaq says. "Not yet. I haven't known all this as long as you have. But there's something that you don't understand either."
Somehow, that not-quite-Force begins to slip from her fingers, the barrier between them buckling.
"Because I remember Malachor, too," Jaq says. "I remember all the anger and hatred I felt as the war was dragged out for nine long years, because the Jedi council refused to join it. I remember feeling that for so long that every other emotion in me grew dull. But you were part of what woke me up again, Cela; you were why I stayed. I've been afraid of the Force for so long—Light, Dark, it didn't matter—but you showed me another way."
The barrier is gone now; Jaq could approach, but he doesn't, leaving the space between them merely empty. Outside, the stars have become not the surface of Malachor V, but coalesced into plain sunlight; the ship, having accomplished its task, simply disappears from memory. All that remains is a tree, a wall, and a field of green, familiar to Dantooine. Light passes through the canopy above, falling dappled upon her shoulders, and unlike the memories the tomb has shown her, this one holds nothing but calm.
Cela runs her fingers through the sunlight, watching the flickers of gold play across them. Jaq, who despite taking her here, seems completely new to their surroundings, looks around with some confusion.
"The wall, it just… fades away," Jaq says. "I know none of this is meant to be real, but…."
"It's all I remember of home," Cela explains. "From before I joined the Jedi."
"Oh," he says, changing his tone in that single word; Cela gives a slight smile.
"It's alright," Cela says. "I'm told my family was proud to let me go. I was proud, too, of all the things I'd been told I could learn to do…."
A leaf flutters in the breeze on one of the branches above, and drops, spiraling into a chaotic fall. Cela holds out her hand, and though its path appears unpredictable, it lands perfectly into her palm.
"The world felt different then," Cela says. "Unknown, but knowable. Vast, but finite. The whole world is simple when you heal; there's nothing else to pour your love into but the wound before you."
This time, she doesn't pull away when Jaq steps forward to close the distance between them. His hand finds the curve of her face; his thumb is gentle as he brushes her cheek, and she realizes that, at some point, a tear had fallen there, betraying her.
"Can you show me how?" Jaq asks.
"So you can heal the wound in me?" Cela says, with a weak laugh. "It's futile. You could keep trying for years upon years, an eternity, and never make a mark."
"That's alright," Jaq says, "I've got nowhere else to put my love. The Sith Lord it belongs to doesn't want it."
"I'm no Sith Lord after this," Cela says; though no one else need know about the tomb and its test, she'll forever know she failed it. "And… you don't know that."
"I don't?" Jaq says. "Does that mean you'll come back with me, now?"
Cela lifts her gaze to his.
"I will, but... do you understand what you're asking?" Cela says, stilling his hand. "If we're to love each other, we'll inevitably form a Force bond. You'll be able to feel my pain, my sadness—"
"—And your love, and your relief," Jaq says. "And the same goes the other way around; I know. I remember my training. I always thought a bond like that would weaken me, but now it sounds like what we already have."
"But it's stronger," Cela says. "Unbreakable, unless one of us dies, or wounds ourselves to sever it."
Rather than match her seriousness, Jaq only smiles, and the fluttery, warm thread laced through the tangle of his emotions reveals the love beneath.
"Cela," Jaq says teasingly, "Are you proposing to me?"
Her words play back in her head, her face burning with warmth—but her response is cut short. Dantooine is fading: the tree bark has grown stony and jagged, the land barren, and the wall translucent, a window back into the trial she’d left behind. Cela pulls Jaq close to her.
"We can't dwell here any longer," Cela says. "You've shown me a way out; now take it."
It's no different from waking from a dream. Cela's eyes open to the ancient, dusty tomb floor she had fallen upon, and Jaq, slumped over her previously limp body, begins to rouse as well. His eyes catch hers, and she's pulled forward.
"Cela," Jaq breathes in relief, pulling her into a crushing hug. It's uncomfortable yet calming at the same time; his heartbeat is strong against hers, reminding her that she's still alive. When the embrace relaxes, it's only so Jaq can pull away slightly to look into her eyes. "No more creepy Sith tombs, please—at least not without me."
"Y—yes," Cela says, and it's only now that she's experiencing the real thing that she realizes how muted Jaq's touch was in the tomb's illusions. Had he always been so warm? And had she really said all those things—been so honest with him... shown him the parts of herself she'd long sought to hide?
Somehow, Jaq seems to know exactly what's running through her mind.
"I guess they're not all bad, though," Jaq says. "I finally know how you feel about me."
The look on Jaq's face is smug, satisfied—but just a touch uncertain, as though a trace of doubt lingers that their earlier conversation had ever happened at all. Cela could deny it now, put him back at an arm's distance—but after all the pain it took to get here, there's something freeing in pure honesty.
"You do," Cela admits, and for all her embarrassment and flushed cheeks, finds it the easiest thing in the galaxy to say, "I love you."
It's one thing to know, and another to hear it outright: Jaq turns red, as well.
"R—right," Jaq says, and clears his throat awkwardly. "And the bond, well… I think you know what my answer is."
A warmth glows in Cela’s heart, and she takes his hand, interlacing their fingers.
"I do," Cela says, "Though I wouldn't mind hearing it."
"I'll spill everything once we get out of here," Jaq says. "We've had a long enough heart to heart in some dead Sith’s resting place."
Cela laughs, and with that, they leave.
—
"So, Nar Shaddaa?" Jaq asks.
"Nar shaddaa," Cela confirms. "It will be easier to hide you there than on Korriban."
"I'm sorry," Jaq says, and Cela wonders what the apology is for when she's already come to realize that she has only ever suffered through this place, but he continues, "I know what you gave for your place here."
That, out of everything, is what constricts her throat, with something not unlike sorrow cinching it shut. She grips the sill of the ship’s viewport; the pressure against her fingertips grounds her.
She looks out across the cracked and barren land, to the academy, standing high on its cliff, a lofty structure that well represents its place in Revan's army. It had seemed so crucial and all-encompassing, holding all the crushing weight of Revan's influence… and yet now that she's prepared to leave, it appears small.
"It's alright," Cela says at last, turning away from the sight. "It never suited me."
#sovo writes#*locks jaq in a dark room and makes him confront himself*#cela: i *could* ask for help... OR i could keep hiding what's wrong with me#cela: i'm dropping subtle hints that i love him | cela to jaq: stop helping me. leave me alone
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