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Jedi training often left Ezra tired, and normally he found himself heading to bed not too long after dinner, but sleep seemed to elude him that night. The Ghost was on some random planet in the outer rim where the crew was just laying low for a while, and they weren’t in any danger as they were far enough from any civilisation that they wouldn’t be discovered. Ezra found he just couldn’t sleep well anymore. Whether it was being away from Lothal for the longest time in his life, or something else that kept prodding at the back of his mind, Ezra would find himself staring at the ceiling above his bunk listening to Zeb snore until he was so exhausted that he just passed out and slept until Hera woke him up for breakfast.
It wasn’t healthy, the young Jedi knew that, but he had no idea what was wrong and couldn’t even begin to figure out how to fix it. Sometimes, when he knew everyone was asleep, he would go for a stroll around the ship or hide in the cargo hold with the old video game handset he and Sabine had repaired. It kept him occupied enough to stop his mind from wandering to places he really wished it wouldn’t.
It might have been his overactive mind that was keeping him awake. What if s constantly littered Ezra’s thoughts. What if someone was hurt on a mission? What if the Ghost gets captured? What if the Inquisitors found them? What if one of his teammates died ? He hated the thoughts, preferring to shove them all away as best as he could, but the nagging feeling of dread was always there, loitering in the back of his mind waiting to slap him in the face with an I-told-you-so the moment one of the scenarios came true. Kanan had taught Ezra to release his emotions into the Force, allowing it to help soothe his anxieties or fears.
A light prod came from the other side of the bond Ezra shared with Kanan, snapping the teenager’s eyes open. It was a silent question, one laced with concern, “are you alright?” Ezra sighed and sent back his own response, one admitting his restlessness and inability to fall asleep. He didn’t bother to hide his emotions from his Master; Kanan could read him too well even without their bond.
“Would you like to come and join me?”
Kanan’s offer was full of understanding and comfort, as clear as if he was standing there in Ezra’s room with his arms open wide for his padawan to accept. Ezra jumped down from his bunk with silent grace and all but ran to the next cabin, pausing for just a second to at least try and compose himself.
Like he did all of the crew, Ezra loved Kanan. He was his Master, he had taken Ezra in when no one else would, and he had become a second father over the year they had known one another. When Kanan was rescued from the Empire, just before they met Fulcrum, Ezra hadn’t left his Master’s side as he recovered. Hera had photographic evidence of the teenager curled up on Kanan’s bed in the medical centre, an arm wrapped tightly around his padawan with the young boy’s head on his chest as he peppered kisses on the blue hair, crying about how much he had missed him and how scared he had been that he would never see Ezra again. Since then the two were almost inseparable, and Kanan was a lot more affectionate than he had been before he was taken. Ezra called Kanan “Dad” when it was just the two of them.
Ezra knocked on the door lightly, not that he needed to, and Kanan sent a soft word through their bond saying he could enter. The teenager pressed the button on the panel next to the door and it whooshed open, revealing Kanan sat upon his bed, a datapad in his hand and a blanket draped over his lap. He had let his hair down and had changed into sleep clothes, and seemed more relaxed than Ezra had ever seen before. Kanan looked up from the datapad, placed the device on the small table nearby, and opened his arms wide. Ezra all but pounced into his Master’s lap.
The padawan threw his arms around Kanan’s middle and buried his head in the soft shirt. A hand stroked through his hair and held him tightly, kisses being pressed to his temples.
“What’s on your mind, kid?” Kanan asked him.
“I don’t know,” Ezra admitted, one of his hands fiddling with the ends of Kanan’s hair, “I just can’t seem to fall asleep.”
“Why don’t I go and make us some hot chocolate whilst you get comfortable here?” Kanan suggested. Ezra nodded and shifted from his master’s lap, allowing the Jedi to gently get up from the bunk. As soon as Kanan had left the room, Ezra jumped down from the bed and pulled open one of the draws below. It was just a small draw and it only had one item inside; a heavy looking dark piece of folded fabric. Ezra quickly grabbed the fabric and unfolded it, revealing a long cloak with a hood. Lightly kicking the draw closed, Ezra wrapped himself up in the cloak and slipped his arms through the sleeves. It was still a little bit too long in the sleeves, but it was warm and familiar, and perfect.
Ezra jumped back onto the bed just as the door swished open again and Kanan walked in with two steaming mugs. He clocked his padawan curled up on the bunk in his old Jedi cloak and just raised an eyebrow, smirking. He walked over and perched himself next to Ezra, handing one of the mugs over to the pile that the too-long cloak had formed around the teenager.
“I added some cinnamon on top,” Kanan told him, taking a sip from the warm mug. Ezra grinned like a five-year-old, taking a large gulp of the hot drink before his master could stop him. “I worry about you sometimes…”
“Only sometimes?” Ezra remarked with a smirk of his own. A comfortable silence fell over the pair, feelings flicking back and forth across their bond.
Ezra spoke up once his mug was almost empty. “Dad…” he began, making sure he had Kanan’s attention, “do you think we’re ever gonna go back to Lothal?” Kanan’s eyes grew sad, his mind growing sombre despite the soft smile he still had on his lips. He reached out to put his own mug down next to the datapad on the table, and without moving his eyes from Kanan, Ezra placed his own mug on the floor near the bunk
“Only Ahtohallan knows,” Kanan replied, words quiet yet heavy. You didn’t need a training bond to feel the confusion Ezra was radiating, his head tilting like a loth-cat staring quizzically at a passerby. Kanan let out a small sigh. “When I was a Padawan,” he explained, “my master would sing a special song about a river called Ahtohallan,” the crack in his voice when he mentioned his fallen master made tears well up, but Kanan blinked them away as quickly as he could. The memories that flashed in his mind were ones he wanted to hold tightly, “it’s a Jedi legend; the river was said to hold all the answers about the past. About what we are a part of. It would be passed down from Master to Padawan in every lineage.”
“How does it go?” Ezra asked. The smile came back to Kanan’s lips. He wasn’t about to deny his Padawan his right to know the legend
“... Okay,” Kanan shuffled on the bed, scooting up to lean back against his pillow as he had been when Ezra first came to his cabin that night, “as my master used to say, ‘cuddle close!’” Ezra scrambled to sit pressed up against Kanan’s side, his Master’s arm coming to wrap around his shoulders whilst pulling the blanket up over them. Once they were both settled, curled up together on the bunk, Kanan began.
“ Where the north wind meets the sea, there’s a river full of memory, ” he sang, the words coming to him with ease as he recalled the countless times Master Billaba had sung the exact melody to him. He reached his hand up to brush stray strands of hair from Ezra’s face, fingers lightly tracing the parallel scars that had been left on his cheek by the Grand Inquisitor. He ran his pinky finger down his padawan’s nose in soft motions, gently coaxing Ezra into closing his eyes. Ezra yawned and curled up closer, “ sleep, my darling, safe and sound for in this river all is found. ”
Years earlier, Caleb Dume had been in the exact same position: curled up next to his master’s side as Master Billaba gently traced her pinky finger down his nose, the ancient song a gentle lullaby whilst the war raged on throughout the Galaxy. In escaping the rain on a particularly stormy planet, Caleb and his master’s battalion had taken shelter in a cave. It was dark, even with the fire that Grey and Styles had made, and the thunder was loud, but Caleb found comfort in his Master’s arms as she sang the beautiful words.
“ In her waters, deep and true, lay the answers and a path for you, ” Master Billaba continued, reaching to gently brush her padawan’s braid back behind his ear. It was crooked and his hair was a mess, but they could worry about that in the morning. For now, she would soothe her youngling’s worries with soft words and a calming tone, ignoring the fond smiles her soldiers sent their way. Caleb was her only focus that evening, “dive down deep into her sound, but not too far of you’ll be drowned.”
Master Billaba hadn’t created the gentle motion of running a pinky finger down one's nose. No, she had learnt that action from her own master after many nights spent struggling to adjust to the changes brought on when she became a padawan. Young Depa had found herself curled up in Master Windu’s arms as he rocked her slowly, calming the anxieties she felt from the sudden change. Moving from the clans to a shared quarters with one’s master was a difficult period all padawans went through, but Depa felt at ease when she knew that Master Windu would always be there to help her through the rough nights.
“Yes, she will sing to those who’ll hear, and in her wong, all magic flows,” a light brush down the nose with his pinky finger seemed to send Depa right back to sleep, as Master Windu had discovered after many restless nights. Not that he minded sitting up with her, their bond strengthening with every nightmare chased away and every moment spent by each other’s side, “but can you brave what you most fear? Can you face what the river knows?”
The Legend of Ahtohallan was not a story Ezra would ever get to tell to a Padawan of his own, but many decades later when he was much older and wiser, he would find himself with a lap full of a ten-year-old boy with bright green hair and his father’s teal eyes. He would copy his adoptive father’s actions and slowly coax Jacen back to sleep, the words coming back to him as if Kanan had taught them to Ezra just yesterday. “Where the north wind meets the sea, there’s a mother full of memory,” he sang, even though Jacen had already fallen asleep in his arms. Hugging the little one tightly, it almost felt as if another presence enveloped them both, a familiar one Ezra thought he would never feel again, “come my darling, homeward bound, when all is lost, then all is found.”