Chapter Text
18 BBY, Winter
The snow storm tore through the city and there was nothing she could do about it. All she could do was sit in her furs and sit in front of the fire in their room.
But not him. He was downstairs. Talking. So after a while, she went down too. But he ignored her and continued to play dominos with the receptionist. So she ignored him, and went looking at the reception, even though he had already told her that there was some “heat” on them (she wasn’t sure what that meant, but it sounded like someone knew they were stealing), and they had to lie low for a while.
All she found was a tiny wood carving of a loth-cat under the chair. It didn’t look like it was worth anything. She hid it from the receptionist and took it anyway. Not that she needed to. That receptionist couldn’t stop talking to Luthen.
“Was a big argument. That one fella kept saying it was wrong. So he stayed back and didn’t help.”
“Coward.”
So forceful that Kleya stopped playing with the loth-cat toy to look at Luthen.
The receptionist shrugged.
“Anyways. Never saw him again. Now that gang’s down to six. Not that I can say nothing. Business’s bad after the war.”
“Six? That’s a big group.”
“Yeah. Heard’s they been out. Digging. Don’t know. We ain’t allowed near. Heard they might be digging for…”
The receptionist made the sign of some God and whispered.
“Bodies.”
And that was that.
-
Later, in the dining room, when the six men entered.
“Imperials.”
Of course he would know. He was one of them too.
-
He followed them the next time the hailstones stopped and the sun came out. The receptionist wondered if the storm had ended. But she had seen storms with him and she knew better. Until they had one full day of sunshine, the hailstones would come back the next morning.
They stopped by the edge of a burned down place. There was some sort of dig site. The group of Imperials from the inn were there. Some of them were sticking heaters into the ground to melt the ice. Others were digging up things and piling them into an old shed. Chains, helmets, and things like that.
They were stealing.
“Hey! You! Back off!”
He held his hands up and backed away. She wasn’t like him. She didn’t want to walk away. But she had no choice.
“Massacre the city…loot what’s left…”
She didn’t know what all that meant. But she did know he looked very angry. And that made her scared.
-
The receptionist found some grog for dinner. He said no, but the Imperials didn’t, and so they were blind drunk by the time it was night, singing just about every song she knew (and some she didn’t).
He continued to watch them from across the dining room. She thought maybe he wanted some of their grog after all. But she wasn’t going to fetch it for him. He would have to get it himself. Except that when she looked at him, he didn’t look like the old days, when all he did was drink all night. Now, it looked as if he was thinking very very hard.
One of the Imperials tripped over a piano chair. Luthen stood. Now he didn’t look like he was thinking. Now he looked a little nervous.
Strange.
But she was wrong. Cause now Luthen was all over the drunk Imperial, pulling him up and holding out a chair for him.
“T…Thanksh.”
She could see his smile from across the room.
“Don’t mention it.”
-
“Watch.”
She sank into her furs. Night time and cold. But he said they were going to steal again. And he couldn’t do it in the day. Not when he was breaking into the Imperial’s shed at the dig site. And not when he was using the key he stole from the drunk Imperial a few hours before.
“Kleya.”
She scrambled towards the open window and held out her arms. A necklace landed in the snow. Then a helmet. An old tablet. A mask. Coins.
“Careful. The tablet’s very old.”
She was careful. But they had to hurry, and she ended up stuffing all of them into her bag. She will scratch the tablet, and he will tell her, quite crossly, that that had cut its price by half, and she will tell him quite crossly, that he shouldn’t have thrown it in the snow in the first place.
But now, he was out the shed, and he had taken the bag from her. She saw that he had left the window open. The lock now looked broken when it didn’t look broken before. And there were a few heaters sticking out too.
“You forgot to close the window.”
“Leave it.”
Snow was already falling. It would cover their tracks by morning.
-
“Why did you do it?”
The snow crunched beneath their feet as they left the village the next morning. He wasn’t looking at her again.
“It was the right thing to do.”
She thought for a little. That seemed like the right answer. He didn’t do it for her home or for her parents. That would be too much. Like he was doing it for her. And she didn’t want that. Ever.
But saying it was the right thing to do. That was easy. Now she could say what she wanted to say too.
“I want to do it again.”
When his pledge came, it wasn’t a full bloodied roar, but a low, soft grunt.
“I’ll think about it.”